Flight of Pigarus - caravan shmup for the Sega Master System

[Herr Schatten]

As participants in the recreational programming thread already know, I make games for the Sega Master System. My latest one is a score-attack shmup. It's heavily inspired by the caravan modes in Hudson's classic Star Soldier series, naturally. Thematically, it's more akin to the likes of TwinBee or (to a lesser extent) Parodius, though.

I know there are quite a few fans of caravan shmups around here, so hopefully, you'll enjoy this.

Get it here:
http://www.smspower.org/Homebrew/FlightOfPigarus-SMS

[Stevens]

Wow. That looks really good HS:D Will try later tonight!

[donluca]

Really enjoyable! I've just played a few rounds on emulator and I loved the presentation and gameplay.

A couple ideas which just came into mind while playing the game: give time extends every X points (this means that the game loops from the start after the boss) and change the first button from a simple "speed change" to a kind of laser similar to dodonpachi, where your shots get concentrated in front of you at the expense of speed.

[FRO]

The graphics look stunning! I don't have a flashcart yet, but I will have to download the ROM to try on an emulator later on. Looks neat!

[Herr Schatten]

Really enjoyable! I've just played a few rounds on emulator and I loved the presentation and gameplay.

Thank you.

A couple ideas which just came into mind while playing the game: give time extends every X points (this means that the game loops from the start after the boss) and change the first button from a simple "speed change" to a kind of laser similar to dodonpachi, where your shots get concentrated in front of you at the expense of speed.

Those are interesting ideas. Maybe if I ever decide to make a sequel. I have no such plans at the moent, though.

[soprano1]

It looks and plays wonderfully. Nice job, nice to see the SMS can still kick it.

[z0mbie90]

Yay, more Caravan! Looking forward to give it a go.

[M.Knight]

While the (probably terrible) Retroarch emulators I used gave me too much input lag and slippery controls to properly enjoy it, I have to say it's a nice game, with its colorful and quirky visual style and classic caravan style gameplay.

So far I only have two bits of criticism :
-The music is a bit too mellow and peaceful for what should be a pretty intense speed-kill focused game
-That's probably due to following the Star Soldier formula to a T, but there are situations where increasing your power level feels like a regression in some ways, especially with the loss of the twin forward shot for a forward three-way. Against the 2 min mode's boss for example, if you get hit once and lose the max power, it seems more efficient to get hit again on purpose just to get another power level with a twin forward shot that can hit the core for double damage. Of course, the final power level is still optimal but everything in between may not always be gradually stronger.

[Herr Schatten]

Thank you.

The music is a bit too mellow and peaceful for what should be a pretty intense speed-kill focused game

To be perfectly honest, I'm just happy to have been able to squeeze half-decent music out of that piece of junk that is the Master System's PSG at all. I see what you mean, but I wanted to go for a sort of circus-y feel instead of a more typical adrenalyn-laden shmup music style. I just hope it's not too inappropriate.

That's probably due to following the Star Soldier formula to a T, but there are situations where increasing your power level feels like a regression in some ways, especially with the loss of the twin forward shot for a forward three-way. Against the 2 min mode's boss for example, if you get hit once and lose the max power, it seems more efficient to get hit again on purpose just to get another power level with a twin forward shot that can hit the core for double damage. Of course, the final power level is still optimal but everything in between may not always be gradually stronger.

Yes, that's due to the prevalent Star Soldier influences. During the levels, the powerups are always an improvement, because you gain better crowd control, but at the bosses, powering down on purpose can indeed be the better strategy. That's at least partially intentional, though. I want the players to play aggressively and risk something at the bosses, not play defensively and attack them with angled shots from the sides.

[louisg]

To be perfectly honest, I'm just happy to have been able to squeeze half-decent music out of that piece of junk that is the Master System's PSG at all. I see what you mean, but I wanted to go for a sort of circus-y feel instead of a more typical adrenalyn-laden shmup music style. I just hope it's not too inappropriate.

Aww, I like the PSG It's pretty basic though. Did you do your own music engine? The thing's pretty capable if you put things like arps, echos, and use the bass hack when possible. Planning to check your game out on real hw today! It looks great.

[ED-057]

Pretty cool. Now SMS has an answer to NES Blade Buster...

I have an Action Fighter cartridge with an EEPROM in it. Does this use the same bank-switching scheme?

[Herr Schatten]

Aww, I like the PSG It's pretty basic though. Did you do your own music engine? The thing's pretty capable if you put things like arps, echos, and use the bass hack when possible.

Maybe I'm being a bit harsh, but the impossibility of changing the wave form and the lack of a proper bass range make it really hard to create something pleasing.

The engine I use is PSGlib, which one of the talented guys over at smspower has developed. It's a beautiful solution for both music replay and sound effects. The sound data takes up a bit of space, but the player of PSGlib is super-fast, so that's been my go-to solution from the beginning. For creating the music I used Sneventracker, a version of 0CC-Famitacker specially taylored to the PSG.

I have an Action Fighter cartridge with an EEPROM in it. Does this use the same bank-switching scheme?

I'm not so much into the hardware side of things, but I don't think so. As far as I know, Action Fighter is one of the early titles that use the 315-5208 paging chip, which only works with 1 Megabit games, whereas Pigarus is a 2 Megabit game that would require a 315-5235. What certainly won't work with an EEPROM cartridge based on a donor board are the highscore saves and the replays, because I use the full 32KB of SRAM Sega's specifications allow for, but there is no commercially released game that ever used more than 8KB.

[BrianC]

I gave the game a try on the Genesis with the Mega Everdrive and it works great. Very fun game. Some of the best graphics I have seen on the system too.

[DietSoap]

I gave the game a try on the Genesis with the Mega Everdrive and it works great. Very fun game. Some of the best graphics I have seen on the system too.

I really don't understand how a hobbyist developer in his freetime was able to make a game that looks and runs better than 99% of the commercials games released on the system by teams of professional developers who had access to official documentation and support.

[Herr Schatten]

If I recall correctly, Sega were notorious for giving their internal development teams just three months to finish a game, reagrdless of its content. Knowing that, it's no surprise that most of the stuff that used the hardware well or even pushed it came from third party developers (e.g. Taito, Compile, Westone).

I still occasionally dream of an alternative past where Nintendo's iron grip on third party developers had lessened a few years earlier, and Konami had poured all the Z80 wizardry acquired by working on the MSX range of computers into SMS development.

[louisg]

If I recall correctly, Sega were notorious for giving their internal development teams just three months to finish a game, reagrdless of its content. Knowing that, it's no surprise that most of the stuff that used the hardware well or even pushed it came from third party developers (e.g. Taito, Compile, Westone).

I still occasionally dream of an alternative past where Nintendo's iron grip on third party developers had lessened a few years earlier, and Konami had poured all the Z80 wizardry acquired by working on the MSX range of computers into SMS development.

Damn, I didn't realize the time period was so short for Sega's internal games. That explains a LOT. I'm amazed they were able to pull off something like Fantasy Zone 2 now.

[M.Knight]

To be perfectly honest, I'm just happy to have been able to squeeze half-decent music out of that piece of junk that is the Master System's PSG at all. I see what you mean, but I wanted to go for a sort of circus-y feel instead of a more typical adrenalyn-laden shmup music style. I just hope it's not too inappropriate.

I checked a few other SMS soundtracks to compare and yeah it doesn't seem like the sound capabilities of that machine were the best around, though maybe I haven't checked enough games to have an accurate idea.
Having some more relaxed music can work but I fear there isn't enough catchiness to it here to compensate. The tracks would fit a slow-paced RPG a lot more IMO.

Yes, that's due to the prevalent Star Soldier influences. During the levels, the powerups are always an improvement, because you gain better crowd control, but at the bosses, powering down on purpose can indeed be the better strategy. That's at least partially intentional, though. I want the players to play aggressively and risk something at the bosses, not play defensively and attack them with angled shots from the sides.

It's fair to want the players to play in riskier ways for score, especially in a caravan shmup. That said, I think the power-down mechanic only comes into play after you have already taken a hit. At max power, you'll always have the twin forward shot (on top of the side shots) so you'll already try to stay in front of the boss as often as possible to quick-kill it.

[Herr Schatten]

@M.Knight: Just stumbled upon your videos. Excellent work on the boss! I'm fascinated to see how differently people approach them. Also, I'm happy to hear that you're slowly starting to warm to the music.

[M.Knight]

Thanks! With each remaining second worth 500 points, quick-killing the boss is definitely the way to go.
And my current scores are far from optimal. The game has garnered some interest on the Shmupemall forum for example and the other players' scores are really good in comparison.

[Herr Schatten]

The game has garnered some interest on the Shmupemall forum for example and the other players' scores are really good in comparison.

That‘s some fierce highscore battle that‘s going on there, and some truly excellent scores. It‘s very satisfying to see that people are enjoying the game. I‘d love to see a video of a 100+K run.

I‘m pleasantly surprised that the game seems to be holding up so well under high-level play. I always half-feared it might break in unforeseen ways I couldn‘t have tested due to lack of skill on my side.

[M.Knight]

I asked one of the players if he has some 100k replays so he may get back to you with one.

Flight of Pigarus follows the solid Star Soldier formula a lot and that's probably one of the reasons the game holds up well even at a high level. Still, I definitely get your worry, especially in a subgenre where even a single enemy that spawns one second too late can break the stage's flow. I haven't played the 5 minutes mode a lot but so far I think you did a good job, so congrats!

Do you know how many people played the game ? I know for example that the Pixel Gaiden website is also setting up a little competition on their twitter account. The scores aren't as high as the SEA forum because most players don't seem to be caravan experts, but the fact that people have been interested in the game anyway must feel rewarding. I wouldn't be surprised if other retro-game communities took a liking to the game too.

[Herr Schatten]

I did, in fact, put a lot of effort into testing and refining the gameplay for quite some time after the basic programming was done, up until I felt that the flow of attack waves was as good as it could possibly be. It’s nice to know that it shows. IMO a certain lack of willingness to polish a game is what often holds back otherwise promising homebrew efforts. Besides finishing them in the first place, of course.

Flight of Pigarus seems to be the most popular of my games by quite a margin. I know of several different forums where people are competing for scores. None of them are playing on a level comparable to the SEA forum, though, for some of them it even seems to be their first experience with the caravan subgenre.

However, I think it‘s a good thing that the game can be enjoyed by both highly-skilled and more casual players. I suspect that the lighthearted nature of the cute‘em-up theme also helps easing in the latter. Maybe some of them discover the joy if playing for score that way. (Probably not very realistic, but one can dream.)

[DialKnight]

@ Herr Schatten This looks amazing, and can not wait to give it a spin. All the feedback seems like you could make a black label version with an FM soundtrack

As For Konami's MSX wizardry, I wish those conversions were more possible. Master System only had a few glimmering moments, and it's a shame.

[louisg]

I keep meaning to try this! I swear I'll do it tonight-- just got new AV cables for my Genesis since I lost the last ones. Hopefully I can find the flash cart :>

Flight of Pigarus seems to be the most popular of my games by quite a margin. I know of several different forums where people are competing for scores. None of them are playing on a level comparable to the SEA forum, though, for some of them it even seems to be their first experience with the caravan subgenre.

I don't know about anyone else, but this release was the first time I learned about your games.

[louisg]

Wow, this is an achievement! It's smooth, and that color palette looks almost as nice as half the Genesis library. There aren't many giveaways that this is a SMS game. I've tried to write shmups on much more powerful hardware, and they aren't as good as this! I think the music works well for it, too.
.

[Herr Schatten]

@ Herr Schatten This looks amazing, and can not wait to give it a spin. All the feedback seems like you could make a black label version with an FM soundtrack

I've actually been looking into FM sound lately, but for Pigarus, it's just not feasible. Getting everything up to speed was quite a bit of a struggle already. FM sound, with its need to update more channels and longer required pauses between writes, would take too many cpu cycles per frame, thus introducing slowdown.

You can witness the effect when you compare Aleste/Power Strike with PSG and with FM sound. With FM sound, the game has noticeably more slowdown. That's probably the reason why Compile decided to drop FM sound for their super-busy technical masterpiece Power Strike II, even though all their other SMS games supported it.

Master System only had a few glimmering moments, and it's a shame.

Indeed. It's really nice hardware to develop for.

I don't know about anyone else, but this release was the first time I learned about your games.

Well, the other ones weren't shmups, so I only talked about them in the OT thread I linked in the original post above. If you like Taito-style single-screen platformers (Fairyland Story, DonDokoDon, BubbleBobble), though, you might want to try Bara Burū. That one turned out pretty well, I think.

[louisg]

I've actually been looking into FM sound lately, but for Pigarus, it's just not feasible. Getting everything up to speed was quite a bit of a struggle already. FM sound, with its need to update more channels and longer required pauses between writes, would take too many cpu cycles per frame, thus introducing slowdown.

You can witness the effect when you compare Aleste/Power Strike with PSG and with FM sound. With FM sound, the game has noticeably more slowdown. That's probably the reason why Compile decided to drop FM sound for their super-busy technical masterpiece Power Strike II, even though all their other SMS games supported it.

Ahh I wonder if it's like Yamaha's OPL2. I was shocked at how long each write took-- the chip would bug out if you didn't pause, and it started noticeably cutting into the CPU time even on a pretty decent system. Though, that was up to >1000 OPL2 commands a second. That makes it make even more sense why they went for the OPLL in the SMS design, other than price, given how busy the writes get with custom patches.

[Bydobasher]

I just had a go with this game and I'm impressed. It reminds me of Power Strike II in the way it looks -- especially the boss -- and the way it sounds (albeit the arrangement doesn't seem as complex). And it plays perfectly well. I'll have to try again later, because I could only manage a score around 21k in my first couple of attempts.

How long did it take to develop this?

[Herr Schatten]

It reminds me of Power Strike II

That is a HUGE compliment. Thank you.

I'll have to try again later, because I could only manage a score around 21k in my first couple of attempts.

Then you have plenty of room for improvement. Current top scores are around 37k for 2 minutes mode and 110k for 5 minutes. If you haven't found any of the secret bonuses yet, there's three types of them, and the manual hints at how to get them.

How long did it take to develop this?

Two and a half years, roughly.

[Despatche]

Glad someone bumped this, I missed this thread altogether. Gonna check it out now. Already a gigantic fan of the aesthetic.

I really don't understand how a hobbyist developer in his freetime was able to make a game that looks and runs better than 99% of the commercials games released on the system by teams of professional developers who had access to official documentation and support.

A lot of older consoles had no real documentation. Nearly all of the documentation we have nowadays was created by former developers or hobbyists well after the fact.

Making a game in your free time is fundamentally way easier. When you don't have to put up with deadlines and sales, nor current knowledge about how a new piece of hardware runs, you can make just about anything you want. Playtesting in particular gets a lot more appreciation, but developers refusing to playtest their games is also a thing in this field.

This is just one of the many reasons why making games for a living isn't the best idea. You have to put up with a lot that you wouldn't have to normally. People who take two and a half years to make a game like this get fired before the first month is over, crunch time or not.