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https://www.smspower.org/Homebrew/FindTheWordyGems-SMS

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Find as many gems sequences,displayed with their skip sequences, in the time limit to beat the high score.Enter you guess, of where you think the first gem in some gem sequence starts by placing the red cursor on the first gem of the gem sequence. The right and down keys moves the red cursor and button 1 resets the cursor back to the top left of the game board, button 2 enters your guess.

Hey @Z80ASMprogrammer2022, another really creative idea for a puzzle game!

I tried to get into this, but I am having problems with the controls. Firstly I didn't realise that you couldn't go up or left (then I read the instructions!) but even trying to go down and right is difficult because it doesn't register my control inputs reliably, and so often when I press right it does nothing, and sometimes it skips over the tile I was attempting to select!

Perhaps it's some problem with the control reading routine, or maybe you intentionally put some kind of debouncing in which is a little too strong.

If the controls were easier to handle, I think the game would be an intriguing challenge, and I also suspect setting the level timer lower might be a nice option in that case, since often I can see the solution quite quickly, only navigating there takes all the time!

I had the same problem on my SMS1. I also had an interesting bug with colours on that where the playfield didn't match the prompt.

willbritton wrote

Hey @Z80ASMprogrammer2022, another really creative idea for a puzzle game!

I tried to get into this, but I am having problems with the controls. Firstly I didn't realise that you couldn't go up or left (then I read the instructions!) but even trying to go down and right is difficult because it doesn't register my control inputs reliably, and so often when I press right it does nothing, and sometimes it skips over the tile I was attempting to select!

Perhaps it's some problem with the control reading routine, or maybe you intentionally put some kind of debouncing in which is a little too strong.

If the controls were easier to handle, I think the game would be an intriguing challenge, and I also suspect setting the level timer lower might be a nice option in that case, since often I can see the solution quite quickly, only navigating there takes all the time!

Hi Will,

I assume you tried it on real hardware regarding the controls. The way buttons are read in software suited my reflexes so I didn't notice it the problem you pointed out. It would probably work better with a joystick (instead of the SMS game pad) regarding the timings because a joystick can take a little bit more time to input-if you know what I mean.

Yesterzine wrote

I had the same problem on my SMS1. I also had an interesting bug with colours on that where the playfield didn't match the prompt.

Sounds like the palette didn't load correctly on your SMS1 on startup for some reason. I would try cold/hard reset the game a few times until the colors match the title screen colors shown in the screenshot of the game on this website (so you see the red, blue, yellow,green colors in the word "FIND THE WORDY GEMS" to be the same as shown in the screenshot of of the title screen). Also the gems can be matched by their shape instead of color-so its playable even if the colors don't match, or the playfield doesn't match the prompt, but it is probably a bit more difficult as you only have the shape, not both shape and color for some gem, as a clue. Note it is a WIP (as mentioned on the title screen).

Z80ASMprogrammer2022 wrote

Hi Will,

I assume you tried it on real hardware regarding the controls.

Actually I was just trying on Emulicious using a keyboard to start with.

Yesterzine wrote

I also had an interesting bug with colours on that where the playfield didn't match the prompt.

I think I found this too - see screenshot below from Emulicious.

Also I actually think this can occur even mid-game, although I haven't been able to reproduce that. I've certainly seen it happen on hard reset, but not anywhere near as often as in the Spaghetti game.

Having played it a bit more, I would also say that some of the shapes and colours are quite hard to differentiate, in particular the two yellow gems (and to a lesser extent the white one), and the two green gems.

gems.png (47.63 KB)

willbritton wrote

Yesterzine wrote

I also had an interesting bug with colours on that where the playfield didn't match the prompt.

I think I found this too - see screenshot below from Emulicious.

Also I actually think this can occur even mid-game, although I haven't been able to reproduce that. I've certainly seen it happen on hard reset, but not anywhere near as often as in the Spaghetti game.

Having played it a bit more, I would also say that some of the shapes and colours are quite hard to differentiate, in particular the two yellow gems (and to a lesser extent the white one), and the two green gems.

Hi Will,

For Find the Wordy Gems, I am told the colors are 100% correct on real hardware and when I get a photo I will upload it later to show this.

So attached is the photo showing

Find the Wordy Gems

works on real hardware, the black shiny wire in front the screen is the master system aerial. As can be seen the colors are 100% perfect on real hardware.

findthewordygems-realhardware.png (376.88 KB)

This game suffers the same issues of your other entry.

For instance in this one at address $02D6 you have an OTIR to push data to VRAM.
But OTIR is too fast when the screen is on, so you have two options:
- make sure the screen is off when you get here
- replace this OTIR with

-:OUTI
JR NZ,-

so that the transfer is slow enough to do not break VDP timings constraint.

Also, make sure the VDP register #6 is set correctly.

Try Emulicious' debugger, you won't be disappointed. :)

Here is the second version (version 1.1) of Find the Wordy Gems (which works on real hardware too).

* It changes the VDP register 6 to load 3 as sverx suggested (for SMS1 and SMS2)
* It uses OUTI instead of OTIR as sverx suggested enabling the slow down for writing the tile and sprite palettes to graphical memory-this has been tested in an emulator and as a consequence of this code change,suggested by sverx, the palette always loads correctly in an emulator.

Following on from the suggestions from Will Britton the following changes were made.

* Improved controls. The controller will move the cursor more smoothly (not at least because an intentional delay was removed) and the cursor is easier to control.
* The gems are more distinct in shape: there is now a larger and smaller yellow gem, and a larger and smaller green gem.
* The high score has been lowered (I think this is similar to lowering level timer because lowering the time means it is harder to get a higher score)

Can somebody update the page for it here

https://www.smspower.org/Homebrew/FindTheWordyGems-SMS

with the updated zip file attached

FindTheWordyGems-SMS-v1.1.zip (16.14 KB)

(Maxim, or Bock, or someone else with the page edit ability, thanks)

@Z8AP, I updated this earlier today for you.

Can confirm the palette problem is now fixed!
Also the input seems a little better now too, it plays better now.

It’s always nice to see games that try something new. It’s s novel concept that works quite well. Since the playfield is quite small I wonder if it would be possible to make a version where each gem is 2x2 tiles big, which would not only look nice, but also made them easier to distinguish.

Kagesan wrote

It’s always nice to see games that try something new. It’s s novel concept that works quite well. Since the playfield is quite small I wonder if it would be possible to make a version where each gem is 2x2 tiles big, which would not only look nice, but also made them easier to distinguish.

Each gem on the game board is a sprite. So my initial thought is yes, because the obvious way to do it would be to magnify each sprite into a 2 by 2 tile using the master system's built in sprite magnifying hardware. However, I think this would make the gems have a blocky look, because of enlarged pixels, which I think is not a good look.

I don’t think there is any advantage to using sprites here as the images are aligned to the 8x8 grid. Drawing them into the name table would allow you to use 16x16 art.

Maxim wrote

I don’t think there is any advantage to using sprites here as the images are aligned to the 8x8 grid. Drawing them into the name table would allow you to use 16x16 art.

I know what you mean. They are sprites because, in an earlier version. the gems slid along the game board. But in the final version sliding gems are not used. Thus they (remained as) sprites. Note that is a WIP (this is shown on the title screen).

willbritton wrote

@Z8AP, I updated this earlier today for you.

Can confirm the palette problem is now fixed!
Also the input seems a little better now too, it plays better now.

Hi WIll,

"Also the input seems a little better now too, it plays better now."

So attached is the third version (version 1.2) of Find the Wordy Gems (which works on real hardware too).

"Also the input seems a little better now too, it plays better now."

I have made the input keys control the cursor even more smoothly compared to the second version. I did this my optimising some parts of the code to free up more time to read the keys.

"Firstly I didn't realise that you couldn't go up or left (then I read the instructions!) "

I have also added up and left keys to the control so it the cursor can be moved up and left with the above keys.

Consequently I have updated the instructions (the rtf file).

So can you please update the page at

https://www.smspower.org/Homebrew/FindTheWordyGems-SMS

with the attached zip file. It Also needs the "Gameplay" and "Controls" section updating on the above webpage which can be copied and pasted from the section in the attached updated rtf file,

(For anyone playing this, the game may emit some sound or a tone I didn't program depending on your specific master system hardware, so you can turn off the volume on your TV for now-there is no music or sound to this game as it is a WIP. So sound you may hear is not a bug in the game)

FindTheWordyGems-SMS-v1.2.zip (16.35 KB)

(Or Maxim, or Bock, or someone else with the page edit ability, thanks)

Just updated page for v1.2 @Z8AP

Yesterzine wrote

I had the same problem on my SMS1. I also had an interesting bug with colours on that where the playfield didn't match the prompt.

Hi Yesterzine,

The colors bug was fixed in the version uploaded 2/Apr/24 (version 1.2) and the game has improved controls in that version..Still like my other game it's a WIP as stated on the title screen.

For me this is a great game and I really like the new novel game design which I think is great. I enjoy playing it. But I like Spaghetti Numbers more.

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