AuthorTopic: New Amiga game  (Read 6645 times)

Offline Zoulz

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New Amiga game

on: July 31, 2019, 09:50:59 am
Greetings, so i'm mostly just gauging interest here to see if anyone would be willing to create pixel art for a old school Amiga game. I'm currently working on a turn-based RPG that will be released for the original Amiga systems. It should run on all models (with at least 1MB RAM) A500/A1200/CD32. It won't support the AGA chipset (256 color palette) which means the art is limited to 32 colors (picked from a total of 4096 color values). The target full screen size is 320x256 (NTSC not supported). Coupled with the limited memory footprint, it offers quite a challenge and every byte counts.

The project is mostly a labor of love and I don't see it making much money (it's such a niche market). But there is a small and growing scene of people making games for the Amiga in 2019. Coco banana, worthy, heroes of gorluth etc have all had commercial releases. If you enjoy a challenge and retro computers then this might interest you. And if any money is made i'm willing to make it a even split.

I'm using AMOS to build the game, and apparently AMOS 2 for modern computers is in the works by the original author (Francois lionet). It will be able to interpret old Amiga AMOS source code which means it would probably be trivial to port the game to modern systems as well.

The art style I envision is something akin to that of the bitmap brothers (gods, chaos engine, speedball etc). That might be a tall order since they made some of the finest art back in the day. I'm really quite open though because my skills are in coding, not making art. Nobody wants to see my programmer's art, trust me.

As for the game itself, it's kind of a mix between the might & magic and bard's tale series. You have a party of 4 characters and move around a world map tile-by-tile from screen-to-screen (no scrolling). Occasionally you will get encounters and fight enemies. Some tiles can trigger other types of encounters as well, like quests or talking to NPCs. Some tiles are cities which allow you to enter shops, drink in taverns and hear gossip etc. Your characters will gain levels and improved stats in traditional RPG fashion. The storyline is very loosely defined right now and needs more work.

Anyway, thanks for reading. Feel free to e-mail me if interested or if you have any questions. Cheerio!

Offline yrizoud

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Re: New Amiga game

Reply #1 on: July 31, 2019, 03:03:54 pm
It's always difficult to find a coder for a graphician, and the opposite as well, so I wish you luck.
IMO, you need to start anyway, with whatever programmer art you can produce or convert (for example from opengameart.com)
Since you're aiming for turn-based RPG (probably square-tile-based?), even 2-color graphics are enough to check what works - and fits memory.
Working prototypes will show that you're really serious about the project and that the work on graphic doesn't go to waste.
An artist teammate is going to need to test what he's drawing, so you had better advertise (and post updates) on an amiga forum. I think EAB is still quite popular.
In fact since you're talking AMOS, it may actually be necessary to draw directly on the Amiga (or emulation), in AMOS's SpriteX so that it can save/load the AMOS banks directly. (At least that's what I was using... in '95 or something)

Offline Zoulz

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Re: New Amiga game

Reply #2 on: July 31, 2019, 06:45:52 pm
It's always difficult to find a coder for a graphician, and the opposite as well, so I wish you luck.
IMO, you need to start anyway, with whatever programmer art you can produce or convert (for example from opengameart.com)
Since you're aiming for turn-based RPG (probably square-tile-based?), even 2-color graphics are enough to check what works - and fits memory.
Working prototypes will show that you're really serious about the project and that the work on graphic doesn't go to waste.
An artist teammate is going to need to test what he's drawing, so you had better advertise (and post updates) on an amiga forum. I think EAB is still quite popular.
In fact since you're talking AMOS, it may actually be necessary to draw directly on the Amiga (or emulation), in AMOS's SpriteX so that it can save/load the AMOS banks directly. (At least that's what I was using... in '95 or something)

Ah yes, I actually have a tile map up and running in AMOS already. But I agree, and my programmer art will do for now just to get things done. It's still early days and maybe i'm a bit too eager. :) I'm using emulation software (winuae) to work in AMOS instead of sitting at my real A1200 computer. :) It's a lot more convenient and I can use windows-based software to create content for the game. For example, i'm using the tiled map editor to design maps and google sheets to create meta data for items, monsters, npc dialogue etc. I will check out the amiga forums too, and thanks for the input! ;D

Offline Chris2balls

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Re: New Amiga game

Reply #3 on: August 02, 2019, 08:17:44 am
Hi Zoulz,

I'd be very interested in helping, but I'm not currently available. It'd be a pleasure working on this project when I have the time, though!
☑ Available for work     ☒ Unavailable for work
Check out my portfolio if you are looking for a pixel artist!

Offline Zoulz

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Re: New Amiga game

Reply #4 on: August 02, 2019, 10:47:49 am
Hi Zoulz,

I'd be very interested in helping, but I'm not currently available. It'd be a pleasure working on this project when I have the time, though!

That's actually not a problem as i'm currently still working on the very fundamental systems of the game and setting up my own little tools. Getting to grips with exactly how much resources I have to play with (1MB is not a lot and AMOS adds a bit of overhead). I'm also in the process of writing a small design document. Both for myself and to communicate the game design more easily. Let me know when you are available. Unless someone else has joined up by then i'd be thrilled to work with you.

Offline daramon

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Re: New Amiga game

Reply #5 on: August 02, 2019, 02:54:50 pm
I have incredibly fond memories of the many hours (days? weeks?) I lost to my Amiga, a desire to improve my skills and I'm interested in working with palette limitations. So this sounds very interesting.

I can't guarantee that I'll have time to work on it and I'm still pretty new to pixel art, but it can't hurt to ask for a few samples when you're ready.

If Chris2balls is available and willing though, bite his hand off! ;)

Offline DawnBringer

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Re: New Amiga game

Reply #6 on: August 03, 2019, 10:09:44 am
@yrizoud:
In AMOS you can grab the gfx you need from normal images when the program starts (create gfx banks on the fly). I only ever used fixed banks in the final compiled version of smaller programs. In my bigger projects like BabeAnoid all graphics are still grabbed from loaded images when the program boots.

@Zoulz: Good luck with your project. And yeah, it will be interesting to see what happens with Francois' AMOS 2! :)

Offline Zoulz

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Re: New Amiga game

Reply #7 on: April 03, 2020, 05:49:32 am
Some time has passed and the scope has changed a bit, but i'm making pretty solid progress. Some of the basic stuff like combat, shops and moving between locations is in the game. I'm currently working on skills/spells and temporary combat effects. My aim is to have all the building blocks (questing, combat AI, NPC dialogues etc) in place by summer (end of july/august). Still looking for someone to take the reins on the graphical side.

Check out this little write-up I made about the position: http://pixelshift.se/recruitment/
Check out the twitters for updates on the project: https://twitter.com/pixelshiftDev
And youtube for some videos: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTgTSP7-JQrEJOl-0uNMYQQ

Thanks :)