itch.io

Its ok, it didn't take me too long to figure it out and it could easily have been a real bug.

It's not unreasonable to be suspicious about bugs as there have been plenty of bugs that I needed to fix (some game breaking).

Glad you are enjoying it, make sure you play the latest version (v1.3) to avoid any of the bugs I have fixed.

The dynamite has a blast radius which will damage the player if you get too close.

Are you standing next to the dynamite when it explodes or have you moved away?

Thankyou, if you can give me some more detail I can try and figure out the bug.

Is this on the lava level?

Do you lose a life from where you place the dynamite or is there something specific about placing dynamite a second time? There is an ideal order to place the dynamite to finish the level, you can get stuck if you do it in the wrong order.

Thankyou and nice to see it running on real hardware.

There is no required theme for the entries themselves but they are constrained by the hardware they must be able to run on.

All the entries must run on the Amstrad CPC 464 microcomputer.

If you are looking for a theme there is an optional gesture detailed in the rules that could be used for inspiration.

In what I think might be becoming a tradition the deadline on itch.io and the one listed in the rules are not the same.

In the official rules it says:

3rd November 2023 23:59 UTC+1

However on itch it says:

2rd November 2023 23:00 UTC+0

I completely missed your post. Thanks I really appreciate it.

You are probably right that it is a bit harder (I am good at the game so have difficulty being objective about this), this wasn't intentional apart from adding a timer.

Is there anything that specifically makes the game such as the timer, spikes, enemies, etc or is it some combination of everything?

I do plan on updating the game (just like last year) to address the bugs (v1.1) and address the difficulty (without redesigning the levels) and a few features I didn't get to originally (v1.2).

Thanks, colourful is definitely one of my aims for the graphics.

Nice to know someone noticed the green mode, as I have a GT64 I like to be able to support it even if it is true that not many people would actually play in green.

The official site and itch have two slightly different deadlines.

On the official site it says: 2 Nov 23:59 UTC+1

On itch.io it says: 1 Nov 23:00 UTC+0

Was the wrong date put on itch resulting it being one day out from the official site?

After all when time is running out every day counts :).

Your welcome. With all the changes together it should be a bit easier to finish then the original v1.0.

I can confirm I have recently played the game from start to finish on brutal in one sitting without losing a life :). However that took many attempts and I had the advantage of a lot of practice.

I hope you can make it all the way through the 10 levels, some of them are quite difficult but level 4 should be easier than level 3.

Some things that might help you:

- Using jump in the water makes you go up faster than only using the up key.

- If there is a spike there should be some way to line yourself up to ensure you don't take any damage.

- Don't try to rush too much as its far easier to make mistakes but of course you can't go too slowly because of oxygen.

You get to decide what it means to complete the game, it could be finish each level individually on easy and making use of checkpoints and level codes, or playing from start to finish on the hardest difficulty. Each is valid, I'm just happy for the game to be played :).

Having update the game a few times in v1.3 there is now some animations for player walking, jumping and enemies turning around.

I have updated the game to version 1.1 with a number of bug fixes as well as making the game slightly easier. I have kept v1.0 available because I don't see much reason not to but v1.1 is the version to play.

Change Log for v1.1 (Build 525)

- Fixed memory corruption crash from stopping Arkos sound outside an interrupt.
- Make sure you cannot go above top of screen.
- Combined shoot and use to a single control.
- Moved spike near top left entrance of middle right room to make room transition easier on second level.
- Expanded the right most wall in the centre middle room to make room boundary clearer on second level.
- Removed spike near bottom right room entrance on the intro level to make room change easier.
- Made centre middle exit more obvious on the intro level to make room change easier.
- Entrance to bottom mid room is now normal water on valves level to prevent instant death.
- Fixed clipping through solid blocks underwater.
- Added additional health to the game to make it slightly easier to play.
- Fixed water boosting just off block bug.
- Improved boost pixel off bug fix when water at top of screen.
- Fixed bug where a tile can be drawn seemingly randomly on screen due to a futureYTile value of 255 (-1).
- Fixed bug where a valve could be used multiple times to cheat valve objective action count.

Thanks I appreciate it (I did mean to respond to your other post but I didn't get around to it). Yeah I can see the resemblance to New Zealand Story, its not a game I know well but it is clearly one I should look into more. Perhaps a case of parallel inspiration. Feel free to let me know about any bugs as I am working on some updates. Currently the game has 9 levels some of which are quite challenging. 

My plan is to release v1.1 to fix a few bugs (in the next day or two) and make it slightly easier (added some health and fixed a movement bug). 

Following that will be v1.2 which hopefully will have an extra level (I planned for 10 but ran out of time in the end), respond to some suggestions (eg enemies don't turn around) and find a way to make the game a bit easier (probably with an extra difficulty level to keep the game challenging for people who like it hard).

Thanks, I tried to avoid too much in the way of pixel perfect jumps and movement (I may not have succeeded fully but hopefully close).

Thanks Arnaud glad you like it, Yes it was suggested it might be a little bit too difficulty.

I think adding some extra health or some slightly easier difficulty modes but help.

This is what v1.1 is for or maybe v1.2 depending on the bug fixes that I need to do.

Thanks, animations are definitely something I should be looking into for future.

Hopefully each year there should be something I can do better on or improve.

Thanks, I'll be sure to tell the composer of the music.

Thanks for the video, it is always interesting to see other people play your own games (especially after playing it so much myself). I hope you figured out where to go next.

Thanks, I haven't played Bruce Lee although I think I've seen videos of it (not sure what platform).

The games that originally inspired me were Caves of Doom and Scubaventure, possibly slightly obscure choices but it worked for me :).

Just thought I should check as it looks like the deadline counting down here on itch.io is 2021-11-02 00:00 UTC instead of 2021-11-02 23:59 UTC+1 as in the rules\cpcretrodev website.

Almost a whole day is a significant amount of time for anyone rapidly running out of time to complete their game for submission.

Is this just an oversight on itch.io rather than an earlier deadline expected then the one in the rules?

There isn't really a theme, you can basically do whatever you want.

You are encouraged to include a gesture to Rainbow Islands, this could be used to influence your design or it could be a simple inclusion in the game.

Your main constraint is that the game must run on the Amstrad CPC 464 rather than a thematic one.

Rainbow Islands is an arcade conversion by Ocean.

https://www.cpc-power.com/index.php?page=detail&num=1751

A gesture generally means incorporating something in your game related to Rainbow Islands such as a sprite or a recognisable level feature.

It is open to your creativity and generally fairly flexible as long as you can show it in a screenshot and explain what it is (doesn't need to be longer than a sentence).