Yeah, I don't remember what I said, but I would have emphasised that you were a big help to me because that's the way I am, but I don't remember you doing the core of the game personally.
You always did the vast majority of my graphics because I was shite and that music routine which was what people really liked about Ping Pong was entirely your work.
However, I'm a bit disconcerted that in my natural modesty about not being, erm, the world's best games programmer, that I might sound like I never did anything remotely worthwhile when measured against others who might sell themselves a bit better. e.g. I was an early POP/PUSH bloke and even my earlier days had an inline-coded scroll routing for the unfinished Grog's Revenge that Jof seemed to think was ok.
So, enough ... I wasn't prolific, was nowhere near as good as others like Jof, but I wasn't a muppet!
"Steve Wetherill also included I LOVE YOU HEATHER! at the end of the scrolling message in Arc of Yesod and was nearly fired, because we had to call all the cassettes back and remaster them."
All I did on Ping Pong was a 2 player menu system - trying to get it down to the least number of key presses to start the game. But this was really a piece of ambiguous code that Doug had to adapt to his needs. He had to re-code and format the text and add the FX and stuff.
And the music was just stuff me and Martin Glalway were messing with anyway. That tune probably should have gone on one of my games, but Ping Pong was ready to ship!
Even the sound FX, which I think I did most of (though there wasn't that many anyway) were adapted by Doug.
I had nothing at all to do with the game coding! Pure Doug!
As for the graphics - I did the faces in the crowd. That was it.
John Woods (an Ocean director) asked my to go and see him ans "Grog's Revenge" game in a tiny room. And it blew me away! It was a 4 pixel scrolly thing. And we got talking.
Just for the record - I was just trying to get a rise out of the lurking Mr Burns with that one - Doug didn?t really say you had programmed most of Ping Pong.
He did say Christian Urquhart programmed most of Hypersports though Jof!
*sits on the WoS settee, stretches legs*
I think I may become a WoS-lurker for a while just listening to these old war heroes ...
"In the far corner we have old Iron-Sides and in the other corner Mr. Kick-In-The-Seat-Of-The-Pants ... play fair, no coding below the belt, let's have a laugh!"
Although after reading Doug?s Pop/Push comments perhaps it was he who pioneered this technique?
Well, people used PUSH/POP for lots of things and I believe if you disassemble the Ping Pong code, you'll see it there as a fairly standard way of displaying sprites quickly, but using it in scrolling routines is another matter and people were constantly refining things as well as pioneering them.
Whatever - As far as I'm concerned, Jof was the master Spectrum programmer. End of story.
LOL - at least he didn’t claim to have written the Cobra scroll - Mr Owens the other dodgy Ocean programmer of that era - take a bow!
Although after reading Doug’s Pop/Push comments perhaps it was he who pioneered this technique?
"Can I have a longer spoon please"
Well, Hypersports used 'Push' scrolling and 'Push' sprites (and used for emulator testing with the "R" register usage - if your emulator gets Hypersports to work, you'll be fine!) and all ran in a 'frame', and was before I met Doug. I don't know of any other released games that did such a thing before then.
But then Chris Urk was supposed to have written it! LOL!
*sits on the WoS settee, stretches legs*
I think I may become a WoS-lurker for a while just listening to these old war heroes ...
"In the far corner we have old Iron-Sides and in the other corner Mr. Kick-In-The-Seat-Of-The-Pants ... play fair, no coding below the belt, let's have a laugh!"
*ding ding*
Yep, this is what makes the forum so fun to read - not twenty year old bile from someone who just signed up.
Guys, tell me more about Gary Bracey - all I know of him is from various mag interviews at the time, and the only thing which stuck in my mind was the interview over dinner where he ordered two desserts...
Well, Hypersports used 'Push' scrolling and 'Push' sprites (and used for emulator testing) and all ran in a 'frame', and was before I met Doug. I don't know of any other released games that did such a thing before then.
But then Chris Urk was supposed to have written it! LOL!
Stalkers. I have a gun. It's plastic, but what the hell!
Filled with:
Water?
Acid?
Wee?
Dribbly bits of Spotted Dick?
*Dons on HAZMAT suit, cracks knuckles, does a few finger-stretches*
Yup, this index-finger will be ringing all the door-bells until I get to that Afrobush personthingie. I hear he just loves visitors and always has a hot cuppa ready and waiting for weary travellers.
Well, Hypersports used 'Push' scrolling and 'Push' sprites (and used for emulator testing with the "R" register usage - if your emulator gets Hypersports to work, you'll be fine!) and all ran in a 'frame', and was before I met Doug. I don't know of any other released games that did such a thing before then.
But that's the thing - most of the time you wouldn't really know what other people were doing, eh? I might or might not have been the first person to use inline LDI/LDDs for a cheap 4-pixel scroll - who knows? In fact, who cares, as long as you weren't ripping other people off? People do come up with similar innovations at similar times. Happens in the scientific community all the time ...
All you can know is you did something that no-one else you knew had done yet and whether your stuff looked much better than other people's (which it did).
I remember how hard you worked - I don't think you had time to disassemble many other games!
Comments
That's not a hidden feature. You needed to do that to get past the ghostly granny...
Although I admit, it did give me a scare the first time.
Andrew
Really?
Which bit?
You left your Einstein on the train!
Bet you don't remember lighting your own farts too!
You're kidding, aren't you? I recount that one all the time ;-)
Yeah, I don't remember what I said, but I would have emphasised that you were a big help to me because that's the way I am, but I don't remember you doing the core of the game personally.
You always did the vast majority of my graphics because I was shite and that music routine which was what people really liked about Ping Pong was entirely your work.
However, I'm a bit disconcerted that in my natural modesty about not being, erm, the world's best games programmer, that I might sound like I never did anything remotely worthwhile when measured against others who might sell themselves a bit better. e.g. I was an early POP/PUSH bloke and even my earlier days had an inline-coded scroll routing for the unfinished Grog's Revenge that Jof seemed to think was ok.
So, enough ... I wasn't prolific, was nowhere near as good as others like Jof, but I wasn't a muppet!
Yes, I am ;-)
And, really, it's not true - honestly. Sheesh - you try to be modest and end up making yourself look like some sort of charlatan!
Most of the programming?!?!?
Now that, I like...
And the music was just stuff me and Martin Glalway were messing with anyway. That tune probably should have gone on one of my games, but Ping Pong was ready to ship!
Even the sound FX, which I think I did most of (though there wasn't that many anyway) were adapted by Doug.
I had nothing at all to do with the game coding! Pure Doug!
As for the graphics - I did the faces in the crowd. That was it.
John Woods (an Ocean director) asked my to go and see him ans "Grog's Revenge" game in a tiny room. And it blew me away! It was a 4 pixel scrolly thing. And we got talking.
That's just a denial of responsibility for shit graphics! :grin:
(quite right, too!)
He did say Christian Urquhart programmed most of Hypersports though Jof!
;-)
That's what I heard!
ROFPML
You are no match for karingal! He coded the 128k version of Steve Davis Snooker* you know!:P :D
*In-house joke. Ignore! ;)
Bytes:Chuntey - Spectrum tech blog.
Oh, that stings!
Christian is the only programmer I know who can get score digits to flicker! (Cavelon)
OI!
They were copied from the arcade machine! Pixel for pixel!
Except the arcade version had a penguin there somewhere! Eat my penguin!
That bought back memories ...
"Flicker, flicker"
"Chug, Chug"
(The latter, in particular, needs to be said with a Widnes accent)
I was giving a presentation on Oracle performance in December and had 'Chug, Chug' fly in on one of the slides r-e-a-l-l-y s-l-o-w-l-y.
But then I took it out, because I knew no-one would understand :-(
See, that's what I mean about forums! An hour and a half and I'm supposed to be making Sunday dinner!
(Roasted Pork Loin, Cabbage, Carrots, Potatoes)
I didn't mean the crowd graphics (that you admit to) but everything else!
... and I remember the penguin. Would have been a waste of memory, though. Which means it probably would have made the cut, if it had been yours ;-)
Ex-Ocean Software graphic artist -
Download my FREE PDF 'LOAD DIJ DIJ' (180,000+ words): https://ko-fi.com/i/IG2G3BEJZP
ZX Art page: https://zxart.ee/eng/authors/m/mark-r-jones/
https://twitter.com/MarkRJones1970
https://www.facebook.com/OceanSoftwareLtd/
https://www.facebook.com/ultimateptg/
I think I may become a WoS-lurker for a while just listening to these old war heroes ...
"In the far corner we have old Iron-Sides and in the other corner Mr. Kick-In-The-Seat-Of-The-Pants ... play fair, no coding below the belt, let's have a laugh!"
*ding ding*
LOL - at least he didn’t claim to have written the Cobra scroll - Mr Owens the other dodgy Ocean programmer of that era - take a bow!
Although after reading Doug’s Pop/Push comments perhaps it was he who pioneered this technique?
"Can I have a longer spoon please"
Well, people used PUSH/POP for lots of things and I believe if you disassemble the Ping Pong code, you'll see it there as a fairly standard way of displaying sprites quickly, but using it in scrolling routines is another matter and people were constantly refining things as well as pioneering them.
Whatever - As far as I'm concerned, Jof was the master Spectrum programmer. End of story.
Well, Hypersports used 'Push' scrolling and 'Push' sprites (and used for emulator testing with the "R" register usage - if your emulator gets Hypersports to work, you'll be fine!) and all ran in a 'frame', and was before I met Doug. I don't know of any other released games that did such a thing before then.
But then Chris Urk was supposed to have written it! LOL!
Yep, this is what makes the forum so fun to read - not twenty year old bile from someone who just signed up.
Guys, tell me more about Gary Bracey - all I know of him is from various mag interviews at the time, and the only thing which stuck in my mind was the interview over dinner where he ordered two desserts...
You guys crack me up!
Great. Now everyone knows my location! Nice one!
Stalkers. I have a gun. It's plastic, but what the hell!
Well, not really. Because (hope you're ready for this) sometimes people move away from their home town. Really, it happens.
Then again, I'm not from Widnes.
Filled with:
Water?
Acid?
Wee?
Dribbly bits of Spotted Dick?
*Dons on HAZMAT suit, cracks knuckles, does a few finger-stretches*
Yup, this index-finger will be ringing all the door-bells until I get to that Afrobush personthingie. I hear he just loves visitors and always has a hot cuppa ready and waiting for weary travellers.
But that's the thing - most of the time you wouldn't really know what other people were doing, eh? I might or might not have been the first person to use inline LDI/LDDs for a cheap 4-pixel scroll - who knows? In fact, who cares, as long as you weren't ripping other people off? People do come up with similar innovations at similar times. Happens in the scientific community all the time ...
All you can know is you did something that no-one else you knew had done yet and whether your stuff looked much better than other people's (which it did).
I remember how hard you worked - I don't think you had time to disassemble many other games!
I know nothing about him really
Just make something up ... then say Jof mislead you with his "steel-trap" memory.
Now that Paul McKenna ...
(ducks and runs for cover while waiting for that thread to explode into life again ...)