Generates a random star system on load. Sometimes it generates one without a nebula at all so you may need to Cmd/Ctrl+R to reset if that happens.
My first Pico 8 cart on the BBS. This is a cart that generates a procgen starfield with nebulae, that you can scroll through (256x256 pixel size).
The big technical achievement is the nebula. I used fractal noise with smoothing to generate the data, where every point is a 2x2 pixel area. After that I stored every row of colors as runs containing the byte length for that color and the color data. When drawing the screen I go through the runs of color, using memset to fill in the pixels which makes the dithering pretty easy, doing two rows of pixels on screen at the same time by flipping the pattern for odd numbered rows.
The really tricky part was the scrolling, particularly in the X direction, because the patterns break if the camera X coordinate is odd and not even. To fix that I draw it as if it were 1 pixel to the left with the pattern flipped, then take the last 2x2 pixel area for a run, and copy the next run's right side pattern into the right side of the 2x2 area. That fixes the one pixel offset without too much of a performance penalty. I didn't fix artifacts along the edges of the screen and instead just lazy draw a black rectangle over it.
I also used a monochrome hue ramp for this because it lets me do some other cool effects, like the blinking stars. The little one pixel stars also dim when they go behind the nebula, and dim more when behind the purple sections.
Finally I wanted to add random noise like described in the linked article, but with scrolling I couldn't really forego cls(). What I wound up doing was trying to add a few random points every frame to a table, and only keeping the last 200, removing the oldest at the start of the table first, as well as removing any that are offscreen.
5 comments
We've all been there. Trying out some boffo new game and just being so green and jealous of the awesome music in it.
Well if you didn't know I'm actually pretty good at music and writing custom database software. How will this help you ? If you or someone can point me or direct me to a utility that can take MIDI and break it out to a text file, I will definitely see myself to making everyone a utility that can take this raw MIDI .TXT file and convert it straight to binary import MUSIC for Pico-8.
They both share similar methods of playback. MIDI uses onboard instruments to play their notes and PICO uses the same, but with a rather conservative list of instruments - a conversion could be and can be made.
And no, I'm no slouch at this sort of thing. Years ago there was a company called "American Church Lists."
My job there was to write a database that would keep track of all the churches in the world. The data they had stored originally was a real hectic mess. I was to write a program to organize that data and put it in a neat format where it could be easily output on the printer and used for mailing out religion-based advertisements.
So ... help me find (I know it's out there) that nice utility to convert any .MID to a .TXT file and I'll write a program to convert that for direct PICO playing. I know I can do this, I've seen the SOUND and MUSIC format of PICO. It's not so bad if you look just at the straight hexadecimal data.
And something we do NOT have lacking in the world is MIDI music. Myself alone I know I have pretty close to 11,000 if you add up all the ones from my MIDI directories that are ripped from video games, cartoon/anime themes, show tunes, movie tunes, the legendary music of Final Fantasy, everything from Squaresoft, every possible gaming platform, and other original tunes, I think you can see we will never run out of good music - ever.
And I'd like to help in that ...
5 comments
NEW BUILD:
an #AGBIC jam entry based on a cart of the same title.
still unfinished, this description is a placeholder as well.
missing Dr. Mario/Yoshi's Cookie-like cutscenes, title screen & music, but still very playable.
features finished:
- options screen
- some music
- complete 1P/2P gameplay
features missing:
- cutscenes
- title screen
(CC) 2018 Adrian Makes Games.
1 comment
A demo by Jumalauta. Participated in the demo compo at the JML 18 years anniversary demoparty, won first place.
Might not work properly with Chrome, there may be some sync errors and glitches. Should work consistently with Edge. Cart works just fine in the PICO-8 application itself, of course.
UPDATE: Now fixed for 0.1.12! Which means it won't run correctly in older versions anymore, since it depends on time() for sync.
17 comments
WARNING! SET YOUR SOUND TO LOW BEFORE PLAYING!
I cant understand why its so loud (in sound editor 1 and 2 sound levels are used), pls help if u can =(
1 comment
I am thoroughly confused at this:
cls()
print(stat(0))
a=""
for i=0,8191 do
a=a.."*"
end
print(stat(0))
a={}
print(stat(0))
for i=0,8191 do
a[i]=255
end
print(stat(0))
|
If I'm reading this correctly, a numeric array of the same length as a string takes far less space ?
In fact what's really weird is if you run it a few times, the last STAT says 2048, matching the others instead of the 62.8115 - but the string maintains at 2048.
Which takes more space ... and why ?
6 comments
Uncompressed Source Code: https://paste.ee/p/5KOG5 (warning: it's pretty gross)
Late last year (2017) I started work on a port of Super Mario Bros [NES] to Pico-8. The goal was to be authentic as possible to the original game, while working within the Pico-8 limitations. Something like Super Mario Bros Deluxe [GBC] (https://www.mariowiki.com/Super_Mario_Bros._Deluxe).
In the end I was able to get 1-1 and 1-2 mostly complete before starting to hit serious memory limits which make it seem near impossible to ship the full game.
42 comments
I accidentally clicked out of Pico 8 without saving my changes to my game. I found the back up file, how can I restore it?
Thank you.
7 comments
My machine has 2 audio devices that I switch between by changing the default audio device (via control panel -> sound -> playback on Win7) & I've noticed that while most running applications & 'modern' games pick up on the change without having to restart them, Pico-8 does not.
I know this is a pretty niche request & it's not a big deal to be honest, but redetecting them on a focus change or what have you would be a nice quality of life improvement for that one guy who does this ever (i.e me).
Thanks!
6 comments
Yep, me up on a soap box again. Once again, yes, requesting features.
But now that I've had a good long 2-years to work in this language, I think my requests are a little bit closer to home. Some are even bugs I've come across. Hopefully ZEP will see this.
- [1]
If you press CTRL+F to search for something in the IDE, if it's in a TAB that you are not in, it cannot be found. Example:
pico-8 cartridge // http://www.pico-8.com
version 16
__lua__
function main()
cls()
star("hello")
end
-->8
function star(t)
print("** "..t.." **")
end
main()
|
save this as a .P8. Load it up. Notice that the function star is in a 2nd tab. Now, if you were in the first tab and searched for "N STAR" which would be the "FUNCTION STAR()" it will not be found. This could be a problem when someone loads a game written by another and they want to track the functions that make it work.
0 comments
A remake of the classic computer puzzle game LaserTank for PICO-8, for the Demake jam.
Includes a hand-picked collection of 50 levels from the original game. I think I'll have to make a multicart version to include more levels.
I haven't implemented all the physcis quirks (bugs) of the original game, but I don't think any of the included levels rely on them to be solved. At least I hope not.
4 comments
Update: text background color support
Update: some debug features..
Update: 'help' function and basic error handling
If you enter "Connect 123456" where 123456 is a THREAD ID, it will try to connect to that cart.
Please only use valid BBS locations.
To test your pico-8 BBS terminal emulator, try going to 55648
And to test a simple cart 'bbs' that accepts input, try out 55941
Next up is going to be a CNS -- Cart Name Server -- to store registered BBS cart locations you can connect to.
NOTE: From my testing, this should work in the desktop version of pico8. But it's pretty buggy on the forum so far. I'm thinking it has to do with how the web player in the forum handles some of the keyboard input differently vs in the desktop version of pico8.
3 comments
256-colors, really REALLY ??
No, not really. Not in PICO-8 anyways.
Well, if you squint your eyes it sorta works. But that's really not good enough.
Now when I did something like this on the Apple ][+ years ago I had very favorable results.
- [1] it extended the resolution from 280-pixels across to 560.
- [2] There was very little flicker. Almost perfect. I wrote a 6502 machine-language routine to do it.
- [3] I even sat down and wrote a silly little Applesoft word-processor in it to demonstrate.
- [4] Apple was interested in how I did it so I wrote an article explaining my coding.
And as this cart is "presumably" running at 60fps, I'm not sure why it isn't just a comfortable blur the eyes can't see the flicker.
Maybe ... maybe if this truly is 60fps it needs 120fps to blend perfectly so the human eye cannot detect it ? Any chance of a [b]FLIP(60) and [b]FLIP(120) ZEP
15 comments
The Conductor's train went off the rails near the desolate plains of Ash Town, so Hat Kid has returned to the planet to make sure her friends are okay, and to find a mysterious relic! Grab all 30 time pieces in this short platformer, based on the game A Hat in Time!
Arrow Keys: Walk
Z: Jump
X: Hookshot (when near a hook)
This fangame was created for #DEMAKEJAM. All characters and music are recreated homages to content in the original game. Buy A Hat in Time here: https://store.steampowered.com/app/253230/A_Hat_in_Time/
33 comments
Hi,
I'm reinstalling my Picade machine (powered by a Raspberry Pi 3). I'm a total noob with Linux/raspberry so I just bought the SD card containing NOOBS from Pimoroni, which automatically installed Raspbian. I then added a "pico8" drawer in which I dropped the pico-8 files for raspberry. Seems ok, I can launch Pico8 with the pico8/pico8 command line, except for a problem: my keyboard is stuck in qwerty mode within Pico-8. Is there a way to switch it to azerty? I changed the locales on raspbian and the keyset is indeed azerty everywhere except Pico-8. Any idea?
0 comments
Many of the games in PICO involve a player shooting at a target. I mention strafing several times and I think some of you are not understanding what I mean.
Here is a good example of strafing. Hold down the firing button and you will see that you fire in the last direction you moved.
HOWEVER, as long as the firing button is held, despite moving in any other direction the firing direction remains the same - until you let go of the firing button. This is called STRAFING.
This makes it a lot easier to avoid incoming enemy fire yet still continue to fire in the same direction at your desired target.
This example also demonstrates staggered shooting. If you hit the button manually, you can fire faster than if you just hold it down. This is optional but may reward the player to have quicker response by manually hitting the button rather than relying on autofire.
This program also shows effectively how to use three fairly advanced commands:
+ ADD
11 comments
About 2-years ago I wrote a program called, "Fireball." While it had a great effect in igniting the screen, today for my code I don't want it to ignite everything.
So here is a smarter version, that only ignites only the pixels I tell it to, in this case, leaving the text intact but still leaving a very active and flaming fireball trail behind.
Can you think of a way to improve the code without having to write a manual "circle" routine as it does now ? Please let me know !
To see the original program go HERE:
11 comments
Outside of the T.R.S. 80 Model I, Level I, I can't think of any BASIC language that would not let you use a double-sized array.
Here it is in BLITZ:
Global a[8,8]
For i=0 To 7
For j=0 To 7
a[j,i]=15
Next
Next
|
Here is my attempt for PICO:
a={}
for i=0,7 do
for j=0,7 do
a[j,i]=15
end
end
|
Is there a way to do this in PICO ?
9 comments
Well after several hours later, I have managed to take "Mildew's Haunted House" and turn it into "Mildew's Manor."
In addition I have fixed the high-score saving by using CARTDATA() instead of CSTORE().
It is still of concern to me that current PICO-8 is limited now to 256-bytes whereas earlier versions allowed you to have up to 8192 using CSTORE().
A discussion for this can be found HERE:
https://www.lexaloffle.com/bbs/?tid=31608
If you want to see animated screen shots and additional instructions for this game, there are 2 links:
https://www.lexaloffle.com/bbs/?tid=27999
https://www.lexaloffle.com/bbs/?tid=27942
To see Haunted House initial animation cart (which is not used now), go HERE:
https://www.lexaloffle.com/bbs/?tid=27925
If you have any questions about this game, feel free to let me know.
Now that I've finished all the tedious stuff and lab 
work, I can get to work on what I want to.
4 comments
