Let’s Make a Retro Game – EP13 – More Enemies

This is the 13th video in my series, where I am going to work through the steps required to make a home brew game for a retro 8-bit console or computer system.

In each episode I will work through various topics, such as tools, methods and design.

All of the information referenced in each episode will have an associated article on my web site.

In the Intellivision game of Astro Smash, that we are basing our game on, the main enemies are Asteroids that fall down the screen, exploding when they hit the ground.

Points are awarded to the player, when one is destroyed and points are removed if one reaches the planet surface.

In this episode we are going to enhance the generation of the enemy objects. Currently we are only making the same type of asteroid appear, whereas we want a variety of enemies to appear on screen with different movement logic and behaviour.

We won’t cover all the eventual enemy types in this episode, but we will put together the framework so we can add more in the next episode.

I have included the complete code for this section, so you can follow through the various steps without having to worry about typing in code.

The supplied code has folders for Coleco, MSX and Spectravideo systems and each one contains two folders:
Start – where we start in this episode and
End – the final code and a copy of the ROM file.

The corresponding article with all download links and more detail on what is covered in this episode is available on my website here:
http://www.electricadventures.net/Pages/Article/150

Next episode we will be covering some more details of the graphics capabilities of our TI-993X systems i.e. MSX, Colecovision, Sega SG-1000 etc.

If you would like to contribute to my creation of new titles for 8 and 16 bit systems or contribute to my software and magazine preservation efforts, I have setup a Patron page here: https://www.patreon.com/electricadventures

#retro #programming #tutorial #z80

See general updates on both my web site:
http://www.electricadventures.net
and my Facebook page:
http://www.facebook.com/ElectricAdventures

If you are a Spectravideo or MSX fan, buy a copy of my book on these two computers here:

I am part of the ‘Press Play On Tape’ podcast, join the mayhem here:
https://www.facebook.com/pressplayontap

I also do live game plays, usually high score practices on Twitch here:
http://www.twitch.tv/electricadventures