New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

This is the main shmups forum. Chat about shmups in here - keep it on-topic please!
Post Reply
User avatar
system11
Posts: 6273
Joined: Tue Jan 25, 2005 10:17 pm
Location: UK
Contact:

New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

Post by system11 »

This is worth a look - digital version released today, physical ones can still be ordered on cartridge.
Key Features of Soul Force:

20 adrenaline filled horizontal shoot’em up levels, each with their own distinct graphical theme
A dedicated bitmap screen and music for each level
Seven in-game bonus items to collect
Four individually upgradable weapon systems
General ship upgrades
Lots of boss fights
Four difficulty settings
Password and flexible save game system
Progress automatically saved to cartridge
Fully PAL & NTSC compatible
https://www.protovision.games/shop/prod ... anguage=en

It's by Sarah Jan Avory who has made a number of shmups (and other games) including the Gemini Wing port on Amiga, and SoulStar for Mega-CD.
System11's random blog, with things - and stuff!
http://blog.system11.org
User avatar
system11
Posts: 6273
Joined: Tue Jan 25, 2005 10:17 pm
Location: UK
Contact:

Re: New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

Post by system11 »

Being streamed atm on https://twitch.tv/hayesmaker64
System11's random blog, with things - and stuff!
http://blog.system11.org
User avatar
MintyTheCat
Posts: 2023
Joined: Sat Jun 19, 2010 3:46 am
Location: Germany, Berlin

Re: New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

Post by MintyTheCat »

This looks pretty decent. Lots of levels too.
More Bromances = safer people
CanbeeShinobi2
Posts: 24
Joined: Mon Dec 14, 2020 8:20 pm

Re: New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

Post by CanbeeShinobi2 »

Thank you for the link, Soul Force looks cool as a C64 shmup, but I am rather interested in Outrage!
User avatar
system11
Posts: 6273
Joined: Tue Jan 25, 2005 10:17 pm
Location: UK
Contact:

Re: New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

Post by system11 »

Since I did preorder Soul Force I've now had a chance to play it via digital copy and an Easyflash cart, and I'd say it's definitely top 3 on the system, although I think Enforcer is probably still the top of the pile.

The amount of parallax really impressed me, it's amazing what the old C64 can be made to do really. I've beaten it on normal (this is a big game so that's quite a sitting), hard mode is proving ... harder.
System11's random blog, with things - and stuff!
http://blog.system11.org
User avatar
OmegaFlareX
Posts: 884
Joined: Tue Jan 25, 2005 10:15 pm
Location: Virginia, USA

Re: New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

Post by OmegaFlareX »

That's interesting they'd pick cartridge for a physical release instead of tape or disk. I had a C64 as a kid, but bought used as a bundle off of a family acquaintance and way past obsolescence (1991). Most of the games were on disk. I noticed the few cartridge games were mostly early 80s stuff and weren't that impressive. I think the only time the tape drive was used was my mom playing some typing game, but I've read that was the standard in the UK. Anyway, my point is I assume the cartridge format is quite limited because of the lackluster quality of the games we had. With high enough density ROM chips can it outperform disk and tape?
User avatar
system11
Posts: 6273
Joined: Tue Jan 25, 2005 10:17 pm
Location: UK
Contact:

Re: New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

Post by system11 »

The cart format is needed for the storage size, they're 1 or even 2 meg images these days. I do prefer cassette myself but there would be a lot of loading pauses.
System11's random blog, with things - and stuff!
http://blog.system11.org
User avatar
schleichfahrt
Posts: 141
Joined: Sun Jun 12, 2016 12:50 pm

Re: New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

Post by schleichfahrt »

OmegaFlareX wrote:With high enough density ROM chips can it outperform disk and tape?
There's also the slightly practical reason that there.. are no more discs to be had. They're out.
Manufacturing the C-64 cartridges is an almost trivial task, on the other hand.
When you ruin some enemy, add to score points.
User avatar
FRO
Posts: 2263
Joined: Tue Jan 25, 2005 10:25 pm
Location: Nebraska, USA
Contact:

Re: New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

Post by FRO »

schleichfahrt wrote:
OmegaFlareX wrote:With high enough density ROM chips can it outperform disk and tape?
There's also the slightly practical reason that there.. are no more discs to be had. They're out.
Manufacturing the C-64 cartridges is an almost trivial task, on the other hand.
Not to mention going the cassette route is also impractical, as they're less available now than they were in the C64 days, and how many folks want to go that route? Granted, there are phone apps now that can load up tape files, and play back the data to load into a ZX Spectrum, or other platform, but it's still a hassle at some level.

I followed the development of Soul Force on Twitter, and she really created an impressive game in a pretty short time.
StrzxgvNuvWvfld
Posts: 86
Joined: Fri Aug 25, 2017 12:26 pm

Re: New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

Post by StrzxgvNuvWvfld »

OmegaFlareX wrote:That's interesting they'd pick cartridge for a physical release instead of tape or disk. I had a C64 as a kid, but bought used as a bundle off of a family acquaintance and way past obsolescence (1991). Most of the games were on disk. I noticed the few cartridge games were mostly early 80s stuff and weren't that impressive. I think the only time the tape drive was used was my mom playing some typing game, but I've read that was the standard in the UK. Anyway, my point is I assume the cartridge format is quite limited because of the lackluster quality of the games we had. With high enough density ROM chips can it outperform disk and tape?
She actually switched to cartridge only midway through development due to the advatanges it gave (https://twitter.com/sarahjaneavory/stat ... 1576190976).

Those early cartidges were 8/16k and so as you say the games were limited. There was, however, a brief resurgence in Europe during the early 90s where games were released on cartridges up to 512k. They didn't really catch on, partly because the C64 was nearing the end of its commerical lifetime and probably also due to them being significantly more expensive (even though instant loading was a godsend to anyone used to cassettes!).

These days a lot of people will play on an emulator where a cartridge can be distributed as a ROM image, and there's also a popular device called the 1541 Ultimate that loads cartridge images (along with disk and cassette images) on to real hardware from USB. Or you can buy physical, obviously.

Sam's Journey is a good example of what can be done with cartirgde (although in this instance there is a multi-disk version as well).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YTGaSvbtiY
User avatar
Marc
Posts: 3408
Joined: Sat Feb 26, 2005 10:27 am
Location: Wigan, England.

Re: New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

Post by Marc »

They also released an ill-fated 'console' that played the carts only, and rapidly sank without trace. Shame the C65 never made it to production, that sounded like it could have been a nice machine.
XBL & Switch: mjparker77 / PSN: BellyFullOfHell
NAVVARR
Posts: 281
Joined: Sun Aug 27, 2006 1:04 pm
Location: Bonny Scotland

Re: New shmup - Soul Force on C64!

Post by NAVVARR »

I ordered this back on December 29th- no sign of it yet.

Anyone else ordered it- has it turned up?
hoots mon- crivvens, help ma boab
Post Reply