Atari 2600 Rogue-like: What's it like?

[theloon]

I already asked this question to the AtariAge side of things.  here's the same question posed to Rogue-like fans.

I've started a Rogue-like for the Atari 2600 here:
http://www.atariage.com/forums/topic/172686-destiny-wip/
Please note you MUST press FIRE to get past the blank screen when you launch this game!

Not much more than random screens and a random rings dropped in different parts of the dungeon.  Once an item is grabbed ALL the rest of that type of item warp to other places in the dungeon.  Each floor is 256 screens big and the dungeon has 256 levels.  Each room has a secret alternative layout that appears infrequently to prevent getting the player permanently trapped.  The castle is the players home base.  Other ruined castles exist on other floors but are decoration only.

What is a Rogue-like?  What parts of its essence fit the Atari 2600?  What I remember about playing Rogue is:

* You must kill a boss and then come back up to the first level of the dungeon.
* Potions, rings, weapons and armor.  Spell scrolls too, I think.
* Stupid, annoying (in my opinion) perma death and starvation.
* Monsters to wear you down.

As a side I wonder how many other people have attempted a Rogue-like for the Atari 2600?

[getter77]

Slim to none as far as I know.

Good deal though, keep at it, expand it further, and perhaps ascend to to an eventual high quality ACP edition.   

[theloon]

Thanks for the feedback!

Er, ACP Edition?

Is that what they call the Insane Clown Posse in Esperatonto land?

What in particular should I focus/expand on?

[getter77]

http://acp.atari.org/     

In general just whatever adds to the presentation and odds to generate buzz, not unlike how this Atari project evolved over time:

http://hdm.atari.pl/

[theloon]

Is there a good programming language to use on ACP?  In particular a BASIC dialect?  Or, at least an Atari ST BASIC that still works with ACP?

Thanks in advance!

[getter77]

Hmm....that would probably best be asked of the hardcore folks on here:

http://www.atari-forum.com/viewforum.php?f=92&sid=a61f5e56a89ecb45870eb11e1785a341

Offhand, I believe there was much effort spent on compatibility with older machines and environs, so things might jump over rather well depending.

Yeah, I find myself keeping tabs on some unusual corners of the internet, I know....

[theloon]

Bookmarked and browsing!  Thanks again getter77!

Er, but, does anyone care to give me a sanity check?  I'm looking for what things I inherent to Rogue that are feasible on the Atari 2600.  This is what *I* think Rogue is about and seem possible on the 2600:

* Delve to the bottom of the dungeon, kill boss, reach home base on level 1.
* Can obtain armor,  weapons, potions, scrolls, rings and food.
* No save.  Starve if hungry too long.
* Fight random monsters.

Is this what Rogue boils down to?  If so, that's quite possible to achieve.

[getter77]

Pretty solid baseline I'd say, with the clarity that dungeon layout and equipment/items encountered is rather random as well usually.

I mean, things happened:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue_%28video_game%29


So the best idea is to always take it as a baseline and inject your own personality, ideas, etc into it to grow it from there.

[guest509]

  Generally, a Roguelike boils down to the interplay between permadeath and procedural content.

  Like this: The games are hard, and when you die you are dead. It's not too big of a deal to die though, because you learned a bit and have become better at the game. Also it's not that big of a deal to have to restart because the levels are different each time, so you aren't grinding the same content over and over. So you can make the game hard, necessitating many restarts, without it becoming too dry or boring because the game starts fresh.

  The original Rogue had a dungeon crawler mechanics and fantasy theme. So yeah, it had weapons, armor and magic items (scrolls, potions, wands and rings). Here's a good overview of it.

http://userpages.monmouth.com/~colonel/rvm.html

[theloon]

  I just want to say you guys rock.  The advice so far has been crystal clear.  Much appreciate the links too.

  Sadly, looks like GFA Basic has BIG issues with the Firebee.  Seems like there's talk of a converter for GFA executables but, er, yeah.  When I bone up on C I might take another look at a Firebee port.

[getter77]

Cool, Firebee is hitting the stride moreso as it goes along just fairly recently in the grand scheme of things, community folk there should be pretty supportive on the nuts n' bolts as more of the complete plug-n-play machines actually make it out to people across the globe.