Looks like an interesting game... I'd need a little time to get a feel for it, but even with its shortcomings, I'd guess that it'd be alright to play on the 808x mini laptops, though there are probably some much better shooters available!
I imagine 4-colour modes on more modern (EGA/VGA/MCGA) hardware is faster since it's only 2 bits per pixel. I only made stuff in 256-colours (8 bits per pixel) so it probably took 4x longer to draw to the screen. I wasn't clever enough to understand, but at least my games were pretty. 64x the colours is worth sacrificing a 4x speed boost. Jesus, I really grew up to be a nerd.
I can tell you that _Where In Time is Carmen Sandiego_ animated smoothly on my "old" PCjr (1985) in CGA while my "new" XT (1988) with EGA graphics was jerky with lots of screen tearing. And that was only 4 versus 16 colors. The reasons are a bit more complicated than "just" the data sizes, but it did have a lot to do with the results.
That.. looks like eye strain.
Fuck off, CGA is cool :)
"let's make a space ship shooter!"
"Hell yeah! But we'll do a bunch of drugs first!'
CGA graphics are amazing
Looks like an interesting game... I'd need a little time to get a feel for it, but even with its shortcomings, I'd guess that it'd be alright to play on the 808x mini laptops, though there are probably some much better shooters available!
The game looks competent but I agree with another user here... eye strain to the max for me.
I imagine 4-colour modes on more modern (EGA/VGA/MCGA) hardware is faster since it's only 2 bits per pixel. I only made stuff in 256-colours (8 bits per pixel) so it probably took 4x longer to draw to the screen. I wasn't clever enough to understand, but at least my games were pretty. 64x the colours is worth sacrificing a 4x speed boost. Jesus, I really grew up to be a nerd.
I can tell you that _Where In Time is Carmen Sandiego_ animated smoothly on my "old" PCjr (1985) in CGA while my "new" XT (1988) with EGA graphics was jerky with lots of screen tearing. And that was only 4 versus 16 colors. The reasons are a bit more complicated than "just" the data sizes, but it did have a lot to do with the results.
I love when people like you and Jim start discussing the technical details behind the graphics hardware.
Somewhere out there I'm sure some quirky DOS gamers will find this game appealing...
Wow, a CGA shmup from 1990. Weird.