So my last log entry was on April 27th? Wow, how time flies, even when you're not having
that much fun! A lot of what I told you in the previous log entry needs to be rectified,
so here it goes...
First of all, you'll notice that Ping-Pong is no longer mentioned in the sidebar on the
left. Eduardo informed me that the game wasn't actually ready to be released (the sounds
needed to be tweaked, mainly) and the few Ping-Pong cartridges he produced a few years ago
feature incomplete software. Since Eduardo has now retired, there's pretty much no chance
that Ping-Pong will ever get finished and released. Sorry for getting your hopes up
people, but when I wrote the previous log entry, I wasn't aware that Ping-Pong wasn't up
to snuff.
Secondly, the future of Pac-Man Collection is still up in the air. Eduardo recently told
me he still intends to finish it, but he's starting to sound like a broken record. The
boxes and manuals are printed, the MegaCart PCBs have been manufactured, the yellow
cartridge casings are just waiting to be used, and the software is 95% done... We're
so close to completing this project it's not even funny. Still, close but no cigar, as
they say. Suffice it to say I have no idea when Pac-Man Collection will be done and
released, if it's ever released at all.
So what about that new run of Opcode games I promised? Well, I have some good news and
some bad news. But before all that, allow me to explain why it has taken so long for this
new run of Opcode titles to become available. I can truly say that everything that could
have gone wrong with this project DID go wrong. First, there's the story with the boxes
and manuals. All Eduardo had to do was to put some Opcode boxes, manuals, cart labels and
cart casings in a big box and ship it to me. Would you believe it took him an entire
MONTH to do this? The material was finally shipped at the end of May, and if his wife
hadn't gotten upset at him for making me wait that long, I probably would have waited even
longer!
While the printed material was in transit, I decided to order the electronic parts (PCBs
and EPROMs) from the AtariAge store. This went smoothly enough, but the original plan was
to let a new local associate handle the soldering of the EPROMs onto the PCBs. As it
turned out, my associate wanted to let one of his friends handle this soldering job, but
this friend had a sudden death in his family and he was too bummed to work on anything.
So I sent the PCBs and EPROMs back to Albert (at the AtariAge store) so he could program
the EPROMs and solder everything himself. He did a great job, and really fast too!
I thought I was seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, but it turned out to be the
headlight of a train: Once I got the soldered electronics back, all that was missing were
some screws to assemble the electronics and the cartridge casings together. Albert had
given me some samples of the screws I needed so that I would know exactly what to look
for. So I visited a local hardware store, expecting to find those screws easely. Would
you believe I visited 4 different hardware stores in my area and none of them had anything
even close to what I needed? My local associate, who could have possibly helped me with
this new problem, went away on vacation without even warning me, and I had to buy those
darn screws on eBay, which added a few additional weeks of delays!
While I was waiting for the screws to arrive, I started glueing the boxes together. It
took me a whole week to get that particular job done, and it was quite tedious too. I got
the screws at the end of July, and I assembled the cartridges the next day. Assembling
cartridges is fun, but testing every cart to make sure they worked properly wasn't fun at
all.
So in the end, the good news is that I finally managed to get some games ready. I had 50
copies of Road Fighter and 10 copies of each of our other games in stock, and on August
3rd, I started contacting people who had placed pre-orders. The bad news is that, one
week later, on August 9th, I had sold every copy of Space Invaders Collection, Sky Jaguar,
Yie Ar Kung-Fu and Magical Tree that I had. All I currently have left are copies of Road
Fighter. So you can order your copy of Road Fighter right now, but if you were hoping to
purchase some of our other games, I guess you'll have to wait a tad longer. I'm willing
to produce another run, but only if there's a demand for it. So don't hesitate to contact
me to place a pre-order on any of our past games. The more pre-orders I get, the faster
I'll decide to produce another run. This advice also applies to those who would like to
have their buggy Magical Tree carts replaced.
By the way, I would like to reiterate my invitation to purchase some of our Opcode
posters. Click on the appropriate link in the sidebar to learn how. :-)
And in other news, how's my Sudoku project going, you ask? Aside from missing music
and sound effects, my first homebrew game is pretty much done. Here are a couple of
screenshots:
I could possibly add some basic sounds and release Sudoku on cartridge, but I've
decided to make another homebrew game and put them both on the same cart. The official
title of this cart will be "Two Games In One - Sudoku / Remember The Flag".
Remember The Flag is a new incarnation of the familiar game of "Memory Match-Up"
that you've probably played at least once in your life. You just need to flip cards
on the board, and find matching country flags to earn points. When I presented this
game for the first time on
the AtariAge forums a couple of months ago, someone mentionned that a
boardgame version already exists.
I wasn't even aware of this before then! My version of the game will have some additional
bells and whistles to make the game more interesting, especially in the "versus-computer"
and "two-player" modes. I've barely begun coding the title screen and option screens of
this new game, but here are a few tantalizing mockups for your viewing pleasure:
That's all the news I have to offer for now. Hopefully my next blog entry will come
sooner rather than later. ;-)
