The winners of the recently held “NEO Spring (Coding) Competition” are announced. Head over to the linked pages for more details.

http://www.neoflash.com/go/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=238&Itemid=34

POWDER is a roguelike game, which is not a port of an existing roguelike. It is built around replayability and long term ergonomics, not short term learning. Author of this piece of software is Jeff Lait.

Release notes:

The long sought after fire arrows are finally present, self-poly into an iron golem has been further nerfed, and many bugs fixed. Most notable of the bug fixes is one to correct the gender assignment of dungeon citizens.

Changes:
A method to fashion arrows from trees. (Adam Boyd)
When fire, acid, and venom balls explode it is prefixed by a definite article.
Living frosts have a higher hit die (but same hit points) which should make them more effective in combat by increasing their chance of hitting things.
Constructs, such as iron golems, no longer regenerate naturally. Note that undead are powered by unlife so still do regenerate.
New item: fire arrows. (sf, R. Dan Henry, Beefhaze)
Knock is now a ranged spell and can close doors as well as open them. (Brendan)
[SDL] If you were near the very top or very left of the map, the on screen keyboard would draw with the letters not lined up with the key wells. (Eilu)
Gold beetles are now properly aggressive when hostile.
[DS] A VBlank wait is added to the sleep routine so even less power should be consumed when the lid is closed. (Robert)
intervene has an r. (Oohara Yuuma)
Two new rooms.
The golden tridude is as big as they come, not as bit as they come. (Eilu)
Those in wizard mode can create any room template.
If you are wearing a non-ring that grants missing finger, you are now allowed to still equip a ring provided you have zero rings equipped.
After answering the question too many times I’ve broken down and flagged most items as not being equippable as a stack. So, no more wielding two warhammers in one hand. Thrown weapons can be equipped as a stack to allow you to get more mileage out of enchant weapon scrolls. (Ben Shadwick, Bill, TemporalParadox, many more)
Failure to swap with creatures in pits or underwater properly uses the creatures pronoun. (Eilu)
When I added the ability to chose your gender, I accidentally had your choice also affected the gender of every creature in the dungeon. This has now been fixed so creatures will now have their correct gender assigned. (Eilu)
Character dump tells you if Wizard mode is activated.
Character dump tells you how many times you’ve save scummed.
Character dump includes your score on death or victory.
Changed the scoring method for ascensions to penalize based on how long it took you to win. The goal is to save the world, not just self-improvement.
Your last gender selection is saved with your last name so the new game gender choice will match the new game name choice.
Thrown artifact weapons were always [-2] to hit. Now all artifacts properly inherit their base item’s to hit bonus and can have an additional bonus due to being artifacts.
Flaming swords no longer have a [+1] bonus to hit. They are cool enough without such a thing.
Display of weapon damage will no longer show 2+1 for a 2d1+1 weapon and instead show merely 3.

Note: While the highscore is kept, save games are never preserved between versions. Please wait until your current character dies before upgrading.

http://www.zincland.com/powder/index.php?pagename=release

Goomba Color is a GBC emulator written for the GBA. Even though the GBA usually natively plays GBC games, Goomba Color provides the convenience to run multiple games from a flash cartridge, and also runs on the Nintendo DS and Game Boy Micro.

Changes:

* Amazing new speedhacks to make some games run faster
* Fixed some graphical garbage while rom menu scrolls out
* Rom menu no longer shows game codes of GBC games

http://www.dwedit.org/gba/goombacolor.php

Goomba Color is a GBC emulator written for the GBA. Even though the GBA usually natively plays GBC games, Goomba Color provides the convenience to run multiple games from a flash cartridge, and also runs on the Nintendo DS and Game Boy Micro.

Changes:

* Rearranged VRAM and allowed more leeway in games crossing past page #0
* Frame Rate counter now visible
* Optimized memory reads by 1 cycle
* Fixed LCD status polling for real (Final Fantasy Legend 1&2 work again)

http://www.dwedit.org/gba/goombacolor.php

FluBBa has released an updated version of his Master System emulator SMSAdvance for Gameboy Advance. The author just fixed a small bug with the new VRAM copy

http://www.ndsretro.com/

FluBBa has released an updated version of his Master System emulator SMSAdvance for Gameboy Advance. Most games are running in full speed now!

Changes:

*Added copying of first 32kB ROM to VRAM for faster execution.
*Added selection of machine.
*Added correct noise generation for SG-1000 emulation.
*Added correct palette in TMS9918 modes on SMS machines.
*Added different vdp capabilities depending on selected machine.
*Added some very basic Mode5 support when Machine=MegaDrive.
*Added different io maps depending on selected machine.
*Added support for the SMS1 tilemap address masking (Ys(J)).
*Added support for turning on/off internal RAM.
*Added auto save of SRAM (if it’s allready present) when entering menu.
*Added auto turn off of Bios when no header found (on machine=Auto).
*Added auto region (Pop Breaker GG (J)).
*Fixed support for Dodgeball King (KR).
*Fixed pushing and poping of AF register (Adventure of Batman GG).
*Fixed sprite bugs in unscaled mode on Codemasters games.
*Fixed initializing of all CPU regs on reset.
*Fixed timing of HALT instruction.
*Fixed palette setting for TMS9918 modes on GG.
*Fixed noscrolling for TMS9918 modes.
*Fixed up Mode1 graphics a bit.
*Fixed correct HCounter and latching.
*Better switching between TMS9918 and SMS video modes.
*More info shown from the game header.
*Optimised tile rendering for mode 0 & 2 (for real this time).
*Optimised all Z80 memory reads, one instruction and cycle shorter.
*Optimised DAA opcode.
*Optimised DEC opcodes.
*Optimised SBC A/HL opcode.
*Optimised one of the SRA opcodes.
*Optimised CPI, CPD, CPIR & CPDR opcodes.

http://www.ndsretro.com/

Season Stacker is a “dropping puzzle” game for the Gameboy Advance, in which teenage girls, representing signs of the zodiac, duel with the power of the seasons. Tiles are cleared by creating matching groups of four or more in any configuration. As a group of tiles clears, it leaves behind a tile of the next season. Clearing a group of summer tiles creates an autumn tile, and so on, around the cycle of seasons. If all four seasons are cleared in the same combo, the player receives one of twelve different special attacks to help herself out of a jam, or unleash a particularly devastating barrage of blank “garbage” tiles.

This demo version contains four levels, and all of the single-player gameplay found in the full version. The full version will feature a player versus player mode, and three different story modes.

Update 28.03.2008 @ 03:31
I wrote the author an email and found out there is just this demo version existing. Due to public lack of interest, the final version has never been coded.

http://www.indiegameshowcase.com/index.php?file=game_detail&id=90669005-5056-A15E-FEFD044B2321D7CA

POWDER is a roguelike game, which is not a port of an existing roguelike. It is built around replayability and long term ergonomics, not short term learning. Author of this piece of software is Jeff Lait.

Release notes:

This release is a bit late coming out due to my participation in the fourth annual seven day roguelike competition. My submission was Fatherhood.

Spent some time improving environmental interactions, adding some relatively useless spells that people more clever than I will find ways to abuse, and performing the usual grammar fixes.

An exciting change which hopefully you won’t notice is that the SDL based builds are no longer tied to a fixed 8×8 tile size. This was no small change as I had happily spread hard-coded constants everywhere, confident that the Gameboy Advance hardware wasn’t going to change on me. It never did, but POWDER escaped that world and now lives places where 8×8 feels a bit cramped. One intriguing tileset would be to build a 10×10 based set that would then run at a native res of 320×240. See the ArtPack for details. Note I said I hope you don’t notice this. No doubt, I have screwed up somewhere and some menu or stylus input won’t work properly – I look forward to having my error pointed out.

Note: While the highscore is kept, save games are never preserved between versions. Please wait until your current character dies before upgrading.

Changes:

[DS] Pressing keys on on-screen keyboard will move the button-based cursor to the pressed location.
Flavour text for empty bottles. (R. Dan Henry)
Zombies, skeletons, ghasts, and liches that are made by magic will have their original creature type prefixed to the name: rat zombie, tridude lich, etc. (Adam Boyd)
Trolls that resurrect inside lava will remain inside the lava rather than being teleported out. (Oohara Yuuma)
Acid Pool can now be cast at range rather than only on adjacent squares.
When you suffer system shock due to ending a polymorph or possession by dying a “You feel a little dead inside” is reported to alert you to the damage done. The Possess spell help has been updated to point out the dangers of dying while possessing creatures. (Derek S. Ray)
You can now wish for specific spells. Well, provided you can wish at all. If only you knew how to wish.
Wands of light will now slightly damage creatures and blind them for a turn or two.
Floating eyes that are blind can no longer paralyse you. (Michael Brough)
A Grow Forest spell that… grows a forest. I guess you could use it to block line of sight of those that chase you? (Adam Boyd)
Being hit by water has more consistent effects.
To hit bonus of weapons now shown in [] after weapon damage to make it clear that rapiers have a bonus.
A Down Pour spell to sodden excessively cheerful spirits.
Extra commas in the monster descriptions (R. Dan Henry)
The character dump will now give you your playtime and which platform you are playing on.
Option to turn off colouring of hp and mp. (David Damerell)
“Your spear glows grey” from Detect Curse spell now has punctuation. (Michael Brough)
Forest tiles can catch on fire and turn into forest fires. Be careful, these spread.
Support for tilesets with a base tile size other than 8×8 in SDL builds. (Ibson the Grey)
Your tileset, name choice, and button mappings are now saved with the highscores, not with your save game. This means the settings from when you last died or saved will be restored when you power back on again. (Matthew Rollins, Tim Allen, Robert, Irashtar, Matt, likely many others)
[PSP] Quit removed from PSP menu pending me figuring out how to properly boot back to the host system. (stabwound)

http://www.zincland.com/powder/index.php?pagename=release

Unibrau is a demo by Milkmen, released at Breakpoint 2008.

http://pouet.net/prod.php?which=50113

El Tio Sin Chorra is a turn-based RPG for the GBA. This latest demo has been released in honor of playeradvance.org turning seven years old.

http://playeradvance.org/forum/showthread.php?t=19881