JSW - Willy's Weirdy Nightmare

[Spider]

From MobyGames. Some of the text below is from MobyGames as well as my own notes:

Machine: CBM Amiga

Requirements: It is listed for A1200 so quite likely needs the "AGA" chipset (instead of the 'OCS') to function. It might work on the 'ECS' set. Untested.

Creation Tool: Believed to be authored with the creation tool AMOS

Company: F1-Licenceware

Authors: Coding: Richard Williams , Graphics/Music: Steven Tate , Contributors: Gary Waterhouse, David Stephenson, Stuart Moore, Kelvin Hunter, Mark Craig, Keith Rogers (unconfirmed list)

Status: Freeware / Public Domain (unconfirmed)

Notes: Its a flip screen as per the original unlike the other Amiga release which is a continuous scrolling layout. It also has a built in 'snapshot' feature allowing the player to save their progress at any time.

Gameplay (MobyGames): The plot of the game is a little different to the original JSW, but the gameplay is practically identical. The hero Willy is fast asleep and trapped in a nightmare about his enormous mansion being full of monsters, and must collect a large number of magical items before he can wake up. The first room shows Willy both simultaneously asleep in bed, and as a ghostly white figure walking around the room, like an astral projection. (This explains why Willy's sprite is still a solid-white figure, as in the original ZX Spectrum game, even though every other sprite is now more detailed and colourful.)

Magical items are always identified by changing colour rapidly. Almost anything that moves can harm Willy, and so can some static elements, like spikes and skulls. Staircases are depicted as diagonal lines of pixels, and Willy will automatically start climbing a staircase if he walks onto it, but if you jump as you approach a staircase he will pass through it instead. There are also conveyor belts that move Willy in a certain direction, false walls hiding the entrance to secret rooms, and switches that change the state of the world in some way.

Note: That seems more in the theme of "Pyjamamara" in that you're trying to 'wake' him up.

Known (built in) cheat:

 

Type in 'life' and press Enter to regain some lives.

Download: Not currently checked for this.

Link: The page on MobyGames is here

Screenshots:

 

[SymbolShift]

I vaguely remember this one, but the changes to the Willy sprite always bothered me. Rest of the graphics were pretty decent though. Something always seemed missing, or not quite right with the Amiga versions though, almost like the graphics were too good, or too many colours? Some things should remain simple, and I think the Spectrum versions nailed this. I am also guilty of releasing a version of JSW on the Amiga during the 90's, but we won't talk about that! 🤣

[MtM]

Yes, this rings a _very_ distant bell Andy, I think I had a copy of this too. In fairness, SymbolShift is right, the Amiga versions of Willy

were all misguided really, because they tried to use the superior hardware which spoiled the gameplay mechanics / flip screen elements.

Just my opinion anyway. I had the McMaster's version of JSWII on the Amiga, which had the full screen scrolling as you mention, really

not a good game, but perhaps they were told to do it like that.

 

I am curious SymbolShift, what version were you involved with on the Amiga?

[SymbolShift]

It's a dark secret I've carried for many years now. I had already moved on to PC app development, so the game was released in an unfinished state. I was not happy with the final result, and some bad reviews (due to emulation issues) made me remain anonymous.

At the time, I believe it had more rooms than any existing JSW game. Looking back, it really was not that bad, considering how young I was, and was the work of one person. It was more a learning experience on how not to do things.

Anyone like to take a guess? (Clue... it's not Top Hat Willy)

[SymbolShift]

Answer is... Jet Set Willy '97

[Spider]

13 hours ago, SymbolShift said:

Answer is

Its still beyond what I could do. Even if (for example) I spent a month studying AMOS (was it called that, I can't remember) and tried to replicate some of it.

[SymbolShift]

Yes, it was AMOS on the Amiga (which was a reworked STOS from the Atari ST). Shame the language fizzled out really, it was pretty amazing.

[Spider]

Ah OK. 🙂

That was a complete guess about AMOS being used for it. I had heard "good things" but it was at a time when coding was not really "for me" , yes like many tools it could of been so much more... oh well.

[SymbolShift]

Good guess! Was tricky to learn anything back then without the internet! I got the AMOS manual in 1993 and spent that summer reading every word. Before that, I had only wrote basic stuff on the ZX and BBC Micro. AMOS clicked with me and I wrote five games (never released) in the next several months, while still at college. Despite it being regarded as a "Basic", it had some amazingly powerful features, even inline assembly code. I got more into PC's during university and moved onto VB. JSW '97 was written in late 1996 as my final AMOS project.

[Spider]

Thanks for sharing that. 🙂 Appreciate learning.

Out of interest, and its fine to ignore , were the other games platformers as well ? I ask as I had a go at making MM and JSW without using any existing code aside from graphics and only did a couple of screens on each, they are vaguely just about "running" but not playable! 😞  😄

I'd assume AMOS probably has a reasonable following even now maybe its own forum/site given how good it potentially was.

'Way back' I did purchase Laser Basic complete with its green paper manual (discourage copying I guess but it was hard to read) although that had some neat things it was very slow even when compliled with the Laser Compiler which I obtained much later. I know there's better things and were then like Beta Basic perhaps.

The inline assembly sounds good, a bit like BBC Basic where you can do a bit inside the listing itself if i recall correctly. I'm not sure I've only done about 5 or 6 text adventure conversions (Spectrum to BBC) about ten years ago, they were relatively well received though, complete with original ZX version bugs aside from one that made it almost impossible to complete one game! Something for another time and another place perhaps but you'll find them on stardot if really curious.

Never tried VB although I've been told I probably should.

The newer MPAGD looks half the way to go now, write once and tweak a bit and release for ZX / BBC / CPC / CBM etc. I've not had chance to look properly! I do have the (yes I paid) the PGD and SEUD Spectrum tapes but again no real time for them, many plans , so little time! 🙂