Designing a NES themed game for Blitz

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Socoder -> Blitz -> Designing a NES themed game for Blitz
Sat, 01 Aug 2009, 14:44
LostUser	Although development on my "Don of New York" game is currently suspended (mainly because of work), my original intention was to build it as if it were a NES game. A sort of NES themed game. Unfortuently it hasn't turned out that way. Firstly I didn't know how to scale my game to the NES style and it was really hard to read/see and so I abandoned it for a 800x600 screen. And yet, it is still something I want to explore. I've seen Jayenkai's work where he's using impressively done 8 bit graphics scaled up, but I am no closer to understanding what he/she did. I've seen photoshoped mockups of games mocked up as if they were on a NES (listed below), but of course the majority of the following were done in Flash. Links: 1) 8-Bit Shlock (Something Awful): https://www.somethingawful.com/d/photoshop-phriday/schlock-8-bit.php 2) Dark Knight for NES intro screen (Youtube): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXOxX_wX4GA But how does one go about creating those kind of themed games in Blitz. Specific questions: 1. The NES resolution is 256x240, but this won't work in Windows at full screen, plus using the Text command for ultra small fonts can be very hard to read. a) How do you scale the 256x240 to fit say 800x600 and still make it looks like 256x240 without anyone squinting/hurting their eyes. Is it even possible? 2) Has anyone tried building a NES, C64 or Spectrum themed game with Blitz? 3) The graphics on 8-bit Shlock for those movie/game inspired themes have been photoshopped, but how did they do it? Rather than doing pixel editing, did they do something in particular? 4) The font used in the Dark Knight NES spoof, does anyone know what it is? 5) The NES has a limited color scheme, but how do you limit yourself to the same color schemes in Blitz? Is it just a case of switching from 16 colors to 8? Are there any other issues I need to be aware of? Many thanks.
Sat, 01 Aug 2009, 15:08
Jayenkai	You're expecting there to be a magic "NES Mode" command, but instead you have to limit yourself. If you only ever want there to be 2 colours onscreen, you just need to draw all your sprites with those 2 colours. Similarly, if you want nice big chunky sprites.. just draw nice big chunky sprites.. 256,240 -> 800,600 doesn't really go. But if you 2x scale everything, that fits into 512x480, and if you 3x scale everything, it's 768x720. Basically, load up your images, and either make them 2/3 times bigger, or make your screen scale 2/3 times.. Here's a decent-enough screen scaler.. Global screenWidth=256 ; Original Width Global ScreenHeight=240 ; Original Height Global Scale=3 ; How much bigger you want it. Graphics screenwidthscale,screenheightscale,32,2 SetBuffer BackBuffer() ClsColor 125,125,125 Repeat Cls For n=1 To 50 Color Rand(0,2)125,Rand(0,2)125,Rand(0,2)125 Line Rand(0,screenwidth),Rand(0,screenheight),Rand(0,screenwidth),Rand(0,screenheight) Next Rescale:Flip ;<-- rescale before flip.. resizes the stuff.. Until KeyDown(1) Function Rescale() For x=ScreenWidth-1 To 0 Step -1 For z=0 To scale-1 CopyRect x,0,1,screenheight,(xscale)+z,0,BackBuffer(),BackBuffer() Next Next For y=ScreenHeight-1 To 0 Step -1 For z=0 To scale-1 CopyRect 0,y,screenwidthscale,1,0,(yscale)+z,BackBuffer(),BackBuffer() Next Next End Function --v -=-=- ''Load, Next List!''
Sat, 01 Aug 2009, 15:46
spinal	If I wanted a 256x240 screen in full screen, I would choose the closes 'standard' resolution and centre the image on that. So I would use 320x240, with the 256x240 screen centred on that. There would be a border at each side, but I can live with that. -=-=- Check out my excellent homepage!
Sat, 01 Aug 2009, 16:48
LostUser	Oh okay, thanks for your help. This put me on the right track. Thanks for your help.
Mon, 03 Aug 2009, 19:18
Teasy	If you have Blitz3D, you can output the scene to a texture (for any size you need), then draw that to the screen as a sprite/quad (for any resolution you want).
Mon, 03 Aug 2009, 20:03
Afr0	You'd almost certainly want to draw it as a quad, then. Cos IIRC Blitz' drawing functions are really slow. -=-=- Afr0 Games Project Dollhouse on Github - Please fork!
Mon, 03 Aug 2009, 23:56
Jayenkai	Not recommended. At all.. Drawing to textures is not an exact science.. some graphics cards will do it slowly, some will do it quickly. All will do it blurrily if you then try to upscale it. If you do want blurry, just use DirectX rescaling. Graphics 800,600,32,2 ; Set window size Graphics 256,240,32,3 ; Set graphic size But it's blurry, and not recommended. -=-=- ''Load, Next List!''
Tue, 04 Aug 2009, 08:51
Teasy	Actually, it's fast enough for small games aimed at computers that are at least 8.3 years old. There are also some techniques to sharpen the 'blurryness' (no anti-aliasing).
Tue, 04 Aug 2009, 14:19
LostUser	Hi there. After reading the thread, I think its just a good idea to have a bitmap/8-bit game but not in NES resolution. Thanks.