• Commodore Free, Issue 70 - Part8

    From Stephen Walsh@39:901/281 to all on Mon May 13 17:46:02 2013
    July 27-28 Commodore Vegas Expo v9 -
    www.portcommodore.com/commvex


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    JPEG2000 PLUGIN RELEASED
    *************************************

    Airsoft Software has just released a new plugin for Hollywood 5 - Infinity. This plugin enables all Hollywood scripts to load and save images in the JPEG2000 format. JPEG2000 is the successor to the popular JPEG format and offers multiple advantages over its predecessor including lossless compression and the possibility to store images with alpha channels. Additionally, when a JPEG2000 plugin is available and you compile executables for Mac OS X, Hollywood will be able to create Mac OS X icons in the resolutions 256x256 and 512x512 as well because these images are encoded using JPEG2000 bitstreams.

    You can download the plugin from the official Hollywood portal. Thanks to Hollywood 5's cross-platform plugin system versions for AmigaOS3 (Classic), AmigaOS3 (FPU), AmigaOS4, MorphOS, WarpOS, AROS (Intel), Linux (PowerPC),
    Linux (Intel), Mac OS (PowerPC), Mac OS (Intel), Windows and Google's Android platform are provided.

    AROS Vision 1.5.9. with full CD-Support and Mplayer

    25 March 2013, 12:30:41 | OlafS3

    I have just uploaded AROS Vision 1.5.9. One of the main topics is full CD-Support including auto-mounting of CDs, playing Music-CDs (MUI CD Player), Video can be played with ffplay or mplayer (the only missing thing is CD32 emulation). Further additions are FAT95, TwinVNC, Mr. Beanbag, a couple of music player and backup-tools. Amistart-menus are extended.

    the download-link:

    www.natami-news.de/html/distr..._download.html

    the manual:

    www.natami-news.de/html/user_manual.html


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    AMIGA 1200 BADGES
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    Sick and tired of your Amiga's dowdy old badge? Did it fall off in your recent retrobrite adventure and you need a replacement? This badge is specially crafted to meet the dimensions of your A1200 case. Order in a plastic material and paint, or for a touch of real class try it in stunning Sterling Silver

    www.shapeways.com/model/989196/a1200-case-badge.html?li=shortUrl


    *************************************
    REVIEW: STAIR RUNNER FOR THE PET
    From Revival Studios
    *************************************

    Ok you can bet there are no complicated controls here to remember just 2 keys
    O to move left and P to move right. With that embedded into memory we start
    the game. And Starting the game; we find is all a little underwhelming; with just an animated logo then the main title screen says

    STAIR
    -RUNNER-
    START GAME

    But don't stop reading ; because like all these games it does get better....

    I am still hoping for some sort of menu system to be implemented, who knows maybe Retro Revival can manage to cram one into some unused Pet memory space somewhere, I know memory it tight and the game is designed to work on as many PETS as is possible without expansion units, and so memory had to be preserved to get the game to fit BUT..

    anyway moving on..

    So you control a "guy" who has to climb stairs and move across corridors; you can only move left and right but you can move back if needed to dodge the elevators that constantly move up and down. What sort of Hell hole is this place!

    You need some skill and patience to watch the Movements of the elevators, but you start to see a pattern of how they are moving; and on the earlier levels
    at least; you can quickly run over the screen and then up the stairs to the next level; then slowly moving to the goal that is the door to the next level at the top right of the screen!

    It's very entertaining and the fact it runs on the pet makes this even more amazing, the releases keep coming but the quality doesn't let up, it's a great game to show off with friends who can obtain the most points, however as usual a high score would help the game and a menu/instruction screen

    SCORES

    Graphics: 7/10
    Sound: 7/10
    it's a pet what did you expect cd
    stereo sound
    Gameplay: 7/10
    Overall: 7/10

    Teasing game play, cool graphics and easy control system makes this another quality release from Retro revival studios


    *************************************
    INTERVIEW WITH JEREMY SMITH
    RetroFit Project
    *************************************

    Q. Please introduce yourself to our readers

    I'm Jeremy Smith. I'm 35 and I live in the UK. I have a degree in software development with a minor of AI.

    - - - - - - - - - -

    Q. Can you give a little history into why you like retro machines, and maybe what other projects you have worked on

    I've been programming since 1987 (starting in BASIC), and my first computer
    was a Sharp MZ-700, which didn't have a bitmap screen! I used to poke the
    games on the MZ-700 at random.

    I moved onto the C64 when my aunt gave me her old one in 1989. I got an Action Replay 6 and a disk drive soon after (1990?) and got in touch with a guy who told me how to make pokes for games. I got an Amiga in about 1996, and my first Windows 95 PC in 1998. That PC was shared with a friend! Since then I've written a variety of PC software, such as a soft synth, OCR software, decompiler stuff, and email and newsgroup search engines.

    - - - - - - - - - -

    Q. Can you explain the theory behind RETRO FIT, what it is and how it works

    It is a combination of technologies:

    * An advanced debugger (SAM in Frodo) with features like 'Show me all
    functions called 3 times since last entering the debugger'.

    * A decompiler (written myself, and generalised to work with any CPU other
    than 6502).

    * A game decompiled, and then patched to work with a bigger screen area

    * An emulator patched for a bigger screen area (Frodo in this case, but any emulator would work)


    --- CrashWrite 2.0
    * Origin: --:)-- Dragon's Lair BBS --(:- (39:901/281)