On Thu, 25 Sep 1997, Magnus Kollberg wrote:
> > There's no problem in using the vbl in GEM as well, but
> > screen-swapping *might* be a problem.
>
> What I ment was that you can't use vbl if you have got a Nova card as
> you wont get a VBL interrupt, or will you? I don't realy know, but I
> don't think the Nova interface can generate a vbl interrupt.
In that case it'll break a lot of programs! I'm sure the VBL is still
active even with Nova's installed.
> > > a shotemup game I see no reason to make them use GEM.
>
> Oppss... sorry. I ment, as long as it's not a fast scrolling game I see no
> reason why you should not use GEM. :-)
What you *really* ment was that as long as you're using a f**kin' fast
CPU there's no reason not to write fast scrolling games in GEM ;-)
> > And if it doesn't use GEM directly (i.e. use windows and stuff), it
> > should be quite possible to make it work with GEM, perhaps with a
> > hotkey to switch back to GEM during playing.
>
> Yes, but fast scrolling games is harder to do. PAC-Mans and such stuff is
That's why you should use your own/custom-written screen-routines, and
not run things in on the VDI/AES-screen at all. But if you could just
pause the game and jump back to GEM that would be just as fine. It
won't be 100% hardware-independent though, but it's still an
improvement.
Hell, even games that runs/exits cleanly under anything else than
plain TOS would be an improvement! Look at Bad Mood, it's one of the
few "games" I can "play" on my Falcon without having to reset it. It
even works and exits cleanly under MiNTOS :-)
GEM-games are fine (there's a lot of games I would like to see running
in a window), but for Really Good Games (i.e. good graphics, smooth
animation/scrolling) nothing beats custom-written code.
> I guess there is no way to patch some games to run in a GEM window,
> like Popoulus?
:-D Doug called Geir and myself "completely insane" when we discussed
the possibility to use the 030 along with the 040. What should we call
somebody that patches Popoulos into running in a GEM-window? :-)
> BTW. Has anyone tried Popoulus on the AB040? I would realy like to play
> it if it works.
Doubtful. The only game I've partly managed to run on the AB is "No
Second Price". It worked, but the gameplay was interrupted constantly
with a "sure you want to quit?"-alert. Let's install Geir's
CPU-switch, and play "Super Sprint" on our super-Ataris!
/*
** Jo Even Skarstein
http://www.stud.ntnu.no/~josk/
**
** beer - maria mckee - atari falcon - babylon 5
*/
Received on to. sep. 25 1997 - 17:15:00 CEST