News

News

                        by Alone Coder

One more year has passed, and here is a newspaper again. For me, this year was not very productive - for reasons related to linguistics, which I will write about separately (click "3" ). I also plan to release a magazine (Info Guide), but for this I am waiting for independent articles and music.

In the last issue, I proposed to assemble a full-fledged team to develop games of the highest quality (no jokes), but no one responded. This is the current state of affairs on the Spectrum scene - the authors want to promote not the platform, but themselves. This is especially true for artists for whom a variety of solo competitions have proliferated. Works drawn not for a serious release, but for a competition, can be considered time flushed down the toilet. As a result, for example, there are still no graphics for Worms and UFO-2 (although there is new music specially written for it!), and the colour version of Vera has not been completed. And these are not the most difficult projects for an artist. For example, to design a new Wolf 3D and a new Ball Quest (and there are ready-made engines for them), an artist must be truly creative.

Since I've been sitting on the platform for 32 years without a break (and it looks like I'm the only one left, the others have quit and returned, time to time), I can testify that this was not always the case. Artists drew for projects in the same way that coders wrote for projects. Musicians prepared songs for future major releases, rather than throwing them away on the next compo, which few people listen to (at demo parties, people often ran away from the hall during music competitions). Now some people are trying to turn the ZX Spectrum scene into something like a hipster hangout to sell them goods with retro labels (different hipster hangouts have different labels, but the essence of this business is the same). Different stuff is also being released under the same labels, that were purchased from the old owners. It can be seen that sales of this garbage are not going well in Russia, so I hope that the old situation will return, and we must be ready for the revival of groups. Recently there was an attempt to create a virtual group in Discord, I joined it, but the organizer soon disappeared without a trace. Maybe next time will be better. I am sure that we have a lot of responsible people, we just need to have willpower.

Many people have seen what full-fledged, well-designed indie games should look like in YouTube reviews like "Refund". Graphics are the first thing that anyone sees in a game. And the graphics should be enough so that the player sees something new all the time. A good game promotes the platform, and the platform promotes the game. But we still dont have games with graphics for at least several full 128K loads (even just one, taking into account the compression capabilities) - not to mention the megabyte models that have been produced since 1992, and are now available for all the users, at least in the form of an emulator. Instead, a lot of small games are released every year that are unable to advertise the ZX Spectrum and will themselves be quickly forgotten.

Maybe some readers will be interested in a game scenario about Spectrum users, where they can relive the 90's - press "5". The script was mainly written by me, with additions from NS and prices from reliable sources. A side view in the style of River City Ransom is assumed, a map based on some districts of Moscow with a connection of scrollable zones-streets by static zones-squares. But, as always, there are no graphics.

I pulled up the old sources of Nedodemo and found versions of its effects for 6912 screen. I have already rebuilt the first effect (mode7) for 48K. Previously, I released a version of the full-screen multicolor viewer (ZX-Guide #2) for the branded 48K. Frankly, I never saw the branded 48K and only briefly and late - the branded +2.

John started writing a new music. I also start from time to time, but with children in the background nothing really works out. Only the music for the New Year's demo was completed. We also sometimes remember the past and play chess with John and my son Sasha (press "7" ).

Kulich, galstaff, and LVD made new utilities for NedoOS.

I visited Maksagor and saw how he uses ATM-Turbo to connect to a BBS (they still exist!).

Urfin released two ATM-Turbo games that my children liked.

Ldir appeared on Ryazan television in connection with the effects on LED screens: https://vk.com/wall1660020_3937.

Dragons' Lord continues to write Quake on my 3D engine, which is constantly updated (currently it's v1.45 ). A demo version of the game was presented at Yandex Retro Games Battle 2023 under the name "Borsch". The engine allows you to simultaneously compile the game under 128K (tape and disk), ATM-Turbo 2 (in full colour) and 48K (tape, graphics-reduced version). The sources of the engine and examples are open, feel free to ask in Discord or via email.

Week of the Agents reports that he is developing a game named Habar (Swag) with gameplay similar to the first King's Bounty, but in the world of the Zone from S.T.A.L.K.E.R.

My computer is acting strange right now, to say the least. It constantly freezes or turns off (previously it only did this when the WiFi card was turned on), and sometimes turns on the sticky key mode, although it is always turned off in the settings. I tried to find a solution to the problem on the Internet (many people had the same problem) - nothing helped. Only reboots help.