Remakes — Tardis.dk Remakes

Omega Race 2009 updated to version 1.4 (Windows only).

July 28, 2014 By Sokurah

Someone commented on my YouTube channel recently about the controls on Omega Race 2006 and as part of my answer I suggested the person to try out the 2009 version. He answered me this;

“Since I was interested in the most basic retro B&W vector-licious experience I haven’t tried the 2009 version yet. It really does a good job of looking like a vector screen”

I usually put in a fair amount of options in my games, so in retrospect I’m kinda surprised that I hadn’t added a monochrome mode to my second version of Omega Race. Well, a couple of days ago I decided to do just that. 🙂

I added a monochrome mode – still using glowing lines, but as I was finishing it I thought to myself “hey, this is not what I wanted to add” so I also added a “pure clean line monochrome version” to it too. Very retro. 😀

I also added the option to adjust the amount of glow (in the modes that uses it) which is also present in a couple of my later vector games – just to give people a chance to tweak the look a bit…not all monitors are the same. I also added the option to toggle the background music off. Personally I love the music, but it does enhance the retro-feel to play it without music. Now the option is there so you can chose your preferred style.

Space Rawks featured in Retro Gamer Magazine.

December 10, 2013 By Sokurah

How great is this – Retro Gamer Magazine 123 came out and it turns out that Space Rawks was reviewed in the magazine. I didn’t expect that…but it seems that the game was more positively received (by everyone) than I had anticipated. Aces!.

I especially like the paragraph the review ends on;

“Space Rawks takes the formula of the game that inspired it and adds extra bells and whistles, but not in a way that breaks what made the original work so well. It plays very solidly and looks the part too.”

The game was also featured in a blogpost by StiGGy who is running the game on his arcade cabinet. It really is an honor when people like what you do so much that they bother to do thinks like this. Go visit his blog – he posts a lot of good retro-stuff”. 🙂

Review in Retro Gamer Magazine 123

Filed Under: Remakes Tagged With: Space Rawks, Vector graphics

New release: Space Rawks

October 1, 2013 By Sokurah

Not a peep for 9½ months and then suddenly three games in two weeks. That’s so typical of me. 🙂
…I’m like the Octomom of games development. 😀

Today’s release is called Space Rawks. It’s a wordplay on ‘Space Rocks’ (but you probably got that) and it’s basically a remake of Asteroids – but with a lot of new stuff bolted on to make it a bit more interesting that the original game.

The game has more than 20 powerups (and “power-downs”) – not all are equally good, but except one they only lasts a few seconds and will make you chase them. You don’t have to collect them…but where’s the fun in that, right? 😉

This game has had a difficult birth – I started working on it in 2009, and for a while I doubted that I’d ever actually finish it, but I did – and it’s here…and it’s a relief. 😉 There’s a ‘making of‘ post here so you can read a bit about why it took four years to make.

I hope you’ll enjoy it…and don’t forget to let me know by email or on Twitter if you like it.

Filed Under: News, Remakes

Released: The Speccies (1 & 2).

September 16, 2013 By Sokurah

Okay, finally made it – The Speccies has arrived and are now released into the wild.

The Speccies is a puzzlegame for the 48K ZX Spectrum. It’s coded in pure Z80 assembler and contains 101 levels of brain-torturing‎ fun.

The game is not only released as a digital download but also available as a strictly limited run of physical cassettes for the ZX Spectrum – see below and mail me for information if you’re interrested.

We (the artist and me) had problems with parts of the the physical product (mainly the deluxe version) so we decided to hold off the release until after the summer vacation, then we got some better music for it which introduced some last minute bugs, and before we knew of it much more time, than we had anticipated, had gone by. On the plus side that means that – since the game had basically been completed for several months – there was time to submit it to Retro Gamer Magazine and ended up being reviewed and scoring 85% at about the same time the game was released…so that worked out nicely. 😉

During all this time of doing nothing – and being on vacation and not feeling like doing anything – I came across a Flashgame that I liked and I thought “wouldn’t that make an excellent 16K Spectrum game?“, so I began coding that anyway. I reused a lot of stuff from the first game, which saved a lot of time, and by doing that I was able to code this game in 4½ days. It’s not fantastic, it’s not original, but it’s a simple fun puzzle game and I had lots of fun making it…and feel quite satisfied with what I achieved in the time I spent. And so The Speccies II was born. It is included on the tape on the deluxe version of the physical cassette that we sell (all sold out, btw) but it can be downloaded for free as well.

Here’s a picture showing the menus and an ingame screen from each game.

This picture shows the three physical versions of the game being sold; the single cassette version, the double case version and the Ultimate-style deluxe version and in the background – the poster we also produced.