jetsetdanny

Yes, on the Spectrum too. On the Spectrum, there is actually a whole array of weird aspects of the game mechanics (even more in JSW than in MM) that have come to be known as "quirky features". These have to do with they way Willy jumps (e.g. jumping into Earth cells which you have experienced; a jump through the so-called Innocent Looking Block is even more spectacular, as it takes Willy to the room below), with ramps (i.e. invalid ramps), ropes, and various other elements. Andrew Broad once wanted to write an "Advanced MM/JSW Trainer" to make the player familiar with these features (unfortunately, the project hasn't been completed so far).

Sorry if I'm pointing out the obvious, but it is possible to do on the Spectrum as well (from one particular jumping position). It actually allows to complete the room marginally more quickly.

I have added complete screenshot galleries to the pages of "ZX Willy the Bug Slayer" and "Maria's Revenge". I've also added some more information about the respective games on each of these pages.

Thanks for this detailed description, Norman Sword - it's very interesting and informative and I appreciate it! 👍

Did you progress on the bass guitar as quickly as you mastered the Z80 machine code, Ian?

It's an academic discussion, but... I did not say "Mercinary Kongs" used LiganTM graphics. I said it used the graphics from the corresponding room in LiganTM's game. There is a difference, I believe. There ARE some graphics in LiganTM's game, so, if somebody uses them, they use graphics FROM LiganTM's game. This does not automatically and explicitly mean that LiganTM is their author. Furthermore, I imagine this is exactly what happened in real life. When you were creating "Manic 40 Miner", Norman Sword, I imagine that, for the second set of caverns, you copied and modified the rooms from "MM: Back to the Mine". So, when you created "Mercinary Kongs" (and an excellent room it is!), you used the graphics from the corresponding room in "MM: Back to the Mine" (I would be very surprised if you were copying data from LiganTM's game and suddenly, for this particular room only, you switched to the original MM and copied some data from there). So, if the above assumption is correct, you DID use the graphics FROM LiganTM's game. The only element of my statement that could be questioned would be whether or not "MM: Back to the Mine" is "LiganTM's game". Of course an argument can be made that Matthew Smith is a co-author of the game, because of the many elements from the original MM that LiganTM's game uses. Yes, this is obviously correct, the way these MM and JSW games are usually credited IS a simplification, because Matthew Smith IS a co-author of all of the games that use his game engine, or a modified game engine that uses part of his game engine, not to mention his graphics, etc. But this, I believe, is generally understood and not mentioned explicitly, just expressed from time to time through the recognition of Matthew's godlike status 😄 (to quote an example off the top of my head: room 63 "In the Presence of The Almighty!" from Lee Tatlock's "Willy vs The Vampire Lord", with "MATT SMITH" written in large flashing letters across the screen). So I believe my statement is correct in itself and there is no reason to change it. It contains correct information, which is also sufficient in the context of comparing "Manic 40 Miner" and "Manic Miner: Back to the Mine", as explained in my previous post. IF the information were to be expanded beyond that context, the sentence could read: "Mercinary-Kongs on Hire Perches" is not 100% new - it uses Matthew Smith's graphics from the corresponding room in LiganTM's game.

It's a matter of perspective. If I compare "Manic 40 Miner" to "Manic Miner: Back to the Mine", the only thing that matters is whether a given element in the former is the same as in the latter or not. Where it originated from in the latter is of no importance to what I'm considering. My wording that "Mercinary-Kongs on Hire Perches" is not 100% new - it uses the graphics from the corresponding room in LiganTM's game" was written in this context. I stand by it and I'm not changing it, but, fortunately, it is only written on this forum, not on JSW Central (where I would be more willing to change things that may be controversial). The text on JSW Central does not go into this kind of detail, it just reads that The following 20 caverns are rooms from LiganTM's 2018 game Manic Miner: Back to the Mine modified to various extent (with the exception of "Mercinary-Kongs on Hire Perches" [23], which is a new room). I think this statement is essentially true and does not need any further modification. Should anyone here present know of any reason that it should be modified, speak now or forever hold your peace 🙂 . P.S. Good point about the room name of room 23 being different, Ian!

It's good to see you back, Ian! 😊 There is an entire separate thread on the forum devoted to your temporary absence! 😄 I've modified the wording on JSW Central somewhat. "Mercinary-Kongs on Hire Perches" is not 100% new - it uses the graphics from the corresponding room in LiganTM's game, while the rest of its design (the layout, the switches, etc.) is totally new. I don't want to go into too much detail discussing it right there (it gets more mention below), so I just called it "a new room" for the sake of simplicity.

JSW Central YouTube channel has just been updated with four new videos. These are the walkthroughs of: "Maria vs. Some Bastards" (the 2019 bugfixed version) "Maria's Revenge" "Maria on Tour" "ZX Willy the Bug Slayer" In case of the first three games mentioned above, the videos hosted on JSW Central YouTube Channel and RZX Archive YouTube Channel were created from the same RZX recordings (of mine). In case of "ZX Willy the Bug Slayer", the video is of a brand-new RZX walkthrough, which shows the completion of the original game file. The RZX recording made by Robin Clive and hosted on RZX Archive since June 2007 shows the completion of a modified game file - only 7 spare lives are displayed on the status bar, instead of 16. I don't know why Robin used a modified file, as the game is perfectly completable without losing a single life, so there was no need to modify it.

Actually, Edge only downloaded a 4KB file Manic_Miner_64DX.sid. That's not all there should be, is it?

Here's part one: A_Very_Willy_Christmas_(Scottige_2001).zip which works fine on my Windows 10 computer. Hint: It says to press Jump to start. You need to press the SHIFT key (both the right and the left one work for me). The you can walk using the left and right arrows. I remember I once uploaded to the forum all the DOS and PC Miner Willy games I had. I would have to find the thread to point to the downloads if you're interested (or reupload). Please let me know.

Welcome to the forum, Toki! 🙂 Thanks for creating the deluxe version of Manic Miner for the Commodore 64 and for letting us know about it 👍 I've just tried downloading it in the link you've provided, using Google Chrome, but got a message "MM64DX.d64 is dangerous, so Chrome has blocked it". Irritatingly, I can only press the "Discard" bottom there, there is no option to keep the file anyway. Update: Edge, however, seems to have downloaded it OK. What's wrong with Chrome?

As mentioned before, I won't be able to go this year ☹️. But I hope you guys will be able to meet up and have a great time!

Thanks for restoring my truncated post, Andy! 👍

I've just had a look at the page of Njenkin's review of "Jet Set Willy: Wet Sunday Afternoon Graphical Remix" to see if he responded to any of my comments, as apparently he often responds to viewers' comments. He's had plenty of time to do it since April, but there is no reply. Furthermore, some of my posts seem to have been deleted. There are only two left, the first one corresponding to the paragraph which in the text above starts with the words "A related topic is a distinction between whether something is 'a proper game or a homebrew''". So some two thirds of what I posted there have been deleted. I could live with no reply, but I AM displeased that most of my comments have disappeared from that Njenkin's YouTube page - so I'll just express it here... 😵

Njenkin's review of "Manic Panic" has just been published on YouTube. And there are various, very positive comments below! 🙂

I have added a video of the walkthrough on JSW Central YouTube channel. I have also realised that the game should be credited both to Norman Sword and LiganTM, because of LiganTM's rooms. It is the same situation as with "Jet Set Willy 128k", where John Elliott, who created the game, used rooms from Richard Hallas's "Join the Jet-Set!" for half of the rooms in "Jet Set Willy 128k". So the game is credited to both of them, even though it was John who actually created it, while using Richard's rooms. The same goes for the projects I worked on. "Jet Set Willy: The 2010 Megamix" is credited to me, Paul Equinox Collins et al., as it incorporated, among its 256 rooms, 48 rooms designed by Paul (they come from his unfinished "JSW '96 Remix") and a number of rooms by other authors (specific credits are given instead of "et al." wherever space permits). "Jet Set Willy: Mind Control" is a game I created using a lot of material from Sendy (Alex Cornhill), hence we are credited as co-authors everywhere (what a shame Sendy is not active on the MM/JSW scene any more!). Following the same logic, I added credits to LiganTM in the context of "Manic 40 Miner" on JSW Central. I have also included credit to LiganTM on the title screen of the "Manic 40 Miner" video on JSW Central YouTube channel, but in this case I credited the game as "a ZX Spectrum game by Norman Sword with part of the rooms by LiganTM".

JSW Central YouTube channel has just been updated with two new videos. These are the walkthroughs of: "Manic Miner: Back to the Mine" "Manic 40 Miner" In case of "Manic 40 Miner", the video hosted on RZX Archive YouTube Channel and the one hosted on JSW Central YouTube Channel were created from the same RZX recording. However, in case of "Manic Miner: Back to the Mine", the video hosted on RZX Archive YouTube Channel is of "Manic Miner Hard" (the version which later resulted to have been "merely" a beta release), while the one hosted on JSW Central YouTube Channel is of the final gamma release of "Manic Miner: Back to the Mine", so both videos complement each other nicely 🙂 .

I have just corrected the Czech co-author's name on JSW Central (on the game's page and also in the main list of games), adding diacritical Czech characters both to his first name and surname. Although I haven't been able to find any reference to Aleš Martiník, written with diacritical characters, in the context of "ZX81 Manic Miner", I am positive that the original Czech spelling of both his first and last name must be with the characters I added. Come to think about it, I once shared the room in a dorm with a Czech guy called Aleš, for a full academic year. So I should know... 😇 EDIT: I added the diacritical characters which I had initially omitted thinking they could lead to technical problems with this post.

This post of mine: https://jswmm.co.uk/topic/342-file-manic-miner-zx81/#elControls_6702_menu is truncated. It got truncated - as might be expected, with the benefit of hindsight - at the very spot where I used a diacritical Czech character. More of them certainly followed. I think these characters will have to go, but if the post could be restored to its full content, it would be appreciated 🙂 .

The only association I have with what you said is "Eugene - Lord of the Bathroom", the MM game by Vidar Eriksen (Erix1). So I would translate it that you're asking if the guy pointing at the screen is Vidar Eriksen. If this is the question, I would say, No, I would be very surprised if it was. Was that the question? 🥺

What do you mean by Lord of the bathroom?

OK, I've cracked it! 😜 I know the answer, but to show that I know the answer and at the same time not to spoil it for others, I will just paste below the "real" picture, without naming these guys: Thanks for the puzzle! 🙂

I've tried here, but with no luck. Incidentally, it's amazing what a large percentage of the top 100 (according to that website) are Japanese...

JSW Central has been updated again, with a small structural change: The "Other game engines" section has been reorganised and divided into three subsections: "A. The original Manic Miner recreated/modified/extended using other game engines"; "B. The original Jet Set Willy recreated/modified/extended using other game engines"; "C. New games using other game engines". I have moved Norman Sword's version of "Manic Miner" and Paradigm Shifter's "Manic Miner Turbo" from "Versions of the original Manic Miner" to section "A. The original Manic Miner recreated/modified/extended using other game engines" of the "Other game engines" section. The reason for this is that the former is, according to Norman Sword, "a source code rewrite from the first byte to the last", and the latter features "a rewritten game engine". So I have decided that both of these games belong in the "Other game engines" section rather than "Versions of the original Manic Miner" (which lists versions and minor variants using the original game engine). I have also added "Manic 40 Miner" to that section. Detailed info (and possibly some ensuing discussion) about it is here. EDIT: An error spotted by Ian has been corrected.