STUDIO STYLE - CREATORS USING GBSTUDIO
Gnome King Games – Alexander Hamilton
The Train on itch.io, there was a Kickstarter for physical copies.
Welcome to the world of The Train!
The town of Pilcano. Once a bustling, vibrant town full of new ideas and people. This is your home. The expensive and glorious train, The Greyhound, chugged gracefully up the hilly backdrop you know as The Pass. All this, however, was long ago, before you were born, when your Grandfather was a young boy. Over the years, The Greyhound's journeys became shorter, and eventually ceased on the night of your birth. This is the story of that great steam train's rebirth...
The Train is a narrative-driven, comedic game featuring light puzzle elements for the GameBoy!
You play as Eve as she helps her grandad reconnect the villages of the island they live on using a long out-of-service locomotive called The Greyhound, meeting friends and making discoveries along the way.
ALEXANDER HAMILTON QUESTIONS:
What got you interested in making Game Boy homebrew?
I was actually inspired by a GameBoy game I backed on Kickstarter called The Shapeshifter. I'd never played a homebrew GB game before, but it was such a charming little adventure, so I wanted to try to make my own.
Why did you choose GBStudio?
I chose GBStudio because it seemed like the easiest tool to use to create my own GameBoy title that would work on actual cartridges.
What are GBStudio’s best features, and would you add/change anything?
I like how it tells you when a particular scene is too powerful for the GameBoy, and how it tells you the limits of each scene (actor count, triggers, etc.) It was really handy. The only thing I would add would be an in-engine tracker for making the music, but they did actually add that in later versions of GBStudio (The Train is built on a slightly older version), so taking that into consideration, I wouldn't add anything else.
What inspired The Train?
I like journeys, I like stories that take characters somewhere, like the genre of film Road Movie; I like those. I like it when encounters with people lead to fruitful conversation and lasting friendships. These were things that made me want to create The Train, as the whole game is about going on one long round-trip and meeting new people.
What were the trickiest parts of making the game?
The music. While I can make music, I use Ableton Live 10, which doesn't create files compatible with the GameBoy, so learning OpenMPT was super challenging for me and I still don't fully understand it.
What was involved in making a physical version for the Kickstarter?
So I had to do a lot of research on physical cartridges like what boards to use, who makes the best quality boxes, etc. but also shipping abroad. I've never sent a parcel abroad before, and thanks to Brexit it's now even more difficult so I had to read up about customs declarations and stuff that would otherwise have blocked the project from leaving the UK. It's ultimately why I chose to not put a "worldwide" shipping on Kickstarter, but have people message me with their country, so I could read up to see if there were any gotchas for shipping to a particular country.
Do you have any other GBStudio projects in progress?
Yes, I am currently drafting a sequel to The Train, which I'm referring to as Part 2 for now. I've got the core elements of the story written up, but otherwise, it's currently not left paper yet as I'm working on my first 3D game at the moment, but I hope to spend some time on it and get it working because Eve's story is far from finished!
Alexander Hamilton recommends:
The Shapeshifter, and the sequel. These are the games that inspired me, and they're honestly such wonderful little games. I've also just backed Year 2031 on Kickstarter, which looks cool.
Wild Haggis Games – Calum Wilson
CALUM WILSON QUESTIONS
What got you interested in making Game Boy homebrew?
I'm not 100% sure, to be honest. During the first UK lockdown, I tried looking at creative outlets. One of these, initially, was creating 3D models in Blender. While I was looking for tutorials online, I stumbled across a tutorial called something along the lines of "Make a real Game Boy game" by a creator called MortMort. I wasn't doing much, being furloughed and all, so I had a look. From there, I was pretty much invested in the idea of making a fun game or two.
Why did you choose GBStudio?
It seemed so simple; drag, drop, and tell it what you want to do. Imagine, if you will, an overly complicated PowerPoint presentation. GB Studio really stood out to me as well because there was no need to know any coding to get the game working.
What are GBStudio’s best features, and would you add/change anything?
I just love how simple it can be. Sure, there can be some difficult parts, and there's some great support out there, such as the r/GBStudio subreddit which really helped with certain aspects, such as triggering actions, or even just hiding a simple balloon for the remainder of a task. I particularly love how it creates its own event chains. I keep referring to it as an improv thing, where they go "Yes, and...", but I really mean "If, then...".
What inspired you to create a Taskmaster game?
I just love the show. It's incredibly well-made and it's a really good source for learning about new comedians. I couldn't tell you who Paul Chowdry was back in series 3, but now I'm a good fan of his. I really wanted to try and translate the goofiness and fun of the show into a quick pickup game but to also imagine what it would be like if the contestants from other series intertwined with each other.
What were the trickiest parts of making the game?
I think since this was really the second time attempting a game, it was learning the limitations of the software. For example, I wasn't able to have 5 sprites in a row, or at least one wouldn't load, or if there were too many one-pixel colours, the background wouldn't load. Just little things like that.
How did you choose the celebrities and tasks?
The celebrities were completely random. I just thought back to the likes of "Who was on series 7...? Okay, Phil Wang, let's stick him in multiple locations during one task, just hitting out with his catchphrases from the show". The tasks had to be tailored around my own knowledge of the software, so it became a bit of a collect-a-thon, but trying to make it as Taskmaster-y as possible.
Do you have any other GBStudio projects in progress?
I do, it's another quick game for some good friends, based on their band (shout out to the Junior boys). Kind of in a similar stance, some collecting again, a bit of having to talk to NPCs to help get everything ready for a gig, but their tour manager goes missing, and in the process of setting up for the gig, they need to look for him too. Eventually, I want to do a second Taskmaster game with guests from the more recent series. It's all very exciting!
Calum Wilson recommends:
Firstly, there's The Delivery by GalloCode. A nice little point-and-click game based on a true story.
Then we've got not so much a game but an asset generator called 8-Bit Alchemist which creates sprites created by a few different contributing artists but compiled by BeachBoogeyman. A very helpful tool in a pinch!
And just for fun, Super Impostor Bros. by LumpyTouch. A platformer based on the Among US games.
GBStudio Central recommendations:
From Emi Paternostro,
Managing Editor of GB Studio Central
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Well-made point-and-click horror/comedy game.
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Zelda-like action/adventure game.
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Multiple path expansive dystopian game.
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Platformer Puzzle game with a unique “illuminating” mechanic (also a wicked physical cart with an LED gimmick to match).
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Fast-paced platformer, a full game with a physical release coming soon.
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Really well-made “mole mania” style puzzler.
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Delivery game with Platformer and Action-RPG elements.
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DND/Rogue-ish 1-bit game.
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Wacky game with tight controls and a cool jump/spike mechanic.
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If David Lynch made a video game.
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GB Camera Gallery!
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The two biggest releases so far made with GB Studio are Deadeus and Dragonborn, with Deadeus now having a really cool collector’s edition, and Dragonborn DX [renamed Dragonhymn] coming soon, both from Incube8 Games.
There is a new GBStudio magazine on the way - check out:
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NEWS BYTES
AMSTRAD CPC: ESP Soft released Gates To Heaven, the follow-up to Gates To Hell (which is now free to download). https://bit.ly/gatestoheaven
ATARI JAGUAR: JagStudio v1.11 was released - https://bit.ly/jagstudio - allowing development in Basic, C or Assembly, and building directly into Rich Whitehouse’s excellent BigPEmu emulator - https://bit.ly/bigpemu
ATARI XL/XE: Andrea Cucchetto converted the C64 classic Space Taxi, with 48K memory minimum but 128K for sampled speech - https://bit.ly/spacetaxi-xl
C64: Haplo has converted Andy Johns’ gravity-flipping platformer Ooze: The Escape, with additional features. https://bit.ly/ooze-c64
GAME BOY COLOR: Get your detective paws on the demo of Inspector Waffles: The Early Years - https://bit.ly/waffles-earlydays
LYNX: The great puzzle game Assembloids is available in Standard and Limited Editions from poly.play - https://bit.ly/assembloids-lynx
PC ENGINE: The Great Fumo Binning from Vectrex28 is their first title for the console. https://bit.ly/fumo-pcengine
VIC-20: The unusual Supa Vidya Poker from Huffelduff is part of a multimedia Twin Peaks tie-in in development. https://bit.ly/svp-vic20
ZX SPECTRUM: PuttyCAD and Richper released the brilliant match-3 puzzler Clone Zoo, based on their Android game. https://bit.ly/clonezoo
ZX81: Lunapark from Dr Beep crams Theme Park into 1K! Check out the forum thread at https://bit.ly/lunapark-zx81
CHAMPION CODER
John Davies
[Info]
From: Indonesia
Website: https://snagultoof.itch.io/
Format: ZX Spectrum
Previous games: Road Trippin’, Alien Slaphead
Working on: Lil’ Ninja
A Spectrum owner since 1982, John is now designing and making his own games.
When did you first get a Spectrum?
My 13-year-old self desperately wanted an Intellivision, or at least an Atari VCS, for Christmas in 1982. But in late November the 16K ZX Spectrum my dad had purchased via mail order, because it was British and educational, arrived in the post. Initially gutted, I learned to love it because not only did it have commercial games but I could type in games for free from computer magazines like Your Computer and Computer & Video Games too. We upgraded to a 48K model just before Christmas. It was the best Christmas I ever had, beating out Astro Wars from the year before into second place.
When did you start making games?
The very start was some time in 1983 when I'd learnt BASIC from both computer magazine game listings and the ZX Spectrum manual. I never moved onto machine code, so I couldn't do smooth, fast, fancy graphical games. All my games were text and number affairs. Management and stat-riddled RPGs. I didn't share them with anyone and unfortunately, I have no idea what happened to them. Then recently, if you can call 2016 recently, I helped a friend with play testing and designing games, specifically Richard Langford's fantastic Spectrum-themed Project ZX games. That gave me the inspiration to start programming again myself once again.
I learnt AGD by going through Paul Jenkinson's excellent tutorial videos. I like his Spectrum Show videos too. That's when I started developing games with the BASIC-like AGD language which compiled itself into machine code when ran, starting with Percy Penguin and the Present Palaver, my Christmas-themed platformer inspired by a mix of Manic Miner and Jet Set Willy. I don't know why but Dougie McGregor's games programming students in Bearsden Primary School P6, who were also learning AGD and making games with it, loved playing Percy Penguin, even though I'd made it unintentionally rock hard. It seems like they just didn't care about the difficulty. It's a small problem I still have. I don't like to make my games too easy because nobody likes to spend weeks or even months developing something that can be finished in five minutes, but it's not easy to find the right balance so they're not too frustrating to be fun to play either. I'm getting better game by game, I hope.
You use Jonathan Cauldwell’s AGD – what do you like about this utility?
I actually use a variant of AGD called AGDx by Allan Turvey for Percy Penguin and AGDx Mini for my other games. I like the fact that all the tools to develop a half decent game are in one place, AGDx has shortened programming commands which saves on precious memory and probably speeds things up a bit too I imagine and AGDx Mini uses small 8x8 sprites instead of the usual 16x16 in AGD. This allowed more sprites on screen at the same time and a fuller hit box for more accurate collision detection. I like the idea of having a lot of movement on screen at the same time with very little, if any, slow down. I really should try to learn Jonathan Cauldwell's MPAGD though. It seems like a really powerful Pc based tool judging by some of the games I've seen produced using it, and not just for the ZX Spectrum either.
Do you use any other tools/hardware in your development?
I mainly use a Spectrum Emulator on a PC to run AGDx Mini and develop most of the game in that. I've also used a sound tool created by David Saphier, so most of my games have fabulous AY music, usually written by Pedro Pimenta. There's also another utility used to put the loading screen and code together. My friend Sebastian Braunert, famous for his surreal and lovable Spectrum games starring his dog Moritz, sorts that out for me. I think for loading screens Multipaint is used. Not by myself, but by the likes of Andy Green and Clive Townsend who generously knock out amazing loading screens, like they're nothing, for my games. I don't know where I'd be without all these talented kind folk I've never met in person, who offer their talents for free to some fella out in South East Asia. They enable me to get these games finished and give them a lot more polish.
What games have inspired your work?
I've played thousands of games so there's never any shortage of inspiration. Amongst those on the list are Manic Miner, Jet Set Willy, Adventure and Pitfall on the Atari VCS, Cruising on Broadway on the Spectrum, Daredevil Dennis on the BBC Micro, Pac-Man and Bubble Bobble.
What have been your favourite games to make so far?
My top three are Percy Penguin, because it was the first and developing it was a childhood dream finally realised, plus obviously Christmas time is my favourite time, Road Trippin' 2022: Coast 2 Coast because it was inspired by a game with a great mechanic that not that many people are aware of and British seaside towns which I loved as a kid, and finally Alien Slaphead because it's a game specifically for kids and it's educational as well. I was always keen to make a game that was fun and actually taught kids a few things too. It also has the best title for any game ever, hahaha!
What would be your dream project?
My dream project would be to have one of my more unique and complex game ideas, that I'd struggle to create myself, developed by one of my programming heroes, such as Jim Bagley, Steve Turner, Jay Austin, Simon Brattel or someone of that calibre, so that it would hopefully be a memorable game that I'd helped to create.
What inspired your new title Lil’ Ninja?
I wanted to develop a game that had an overwhelming amount of sprites on screen with a character that could jump and shoot the bad guys. It was inspired mainly by Bubble Bobble but also by Clive Townsend's Saboteur and a weird animated movie called Chequered Ninja. I didn't know how to do bubbles but I wanted a way to actually collect the bad guys after you shot them, so their souls bounce around the screen after they've been hit. You collect so many of those to grab so many flames to go to the next stage. There's a bunch of power-ups you can collect too, hopefully giving the game a strategic element.
When will Lil’ Ninja be finished?
I don't think it'll be too long. It's pretty much done bar a few bugs that I've not ironed out yet and then I'm waiting on the loading screen by none other than Clive Townsend based on a piece of original artwork by Sebastian Borda. Having said that I never like to rush things and never give myself any kind of deadline date otherwise it might make it feel too much like work. I like to do it for fun.
Are you working on anything else?
As well as developing and playing games I tried my hand at writing about them too. I wrote a stack of mostly homebrew reviews for various systems, but mainly Spectrum, for George Bachelors 8-bit and Blast annuals. After knocking out seventy-plus reviews, and another dream realised, I thought I'd try my hand at writing a book. Its title is ‘ZX Spectrum: Old Skool Daze’ and it's about my childhood at school, video games, including arcade games, ZX81 games, and mostly, of course, ZX Spectrum games. It's currently running at 118,973 words and just over half done.
I like to help other developers with their games. I've helped Allan Turvey with the playtesting of his ZX Spectrum version of the Vic-20 game Perils of Willy, I also did a few levels for the charity Christmas game Snowed Under and I've helped create levels for Gabriele Amore's Lemmings-type game Humans.
I have dozens of ideas for games but I'm not sure what will see the light of day or when I'll be hanging up my keyboard. It is fun to develop games but it's a lot more fun to play them. I compete in and organise various retro gaming contests in the huge retro gaming Facebook group Retro Games Forever. It's a great community, the best in my opinion. The contests keep me playing games whilst juggling around with the other bits and bobs that I try to do. It's worked pretty well so far.
DATABURST - REVIEWS
Dango Dash
Format: Game Boy Color
Credits: Incube8 Games
Price: $9.99 digital / $59.99 physical (plus $2.99 for plastic protector)
[Score] 89%
Zeta Wing 2
Format: C64 (digital, disk and cartridge images)
Credits: Sarah Jane Avory (Witchsoft)
Price: $4.99 plus sales tax
[Score] 88%
Super Bomberman 2 Remix
Format: ZX Spectrum (128K)
Credits: ZXEvolution
Price: $3.00 or more
[Score] 85%
Processing
Keezees (Kevin McGrorty) is working on a sequel to his 2020 Spectrum platform game Savage Princess - now free at
What got you into programming Spectrum games?
I've always wanted to make games, and in the past, I've tinkered with engines like SEUCK and GRAC on the Amiga and PAWS on the ZX Spectrum, but Jonathan Cauldwell's AGD and MPAGD have been instrumental in sparking the recent Spectrum game resurgence, they're so easy to use, being able to make something that actually looks like a game is an unspeakable joy. I think all us AGD users have had our unrealised game dev dreams made reality thanks to Jonathan.
What inspired Savage Princess 2?
I wanted to have her recovering from the events of Savage Princess 1, so she starts in bed with a hangover, and has to deal with whatever has rudely woken her up. Her surly attitude dictated a few new mechanics, such as using corpses as stepping stones, t-bagging corpses to anger their allies, and the irritable comments she occasionally gives the player.
(Note: the final text printed in the magazine did not reference "t-bagging corpses", the caption simply said, "Performing a certain manoeuvre to a corpse will enrage other enemies onscreen!" - Andrew)
How long will it take to be finished?
Hopefully, it won't be long now! I've been tweaking the game after one of my playtesters came back with some minor issues, but no major bugs have been reported for a while, so fingers crossed!
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