Manic Miner 2021

[0xC0DE]

I hope you don't mind I'm working on this Acorn Electron conversion?

I fully approve, go for it!

[0xC0DE]

@0xC0DE - I hope you're not getting distracted from 'Sexy Curves' game/demo....?!

Haha, yeah, I just thought it would be nice to have a little side project that I can tinker with

And I remember we were discussing MM for Elk before. It wouldn't be so much fun to convert the original version. But this new and improved version just deserves to be converted.

[barbarossa69]

Really good upgrade! Very fast

[bob147]

It's amazing the difference even just removing the flicker and speeding it up a bit makes to the feel of the game (not to dismiss all of the other outstanding changes, the new music is so much easier on the ears!). Even if the controls are identical and it's all in my head, it just feels like I have alot more say over exactly when I'm jumping. On level 3 at the moment, I am shamelessly save stating when I finish a level though. I just don't have the patience to go all the way back to the beginning anymore

[0xC0DE]

@TobyLobster: first attempt on the Acorn Electron, still in MODE 1. (I will make a new post for this)

https://twitter.com/0xC0DE6502/status/1 ... 2285830146

[TobyLobster]

@0xC0DE Looking good!

[TobyLobster]

@0xC0DE That's quick work! Is the move to MODE 4 a speed thing (I'm not so familiar with the Electron)?

[0xC0DE]

@0xC0DE That's quick work! Is the move to MODE 4 a speed thing (I'm not so familiar with the Electron)?

MODE 0,1,2,3 are horribly slow on the Electron.
I will see if I can make it work in MODE 1, before (probably) moving to MODE 4.

Btw, I found a few minor typos in your source. I don't know if I can post that on github or something (never done that) if you want.

[TobyLobster]

MODE 0,1,2,3 are horribly slow on the Electron.
I will see if I can make it work in MODE 1, before (probably) moving to MODE 4.

Ah, ok that makes sense.

Btw, I found a few minor typos in your source. I don't know if I can post that on github or something (never done that) if you want.

If you're not familiar with git I wouldn't want to subject you to that learning curve (its a minefield)! Whatever way is easiest for you to get the changes to me, I can update it here.

[kieranhj]

Just wanted to add that this is a fantastic update to the game, great work. I don't remember the original Beeb version being quite so terrible but looking at the two versions now, it's night & day. I remember spending a lot of time playing the game on my mate's Spectrum BITD but never bothered with it on the Beeb, somehow I didn't realise why but pretty clear now!! I really enjoyed the technical write up as well, thanks for taking the time.

[marcusjambler]

Are any of these changes applicable to the Atom version?

[oss003]

Should be possible ..... the Atom version is based upon the Electron code.

https://github.com/oss003/Manic-Miner

Greetings
Kees

[0xC0DE]

Should be possible ..... the Atom version is based upon the Electron code.

https://github.com/oss003/Manic-Miner

Greetings
Kees

Wait a minute, what Electron version??

[melchett]

Should be possible ..... the Atom version is based upon the Electron code.

https://github.com/oss003/Manic-Miner

Greetings
Kees

Wait a minute, what Electron version??

I assumed Kees based the Atom version on the BBC version based on this thread viewtopic.php?t=9922 so that's an interesting comment. Dave_E asked if it was possible to take the Atom to an Electron so heritage seems to be BBC -> Atom -> Electron if it was completed.

[oss003]

You are right guys, it was the BBC version .....
I'm getting old because I converted it just 4 years ago ....

Normally I use monochrome Electron versions because these are easier to convert but this was the BBC version so there are a lot of similarities in the code.I used a snapshot of the game.

Greetings
Kees

[MatthewThompson]

Just downloaded this update, and can only echo the comments on here already. Excellent upgrade.

[Andy1979]

This is a big improvement, great work.

Tested under Beebjit in Master Compact mode and it's just so much smoother than the original.

[kieranhj]

Yay! I finally got to try this out on real hardware. Great job again, well done.

One quick note that I had a similar compatibility problem as lurkio, except this time it was with the RamFS ROM in my Master. A quick *UNPLUG solved the problem but just FYI. Not sure what's going on there.

[TobyLobster]

Your new version of Manic Miner seems to be incompatible with the Disc Doctor ROM for some reason.

One quick note that I had a similar compatibility problem as lurkio, except this time it was with the RamFS ROM in my Master.

Oops, I realised didn't do a *TAPE after loading, so that could cause issues. Try this new test version?

NEWMINER.ssd

(21.5 KiB) Downloaded 41 times

[lurkio]

Your new version of Manic Miner seems to be incompatible with the Disc Doctor ROM for some reason.

One quick note that I had a similar compatibility problem as lurkio, except this time it was with the RamFS ROM in my Master.

Oops, I realised didn't do a *TAPE after loading, so that could cause issues. Try this new test version? NEWMINER.ssd

The new version still doesn't boot until I disable not only Disc Doctor but also SLAVE. (It turns out I've installed the SLAVE utility ROM in Mac BeebEm, as well as Disc Doctor, and I now find that I have to disable both ROMs before the new version of Manic Miner 2021 will load and run successfully.)



EDIT: JSBeeb with Disc Doctor installed, booting the new version of Miner 2021:

http://bbcmicro.co.uk//jsbeeb/play.php? ... DOC109.ROM


JSBeeb with the SLAVE ROM installed, booting the new version of Miner 2021:

http://bbcmicro.co.uk//jsbeeb/play.php? ... AVE104.ROM



EDIT2: Disc Doctor is notoriously antisocial, so it may not be worth trying to cater for it -- although a little birdie tells me that someone might have found a workaround for Disc Doctor specifically! Watch this space...

[Michael Brown]

Hi All,
Disc Doctor stores &0D at &130 so any code at that location gets corrupted.
The way round this is to make sure any code at locations &100 to &1D3 (like the loader here) includes a JUMP routine at &12D to &131 and then continue your code from there.
Or use the program we had some time back that detects and switches off the Disc Doctor chip.

Mick.

[kieranhj]

One quick note that I had a similar compatibility problem as lurkio, except this time it was with the RamFS ROM in my Master.

Oops, I realised didn't do a *TAPE after loading, so that could cause issues. Try this new test version?

NEWMINER.ssd

Thanks, I’ll give it a go on real hw when I get chance. I forgot to mention that I was loading the disc image from a Gotek via vanilla DFS, not using RAMFS at all, but still had to disable the ROM so definitely some weirdness going on.

[TobyLobster]

Disc Doctor stores &0D at &130 so any code at that location gets corrupted.

I tried this fix with Disk Doctor 1.09 and it does seem to work, thank you.

But SLAVE 1.04 fails still, as it seems to overwrite &137-&174 with data.

EDIT: Could RAMFS be writing to page 1 when loading from GOTEK & plain DFS, anyone know?

NEWMINER.ssd

(21.5 KiB) Downloaded 38 times

[kieranhj]

EDIT: Could RAMFS be writing to page 1 when loading from GOTEK & plain DFS, anyone know?

PAGE &100 is the stack, so nobody should be really writing there beyond PHA instructions. You can normally get away with stealing the bottom half of the page but always a gamble. Also any FS errors that are generated get written to &100, as an error number followed by a terminated error string.

[lurkio]

SLAVE 1.04 fails still, as it seems to overwrite &137-&174 with data.

I wouldn't worry. It turns out that your penultimate version of the Miner 2021 .SSD is compatible with the latest version (1.34) of the SLAVE ROM:

http://bbcmicro.co.uk//jsbeeb/play.php? ... e-1.34.rom

And in any case SLAVE 1.34 can disable itself if the user enters the right command (*CROM -SLAVE), which is built into SLAVE — and so too can the older version (1.04) of SLAVE (*FX30,128). So I think we're sorted!

[TobyLobster]

Thanks for that. I've updated my GitHub repo with the fix, see the initial post for link.

[CaptOates]

This is fantastic, many thanks for doing this!

[TobyLobster]

Thanks, I'm glad people are enjoying it!

[GPC]

What a great version you have done here, this is my tribute and thank you for all your work.

I was espeically surprised when I compared it side by side with the original towards the end of the video, this really does show the love, sweat and tears that went into this update.

https://youtu.be/EdFQEPrWumw