April 2000 news

March 2000 2.April.2000

My monthly overview of the visitors for march 2000 (no hits this time, just unique visitors). BTW I had my 1000th visitor on march the 25th.

You may have noticed I entered april 2000 as the release date of Worm on some sites. That means this month. I can't promise anything, but I'll try to have it finished before may.

Worm 84% 3.April.2000

Another 1% done! Worked the past two weeks on this: external levels. (I must admit I didn't work all the time.) As usual I did have some trouble; it kept crashing for some reason, but of course I overlooked one byte... anyways it worx now!! All levels are loaded from a single file (doesn't support multiple levels yet, but will be soon) and singleplayer hi-scores are saved in the level-file used ('cuz there will be easy and hard levels of course.) Also fixed a small hiscore detect problem.

And there's more: bars are being drawn using the (now correctly functioning) line-procedure. A bit slower at startup (doubt you notice it) but cuts off several bytes and works better than my primitive bar-draw attempt.

Worm to-do 5.April.2000

This is a list of what I still have to do before I release the beta:

  • multiple levelfile (select at start)
  • linkplay
  • singleplay end message or something
  • titlescreen
  • both worms should die when they run right into each other at the same time
  • CTF and domination game types
  • sprites for picks
  • names changable
  • multiplayer level selectable

I really hope I can make this all anytime soon, because besides the items in this list I also have to fix any and all bugs appearing out of nowhere.

Worm levels 6.April.2000

When all levels in a file are complete, a piece of code in that file will be run: doing anything you want. For example it can display congratulations! or it can display a cool demo with sound effects, or it can do nothing at all. It's all upto the maker of that level-file.

Speaking of level-files: a sample level source will be included with Worm so everybody can make his/her own custom levels! This can be either a set of deathmatch arenas, a singleplayer episode, or both. Hopefully, as soon as I release Worm, ticalc.org will be flooded with custom Worm levels ;)

Shiar Homepage news 12.April.2000

Removed the back-button on all pages, since everybody probably has a Home-button on his/her keyboard. One last time, so you won't remember my amazing artwork: Good old "Back", we'll miss you!. Changed some other stuff on some pages too. If you find any errors or missing links please tell me.

Since the computers on some schools (my own school included) have sites with the word game in it banned, my site - games3.net/shiar - cannot be reached from there. That's why I'm going to put my site back on fortunecity as well. Remember I'll always put updates on games3.net first, then upload to fortunecity. The full link is http://www.fortunecity.com/skyscraper/manic/638 but you can also load http://come.to/shiar and click on fortunecity (mirror) before you're redirected to http://www.games3.net/shiar.

Worm 86% 16.April.2000

First of all, I fixed a recent bug causing some crashes from time to time: after some debugging I realized _MM_LDIR changed the ram page from 1 to 2, so data was stored over programs.

That's a sprite, but it can have any form (depends on the level) Because of the good music (a friend of mine burned a really nice CD-R for me with alot of cool mp3s on it) I didn't stop there: I also replaced the pea-blocks with real 5x5 sprites, changable in custom-levels.

Update (17.4): Sprites can now have any size from 1x1 to 8x8! For example level 1 can have huge 8x8 peas, while on the second level they are just one pixel...

Worm 87% 20.April.2000

Some minor bugs fixed and little things added, but it's the small things that make a program great:

  • When two worms run into each other, both die instead of the first one only.
  • Number of lives left is displayed correctly.
  • Sprite size restored when using the default sprite.
  • Some optimizations, smaller size.
  • Worm growth per pea can be altered in levels.
Worm 87½% 21.April.2000

Levels can have multiple bouncing balls. Rightnow there's enough memory for about 42 of them, but if there's need for more, I can always alter that ;-) The screenshot shows a level with 11 balls which is quite difficult already. Note the smiley pickup =)

I also changed the main menu a bit. Now it's easier to change the number of players, and their names (yes, they can be altered now!) and all are saved when you quit.

Worm 88% 22.April.2000

Changed two things:

  • Supports multiple external levelfiles. When you run Worm, you have to select which file you want to use. The levelfiles now have titles too.
  • Quite some size increase: upto 4500 bytes :(
Worm 89% 23.April.2000

You see I'm really trying to finish Worm before may. Here's today's major improvements:

  • Multiple multiplayer (like deathmatch) levels in one level-file!!! The level can be selected from the main menu.
  • Singleplayer games can be started at any level you've been before.
  • Level numbers displayed correctly and starting with level 1 (or more if selected otherwise).
  • When you have completed a level, your score will increase with 40 times the level-number!
  • You gain one extra life every 1000 points.
Worm News 26.April.2000

News item on ti-news with 3 screenies. Since I haven't got any other news (a few bugfixes, but I won't bother you with that) I'll put the preview down here:

Worm Preview
Shiar's "Worm" has been progressing very well lately. We've tested a pre-beta version lacking some features (like it doesn't have enough already ;p). There are external levels, vertical scrolling levels, little boucy balls that kill you if you run into them, you can name your worm (woohoo! mines Spunky =p), and you can start from any level you've beaten before. It's 89% done according to Shiar. In the official release, there will be link play, deathmatch, ctf, and some other stuff (coolz!). You can check out Shiar's page here. Heres some eyecandy =)

Oh yeah, one more thing for all TI-86 programmers out there: click here to check the memory areas Worm uses. Can I safely use these addresses? If not, tell me now!

Worm screeny 28.April.2000

Time for another cool screenshot!! This level has 25 bouncing balls in it (remember a level can have upto 45 balls :P ) Some of you were confused by the TI-News preview saying Worm has vertical scrolling levels; no horizontal scrolling anymore?!? Yes there is, just hadn't made any wide levels yet; check the screenshot...

Just noticed your worm in the original Peaworm could get four times longer. So now if you take about 35 peas you'll get all short again. Because of the limited memory available, I doubled this for player one only (so max. length 2048 pixels = ~70 peas), I doubt you'll pick up >35 peas in a multiplayer game.