Cyningstan

@cyningstan
930 Followers
306 Following
1.6K Posts
Developing #retrogames for the #ibmpc of the early 1980s running #msdos and featuring #cga graphics. Turn-based strategy, puzzle and RPG! Fun in all four colours. With a fondness for Sinclair #zxspectrum and #psion handhelds too.
Webhttp://dos.cyningstan.org.uk/
Itchhttps://cyningstan.itch.io/
Kofihttps://ko-fi.com/cyningstan
The table is a major obstacle to movement. Units can see and fire across it, but it blocks movement; units must move around it. Tables are always placed such that there is a path around them. https://cyningstan.itch.io/star-cadre-combat-class
"It's Been A Labour Of Love" - 81-Year-Old Developer Colin Porch On The 'Head Over Heels' Sequel That Took 37 Years To Arrive. (Image: @itvnews)

"It's Been A Labour Of Love" -...
"It's Been A Labour Of Love" - 81-Year-Old Developer Colin Porch On The 'Head Over Heels' Sequel That Took 37 Years To Arrive

"It's my wits against the person who's going to be playing it"

Time Extension
Conveyors level 4 brings a helpful guard like those on level 2. The guard picks up one card and places it on a conveyor belt each turn. You have a single robot to take all four cards to their card readers. While there's no panic like in level 2, you still want to get a move on to help your score. You can get #TeamDroid from https://cyningstan.itch.io/team-droid #ibmpc #msdos #cga
Chairs are minor obstacles randomly distributed around the location. It takes an extra action point to step over them. Chairs are never placed in corridors. https://cyningstan.itch.io/star-cadre-combat-class
In The Anarchic Kingdom, the buildings and characters on a barony screen are a visual representation of that barony's stats. The better a barony is doing, the more impressive they look. https://cyningstan.itch.io/the-anarchic-kingdom #anarchickingdom #ibmpc #msdos #cga
And when you blank out an area or fill it with a pattern that's not a stored bitmap, you have to vary that too, because when you're inverting pixels, what's "clear" becomes "filled". But I've been playing with the feature and have it figured out enough that hopefully it'll be a feature of my next game. I might even backport it to some of the previous games too if I like it enough.
Ever since I saw this Q&A about "LCD mode" I've wanted to implement it in my games. My #hp100lx has the feature built in, but some #msdos #cga portables like the Amstrad PPC and the Psion MC don't. But I realised it's more complex than just inverting all the graphics as you load them. You have to make sure, for instance, that you don't invert software sprite masks, since they're working on logic rather than just aesthetics. https://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/305318/what-was-lcd-cga-graphics-mode
What was "LCD CGA" graphics mode?

In the old DOS game Total Eclipse, you can select from various graphics modes at the beginning. One of them was CGA: ... but one of them was so-called "LCD CGA": Was this just their way of saying ...

Arqade
Level 3 of Conveyors goes back to the dual chamber theme, with a one-way conveyor belt journey between them. But this time there's a robot in each chamber, so the robot in one chamber can start sending the data cards down to the robot in the other. It's possible that the first robot's work is complete before the second one makes a start. You can get #TeamDroid from https://cyningstan.itch.io/team-droid #ibmpc #msdos #cga
Your empire might be bounded by the sea. The sea is completely impassable to your armies, but any port city will bring in 3 gold from sea trade for each adjacent sea square, in addition to that raised by taxes. Save the empire from the #Barbarians by downloading the game from https://cyningstan.itch.io/barbarians-dos #ibmpc #msdos #cga
Walls surround the mission level and separate rooms and corridors from one another. They are impassable and block line of sight. Occasionally a large room will have a single pillar which is tactically useful. https://cyningstan.itch.io/star-cadre-combat-class