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Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : Seeking Games Programmers
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| Boppa Guru  Joined: 08/11/2016 Location: AustraliaPosts: 814 |
Well it could play 3 tones at once, they called it polyphonic back then, we had a Microbee16 as well, and it was only capable of playing a single tone, the Vic could play much more complicated music in comparison, which many games made use of |
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Grogster Admin Group  Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 9593 |
Atari 8-bit had four voices!    Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops! |
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| matherp Guru Joined: 11/12/2012 Location: United KingdomPosts: 10240 |
I've moved my sprite code onto the Pi-cromite and for me this re-opens the discussion Watch the video In this case the Pi is set at 640x480 full colour and of course it directly supports the USB keyboard USB mouse, RGB888 HDMI It is hugely faster than VGA on the MMX despite being full colour and with HDMI will interface with modern monitors. Because the Pi-cromite and MMX codesets are now pretty much inline it took no more than a couple of hours to move the functionality. If you wanted to implement games under MMBasic this to me seems like a very good option. It easily outperforms the MZ and DA and the hardware is cheaper than any possible solution using Microchip once a custom PCB has been designed and built Hmmmmm........  |
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darthmite Senior Member  Joined: 20/11/2011 Location: FrancePosts: 240 |
Well .... matherp is right ... i have myself look around for perf at price. Say a 10 x 10 cm (2 layers) PCB on batch of 10 cost more than $100 with port and taxes to France. Then add the MCU and all other components needed for Audio , VGA , etc ... It cost more than a PI3 , you just dont have the happyness to build it yourself. And like Mat say "It easily outperforms the MZ" ... @ matherp : is the source for PI available ? , i dont have see it for download on the mmbasic page. Cheers. Theory is when we know everything but nothing work ... Practice is when everything work but no one know why ;) |
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| robert.rozee Guru Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 2437 |
it certainly does create a conundrum. i guess it ultimately depends upon what geoff's own views are on the direction to take the maximite in. from the hard-nosed engineering perspective it seems to come down to the following salient points: 1. a RPi zero is always going to be cheaper, more readilly available, and easier to assemble than a PIC32-based solution. 2. the RPi currently suffers from a relatively slow boot time and stability issues (be it user-created ones) when running MMbasic. 3. a RPi solution lacks the 'cool factor' of a single chip sitting alone in the middle of a PCB (as is the case with the current colour maximite). 4. the MX and MZ processors do offer mirginally higher levels of digital and analog I/O, although that could be mitigated with the addition of cheap I2C peripherals. 5. the RPi can output HDMI, whereas the MX and MZ are limited to VGA. this may in the not-too-distant future become an issue. i feel that the slow boot time and stability of the RPi can be fixed by using a severely cut-back linux (without GUI) to run the mmbasic code as the only 'user application'. the boot time, i have been told, could be brought down to a few seconds, however this may also involve ripping out networking. i am not sure that any of us have necessary expertise to achieve this task. a carrier PCB could be designed, the size of the current CMM PCB, that held a RPi zero, buck-regulator module, RTC, audio, and external SD card slot. the PCB cost would be minimal (100mm x 100mm approx $2), while the assembled unit would be functionally equivalent to a MZ solution. however, would it then become 'just another boring thing to do with your RPi'? cheers, rob :-) |
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| JohnS Guru Joined: 18/11/2011 Location: United KingdomPosts: 4038 |
The carrier PCB (add-on board) doesn't strike me as just another let alone boring. I've used Nard SDK as a small Linux - boots on RPi2 in about 18 secs with LAN. Being an SDK the idea is you customise it, starting small, and so its small as-supplied system does not run mmbasic. It does run pigpiod and such as gpiotest (with a few changes to its shell syntax). Looks like mmbasic wants libncurses, libtinfo & xterm (i.e. curses & terminfo). I don't know how vital they are for most of the things mentioned in this thread but they can obviously be added if they are. John |
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IanT Senior Member Joined: 29/11/2016 Location: United KingdomPosts: 108 |
I'm afraid I can't usually add too much to most of the conversations here - so I just watch and try to learn what I can. But Geoff/Matt here is my input for what it might be worth. I have a MM+64 (thanks Phil), two 28pinners - and MMB running on both my Win10 laptop and an RPi3. I tend to use them as general-purpose "real world" computing platforms. Nothing too 'heavy', just very simple things, mostly because I can easily understand them and they are quick/easy to setup and use. So last week the MM+ was hooked up to a cheap Brushless motor via a 30A ESC. Essentially, a single line of MMB code (using 'Servo') did the heavy lifting (sending PWM pulses to the ESC) - whilst a few other lines just looked at the keyboard for speed I/Ps and range checking. Simples! I briefly thought about using an Arduino (I have several) but the MM was much quicker to set up and easier to programme (because I never get the code right first time). My "Servo Pulser" is now stored on the SD card with other simple utilities as part of my software 'tool-box'. A more complicated MMB system may be used as an intelligent on-board controller for one of my 'model' locomotives (think 13.5mm to the foot). I want to control/monitor multiple traction motors, lights, activators, various sensors and send data to & fro via either Wi-Fi or maybe Bluetooth. The 'Hand' controller may well be anther MM with an LCD screen. Games? Well I used to play with Atari's (I still have three) but these days I'm an XBox Console guy - and I will admit to being addicted to Elder Scrolls for a while last year. So, my days of programming games & sprites are long gone - too Retro for me. VGA versus HDMI? Well, I have three VGA monitors, so I had to get a HDMI>VGA convertor to hook the RPi3 up to one of them. Would I buy an upgraded version of the C-Maximite? Well I might well do so but not for playing games on. I'd buy it because MMB is my preferred HLL "talk to the world" environment and assuming I could simply connect up a keyboard and monitor - it would be more useful than my PC (serial connectivity only) and could presumably give me more convenient (e.g. single board) Comms & I/O capability than the RPi (with it's 40 pin GPIO). If I do ever do want to write games, then as I think you've already realised, a RPi3 (with HDMI) running MMB would be the better 'big-screen' choice - so why worry so much about this? Play to the PICs strengths - which to my mind lay in it's ability to connect to things (IoT?) without a lot of the Linux (and all it's other weird off-spring) getting in the way... So - on a MaxMite 'Extreme' SBC - please just give me the same lovely and simple MMB 'environment' but with more memory, access to SD storage, make it as fast as possible AND gives me truck loads of Comms & I/O connectivity (I'd love to be able to talk to a CAN bus for instance - my layout runs a version of CBus for signalling) And from what I've seen - most folk here are using MM to actually "do" things, rather than just "play" with them... Sorry - that's my two penneth....and I'll go back to quietly lurking again now  Regards, IanT |
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| Grogster Admin Group Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 9593 |
A nice post there Ian, to bring us all back down to reality. Well, one form of reality anyway! You simply can't beat the Pi-0 in terms of price vs resources, but then there's the 'Intermediate Linux' running things in the background, with MMBASIC being a layer on top of that. That concept runs just fine. BETTER then fine, looking at Peter's latest demo, but the 'Instant on' feature of the Maximite and Micromite series of processors is a big draw-card IMHO.  As Rob has said, it really IS something of a conundrum as it is counter-intuitive to favour the PIC32 chip and board which would work out as ten times the price of the Pi-0 for LESS performance when you compare the two.  SUCH a head-scratcher. @ matherp: Does the Pi-mite support a USB mouse? Obviously, it does the USB keyboard. I THINK a USB mouse is supported on the latest Pi-0 builds of MMBASIC, but I can't remember. If it DOES support a USB mouse, then you have USB keyboard and USB mouse, HDMI output AND network support all in the Pi-0 for a 10th the price of a single-chip design that does NOT support have any native network support. What to do? (rhetorical)  Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops! |
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| hitsware Guru Joined: 23/11/2012 Location: United StatesPosts: 535 |
> What to do? (rhetorical) Learn ARM assembly ( or whatever they use ) and develope a stand alone BASIC for the 0 |
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Azure Guru Joined: 09/11/2017 Location: AustraliaPosts: 446 |
I think the solution is getting blurred. My view is the MM is an easy to learn and program platform using graphics and sprites to create some nice graphics and games. If we start to get fancy with higher end platforms we are talking a whole different solution. If we start to program games and graphics via an OS and it's associated drivers then not only things like RPi come into play but iOS, Android and PC's are all very accessible platforms with great toolsets for very sophisticated game programming. They are not that easy and quick to learn, program and understand, even with example code. I did not think that was the aim of the MMBasic Graphics and Sprite capabilities being developed by Geoff and Peter. |
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| MauroXavier Guru Joined: 06/03/2016 Location: BrazilPosts: 303 |
I'm showed this a long time ago in this forum, but I think now The "retroscene" for the CMM have new members that like the retro feelings that only a instant boot PC with a BASIC language can do. This is a tech demo Boulder Dash for CMM: https://youtu.be/iw6C1dToxy4 But now I'm finished a game board that uses the arduino pins that add a SN76489 PSG. With this simple little board the CMM can play Master System musics in background. I wrote a library using only MMBASIC that can play VGM file format and SFX, and uses only 3Kb of RAM. Soon I will upload a video with all the games and softwares using this board, and of course, with free sources and schematics. With this videos and sources I hope this can rise a community of game programmers around the CMM. Eight colours can make outstanding images and games, believe me. Ps.: Sorry about my english. |
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| MauroXavier Guru Joined: 06/03/2016 Location: BrazilPosts: 303 |
Geoff, please, can you fix the port command bug in the CMM firmware 4.5? I'm using the 4.4b firmware that have the port command working, but I loose the peek and poke commands. Ps.: Don't think about remove the sound command. The squared noises generated by this command can create musics and sfx similar to a Atari 800. |
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| Heidelberg Newbie  Joined: 22/01/2018 Location: AustraliaPosts: 13 |
Brilliant work Mauro!  A really great example of the CMM capabilities and a wonderful port of a timeless classic. You should look at the recent updates made to the Micromite extreme - which is a much more powerful device. -Heidelberg |
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| MauroXavier Guru Joined: 06/03/2016 Location: BrazilPosts: 303 |
Thanks, Heidelberg. Unfortunably, I believe that will gonna be very hard to me to get a Micromite Extreme. I live in Brazil and to buy imported things is a little complicated. I bought my CMM in 2015 in Altronics site, but now I doesn't find any source that can export a MMX to Brazil. I would love to make games in a MMX. |
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| MauroXavier Guru Joined: 06/03/2016 Location: BrazilPosts: 303 |
Some images of my projects in CMM: First prototype of PSG board:  MSX King's Valley sprites test:  Soon I will upload some vídeos. |
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| MauroXavier Guru Joined: 06/03/2016 Location: BrazilPosts: 303 |
As I promised, here is a new video showing the Colour Maximite playing some VGM files using a hardware PSG SN76489: https://youtu.be/iSozlDADcbM |
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Geoffg Guru Joined: 06/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 3285 |
That is brilliant. You have taken the Colour Maximite to a new level. Geoff Geoff Graham - http://geoffg.net |
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| Grogster Admin Group Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 9593 |
The sound chip is cheap - 27c each.... Pack of 5 from AliExpress in DIL No doubt a clone at that price. I could not find this chip in stock at any of my primary suppliers - DigiKey, Mouser or Element-14. Not stocked at any of those component houses. Perhaps Mario will say where he got his ones from. Perhaps an optional extra for the new beast Geoff? ...but then, we are off into multi-chip designs again, so perhaps not!  Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops! |
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| MauroXavier Guru Joined: 06/03/2016 Location: BrazilPosts: 303 |
Soon I will upload a file with all sources and schematics, and It's very easy to make this "gamecard". In all games I made I put three options: - PWM Sound only (sounds like ZX Spectrum 48k) - MOD Sound (Amiga style SFX, but I consider this option a little insecure because the relative small flash cycle of the chip) - PSG Gamecard: Remember something between Master System and Coleco Vision. I can mix them, for example, MOD Music with PSG SFX and vice versa. Soon I will show the new version of Boulder Dash with this options and a new game that is a mix between Laser Gates (Atari 800) and Scramble, with the three options of sound too and a smooth scroll. Obviously, all them are betas and can be considered by now a tech demos for CMM. With this I only want to share a new way to make games in CMM, and who knows, MMX. Geoff, with your comment now I'm in the heaven. It's the sparkle that I need to continue this with more effort. |
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panky Guru Joined: 02/10/2012 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1114 |
@Mauro, Amazing work with the Color Maximite. Regarding the MMX, if you contact WhiteWizzard on this forum, he might be able to assist you. You might find this link interesting also. - panky ... almost all of the Maximites, the MicromMites, the MM Extremes, the ArmMites, the PicoMite and loving it! |
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