Shrinking and fast
David
pulled out...does this mean our machine is dying...and games with it?
--
________________________________
| |
| "David" ris...@argonet.co.uk |
|________________________________|
Mr Spence
<ris...@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
>
> Hey, this newsgroup seems to be shrinking very fast. Just because Acorn
> have
> pulled out...does this mean our machine is dying...and games with it?
er..yes on both accounts
--
--. --. --. --. : : --- --- .---------------------------------------------.
|_| |_| | _ | | | | |_ | |Internet provider for all Acorn RISC machines|
| | |\ | | | | |\| | | '---------------------------------------------'
| | | \ |_| |_| | | |__ | kvap....@argonet.co.uk
Simon Jones
David <ris...@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> Hey, this newsgroup seems to be shrinking very fast. Just because Acorn
> have pulled out...does this mean our machine is dying...and games with
> it?
Yeah, I've been thinking the same thing.
I'm not even receiving 10 posts a day to the group, as opposed to at
*least* 20+ a little while ago...
It's the beginning of the end, perhaps. Time to turn out the lights?
Simon:)
* Now you take responsibility! Show me that you want it!
--
SJ Productions -
Email: sjprod...@argonet.co.uk
Website: http://www.argonet.co.uk/users/chestnuts
ICQ: 15114320
I do not necessarily share my taglines' opinions.
Simon Jones
Mr Spence <kvap....@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> >
> > Hey, this newsgroup seems to be shrinking very fast. Just because Acorn
> > have
> > pulled out...does this mean our machine is dying...and games with it?
> er..yes on both accounts
Surprisingly fast, though, I'd say. Where's everybody going? Buying other
computers? Where the smeg they getting the money from? :)
Simon.
* You do this for me and I swear I will never ask you for anything ever again. Until the next time.
David Courtney
<sjprod...@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> Yeah, I've been thinking the same thing.
>
> I'm not even receiving 10 posts a day to the group, as opposed to at
> *least* 20+ a little while ago...
>
> It's the beginning of the end, perhaps. Time to turn out the lights?
I think the real releases are far more than pre- Artex and Rcomp.
Me thinks you're actually complaining about the lack of spam, trolling
and flames. If people stick to the point you'll only get four
articles per event, check out alt.acorn.demos after the recent
mayhem ;-) of the AU competition to see what I mean.
I play Ichess.com in JAVA. Many are using emulators. So perhaps
it's just a sign of convergence, things get less platform specific.
Certainly for us lot online there's a real potential of RiscOS
internet games a plenty coming up. And with free connections
those not online just modem and Acorn User to put some free
connect software on a CD. And games are pretty easy to write
when it's person against person so keep the lights on!
Those that want to read drivel wars can go and re-live the archives
at deja-news.
--
_______________________
http://www.jinksies.com
ICQ 29654704 jinks AUTO
dgs
> > Hey, this newsgroup seems to be shrinking very fast. Just because Acorn
> > have pulled out...does this mean our machine is dying...and games
> > with it?
>
> er..yes on both accounts
Is that why R-Comp have released a wider range of games for RISC
OS machines in the last six months than were available in the
whole of the six months before that put together?
I think authors who promise things and can't produce have gone quiet,
which is a pity (the financial incentives aren't there to keep them
plugging away at it). This makes the group quieter. There's also
a lot of idiocy on the group, which also tends to discourage people,
particularly if it dominates it :-)
On the other hand, there are a whole bunch of freeware/shareware/
budget authors still working away, plus Destiny which has undergone
a whole new lease of life...
Dying? Seems to be thrashing around a bit before it does it, at
any rate :-)
Manchester Acorn User Group - http://www.acorn.manchester.ac.uk/
RPC x86 Card Info Pages - http://acorn.cybervillage.co.uk/pccard/
"Your machine is NOT dead until it stops working" - Ian Gledhill
Dave Roberts
> > Hey, this newsgroup seems to be shrinking very fast. Just because Acorn
> > have pulled out...does this mean our machine is dying...and games with
> > it?
Games were always an iffy topic on later Acorn machines. This group used to
be much quieter!
> I'm not even receiving 10 posts a day to the group, as opposed to at
> *least* 20+ a little while ago...
Sheesh! There are many factors that decide newsgroup traffic of which
current readership is only one.
> It's the beginning of the end, perhaps. Time to turn out the lights?
The beginning is always that of the end...
--
Dave Roberts
Da...@pharpech.demon.co.uk
mrp...@leeds.ac.uk
AU Games
Simon Jones <sjprod...@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> Surprisingly fast, though, I'd say. Where's everybody going? Buying
> other computers? Where the smeg they getting the money from? :)
No idea... I can't think of anyone around here that spends money earnt in
the Acorn market on PC/PlayStation hardware...
OK guys, a few more pointless postings like this one should get the
number up again! Perhaps we need another argument?
Cheers,
Alasdair
--
Alasdair Bailey
Acorn User Games Correspondent <ga...@acornuser.com>
My views are my own and do not necessarily represent those of my employer
Simon Jones
Dave Roberts <Da...@pharpech.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > I'm not even receiving 10 posts a day to the group, as opposed to at
> > *least* 20+ a little while ago...
> Sheesh! There are many factors that decide newsgroup traffic of which
> current readership is only one.
Yeah, I do know that. But there has been a noticeable drop.
As David said, though, I think it's because the usual slagging matches have
finished up for the moment. csag becomes almost a barren wasteland without
them. :)
Simon.
* DO YOU GET ME?
Simon Jones
AU Games <ga...@acornuser.com> wrote:
> OK guys, a few more pointless postings like this one should get the
> number up again! Perhaps we need another argument?
How about if I say a game/website is crap without giving any evidence? That
usually works well. :)
Smj.
* I'm waiting, I'm waiting for you.
Tim Fountain
Yes the Acorn market as a whole may be slowly shrinking, but who knows
what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games market has
certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is unfortunate that at
the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet period". There are several
releases not too far away (Botkiller2, ID, TEK, to name but a few...), so
hopefully things will pick up.
Tim.
--
Tim Fountain (t...@markgf.demon.co.uk)
http://www.markgf.demon.co.uk/
Mr Spence
<t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>
> Yes the Acorn market as a whole may be slowly shrinking, but who knows
> what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games market has
> certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is unfortunate that at
> the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet period". There are several
> releases not too far away (Botkiller2, ID, TEK, to name but a few...), so
> hopefully things will pick up.
Agreed, but because of no real hardware development (Phoebe, Acorn) people
are losing faith, are top of range computers seem to be getting slower
compared to lastets MACs and PCs.
Gary Cowell (QI'HoS)
>
>Yes the Acorn market as a whole may be slowly shrinking, but who knows
>what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games market has
>certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is unfortunate that at
>the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet period". There are several
>releases not too far away (Botkiller2, ID, TEK, to name but a few...), so
>hopefully things will pick up.
>
>
>Tim.
Is Quake from RCI out yet?
Dave Sloan
Simon Jones <sjprod...@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> In article <na.314dab48d1.a...@argonet.co.uk>,
> Mr Spence <kvap....@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> > >
> > > Hey, this newsgroup seems to be shrinking very fast. Just because Acorn
> > > have
> > > pulled out...does this mean our machine is dying...and games with it?
>
> > er..yes on both accounts
>
> Surprisingly fast, though, I'd say. Where's everybody going? Buying other
> computers? Where the smeg they getting the money from? :)
I'm afraid that with Celeron based PCs which even I can overclock to 450
Mhz available for about 500ukp all in, with a brand spanking quick gfx
card, where d'ya think they're going?
I find it depressing, but it's just one of those things that we're going
to have to live with, that flash games are more popular than gameplay
ones ATM, and without 3D cards, we're hard pressed to manage anything
flash :( It saddens me to think that no-one ever managed a follow-up to
SR2000 - the greatest game of all time, but it also sets me in good
spirits when I see that ARM coders are moving over to the playstation,
or even PC markets, so the fantastic talent that we've had here won't be
lost. I'd miss Acorn games if they were to die out, because they've
always had a style that is both addictive and fun, something I've hardly
ever met in PC land (aside from Quake).
Anyway, once Iron Dignity is released, we'll be able to stand on the
rooftops showing off who's got the better computer anyway ;-)
Dave
Dave Sloan
David Courtney <da...@jinksies.com> wrote:
> Those that want to read drivel wars can go and re-live the archives at
> deja-news.
Hmm, yes, the glory days of Robert Templeman VS Martin Piper, and all
the side little arguments that have never been of any relevance. Well,
anyone miss 'em? I thought not ;-)
Dave
Jon
Gary Cowell (QI'HoS) <ga...@mickley.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> Is Quake from RCI out yet?
Nope.
Jon.
--
_________________________________
()____) ))
| acorn_.._ _ _. _| _ | http://www.acornarcade.com
| (_|| (_(_|(_|(/_ | ICQ 21129860
| the acorn games paradise | Jon Hall (S/A Reviews)
|__________________________| My views are my own
AU Games
> >what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games market has
> >certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is unfortunate that
> >at the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet period". There are
> >several releases not too far away (Botkiller2, ID, TEK, to name but a
> >few...), so hopefully things will pick up.
> >
> >
> >Tim.
> Is Quake from RCI out yet?
Nopers, 'soon' is the only official line at the moment...
Tony Houghton
> Anyway, once Iron Dignity is released, we'll be able to stand on the
> rooftops showing off who's got the better computer anyway ;-)
"We"? So you've bought a PC already have you? ;)
--
TH * http://homepages.tcp.co.uk/~tonyh/
Supporting CUT: http://www.unmetered.org.uk/
Rik Griffin
ga...@acornuser.com (AU Games) wrote:
> In article <48d15327e6s...@argonet.co.uk>,
> Simon Jones <sjprod...@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> > Surprisingly fast, though, I'd say. Where's everybody going? Buying
> > other computers? Where the smeg they getting the money from? :)
>
> No idea... I can't think of anyone around here that spends money earnt in
> the Acorn market on ... PlayStation hardware...
I do!
--
"This moment hangs, like your ragged hair."
Celebrate - Fields of the Nephilim
Acorn Arcade
> In article <na.314dab48d1.a...@argonet.co.uk>,
> Mr Spence <kvap....@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> > > Hey, this newsgroup seems to be shrinking very fast. Just because Acorn
> > > have
> > > pulled out...does this mean our machine is dying...and games with it?
> > er..yes on both accounts
> Surprisingly fast, though, I'd say. Where's everybody going? Buying other
> computers? Where the smeg they getting the money from? :)
Not getting an SA and instead getting a Playstation and about 5 second hand
games only 6 months or so old. Ta-da.
G
Stephen Scott
Mr Spence <kvap....@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> In article <48d1c5...@markgf.demon.co.uk>, Tim Fountain
> <t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> >
> >
> > Yes the Acorn market as a whole may be slowly shrinking, but who knows
> > what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games market has
> > certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is unfortunate that at
> > the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet period". There are several
> > releases not too far away (Botkiller2, ID, TEK, to name but a few...), so
> > hopefully things will pick up.
>
> Agreed, but because of no real hardware development (Phoebe, Acorn) people
> are losing faith, are top of range computers seem to be getting slower
> compared to lastets MACs and PCs.
What do you mean by real hardware development? What about the Peanut?
What about Risc OS Ltd? They and others have been given the responsibility
to move the market forward. But making hardware doesnt take days, it will
be months before we get something. The Phoebe concept has been binned for
something a bit more compatible with current standards - PCI, USB sockets
perhaps, and whatever other techno pseudonyms are out there.
Cant some of you lot be a bit more patient? Things are happening, but its
better to wait for something polished, than have a rush job placed in the
hands of impatient Acorn users. Thats asking for trouble!
Stephen (my personal opinion, not the employers)
--
Stephen Scott (e...@tau-press.com)
Expansion Manager, Tau Press (http://www.tau-press.com/)
Acorn User (http://www.acornuser.com/)
Visit my site: http://www.sassquad.freeserve.co.uk
James Hammerton
>
> In message <na.63cee048d1.a...@argonet.co.uk>
> Mr Spence <kvap....@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > In article <48d1c5...@markgf.demon.co.uk>, Tim Fountain
> > <t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > > Yes the Acorn market as a whole may be slowly shrinking, but who knows
> > > what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games market has
> > > certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is unfortunate that at
> > > the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet period". There are several
> > > releases not too far away (Botkiller2, ID, TEK, to name but a few...), so
> > > hopefully things will pick up.
> >
> > Agreed, but because of no real hardware development (Phoebe, Acorn) people
> > are losing faith, are top of range computers seem to be getting slower
> > compared to lastets MACs and PCs.
>
> What do you mean by real hardware development? What about the Peanut?
Where the hell is it?
> What about Risc OS Ltd? They and others have been given the responsibility
That's software.
> to move the market forward. But making hardware doesnt take days, it will
> be months before we get something. The Phoebe concept has been binned for
Can the market survive that long?
James
--
James Hammerton, Department of Computer Science, University College Dublin
WWW Pages: http://www.tardis.ed.ac.uk/~james
Remove "nospam" from my email address
N.A.Atkinson
>
> Stephen Scott <e...@tau-press.com> writes:
>
> >
> > In message <na.63cee048d1.a...@argonet.co.uk>
> > Mr Spence <kvap....@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> >
> > > In article <48d1c5...@markgf.demon.co.uk>, Tim Fountain
> > > <t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Yes the Acorn market as a whole may be slowly shrinking, but who knows
> > > > what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games market has
> > > > certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is unfortunate that at
> > > > the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet period". There are several
> > > > releases not too far away (Botkiller2, ID, TEK, to name but a few...), so
> > > > hopefully things will pick up.
> > >
> > > Agreed, but because of no real hardware development (Phoebe, Acorn) people
> > > are losing faith, are top of range computers seem to be getting slower
> > > compared to lastets MACs and PCs.
> >
> > What do you mean by real hardware development? What about the Peanut?
>
> Where the hell is it?
Most likely Wakefield if it fits in with the trend.
> > What about Risc OS Ltd? They and others have been given the responsibility
>
> That's software.
Hmmmm. Sort of right/wrong, Millipede are and would have to be in
cahoots with Risc OS Ltd.
> > to move the market forward. But making hardware doesnt take days, it will
> > be months before we get something. The Phoebe concept has been binned for
>
> Can the market survive that long?
We'll find out. You dedicated users/enthusiasts will be prepared to wait
because a new motherboard is destined as soon as someone can scrape the
rights off Acorn. The market unfortunately never got big, it's been
shrinking for years. We have a killer app -> that Cerilica thing and the
hardware needs boofing up. Millipede are master of professional video
editing systems so we may probably have the best video/gfx hardware.
We need an expanding market and unfortunately there are hypocrites in
this market, freeloaders, moaners and few companies and ultimately a
weeny market with little interest to any body/organisation.
So why don't we all get up and sod off?
--
Woof woof,
Nathan
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
PR Agent/Webmaster/Team hub of Visions Of The Impossible:
http://cube.icestorm.com/wrath/
Founder of the "Coding Vault". Coming soon to AcornArcade.
Philip Hardy
<e...@tau-press.com> wrote:
> Cant some of you lot be a bit more patient? Things are happening, but its
> better to wait for something polished, than have a rush job placed in the
> hands of impatient Acorn users. Thats asking for trouble!
A-Men!
--
___________________
/ ___ __ _ __ /_
/ / _ \/ / (_) / / /
/ / ___/ _ \/ / / / /
/ /_/ /_//_/_/_/ / /
/__________________/ / Phil....@argonet.co.uk
/__________________/
pa...@cyplexia.demon.co.uk
Tim Fountain <t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
> Yes the Acorn market as a whole may be slowly shrinking, but who knows
> what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games market has
> certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is unfortunate that at
> the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet period". There are several
> releases not too far away (Botkiller2, ID, TEK, to name but a few...), so
> hopefully things will pick up.
On the subject of the "quiet period", it seems only a couple of days ago I was
reading a thread on this very newsgroup complaining about the amount of pre-
release hype/pushing/general chatter for as-yet-unfinished Acorn games. So we
seem to have a choice - we either
a) Talk about games in development, even though it may be several months
before anyone will be able to play them. or b) Don't talk about games in
development and have people running around like headless chickens because the
market has suddenly died, the sky is falling in and all sorts of bad things.
Cheer up folks, everything is going to be just fine! [*]
Paul
[*] Of course, mindless optimism always helps.
-----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==----------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own
Mike Enderby
[snip]
>On the subject of the "quiet period", it seems only a couple of days ago I was
>reading a thread on this very newsgroup complaining about the amount of pre-
>release hype/pushing/general chatter for as-yet-unfinished Acorn games. So we
>seem to have a choice - we either
>
>a) Talk about games in development, even though it may be several months
>before anyone will be able to play them. or b) Don't talk about games in
>development and have people running around like headless chickens because the
>market has suddenly died, the sky is falling in and all sorts of bad things.
And the same could be said about RISC OS Ltd. Just replace all the games
references in the above two points to RISC OS and they apply quite well.
And of course the future of games is closely linked to the future of RISC OS.
>Cheer up folks, everything is going to be just fine! [*]
Hopefully...
--
Mike Enderby
Oracle Corporation
The views expressed above are mine alone.
Andy McMullon
<URL:mailto:mend...@uk.oracle.com> wrote:
> And the same could be said about RISC OS Ltd. Just replace all the games
> references in the above two points to RISC OS and they apply quite well.
>
> And of course the future of games is closely linked to the future of RISC OS.
>
> >Cheer up folks, everything is going to be just fine! [*]
>
> Hopefully...
I think the contract negotiations over RISC OS must be a nightmare (I
mean remember just who they are dealing with and their track
record.....!) and exceedingly complex.
That announcement from Acorn (about RISC OS 4 bring released in mid-Jan)
must have been a little spoiler. Bringing RO4 to market and developing
RO4+ means a very complicated contract indeed if RISCOS Ltd are to have
access to all the sources and a license to develop for the new generation
machines.
Plus there's still the small matter of the finance!
--
Andy: skyp...@bigfoot.com / http://www.mcfamily.demon.co.uk
Tim Fountain
<pa...@cyplexia.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> In article <48d1c5...@markgf.demon.co.uk>,
> Tim Fountain <t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> >
> > Yes the Acorn market as a whole may be slowly shrinking, but who knows
> > what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games market has
> > certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is unfortunate that
> > at the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet period". There are
> > several releases not too far away (Botkiller2, ID, TEK, to name but a
> > few...), so hopefully things will pick up.
> On the subject of the "quiet period", it seems only a couple of days ago
> I was reading a thread on this very newsgroup complaining about the
> amount of pre- release hype/pushing/general chatter for
> as-yet-unfinished Acorn games. So we seem to have a choice - we either
> a) Talk about games in development, even though it may be several months
> before anyone will be able to play them. or b) Don't talk about games in
> development and have people running around like headless chickens
> because the market has suddenly died, the sky is falling in and all
> sorts of bad things.
Nobody minds talking about games in development, and without those
discussions this newsgroup (and the games sites) would be very dull. What
people don't like is when groups/companies release *unrealistic*
deadlines, which is unfortunately quite common. Note I'm not solely
blaming the groups/companies here, there are always reasons for delays,
people just have to accept that in this small market groups/companies
don't have the resources of "the wider world", and the companies need to
try and be a little pessimistic with their predicted release dates!
Tim Fountain
Mr Spence <kvap....@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> In article <48d1c5...@markgf.demon.co.uk>, Tim Fountain
> <t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> >
> > Yes the Acorn market as a whole may be slowly shrinking, but who knows
> > what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games market has
> > certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is unfortunate that
> > at the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet period". There are
> > several releases not too far away (Botkiller2, ID, TEK, to name but a
> > few...), so hopefully things will pick up.
> Agreed, but because of no real hardware development (Phoebe, Acorn)
> people are losing faith, are top of range computers seem to be getting
> slower compared to lastets MACs and PCs.
The top range computers aren't getting slower, they're just falling
further and further behind the equivalent PC/Mac, but yes, this is because
of the lack of hardware development. Unfortunately it doesn't look as if
that's going to change in the near future (in the games area anyway).
Tim Fountain
> Mr Spence <kvap....@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> > In article <48d1c5...@markgf.demon.co.uk>, Tim Fountain
> > <t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > > Yes the Acorn market as a whole may be slowly shrinking, but who
> > > knows what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games
> > > market has certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is
> > > unfortunate that at the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet
> > > period". There are several releases not too far away (Botkiller2,
> > > ID, TEK, to name but a few...), so hopefully things will pick up.
> >
> > Agreed, but because of no real hardware development (Phoebe, Acorn)
> > people are losing faith, are top of range computers seem to be getting
> > slower compared to lastets MACs and PCs.
> What do you mean by real hardware development? What about the Peanut?
> What about Risc OS Ltd?
As you know, the Peanut is certainly not intended as a games machine, and
as nice as future development of RISC OS is, that isn't likely to affect
games development much either.
> They and others have been given the responsibility to move the market
> forward. But making hardware doesnt take days, it will be months before
> we get something.
[...]
> Cant some of you lot be a bit more patient? Things are happening, but
> its better to wait for something polished, than have a rush job placed
> in the hands of impatient Acorn users.
All very true, but unless RISC OS 4, Peanut, and whatever follows actually
/increases/ the user base enough for 3Dfx cards or a successor to the
SA-RPC to be financially viable, the games market will not be able to
expand any further.
Andy McMullon
<URL:mailto:t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> All very true, but unless RISC OS 4, Peanut, and whatever follows actually
> /increases/ the user base enough for 3Dfx cards or a successor to the
> SA-RPC to be financially viable, the games market will not be able to
> expand any further.
Does anyone know what the games potential of the APEX/Imago hardware is?
I presume that will be the graphics side of the Millipede new-generation
RPC mb.
In the long run I expect that the graphics stuff in RISC OS will be
patched in a modular way so that different hardware can be used easily.
The problem is that this may fragment an aready limited market and make
it harder for people to write good Acorn games (or even decent serious
applications). They would have to have drivers for 'classic' RPCs and
A7000s, new-generation RPCs and perhaps even CATS/Phoenix boxes or ChiOS
PCI cards! What a nightmare - unless we grow the userbase somewhat!
Tony Houghton
> The problem is that this may fragment an aready limited market and make
> it harder for people to write good Acorn games (or even decent serious
> applications). They would have to have drivers for 'classic' RPCs and
> A7000s, new-generation RPCs and perhaps even CATS/Phoenix boxes or ChiOS
> PCI cards! What a nightmare - unless we grow the userbase somewhat!
No, as long as all the drivers follow a decent, standard API similarly
to OpenGL and Direct3D, the games writers would only have to write one
version of each game. It can be seen in the PC market where nearly all
new games now only bother to support Direct3D, because all cards now
have adequate drivers for it.
Keith Mckillop
> Said Tim Fountain <t...@markgf.demon.co.uk>
>>
>> Yes the Acorn market as a whole may be slowly shrinking, but who knows
>> what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games market has
>> certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is unfortunate that at
>> the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet period". There are
>> several releases not too far away (Botkiller2, ID, TEK, to name but a
>> few...), so hopefully things will pick up.
>>
>>
> Is Quake from RCI out yet?
"when's Quake coming out?"
Why do I get the feeling that it may turn Phoebe-esque?
Keith
* Wot? Not even... Wensleydale?
--
___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ | Free Internet E-mail and Usenet News |
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Keith Mckillop
> In article <48d1c5...@markgf.demon.co.uk>, Tim Fountain
> <t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>>
>>
>> what will happen in the next few months. The Acorn games market has
>> certainly changed a lot in the last year, and it is unfortunate that at
>> the moment we are in the post-Christmas "quiet period". There are
>> several releases not too far away (Botkiller2, ID, TEK, to name but a
>> few...), so hopefully things will pick up.
> people are losing faith, are top of range computers seem to be getting
> slower compared to lastets MACs and PCs.
Wakefield!"
Keith Mckillop
> In article <48d15327e6s...@argonet.co.uk>,
> Simon Jones <sjprod...@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
>> other computers? Where the smeg they getting the money from? :)
> OK guys, a few more pointless postings like this one should get the
> number up again! Perhaps we need another argument?
discussion over the past month, you'll see that there isn't much of a
variety(1). And I mean the *real* subjects, not just the subject headings.
Some of the arguments are really between two people (re: rjw & Fantasia),
which also explains the drop in postings.(3)
Keith
* Wot? Not even... Wensleydale?
(2) That's right, I can't be bothered to list them, so I say something to get
someone else to list them :)
(3) BKII rocks. The graphics are just so nice, and I'm pleasently surprised
that it's playable on an ARM250 :) And at 10UKP it'll be well worth it.(4)
(4) Ok, slightly irrelevant, but it deserved the plug anyway :)
Andy McMullon
<URL:mailto:to...@tcp.co.uk> wrote:
> Andy McMullon <skyp...@bigfoot.com> writes:
>
> > The problem is that this may fragment an aready limited market and make
> > it harder for people to write good Acorn games (or even decent serious
> > applications). They would have to have drivers for 'classic' RPCs and
> > A7000s, new-generation RPCs and perhaps even CATS/Phoenix boxes or ChiOS
> > PCI cards! What a nightmare - unless we grow the userbase somewhat!
>
> No, as long as all the drivers follow a decent, standard API similarly
> to OpenGL and Direct3D, the games writers would only have to write one
> version of each game. It can be seen in the PC market where nearly all
> new games now only bother to support Direct3D, because all cards now
> have adequate drivers for it.
Well it's nice to have a comment from someone who knows! I'm pleased
that it may be easier than I thought - though my friends with PCs don't
seem to think so!
;-)
Anyway, I hope Tony, as a former ally of RISC OS (though lately an
advocate of another platform), that you might be persuaded to put your
talent to use helping to save it!
I reckon we need people who not only know the strengths of RISC OS but
are not blind to its weaknesses - and have a few ideas of how to fix
them!
Get yourself on the RISC OS Ltd list of coders!
JohnPBain
> Is that why R-Comp have released a wider range of games for RISC
> OS machines in the last six months than were available in the
> whole of the six months before that put together?
Good point. Strange isn't it.
> I think authors who promise things and can't produce have gone quiet,
> which is a pity (the financial incentives aren't there to keep them
> plugging away at it). This makes the group quieter. There's also
> a lot of idiocy on the group, which also tends to discourage people,
> particularly if it dominates it :-)
Also a good point. When I first joined this group, I think I was the idiocy,
well most people seemed to think I was ageist *********** 'Service will be
resumed as soon as possible'.
> On the other hand, there are a whole bunch of freeware/shareware/
> budget authors still working away, plus Destiny which has undergone
> a whole new lease of life...
And why not. Acorn is not dying. If everyone just gave up on something when
it began to fade away, where would we be now. In a world where Microsoft
ruled and everything had to be upgraded every 5 minutes I should think. I
recently bought a Saturn (to stop my Dad complaining that I was filling up
the RPC with games) which Sega have officially declared a failure and a flop
and I'm not sorry. I only really wanted it to play Sonic Jam/R and Guardian
heroes really anyway. But anyway my point is that everything is not lost and
people should continue developing games for the acorn platform as people
WILL buy them. Did you hear that? You WILL buy, you WILL buy, you WILL buy.
(this is not a subliminal message, honest). I'm even working on my own game,
there's only one problem. I can't program.
> Dying? Seems to be thrashing around a bit before it does it, at
> any rate :-)
It's doing a lot more thrashing than it ever did before in my opinion.
John.
--
| This is what I think of being a teenager
| | Bain :-) :-( :-D :-p |:-/ :-{ :-@ :-o :->
---- >:-> :^) Confused? You will be.
For more smilies like this, see my guide at...
http://www.cybernexus.demon.co.uk/jpb
Richard Wilson
<URL:mailto:Bol...@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> > On the other hand, there are a whole bunch of freeware/shareware/
> > budget authors still working away, plus Destiny which has undergone
> > a whole new lease of life...
>
> And why not. Acorn is not dying.
Unfortunately Acorn is all but dead, as it it's market. There is a faint
glimmer of hope in RiscOS Ltd, the CATS board and suchlike, but I'm not
expecting anything to come from them. I hope I'll be pleasantly suprised.
> If everyone just gave up on something when
> it began to fade away, where would we be now. In a world where Microsoft
> ruled and everything had to be upgraded every 5 minutes I should think. I
> recently bought a Saturn (to stop my Dad complaining that I was filling up
> the RPC with games) which Sega have officially declared a failure and a flop
> and I'm not sorry. I only really wanted it to play Sonic Jam/R and Guardian
> heroes really anyway.
This a nigh on perfect example of the Acorn market, although I personally
would not call the RiscPC a flop (it outperformed Acorns prediction for one
thing). For the Acorn market the number of applications/games being
developed is minimal, and people generally buy the machines for access to
certain applications (Easiwriter etc, previously Sibellius, RiscOS) and
they know that the machine is not going anywhere in a hurry (other than
down), but they are contentin the fact that the programs they have access
to will fulfill their needs.
> But anyway my point is that everything is not lost and
> people should continue developing games for the acorn platform as people
> WILL buy them. Did you hear that? You WILL buy, you WILL buy, you WILL buy.
> (this is not a subliminal message, honest).
The prospective market for games on the Acorn market is so amazingly small
there is almost no scope to viably develop games on it. Conversions, such
as those provided by R-Comp, take far, far, less time to do than writing
such a game from scratch.
To put things into context, the amount of money which is expected to be
made from Botkiller2 won't even pay for my phone bill for the duration of
the time it has been in development.
Richard.
R-Comp Interactive
> The prospective market for games on the Acorn market is so amazingly small
> there is almost no scope to viably develop games on it. Conversions, such
> as those provided by R-Comp, take far, far, less time to do than writing
> such a game from scratch.
> To put things into context, the amount of money which is expected to be
> made from Botkiller2 won't even pay for my phone bill for the duration of
> the time it has been in development.
>
>
You're all gonna hate me for saying this, but there is a reason for this.
Now, I'm not familiar with BK2, and it could completely kick ass, in which
case please ignore everything I say. In fact, you'll all probably do that
anyway, so it doesn't really matter.
Anyway, right now, the way most native Acorn games happen (not our Ports)
tends to be (Artex excluded) with a teenage/student coder siting down and
thinking "I can't draw, but it doesn't matter - I'll write a cool game and
flog it for a tenner".
They then spend 12 months creating a superb ARM code optimized 100fps
engine that really moves even on an Arm 2.
At this point, they spend 2 hours in paint doing some mode 13 graphics
(so that it fits on a single floppy and is compatible with an A305 with
RO2 on a telly).
And then they wonder why noone bought the software, and why this group
pans the product.
The reason is quite simple - most users *don't want* dodgy 10ukp games.
They'd be quite happy to pay 20 or 30ukp to get a game which needs an
ARM 3 and SVGA monitor and 4Mb of RAM, which has graphics and sound by
people who can draw/sample/compose etc. Crikey, if it comes on CD,
all the better!
And before you stop me and say "who?", I'd draw your attention to the
demos on the month's AU CD - why the &%*& don't these guys do something
productive with all that raw, oozing talent.
The engines on display in the demo contest are cool - especially the DFI
stuff, although it's a tad OTT - and they sounds are pretty hot as well.
Kulture seem to be able to "do" gfx (although apart from fading them
cleverly, not much else from what I've seen) so why don't these people
produce some real products and games?
Alternatively, you have things like Golgotha sitting around complete
with 3D engine and graphics and textures, and still noone does anything.
The ludicrous thing is that such products probably wouldn't take any
longer/cost more than what you all do at present, due to the amount of
hand coding and optimizing that goes into most Acorn games.
And to cap it all off, we'd be happy to assist any coders with these
kind of projects, in practically any way, yet still no-one does anything.
Grrr.
OK, rant over.
--
R-Comp Interactive
22 Robert Moffat, High Legh, Knutsford, Cheshire WA16 6PS
Tel: (+44) 01925 755043 Fax: (+44) 01925 757377
http://www.rcomp.co.uk/
Richard Wilson
<URL:mailto:r...@arsvcs.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > The prospective market for games on the Acorn market is so amazingly small
> > there is almost no scope to viably develop games on it. Conversions, such
> > as those provided by R-Comp, take far, far, less time to do than writing
> > such a game from scratch.
> > To put things into context, the amount of money which is expected to be
> > made from Botkiller2 won't even pay for my phone bill for the duration of
> > the time it has been in development.
> >
> >
>
> You're all gonna hate me for saying this, but there is a reason for this.
>
> Now, I'm not familiar with BK2, and it could completely kick ass, in which
> case please ignore everything I say. In fact, you'll all probably do that
> anyway, so it doesn't really matter.
http://www.wilsontigger.demon.co.uk/bk/ has some screenshots. Unfortunately
the translucencies and smoothness of the game don't really show through
via such means.
> Anyway, right now, the way most native Acorn games happen (not our Ports)
> tends to be (Artex excluded) with a teenage/student coder siting down and
> thinking "I can't draw, but it doesn't matter - I'll write a cool game and
> flog it for a tenner".
Well, Artex have done the GFX/music... ;-)
> They then spend 12 months creating a superb ARM code optimized 100fps
> engine that really moves even on an Arm 2.
>
> At this point, they spend 2 hours in paint doing some mode 13 graphics
> (so that it fits on a single floppy and is compatible with an A305 with
> RO2 on a telly).
>
> And then they wonder why noone bought the software, and why this group
> pans the product.
>
> The reason is quite simple - most users *don't want* dodgy 10ukp games.
> They'd be quite happy to pay 20 or 30ukp to get a game which needs an
> ARM 3 and SVGA monitor and 4Mb of RAM, which has graphics and sound by
> people who can draw/sample/compose etc. Crikey, if it comes on CD,
> all the better!
Well, BK2 needs an ARM3... 4Mb RAM... VGA monitor to access the VGA mode...
It doesn't however need the player to have lots of cash.
> And before you stop me and say "who?", I'd draw your attention to the
> demos on the month's AU CD - why the &%*& don't these guys do something
> productive with all that raw, oozing talent.
Thankyou ;-).
> The engines on display in the demo contest are cool - especially the DFI
> stuff, although it's a tad OTT - and they sounds are pretty hot as well.
> Kulture seem to be able to "do" gfx (although apart from fading them
> cleverly, not much else from what I've seen) so why don't these people
> produce some real products and games?
>
> Alternatively, you have things like Golgotha sitting around complete
> with 3D engine and graphics and textures, and still noone does anything.
>
> The ludicrous thing is that such products probably wouldn't take any
> longer/cost more than what you all do at present, due to the amount of
> hand coding and optimizing that goes into most Acorn games.
>
> And to cap it all off, we'd be happy to assist any coders with these
> kind of projects, in practically any way, yet still no-one does anything.
IMHO the market simply isn't big enough to support even the humblest of
projects. If Botkiller2 sells even vaguely well I've got a rather lovely
project on the cards already. Personally I hope I'll get the chance to
finish it, if not then I'll give it to AA for someone else to work
with.
Richard.
Owain Cole
> Date: Thu, 18 Feb 1999 20:46:35 +0000
> From: R-Comp Interactive <r...@arsvcs.demon.co.uk>
> Reply-To: r...@rcomp.co.uk
> Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.games
> Subject: Re: Shrinking and fast
> > To put things into context, the amount of money which is expected to be
> > made from Botkiller2 won't even pay for my phone bill for the duration of
> > the time it has been in development.
> >
> >
>
> You're all gonna hate me for saying this, but there is a reason for this.
> Anyway, right now, the way most native Acorn games happen (not our Ports)
> tends to be (Artex excluded) with a teenage/student coder siting down and
> thinking "I can't draw, but it doesn't matter - I'll write a cool game and
> flog it for a tenner".
Very true. Very very true. But there is a distinct lack of people out
there who can actually draw (using a computer). And rendered graphics
often look a bit funny (on the wrong background).
> (so that it fits on a single floppy and is compatible with an A305 with
> RO2 on a telly).
>
> And then they wonder why noone bought the software, and why this group
> pans the product.
Yup, but the problem is, if you don't back support then there is even less
of a market.
However, if it helps then hopefully, ie not this month, but within the
next 10 years, the I'm going to be able to offer up a very early demo
using the DFI 3D engine.
Keep watching this space......
Still watching?
Ok, you can look away now.
Owain
VotI
N.A.Atkinson
>
> Anyway, right now, the way most native Acorn games happen (not our Ports)
> tends to be (Artex excluded) with a teenage/student coder siting down and
> thinking "I can't draw, but it doesn't matter - I'll write a cool game and
> flog it for a tenner".
That's why VOTI will try and help any coder with gfx but what seems to
happen is that the coder can't be arsed to bother anyone and it comes
out with crap gfx. I personally feel that our own Joe Burmeister is one
of the better gfx artists on this dismal scene and he hasn't been used
for any VotI projects as yet.
> They then spend 12 months creating a superb ARM code optimized 100fps
> engine that really moves even on an Arm 2.
>
> At this point, they spend 2 hours in paint doing some mode 13 graphics
> (so that it fits on a single floppy and is compatible with an A305 with
> RO2 on a telly).
>
> And then they wonder why noone bought the software, and why this group
> pans the product.
Or why people complain when it doesn't run on an old machine and yet is
should do....most Acornites are going to complain severely about most
things even if it was 100% pure ecstacy as a game.
> The reason is quite simple - most users *don't want* dodgy 10ukp games.
> They'd be quite happy to pay 20 or 30ukp to get a game which needs an
> ARM 3 and SVGA monitor and 4Mb of RAM, which has graphics and sound by
> people who can draw/sample/compose etc. Crikey, if it comes on CD,
> all the better!
Although if it doesn't need CD then it's a bit daft.
> And before you stop me and say "who?", I'd draw your attention to the
> demos on the month's AU CD - why the &%*& don't these guys do something
> productive with all that raw, oozing talent.
Because: a) They don't have time.
b) Where is the support for the years it may take to do a game.
c) Not that easy to get decent gameplay.
d) Most of the demos were to be entered to win a Phoebe which is an
advantage over earning a 100 quid writing an Acorn game.
To be honest, I can't see why these demo geeza's aren't lured to the PC
software houses to do cracking stuff. I know I wondered by flustered
with writing a game for a weeny market.
> The engines on display in the demo contest are cool - especially the DFI
> stuff, although it's a tad OTT
Obviously, it is a demo :)
> - and they sounds are pretty hot as well.
> Kulture seem to be able to "do" gfx (although apart from fading them
> cleverly, not much else from what I've seen) so why don't these people
> produce some real products and games?
I doubt Kulture would do much as there has not even been a demo of
Scorpion.
> Alternatively, you have things like Golgotha sitting around complete
> with 3D engine and graphics and textures, and still noone does anything.
Because they have to understand the source and then finish it of and
then it will probably be too slow for the Acorn.
> The ludicrous thing is that such products probably wouldn't take any
> longer/cost more than what you all do at present, due to the amount of
> hand coding and optimizing that goes into most Acorn games.
>
> And to cap it all off, we'd be happy to assist any coders with these
> kind of projects, in practically any way, yet still no-one does anything.
Incentives play a bigger part in PC teams as a large company would
provide funds *during* the writing of the game rather than have a few
years of no money and struggling.
I know I sound rather negative in this mail, but I'm in a negative mood.
Most coders prefer to keep themselves to themselves and the number of
coders putting code into the Coding Vault will probably never get very
large.
AU Games
R-Comp Interactive (RCI) <r...@arsvcs.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> And before you stop me and say "who?", I'd draw your attention to the
> demos on the month's AU CD - why the &%*& don't these guys do something
> productive with all that raw, oozing talent.
> The engines on display in the demo contest are cool - especially the
> DFI stuff, although it's a tad OTT - and they sounds are pretty hot as
> well. Kulture seem to be able to "do" gfx (although apart from fading
> them cleverly, not much else from what I've seen) so why don't these
> people produce some real products and games?
I couldn't agree with you more! Why don't these demo teams show off
their coding abilities by writing a commercial product to wow the world
rather than a nice gfx demo that can't really make much money.
Face it people, RISC OS as a platform is in decline, perhaps if we as a
whole spent more time writing commercially viable products, things would
be a little different?
Cheers,
Alasdair
--
Alasdair Bailey
Acorn User Games Correspondent <ga...@acornuser.com>
My views are my own and do not necessarily represent those of my employer
Manu_T
> And to cap it all off, we'd be happy to assist any coders with these
> kind of projects, in practically any way, yet still no-one does anything.
Acorn coders are usualy very good but also very lazy :-)
...but then again you haven't seen us "the users" :*)
Regards,
Manuel
--
Manuel Timmers NEW Email at: Man...@writeme.com
StarLigh Corp. Website: www.whib.be/starcorp
Windows95... or "how to become insane in 30 minutes!"
Paul Thomson
> And before you stop me and say "who?", I'd draw your attention to the
> demos on the month's AU CD - why the &%*& don't these guys do something
> productive with all that raw, oozing talent.
I for one, have plans, but unfortunately I also have priorities. I've
got to finish my degree now (rather regretting spending time last term
writing that demo when I should have been working). It also didn't
help that last summer, when I was writing games related stuff and not
thinking about demos, I was lured away by an Acorn employee to write
a demo for the Risc PC 2, all expenses paid etc - a month before Acorn
imploded. Oh well, that's life.
Paul Thomson
Gareth S. Long
R-Comp Interactive (RCI) <r...@arsvcs.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>
> Anyway, right now, the way most native Acorn games happen (not our Ports)
> tends to be (Artex excluded) with a teenage/student coder siting down and
> thinking "I can't draw, but it doesn't matter - I'll write a cool game and
> flog it for a tenner".
>
> They then spend 12 months creating a superb ARM code optimized 100fps
> engine that really moves even on an Arm 2.
>
> At this point, they spend 2 hours in paint doing some mode 13 graphics
> (so that it fits on a single floppy and is compatible with an A305 with
> RO2 on a telly).
>
> And then they wonder why noone bought the software, and why this group
> pans the product.
>
>
> The reason is quite simple - most users *don't want* dodgy 10ukp games.
> They'd be quite happy to pay 20 or 30ukp to get a game which needs an
> ARM 3 and SVGA monitor and 4Mb of RAM, which has graphics and sound by
> people who can draw/sample/compose etc. Crikey, if it comes on CD,
> all the better!
I hear you. There's a lot of reinventing the wheel in the Acorn market
because people *have* to reinvent it - IE graphics libraries, sound
management, this, that, whatever.
If the target was a killer game (which is not going to move the system into
the limelight, but at least it'll involve a lot of fun and maybe some money
for some people at the end):
We need to concentrate on a method of handling floating point cleanly and
quickly as possible on the system. We're a desktop machine running on
embedded system processors, that's just the way it is today. But, we can do
the best we can. All donations in this area would be productive and welcome.
A 3D plotting engine. If it could be made generic in some way, in terms of
calls, then so much the better. I've ported GLIDE 3.x source to an embedded system
already (because I had to) so I know what's involved there. I could help with
the creation of something not disimilar. For people with hardware interest,
using a voodoo II chipset on a Risc PC is far from impossible.
Thirdly, make abandoned projects available to people within a closed group,
maybe the summation of all could help in the production of something.
Also, know your limits: We have lots of RAM on a Risc PC only. We have an
8-16MHz RAM bus, and no level 2 cache. Some people have no cache at all.
Don't expect Quake 3 at 100fps.
--
Gatch
Julian Brown
Gareth S. Long <ga...@elecslns.demon.co.uk> wrote:
[snip]
>
> We need to concentrate on a method of handling floating point cleanly and
> quickly as possible on the system. We're a desktop machine running on
> embedded system processors, that's just the way it is today. But, we can do
> the best we can. All donations in this area would be productive and
> welcome.
>
I feel the need to plug my floating point library here ;-)
http://members.xoom.com/julesmind/jsfp.html
There is one other 'unofficial' fast FP implementation that I am aware of,
written by Peter Teichmann for his ArcQuake port,
http://rcswww.urz.tu-dresden.de/~teich-p/afpe.html
Both of these are somewhere near (a factor of two?) to being the fastest
implementations for IEEE-format floating-point arithmetic on integer-only
ARMs. Perhaps.
Julian
--
._________________________________________________.
| |
| Julian Brown, Queens' College Cambridge |
| <jt...@cam.ac.uk> http://jtb20.quns.cam.ac.uk |
|_________________________________________________|
Can't think of a funny tagline right now.
Keith Mckillop
> R-Comp Interactive (RCI) wrote:
[snip]
>> And before you stop me and say "who?", I'd draw your attention to the
>> demos on the month's AU CD - why the &%*& don't these guys do something
>> productive with all that raw, oozing talent.
> b) Where is the support for the years it may take to do a game.
> c) Not that easy to get decent gameplay.
> d) Most of the demos were to be entered to win a Phoebe which is
> an advantage over earning a 100 quid writing an Acorn game.
competition to create the best home-grown game on the Acorn scene (has to be
previously unannounced, to make it fair for everyone). Prize: 2000UKP, or
equivalent in the best hardware (millipede board, with the next-gen ARM chip
prehaps?)
The deadline would have to be something like: 1st Jan 2000 (conquer the world
games market as the millenium bug strikes on peecees :), or Wakefield/AW 2000
[1], to give people enough time.
If Acorn were willing to provide a prize of a Phoebe for the demo scene, then
why shouldn't they do something similar for the games scene? I'm sure it would
work...
Keith
* Wot? Not even... Wensleydale?
another AW show in London?
Keith Mckillop
>> The prospective market for games on the Acorn market is so amazingly
>> small there is almost no scope to viably develop games on it.
>> Conversions, such as those provided by R-Comp, take far, far, less time
>> to do than writing such a game from scratch.
>> made from Botkiller2 won't even pay for my phone bill for the duration of
>> the time it has been in development.
> You're all gonna hate me for saying this, but there is a reason for this.
> which case please ignore everything I say. In fact, you'll all probably
> do that anyway, so it doesn't really matter.
> Anyway, right now, the way most native Acorn games happen (not our Ports)
> tends to be (Artex excluded) with a teenage/student coder siting down and
> thinking "I can't draw, but it doesn't matter - I'll write a cool game
> and flog it for a tenner".
> They then spend 12 months creating a superb ARM code optimized 100fps
> engine that really moves even on an Arm 2.
> At this point, they spend 2 hours in paint doing some mode 13 graphics
> (so that it fits on a single floppy and is compatible with an A305 with
> RO2 on a telly).
come out of it :)
And more to the point, BKII's gfx are pre-rendered. And the transparencies are
kick-ass. So you will buy it, Andrew, just to prove thyself wrong :)
> And then they wonder why noone bought the software, and why this group
> pans the product.
> The reason is quite simple - most users *don't want* dodgy 10ukp games.
> They'd be quite happy to pay 20 or 30ukp to get a game which needs an
> ARM 3 and SVGA monitor and 4Mb of RAM, which has graphics and sound by
> people who can draw/sample/compose etc. Crikey, if it comes on CD,
> all the better!
home, therefore it's cheaper to produce it on disc. And let's face it, for
10UKP, the CD duplicating company are going to want most of that...
But you may get your wish, if you check out the AU preview of Skirmish :)
> And before you stop me and say "who?", I'd draw your attention to the
> demos on the month's AU CD - why the &%*& don't these guys do something
> productive with all that raw, oozing talent.
> The engines on display in the demo contest are cool - especially the DFI
> stuff, although it's a tad OTT - and they sounds are pretty hot as well.
> Kulture seem to be able to "do" gfx (although apart from fading them
> cleverly, not much else from what I've seen) so why don't these people
> produce some real products and games?
> with 3D engine and graphics and textures, and still noone does anything.
[snip rest]
Keith
* Wot? Not even... Wensleydale?
Simon Jones
Keith Mckillop <k...@arcade.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> If Acorn were willing to provide a prize of a Phoebe for the demo scene,
> then why shouldn't they do something similar for the games scene? I'm
> sure it would work...
Er...except they *didn't* provide a Phoebe in the end, did they?
Count Acorn - sorry, *Element 14* (how amusing sci-fi is that???) - out of
the entire Acorn scene, if I were you.
Although good idea overall.
Simon.
* Do not pretend to yourself.
--
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Email: sjprod...@argonet.co.uk
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ICQ: 15114320
I do not necessarily share my taglines' opinions.
Tony Houghton
> > The prospective market for games on the Acorn market is so amazingly small
> > there is almost no scope to viably develop games on it. Conversions, such
> > as those provided by R-Comp, take far, far, less time to do than writing
> > such a game from scratch.
> > To put things into context, the amount of money which is expected to be
> > made from Botkiller2 won't even pay for my phone bill for the duration of
> > the time it has been in development.
> >
> >
>
> You're all gonna hate me for saying this, but there is a reason for this.
>
> Now, I'm not familiar with BK2, and it could completely kick ass, in which
> case please ignore everything I say. In fact, you'll all probably do that
> anyway, so it doesn't really matter.
>
> Anyway, right now, the way most native Acorn games happen (not our Ports)
> tends to be (Artex excluded) with a teenage/student coder siting down and
> thinking "I can't draw, but it doesn't matter - I'll write a cool game and
> flog it for a tenner".
You're running an Acorn games company and you don't know anything
about Artex's next release? Gulp.
> Alternatively, you have things like Golgotha sitting around complete
> with 3D engine and graphics and textures, and still noone does
> anything.
>
> The ludicrous thing is that such products probably wouldn't take any
> longer/cost more than what you all do at present, due to the amount of
> hand coding and optimizing that goes into most Acorn games.
And didn't someone recently point out that Golgotha is too FP-centric
to realistically port to Acorn? The A7000+ probably doesn't have
enough grunt either, not that there are more than a handful of owners
who might play games.
> And to cap it all off, we'd be happy to assist any coders with these
> kind of projects, in practically any way, yet still no-one does anything.
Like you "assisted" Andreas Dehmel?
Tim Fountain
R-Comp Interactive (RCI) <r...@arsvcs.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> > The prospective market for games on the Acorn market is so amazingly
> > small there is almost no scope to viably develop games on it.
> > Conversions, such as those provided by R-Comp, take far, far, less
> > time to do than writing such a game from scratch. To put things into
> > context, the amount of money which is expected to be made from
> > Botkiller2 won't even pay for my phone bill for the duration of the
> > time it has been in development.
> You're all gonna hate me for saying this, but there is a reason for this.
> Now, I'm not familiar with BK2, and it could completely kick ass, in
> which case please ignore everything I say. In fact, you'll all probably
> do that anyway, so it doesn't really matter.
> Anyway, right now, the way most native Acorn games happen (not our
> Ports) tends to be (Artex excluded) with a teenage/student coder siting
> down and thinking "I can't draw, but it doesn't matter - I'll write a
> cool game and flog it for a tenner".
> They then spend 12 months creating a superb ARM code optimized 100fps
> engine that really moves even on an Arm 2.
> At this point, they spend 2 hours in paint doing some mode 13 graphics
> (so that it fits on a single floppy and is compatible with an A305 with
> RO2 on a telly).
That is very true, however I'm pretty sure BK2 won't fit into this
category. From what I've seen of it (which is beta version 0.01 :-) ), it
is going to be pretty kick ass. I wouldn't put it on the same level as
Abuse, but it's not really the same sort of game. Whether it'll be worth
a tenner remains to be seen. Ask me after I've reviewed it.
The reason BK2's different? Artex. If you want some real examples 'dodgy
games', look no further than <ahem>4D<ahem>.
On a (slightly) related note, after BK2 and all RPM's stuff is released,
can we please have a break from platform games and scrolling shoot'em ups
for a while?
Tim Fountain
> >> demos on the month's AU CD - why the &%*& don't these guys do
> >> something productive with all that raw, oozing talent.
>
> > b) Where is the support for the years it may take to do a game.
> > c) Not that easy to get decent gameplay.
> > d) Most of the demos were to be entered to win a Phoebe which is
> > an advantage over earning a 100 quid writing an Acorn game.
>
> Hey, I've just had a great idea to stimulate the Acorn games market! Set
> a competition to create the best home-grown game on the Acorn scene
> (has to be previously unannounced, to make it fair for everyone).
> Prize: 2000UKP, or equivalent in the best hardware (millipede board,
> with the next-gen ARM chip prehaps?)
Are you going to donate the 2000 quid Keith?
> [1] Speaking of which, is AW 99 likely to happen at all? Will there
> *ever* be another AW show in London?
Hope so!
David Courtney
Mckillop) wrote:
> Hey, I've just had a great idea to stimulate the Acorn games market!
> Set a competition to create the best home-grown game on the Acorn
> scene (has to be previously unannounced, to make it fair for everyone).
I get the feeling you've got a kick ass game unannounced Keith. :-)
> Prize: 2000UKP, or equivalent in the best hardware
> The deadline would have to be something like: 1st Jan 2000.
I can't see why a digital decoder company would want to get involved
in this compo! However Tau Press would sell more adverts in a bumper
competition issue. A couple of extra full colour page adverts and
you'd soon get some prize money. The Booker is about 10,000 though
I don't think more than 1000 is needed here.
It would certainly benefit all involved!
But I'd question your dates given your conditions, we all know if
people aim to get a game out for 1st Jan they will probably miss the
deadline by months. Also unless you allow Botkiller2, ID, TEK you're
going to make it a farce. Simply allow all home grown games this year
to include themeselves in a running list for the competion. At first
you'd mostly just have titles each one an entry number and all the
mystery if anyone can take on Artex. Dare I say it might even be a
handy fall back story for Alistair when he's pushed to fill copy in
the quiet months. :-)
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Alex Macfarlane Smith
<URL:mailto:t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
[snip]
>
> On a (slightly) related note, after BK2 and all RPM's stuff is released,
> can we please have a break from platform games and scrolling shoot'em ups
> for a while?
>
Personally, I'd like to see a sort of mixture of Starfighter and Elite, where
it's sort of like Elite in space, but you can fly down to planets and play
it like Starfighter, and there's missions in space/on planets. I think
that would be cool.
Alex.
--
E-mail: macfar...@altavista.net
WWW: http://www.macfarlanesmith.freeserve.co.uk/
Simon Jones
Alex Macfarlane Smith <macfar...@altavista.net> wrote:
> Personally, I'd like to see a sort of mixture of Starfighter and Elite,
> where it's sort of like Elite in space, but you can fly down to planets
> and play it like Starfighter, and there's missions in space/on planets.
> I think that would be cool.
With a non-linear storyline. Ie, it's not "do mission one". "OK, now do
mission 2". "Er...now mission 3" - that's dull.
Should have it so you start out as a trainee pilot, in the military maybe,
go through training, then given a mission depending on how well you did in
your training, do the mission. However, if you cock up the mission it isn't
just "mission failed" - it then has repurcussions on future missions. The
whole game could take place in a state of war, and a failed mission doesn't
result in the end of the game, but leads to the war turning against you.
You can gradually rise up through the ranks, commanding bigger and better
ships and eventually getting command of a squadron etc etc...
Alternatively, you can just take an Elite-role, playing a trader who's
going about his business whilst this war is going on all around.
Now *that* would be rather groovy. :)
Take an OK game (or, preferably, a really fun, groovy game), and add a
non-linear, involving storyline, and it suddenly gets *soooo* much more
involving. That's what stops SF3000 from being great - there's no story.
Nothing to make you want to find out what's going to happen next.
Simon.
* You and I are more alike than you realise.
Jon
Simon Jones <sjprod...@argonet.co.uk> wrote:
> Alternatively, you can just take an Elite-role, playing a trader who's
> going about his business whilst this war is going on all around.
Yes. Karma. Hopefully.
Jon.
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()____) ))
| acorn_.._ _ _. _| _ | http://www.acornarcade.com
| (_|| (_(_|(_|(/_ | ICQ 21129860
| the acorn games paradise | Jon Hall (S/A Reviews)
|__________________________| My views are my own
Tony Houghton
> On a (slightly) related note, after BK2 and all RPM's stuff is released,
> can we please have a break from platform games and scrolling shoot'em ups
> for a while?
What else do you suggest? They were the staples of the 16 and 8 bit
consoles apart from beat-em-ups (yuck). Sure, even the old Arcs are
capable of 3D, but along with more powerful hardware they need more
"powerful" developers, so it's no good expecting a masterpiece from
the "one man and his !Paint" sort of outfit. OK, Destiny turned out
pretty good in the end by all accounts, but it took ages and I'm sure
nobody would want to go through that for the sales it'll achieve.
Darren Salt
Tim Fountain <t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
[snip]
> From what I've seen of [BK2] (which is beta version 0.01 :-) ), it is going
> to be pretty kick ass.
That donkey must be getting sick of being kicked all of the time... ;-)
--
| Darren Salt | nr. Ashington, | Acorn | ds@youmustbejoking,demon,co,uk
| Risc PC, Spec +3, | Northumberland | Club | ds@zap,uk,eu,org ** anti-UCE
| A3010, BBC M128 | Toon Army | NE | arcsalt@spuddy,mew,co,uk
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Government agencies, spies, and secret services... you know where we live!
Simon Jones
Jon <J...@acornarcade.com> wrote:
> > Alternatively, you can just take an Elite-role, playing a trader who's
> > going about his business whilst this war is going on all around.
> Yes. Karma. Hopefully.
I can't honestly see Karma ever being released. It's a strange situation
it's in, but it seems to be dead and buried, for all outside appearances.
Even if it is being worked on, it'll take years at this rate....:-(
Still, if the programmers are reading this and are still working on it -
keep it up, 'cause it looks like it'll be great. :)
Simon.
* We're creating the future here, baby. You and me.
Edward James Donnelly
> Should have it so you start out as a trainee pilot, in the military maybe,
> go through training, then given a mission depending on how well you did in
> your training, do the mission. However, if you cock up the mission it isn't
> just "mission failed" - it then has repurcussions on future missions. The
> whole game could take place in a state of war, and a failed mission doesn't
> result in the end of the game, but leads to the war turning against you.
>
> You can gradually rise up through the ranks, commanding bigger and better
> ships and eventually getting command of a squadron etc etc...
>
> Alternatively, you can just take an Elite-role, playing a trader who's
> going about his business whilst this war is going on all around.
>
> Now *that* would be rather groovy. :)
I like, I like. It'd be even better if you could play it like I play
elite, i.e. stuff trade, lets go and beat up some fer-de-lance's for
being rich. If it's in a war, you could start unattached, then work for
one side for a while, then get lured away for extra cash to the other,
whereupon the first side goes hell for leather to kill you etc etc. It's
great in a game when you start to feel persecuted! The stories could
divide on whether or not you keep swapping sides: if you do it too
often, it could get so that neither want you and you have to become a
free agent, leading your own group of rebels against the two sides,
pinching their weapons/money/resources/women in lightning fast attacks,
building up slowly until the last pitched battle. Now all it needs is
for someone to write it....
Ed
Simon Jones
Yeah.
What you need are a few - not necessarily programmers - writers to help
with the plot, the dialogue, the story, the 'missions', the universe, the
history, the characters etc... and some extremely talented programmers to
carry it out.
Simon.
* You do this for me and I swear I will never ask you for anything ever again. Until the next time.
Richard Goodwin
> If it's in a war, you could start unattached, then work for
> one side for a while, then get lured away for extra cash to the other,
> whereupon the first side goes hell for leather to kill you etc etc. It's
> great in a game when you start to feel persecuted! The stories could
> divide on whether or not you keep swapping sides: if you do it too
> often, it could get so that neither want you and you have to become a
> free agent
Ever seen the film "Yojimbo"? :) (remade as "Last Man Standing",
"Fistful of Dollars" etc.) If you're good enough then you'll get hired,
but it doesn't necessarily stop your new comrades from wanting to stab
you in the back... ooh, the posibilties are endless! :)
Cheers,
Rich.
--
_ _________________________________
/_| _ _. _ /| /_ _/_ /' Richard Goodwin - my views only.
/ || (_|(_)/ |/(/_/_ / mailto:ric...@goodwin.uk.com
________ (_) ___________./ http://www.goodwin.uk.com/richard/
Trust No One
Edward James Donnelly
>
> Ever seen the film "Yojimbo"?
Seen it? Hell, I can't even SAY it!
Ed
Edward James Donnelly
First off, the conversions are fine in and of themselves. They are
generally only the best games from the other side, and they are old
enough that they can be tweaked (anyone see South Park this weekend -
Tweak's the best character in it!) a little and made better than their
predecessors on other platforms. That's all well and good, and I am glad
that its being done, but it doesn't help Acorn Computers in the outside
world. What would help is a kick ass conversion of a game like Golgotha.
If we could have a version that was obviously better than either a PC or
Mac version, people may just nod in our direction for once.
This shrinking and fast thing has developed into what people reckon
would be an ideal game, i.e. an Elite/SF3000 cross. Why doesn't everyone
write in to suggest what should be in the ultimate game? If we can
thrash out a game and plot between us, the actual people who have to
write it might feel a bit more comfortable, knowing that they are doing
what people want. I have no idea how to program - I gave up after the
game I wrote on my old Electron crashed if you did anything at all - but
I know what I like in a game. For instance, while it may be argued that
Birds of War is much better than Chocks Away, I for one wish I had never
bought it. Every missions the same - I go out, fail to do what I am
supposed to then crash on landing, whereas Chocks away is one of the
four or five best Acorn games ever, even though it hasn't got as much
depth.
This group represents a fair section of the people who would buy games
for an Acorn, so if players and programmers together we can sort out the
best game imaginable we might be able to do something with it. This
said, I bet now that I have written this, no one will reply leaving me
highly embarrassed, but I some of us can make the effort, maybe the
future is not as bleak as it looks. Apathy is the enemy!
Ed
Keith Mckillop
Smith wrote:
> In article <48d78d...@markgf.demon.co.uk>, Tim Fountain
> <URL:mailto:t...@markgf.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> [snip]
>>
>> can we please have a break from platform games and scrolling shoot'em ups
>> for a while?
>>
> Personally, I'd like to see a sort of mixture of Starfighter and Elite,
> where it's sort of like Elite in space, but you can fly down to planets
> and play it like Starfighter, and there's missions in space/on planets. I
> think that would be cool.
Keith Mckillop
wrote:
> In article <990220...@arcade.demon.co.uk>, k...@arcade.demon.co.uk
> (Keith Mckillop) wrote:
>> Hey, I've just had a great idea to stimulate the Acorn games market!
>> Set a competition to create the best home-grown game on the Acorn
>> scene (has to be previously unannounced, to make it fair for everyone).
> I get the feeling you've got a kick ass game unannounced Keith. :-)
>> Prize: 2000UKP, or equivalent in the best hardware
>> The deadline would have to be something like: 1st Jan 2000.
> I can't see why a digital decoder company would want to get involved
> in this compo! However Tau Press would sell more adverts in a bumper
> competition issue. A couple of extra full colour page adverts and
> you'd soon get some prize money. The Booker is about 10,000 though
> I don't think more than 1000 is needed here.
> It would certainly benefit all involved!
> But I'd question your dates given your conditions, we all know if
> people aim to get a game out for 1st Jan they will probably miss the
> deadline by months.
> Also unless you allow Botkiller2, ID, TEK you're going to make it a
> farce. Simply allow all home grown games this year to include
> themeselves in a running list for the competion. At first you'd mostly
> just have titles each one an entry number and all the mystery if anyone
> can take on Artex. Dare I say it might even be a handy fall back story
> for Alistair when he's pushed to fill copy in the quiet months. :-)
something they've completed before the competition is even announced is
slightly cheating, although it does encourage people to work harder to try to
beat ID :)
And if Alasdair can put a little mention in the next AU for anyone willing to
organise such a competition...
Keith Mckillop
> In article <990220...@arcade.demon.co.uk>,
>> In message <36CD688C...@durham.ac.uk>, "N.A.Atkinson" wrote:
>>> R-Comp Interactive (RCI) wrote:
>>>>
>>>> And before you stop me and say "who?", I'd draw your attention to the
>>>> demos on the month's AU CD - why the &%*& don't these guys do
>>>> something productive with all that raw, oozing talent.
>>>
>>> Because: a) They don't have time.
>>> b) Where is the support for the years it may take to do a game.
>>> c) Not that easy to get decent gameplay.
>>> d) Most of the demos were to be entered to win a Phoebe which is
>>> an advantage over earning a 100 quid writing an Acorn game.
>>
>> a competition to create the best home-grown game on the Acorn scene
>> (has to be previously unannounced, to make it fair for everyone).
>> with the next-gen ARM chip prehaps?)
> Are you going to donate the 2000 quid Keith?
> [1] Speaking of which, is AW 99 likely to happen at all? Will there
> *ever* be another AW show in London?
> Hope so!
Might be able to make it to Wakefield though. I hope...
Keith Mckillop
> In article <990220...@arcade.demon.co.uk>,
> Keith Mckillop <k...@arcade.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>> then why shouldn't they do something similar for the games scene? I'm
>> sure it would work...
> Er...except they *didn't* provide a Phoebe in the end, did they?
> Count Acorn - sorry, *Element 14* (how amusing sci-fi is that???) - out
> of the entire Acorn scene, if I were you.
> Although good idea overall.
:)
Robin Williams
to put anyone down or to rubbish ideas.
On Wed, 24 Feb 1999, James Donnelly <lau9...@rdg.ac.uk> wrote:
>What would help is a kick ass conversion of a game like Golgotha.
>If we could have a version that was obviously better than either a PC or
>Mac version, people may just nod in our direction for once.
Yes, if only it were possible to compete with the PC gaming scene...
Seriously, there are a lot of good PC games out there which leave our
Acorn games stunned in their wake. Like my posting to csa.misc, I think
us Acorn fans should focus our programming and game designing talents on
our own games rather than attempting to rival PC games. There is a huge
potential from our Acorn programmers, except there seems to be no way
of efficiently harnessing them. Yet.
VoTI is an excellent example of original and fresh design, since they
can produce quality games with superb gameplay without worrying about PC
gamers laughing at them.
Then again I could be horribly mistaken- no doubt someone will interpret
the Acorn game scene in their own manner.
>This shrinking and fast thing has developed into what people reckon
>would be an ideal game, i.e. an Elite/SF3000 cross. Why doesn't everyone
>write in to suggest what should be in the ultimate game?
An excellent idea! This is a call for *all* lurkers to post to this NG for
once!
Mine would be a Quake/Angband type game. Although this might be fun there
is certainity that ppl will begin to send in riddiculous ideas like:
'I wanna a Quake style Grand Theft Auto game based on Theme Hospital with
characters from South Park....'
I expect this would be quite enjoyable to find out how imaginative we
are....
> ...whereas Chocks away is one of the four or five best Acorn games ever...
Amen. IMHO, CA was a cool game that even though was fast, it's graphics-
well lets just say I haven't exactly boasted about them to my PC friends.
The point is we now not only have the hardware that can handle extremely
good graphics, we also have the programmers to get a game working and also
the designers and writers who would give the visual and audio elements of
that game the background it demands, or deserves.
>This group represents a fair section of the people who would buy games
>for an Acorn, so if players and programmers together we can sort out the
>best game imaginable we might be able to do something with it.
Within our friendly Acorn community, the programmers have IMO kept close
contacts with their players. However, there has never been a project were
ordinary players have designed a game and the programmers are the ones who
follow up. From a player's point of view this would be like, dare I say it,
a dream come true. From a programmer's point of view this would be not only
daunting but also reassuring since they would know that after 2 years of
coding ppl would actually buy the game. This idea of active
player-programmer development is a sound idea.
>This said, I bet now that I have written this, no one will reply leaving me
>highly embarrassed, but I some of us can make the effort, maybe the
>future is not as bleak as it looks.
Well, I've replied- if anyone finds it of use. You have raised quite a few
interesting and thought-provoking comments which should eject a bit more
life into this NG.
>Apathy is the enemy!
Hmm, I thought Bill was....:-)
Cheers,
Chris
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