"Betelgeuse" TD shooter (NES restrictions)

[winged doom]

Seems like you've got it except perhaps for the HUD. Great work!

Thank you! =)



HUD! Not sure that I make it right :D

[Cyangmou]

HUD means "Head Up Display"
The name implies that it's above your head.
It's called after the place where it should be positioned.
If you position it at the bottom of the screen, the readability will suffer a lot.

[coffee]

Plenty of games where the HUD isn't at the top or it's spread over the screen. If the readability changes it's because of habit. And no it's not called "Head up display" because it's over your head, it's named after the HUDs in Jets. Where you have a transparent board of information right in front of you face so you don't have to look down at the instruments to see important information. "up" is implied therefore, as to not look down.



following the proper idea of a HUD would be something like this then:


If you look in the middle of the playing area and then look top and back, then bottom and back it will take you just the same amount of time to do it. And to be honest it doesn't bother me at all the HUD being down there, Kasumi probably just ment that it usually is top and have been in NES games, but it most definitely have some other reason, probably where it "collides" with less things.

Anyhow, Very nice job!

[Kasumi]

I just meant it wasn't arranged for 16x16 boundaries/standard tile boundaries, I take no issue with its positioning or appearance. It's fine at the bottom. That's where lots of games put it. (Super Mario Bros. 3, Gimmick, Kirby's Adventure, Panic Restaurant etc.)

Anyway, you're pretty much fine now, winged doom. You have more than 256 unique tiles, though. (I didn't check that before.) But only one more (you have 257), not including the HUD. You also have two different zeroes. (One on the left of the tile edge, one on the right.)

Edit: Actually, you don't have more than 256. I checked the lazy man's way which ignores possible same tiles that share a palette.  The solid green tiles and solid gray tiles are the same (just using a different palette), and I'm sure there are other things like that. That said, I have no idea how many you have, because I don't have a good way to check for that stuff. If including the HUD (and the other numbers the HUD will require) you have less than 256, you're totally good. If the HUD pushes it over, you might want to make it not occupy the same lines as the main level. (Right now it's on the same row as what looks like a door from the main map.) There's a way to swap to another set of 256 tiles mid screen, (Kirby's Adventure does it), but it would affect everything on the row.

tl;dr, You're good.

[winged doom]

 

Actually, you don't have more than 256.

I have 216 (12x19) now:



+version without black

This tank on bottom of tileset can turn his turret (NS and WE), but I'm not sure how is easy/hard to realize it for NES game, so removed all turrets rotations.

I checked the lazy man's way which ignores possible same tiles that share a palette.

Maybe I should use 8x8 grid (now is 16x16, except gui stuff) for this tileset, it would greatly reduce amount of (same) tiles.

If the HUD pushes it over, you might want to make it not occupy the same lines as the main level. (Right now it's on the same row as what looks like a door from the main map.) There's a way to swap to another set of 256 tiles mid screen, (Kirby's Adventure does it), but it would affect everything on the row.

You mean this row?



Well, apparently I'll have to find another solution for HUD/south door, ok.


Trying test this tileset in Tiled Map Editor. If somebody have this program, you can try to build your map, here the source, just place tileset in same folder with map.

[Kasumi]

I have 216 (12x19) now:

I'm not quite sure where this number comes from. If you're counting 16x16 pixel regions, the image is 12x18. But, that includes both sprites and background tiles. You're aware that you get 256 8x8 tiles for the background, then an additional 256 8x8 tiles for sprites, right? So having the two of them together in that image is throwing me off.

Either way, I was talking about 8x8 tiles and just the background. Ignoring palette swaps, you've got 267 unique 8x8 tiles in the background set. So if 11 of them aren't the same just with different palettes, you've got a problem.

NES is no fun. The color borders are 16x16, the tiles themselves are 8x8.

but I'm not sure how is easy/hard to realize it for NES game, so removed all turrets rotations.

Not really any harder than displaying it in the first place.

Well, apparently I'll have to find another solution for HUD/south door, ok.

Only if you have more than 256 8x8 tiles or want to scroll. I can't easily check that because of palette nonsense. Also take note: You need some more tiles to display things as you have them.

You have the left two. To display two next to each other like in the image, you'd need the right one. But you can probably lose the middle one.

You have 2 of whatever that bar represents. Use right tile. You lose 1 bar. Use left tile. Lose another. Blank tile. Etc.

Edit: Wow, my image palette got messed up. Update:

Marked in the top left is a color representing the tile used to display the bar.

The same for the other bars. If they deplete, you need tiles representing all the other states.

[winged doom]

NES is no fun.

But I got fun when realized that miss everything that was written a few posts ago, time to read this thread again.

Tileset:



Is that right? (Sprites set I'll make later, with HUD feature that you posted in Update/Edit.)
It is not finished, but I post it now because is possible that next few days I'll be not able for pixels.

And tiles testing (with Tiled):

[Kasumi]

Yep, that tileset works. It's even full of duplicate tiles, so plenty of room for expansion. The HUD tiles might fit, and if not you can always swap in a new set in for the HUD after the level above it is rendered.

I don't imagine you'll be anywhere near the limit for sprites. Unlike background tiles, NES can flip sprite tiles horizontally and vertically. So if you've got a left facing tank in the set, you also have a right facing tank for free.  The south facing tank with turret pointed south is just 5 tiles fully animated. 1 for the top of the non firing version of it, 1 for the top of the firing version. 2 for the the treads which are different between the non firing frames. 1 for the treads of the firing frame.

I think all the tanks you last posted is a hair over 50 tiles fully animated. You're probably barely above 100 for everything you last posted, but I wasn't too scientific about counting so don't quote me on that.

[winged doom]

It's even full of duplicate tiles, so plenty of room for expansion.

You're right. But then I need a good solution to arrange this tiles so that it will comfortable in level design. In this case current tileset is very good. Btw, a small change (that white block near computer):



to make laser beam started from the grid:

I don't imagine you'll be anywhere near the limit for sprites. Unlike background tiles, NES can flip sprite tiles horizontally and vertically. So if you've got a left facing tank in the set, you also have a right facing tank for free. 

Haha, that's cool, so here it is:



I make a small revision, following your advice about sprites. Also, now items on the map and in the HUD are same.

Still WIP, now I have to make color conversion for bugs and doors.

[Kasumi]

Some more duplicates removed in the sprite set.

You can flip the "longer" half of something that has an odd number of pixels, and overlap the two halfs by one pixel.

Since that HUD stuff is in the sprite set, remember about the eight sprites per scanline limitation.

Also, in the case that you do use sprites, you don't need two tiles in the spriteset for this bar:

Since sprites don't have to be aligned to any grid, you can just put multiples next to each other, whereas doing so with tiles would leave space between them. Having the extra tile in the sprite set does cut the number of sprites needed to display it on a horizontal line in half, though.

Basically, you have four choices for the HUD:
1. Keep it entirely in the backgroundset with the level.
2. Have the HUD entirely below the playfield, and use a separate set of background tiles for the HUD/playfield.
3. Use sprites, but make sure to never have more than 8 on a scanline if you don't want it to flicker.
4. A mix.

1. is a simplest choice. Keep in mind you can have many sets for different rooms or whatever, it's not like you're forced to use the same 256 tiles throughout your game. Yes, having the HUD as part of the background set would take up some space on every set, but it's not too limiting for the type of game this is looking like.

2. is cool, and you'd need the HUD entirely below the level if you wanted to scroll anyway.

3. is okay if you don't need to display a lot of information. But it looks like your game needs a lot of info on screen.

4. could be awesome with 2 or 1. You could keep the icons in the spriteset (coin, gun etc.), since they need to be there anyway. They'll be in the level as collectibles sometimes. You could keep other parts of the HUD there too. As long as you never have have more than 8 on a scanline, you're fine. I wouldn't do the numbers as sprites. You've got 8 on a line doing that right off the bat.