Archived News Updates

Merry Christmas

Sunday, December 26, 1999

Unfortunately, I haven't had much time to work on Zelda this past week. With this new school calendar system that my school district has, all of the public schools had to go to school on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of last week. It's not fun. Not only did I have to go to school, but I've had to work every day last week except for Sunday and Saturday. So my week was pretty stuffed and I didn't hardly have any time to pick up my 89. But, I don't have school at all this week, thank goodness, so I'll be able to put in a lot of programming time. Expect to get some good info next week regarding the animated people, and hopefully, enemies.

I did, however, have some time to work on it, although not much, but the animated people are coming along quite nicely. Currently, I have a separate set of programs where I'm working everything out and eliminating all the bugs. These programs take one person, and animate them while you're walking around. As soon as that person is no longer on the screen, it jumps back to the normal Zelda programming and you can continue playing normally. Once I've got everything ironed out, I'll "link" the two programs together. So as long as there's another person on the screen, they'll be animated.

Also, for those of you who are wondering about Rotator 83, yes, it is being developed. I reported a few weeks ago that I am now working with another programmer to develop games. Jon (my programming partner) is currently taking over the task of programming Rotator. This will be the first program that he will have released onto the Internet, and he's looking forward to it. I won't be seeing him until I go back to school, but he told me that over the break he would try to do as much programming as possible. I'll keep you updated on this project as I hear from Jon.

Sunday, December 19, 1999

Lots of Zelda work has been going on this week. That's my main focus right now. There's a lot of people out there who are looking forward to seeing the next demo, and I'm working hard to get it to them as soon as possible. Here's a few of the things you can expect to see when I release this next demo:
Multiple Save Files
Yup, that's right. You'll be able to save three files just like you can in the GameBoy version. You can see this in the screenshots to the left. The top one is, obviously, from my LA89 (Link's Awakening 89), and the bottom one is from LAGB (Link's Awakening GameBoy). Link even wiggles back and forth on the Player Select screen just like in LAGB!

Animated Characters
As in LAGB, the characters in LA89 will be animated. What this means is that whenever another person shows up on the screen, he/she will "wiggle" back and forth. If you've played LAGB, or any of the Final Fantasy games on the SNES, you know what I'm talking about. For example, in the original demo, one of the women said "I'm sweeping the island clean...". But she was just standing still. In this next demo, she will actually be "sweeping" back and forth.

Enemies
As of this writing, I have not begun to incorporate enemies into the game. However, I fully expect to be able to include enemies in the next demo release. If everything goes as planned, there will be several different types of enemies in this demo. Some that wander around and attack randomly, others that just sit still, and some that actually chase you around. Assuming I can work in all of these different types of enemies, don't expect the demo to be out by Christmas. There's simply not enough time for me to include everything I want to include, and still have it done this week.

Minor Optimizations
You'll also notice a lot of minor changes to the play of the game. Taking into consideration many of the email responses I got back after releasing the first demo, I've been able to incorporate suggestions and minor improvements from several different people. To anyone who sent me an email with a suggestion or idea, thank you. You've helped to improve this game all the more. Some of you may notice your suggestions, and others may not. A lot of the improvements take place within the programming code, so the player can't tell anything's different, but the programming is more efficient.

I've also updated the Learn and Contact pages. Instead of offering online programming tutorials, which are just how-to, I'll offer programming assistance on a more personal level. If you have a question or a problem regarding programming on the TIs (preferably 83 & 89), just talk to me and I'll try and help you come up with a solution to it. On these two pages I've listed my AOL Instant Messenger name, as well as my ICQ number, so you can get a hold of me either way. I'll be glad to try and help you come up with a solution to any programming questions you have.

Sunday, December 12, 1999

Sorry for the lack of updates, but I forgot to mention that I'll be updating the news on a weekly basis from now on. Expect to see a new update every Sunday. I apologize for not letting you know about this sooner.

In recent news, I upgraded my TI-89 to AMS 2.03, as most of you have probably heard about. I haven't noticed any real differences when running Zelda, so if you've upgraded it doesn't look like it will be a problem. However, you probably also know that if you originally had ROM 1.0, you won't be able to use the entire 700k of archive space. You'll have the same amount you do now for storage, and about another 300-350k for Flash Applications. I will be striving to be able to have the final Zelda game fit in the original 380K of archive, and it's looking like that will work.

As far as an update to the Zelda Demo goes, things are looking good. I can't guarantee a Christmas release, so if it's not done by then, it's not done. When it's fully ready to be released, I'll go ahead and let you have it, but not until then. I've been changing a lot of things, as well as adding more too. When Link walks into or out of a door, it goes a lot faster than the previous demo. I'm doing a lot of "Code Cleaning" before I release this demo, also. What I mean by that is I'll go through every program and eliminate every little useless thing and optimize the code for both speed and efficiency. You can expect the new demo to take up much, much less space than the original.

Look for another update next Sunday.

Thursday, December 2nd, 1999

Well, I'm back. I didn't get as much done as I was hoping to since I released the Zelda Demo, but I've got a few good projects in the works. First of all, a second release of the Zelda Demo is planned for sometime around Christmas. This demo will most likely have the same map area, but the people will be animated, and there will be enemies also. A lot of the programming code will have been "cleaned up" for this demo, and it will be MUCH smaller than the first one was.

Also some more good news, philring83 Programming now has another member, Jon Gordin! I have personally known Jon for over three years, and he is an avid TI-83 BASIC programmer and will be assisting me in the development of games such as Rotator, as well as doing his own projects. He is currently developing a BlackJack/Poker type of game, hopefully to be out sometime this month. I'll keep you posted on Jon's progress on this and other projects as he's ready to release more information.

I'm also finally going to finish Rotator 83, hopefully by Christmas as well. Both of these projects depend on how much schoolwork I have, as well as how much time I'll be spending at work. I have a big project due in early January for my American-Lit class, so that'll be sucking away a lot of good programming time. I'm just saying now that school will be my priority over programming. Just so you all understand, if any of my projects become delayed due to incompletion, it is most likely because school gets in the way. Wish me luck, and hopefully I can get Rotator out before the end of the year. Enjoy the new site!

Monday, November 8, 1999

Now that you've all gotten a chance to see what I've been working on, I've decided to "crawl back into my cave" for a while. What do I mean by this? Well, for the past six months I've been working on Zelda, and no one ever knew. I like developing games better that way, instead of making public announcements every few days or whatever. So, when I say that I'm going to go back to my cave, I mean that I won't have any updates for a while.
How long is a while? I'm not exactly sure. I've got some good projects in mind, besides finishing Zelda, and it'll take some time before they're ready to show off. Yes, I'm still programming in BASIC. You've seen what I've done with it on the 89, and I think that the 83 deserves some superb, high-quality games and programs also (in BASIC). People think that it's a worthless language, but, if you've played Zelda, you've seen what it can do when put to good use.
I'm not going to tell you what my ideas and projects are, but they'll be good. I'm hoping to develop one of my projects for both the 83 and the 89, and to do things never before seen even in ASM programs. I'm thinking about "coming back" to the TI world around the beginning of December, but it depends on what I get done. I promise you that I'll be coming back, and I promise I'll have some good stuff when I return. Thanks for visiting.

Sunday, November 7, 1999

Yesterday I released a demo version of Zelda: Link's Awakening for the 89. This is a game that I've been working on for a long time, and a demo is finally out. Check it out here.

Tuesday, October 26, 1999

Well, I finally released a whole website about my big 89 project. I think you'll be impressed with what you see. Instead of blabbering on about it here, why don't you just click right here and see for yourself...

Wednesday, October 20, 1999

Ooze is finished. Click on the TI-83 button to get it. Remember, please tell me what you think of the game after you've played it. This helps me out a whole lot. Thanks!!

Wednesday, October 20, 1999

Well, I announced last night that I would be releasing a game called "Ooze: Welcome to the sewer" today, and I definately should get it out today. I'm working on getting the last few bugs out of it and making sure it all works fine. Look for it later tonight.

Monday, October 4, 1999

I think I've got a little explaining to do. I'm sure some of you were looking for Rotator a little while ago, and I had it all ready to go. Well, due to having SOS on my 83 at the same time, and apparently an unstable assembly game, my 83 crashed and I completely lost Rotator. I did have an old file backed up on my computer, but that isn't going to do me much good because I changed almost everything after I put that file on my computer. I will recreate Rotator as soon as I can, but it might take a couple weeks. I'm sorry for the dissapointment.

Saturday, September 25, 1999

Well, if anyone is a regular visitor, you might be waiting for Rotator 83 to come out today. Well, if everything goes as planned it will. I've been putting on the finising touches today, so it's almost finished. However, I have to work in an hour, and I won't get back home until around 9:00 central time. Hopefully when I get back, I'll finish touching-up the game and release it. So, sometime later tonight, if you're waiting for Rotator, be sure to check back.