New NES game

soiaf

I've written a new game for the NES and was wondering if anyone here would be interested.
The game is called Dúshlán and you can download it from my GitHub page here:

https://github.com/soiaf/Dushlan

The actual game file is dushlan.nes

The game is a take on Tetris, but I've added some extra challenges to the usual game.
While I don't think its going to set the world on fire, I think it's fun
I've released all the code etc. so hopefully anyone else interested in programming for the NES may find something useful.

I'm not sure what system I'm going to try coding on next, possibly the GameCube as I really like that system.

The Last Bandit

Cool !!

Looking forward to trying in out..

Andrew76

Will give that a lash later this evening. Nicely done! :cool:

seo-ireland

I just tried it out. Awesome work! The level designs made it fresh enough to be interesting, as well as the ghost pieces and save mechanism to add a modern element to it. I got as far as the bomb defusing stage but there was one pesky one at the bottom that I couldn't get to (not due to a bug but rather my skill level). I coded a tetris-like game also in the past and it was fun to do. Not in Assembly however

Thanks for sharing, you are obviously talented!

um7y1h83ge06nx

Fair going writing it in Assembly, haven't coded in that in 10 years (main 8051 abased micro-controllers) so would be more than a bit rusty now!

soiaf

Thanks guys!
I had programmed in assembly before (z80 on the ZX Spectrum) so learning 6502 was very quick. Though a couple of weeks ago I was running out of space so I reviewed the code I had written at the start - it was definitely not the most optimised code. I was able to make a lot of memory savings, I think I have over 1KB of free space now
The bomb level was good fun to program - originally it was just going to be 'defuse the bombs', then I thought of the whole time aspect. Depending on where the bombs are put the level can be quite stressful
I got some feedback so I'll be working on the game over the weekend, some cosmetic, but the main change will be I'll be adding a pause option.
I'll post an update here when the changes are made.

Retr0gamer

Hats off to anyone that can code in assembly. I find it difficult to code in higher level languages, currently making a total arse out of a 2D polygonal collision detection engine in gamemaker. It's unfortunately a forgotten art in an age when memory and processing power are so good that you don't really have to think about optimisation.

eddhorse

I did assembly in college wars ago, man it was difficult, fair play and it looks great.

soiaf

I've made those changes and they're now available on my GitHub page.
I've added a pause option to the game and changed the behaviour of the mixture drop method, the piece will now drop quicker while the button is held.
I also modified the way I handle palettes, not much noticeable difference except the initial logo screen now quickly fades in instead of just appearing.

I've ordered myself a couple of flashable NROMs so I can have a dedicated cart version of the game for myself, think it'll be kinda cool
I have a Powerpak which I used to test the game on a real NES, but to me it just don't feel as real as having a dedicated cart.
Testing on a real NES did help me find a bug early in the games development, I had a bug that didn't give any problems on any of the emulators I tried, but on a real NES immediately showed up.
So my advice for anyone making their own homebrew is always test it on a real machine if you can