Atari 2600 News
Bombs Away (02-03-2010 r2) (A2600 Game)

The object of the game is to zap the falling bombs before they reach the city below. You have a powerful laser beam that can be moved back and forth to take out the bombs. The city also has a set of shield defenses which will stop the bombs, but you won’t score any points for their desctruction. You also have one super powerful laser blast that you can deploy at any point during the game. It will destroy all of the falling bombs on the screen. To activate the super laser, push up on the joystick. You will receive 10 points for every bomb you destory, and as mentioned before, no points for bombs destroyed by the city shields.

The game is divided up into 12 levels, and with each passing level you’ll face a faster bombing raid on your city. Once you reach level 12, it’s a test of endurance – there will be no more pauses in the action until you reach the inevitable destruction of your city. You’ll see your city blow up when six bombs have hit. When the game pauses at each level, press down on the joystick when you’re ready to continue.

The city can survive six direct bomb hits before it’s destroyed. Your six hits are indicated with the level counter at the bottom of the screen. If you reach the end of a level and you’ve taken at least one hit you will gain one life back. Once you reach level 12, there are no more opportunities to gain extra lives.

This game includes the option of having a second player control the city’s shields using the right joystick. If no one is using the right joystick, the shields will hover back and forth automatically.

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/159011-bombs-away/

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Sound System (23-12-2009) (A2600 misc)

Richi_S has released a new “Sound System” for A2600 a while ago.

The features are:

– It fits in the Vsync area for all conditions (verified)
– Needs 9 bytes of RAM
– Variable Music Speed.
– It enfeatures one Melodic Instrument with ADSR-Envelope waveform functionalty (AUDF and AUFV are modulated every TV frame)
– It enfeatures one percussion track with up to 30 freely designable Percussion Instruments (AUDC, AUDF and AUV are modulated every TV frame)
– The song can be Programmed with a Tracker.
– In order to save ROM space and coding time, repetitive music data (beats) can be “compressed”.
– Selectable Song Start position, Song End position, “Loop to when song has ended” Position.
– Both Tracks: “Melodic Instrument” and “Percussion Instrument” can be muted with flags separately, thus the game developer can regain control of the TIA for his own sound effects.

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/155350-my-new-sound-system/

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Toobin (09-02-2010) (A2600 Game)

Developer “atari2600land” has updated his game Toobin.

Release notes:

There seems to be no rhyme or reason as to why it blinks, but it does. Could someone look at the code and help me get the scanline back down to where it should be?

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/152809-toobin-attempt-%232/

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Skull Island (13-02-2010) (A2600 Game)

You find a treasure map in the attic of your house. Think Goonies movie. You and some friends go in search of this buried treasure on Skull Island. One problem, you don’t exactly know where Skull Island is. You each get out your raft and head out into the river. Your friends are represented on the grid as colors. The red color is you. The other colors are your friends. The pink square in the middle is an island. You’re object is to get to the island.

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/145509-skull-island-updated-test-3-021310/

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2600Tris (06-02-2010) (A2600 Game)

atari2600land has updated his single and two player simultaneous play variant of a very well known russian block game. The game was previously known as “Tetris”.

Release notes:

Was test-playing this and kept finding a bug which made the game freeze sometimes if you’re on level 9. So I just removed level 9 altogether. Now if you get 80 blocks, that’s the fastest speed there is. And it’s still pretty hard on that speed (at least for me.)

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/153710-2600tris/page__st__100

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2600Tris (05-02-2010) (A2600 Game)

atari2600land has updated his single and two player simultaneous play variant of a very well known russian block game. The game was previously known as “Tetris”.

Release notes:

Here’s the latest binary. Any changes I should make?

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/153710-2600tris/page__st__100

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2600Tris (02-02-2010 r2) (A2600 Game)

atari2600land has updated his single and two player simultaneous play variant of a very well known russian block game. The game was previously known as “Tetris”.

Changes:

r1
major update: I’ve added a B-Type to the game. For those who don’t know, B-Type is where you can freely set the level and the height of garbage blocks and the goal is to complete 25 lines. B-Type is one player only and you press the select switch until one joystick appears with a playfield pixel on the left side. Once pressing fire, you can then select level (speed) and height, and then try to get 25 lines.

r2
Fixed the bug having to do with levels with the B-Type.
EDIT: Fixed another bug having to do with B-Type. All bugs should be fixed now (hopefully.)

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/153710-2600tris/page__st__100

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2600Tris (01-02-2010) (A2600 Game)

atari2600land has updated his single and two player simultaneous play variant of a very well known russian block game. The game was previously known as “Tetris”.

Changes:

Nothing much, just fixed the demo so it works the way I want it to again.

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/153710-2600tris/page__st__100

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Dragon Attack (01-02-2010) (A2600 Game)

Will is working on an adventure/RPG style game for Atari 2600 named “Dragon Attack”. The game is yet in early stages.

Release notes:

Hello everyone!

A while back on an Indenture thread I had posted a possible 2600 asm kernel that could be used to create asymmetrical playfields used by Indenture.

I’ve been playing around with it for a while, and have actually got it to the point where it supports not only asymmetrical playfields, but also multiple-color playfields and 2-scanline-resolution support for missile0 and missile1. What this means is that I can create a new version of Adventure that adds fire-breathing dragons, castle moats that need to be crossed with a bridge, and tons of other neat things.

Here are some screenshots and an NTSC binary of what I have so far. The binary is just a static frame, there’s no player or dragon movement coded yet. I just wanted to show that this is actually doable on the 2600, and not just a mockup.

What I eventually plan to do is incorporate:
– all 31 of the original rooms from Adventure
– 32 of my favorite rooms from Indenture, including the yellow maze, orange “ATARI” maze, and the green and silver castles.
– 34 original rooms

I’ll also be including the shield, flashlight (possibly reimagined as a torch), blue balloon, and a handful of rooms from my Duck Attack! homebrew.

Note that this isn’t a hack of Adventure (although I’ve got nothing against Adventure hacks, obviously); it’s a complete rewrite from scratch (although I’ll probably pull in some routines from Duck Attack! when appropriate – e.g. the fire-breathing logic.) Nonetheless, the basic gameplay should feel very familiar once it’s done.

I’ll post updates here as it progresses.

–Will

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/157421-dragon-attack-2600/

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2600Tris (31-01-2010) (A2600 Game)

atari2600land has updated his single and two player simultaneous play variant of a very well known russian block game. The game was previously known as “Tetris”.

Changes::

+When you try to rotate a piece and it can’t rotate, the rotating sound is gone.
+Added a little music to the secret scene (you’ll see it if you get 100 lines or more.)

http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/153710-2600tris/page__st__75

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