Boulder Dash Forum

G'day Dustin

I was just puzzled by a couple of things and wondering if you (or anyone) could shed some light on them.

I'll start of by saying:
- I assume "Rock Fort 01.brc" is made for BRemake
- I also assume "Rock Fort 01 - The Long Way.bd" is made for GDash
Correct me if I am wrong.

My questions are:
1: I opened the .brc Version of Rock Fort 01 with BRemake and it opens with Cave B/1 loaded. Why??? I was a bit confused at first since I expected Cave A/1 then I noticed by default it had Cave B/1 ready to go.

Edit: I just noticed that Rock Fort 02.brc starts on Cave I/1

2: I tried the BRemake and GDash Versions of Rock Fort 01 and noticed that the Elements are in different places. For example in Cave A/1 the Fireflies have different locations and in Cave B/1 the Amobea and Boulders are in different locations. Why???

As an aside...WOW...BRemake has a completely different feel to it, the Smooth Scrolling as mentioned in another Post takes a bit of getting use to (for me anyway) and everything looks so Snazzy!

Regards
John

I hope Dustin doesn't mind me speaking for him here but, as far as the different element placements go, I'm pretty sure he refined the design further after moving to GDash, so some things in the older BR versions are probably left unchanged.

As for the weird starting caves, I honestly have no idea - they seemed to start on A/1 for me.

RTADash wrote:I'm pretty sure he refined the design further after moving to GDash, so some things in the older BR versions are probably left unchanged.

Thanks for that RTADash, I just assumed that both Versions (of the same name) would be the same.

As for the weird starting caves, I honestly have no idea - they seemed to start on A/1 for me.

After playing with Rock Fort 02 it seems that it opens on the last Cave played, even after a re-boot (I think I re-booted, it's been a busy day)

The RF02 on my desktop now opens on L1, which is the last Cave I played. If I open the one that came in the Download pack it opens on Cave I/1, maybe that's the last Cave Dustin played before he made the package and BRemake remembers that???

Thanks again

Hi John, thanks for questionning
[quote"=Johnomg"]1: I opened the .brc Version of Rock Fort 01 with BRemake and it opens with Cave B/1 loaded. Why??? I was a bit confused at first since I expected Cave A/1 then I noticed by default it had Cave B/1 ready to go. [/quote]

Yes, it actually starts at the cave last played; I wasn't aware of this, obviously I tested B/1 respectively I/1 last before releasing. But on the title screen ("Select cave and play!"), you can rechoose the cave you wanna start with.

johnomg wrote:2: I tried the BRemake and GDash Versions of Rock Fort 01 and noticed that the Elements are in different places. For example in Cave A/1 the Fireflies have different locations and in Cave B/1 the Amobea and Boulders are in different locations. Why???

RTADash wrote:I hope Dustin doesn't mind me speaking for him here but, as far as the different element placements go, I'm pretty sure he refined the design further after moving to GDash, so some things in the older BR versions are probably left unchanged. Wink

Exactly. I designed the BRemake versions by choosing a random seed and then overwriting objects I didn't wat and added objects on other placements. This is, I think, the easiest way to design in BRemake, because if you first design the cave and then note that you don't like the chosen random seed value and choose a new seed, the whole cave is erased and you have to redesign it completely.
Shortly after I finished RockFort 2.brc cicrix released the famous new clone Gdash, which has many advantages compared with BRemake:
- much better c64 emulation, so that you get the feeling of classical gameplay (esp. more variation concerning colors!!)
- You can change the random fill also after having designed the cave objects
- much better compatibility with other clones

It was above all the first point that made me decide that I would redesign the caves of RF1&2 in Gdash. I didn't want to overwrite single random objects anymore, so in many cases Ichose new random seeds so that the caves look slightly different than in the BRemake version. And while I was redesigning the caves in Gdash, several new ideas for some levels came to me, which I also included in the Gdash versions. As the game is still very close to the Bremake version, I think it is justified to name it identically.
Summary: I prefer the Gdash version a lot. If Gdash had been released already when I started to make own games, I wouldn't have used BRemake at all. RockFort 2 for Gdash will come out very soon too, and then I'll make the third part in Gdash directly.
Hope this answers your questions satisfactorily!

Cheers Dustin

G'day Dustin and Thanks

That explains it all and it's nice to get an insight into the development of the Rock Fort series.

Regards
John