JSW2 Bright Colour Palette

[SymbolShift]

For some reason, I've never noticed this until today. It may have been discussed previously, but I could not locate anything on the forum.

I noticed that the JSW2 colour palette (at least on the ZX version) only uses BRIGHT colours. Both MM and JSW used a mixture of standard colours and brights to create rooms/sprites, but I'm curious if only using bright's in JSW2 was a design decision, or a technical decision.

The only exceptions to this rule I could find are the room names themselves, which use standard white, and only two rooms that use standard yellow ("The TROUBLE with TRIBBLES is..." and "Highway to Hell").

Any thoughts?

[Spider]

I had noticed this but never to be 100% honest gave it a lot of thought as to why. A few backgrounds of the same room are different too, for instance "To the Kitchens , Main Stairway" is blue in JSW1 and black in JSW2. To be honest it looks better in black for that room.

Indeed the mini (very mini) JSW I prepared for "Woot!" a few years back, I purposely changed the cell colours and brightness to match JSW2 in the appropriate rooms, including the minor variations in the cell designs.

I don't know if its related in any way to the Amstrad version, I mean if it was ported over.

 

[SymbolShift]

26 minutes ago, Spider said:

I had noticed this but never to be 100% honest gave it a lot of thought as to why. A few backgrounds of the same room are different too, for instance "To the Kitchens , Main Stairway" is blue in JSW1 and black in JSW2. To be honest it looks better in black for that room.

Indeed the mini (very mini) JSW I prepared for "Woot!" a few years back, I purposely changed the cell colours and brightness to match JSW2 in the appropriate rooms, including the minor variations in the cell designs.

I don't know if its related in any way to the Amstrad version, I mean if it was ported over.

 

That's an excellent point about Amstrad. As far as I know, DPR primarily developed on CPC (hence the original MM/JSW ports), so it's possible that JSW2 was also developed on CPC. Keeping in mind, Matt Smith developed the ZX version on the TRS-80. The non-bright colours on the CPC palette are very dark, so may have been avoided.

[Norman Sword]

If only bright was used, then usage was technical. However I do not like the Mud versions of the bright colours. Given a choice I tend to use bright. 

Basic background on JSW on the CPC 464.

When tasked with writing the CPC464 version of JSW, I started with the knowledge that Manic Miner on the CPC managed to use all the memory available. So JSW has triple the amount of rooms and that was why I decided to compress everything I could think of. 

The final version called "JSW the final frontier" was supposed to be just my version of JSW on the cpc. It was never intended to be a new version. In fact most things were toned down to stop it diverging too much from the original.

When I was asked if it could be rewritten back on the spectrum, I tentatively said "probably yes". I knew it would not be an easy task. The reason behind the apprehension was because the way the cpc was doing collision detection was based on colour, but was also being drawn directly on the cpc's screen. The spectrum would need to do things differently, and somewhere along the line I would be forced to introduce a copy screen. 

The cpc version used translation colour bytes for the rooms. Most code was an adaptation of the cpc code. The compacted code needed to be even more compacted due to needing to save 4k when moving from the cpc game onto the zx spectrum. All screen draws on the cpc are done on the viewed screen. To stop flicker the drawing on the zx spectrum is done on a copy screen. (that takes a minimum of 4k) In essence if space was available anywhere then it was used. Most of the games running variable data is stored on the screen for the zx spectrum version 

The cpc version on Manic Miner with written On a Tandy Model 4 - with floopy discs
The Cpc version of "Jet Set Willy the final frontier was written on a Tandy Model 4- with floopy discs
The cpc version of "Jet Set Willy" was written on a Tandy Model 4 - with floppy discs
The spectrum version of "Jet Set Willy 2" the final frontier was written on a Tandy Model 4 - with a 20 meg hard drive

The Tandy was running Newdos 80 (disc operating system). The assembler was EDAS by misosys.

Download from Tandy to CPC was done using a z80 dart.
Download from Tandy to zx spectrum was done using a parallel interface - using my own direct download software - taking the Tandy's loading structure as it basis. Which allowed direct disc to memory transfer. Which was nothing like Matthews fixed memory transfer. Where source and destination occupied the same address.

I will elaborate on the transfer. In Matthews case to transfer from the Tandy to the spectrum.  Data is loaded into the Tandy's memory. That data is transferred byte for byte from a location on the Tandy to the same location on the spectrum. - this lead to bugs.

My method interrogated the Tandy's disc loading system, and transfers the disc contents from the Tandy to the address it was assembled at. This meant a re-org of the assembled program, would also be transferred to the new org. No data (apart from one sector) is loaded from the Tandy's disc, when transferring code.

Matthews method also introduced the loss of four rooms into JSW. What Matthew had not realised, was  that the upper memory of the Tandy was dedicated/allocated just for the Hard disc operating system. The hard disc was bought after development of Manic Miner. So the very upper memory on the Tandy was and could be used, whilst he was writing Manic Miner. That same memory was occupied when it came to develop Jet Set Willy. Simply because he had bought himself that 5 meg hard drive.  (I am surprised he did not notice) The upper memory rooms ended up being corrupted and those rooms, were eventually deleted. The upper memory of JSW still contains the TANDy hard drive code, (instead of room data) 

 

The biggest problem (apart from disc size) was the source code needed to be continually stripped of comments and meaningful labels. After a while you get used to seeing what look like meaningless labels. So a label like "main_control_loop"  (which can not be written - max eight letters), gets shortened to "MCL". and slowly you get multiple versions such as MCLx,MCLp  When I first saw the assembly listing again, a few years ago, it was strange to read a label such as "IAOAL"  and immediately say to myself  "I am on a lift"  It was if I had written the label a few moments before I had read it. Yet the time gap was nearly 30 years.

 

Edited September 3, 2022 by Norman Sword

[Spider]

On 8/31/2022 at 7:34 PM, Spider said:

I purposely changed the cell colours and brightness to match JSW2 in the appropriate rooms, including the minor variations in the cell designs.

Well, almost changed all of them. My memory fades a bit! 🙂 , map of it for the sake of completeness. Had I had it to hand at the time of my post the other day I'd of attached it then.  I'll not go into the tricks in it because that is not relevant here to this topic.

 

[Spider]

6 hours ago, Norman Sword said:

When tasked with writing the CPC464 version of JSW, I started with the knowledge that Manic Miner on the CPC managed to use all the memory available. So JSW has triple the amount of rooms and that was why I decided to compress everything I could think of. 

The final version called "JSW the final frontier" was supposed to be just my version of JSW on the cpc. It was never intended to be a new version. In fact most things were toned down to stop it diverging too much from the original.

I've quoted just part of it, not because the rest is uninteresting, on the contrary it is very interesting however this does explain why (to me) JSW2 is slightly tricky to edit at least without some tools.

I'm surprised Manic Miner used all of the memory even with the 64K unit, although I do not know anything about the CPC hardware other than it is probably a lot more powerful than it appears to be. I'm thinking along the lines here that certain screen modes may be 'eating' a portion of the available ram, rather than that having its own dedicated shadow ram.

I do think there was enough detail and amusement in the released JSW2 , I do wonder what could of been added actually. In particular use of " [ " and " Banned " are funny. 🙂

 

I'm not sure what the missing '4 rooms' from the original were intended to be, I've heard a lot of things over the years, the most "popular" one was an expansion of the MegaTree, how true that may be is another matter. I'm not asking about that though really. Some of the exits may give clues perhaps.

[Norman Sword]

An ommision from the above.

The CPC does not have a version of JET SET WILLY2. It has a version that is identical but is called JET SET WILLY - the  final frontier.  

Yet the cpc also contains a version called simply JET SET WILLY. Which might seem confusing, but in a way it does make sense to have the two versions.

Whilst converting  the game from the CPC to the Zx spectrum, I was asked was it possible to reduce the game (on the cpc) back to the original with a mere 60 rooms, eg delete 70+ rooms and leave just the 60 . I answerd it was not a big task, to reduce the size down to less than half. But did question "for what purpose?". The answer was simply to enable the game to be part of they "sold a million" compilation tapes, and strictly speaking the version I had written was not the original jet set willy, it had been more than doubled in size.  Plus the smaller (a mere 60 rooms) version was not going to be sold as a stand alone product. But only on a compilation tape, which meant that both versions could still be sold on the cpc.

Version 1) JET SET WILLY - the final frontier-- 130+ rooms - written first and sold first on the cpc
Version2) JET SET WILLY a mere 60 rooms - sold only on a compilation tape/disc with they SOLD A MILLION compilation. (Beach head, Sabre Wulf,Jet Set Willy, Daley Thompsom-DECATHLON)

The reduction down to the mere 60 rooms of the original was not that difficult. It was just a case of deleting most of the data. I added a high score table to give immediate feedback to the player that it was a different version. But their are visual changes on the title screen as well. (see picture)

And before anyone says that the tail on the title screen looks like a two. It was just a copy of the squiggle on the graffiti. Which on reflection when doing JSW2, I decided to remove.





 

Edited September 4, 2022 by Norman Sword

[Spider]

Thanks for the detail. 🙂 I was aware of most of what you'd said although I'm hugely appreciative of it being posted.

Most 'used' versions of "JSW" for the CPC are actually JSW2, its when you look at the inlay you see this, as indicated.

I did as you mention have a lot of trouble finding JSW1 for the CPC and yes it is only on the compilation , same Speedlock almost as the ZX version of this compilation. There's actually this single extracted tape file here, both 'as is' and a very slightly tweaked version I did of it (thank goodness its an early 'easy to break' Speedlock) 🙂

I did conclude but was not sure that the CPC version of JSW1 was never a stand alone release.

 

Random thing: I did 'cut down' the ZX version of JSW2 to match the map of JSW1 although I never finished it, I think this was about 6 or 7 years ago now. Mainly to play JSW1 with the 'engine' of JSW2.

EDIT... Here's mine 😉

[SymbolShift]

Fantastic back-story Norman! thanks for posting.

It's amazing to hear you talk about 5 and 20 meg hard drive's back then, that must have felt like a ton of storage. Even 5.25" floppy's would seem large! Sounds like it was a technical nightmare to optimize and bring the size of JSW down, and do the ZX conversions. Squeezing JSW2 within 48k is some seriously clever stuff. Programmers are so hardware spoiled and sloppy now, they really have no idea.

I'm curious if you ever worked on a project together with Matthew? (at SP or elsewhere). There was a rumour that you were responsible (but uncredited) for "The Birds & The Bee's", which Matthew contributed graphics.

[MtM]

This is a brilliant topic, very interesting for fans to hear of how things were created by their creators.