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Posted By

Luca
on 2018-11-14
20:34:59
 Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

http://www.psytronik.net/newsite/index.php/plus4/101-petsrescue
Pets Rescue: budget, premium+, collector's edition. Preorders will start very soon.



Posted By

carrion
on 2018-11-15
08:25:47
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Oh WOW!
The box art looks so cool!
Great Job. I will order one box for sure.

and to be clear I only created the c+4 loading screen. :)
Someone here made a great job doing this box version - really kool!

Posted By

Luca
on 2018-11-15
08:58:36
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Yep! Trevor "Smila" Stoney has reprised the Carrion's original picture (MFLI?) to draw the cover art.

If there's somebody interested in this Collector's Edition box, I suggest to preordere it ASAP, 'coz there will be quite a limited number of those due to the high production costs.
Oh and don't forget that all the ppl who created Pets Rescue have donated their proceeds to Humane Society International, to help real pets by freeing some digital ones :)

Posted By

Romppainen
on 2018-11-16
06:42:43
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

No option for just the digital download?

Posted By

carrion
on 2018-11-16
07:22:01
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

The download is free. Here on this site.

Posted By

Luca
on 2018-11-16
07:55:28
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Romppainen: Psytronik's site contemplates a download page, used both to sell digital copies and to spread free stuff, but actually I dunno how they will move about Pets Rescue. Anyway, as Carrion has pointed out, you can download from here the freeware version as .d64. And yes: the commercial one has got various improvements here and there happy

Posted By

MMS
on 2018-11-16
16:03:57
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I really like the color and texture of the logo.

Posted By

Romppainen
on 2018-11-17
10:38:18
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I ment specifically the commercial edition, I'm aware of availability of the freeware version. Hopefully they put the digital download on their itch.io page.

Posted By

MIK
on 2018-11-17
11:38:46
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Wow sexy box!! happy

Romppainen, the commercial version has a few tweaks and added polish which were done as an incentive to buy over the free version.

Posted By

Luca
on 2018-11-17
15:30:33
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Romppainen: ok, I asked and: yes, we will have a download page next week; also, anybody who orders the physical version will receive a free download as well.

Posted By

Romppainen
on 2018-11-18
04:59:04
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Great news! happy

MIK: I know it is extended and I'm definitely ready to spend few bucks for it, I asked for digital option because I don't collect physical copies anymore due the lack of storage space although I still use original hardware.

Posted By

MIK
on 2018-11-18
10:53:02
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

While your question has been answered buy the gods that made it,... if a physical copy was going to be that much of a burden you could of put it in the bin once it arrived. Or offered it to someone willing to give it a home for the price of postage. wink

Posted By

Romppainen
on 2018-11-19
09:24:43
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I just fail to see a joke in there: If somebody simply doesn't want physical version the next best thing to support devs is buying the digital download instead of just forgetting the whole thing or downloading illegal copy from shady side of internet, but for each of their own I guess...

Posted By

retroscener
on 2018-12-11
13:20:58
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Well I will certainly be purchasing this, especially seeing as it isn’t SD2IEC compatible. It will look nice next to my C64’s Sam’s Journey cartridge box. Will there be a poster made available too?

Posted By

Luca
on 2018-12-11
17:21:32
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Baz thank you! The Collector's Edition box should include a poster too, with pins, stickers and the CD with the OST happy

Posted By

Luca
on 2018-12-27
08:59:58
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

We are veeeery close to the preorders disclosure. Meanwhile, see how some new levels look like in this game preview: produced by Kenobisboch Productions, with Andrea "Bisboch" Babich (Ubisoft Italia) introducing Pets Rescue Psytronik commercial version, as part of the "Commodore 64 Advent Show 2018". Too much love...



Posted By

MIK
on 2018-12-28
06:02:05
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

He sounded very pleased with it! grin

The new Desert stage looks cool.

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-01-03
11:25:31
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

We're even closer to the preorders, so 5tarbuck has updated the Pets Rescue OST taking it to complete state, and the KPS music archive has been changed too.
We should be almost in, guys wink



Posted By

Luca
on 2019-01-06
15:32:25
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

4Sceners has just released the charts about the best of 2018 from the scene, and Pets Rescue has been ranked 1st in the "Best Scene-Game 2018". We won happy
And that's not finished here: Promised Land has been ranked 4th in the global "Best Oldskool Demo" too! Congratulations guys!

It comes exactly in the day the commercial version is on the market: you can actually preorder your copy (Budget, Premium Plus, Collector's Editor Box) here, but I'm gonna post a short text in the news when the Digital Download will be up too. Guys, we really did it wink



Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-06
20:06:09
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

WOW!!! happy (And congrats for the Promised Land entry!!)

Posted By

retroscener
on 2019-01-07
04:05:10
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Pre-ordered the collector’s big glossy box edition. Now to buy a frame for the poster. Will hang well next to C64’s Sam’s Journey happy

Posted By

MIK
on 2019-01-07
07:55:51
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

You never replaced the Grassland tune which is more or less a copy the Amiga game Super Frog?!?!?!

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-01-07
07:11:03
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Errr...should I? Me, really? Dunno, we should better ask this to 5tarbuck and Mad instead, personally this one about the 1st level's music is a completely new request to me, didn't suspect anything about. I knew it was a sort of consecration to that Amiga game, even though I dunno why...
Anyway, I feel to agree with you, a music from scratch could have been a better choice, but if I remember how has happened, I entered before when the crew has just decided about that particular tune happy

Posted By

MIK
on 2019-01-07
07:50:42
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Maybe you missed it as I was scratching my head trying to remember and shortly afterwards I updated my post to let you guys know. Or maybe I was too polite at the time hoping 5tarbuck would realize...

Don't get me wrong. The Plus/4 tune for Grassland is cool and it's a great quality effort, it just rings out Super Frog if you have played it. Super Frog to the Amiga is like Mario to a SNES or Sonic to a Megadrive, it's that big and significant to it's fans. I'm not one of them but know the tune. wink

forum/35662

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-07
10:59:25
 therRe: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Why would someone have problems with a roughly converted SuperFrog tune? Please explain! I love this tune btw..

Could be that you have problems with the roughly converted SuperMario graphics, too.. You will be really dissatisfied with our following games if you really can't stand converted (highend) stuff.. Just sayin.. :)

Posted By

Lavina
on 2019-01-07
10:19:11
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Hmm.. strange top list regarding oldschool demos. happy Mostly because of the many platforms it included releases from... Also virtual platform is present. How is that oldschool? grin Also, from the many great C64 releases from 2018 I was surprised to see only one and especially that one on the list... So, all in all, very strange list, but of course I’m happy to be on it just because raising attention to our platform. Thanks for pointing this out, I’d have never found this piece of news.

Congrats for Pets Rescue, well deserved first place, and I love the music. :)

Posted By

MIK
on 2019-01-07
11:23:16
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Mad, your on the wrong wave length some where. I was talking about 1 tune which has nothing to do with graphics, game play nor does it have anything to do with what game/s I might play in the future.

And do I really have to spell it out??
Nah I won't because we could of talked about this ages ago.

A shame but there we go...

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-07
13:20:11
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

It's a top tune which perfectly fits the graphics and atmosphere! What is your point? I really don't understand what you are saying!

Btw.. That tune was a special request by a team member. Starbuck even didn't want to compose such a tune and wrote a lengthy response in a forum, that he was disatisfied with the request. So it's at least not the musicians fault. For instance I am extremely happy with the atmosphere in the first level (and the guy who requested the tune, most probably too).

We even have a not far from beeing an almost original Super Mario tune in the waterlevel as a "request" by some other team member. The game started as a port of Super Mario, but you apparently do know this.

...

I am really happy with your response in the past and implemented almost all the changes you "requested", even if it took some hard work to free the memory for them, as far as I remember. I just couldn't find the forum post where you wrote, we are forced by you to exchange the perfect fitting music of the first level.

...

It's just that it was the toughest project for me till now, managing all the requests from around 10 very different and unique people who did this in their freetime.. And I am happy that this is over and I am through it finally!

I even had to kick one team member because of too many change requests, directly at start of the project.. Which was a hard experience, since I just want to do a good game with like minded people.

That's just me, sorry.. But sometimes it's really hard to hear these: "You should have done better this, like I want it." requests.

At least if you have to synchronize many people and the project is a work of all of them !!together!!..

But I can't change people so whatever, the internet is full of change requests for almost everything so whatever again.. Thanx for your response!

Sorry for my response.. The next posts will be calm again.. It's just hard for me to hear this currently.. My answer two posts up there was already the polite one.. I didn't want to write this.. But it seems to be needed in order to understand me..

And perhaps you are right.. Who knows..

And sorry to the guy which was kicked after one month of developing.. It was just that I couldn't handle it.. Hope you accept my apologies! And thanx to all involved for the mostly calm and relaxed working atmosphere..

(Some guy told for 9 months or so, that he finishes his work just on this current weekend.. 9 months are a lot of weekends I was waiting for (not knowing what I will get finally.. Turned out it was awesome work and totally was worth it in the end.).. And I was not knowing if it all will fit on one disc including his work.. Happily 0 blocks free at the end of the project ..So that seems to be the sad reality of freetime projects, if you understand.. However we got through this and !!together!! (including you MIK) did finish this! :) )

Edit: I want to delete this post again.. But perhaps it's better to stay so it's somehow understandable what I wanna say..

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-01-07
12:05:09
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Ahahah! grin

MIK and Mad I second both of you, guys, and I think we should end this laughing at the whole picture, especially because we're in a win-win situation: anybody gains something, both the players and the releasers. Players can now play to a game that pushes their prefer machine to the max becoming famous in some unexpected outer cultural and recreational environments; releasers can boast of another tangible production becoming reality happy

The most hilarious thing here is that both MIK and Mad don't like to have a partial cover from another game, so they are basically saying the same grin Probably, MIK have seen this just like a sacrilege about one of the game of his own youthness and this has destabilized him ("Hey what's this, what I'm really playing here?" grin ), and Mad has to survive into a teamwork with diplomacy, dealing here and there, being rigid when it has to be needed and yielding when it has to be needed too.

A first music reminding a famous Amiga platform game is a sort of trait d'union between different environments which show basically the same target for a developers' point of view, and that's why I pacifically accepted it (just like Mad did), though my opinion is quite close to MIK in substance.

Heeey too much to chitchat about and nobody is actually smashing his joysticks/fightsticks/keyboards/joypad! grin Let's finish it!

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-07
12:17:25
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Thanx Luca!

Posted By

retroscener
on 2019-01-07
12:19:54
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I have never heard the tune before this game anyway, so makes no difference to me, nor probably most..... Just saying

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-07
14:39:41
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Luca I have to admit that MIK is right, we could have changed the first level tune due to the 40 tracks disc.. However it totally wasn't clear to me, that we have to change it. I really didn't know that there was an issue.. Perhaps I should have better read the forum posts carefully.. I just couldn't find the post where this was actually requested..

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-01-07
14:57:57
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

He me neither happy My mind was stuck on the bouncing logo stuff and can't remember further grin

Hey we're wasting time! The real news here is: Pets Rescue preorders are now open! grin

Get your own copy on February 2019, choose your product: Budget Edition (£6.99), Premium Plus Edition (£13.99), Collectors' Box Edition ( ̶£̶3̶9̶.̶9̶9̶ £29.99 special offer for the firsties!), Digital Download ($2.99).

Posted By

theruler
on 2019-01-07
15:05:51
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Guys, CONGRATULATIONS! you deserved it! You really pushed my C16 to its hardware limits! both visually and acoustically.

https://psytronik.itch.io/pets-rescue
Is the version on itch.io the "optimized"? I mean the one with improved scrolling.

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-07
16:10:01
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Yes! It has an improved framerate.. If the last version had sections with around 16.6 fps the new version has almost 25 fps in these sections (2 frames instead of 3 frames delay).. But it's a 40 tracks disc, so keep that in mind when copying it to a physical medium! Thanks for your compliments.. Much appreciated!.. Have fun!

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-01-07
19:32:27
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

And this also means that you have to specify which version you played, when adding your best scores to the Hall of Fame wink

Posted By

Spektro
on 2019-01-08
09:13:15
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

From the Pets Rescue's commercial version:



How do you jump over that?

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-01-08
10:46:58
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Keep the fire button pressed to run while jumping...and never use that horrible VICE! grin

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-08
11:25:32
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Oh my.. Spektro I really implemented that place in the first level, because some people in the past did not understand to use the firebutton for running.. Seems it was a fail.. :/

Posted By

gerliczer
on 2019-01-08
12:58:26
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Cut Spektro some slack guys, please. Seemingly he's running macOS, so no YAPE or plus4emu for him, unless he runs some Win emulator or makes his own plus4emu build.

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-01-08
13:56:23
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Uh, really? It's 2019 and life keeps to be so hard for the Apple users... :o

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-08
15:21:48
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I did use a Mac for a longer time (currently just Linux and Windows).. If I remember right, there is a final and usable plus4emu build to easily install on a Mac, too.. Plus4emu is cool if you have to work on different systems.. Since Yape has some very extensive stuttering on my homeplace (the screen stucks every several seconds for around 0 - 1 seconds) I am happy that Plus4emu provides an absolut fluid scrolling if I show this game and other stuff to people, not these almost seconds long stuterring all the time.. (Seems to be some timer issue, it got worse over the last months.. Perhaps my Windows clock has a bad or to high counter, several older yape versions show the same stuttering behaviour).. It's nice to have plus4emu around for all three systems.. Vice really is no option for Plus/4 people, at least every other option is better .. Just sayin..

Posted By

carrion
on 2019-01-09
08:25:00
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Mac and Mac OS discussion aside (Im impacted too)
I'll buy this box version ofcoz - if still available...
But the news of the week (or of the year) is the game being the scene game of the year 2018.
I'm so proud being small part of it bur all credit and huge thank you goes to you all magicians of C+4.
I'll keep doing gfx (and maybe even more code) for this superb platform.

Congrats to all of the team involved.

Posted By

bubis
on 2019-01-09
10:33:20
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Congratulations for the 1st place and congratulations for the 4th place too! (No X2018 demo on the list???)

I have bought my Pets Rescue, my order# is 2340. happy

Posted By

Lavina
on 2019-01-09
10:59:05
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Thanks,

What's more interesting is that on the oldschool demo toplist PL is 4th while on the corresponding image above the list it's marked as 3rd. happy

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-01-09
11:04:32
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

carrion and bubis thanks for your words, Pets Rescue's success is based on the Mad's coding performance of course, but on a series of non-random particulars for the other half of it: Bitloader+4 allows the game to be on a single extended disk's side, with loading times comparable to a artridge game; the overscan bitmap title has been the real passport of the game since the very beginning, till becoming the tangible box cover of the final release.
So, how could be possible not counter-thanking you too? wink

Lavina: wow, you're right :O

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-09
11:43:48
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Hey Lavina, seems it should be the 3rd originally then.. happy

Bubis we did have another loader at starting with the game, it took around 10x the time to load the game. We thought a lot of ways to get around this loading times.. With Bitfire (done by BSZ and some further stuff done by you) we had the possibility to do the game like it is now.. We do have a lot of loading in between the actuall game mechanics.. You don't really see it, because mostly it takes 1 or 2 ( maybe more :D ) frames or something to load !!!AND DECOMPRESS!!! the stuff on the fly while loading. The game has 0 blocks free on the disc, so yeah we relied on the ultra fast decrunching, too.. Thanx a lot for Bitfire it was a big help in doing the game like it is.

Carrion Have to say, that I am happy, that we managed to get this awesome title picture done by you.. You know who you are happy..

And have to say, that Kichy and Luca played a major part in the production.. I loved the friendly atmosphere of constantly working on the game.. Both people did work on the game almost on a daily basis.. And 5tarbuck of course, too! Funny that it's possible to have such a "work ethics" on a just freetime project.. happy

Have fun and good that this game is done and in the stores now! happy

Posted By

Lavina
on 2019-01-09
11:53:30
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I can't imagine (well, I can, sort of, because of PL) the amount of work and commitment involved in the creation of this game from all participants, especially MAD. This gem made justice for our platform once and for all.

Now you can go back to Rocket Science 2. wink Or something similarly breathtaking.

Posted By

Spektro
on 2019-01-10
19:09:06
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

@Luca
Got it, thanks!

Not a lot of Plus4 emulator options for Mac users, I'm afraid There is a Mac version of plus4emu, like Mad said, but VICE has a better user interface, so I've decided that VICE is good enough for me.

@Mad
As long as there are no instructions on how to run, running is one of the game's secrets.

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-10
22:22:58
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Spektro

I implemented this section because the creator of Super Mario (Miyamoto) also said in a youtube video he used this same "technique" in some early Mario Game to get the players find out on how to run.

I know it's not easy, but I think some 10 year old boy would find this pretty fast by just getting his head scratched about this gap in the first level.

Perhaps were already just too old for that or something..

And sorry, I understand what you mean..

But having players playing the game without running was very frustrating with the freeware version. It's almost impossible to reach farer than the third level without running. Dunno how they did get to the 6th level this way.. We do have all in all around 40 levels..

I hope it's not a riddle that is too hard for everyone, at least Miyamoto said it was a good move to add a section with a gap in the first level to get the players to run and jump.

Hope it wasn' t too disgusting and frustrating..

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-01-11
02:08:05
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

The greater experienced game develope Alf Yngve has recently started a thread on the Lemon64 forum where his first post begins with this sentence:"I've noticed a recurring complaint about newly released homebrew games... that the difficulty level is too high." Several replies follow. Seems like this is an actual common point nowadays...

Posted By

Frederick
on 2019-01-16
23:55:43
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I purchased the Collector's Edition soon after the announcement and I've been playing the digital download in YAPE. Tonight I finally got to the last level and finished the final boss. There's something very magical about how all the parts of this game have come together in a way that I can't quite describe. It's not just a good game given the limitations of the system, it's a good game for any system in any era. Some reactions:

The level design is amazing. While there's an element of coordination and quick reflexes required, if you study how the level is structured you can solve it almost like a puzzle. It's a good combination and I wish more games could strike the balance you have here. I've been focused on getting through the levels to unlock the next one and see what you've come up with, but I haven't explored them nearly as much as I would like, nor have I really been focused on getting a high score yet.

The atmosphere of the game is incredibly immersive. The soundtrack and sound effects go incredibly well with the game, and the soundtracks for the levels work very well. I'm also amazed at how beeps from an emulated TED can conjure up thoughts of a happy dog yipping and bouncing back and forth. I was also particularly impressed by the use of color in the graphics. Instead of fighting with the color restrictions, you managed to select palettes that gave each level its own uniqueness and made the software sprites feel like part of the world rather than standing out so much from it.

I don't know how you guys managed to get the animation for the final boss to be so fluid, but it reminded me of final bosses in old Nintendo games. The entire game felt incredibly smooth, and that's in an emulator rather than on real hardware, but that last bit was amazing even given what had come in the levels before.

The ending sequence is beautiful. I don't want to give too much away about it because you should see it for yourself. And the last screen of the ending sequence is touching, particularly for anyone who has or has ever had a pet. I've never gotten to the end of Super Mario Bros and probably never will, but I know that it wouldn't get me in the heart like that.

Great work! I can't wait for the boxed copy to arrive.

Posted By

Frederick
on 2019-01-17
00:14:54
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

An afterthought: Has anyone tried to contact Bil Herd and mention the game? He seems reasonably active in the retrocomputing community and I remember some of his videos talking about the history/legacy of the Plus/4. I know if I'd been the lead engineer on an underappreciated system and someone was able to come along and do this with it, I'd have a moment of pride in learning of it (i.e., yes, in addition to being a serious computer, the Plus/4 can also be a first-rate games machine).

Posted By

KiCHY
on 2019-01-17
01:52:22
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Frederick, your comments are heartwarming happy Thank You!

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-01-17
04:15:29
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Thank you for the super review, Frederick! grin
Yes, I'm pretty sure Bil knows about Pets Rescue, hafta say the fame of our game got a boost especially in the US when David "The 8-bit Guy" Murray did show it in two different videos, and we're talking about 300.000 views videos!

Yes, that's the kind of gameplay feeling we aimed to, and finally we have a feedback from someone who solved the game, yeeeah! have to admit I got this face me too, when I've seen the big boss the first time, Mad's and KiCHY's stuff is a surprise every time (but I had to draw sprites and compose music for the final boss' level, so I moved to work pretty fast, ahah! wink ). Btw, I'm very proud of both the boss level and the outro tunes, but after having composed several tunes and drawn all the animations, I have to say that the point which makes me feel real proud is the story and scenario creation, which seems to be quite consistent and, yes, if you'd get a pet in your life as an important slice of your feelings, our game's ending is dedicated exactly to you happy Nonetheless I seize this opportunity to remember that all the ppl who created Pets Rescue have donated their proceeds to Humane Society International, to help real pets in their real lives.

KiCHY's level design has been praised by all the ppl I talked with, and I think the ultimate words about the gameplay triggering come from Andrea "Bisboch" Babich (Ubisoft Italia), in his personal video review, sticking on some points:
- has a high atmosphere overall;
- of course is a tech milestone for the machine, but most of all it's a very good game per se;
- yes it's difficult 'cause is an oldschool type of game, but not impossible or frustrating as described from someone, "unless you're crap at playing games" (cit. grin );
- the level design is neat and "follows what the N...endo grammar teached very well";
- (he says that our game plays better than Sam's Journey being more inspired, but hey, let's keep this inbetween brackets, sssssh! wink ).

What can I say more? Thank you again for your kind words, they're fuel for all of us, keep up to improve your scores (and specify by notes you're playing the commercial version if you're gonna enter your score in the Hall of Fame) searching for any evil secret we added wink A good clue? Dig "in danger" the seabed wink

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-17
14:49:17
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Frederick THANX a lot!!

That's some of the best review I read.

Honestly my fear was, that no one could complete the game and see "Lucas" ending sequence.

Seems you managed it!

About the graphics I am also pretty overwhelmed what KiCHY could pull out of the pure Character Mode on this machine.

5tarbuck Luca and Degauss did the chiptunes, where everyone of them did an amazing job.

And thanks for the comment for the level design.. KiCHY gave his best there.. I always feared that KiCHY could have made the levels to hard to solve, and complained sometimes :/. However the 2 or 3 levels I "designed" where also on a very high difficulty level.

So you solved that!! YEAH!! happy

I don't know if other people could see the boss of the game, but it's nice to hear that already someone did! happy Congrats!

And thanks for you extremely kind words.. Somehow a brighter day after reading this! Thanx!!

I hope Bil checked the game and that he finally could be proud of his "little machine" afters years of trying to forget this "mistake". The Plus/4 is capable of a lot more.. I think for instance Bubis will show some stuff in the future which will push the boundaries once more.. At least I am waiting for a demo already.. Could take some time, but who knows.. And there are other guys pushing the boundaries too already Lavina anyone.. So to say I hope Bil will check, that he has done good with these machines!

(Reading the specs of the Plus/4 some years ago and getting detailed explanation of several effects by Degauss made me wonder anyways, why this machine was so "underprivileged", the TED is an awesome chip and it's programming "interface" is extremely nice to use.)

Posted By

Mozar​tkügel
on 2019-01-29
02:27:32
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

To everyone involved in creating this masterpiece: Thank you for this astonishing game and congratulations for the achievement! What a wonderful game and polished end product! I've been playing it for a couple of nights and every part of it is fabulous, the graphics, the game-/level- design, the music and of course the coding, including the software sprites.

I really don't understand how you pulled off the graphic tricks? I see many other colors than the background color behind the main character and other colors in the background than the colors on the main character. That shouldn't be possible in multicolor mode, I'm baffled! Could a kind person in a short simplified way shed a light on how it's done technically? I found the sprite engine code, but I'm not sure if I can decipher what's going on there (certainly not at this point as a plus 4 noob).

I've always loved the c64, but I recently got interested in the VIC-20 because of 8-bit guys video and cheese and onion, now I'm also falling in love with the plus 4 / c16 largely because of this game. I already got the digital download but as a next step I will start putting aside some money for getting a real plus 4 or c16+64k and a physical copy of the game.

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-01-29
10:07:33
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Oh wow thank you Mozartkügel, I really appreciate your words, and I feel so happy when the players spend their time to talk about our little platform game, because that's the only actual way to know if our efforts have been directioned toward the right side wink

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-29
23:22:03
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Hey Mozartkügel,

Thanx a lot!! We did make this game in order to show what the Plus/4 is truly capable of doing. I know old games show already a lot of skills and technical excellence. However the Plus/4 as platform wasn't much recognized as a good gaming platform before.. what it actually is!!

The "trick" with the 4 colors behind the sprites is very simple.. We just took the 3 "solid" colors (used for the whole screen) to display the sprites.. The 4th choosable color (per 8x8) is just taken for the background not for the sprites. So it's ensured that the sprites always can be blitted over any background element possible..

Really nice to read that you got interessted in this platform by our game.. That is one point why the game actually was done by us.. happy Hope this answer suits somehow.. :)

cheers,
Mad

Posted By

Mozar​tkügel
on 2019-01-30
02:13:34
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Back in the day I only had one friend with a C16 and one with a VIC-20 (had a C128 myself), so I think the interest has been there under the surface, but now it was finally awakened by Pets Rescue, Thanks! grin I do enjoy simpler games too, but it's obviously very exciting to see when the limits of an old system are pushed, hats off to your dedication, I know how much work even a much smaller game than this is.

Ahaa, actually I thought I was aware of that technique. Thanks for the explanation! Aparently the dots somehow didn't quite connect in my head. You are talking about blitting, does that mean that the sprites somehow are drawn on top of the background? I was trying to figure out the 'sprite transparency', I was thinking that maybe you check for the cell coordinates on which the sprite is, then draw the background cells to the sprite character cells and after that draw the sprite on top of that, again to the sprite character cells (I guess that would indeed be a kind of blitting). Sorry, I'm not the most technical person, but I love these things! (I've been doing my first steps of c64 and vic-20 coding the last couple of months and started some small plus4 coding yesterday) happy

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-01-30
08:37:43
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Mozartkügel:

I paint the sprites in some empty (black) chars first.. The empty characters range from character 140 (or something) to 255.. After that the background graphics characters are combined with these now prefilled (prefilled with the sprite data) characters. If there is no background set at some character I just don't combine the background here, just leave it with the single color of this character (the 8x8 of the background has just some single color). (If the background has just some single color, the sprite painting is almost twice as fast.) Then I copy these now final characters onto the screens "tilemap".. So yeah you could say it's some sort of blitting but I use this (Amiga) term also to do any graphical operation which puts something to the screen.

The thing is to do as much operations as possible in an unrolled manner and to use jumptables for destinguishing different cases. Also we have some extra routine which paints the sprites clipped at the border (just the tiledata) and one which paints them midscreen. It's really no magic, but doing this stuff several times with different games and learning by doing from it.

Have a good day! happy

Posted By

Mozar​tkügel
on 2019-01-30
16:46:03
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Hey thanks so much for explaining again, very interesting and helpful to understanding the process! I like the word blitting too grin I was first familiar with it from coding on the Atari Lynx a little (it was designed by a couple of the Amiga designers). Yes, you have to do things over and over to master something, and you've really done it with this game! It still feels quite magical to me although I now know how you did it grin

Posted By

icbrkr
on 2019-02-02
22:34:37
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I've tried at least 5 times over the last few weeks, I can't seem to preorder it.. I get this from the page:

10606 Buyer cannot pay. - Transaction rejected, please contact the buyer.

Well.. yeah, I can pay. I have no problems except for here. It happens when I check out via Paypal and am reverted back to the page after I logon.

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-02-03
02:53:26
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Hey icbrkr!

Did you already mention it to Psytronik itself? If not, then perhaps it would be an option that I write to Kenz of Psytronik about that matter. Sorry for that.. Seems that's on Psytroniks side.. Did you disable all antivirus programms, that was a solution I encountered with Kaspersky. I have to disable Kaspersky for Paypal almost every time.

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-02-03
07:08:20
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

icbrkr I contacted Kenz and he will have a check about it. Anyway, it looks more like something related to you than an actual Psytronik's bug...

Posted By

icbrkr
on 2019-03-04
15:17:43
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I can send a note. I've tried multiple computers, Macs, Amigas (I have an x5000), and W10 boxes. Heck I even have the money in my Paypal account but whole lot of nothing.


Update: Well I tried... he said it was on my side - I asked for maybe some help with what his software was rejected specifically so I could ask for some help maybe with Paypal and no response. Oh well, I did want to buy it...


Second Update: Not using my Paypal funds, not using a debit card, but using a credit card it worked. Sigh.

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-03-04
15:26:06
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Wow, better late than never, seems that you did it just in time, we're ready to pack and send the stuff wink



Posted By

blinddarm
on 2019-03-05
12:42:10
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

hey guys and girls,
sorry for my bad english... does it mean the shipping will start just now?
regards,
Norman

EDIT: hmm, for some reason i can't log in for now

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-03-05
13:58:56
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

blinddarm Kenz wrote on Facebook that he has to do the discs now.. There was a longer discussion about how to get these 40 Tracks easily to an actual physical medium. I think Kenz just started with preparing the discs and they are very soonish ready to ship!!

Posted By

Patrick
on 2019-03-10
09:59:50
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

just ordered a collectors box!!

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-03-11
18:38:25
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Patrick: nice!!!

Kenz just wrote that he will send out the boxes within the next 2-5 days (maybe some more).. But all is ready to be shipped.. All of the collectors editions are sold out!! 42 items will be send out, and Kenz don't know if he'll prepare another charge soonish.. Seems you people got some kind of rarities happy..

Posted By

siz
on 2019-03-13
12:18:40
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I just received an order update that my copy is dispatched. Yay! happy

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-03-14
03:31:29
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Yes, the first bunch has gone and the Collectors' Edition boxers are all around the world right now! grin Thank you guys, we love to remember that purchasing any kind of Pets Rescue publication, your help goes straight to Humane Society International.

Posted By

bubis
on 2019-03-14
08:31:50
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I got mine yesterday! How is it possible? Excellent product inside and out! Congrat guys again!

Now, we only have to travel back in time and change history. grin

Posted By

retroscener
on 2019-03-14
17:19:42
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

My collector’s boxset arrived this morning. Loving the poster. Things like this deserve proper framing.



P.S. Also just recieved my C64 Hunter’s Moon cartridge which is why you see that also as well as Sam’s Journey too. It all looks great next to each other happy

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-03-15
02:55:15
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Uuuh. what a great bunch of winners Baz, congrats!

Posted By

retroscener
on 2019-03-15
08:49:19
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Thanks. Haven’t had the chance to play the soundtrack CD yet. Anyway how many limited edition boxsets will there be in total?

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-03-15
08:58:40
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Originally 50, now 0, off, gone. Next...who knows? wink

Posted By

MMS
on 2019-03-15
11:05:26
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Wow, Baz, nice package!
I prefer Pet's Rescue cover, it is more stylish and have a much better color scheme.

(I just deleted a part of this message, as I was curious what kind of joystick you use, and just noticed there is a new topic on the matter. thanks for the details!)

Posted By

retroscener
on 2019-03-16
14:03:22
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I’m currently using the sturdy competion pro stick. But it tires my wrists when jumping. My favourite konix navigator sticks keep breaking. I’d definitely love a gamepad with a secondary button for jump that won’t blow my C16.

Incidentally, I’ve just noticed that whilst the hi-scores are automatically saved to disk, I cannot seem to find a way to reset the hi-scores back to the default hi-scores. Is there a method? Or is it a case of having to copy the included Psytronik D64 file back to the physical disk?

Also, is there a difference between the commercial Psytronik disk & D64, and the free downloadable D64 version here?

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-03-17
12:06:15
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Baz There is no way to "reset" the highscores. Seems you are knowing games where this is possible.. I don't remember any.. Yes, "sadly", you have to copy the game back to disc to reset the highscores.

Yes the commercial version has changes to the freeware one:
- 4 more levels (new songs, graphics and so on)
- almost one frame faster framerate (in some places 25 fps instead of 17 fps)
- some recolorings of items to not disturb Nintendo
- almost removed the sliding on the player controls, making it more easy to control
- some changes MIK suggested (some sounds added and other stuff)
- it's a 40 tracks disc instead of a 35 tracks one
- some bug fixes
- hidden areas with many many items to collect
- perhaps some other stuff I don't remember, yet...

Hope that helps.. happy

Posted By

retroscener
on 2019-03-17
12:52:17
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Thanks. Yes, there are a few C64 disk games where the hiscores can be resetted back to default. I can’t recall any offhand though. Pretty sure that there is a Giana Sisters crack where it has this option. But I think there are new Psytronik ones too

Anyway, it won’t be difficult to rewrite the commercial D64 back to disk. I can easily do this via my 1541u2 on my C64. I’ll do this later. Keep the original disk as the master copy, and just load a backup copy.

Posted By

carrion
on 2019-03-19
13:29:39
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Yeah
My package arrived today.
http://retronavigator.com/post/183566883798/pet-rescue-a-commodore-plus4-game-collector

What a great feeling of being part of it. I'm kind of proud how the box art ended up looking.

Posted By

icbrkr
on 2019-03-20
20:25:40
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Got mine today!

I haven't had a chance to play it, but the box and presentation is very professional! Looks awesome!

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-03-21
02:57:05
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Happy you liked the commercial stuff mates! Regarding luxury boxes, Kenz is unbeatable! wink

Posted By

Frederick
on 2019-03-21
23:58:43
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

I received my collector's edition copy here in Arizona today and I was incredibly happy with the effort and detail that went into the physical release. The experience really took me back in a lot of ways to being a little kid and buying boxed games on floppy or CD-ROM, except that I don't think a lot of those had the same level of care devoted to making the product. happy Funnily enough, the post office actually made a delivery attempt the day before, but we were out taking our own little dog to the veterinarian when they came by. Thanks so much to everyone involved in putting this together, it was well worth the wait.

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-03-22
02:57:42
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Frederick: thank you, hope that your beloved familty fluffy boy gets well soon!

Posted By

gerliczer
on 2019-03-25
12:23:46
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Seeing this many of you having your collector's edition copies, I started to feel somehow envious. Oh, well.

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-05-18
18:22:24
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Hey peeps,

We got one of the best reviews yet by Vintage is the new Old.. Just if you wanna have a good review read about this game.. Funny to see where it all did start and now we are done with it and getting these reviews.. <3 https://www.vintageisthenewold.com/review-pets-rescue-commodore-16-plus-4

Thanks to Luca and Vintage is the new Old for pushing things forward in connection with this review!

Posted By

MMS
on 2019-05-19
17:56:23
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Thank you for the link! It was a good read.

I agree with most of this really positive review. The gfx, the music and the gameplay are all on top.

At one point I really had to disagree with the review, but maybe it is just due to my limited knowledge "Lets not forget that the C16 series had about as much pixel-pushing power as your average potato".
According to my knowledge, the C16 HW has equal pixel pushing possibilities as the C64 (same registers), and due to CPU raw power even a little more (in fact required, as the luminance map also need to be moved).
Because of HW scroll registers, C16 is more prepared for games than most of the computers in the period.
Not only better then the ZX Spectrum, BBC or Apple II, but even SAM Coupe ('Amiga killer"), MSX1.0 or Atari ST initial lineup with the original video chip.

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-05-19
13:42:10
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

MMS friday we had a party in a small town close to Firenze, a Gameboy 30th Anniversary party with famous chiptune djs and gameboy performers, and that also has been a chance to meet ppl and have nice "retro" chitchatting around some glasses of Negroni (yes, a real Florentian drinks Negroni instead of the normal spritz). So, again, ppl was sure of the fact that the C16 doesn't have softscrolling just like a C64 has. It's 2019, and in a round table of retro machines experts, ppl confuse the C16 with the MSX

Also, in that (fantastic!) review, there's the phantomatic "difficulties in scrolling along the game". Me and Mad were fighting against this shit since months: ppl plays the game on YAPE and expect to have the same scrolling as the real machine. It's 2019, and ppl still don't know about the difference between the PC screen Vs. the emulated scrolling. And I mean: for any emulator, for any machine

Posted By

Mad
on 2019-05-19
16:58:41
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

MMS yeah people always think that the C16 has no hardware scrolling capabilities. But in reality it's even better than on the "other 8 bit Commodore".. You have of course softscrolling in x and y (y with splitscreen is a little more irritating than on C64). And on top of softscrolling you have a Bitmap Pointer ($ff1a,$ff1b) where people on C64 would climb hills for. And you have the possibility to easily double buffer the whole screen including the colorram. For what the C64 people also would visit far planets if it could be found there, I suppose..

Luca Yeah I am too wondering why people always ask me if the C16 has softscrolling.. Perhaps some sort of unconscious joke people make, even when they know of the softscrolling registers.. Dunno..

Could be that Majesty of Sprites part one was responsible for that.. I really didn't want people to think that scrolling is complicated, whilst it's even more easy than on C64 happy (besides screen splitting which really seems more complicated on C16)..

Posted By

MMS
on 2019-05-19
17:53:19
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Luca, Mad: thank you for your detailed answers!

PS I've never tried Negroni, in the past I preferred Martini, then Campari, now simple good o'beer happy

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-08-05
02:09:14
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Do you remember that all the ppl who created Pets Rescue have donated their proceeds to Humane Society International? Now time has come to say thanks to all the buddies who purchased a copy. Woof!



Posted By

MMS
on 2019-08-05
03:40:09
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

wow, it is good to know, that this money goes to such a right place.

One year ago we visited with my kids a animal care center, and I can tell, every little penny really helps a lot.

Thank you for your initiative!

(on the other hand I think the creators also deserve a little more their outstanding effort and great job than zero $, my 2c.
I suppose you are also not a light-eater happy
What do you think about a Kickstarter for the next one?
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1206403106/chaos-reborn-from-the-creator-of-the-original-x-co)

Posted By

siz
on 2019-08-05
05:55:50
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Wow! I was not aware this when I ordered mine but I'm really proud that my money serves this purpose!

Posted By

retroscener
on 2019-08-05
06:40:29
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Fantastic news. I didn’t know either. I bought the limited collector’s edition boxset so happy to know it all helped a good cause.

Posted By

carrion
on 2019-08-07
03:58:02
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

@Luca
Great news. It's good karma!
And regarding next game.... count me in grin

Posted By

Lavina
on 2019-12-04
03:03:56
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Dunno if you'd caught this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgzDvLy87qI

Features Pet's Rescue and also Csabo's Nyan Cat. grin

Posted By

Luca
on 2019-12-04
06:29:24
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Of course yes, Perifractic is agreat buddy and we all love his fantastic dog, don't miss his wonderful April's Fool with Mini+4 wink

Posted By

Luca
on 2020-01-13
03:35:47
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Let's celebrate the 10000 views of the Pets Rescue's promotional video by revealing the endboss + finale sequence happy



Posted By

Mad
on 2020-01-13
04:35:32
 Re: Pets Rescue Psytronik preorders

Thanks for posting this!! happy



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