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Banchor: Legend of the Hellspawn (TI-84+CE)

Started by JamesV, October 06, 2017, 06:55:55 AM

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JamesV

Back in 2006 I released Banchor, which was a Zelda-like grayscale RPG for the TI-86, using a modified version of an engine written by David Phillips of Assembly Coders Zenith. By the time I released it, the TI-86 was long since discontinued.

I decided to do a quick port over to the TI-84+CE, with minimal changes to the original game. Even though there are probably numerous things that could be done to improve the game, I wanted to leave it mostly untouched. And it was simply a fun exercise in porting the grayscale engine, as well as giving Banchor a little more life, because all those years ago I had plans to turn it into a trilogy, with each game having different a different play style.. plans that never really went away... Zargul was secretly going to be a sequel or prequel to Banchor, using the first-person D&D style of Eye of the Beholder (thus, Zargul will become Banchor 2 if/when I get back to working on it).

Anywho.. the port is complete. The TI-86 128x64 resolution is scaled up to 256*128 in the original 4-level grayscale. Here are a couple of screenshots.

 
 

One final note - along with Zelda, Banchor was heavily inspired by Golvellius. Nevertheless, I'm still planning on continuing my 84+CE version of this at some stage, given that Golvellius will be in full colour, and Banchor is only in grayscale.. :)


Download here

Dream of Omnimaga

Glad to see this game ported :) I wonder if in the future it would be easy to add color palettes based on area you're in or menu for some colors?
  • Calculators owned: TI-82 Advanced Edition Python TI-84+ TI-84+CSE TI-84+CE TI-84+CEP TI-86 TI-89T cfx-9940GT fx-7400G+ fx 1.0+ fx-9750G+ fx-9860G fx-CG10 HP 49g+ HP 39g+ HP 39gs (bricked) HP 39gII HP Prime G1 HP Prime G2 Sharp EL-9600C
  • Consoles, mobile devices and vintage computers owned: Huawei P30 Lite, Moto G 5G, Nintendo 64 (broken), Playstation, Wii U

Ranman

I remember when this game first came out. I was amazed then... and still amazed today!

Great job JamesV  :thumbsup:
  • Calculators owned: TI-89 HW1, TI-92+, Casio 9860G Slim, Casio fx6300, Tandy PC7
Ranman
Bringing Randy Glover's Jumpman to the TI-89 calculator. Download available at Ticalc.

JamesV

Quote from: xlibman on October 08, 2017, 10:36:58 PM
Glad to see this game ported :) I wonder if in the future it would be easy to add color palettes based on area you're in or menu for some colors?
I would be possible, even just some 4-bit colour. Although I'm kind of inclined to just leave the pretty colours for the sequels if/when I get around to continuing work on them.. :)

tr1p1ea

What bpp are you running the program in out of interest?

JamesV

Quote from: tr1p1ea on October 10, 2017, 09:52:46 PM
What bpp are you running the program in out of interest?
8bpp, although the palette only has 5 colours loaded (the dark red background, plus the 4 gray shades). The original grayscale buffering part of the engine is unchanged, so all the sprite routines, etc. are the same as they were on the TI-86, but there is a new routine that parses the dark & light buffers simultaneously to select the palette colour when updating vram. At the same time, it does the scaling up 2x horizontally, and finally performs ldir's to scale vertically (similar to Pirate Space Kitties).

123outerme

Looks amazing! I can definitely see the Zelda influences, especially from the "enemy spawn" animation. That looks pretty familiar ;) But that's good, of course, that your game reminds me of an NES classic that grew to a massive franchise. I'm looking forward to other releases from your planned trilogy!

Quote from: JamesV on October 10, 2017, 10:24:38 PM
Quote from: tr1p1ea on October 10, 2017, 09:52:46 PM
What bpp are you running the program in out of interest?
8bpp, although the palette only has 5 colours loaded (the dark red background, plus the 4 gray shades). The original grayscale buffering part of the engine is unchanged, so all the sprite routines, etc. are the same as they were on the TI-86, but there is a new routine that parses the dark & light buffers simultaneously to select the palette colour when updating vram. At the same time, it does the scaling up 2x horizontally, and finally performs ldir's to scale vertically (similar to Pirate Space Kitties).
Speaking of that dark-red background, I love it! It looks really fitting of the whole atmosphere, at least from the screenshots in the topic. I have to ask, though, why'd you choose that red? I'm really interested to know :)
  • Calculators owned: TI-84+CSE, TI-nspire Clickpad, TI-84+SE

JamesV

Quote from: 123outerme on October 11, 2017, 01:38:36 AM
Looks amazing! I can definitely see the Zelda influences, especially from the "enemy spawn" animation. That looks pretty familiar ;) But that's good, of course, that your game reminds me of an NES classic that grew to a massive franchise. I'm looking forward to other releases from your planned trilogy!

Speaking of that dark-red background, I love it! It looks really fitting of the whole atmosphere, at least from the screenshots in the topic. I have to ask, though, why'd you choose that red? I'm really interested to know :)
Funnily enough, my inspiration for the enemy spawn animation was from Golvellius (see below), not Zelda. But then, Golvellius was Sega's answer to Zelda :P

I've already started the sequel a couple of years back, under the name Zargul, as a first-person D&D style game based on the Eye of the Beholder engine. It hasn't seen any progress in about 12 months, but I'll eventually get back on to it. And then at some point, the 3rd part, which will be a different style of RPG again.

The red came from the old HTML readme from the TI-86 version, which I think I originally used because it just seemed like a fitting, dark, evil colour to suit the theme.


JamesV

Based on some feedback I've received, I've uploaded a small update (v1.2.1). It should be available soon at the original download link above. Changes are as follows:

- Fixed the "warp into wall" bug in one of the maps in the Pyramid of Snakes.
- Can now press [2nd] to finish talking/reading/viewing inventory.
- Fixed a bug with partial heart level when starting a game.
- Wells now fully heal all your hearts, with the cost being increased to 150 Gold (up from 100 Gold).
- Reduced Gold loss upon death to 1/4 (down from 1/2).
- Player now revives at a nearby Well of Life after death.

Additionally, I added in a little nod to the potential Banchor II :P

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