DIZZY AND THE Y2K PREDICAMENT DIZZY & the Y2K Predicament exclusively for the Sinclair Spectrum Emulators 48k/128k+2 By Tommy Pereira December 1999 It was on a December night that I got this bug up my ass to make a game. I'm not a real programmer but I owned a 128k+2 while living in Portugal from '86 to '91 and I used to mess around with it alot, so by doing that and picking some things up from other people's programs (mostly Peter Shaw, thank you!) from computer magazines like 'MICRO HOBBY' and 'YOUR SINCLAIR' (remember those?), etc., I knew enough in BASIC to at least get something started. I am aware that basic is very limited and I didn't have any desire to do anything that creative or original because of it. It started out by me wanting to make my own version of 'Space Invaders' but then 'Dizzy' came to mind all of a sudden. So ahead I went changing all the user defined graphics into a version of Dizzy that would look decent and still leave enough 'G' letters to do the rest. I quickly came up with a little plot and "shazam"! The whole thing took me two weeks and when it was done I started making an ending for the game. Right when I was almost done was when it started crashing and getting error messages like '4 Out of memory' and man, was I pissed off. I knew then I would have to delete lines and shorten up the program but I didn't want to sacrifice any part of the game so I switched it from 128 basic to 48 and the game would play a little longer than before but I still had to shorten up the program. As a result there isn't the originally planned option of 48k or 128k music but it allowed me to then get to use the UDG's 'T' and 'U'. One of the good things about the emulator is the frame skipping. I never would have gotten away with this program on the real machine unless I knew code but I never got that deep into it to be able to do it. Another great thing about the emulator is that I could come up with the graphics, delete the lines, save it, and then they would always be there without having to be read every time the game is loaded. So between deleting the unnecessary lines ( Lots of REM statements ) that I found, taking away the 128 music and being able to delete 4 UDG's because of the 2 extra letters in 48k basic, it finally worked. Hurray! Now I think it's kind of ironic and cool that it would crash because of Y2K (I'm so sick of that expression) and the fact that there are crash versions of Dizzy games except mine really does crash :) . Although at the time I was furious that I put in the energy and time that I did, and it would go and crash right when I was about to finish, I know that I'm not the first person that it's happened to and it turned out well considering ... There are two bugs I've noticed. 1. The enemies that scroll to your right will only die if they are hit two spaces to the right or one space to the left. 2. The lasers that fire at Dizzy will only kill him if it fires directly to your left. (Dizzy's right) It kind of sucks that way but with the problems I've had I didn't want to mess around with it anymore because of the lack of maneuverability and mostly because I want to share this with all of you a couple of weeks before the new year. But, in being aware of these two problems, it shouldn't make any difference as far as playing it. The game is extremely beatable once you get your timing down. If I have the energy and the desire I will try to fix these bugs later on, or if any of you want a crack at it, go right ahead. You have my blessing. I poked the program but you should still be able to break into it at some parts. I have included the "crash" version and the regular one ( less likely to crash ) along with this file. Whoever is kind enough to put this on their site, please make sure all three of these files are together. Unless I messed up, the "Crash" Version should do just that eventually during the game. If you're quick enough though, who knows?! Maybe you can beat it before it crashes! Will you take that Dizzy challenge? The other, 'Dizzy99' may crash but it is alot less likely. I have played it and beat it four times to test it since I corrected the problems and it hasn't crashed once. The less time you take to beat it the less likely it is to crash. You should have these files ... DIZZY'99.Z80 CRASH'99.Z80 DIZZY'99.TXT The program was written on the 'SINC300' and it works best with that emulator. You can get the Sinc300 emulator at ... "http://www.ugr.es/~pedrom/" I have a 75mhz and I need to set it to 'RETARDO 0' (Delay 0) just to give you an idea of the ideal frame skipping rate. If you use WARAJEVO it won't work the way it is so you'll need to convert it to a WARAJEVO *.tap file to function. Dizzy is the best video game character ever. I have never seen him on a system other than the Spectrum (I think Commodore and others might have him, I don't know). I think there was a version of Treasure Island on Nintendo but it didn't seem to do well. I wish he didn't die with the Spectrum. There was a Rainbow Islands game for the Sony Playstation with an enhanced version, original and Bubble Bobble. It would be great to see something like that of the Dizzy series for say ... the Dreamcast?!!? The Spectrum doesn't really have to be dead. Why don't some some of you make your own programs? If there are any, I hope to come across them. Happy Holidays. Tommy Barreira Pereira Connecticut, USA Dec. 13, 1999 e-mail ---> punktriste@aol.com GAMING HINTS AND TIPS 1. The enemies that scroll to your right will only die if they are hit two spaces to the right or one space to the left. 2. The lasers that fire at Dizzy will only kill him if it fires directly to your left. (Dizzy's right). So if you stand anywhere else, even in the line of fire, it won't hurt you! 3. Lasers cannot be fired while a rotten egg is in flight, so shoot away! You have unlimited stinky eggs to launch. 4. Pressing "M" during the title screen will make a musical status comment appear at the bottom. (This was due to my initial plans of 128 or 48 music) 5. You can change Dizzy's appearance. (But I won't give it away yet) ... Mess around a bit ... you'll find it. 6. Who is that guy that that runs by and collects all of the eggs Dizzy misses with? (He will appear at the end of game sequence.) "AND DON'T FORGET TO TAKE YOUR SUGAR BABY" - Bruce Campbell