[Coco] How I "Ported" Planet of Death to Coco

[Bill Pierce]

Steve, if you "google" text adventures" I'll bet you'll be suprized at the number of websites deditcated to the subject.
There's also java, perl, activex, (and many other) engines for making text adventures on a modern computer.

 

 


Bill Pierce
"Today is a good day... I woke up" - Ritchie Havens
 

My Music from the Tandy/Radio Shack Color Computer 2 & 3
https://sites.google.com/site/dabarnstudio/
Co-Contributor, Co-Editor for CocoPedia
http://www.cocopedia.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page
E-Mail: ooogalapasooo at aol.com


 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Steve Batson <steve at batsonphotography.com>
To: CoCoList for Color Computer Enthusiasts <coco at maltedmedia.com>
Sent: Tue, Apr 14, 2015 12:03 pm
Subject: Re: [Coco] How I "Ported" Planet of Death to Coco





I've always liked the idea of a Text Adventure Engine, but I haven't
tried
using one. I've considered writing my own, but just haven't spent
the time. For
Resource constrained systems such as 16K CoCo or what's
normally available to
RS-DOS Basic, probably makes more sense to write
something from scratch
optimized for the CoCo, same with the MC-10 or
other systems. Obviously, basic
would be more portable, but an Assembly
Language engine called from basic could
be much more compact
and be faster. Not even sure I'd want to tackle that
one.



Besides some Classic Computer Fans, is there even enough interest in
Text
Adventures with this world of high res graphics? And I'm not talking
about
money, but behind the sense of accomplishment and personal enjoyment,
I
wonder how many people of modern systems including phones and tablets
would
have an interest in text adventures.
 


> I used the same adventure engine back
in the early 80s to
"attempt" to

> write a large adventure in BASIC. I
eventually ran out of memory on
my 16k

> Coco 2and abandoned the project.

> I
got the "Tower of Mystery" listing from:

>

> "COMPUTE!'s Guide to Adventure
Games"

>

> by Gary McGath and published in 1984. I think it was a collection
of
their

> articles so the "Tower of Mystery" was probably in
"Compute!"
magazine as

> well.

>

> The info in that book was invaluable to me in
learning BASIC
programming

> as I had to convert the listing to be compatible
with the Coco.

> I have a scan of the book that could be upoloaded.

>

>

>
Bill Pierce

> "Today is a good day... I woke up" - Ritchie Havens

>

>

> My
Music from the Tandy/Radio Shack Color Computer 2 & 3

>
https://sites.google.com/site/dabarnstudio/

> Co-Contributor, Co-Editor for
CocoPedia

> http://www.cocopedia.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

> E-Mail:
ooogalapasooo at aol.com

>

>

>

>

>

>

> -----Original Message-----

>

From:
jimgerrie <jimgerrie at ns.sympatico.ca>

> To: coco <coco at maltedmedia.com>

>
Sent: Tue, Apr 14, 2015 10:31 am

> Subject: [Coco] How I "Ported" Planet of
Death to Coco

>

>

> Steve,

>

> I don't work from binaries only text source
(BASIC,JAVA,C, etc.)

>

> scavenged from the Net or magazines (if you know of
any good
prospects

> let me

> know). In the case of POD, someone had ported
the original game

> to C so it

> could be run on one of the old TI calculators
(or something

> like that). I

> came across it while researching POD. It had
all the

> objects, messages,

> locations, and responses nicely typed out in
neat

> strings and a numeric table

> of the room motions (luckily in a
pretty

> standard format of room numbers for

> N,S,E,W,U,D for every room). I
just

> plucked these, and then plunk them into a

> pretty flexible BASIC

>
two-word parser engine from Compute magazine (I think),

> called "Tower

> of
Mystery "(which Neil Morrison of the Yahoo group sent me
and

> which I

> have
tweaked with a 32 character word wrap routine, so it fits

>

> everything
neatly onto an MC-10/Coco screen). Then it was just
reading

> and

> watching
various walk-throughs to tweak the "Tower of Mystery

> engine to

> provide the
right responses to all the verb object

> combinations needed.

>

> I

> forgot
to mention, another ZX derived game of mine is FESQUEST
(which

> is a

> homage
to the Coco Fest Chicago events). It is a rehash of a port

> to the

> MC-10 of
"Pit with Monsters" by Jim Enness for either the
ZX81

> or Spectrum

> (can't
recall which), which I typed in from a Brit computer

> mag many years

>
ago.

>

> If you look at my

>
http://faculty.cbu.ca/jgerrie/Home/jgames.html

>

>

> programs marked with *
are completely new programs. Ones marked with
+

> are

> either remakes
(drawing inspiration from or possibly code as in
the

> above

> case) or more
straightforward ports of BASIC source modified to

> run on the

> MC-10 (and
then later further modified to work in Color

> BASIC for the Coco

> and
Dragon).

>

> --

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> list

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>
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>

>

>

> --

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list

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>





--

Steve
Batson

Website:
http://www.batsonphotography.com

Facebook:
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Gallery:
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