Alternate Reality X - Release 0.1 for Mac OS X

Choosing your display options in the Mac OS X 0.1 release of ARX 

You can now download the Mac OS X 0.1 release of Alternate Reality X over on the Patreon site. Alternatively if you've supported CRPG Dev through Paypal then you should have received a download link via email. 

It's identical to the Windows release. I've tested it myself and it seems to work really well. In future I'll release the Mac OS X version at the same time as the Windows version. Unity 3D makes the Mac build really easy.

Thanks for your support for CRPG Dev and Alternate Reality X.

ARX - Release 0.1 on Mac OS X

Alternate Reality X - Save game coding underway

I've made a start on coding the save game feature and so far it's working as expected. Might be a few weeks before I am able to release a version for people to try it out though.

Alternate Reality X - Display timing issues

I recently posted on the 8 bit Atari Age forums and some of the regulars there who've responded to my AR X posts over the last couple of years reminded me of an often mentioned issue which I've still to fix. This is the high speed which the City and Dungeon gate counters spin around. I'm not currently timing the speed with which different computers should display things on the screen which means some people find this very frustrating as it's way too fast.

Along with the save game facility I'll aim to fix this problem in the next release. I know what SFML commands I need to look at to help with this and once I've worked it out this will hopefully help me to be able to tackle others features such as encounter animation and on screen timed song lyrics.

Alternate Reality X - Save games

Lots of people have asked me to include a save game option in the next release of ARX. I'm really surprised as I expected players would be looking for other features first before they would want to save characters. Anyway I think I've come up with a fairly good way of providing a save game option in the next release which will allow players to save their characters AND load them into future versions of ARX. I can't guarantee this but I'm going to give it a good try.

The next release will allow you to save and load into one of 10 save game "slots" similar to the original Dungeon game.

Alternate Reality X - Currency Exchange at the D & P

My 10 year old son started enjoying the wonders of Alternate Reality last night for the first time. He's seen me playing the original games and working on Alternate Reality X plenty of times but yesterday he downloaded version 0.41 of ARX from the website and started playing through what's there. He quickly got sucked into the game but was a bit frustrated once he realised there are some features missing. In the meantime he's keen to try the originals.

One of his complaints was that he could not trade the gems and jewels he found from encounters for silver so I thought I would put that into the game next. I've added the "Currency Exchange" menu to the Damon & Pythias shop so you can now trade in gems and jewels as well as convert silver and copper to gold to lessen your load ( for a fee of course ). I'm away at a conference for a few days but will add the similar functions to the City banks on my return.

Alternate Reality X - Release 0.41

I've finally uploaded release 0.41 of Alternate Reality X to www.crpgdev.com - it's only about 4 months late! Finally tackled some of the work on the City taverns and I'll try and totally finish these for release 0.5. Tavern features still missing are buying rounds and friendship levels which determine whether you get help when you're down and out or get refused entry to certain taverns. I'm also keen to add a save game facility as many people are asking for this.

Anyway here's what's included in this 0.41 release:

• City Courier healer bug fixed
• Use food packets and water flasks
• Buy food and drink from City taverns
• Basic recording of hunger, thirst and alcohol levels added
• City Tavern jobs and memberships now available
• Updated city map with correct signs and Arena walls (many thanks to Dalimar who did this work)
• Added Trolls and Goblins palaces
• Added Dungeon Chapel placeholder and music
• Added fountains to Dungeon
• Mini map and full screen map no longer slow down frame rate due to SFML 2.0 library
• "Use" command now works during encounters
• Mercenaries / Paladin guilds in Dungeon no longer crashes
• No longer crashes when using the secret doors in the outer City walls to move from one map side to another
• Mini map now displays during encounters
• Lots of code reorganisaion behind the scenes

Feedback as always appreciated.

Alternate Reality X - Working towards 0.41

I now feel I'm back into the swing of coding for my long sterm Alternate Reality remake project. I've now completed moving it over to use the latest version of the SFML 2.0 media library and I'm pleased with the results such as the automap display now displaying instantly.

I'm now working towards releasing a new version of ARX. This so far contains bug fixes, a few new placeholders for shops / modules such as the  Dungeon Chapel and pretty much the full Troll / Goblin ring quest. I've also added in the Dungeon fountains and have made a start on adding more features to the City Taverns. It also features an updated City map provided by Dalimar with all the shop door signs now in place and the Arena walls using the pillar texture. You can also move / wrap from one side of the City map to the other using those secret doors - instead of appearing "outside" the map as in previous versions.

Hopefully have this mini release which I've marked as version 0.41 out in another week or so.

Alternate Reality X - Release 2.1

After taking almost a year between the first and second demo releases for Alternate Reality X (ARX), I've vowed to release updated versions more frequently. However I have been really busy with work and been away on holiday so I've made very little progress since the demo release at the beginning of August 2010.

I have started working on the City character creation and now have it at the point that it's mostly complete. I still need to fix a few things such as the colour of the counters and music / sound effect timing. I'm not attempting to match every element of the original character creation sequence but hopefully people will understand that. I'm rather spend the time on key parts of the game such as combat and shop functionality.

My graphic card issues are now resolved so I have ARX running at about 60 frames a second - much better than the previous 6 frames!

Over at the ARX forums there a number of bug reports which I will try to resolve in the next few days. Possibly the worse is the teleport bug which places you outside the level 2 map. I think this will be due to me using level 1 teleport coordinates when adding the level 2 dungeon map. Thanks to dalimar for pointing these out.

I'm hoping to finish off the city character creation sequence and fix these bugs for a small 2.1 update release sometime this week.

Alternate Reality - Graphic card woes

I was fortunate enough to be able to upgrade the old laptop I was using to a decent spec PC. Everything initially looked very positive. Windows 7 installed smoothly, detected all the right drivers and the PC seemed to perform very well. I installed Visual Studio 2008 Express which I am using to develop my Alternate Reality remake and everything compiled fine.

However when I ran Alternate Reality X (as I've now started calling it) but it was very slow. SFML (the media library I'm using for the project) uses OpenGL to produce all its graphic output and I'm also using OpenGL to produce the 3D view in the game. The onboard Intel graphics in the PC obviously doesn't have proper Windows 7 drivers which support OpenGL (despite the OpenGL logo being displayed within the graphic card driver tab within Windows).

The number 3 on the status bar below indicates the number of frames the game is currently running at with the alternate graphics option. It's not quite so bad with the original graphics which are smaller dimenstions. On my previous laptop (also using Intel graphics but with proper OpenGL supported Windows 7 drivers) the game ran around 30 frames a second. Sadly there seem to be no better drivers available.

I ordered a new graphics card with an NVidia chipset but didn't realise that the PC didn't have a PCI Express x16 slot! I'll get this sorted eventually. In the meantime I'll focus on parts of the game which aren't really affected by the slow speed.

Welcome

Welcome to my Game Development Blog. Alternate Reality (AR) was a series of computer role playing games (CRPG) games back in the mid 1980s. The Alternate Reality games were originally intended as a series of seven scenarios - The City, The Dungeon, The Arena, The Palace, The Wilderness, Revelation and Destiny. Only the first 2 games in the series were ever completed, though plans for the Arena scenario were outlined.

Alternate Reality: The City was designed and programmed for the Atari 8bit by Philip Price with music by Gary Gilbertson and graphics by Craig Skinner. This original installment was intended to include the content of both The City and The Dungeon but was split into 2 games at the request of the original publisher. Numerous 8bit and 16bit versions exist, some better than others. The original Atari 8bit version is widely thought to be the best version.

Alternate Reality: The Dungeon was designed and programmed by Ken Jordan and Dan Pinal who worked for Datasoft with design notes left by Philip Price. 70% complete 16bit versions of the Dungeon for the PC and Amiga were in progress but were eventually cancelled. Versions exist for the Atari 8bit, Commodore 64 and Apple II. All copyrights for Alternate Reality have now returned to Philip Price.

Though not as well known as say the Ultima series of CRPGs, AR still has a small but dedicated following of fans who are keen to see the series revised. There is an AR mailing list which is still active and sometimes has the original series' developers posting to the list. There have been various attempts from fans and the original developers to redevelop the series for modern systems but unfortunately none of these have come to fruition.

Originally I started playing the Commodore 64 version of The Dungeon whilst I was still at school and it's remained one of my favourite games ever since. I've been interested in producing my own modernised version of the game for a number of years and a few years ago produced a simple C++ and SDL demo version which allowed you to explore a level of the Dungeon map and fight a few monsters. I eventually gave up after struggling to make progress with the 3D engine.

Over the last year or so I've started from scratch this time still using SDL for sound, music and input but also using the OpenGL library for graphics. This has allowed me to progress further and produce a more flexible display than my previous efforts, though the 3D view is still very basic.

My intention here is to record my progress on the development of the remake as well as give those who are interested in it the opportunity to comment and assist with the development of this project.