Lyon

[Commodore]

I need to emo vent about this, sorry. I love to code. I'm the most proud of this project. Is it useless? If you count the time I spent from when I created ZZT Experience to now, you'd see that it's almost been 10 years. I regret not taking the approach I am taking now back then. Maybe I wouldn't feel like this if the scene was as alive now as it was back then. We could all just use DoxBox right? Countless attempts were made to clone ZZT and only Megazeux really succeeded. MZX succeeded because it didn't try to be ZZT at all. It took a good thing and made something new based on that. Lyon doesn't do this. Lyon is an imitation. I didn't know anything about 8086 ASM or reverse engineering when I started this project and I am grateful to have learned these things as a result. But do we need Lyon? What about Mac or Linux? It'll never be the same as ZZT. It'll never convince the purists. In the end it has no use. It is my indulgence. It is a testament to my determination to be successful. I've never completed anything. Maybe I never will. ZZT is an obsession yet I haven't made a ZZT game. Maybe after I finish Lyon I can finally settle in and craft the world I always imagined. Maybe after I finish I can finally move on. Can I get over ZZT? Am I maybe even the slightest bit insane to obsess over such a thing? Maybe it's stupid. I can't help myself. Even if it makes sense, maybe I'm too late.

That felt good to post. Carry on!

among the more useful things I've think you've learned (from my limited perspective), is the use of several external libraries, and the ability to create your own libraries. it seems that sort of thing has applications to several programming languages and skills.

Anyway here's a bug ;)

Code: Select all

System.ArgumentNullException
   at System.IO.BinaryReader..ctor(Stream input, Encoding encoding)
   at Lyon.Roton.File.ZZTBinaryReader..ctor(Stream input)
   at Lyon.Roton.File.Load(Stream Source)
   at Lyon.Roton.Environment.ExecuteInit()
   at Lyon.Roton.Environment.Execute()

I when you die and the game over music plays, you can make the sound screw up by pressing direction keys, then the error occurs when you try to replay the world after pressing esc.

[Smilymzx]

* Animated CHR files via Animation.INI file (Animations should be done in seperate CHR files)

I don't fully understand what you're getting at. Does it cycle through full character sets?

It is possible to let a TSR cycle CHR files in ZZT, but since Lyon is availible, maybe it has a better chance simulating it, Same with PAL files.

EDIT: That being said, Roton is possibly never gonna be portable unless it is in another language, switching to Pure C code (C89 or C99 style) or C++ can help a lot after it is finished.

[Saxxon]

Anyway here's a bug ;)

Code: Select all

System.ArgumentNullException
   at System.IO.BinaryReader..ctor(Stream input, Encoding encoding)
   at Lyon.Roton.File.ZZTBinaryReader..ctor(Stream input)
   at Lyon.Roton.File.Load(Stream Source)
   at Lyon.Roton.Environment.ExecuteInit()
   at Lyon.Roton.Environment.Execute()

I when you die and the game over music plays, you can make the sound screw up by pressing direction keys, then the error occurs when you try to replay the world after pressing esc.

I know where to look for the sound bug, will track it down. (Edit: fixed, sounds are silent after game over)

Does the world have the same name as its filename? If not, and a filename that is the world's name does not exist, the original ZZT fails also. Mission: Enigma is an early example of this.

If this is not the case, please send me that file :)


- Added commandline integration. You can drag and drop worlds onto the Lyon executable and they will all be opened. Saved games will be restored automatically when loaded this way.
- Blink/bright can be switched in the View menu.
- Help menu added. Contains About window, and links to both Z2 and this thread.
- Fixed weird DirectDraw scaling issues when toggling the sidebar.

Unrelated: I am putting together another electronic music album. WIP for that: http://soundcloud.com/saxxonpike/insomnia

[Commodore]

Any chance of the dark purple transition effect?

[Smilymzx]

Any chance of the dark purple transition effect?

Not really a useful feature, I'd perfer a better fade: Light <-> Dark

Either that or leave it as is, It is not really nessicary.

[Saxxon]

The code is in there and I know how ZZT does it. It was kinda low priority but I'll add it sometime :)

[bitbot]

I need to emo vent about this, sorry. I love to code. I'm the most proud of this project. Is it useless? If you count the time I spent from when I created ZZT Experience to now, you'd see that it's almost been 10 years. I regret not taking the approach I am taking now back then. Maybe I wouldn't feel like this if the scene was as alive now as it was back then. We could all just use DoxBox right? Countless attempts were made to clone ZZT and only Megazeux really succeeded. MZX succeeded because it didn't try to be ZZT at all. It took a good thing and made something new based on that. Lyon doesn't do this. Lyon is an imitation. I didn't know anything about 8086 ASM or reverse engineering when I started this project and I am grateful to have learned these things as a result. But do we need Lyon? What about Mac or Linux? It'll never be the same as ZZT. It'll never convince the purists. In the end it has no use. It is my indulgence. It is a testament to my determination to be successful. I've never completed anything. Maybe I never will. ZZT is an obsession yet I haven't made a ZZT game. Maybe after I finish Lyon I can finally settle in and craft the world I always imagined. Maybe after I finish I can finally move on. Can I get over ZZT? Am I maybe even the slightest bit insane to obsess over such a thing? Maybe it's stupid. I can't help myself. Even if it makes sense, maybe I'm too late.

That felt good to post. Carry on!

That's not emo, it's good to vent. You simply got to the heart of the matter. Despite the majority, you did what had to be done and reverse-engineered ZZT. You've come a long way since ZZT Experience and we're grateful for your dedication. Lyon isn't an imitation, it's an emulator like dosbox--but better. It doesn't have to be an exact replica, just backwards compatible. Admittedly, my first impression was... Why do I need this? But I'm beginning to see it's advantages and potential as the premier "ZZT experience" for the PC. Improving it's feature set will give it that edge, like a config file to toggle out those bleeps and annoying messages or whatever else. Also, modeling console emulators might not be a bad idea... and for further insight, make that world you always wanted. Even Kev Vance had to start somewhere. ;)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hd1gq1j2 ... ure=relmfu

I salute you for your service to the community.

[Saxxon]

Thanks for the inspiration :) I feel at times that this project is really stupid. But I'll keep working on it.

- I added a special debug menu. Cheat with DEBUG and it'll open up a few handy functions like board selection. This should assist in debugging stuff. Works on a per-game basis.
- More framework for the "extended" ZZT format. You won't be seeing any of this in Lyon soon, but I want to note it here that I am at least working on it. It'll support all ZZT+SuperZZT elements, and circumvent other arbitrary limits.

[Dr. Dos]

One of the extra features I added to Tyger that I really liked the idea of was allowing cheats to also be ZZT-OOP. So you could type #change lion empty or #give health 5000. Also binding keys to execute code but that's more of an extra feature that I don't think would benefit any current ZZT game.

[Saxxon]

One of the extra features I added to Tyger that I really liked the idea of was allowing cheats to also be ZZT-OOP. So you could type #change lion empty or #give health 5000. Also binding keys to execute code but that's more of an extra feature that I don't think would benefit any current ZZT game.

That is actually really awesome. I'll see if I can work something like this in. Come to think of it there are fantastic applications of this for debugging purposes.

[bitbot]

Thanks for the inspiration :) I feel at times that this project is really stupid. But I'll keep working on it.

- I added a special debug menu. Cheat with DEBUG and it'll open up a few handy functions like board selection. This should assist in debugging stuff. Works on a per-game basis.
- More framework for the "extended" ZZT format. You won't be seeing any of this in Lyon soon, but I want to note it here that I am at least working on it. It'll support all ZZT+SuperZZT elements, and circumvent other arbitrary limits.

Cool man. For now, I think Lyon is about ready to show off. I'm going to bundle it with my upcoming game... As for aesthetics, do you need a desktop icon? I'm pretty good at Photoshopping them. I'd be happy to draft some samples based on your requirement. Also, I think the background might look better in black (more DOS-esque/emulator-like) Anyone else agree?

That's enough nitpicking from me.

[Saxxon]

Cool man. For now, I think Lyon is about ready to show off. I'm going to bundle it with my upcoming game... As for aesthetics, do you need a desktop icon? I'm pretty good at Photoshopping them. I'd be happy to draft some samples based on your requirement. Also, I think the background might look better in black (more DOS-esque/emulator-like) Anyone else agree? That's enough nitpicking from me.

The background uses standard windows theming IIRC. I can change this though.

Since the application is called Lyon, I would like to use the icon for the Lion enemy from ZZT, standard color (pink). That's the only requirement.

[bitbot]

Cool man. For now, I think Lyon is about ready to show off. I'm going to bundle it with my upcoming game... As for aesthetics, do you need a desktop icon? I'm pretty good at Photoshopping them. I'd be happy to draft some samples based on your requirement. Also, I think the background might look better in black (more DOS-esque/emulator-like) Anyone else agree? That's enough nitpicking from me.

The background uses standard windows theming IIRC. I can change this though.

Since the application is called Lyon, I would like to use the icon for the Lion enemy from ZZT, standard color (pink). That's the only requirement.

It does have that generic Micro$oft look to it. It might be worth experimenting with if it's not too much trouble.
Here's an icon for starters... Sort of blocky, but I can change it up:

[Saxxon]

I like it! :D

Leave it blocky. That's classy. Thanks!

Edit: Added it to the application.

[Commodore]

Haha, that's great! Nice work.