
Your Pico-8 just got down to business.
The full-featured, high-precision spreadsheet application for the Pico-8 that nobody asked for has finally arrived! PicoCalc is a feature-complete1 clone of the 1979 classic VisiCalc, which introduced the world to an entirely new category of business application. Steve Jobs said of VisiCalc, it's "what really drove -- propelled -- the Apple ][ to the success it achieved."

PicoCalc does everything* VisiCalc can do, with some enhancements over the Apple ][ classic:
- 18.18 integer/fractional precision vs. VisiCalc's 12.
Handles numbers as big as 999999999999999999.999999999999999999 - Granular error reporting!
Get informed of division by zero, number overflow, and more. - Multi-color representation of active/inactive cursor, locked titles, truncated values, and error messages
- Save and load your work




The Quest for the Perfect PICO-8 handheld
Ever since PICO-8 was created people have longed for a physical form of what is still a fantasy console.
On my long quest for the perfect PICO-8 handheld I've owned no less than six handhelds (plus experiments with iPhones and DIY Pi Zero solutions). Until I finally reached the handheld endgame with the Waveshare GPM280. Here's my take on all of them:
Name | Pros | Cons |
---|---|---|
PocketChip | Officially supported by Zep | Terrible keyboard, unplayable game controls |
" | Screen is pixel-perfect (with a bit of border) | Really bulky |
" | Hacker vibes | Unfinished look |
" | No sound | |
" | Not enough perf for demanding carts | |
Clockwork Pi | Good performance | Bulky |
" | Good controls | Low rez plastic screen that scratches easily |
" | Nice OS | Need to assemble |
" | Video driver issues | |
GPi Case | Great build quality | Pi 0 doesn't have enough perf even for 30 fps carts |











Hi,
on a Mac (Big Sur) I did some experiments with drawing a 3D starfield using lines.
However, PICO-8 regularly crashes completely (play around with the 6 buttons for the star speed in all 3 directions) and a debug with lldb on the Mac terminal uncovered the following:

So there seems to be a problem in 0.2.2 with line drawing somewhere.
I hope this can be fixed for the upcoming 0.2.2b
- Martin




I don't have the ability to make games but I have some ideas.
1: Dad Jokes. The game would give you random dad jokes and whoever knows the most gets the high score! Basic game but still a fun concept.
2: this one will either sound dumb or stupid or both, but ill shoot. A squirrel simulator? it's always funny to watch them miserably fail or succeed in raiding bird feeders. So why not make a game where u are the squirrel? Birdfeeders could be levels or something... again idk how this sounds.
Just some ideas. thnx.

I made a very simple FPS controller as a sort of example cart to build off of. This is just to get you going, as opposed to a full framework around which to build a full game. Hopefully it serves as a good jumping off point for someone to make something fun.
It uses player 2's ESDF controls for moving around and SPACE for jumping.

EDIT: Here's a very heavily commented version! Probably way more comments than usually necessary, but it's intended to help you learn, rather than just briefly annotate what's happening in the code.







There's something weird going on here; using ..= along with a single-line if-then-end statement causes a syntax error that makes no sense:
syntax error line 16 (tab 0) if x<2 then bad..="1" end ')' expected near 'end' |
I've included 4 similar test cases that don't trigger this bug
My pico-8 version is 0.2.2 (stat(5)==30)


Turtle Time
A Puzzle Game
You need to bring all of the turtles to their houses. Careful, though: you may only move a turtle once before it hides in its shell.
Controls
Use the left and right arrows to select a turtle, and press Z to select it. Press Z to de-select too.
Once a turtle is selected, press any direction to move the turtle.
Press X to restart the level.
NOTE: ALL LEVELS HAVE BEEN TESTED AND ARE POSSIBLE
Version 1.1 Update
Added a level and moves counter.



The Porcelain of Sisyphus is the zen ocd music art germ game of 2021! Enjoy a li'l hell.
Featuring awesome musical stylings of @yeenmachine
Hold down ❎ to bleach the culture, 🅾️ to display the title (and sprinkle more grody pixels on the porcelain).


Making my own tiny, tile based version of SuperHot. Here's the prototype!
Arrows for movement
Z/C to use weapon if equiped. Otherwise punches
X to pick up weapon. Later, you will be able to throw them too.
S to skip a turn.
When you go past the top of the screen, you will be sent to the start. Later versions are planned to update the room when you exit it.
Bullets don't do anything yet since I haven't had enough time to do that yet(remote learning. Ughh.) Punching doesn't do anything either. One enemy is at the end of the room, but, once again, does not do anything. You can go through him if you want. I do want to keep working on this. Let me know what you think!

Current Build!
I've added music and sound effects!
This is working a lot more how I want it to. Still want to clean some things up and I'll need to get some playtesting in order to nail down a lot of the numbers, but this is a lot more like what I'm hoping the game to be.
Gather fuel before you run out! Fuel drains over time plus rushing uses even more fuel!
Arrow keys to move
X to "rush"
If you do try the game:
How does moving feel?
Did you use the Rush mechanic much? Did the cost feel too much or too little?
Was the fuel a good motivator and did it seem too harsh or too forgiving?
Other thoughts?
old builds:


I wanted a nice simple menu system for pico-8 so I decided to recreate an old UI I made ages ago in Flash (my game Red Rogue uses it).
The Cardinal Menu only uses arrow keys to navigate. The menu is made of branches. Each item in a branch points to either a string (providing a description panel), a function in your code, a new branch, or nothing (disabled).
The purpose of this system is to make it as fast as possible to build a menu and add options.
In the demo you can see what each option does and there's a demonstration of an inventory system.
The menu system alone is 712 tokens.
This is about as basic I could make it without adding too much noise to the code, but I welcome suggestions for improvements and optimisations.
