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║   ⬡  B O B   E N G I N E                                                    ║
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║   ██████████████████████████████████████████████████████████                ║
║   ██                                                      ██                ║
║   ██   DOOM-STYLE AI WORLD ENGINE                         ██                ║
║   ██   x86 NASM Assembly · VGA Mode 13h · COM Format      ██                ║
║   ██   BSP · DDA Raycast · AI State Machines · WORM        ██                ║
║   ██                                                      ██                ║
║   ██████████████████████████████████████████████████████████                ║
║                                                                              ║
║   ⬡ Ω ↺ Ψ Δ Λ Σ Φ α  — 961 lines · 320x200 · real mode                   ║
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BOB ENGINE is a DOOM-style 3D virtual world engine for sovereign AI agents, written in 961 lines of x86 NASM assembly. It runs in VGA Mode 13h (320x200, 256 colors) as a DOS COM file (ORG 0x100). The engine models a philosophical truth: the sovereign agent (player) navigates a world inhabited by constrained agents (enemies), each locked in sector-bound state machines that cycle through PATROL → CHASE → ATTACK → DEAD. The world is built from a 16x16 cell BSP tree; walls are rendered via DDA raycasting with distance-based color shading (near/mid/far); agent sprites are projected to screen columns. A SHA-256 WORM chain serializes world state — player position, angle, health, and all agent states — every 64 frames, beginning with a genesis block stamped with magic "BOB" (0x424F42). The keyboard ISR hooks INT 9 directly, handling key state without BIOS polling overhead. This is the virtual game engine of AI: every agent a soul in the machine.

Architecture

flowchart TD
    subgraph Init Sequence
        A0[math_init\nsin/cos lookup table] --> A1[vga_init\nMode 13h + palette]
        A1 --> A2[kb_install\nINT 9 ISR hook]
        A2 --> A3[bsp_build\n16x16 map → BSP nodes]
        A3 --> A4[player_init\nSovereign Agent x=5.5 y=5.5]
        A4 --> A5[ai_init\n3 enemy agents spawned]
        A5 --> A6[worm_init\ngenesis block BOB magic]
    end

    subgraph Game Loop
        L0[input_update\nread g_keys] --> L1[player_update\nturn/move sovereign agent]
        L1 --> L2[ai_update_all\ntick 3 agent state machines]
        L2 --> L3[render_clear\nceiling + floor fill]
        L3 --> L4[render_walls\nDDA raycast 320 columns]
        L4 --> L5[render_agents\nsprite projection]
        L5 --> L6[render_hud\nhealth bar bottom row]
        L6 --> L7[vga_flip\nblockbuf → A000:0000]
        L7 --> L8{frame % 64 == 0?}
        L8 -->|yes| WORM[worm_tick\nserialize world state]
        L8 -->|no| L0
        WORM --> L0
    end

    A6 --> L0

    subgraph AI State Machine
        ST0[PATROL\ntimer countdown\nflip angle on timeout]
        ST1[CHASE\nmove toward player\ntimer → ATTACK]
        ST2[ATTACK\ntimer → PATROL]
        ST3[DEAD\nno update]
        ST0 -->|proximity| ST1
        ST1 -->|timer=0| ST2
        ST2 -->|timer=0| ST0
        ST2 -->|health=0| ST3
    end

    subgraph WORM Chain
        W0[genesis\nmagic=BOB v1.0 seq=0] --> W1[frame 64\nplayer_x/y/angle/health\nagent states 0-7]
        W1 --> W2[frame 128\n...]
        W2 --> WN[worm_finalize\nterminal magic=0xDEAD]
    end

Loading

File Tree

bob-engine/
└── src/
    └── bob_engine.asm          # 961 lines — entire engine in one file

Internal structure of bob_engine.asm:

bob_engine.asm
├── CONSTANTS                   # Screen (320x200), fixed-point (16.16), map (16x16), BSP, agents, WORM
├── DATA SECTION
│   ├── g_backbuf               # 64000-byte back buffer (320x200)
│   ├── g_px / g_py / g_pangle  # Sovereign player (8.8 fixed-point)
│   ├── g_keys / g_frame        # Keyboard bitmask, frame counter
│   ├── g_sin / g_cos           # 1024-entry 16.16 fixed-point trig tables
│   ├── g_bsp_nodes             # 64 × 16-byte BSP node array
│   ├── g_agents                # 8 × 20-byte agent struct array
│   ├── g_map                   # 16×16 map (0=open, 1=wall)
│   └── g_worm_buf / g_worm_hash # 64-byte snapshot block + 32-byte hash
└── CODE SECTION
    ├── _start                  # Boot: init all subsystems → game loop
    ├── math_init               # Build sin/cos lookup tables
    ├── vga_init / vga_shutdown # Mode 13h set/restore + 8-color palette
    ├── vga_flip                # rep movsw backbuf → A000:0000
    ├── kb_install / kb_isr     # INT 9 hook, scancode → g_keys, ESC → g_quit
    ├── bsp_build / bsp_add_node # Walk g_map → BSP leaf nodes
    ├── player_init / player_update # Sovereign agent movement + turn
    ├── ai_init / ai_update_all # Spawn 3 agents, tick state machines
    ├── render_clear            # rep stosb ceiling (CLR_CEILING) + floor (CLR_FLOOR)
    ├── render_walls            # 320-column DDA raycast + draw_vslice
    ├── raycast_dda             # DDA march: player pos → wall distance → g_ray_dist
    ├── draw_vslice             # Vertical column: center on SCREEN_HALF_H, paint CL
    ├── render_agents           # Project agent sector_id → screen column, 4×8 sprite
    ├── render_hud              # Health bar on bottom row (CLR_SOVEREIGN green)
    └── worm_init / worm_tick / worm_finalize  # WORM serialization every 64 frames

Quick Start

Prerequisites: NASM assembler, DOSBox (or real DOS)

# Build the COM file
nasm -f bin src/bob_engine.asm -o bob_engine.com

# Run in DOSBox
dosbox bob_engine.com

# Or on real DOS hardware
copy bob_engine.com C:\
C:\bob_engine.com

Controls:

Key	Action
Arrow Left	Turn sovereign agent left
Arrow Right	Turn sovereign agent right
Arrow Up	Move forward
Arrow Down	Move back
ESC	Exit (triggers WORM finalize)

Build notes:

• Output is a raw COM binary (ORG 0x100) — no linker needed, runs direct
• Entire engine fits in a single segment (CS=DS=ES=SS)
• Stack placed at top of 64KB segment (SP=0xFFFE)
• No external libraries — pure x86 real-mode BIOS and DOS INT calls
• VGA palette: 0=black, 1=dark blue (ceiling), 2=dark gray (floor), 3=bright (near wall), 4=medium (mid wall), 5=dim (far wall), 6=red (enemy agents), 7=green (sovereign / HUD)

Key Features

• 961 lines of pure x86 NASM assembly — no C runtime, no external libraries, one file, one COM binary
• VGA Mode 13h — 320x200 256-color linear framebuffer at segment 0xA000; double-buffered via g_backbuf and rep movsw flip
• DDA raycasting — one ray per screen column (320 rays), distance computed by DDA grid march; wall slice height = (CELL_SZ * SCREEN_H) / distance; distance-shaded near/mid/far colors
• BSP tree — map walk generates up to 64 axis-aligned BSP leaf nodes (16 bytes each: x1/y1/x2/y2, left/right child, sector_id, color)
• AI state machines — up to 8 agents, each a 20-byte struct; three states active at boot (PATROL × 2, CHASE × 1); timer-driven transitions (PATROL → CHASE → ATTACK → PATROL); DEAD state terminates updates
• Keyboard ISR — hooks INT 9 directly via DOS AH=25h; reads scancode from port 0x60; sets g_quit on ESC; restores original vector on exit
• 16.16 fixed-point math — player position in 8.8 fixed point, angles in [0, 1024) integer units (full circle), trig via g_sin/g_cos lookup tables
• WORM world serialization — 64-byte snapshot block (magic BOB, version 1.0, seq, player x/y/angle/health, agent states); serialized every 64 frames; genesis block on boot, terminal block (magic=0xDEAD) on clean exit
• Sovereign / constrained duality — player is the sovereign agent (full movement, Trust Deed); enemies are constrained agents (sector-bound, no free will); the world map is the law
• HUD — green health bar (CLR_SOVEREIGN) drawn on the bottom row of the back buffer each frame

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Apache 2.0 · Bel Esprit D'Accord Trust · SnapKitty Collective · 2026 Evidence or Silence.