No hype for Sydney Hunter?

No hype for Sydney Hunter new SNES game?

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/439982171/new-snes-game-sydney-hunter-and-the-caverns-of-dea



I believed it was programmed by Frenchman Alekmaul? Did he ever post here?

I thought it wasn't finished. Looks like they made their first production last week, and are shipping out now.

Thanks for the update.

I didn't even know there was such a thing ! Congrats to the makers ~

A Md version is currently developed by alekmaul.

Sydney Hunter is arguably one of the most impressive SNES homebrew released. The package is very qualitative - it's not made with cheap chinese shells. Instead, the box, the shell, the manual have all been manufactured specifically for this game and looks like the original ones.



(the manual is available both in English and French, here it's a picture of the "French" part)

(pictures taken by ShiningBZH, who bought the PAL version of the game: http://www.gamopat-forum.com/t98256-syd ... s-of-death)

The game itself is apparently pretty cool too. It's a very challenging platform game with cute graphic and music. The goal is to explore caves spanning over many screens in order to retrieve specific items to go to the next levels. There is 10 levels in total.

Here is a video showing the "unboxing" of the PAL version of the game (0:00 - 11:00) alongside with a detailed gameplay video (starting at 11:00).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bo66NLVjrVM

And the most impressive feat is that the game was developed by a single developer, AlekMaul, using a combination of ASM and C code (with PVSNESlib).

Congrats @alekmaul for releasing such a polished SNES game!

This review pisses me off a little bit.

https://www.reddit.com/r/snes/comments/ ... r_and_the/

"Graphics-The graphics themselves are nothing to write home about. Aside from a few extra colors and an animation of the "boss" skeleton dying, it looks like stuff that could be done on the NES."

"Level Design...a lot of recycled screens...lazy"

I think the graphics look fine, probably better than I can do. There are lighting effects and smooth moving lava, far better than the NES can do.

So I guess there's no space in the North American market for platformers with TurboGrafx-16 graphics (more than 4 colors per tile but no parallax). The NES isn't powerful enough, the Super NES is too powerful, and the TG16 isn't common enough.

If I still had an SNES I'd be interested. They don't sell a ROM though, and I guess there's a Switch version coming but I don't have one of those either.

I'm a little bit stoked for the NES version though, whenever that arrives.

I hear what you're saying, although I don't mind brutally honest reviews. Most of us that make games realize the amount of crazy effort that goes into a game like this, so I'm going to be impressed no matter what, but if he's trying to give it a review based on just the players' perspective, I think it's fair to nitpick things like that. Similarly, the existence of so many NES homebrew games brings me a lot of joy, but an honest review of a lot of the games would have plenty to critique. Many (including my own) just aren't that great compared to commercial games. I think it's ok for reviews like that to exist, but just as ok for us to shrug them off and say "so what if you don't like the graphics? The fact that this game exists is AWESOME"



One guy's review doesn't mean there's no space in the market.

The best antidote for a bad review is writing your own good review.*

(Unless it's your own game, of course.)

This should give you some idea of what the current mindset is of people gaming today. Even folks "our" age (40s, or late 30s) who were around for the NES and SNES launches, and grew up with them, have trouble not comparing the quality of retro games (esp. homebrew) to "other stuff" out on the market.

What used to be pretty black-and-white is now all convoluted, particularly with the introduction of "pixel games" that run on PCs (often indie games on Steam). Many of them are gorgeous, but way too vast/complicated -- yet will describe themselves as "NES-like" or "classic retro" or "8-bit" (another one that gets me riled up: "Metroidvania") when in fact the entire game may resemble something you'd find in last-gen SNES or more likely PlayStation: graphics too complex (common one is saying "NES-like" but then not having anything even remotely like an attribute table limitation), levels too large, animations too smooth, excess sprites (count or size), use/requirement of analog sticks, and so on. Many have truly forgotten what the actual limitations were, how the actual systems they're referencing felt, etc..

My opinion? Sydney Hunter is great. I don't see anything "NES-like" about it -- it totally looks like a SNES or TG16/PC Engine title. It's wonderful to see people putting some new stuff out for the SNES -- and it puts an especially big smile on my face because it brings me back to early homebrew efforts in 1993 or thereabouts. It was extremely uncommon to find a completed homebrew at that time (most were general demos (hot in the 80s/90s), or sometimes little games -- an example of a good one is the 4-player Multitap Asteroids-like game called Shoot Your Load from Anthrax). So to see some NOW is wonderful.

Unlike low-resolution, which is an aesthetic, "Igavania" or "Metroidvania" is an actual genre of exploration-oriented platformers inspired by Metroid and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. It's called "Igavania" after Symphony co-director Koji Igarashi. I tend to drag out that genre in discussions of mobile gaming on Slashdot.org because unlike more linear platformers, an Igavania can't be adapted to a touch screen by turning it into a continuous runner like Rayman Jungle Run or Super Mario Run, treating the whole touch screen as the A Button.


Large levels are very possible; it's more a function of memory size and how much you trust the player to take blind leaps. Blaster Master has sixteen levels, each up to 72 screens (2048x2048 pixels). If you want me to dig up the total count of screens in Haunted: Halloween '85 and its sequel, I could probably do that.


That's also a function of memory size. As long as a game actually uses discrete cels with baked inbetweening, not runtime inbetweening like a Flash game, it's technically practical to animate four characters roughly as big as Super Mario at 12 fps, the same rate that Disney cel animated movies run. The primary limit to a sprite cel double-buffering system like that of Haunted: Halloween '85 is CHR RAM bandwidth, and a game with CHR ROM or larger CHR RAM (The Curse of Possum Hollow has the latter) could push that a bit harder.


Optional analog sticks I'm willing to forgive, as 8-bit arcade games were already using pot paddles (Pong), spinners (Arkanoid), trackballs (Missile Command), and the so-called "49-way joystick" (Sinistar) around that time. The Atari 5200 SuperSystem came with an analog stick, and a trackball was available. Many Super NES games support a trackball, as do two NES games (Thwaite and Sliding Blaster).

But guys I totes went to PS and selected the 8-bit graphics options its totes 8-bit PS said so!

Would love to make a video on it... point out that any 8bit games is actually 32bit and not a bit less Does that NPC have more than 2 frames of animation, not (console)8bit Whats that 3 layers of parallax you say.. did you just zoom?

There is a download option coming for the C64 version, not seen anything about the SNES version. The publisher seems to be a bit worried about download ROMs. Even though the crackers already have the C64 version so that it a moot point.
Good to see they actually have the PAL version on their site now, when I looked a while ago it was to some other site that looked like a scam. Still shipping from Canada is high and this has stiff competition from Joe Gunn and Atlantis well maybe just Atlantis, we seem to be swamped in flip screen temple exploration games at the moment.

The C64 is able to get away with "spectrum" level games, seems odd that the SNES is not able to get away with SMS level games. I however feel that the problem is gameplay level rather than graphics, sure they can say its a bit NES+ even when its NES+++ but still I think the issue is more how limited the gameplay is/repetitive the levels are. People will forgive lack of eye candy if they are doing more and having fun. I think people have a line that forms the Pretty vs Stuff to do. To which if you have more things to do, people understand that making art for it takes time and room, but if you have less things to do that allows you to have more graphics. I wonder if it really is that glitchy or they are maybe running the wrong version of the game? But then I think if people are going to put up with making space for a cart and box etc then it has to earn that slot on a shelf to which DKC2+ or no thanks.
I think this also speaks to how "homebrew" is perceived, for example Pat the NES punk will point out that most NES homebrew is not even as good as the average stuff from back in the day and hence if you want something new to play on the NES there is a pile of stuff you would have missed back in the day that will be better than most "here I did a thing and showed off a trick homebrew". Meanwhile on the C64 1~3 team people working at home is how the industry ran, so we don't have a "this is a real game and this is something some hacker made at home" and games that are 83 spec are permitted along with 18 spec The question is what do we need to get consoles treated equally?

Yes they can....I made an Android game based exactly on this description - a "metroidvania based on the tap-to-jump runner mechanics"

Not wanting to be an annoying guy, don't 3v ROMs damage retro systems?
Sorry if I'm bothering you guys here...

Only if there's no level shifting. A 3 volt memory behind a level shifter will not damage a 5 volt console. I'm guessing those RAs are supposed to do at least some sort of limiting, even if they are just resistor arrays and not proper level shifters.

@gauauu
Thank you for the counterexample. But can any Igavania be adapted to the 1-button paradigm, or must the entire franchise be designed from the start to support 1-button play?

These resistor array based current limits which make things easier for everyone involved, not ideal but will not be outright deadly as direct connection is.

Ah, if this is about adapting a pre-existing game, then you're correct. I can't imagine most existing games of this genre would adapt well.

But I'd also say that the vast majority of platforming games in general would fail to be a good candidate for a converstion to 1-button play. Sure, there's a few that are based mostly on running and jumping (Sonic, Mario, etc), but combat-based platformers (Contra, Mega Man, Ninja Gaiden) would be a big disappointment. Puzzle platformers (Lost Vikings, Eskimo Bob) would also fail.

I've played the game and from a players perspective, I'd have to say this is a harsh, yet honest review.

Around this place, we're acutely aware of the effort and knowledge required to get even the most basic of demos off the ground on these old systems, but I feel that because of that, we often get hung up on technical details and forget the most important thing:
That games are meant to played and that games should be a fun and interesting experience for the player.

The world has kept on spinning in the decades since our favorite systems have been released, with lots of game design lessons learned, lots of gameplay conventions cemented and lots of stellar commercial releases that upped the bar for what is considered a good game, plus players have a vastly increased amount of games available to them and a diminished timespan available for each individual game.

So yes, if you publically release a game in 2018, it will be compared to everything that came before it, be it the best on that system, current-gen games or retro-styled games on modern platforms.
And if you ignore what's happened since, release a buggy game, get sloppy with the level design or don't polish the gameplay, you will be called out for it.

Instead of lamenting this fact, I tried to embrace it with the latest released SNES game I've worked on and distinguish it by focussing on the following:
-polished gameplay first, no compromises
-zero-bug policy
-no filler, cherish the players time (no repetitious, tedious or overly difficult level design to pad out playing time)
-improved replayability (collectable secrets, unlockable simultaneous multiplayer mode)

It has its fair share of blemishes (SNES-CD-version not working on real hardware, uses intellectual property of others, very short total playtime), but I'm still content with the result.

Regarding Sydney Hunter, I applaud the effort:
Creating a complete game, manufacturing cartridges and packaging are a monumental accomplishment in itself, and the sprite animations do look great.
Still, the lack of polish feels a bit like a missed opportunity to me.

tl;dr: Don't let seemingly unfair/uninformed critique put you off. Instead, consider which valid points it makes, know where your audience is coming from, know what you're up against and polish, polish, polish. Just my 2 cents.

Wait, "so-called"? It's genuinely a 49-way digital input device. Normal digital joysticks are a 9-way input (center and ±1 in each x/y direction makes a 3x3 grid), while the 49-way has 3 discrete intensities in each x/y direction, yielding a 7x7 grid of possible positions.

The C64 Download link has gone live http://collectorvision.com/shop/commodo ... modore-64/ Maybe they need the Physical versions to sell out and ship before they will open a download for the SNES version?

BTW, I was very excited to see you at the head of Watermelon's project N. But from what I heard, the project was abandoned in 2015.
Do you intend on resuming your work on it one day, or make a «post mortem» ? I'm sure it would be interesting to read.

Preview of the NES version seems to a port of the SNES version?? http://www.indieretronews.com/2018/04/s ... .html#more

They need to work on those screen transitions, because we can see the palette being updated and the screen being disabled/enabled outside of vblank, which causes the image to jump.

It's goes deeper than that, all versions of Sydney Hunter: Caverns of Death, are ports of an old Flash game from 2011:
http://studiopinagames.com/sydney.html

But, you know, gotta support those KickStarter campaigns!

Well the C64 version is "The scared tribe" vs "The caverns of death" on the SNES. Porting the C64 version would seem to be faster (smarter?) path as its already in 6502.
Kickstarter? As far as I can tell the game is being dev'd and sold without one?

It did have a Kickstarter campaign:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/439982171/new-snes-game-sydney-hunter-and-the-caverns-of-dea

(Though that was linked in the OP..)

Ahh the NES version is a stretch goal of the SNES version. I didn't look at it that closely. my bad.