March 28, 2008
Note: I have been informed that the code below no longer works in Windows 7 due to changes in the way IThumbnailProvider operates. It is recommended that you use unmanaged code instead of the managed solution presented below.
I have started releasing Cogwheel binaries on its project page, so if you'…
I have started releasing Cogwheel binaries on its project page, so if you'…
March 07, 2008
I have finally got around to adding sound to Cogwheel using Ianier Munoz's waveOut API wrapper.
The technique used is fairly simple. I start with a sound buffer that is a multiple a number of video frames in length (1/60th of a second is one frame) - four seems a good number. This buffer needs to be…
The technique used is fairly simple. I start with a sound buffer that is a multiple a number of video frames in length (1/60th of a second is one frame) - four seems a good number. This buffer needs to be…
March 03, 2008
The biggest update to the emulator relates to input.
I've added a new control panel that lets you customise key bindings. For the keyboard, you simply click on the button you wish to customise, then press the key on your keyboard you wish to bind. As you can probably tell from the screenshot, I've a…
I've added a new control panel that lets you customise key bindings. For the keyboard, you simply click on the button you wish to customise, then press the key on your keyboard you wish to bind. As you can probably tell from the screenshot, I've a…
February 24, 2008
On bakery2k1's suggestion, I took a look at my sprite collision flag code. It only checked for collisions between sprites appearing in the foreground - sprites that were hidden behind a background tile weren't checked, which caused the Fantastic Dizzy bug.
I have decided to give Google's free projec…
I have decided to give Google's free projec…
February 22, 2008
World Class Leaderboard Golf
Well, I've just about got it the way it was before with the new interrupt code; most games work again, but the few that have always given problems (such as Desert Speedtrap) still don't work properly. [sad] I think this is the stage where I have to start trawling throug…
February 21, 2008
I gave in and rewrote all of the Z80's interrupt emulation from scratch, finding some rather horrible bugs in the existing implementation as I went.
Some of the highlights included non-maskable interrupts ignoring the state of the IFF1 flag (this flag is automatically cleared when an interrupt is se…
Some of the highlights included non-maskable interrupts ignoring the state of the IFF1 flag (this flag is automatically cleared when an interrupt is se…
February 20, 2008
OutRun Europa
I've been adding a series of new features to Cogwheel. I wrote a basic zip file class a while back (only supporting store and deflate compression - the majority of zip files use deflate), and have added a Utility namespace with methods for help with loading ROMs.
For example, there is …
February 14, 2008
The Game Gear's hardware is very similar indeed to the Master System's - so similar that you can play Master System games on a Game Gear via a special adapter. Some Game Gear games were just the Master System ROMs in a Game Gear cartridge. [smile]
That said, the Game Gear's LCD is only 160x144, and …
That said, the Game Gear's LCD is only 160x144, and …
February 08, 2008
After seeing Scet and Drilian's work on their respective emulator projects I decided I needed to do something with the stagnating Cogwheel source on my hard disk drive.
The only ROM I have tested where I can't find an explanation for a bug is the Game Gear Garfield: Caught in the Act game. Like many…
The only ROM I have tested where I can't find an explanation for a bug is the Game Gear Garfield: Caught in the Act game. Like many…
February 04, 2008
PlayStation controllers are relatively comfortable, and I have a number of them knocking about.
From top to bottom - PS2 IR remote control and receiver; Guitar Hero wireless Kramer and receiver; black PS2 DualShock 2 analogue joypad; a pair of grey standard PS1 digital joypads.
As I've learned in the…
From top to bottom - PS2 IR remote control and receiver; Guitar Hero wireless Kramer and receiver; black PS2 DualShock 2 analogue joypad; a pair of grey standard PS1 digital joypads.
As I've learned in the…
February 01, 2008
I intended on making at least one post in January, but looked like I missed the opportunity by a day. I hope you all had pleasant breaks (and here I refer to breaks from my inane ramblings, not any religious festivals).
The lack of updates stem from having precious little to talk about; I've been bu…
The lack of updates stem from having precious little to talk about; I've been bu…
November 21, 2007
Scripting with .NET is unbelievably easy. [grin]
I wanted to add scripting support to Brass, and have added it using .NET's excellent powers of reflection and its System.CodeDom.Compiler namespace.
The first thing I need to do is find out which language the source script is written in. I use the exte…
I wanted to add scripting support to Brass, and have added it using .NET's excellent powers of reflection and its System.CodeDom.Compiler namespace.
The first thing I need to do is find out which language the source script is written in. I use the exte…
November 14, 2007
My work with the VDP in the Sega Master System made me more aware of how video signals are generated, so thought it would be an interesting exercise to try and generate them in software. This also gives me a chance to test Brass 3, by actively developing experimental programs.
I'm using a simple 2-b…
I'm using a simple 2-b…
November 05, 2007
Brass 3 Website.
I've released a beta version of the new assembler. It comes with the compiler, a GUI builder (see the above screenshot) and the help viewer; it also comes bundled with a number of plugins.
I've also knocked together a quick demo project that can be built directly from Explorer once B…
October 29, 2007
OS 1.15 appears to boot, and if I run an OS in Pindur TI, archive the files (copy them to Flash ROM) then use that ROM dump in my emulator the files are still there, where they can be copied to RAM.
Trying to re-archive them results in a fairly un-helpful message, as I haven't implemented any Flash …
Trying to re-archive them results in a fairly un-helpful message, as I haven't implemented any Flash …
October 26, 2007
Brass 3 development continues; the latest documentation (automatically generated from plugins marked with attributes via reflection) is here. The compiler is becoming increasibly powerful - and labels can now directly store string values, resulting in things like an eval() function for powerful mac…
October 02, 2007
Quake isn't dead, but I've shifted my concentration to trying to get Brass 3 (the assembler project) out.
Brass 2 didn't really work, but I've taken a lot of its ideas - namely the plugin system - and kept some of the simplicity from Brass 1. The result works, and is easy to extend and maintain. Las…
Brass 2 didn't really work, but I've taken a lot of its ideas - namely the plugin system - and kept some of the simplicity from Brass 1. The result works, and is easy to extend and maintain. Las…
September 18, 2007
Quake has a few dynamic lights - some projectiles, explosions and the fireballs light up their surroundings.
Fortunately, the method used is very simple: take the brightness of the projectile, divide it by the distance between the point on the wall and the light and add it to the light level for tha…
Fortunately, the method used is very simple: take the brightness of the projectile, divide it by the distance between the point on the wall and the light and add it to the light level for tha…
September 14, 2007
I've updated the collision detection between points and the world with Scet's idea of only testing with the faces in the leaf containing the start position of the point.
ZiggyWare's Simple Vector Rendering GameComponent is being very useful for testing the collision routines. [smile]
I have also exte…
ZiggyWare's Simple Vector Rendering GameComponent is being very useful for testing the collision routines. [smile]
I have also exte…
September 12, 2007
I've reworked the VM completely to use an array of a union of a float and an int, rather than the MemoryStream kludge I was using before. This also removes a lot of the multiply-or-divide-by-four mess I had with converting indices to positions within the memory stream.
There are (as far as I know) t…
There are (as far as I know) t…
September 06, 2007
After all that time spent trying to work out how the QuakeC VM works I finally have some real-world results. [smile]
Apart from the obvious boring stuff going on in the background parsing and loading entities go, two functions in particular are of note. The first is a native function, precache_model…
Apart from the obvious boring stuff going on in the background parsing and loading entities go, two functions in particular are of note. The first is a native function, precache_model…
September 03, 2007
This journal hasn't been updated for a while, I know. That doesn't mean that work on the Quake project has dried up - on the contrary, a fair amount of head-way has been made!
The problem is that screenshots like the above are really not very interesting at all. [rolleyes]
As far as I can tell, Quake…
The problem is that screenshots like the above are really not very interesting at all. [rolleyes]
As far as I can tell, Quake…
August 20, 2007
All of this Quake and XNA 3D stuff has given me a few ideas for calculator (TI-83) 3D.
One of my problems with calculator 3D apps is that I have never managed to even get a raycaster working. Raycasters aren't exactly very tricky things to write.
So, to help me, I wrote a raycaster in C#, limiting my…
One of my problems with calculator 3D apps is that I have never managed to even get a raycaster working. Raycasters aren't exactly very tricky things to write.
So, to help me, I wrote a raycaster in C#, limiting my…
August 15, 2007
I've started serious work on the QuakeC virtual machine.
The bytecode is stored in a single file, progs.dat. It is made up of a number of different sections:
The bytecode is stored in a single file, progs.dat. It is made up of a number of different sections:
- Definitions data - an unformatted block of data containing a mixture of floating point values, integers and vectors.
- Statements - individual ins…
August 14, 2007
I have a Creative Audigy SE sound card, which provides hardware MIDI synthesis. However, under Vista, there was no way (that I could see) to change the default MIDI output device to this card, meaning that all apps were using the software synthesiser instead.
Vista MIDI Fix is a 10-minute applicatio…
August 10, 2007
Quake 2 stores its visibility lists differently to Quake 1 - as close leaves on the BSP tree will usually share the same visibility information, the lists are grouped into clusters (Quake 1 stored a visibility list for every leaf). Rather than go from the camera's leaf to find all of the other visi…
August 09, 2007
Pixel shaders are fun.
I've implemented support for decoding mip-maps from mip textures (embedded in the BSP) and from WAL files (external).
Now, I know that non-power-of-two textures are naughty. Quake uses a number of them, and when loading textures previously I've just let Direct3D do its thing wh…
August 07, 2007
Following sirob's prompting, I dropped the BasicEffect for rendering and rolled my own effect. After seeing the things that could be done with them (pixel and vertex shaders) I'd assumed they'd be hard to put together, and that I'd need to change my code significantly.
In reality all I've had to do …
In reality all I've had to do …
August 06, 2007
I've transferred the BSP rendering code to use the new level loading code, so I can now display correctly-coloured Quake 2 levels. [smile] The Quake stuff is in its own assembly, and is shared by the WinForms resource browser project and the XNA renderer.
I'm also now applying lightmaps via multipli…
August 03, 2007
ArchG indicated a bug in the TextInputHandler class I posted a while back - no reference to the delegate instance used for the unmanaged callback is held, so as soon as the garbage collector kicks in things go rather horribly wrong.
/* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * …
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