Week of April 20, 2008

DeathChase 3D ported by ron

Posted by Darc 15:09, 26 April 2008 (CDT)

ron has released an alpha version of a port of DeathChase 3D to Dreamcast. Here is the translation from Dreamcast.es:

DeathChase is a classic game for Sinclair ZX spectum, recently ported to Amstrad CPC, and now we have it available on Dreamcast.

Based on SDL and vector graphics, an alpha 01 test version is now released. At the moment this version is a work in progress and is in its early stages. Do not expect a finished game since it is very primitive. The game will eventually finished to be a frantic game of deadly racing of motorcycles.

The author of the original computer code is Paul Robson.

Update by Indiket: Unloading corrected and added some sound effects ;)

You can download it from Dreamcast.es or download a copy from our server here.

Source: Dreamcast.es

Giana's Return - Development in trouble? UPDATE: It doesn't look like that

Posted by Maturion 13:55, 26 April 2008 (CDT)

Giana's Return-Team has been informed that a German software company (bhv Software GmbH) is about to release a commercial Giana's Sisters remake. They are frightened of legal conflicts. However, Kojote, a team member has been told via e-mail about 3 years ago, that they are free to use the name "Giana's Return".

Here's the quote from the official website:

Light into the dark?

The organizing team just recieved an email from someone who pretends to know more about a commercial “Giana Sisters” remake, which is in the works by the german company “bhv Software GmbH”. If we can believe Amazon Germany the game should be out in shelves on 15th May 2008. We are really looking forward to have a talk with the guy who has details.

Actually this is something which scares some of us off.

I might repeat a part of the story again, for those who don’t know: The history of ”Giana’s Return” has begun as Giana 32k (DOS), a Giana Sisters clone with 7 levels, coded in less than 32 kilobyte. Later on, he wanted to make a full game out of it and was looking for a leveldesigner, this is where Kojote, the current organizer of Giana’s Return came in.

To shorten it a bit, Myth was working on a Windows version (Giant Worlds) which was published on a computer magazins cover CD. From this moment on he had the attention of the copyrightholder Armin Gessert, who tried to sue him, but after a chat on the phone, he dropped this.

Myth was too scared to continue development, but Kojote had plenty of new levels left, which were now without use. Considering building a level and testing etc takes more than some would believe, he took the project into his hands, now as “Giana’s Return”. Due to Myth complaining about his poor code and not giving the relevant parts, we had to start from scratch.

“Giana’s Return” was now born in 2001/2002. With the help of a console coder known as Christian Nowak, we have gone pretty far and were able to release a 0.90 beta version to the public, mainly for Dreamcast, GP32 and Windows (32-Bit). Due to unkown reasons, CHN dropped the work on Giana’s Return and left the console scene in general.

There we were… an almost done game, but with some minor bugs which destroyed the gameplay - and the best part - no source code.

It came what had to come…

The whole game required a new team and a new code base. In 2004 we pulled our head in an iceblock and started over again, with a NEW team.

Of course the organizer tried to get in touch with the responsible people, specially Armin Gessert. It turned out into a real pain, as Armin seems to hide himself pretty well. We have sent a written statement to him, CHN at the beginning of the project, as long as the project organizer. Without direct response from Armin. We didn’t take it too serious as we know he has to earn his bread as well, but we did not gave up. We even tried to ring up Armin Gessert at his company “Spellbound AG” in Germany - all we reached was talking to Mr. Speer, who said he will talk with Armin. No direct response from Armin again at all - up to now.

Considering “no answer” is an answer too and the word of Mr. Speer (see E-Mail above), we accepted his silence as “Do what you want”. After all we had no money intensions and just bring a worthy sequel of Armin’s great game. We have also been in touch with Chris Hülsbeck, who allowed us to use his original .SID files (the e-mail is still in our hands) and Manfred Trenz allowed us to redo all of the levels one by one. Of course the last two don’t have too much to say, as the copyright holder is still Armin, but having support from two people who were involved as well, nothing could have gone wrong.

Regardless to this, we want to point out again that no profit money has been made from this project, a four digit Euro sum has been invested by the organizer up to this day. Not to mention the hours and hours of work, provided by all team members.

Depending on the conflict which turns up now (no one is interested in getting sued for something), we either change the name of the game (as already announced) or we will limit the release to platforms which are comercially dead such as the Dreamcast and GP32.

The situation is more than disappointing, specialy after the progress we made recently and still do.

Well… let’s find out how limited the license of “bhv Software GmbH” is, maybe they just have the rights for a Windows version - and the Giana’s Return Team can easily avoid a Windows release, to keep everyone happy.

Time will tell…

Giana’s Return Organizing

E-Mail Memories Part I

Kojote just had a look into his mailbox, and voila - here is something interesting (in german) dated 05.09.2005 19:55:

Hallo Herr removed

zunächst einmal möchte ich mich im Namen von Herrn Gessert entschuldigen, dass 
Sie bisher keine Antwort bekommen haben. 

Wir möchten selbstverständlich einem enthusiastischen wie dem Ihren nicht im 
Wege stehen.

Die Rechte an der Marke “Giana Sisters” liegen bei Spellbound. Mit der
Verwendung des Titels “Gianas Return” sehen wir keine Probleme. Sie können ihn 
gerne verwenden.

Bei der Grafik und der Musik ist es nicht ganz so einfach:
Sollten Original-Grafiken aus “The Great Giana Sisters” verwendet werden, 
können wir keine Freigabe erteilen. Bei wem die Rechte für die Grafiken liegen 
ist nicht eindeutig klar. Die Verwendung solcher Grafiken wäre also Ihr 
eigenes Risiko.

Die musikalischen Rechte liegen komplett bei Chris Hülsbeck. Wenn Sie seine 
Musik oder Remixes davon verwenden möchten, müssten Sie ihn kontaktieren. 

Es freut uns auf jeden Fall, dass die Faszination an Giana Sisters unbebrochen 
anhält. Wir wünschen Ihnen und Ihrem Team viel Erfolg. Spellbound wird ihrem 
Projekt und dessen Verbreitung nicht im Wege stehen.

Viele Grüße aus Kehl
removed

The question is now, if “bhv Software GmbH” got a lincense, in how far this quote still has any value for the team?

Source: gianas-return.de(1)/gianas-return.de(2)

News from DUX: A Water Fulfilled Cave

Posted by Maturion 07:41, 26 April 2008 (CDT)

Here you can see a few screens of DUX's 2nd stage.

These screens showing an early development status of roughly 80%.

Note: Water effect is premature, full background has yet to be implented.

As shown this stage is full of water and creatures. Some of the enemies will spit flower shaped pollen at you while others will make you squeezing your ship through their laser barriers. More about the enemies of this stage with the next entry.

Source: hucast.net/blog

T-SIM 0.1 OpenGL

Posted by Maturion 12:07, 23 April 2008 (CDT)

Indiket has relased a port of T-SIM. A rough translation of his relase notes is below.

As know, our friend Chui has recently drawn bookstores SDL + OpenGL (partial) for the use and enjoyment of staff xD

Indiket wanted to try them first with a little game and here is the result:

T-SIM 0.1

This "game" (it is more an attempt to create a simulator) allows us to fly our helicopter in a world created entirely in 3D.

We recommend, if you are going to test, use a keyboard since there are many functions that cannot be used with the pad.

*Pad: Arrows moves the helicopter *Start: Quit Game *L: Interior view *A: Outside view *A: Accelerating engine *B: Reduce engine *X: Move collective top And: Moving collective below To take off: Hold A + X few seconds.

For more information on the checks with the keyboard, letting you Web original author:

http://igwe.vub.ac.be/~traes/t-sim/

Download and discuss this in our forums!

Source: Dreamcast.es

Giana's Return - Beta (21-04-2008) & Runner up project “LB”

Posted by Maturion 12:07, 23 April 2008 (CDT)

Another huge update on gianas-return.de! They've released a beta for beta testers and also announced a new project, LB, which will most likely be available on the Dreamcast, too!

Runner up project “LB”

As we are currently waiting for more graphics and have time in between, due to this we started the work on our runner up project “LB”. It’s going to be a Jump’n'Shoot game with a sciene fiction topic. We will use the Giana’s Return engine, this also grants, that this game will be available on multiple platforms.

Beta (21-04-2008)

• New clouds
• New SFX

The beta is only available to beta testers.

The team will be slightly different from the original Giana’s Return team, so we can assure a much faster release Give us your thoughts!

Possible platforms of release: GP2x, Dreamcast, PSP, maybe others…

Source: gianas-return.de (1) / gianas-return.de (2)

Interview with TheGypsy

Posted by Maturion 12:45, 22 April 2008 (CDT)

An interview with TheGypsy has been published on the main page. Go check out TheGypsy's interview!

More details about DUX

Posted by Maturion 08:45, 22 April 2008 (CDT)

1) Use Your Arms

To shoot yourself through the space alien scum you will need following arms. Depending on the games situation you can change the actual wep by picking up the individual item since all of them has strong and weak points.

Hyperbeam

Maximizes the power of the on-board shots including hyper charge beam. This shot is very helpful to get read of a bunch of enemies at the same time and it also makes more damage on boss enemies.

Potency: Does a lot of damage to boss enemies, and takes many enemies to death on one blast.

Weakness: Slow to load.

Bouncinglaser

Warps two lasers with bouncing effect onto the environment. This bouncinglaser can be quite powerfull, when it's used right. Especially cannons on the roof and ground will fear this laser. Not so recommend for boss encounters.

Potency: This shot can do a lot of damage to enemies when bouncing along the walls.

Weakness: Doesn't harm boss enemies too much due to the 45° shooting angle.

X-Ray Fires a strong x-shaped laser onto the screen and has a minor bouncing abillity depending on the active power level. Use the enviroment with this x-ray shot to make this weapon even more dangerously. Maybe the strongest weapon in the game but seldom to find.

Potency: Very powerfull, especially with bouncing abbility active.

Weakness: Relative low shoot frequency and saldom to find.

Additionally to this fire power, you can get upgradable rockets and bombs. All in all this selection of weps in this is pretty straightforward and increases efficiency when used properly.

Next time some enemies will be introduced.

2) DUX

Hello and welcome to the DUX news blog.

I am René Hellwig and as you may already have heard I'm currently developing a 2D shooter for the Sega Dreamcast to be released this year on a physical disc.

I choosed the horizontal memorize type of shooting as personal preference and because the Dreamcast could easily need more of them. Border Down and Last Hope is just not enough. Speaking about Last Hope, you may know that I'm actually part of the NG:DEV.TEAM and that our next Neogeo shooting game is still in progress, so it will hopefully get an relase next year.

So let's take a look at DUX.

http://www.hucast.net/blog/s02.png http://www.hucast.net/blog/s03.png

Source: hucast.net/blog

DCiberia & Dreamcast.es merge, online now!

Posted by Maturion 09:54, 21 April 2008 (CDT)

Here's the official announcement by Ron:

DCiberia.net and Dreamcast.es have merged with a new portal dedicated exclusively to the Sega Dreamcast and continue to disseminate all the information together in Spanish.

This portal can find all the information officer of Sega Dremacast Scene and the whole undiluted.

Sign up and work with us, we hope.

We're Online!

The long-awaited FUSION is already today reality. From now have a new portal Dreamcast that covers everything related to the World Scene and Dreamcast in Spanish. We are already operating DCiberia is in no way ReadOnly and will be updated today onwards. Will be kept operational purposes repository for information and to update our new website. All news related to the Scene and the Dreamcast Original can be found from here today, update your bookmarks, the new URL is: http://www.dreamcast.es As a first advice is to go registering, the previous accounts to other pages do not work anymore, not take anything and of course is free.

Dciberia.net is currently accessible only by the subscribers, if you want to enable an account, both because they want to help overturn the information as if you need to see something, put a comment in this press release and you send your data login to your private courier on the web. The forums are also accessible means of consultation.

Although at the moment this new web portal contains no information, we are working to be adding all that (previously filtered) can be useful for the community, and make this portal is # 1 on information Dreamcast speaking Spanish.

The new Staff consists of: NaOnaK, Ron, Neoblast, Melovampire, Timofonic and Indiket (for the moment), as partners Puch666 and diegomr.

As always, appealed to all, we are open to collaboration and support of all to complete our contribution to the spread of the Dreamcast and Scene, all we can. We believe that this Time Lucky

Thank You

Source: Dreamcast.es

Segagaga translation project update: needs translation help

Posted by Darc 13:07, 20 April 2008 (CDT)

Omar Cornut of SMS Power! and MEKA fame has posted an update on DCEmu UK regarding some progress on the Segagaga translation.

Based on James Howell's request of tools/programmers for the Segagaga translation, I've gathered a teams of guys who are working on this.

http://forums.insertcredit.com/viewtopic.php?t=10100

James' has been not helpful so far (busy etc) and we need actual translated data to progress, right now the guys will likely be halted. In the past weeks they made toolset to extract all game text, inject it back (in separate file or in executable), stored as Ascii to save memory, code modified to manipulate and convert Ascii text, code modified to scale font size as requested by James, etc.

Does anybody knows the original programmer on this project?

Can anybody provide translation data so we can evaluate memory consumption of english data?

Anybody interested in doing work on this would be welcome.

Source: DCEmu UK Forums

lxdream WIP - Fun with OS X 10.5 + GLX

Posted by Maturion 09:54, 21 April 2008 (CDT)

The good news is that I now have regular access to a mac again, and it’s actually fairly up-to-date (ie it’s running 10.5). So as a result, I have to say I’m stunned that other people have managed to get as far as they did - as far as I can see, Apple seems to have broken GLX pretty thoroughly[0] .

So I’ve done 3 things:

• Fixed the crashes at least, with glx, and generally fixed up the configure script for 10.5. I’ve probably broken it for 10.4 though. Which raises the question - is anyone actually trying to use lxdream on 10.4?
• Added support for the native GTK port w/ NSGL. This actually works fairly nicely. Unfortunately the only binary I can find for GTK/Quartz is provided by macports, and the font support is broken at the moment (ie completely missing). If anyone actually manages to build it from source… do let me know
• Started implementing a (fairly minimal) native cocoa UI. Well I was always going to do this eventually, I just hadn’t been planning to do it _now_.

In unrelated news, pulseaudio support is now in, along with spanish and italian translations (thanks to segnini75 and ghost22)

[0] So far I’ve noticed: It’s restricted to 16-bit depth buffers, has various other regressions from 10.4, creating a context with fbconfig crashes the app, glSecondaryColorPointerEXT fails if given a size = 4 (and lead to a crash), not to mention the libGL link cycle issue…

Source: lxdream.org