Mega Sparkmaster [Lexaloffle Blog Feed]

4OP-8 - synth patch editor

Thu, 28 Apr 2022 02:41:20 UTC

4OP-8

by Mega Sparkmaster

[Click to Play]

4OP-8 is a tool for creating sound patches with four operators. This instrument editor features additive, AM, ring modulation and orbit (bitwise or) synthesis. This effect is achieved by mixing four sine waves and playing them through the PCM channel.

Controls and layout:

Just like PixEditor, this tool only uses the mouse for its controls, which also makes it mobile compatible (except for saving and loading). The patch editor has several parameters which can be changed to obtain unique sounds:

Global parameters
- Master Volume: set the global patch volume (x1 or x2).
- Operator: select the operator currently being edited.
- Octave: set the keyboard's octave (0-3).
- Synth Type (located between the octave parameter and the save/load buttons): swithes the synthesis between additive, AM, ring modulation and orbit.
Operator parameters
- Volume: set the operator's volume (0-10)
- Multi: set the operator's frequency multiplication (1-15).
- ADSR: set the operator's attack (A), decay (D), sustain (S) and release (R).

Patches can be played with the on-screen keyboard, which features an entire octave that can be selected with the Octave variable.

Saving:

The 4OP-8 save format is an array with 26 items. The first item is always "4op-8_patch" and it's used for format checking. The second item stores the instrument's synth type. The other 24 items store the paramenters of all the operators.
To save a patch on the BBS, press the key combination ctrl+c after clicking the save button to complete the copying process. For a string copied outside of PICO-8 to be loaded on the BBS, the keys ctrl+v must be pressed before clicking the load button.

Thanks to the PICO-8 discord server for all of the help and feedback!
Thanks to Bikibird and Luchak for helping with and providing code for PCM playback!

PixEditor - turn your sprites into puzzles!

Sat, 12 Mar 2022 18:52:44 UTC

PixEditor

by Mega Sparkmaster

[Click to Play]

PixEditor is a tool that can be used to draw 8x8px sprites and turn them into nonograms/picross boards. It uses a simple format that allows boards to be shared for other people to edit/solve. Here's a little guide:

Controls and layout:

PixEditor is controlled with mouse only, using just the cursor and left click. This also makes it compatible with mobile devices (except for saving and loading).
The PixEditor layout is designed to look like the built-in editors found in PICO-8. It features two modes: Draw Mode (PixEditor) and Play Mode (PixPlayer). In both modes, colors can be selected from the bottom of the screen. Draw Mode's layout has several icons, each one affecting the board in a different way:

Clear: this icon clears the entire board filling it with color 0, the default transparent color.
Grid: this icon turns the grid on and off.
Play View: this icon turns Play View on and off. If Play View is on, all transparent colors will turn invisible (color 0) and all visible colors will be displayed as color 7.
Save: this icon saves the board as a string.
Load: this icon loads a string to the board.
Game: this icon switches the game mode from original to color and vice versa. Unlike all of the previous icons, it can be found at the top right of the screen.
Play on Load: this icon turns the "Play on Load" mode on and off. It can be found next to the Game icon.
Switch Mode: changes the mode from PixEditor to PixPlayer and vice versa. It can be found at the top right of the screen, which displays the name of the mode.
Color Transparency: this icon turns the transparency of the selected color on and off, and it can be found next to the "pen color" text (top middle). When a color is transparent, it shows four dots on top of the color selection bar found at the bottom of the screen.

The name and state of each icon can be seen at the bottom left of the screen when the cursor is positioned over it.

Saving:

When clicking on the "save" button (on the BBS, press ctrl+c afterwards), the board will be saved to a string, with each part of it representing different parameters of the sprite:

Item 1: pixeditor_board (used to check the loaded string format)
Items 2-17: color transparency table
Items 18-81: pixel colors
Item 82: PixPlayer completion text - this string defines the message that's shown when a board is completed in the PixPlayer. When saving, this string defaults to "well done!", but it can be changed in a text editor. It can be useful to display the name of whatever the sprite is supposed to represent. However, once the player switches to from Play Mode to Edit Mode this text will be reset to "well done!".

To load a string copied outside of PICO-8, the key combination ctrl+v must be pressed before clicking the "load" button.
If Play on Load mode is enabled, the mode will be set to PixPlayer as soon as a string is loaded, and, every time the mode is switched to PixPlayer, the player won't be able to go back to PixEditor until the puzzle is solved.

Thanks to the PICO-8 discord server for all of the help and feedback!
Thanks to Ningow for helping with and providing code for number rendering!

Pointsketch - a simple point-based art tool

Sat, 12 Feb 2022 05:25:22 UTC

Pointsketch

by Mega Sparkmaster

[Click to Play]

Pointsketch is a simple art tool based on points with three parameters: x, y and color. These points can be easily edited, and all of them are connected by lines in the order that they were created.

There are several things that can be done in Pointsketch, so here's a little guide:

Overview

Section A - insert/delete/edit points
Section B - select/customize colors (alternate colors are marked with ◆)
Section C - save sketch (⬇️) / load sketch (⬆️)
Section D - change mode (draw/edit)

Controls

General use

Arrow keys - scroll
O/Z, X - zoom

Section A

Left click (draw mode) - insert point
Right click (draw mode) - undo
middle (wheel) click (draw mode) - clear
Left click (edit mode) - grab/release point

Section B

left click on a color - select color
right click on a color - change color (alternate palette)
right click on B button - change background color (alternate palette)

Section C

left click on "Pointsketch" (between ⬇️ and ⬆️) - turn on/off coordinate lines
left click on ⬇️ button - save sketch
left click on ⬆️ button - load sketch (to load a sketch copied outside of PICO-8, press ctrl+v before clicking)

Section D

left click - switch mode

Saving/Loading

When the ⬇️ button is clicked the parameters of each point will be encoded and the sketch will be saved as a string (if the tool is used on the BBS, press ctrl+c to copy the string, otherwise it will be copied automatically). This string has a very simple to understand format ('pointsketch_sketch',x,y,color,x,y,color,x,y,color...) and can be pasted anywhere else since it's copied to the clipboard. This can be specially useful to share sketches. To load a sketch string found outside of PICO-8, copy it, then in Pointsketch press ctrl+v. Once these keys have been pressed, right click the ⬆️ button.

Sketch Renderer

Additionnally, here's a function that can render a sketch without needing to use Pointsketch. This can be useful for implementation in other PICO-8 carts. It's recommended to call this function inside of function _draw().

sketch={paste your sketch here}

function render_sketch()
 if sketch[1]=='pointsketch_sketch' and (#sketch-1)/3==flr((#sketch-1)/3) then
  for i=2,#sketch,3 do
   if i<#sketch-2 then
    line(sketch[i],sketch[i+1],sketch[i+3],sketch[i+4],sketch[i+5])
   end
   circfill(sketch[i],sketch[i+1],1,sketch[i+2])
  end
 end
end

Thanks to the PICO-8 discord server for all of the help and feedback!

Slimeblast

Mon, 31 Jan 2022 05:31:08 UTC

Slimeblast

by Mega Sparkmaster

[Click to Play]

Run, jump and shoot in a space station full of slimes!

Slimeblast is a platformer with a focus on score and experimentation. You can choose if you want to use checkpoints or blast slimes, but all of it is optional. In fact, you can beat the game by just running until you find the exit!
Checkpoints can be unlocked by using 20 crystals. Crystals can be obtained by blasting slimes, and the amount of crystals obtained depends on the type of slime. There are three types:

Green - 1 crystal
Yellow - 2 crystals
Red - 5 crystals

At the end of the game, the screen will display the amount of slimes blasted, crystals obtained and energy lost.

Controls:

D-Pad/Arrows: move left/right
O/Z: jump
X: shoot

External code sources/additional code credis (these can also be found at the end of the game's code):
Azure, Groove,M.D., MBoffin's "PICO-8: Smooth Map Screens" Tutorial, msx80's TIC-80 racing game tutorial, trelemar's TIC-80 simple platformer game tutorial.

Orbit Dasher

Wed, 12 Jan 2022 01:54:52 UTC

Orbit Dasher

by Mega Sparkmaster

[Click to Play]

In this arcade-style game, you need to collect all the items (blue circles) and avoid the enemies (red circles) in a circular stage to move to the next one. To do this, you need to move not only from left to right, but also dashing from one side of the stage to the other, which can be done with the O Button/Z Key. Try to clear as many stages as you can!

Controls:

Left/Right - Move
O Button/Z Key - Dash/Start

Thanks to the PICO-8 Discord server for all of the help and feedback!

Explore Dragon: Bean Bash

Wed, 29 Dec 2021 15:47:54 UTC

Explore Dragon: Bean Bash

by Mega Sparkmaster

[Click to Play]

Explore Dragon: Bean Bash is the sequel to Explore Dragon. It runs on the same engine as the original game, but with some new features!

Pressing X will allow you to "dash", which makes your speed faster for a bit. There are also some parts of the map that are extremely dark and make the game more difficult. These sections decrease the light energy, so be careful: if you run out of energy, you get sent back to a checkpoint!

Credits for additional code (these can also be found at the end of the game's code):
Azure, Groove,M.D., Kometbomb, Thykka, Yolwoocle, Daniel Shiffman's "The Nature of Code", MBoffin's "PICO-8: Smooth Map Screens" Tutorial.
Thanks to the PICO-8 Discord server for all of the help and feedback!

Explore Dragon

Thu, 02 Dec 2021 17:57:26 UTC

Explore Dragon

by Mega Sparkmaster

[Click to Play]

Control the dragon to get all the beans while exploring a small world!

In Explore Dragon, you control a dragon that moves automatically by turning with the arrow keys/directional pad (left and right). Your objective is to collect all the dragon beans while avoiding walls and other obstacles.
Each time you collect a bean, the dragon gets longer, which makes avoiding obstacles harder. However, when your dragon power meter is full, the dragon's lenght resets!

Modern Love Classics: "Left Right" - PICO-8 Version

Thu, 28 Oct 2021 19:55:51 UTC

Modern Love Classics: "Left Right" - PICO-8 version

by Mega Sparkmaster

[Click to Play]

A tiny port of Multistyle Labs' awesome demo Modern Love Classics!

Using all music and sprite space, this little recreation only has a cover of "Left Right" by Jammer, including the spinning face found in the original demo (converted to the tilemap with the help of Rilden) and a music visualizer based on code from the one made by Numzyx (under CC4-BY-NC-SA license), as well a title screen with music based on the original intro theme by Linus (without the swinged rhythm due to limitations).
An exit button was added since there is only one theme, so the demo is much shorter. This button allows you to access the title screen at any time during the main screen.

--Credits--

Original demo made by Multistyle Labs
Original music: intro theme by Linus, "Left Right" by Jammer
Coding, custom fonts and arranged music (PICO-8 version) by Mega Sparkmaster
Tools used in this demo:
Triangle graphics converter and spritesheet (used for the face) by Rilden
Music visualizer by Numzyx: https://www.lexaloffle.com/bbs/?tid=37918
Screen fading effect by Kometbomb: http://kometbomb.net/pico8/fadegen.html

Original demo:
CSDb release page: https://csdb.dk/release/?id=157489
YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCrfDHS_YUw

Chip Rush

Thu, 14 Oct 2021 23:24:03 UTC

Chip Rush

by Mega Sparkmaster

[Click to Play]

Collect all the chips! Move through series of mazes with the arrow keys and try to get to the finish as soon as possible. In Chip Rush, you have a 10 second time limit, and collecting one chip will give you a bit of extra time. But be careful, colliding with a wall will make you lose one second, and if you run out of time it's game over!

Screen fade effect from http://kometbomb.net/pico8/fadegen.html

Duo-League - A Remake of my TIC-80 game Duoswitch

Fri, 24 Sep 2021 02:33:40 UTC

Duo-League

by Mega Sparkmaster

[Click to Play]

A remake of my TIC-80 game Duoswitch, featuring new graphics, bugfixes and slightly different gameplay incluiding a high score system and being able to win the game.

There are two types of blocks: green and red. When O is pressed on the tile selected by the cursor, it will add one point to your score if it's green or make you lose one if it's red. However, in every turn, a random direction is set for the next block to generate new adjacent tiles, which can be seen in the "next" area of the screen. If you reach the board's corner, you will lose the game and be sent back to the title screen. To help you, there is also a power up that can be triggered by pressing X and allows you to turn a red tile into a green one. Can you clear all of the green tiles?

The original game can be found here:
https://mega-sparkmaster.itch.io/duoswitch-puzzle

Fade effect code from http://kometbomb.net/pico8/fadegen.html