Hello!
I have had PICO-8 a while, but never really used it until I watched aarthificial's YouTube video about pixel art. I wanted to try around with a bit of pixel art myself, so I did my 16x8 sized version of the heroine in the sprite editor. Then I remembered playing "Bionic Commando" on my friend's Amiga as a kid, and a long love of Portal means that I started work on this game over the last few evenings.
The basic functionality is all there (running, collision, hooking, pulling, switches, pressure pads, launchers) and I've had a go with music and graphics, but I'm no level designer, it turns out! So this is a work-in-progress job to get feedback on those core mechanics, and ideas for how to extend the game out!
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I ripped off the Google Snake game to see if I could. Don't worry, I have bigger plans for this.
Controls
⬆️⬇️⬅️➡️ : turn
🅾️/z : retry
❎/x : ???
Versions
Version 1:
- added visual effects (particles, screen shake, etc.)
- scoreboard now moves so that it never hides the apple or the snake's head
- scoreboard now shows high score
- pressing ❎ in the menu now does something...
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I put a completely unscientific research poll up on Twitter asking folks where they usually play PICO-8 games and the majority said they primarily play using the desktop client.
- Desktop App: 56.7%
- Desktop web browser: 23.3%
- Phone web browser: 16.7%
- Handheld App (non-phone): 3.3%
I put up the poll because PICO-8 is in a unique spot where it can be played various ways on various platforms, and yet we're not able to design games to account for one or the other. This has always been a point of ponder for me and having this data helps me think about it better.
However, the audience that saw my tweet is probably regular PICO-8 players and devs anyway, so it's not the casual gaming public that most certainly plays through the web on Itch.io and whatnot. But, still interesting to see the results.
What does this tell us? I mean, not much, I guess, but to me it says the laptop/desktop is the device (and environment) where we're mostly playing. It's not on your phone or on a handheld like the RG351. It also means Splore is likely a primary source of access/finding of games. We might also be able to infer that the game is being seen on a rather larger display, not phone or handheld sized...so worry about sprites being "too small" could be less so.
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Vec-Rhytm is a game similar to vib-ribbon. Your goal is to dodge
the obstacles that appear as the music is playing.
There are only 2 songs. This is more of a tech demo than a real game,
I wanted to see if drawing lots of triangles would be viable, It was!
The music titled "Into the belt" was taken from Pico-8 Tunes Vol.2
which can be found here
https://www.lexaloffle.com/bbs/?pid=62911
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Tetris with Hexagons
Ever wonder what Tetris would be like if it used hexagons instead of squares? It would look like this! Tetrahex plays like Tetris, but uses tetrahexes instead of tetronimoes.
Options
Title Screen
- Level - Starting Level. Each level goes slightly faster, but scores more points.
- Speed - Changes the speed of all levels. Each change either doubles or halves the speed.
- Controls - Left and Right always moves pieces the same direction, but you may choose what each other button does. Chose between
Hold - Swap the current piece for what is in the hold place. May only be done once per piece (you can't swap back and forth). First time swaps for the next piece.
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Hi guys.
I'm making a top-down style action game.
But, my implementation of the diagonal movement and the collision detection does not work as desired.
- 1st, the diagonal movement seems too slow.
- 2nd, after a few try, it may be got stuck into the solid block.
Any help about those ?
English is not my tongue, I hope my English get through to you.
Thank you.
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Earlier this week I released Pico-Pond, a networked PICO-8 demake of Frog Chorus, a web-project I love by v buckenham and Viviane Schwarz.
You can play Pico-Pond for free in your browser here: https://andymakes.itch.io/pico-pond
You can also look through the source code, which I hope will be helpful for anybody else looking to make a networked PICO-8 game. The code is commented and (hopefully) easily readable.
- Frontend Code: https://github.com/andymasteroffish/pico_pond_front
- Backend Code: https://github.com/andymasteroffish/pico-pond-backend
Please keep in mind that this was a weekend project that was never meant to scale beyond 20 players. I did not try to make it super efficient or account for every edge case.
Overview
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It's a very minor issue but may be important for some carts. In the web version of PICO-8 using menuitems in the pause menu causes _update and _draw to be called.
Version: 0.2.4c4 web applet
How to replicate
Make a cart that has an _update function defined that will cause a visible change on screen. Define a menuitem with a callback that returns true so that the menu stays open after the menu item is used. Run the cart, pause it and use the menuitem.
Expected behavior
The callback runs and the state of the program is only changed in the way the callback changed it. (This is waht happens in the full desktop app version 0.2.4)
Actual behavior
A frame progresses before the callback is resolved. The calling order seems to be: _update, _draw, callback.
Examples:
Simple example:
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Wooble Maker
A simple virtual theremin built for the The Tool Jam 2!
A theremin is an instrument that can be played without even touching it. In this simplified version, you can use your mouse (or your finger on mobile) to control both the pitch and volume, with volume on the X-Axis and pitch on the Y-Axis.
You can also make an audio recording by pressing X on your keyboard (unavailable for mobile and web)
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Zelda-Like Project
Thanks in advance for trying it out. Stay tuned for updates!
v0.6
A small but major step has been added, you can now enter and exit doors. While they currently all go to the same place it is still a bit step towards building dungeons and shops and secrets! Aside from that, I made some small fixes like the character's hitbox size to make it easier to through tight spaces. I fixed some minor map transition issues that caused soft locks.
Though I may not keep it, I'm also experimenting with the alt colour pallet for the caves and dungeons to give it a darker feel.
v0.5.1
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This is an implementation of an algorithm that plays snake very well. It's based on a path through all board cells and calculated shortcuts to get more efficiency.
Controls:
X - show/hide the path
Menu items:
ALG - controls which variant of the algorithm is used.
SPEED - Snake's speed, lower = faster.
SNAKE - Change snake visualisation.
The path was generated based on a Hilbert curve. It would work with any path that goes through all board cells, but the Hilbert curve has some nice properties and looks.
I have implemented two variants of this algorithm here, togglable in the menu. "Tail" algorithm tends to follow it's tail very closely when it can't get directly to food. "Blocky" algorithm curls on itself until it has a clear path to food resulting in big patches of snake body later in the game. I believe "Tail" is more efficient than "Blocky".
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Tscherno Jump 1.0
Follow the arrows! Dodge the cats! Avoid the Sawtraps! This game is bloody - bloody diffcult!
Tscherno Jump is a demake of a game that unfortunately never saw the light of day, by @Asebist and me.
You only need one button, Tscherno and his clones will automatically follow the arrows on the ground, except if you want to jump over them or need to jump an obstacle. Try and figure out the fastest way through the levels!
How to play?
- press X/O to start running, arrows change your direction
- collect all coins in a level to finish
- run into cherries to spawn two clones besides you
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Controls
Arrows: Move cursor around the screen.
x: Select tool/menu/option.
z: Return to previous menu.
How to play
Take an empty field and turn it into the next big Theme Park!
Select the Tools to access the build menu. Start by placing paths, shops and your first ride. Watch out for the cost of the buildings to be sure to not run out of money. Guests will be attracted to your park over time and spend money at each of your rides and shops. Be sure to keep them happy by providing them with rides, food and toilets.
As you save more money, better rides become available for you to build. Try to build them all and keep track of your park records.
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The manual describes layers, the optional last argument to map(), like so:
> LAYERS is a bitfield. When given, only sprites with matching sprite flags are drawn. For example, when LAYERS is 0x5, only sprites with flag 0 and 2 are drawn.
To me, this example indicates that only sprites with both flags set should be drawn. However, testing shows that sprites with either flag set will be drawn.
If this is as intended, can the manual be updated to say "or" rather than "and"? Something like this:
> LAYERS is a bitfield. When given, only sprites with at least one matching sprite flag are drawn. For example, when LAYERS is 0x5, only sprites with flag 0 or 2 are drawn.
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