Day of the Viper - moving via keyboard

[èné]

Hi there, it's about Day of the Viper - I'd like to know if you could provide a feature that allow you to move from the keyboard (either on keypad or with the 4 arrows). The game is only mouse-controlled. I finished it a long time ago with a cracked version but wouldn't mind to play it again with this enhancement. It already plays from hardrive btw.

The game is not very popular but I think it'd worth it - gameplay is quite good; with such improvement, it'd be even greater. Also (and in case you'd be interested),  just  a 'standard' patch if possible (ie, no gamex stuff). I hope I don't ask too much !

Last, the game has a protection; i can provide codes if you need them or the cracked version from which I completed the game (and which bypass the protection) - Thank you.

[Petari]

I already started with Day of the Viper somewhere in February, but did not finish because other activities.  I think that adding arrow controls for movement will be not so hard. 
Codes would be good - may help in breaking protection. I have STX image, and will use it instead some crack - it is more reliable source indeed.
Why you want "standard patch" instead gamex one ? Not good to have possibility to save gamestate at any moment ? 
In any case, I will do floppy version too, I think.

[èné]

Hi Petari, that's good news, thank you ! To be honest, I'm not a big gamex fan as I don't have a real Atari (only use Steem, remember?  ) so savestates are already included. Moreover, Gamex patches works via image which is 250/500mb if I'm not wrong + you need to install it on hard drive before you can play, etc. So I mean, It's a bit much for just one game. I prefer Haga - just run and play  . I understand you provide Gamex patches for people with have real hardware, I'm just speaking for myself who play with emulator. It's up to you, I would already be greatful if you could provide keyboard movements - with mouse, it's a bit tedious !

I've only found these codes; it's not very easy to use them : codes.zip

[Petari]

I do only HAGA in last 3 years. It is partially Gamex based, so I though that you don't want it.  The things are that when need to make some modifications in game HAGA is usually easier than pure mod of game's exec. And as you said, it is easy for usage in emulators. But will do floppy version too, for case that someone want to play so modded game on real Atari without hard disk.

[èné]

... So keyboard controls wasn't possible then ? I have tested your adaptation... code is too lame if I understood properly. Requires too much work (time) to make modifications probably ? After all this time waiting for a patch, well a bit disappointed obviously, but I may conceive the challenge isn't worth it.

Or perhaps you simply forgot about this post (or worse, ignored it...) 

Well that's ok  the keyboard omission for the movements is a bad move, kills the gameplay a bit. 

[Petari]

The complete story is that I wanted to do it couple years ago. I looked into game code then little, and concluded that it will be pretty much hard. So, it was put aside, waiting that I have more free time. What is not rare case, actually all larger projects went that way:
Uridium waited some 2.5 years after disassembling it's code, then took about 2 months of intensive work - what means some 20-30 hours/week. OIDS was less, but still over 100 hours of effective work .
What waited most is TOS impriving. I disassembled TOS 1.04 some 10 years ago, used it for game adaptations. But I seen then some interesting things in code, had idea why TOS hard disk FAT16 is not well solved. and that it should be improved. And that it will be very hard.
Yes, finally, at beginning of this year it was that I had time, winter was good for sitting at home, so I went in it, being not sure that it will be possible doing in ASM, without real source code (C) . I made first some early tests, to see is code able to handle clusters with more than 2 sectors. What is the key of whole thing . And yes, it is able, up to 32KB size . After it, all was on changing 16-bit variable to 32-but, signed integer to unsigned .... etc. I made over 300 changes, took over 2 months of full time work.  And with it have much better FAT16 filesystem,
what takes only little more TOS ROM space,  can access 1 GB partitions, 30 of them, even with less RAM used for buffers.  I think that it was worth of effort.  Especially because doing same in TOS 1.62 was easy - they are practically same.

Yes, I talking here about something what is not game  But it will have influence on game playing too. There are many other things planned, solved already for improved TOS . I posted about it on exxos and atariage forums. Not on 'great AF', because they care not for developers, only for ego of some circles.
Back to Day of the Viper:  in June, I finally decided to finish it. Went deeper into code, and realized that I can not make not only keyboard movement control, but even doing usual Gamex/HAGA statesaves and exit to Desktop    is not possible without complete rewrite of game's keyboard input handling code.  And this is very first case that I did not it - after about 1000 games, 10 years. Need to properly disassemble whole code, what self can take days , then understanding many things about input, developing new code ...  Just too much time for one, really not outstanding game.
So, we may consider this as finished, as is. Chances that I will go back to it later are minimal.  There are many other games, doable in much shorter time - like 100x shorter. Not to mention need to work on TOS improvement, new hard disk driver versions etc.
Life is short, can not do everything - we need to choose wisely what is real worth to deal with.