Scramble 500

This is a (successful) attempt by jotd to create a 1:1 port of the famous arcade game on Amiga 500 using 100% 68k assembly.

REQUIRES:

• any 68k CPU
• Kickstart 1.3, 1MB memory
• Kickstart 2.0, 1MB memory

FEATURES:

• original portrait layout, visual & sounds
• faithful enemy behaviour & speed & increasing difficulty
• 50 frames per second (PAL) even on a 68000 A500
• all levels
• joystick/joypad controlled (port 1) or keyboard controls (arrows + ctrl + alt), P pauses
• 2 player mode (still using joystick in port 1)
• 2/3 button joystick and CD32 joypad support
• can run directly from shell or from whdload (fast machines/high-end configurations)

CONTROLS:

• joystick directions/arrows: move player
• control/left alt/fire button/second button: start game
• P/third button (3 joystick button)/play button (cd32): pause
• F10 (or quitkey): quit (and save scores)
• two button joystick/joypad: fire to shoot, second button to bomb
• one button joystick: fire to shoot and bomb
• when game is about to start (intro music playing), press any direction to change controls. If a cd32 joypad is connected, two button mode is selected by default. Also, if keyboard is used to launch bombs, it also selects two-button mode. If game is started using bomb or second button, two-button mode is also selected.
• when the game prompts "one player only", move the joystick to switch to "two players"

HOW TO PLAY:

• all levels: shoot/bomb everything! don't miss fuel tanks to avoid running out of fuel
• level 1: avoid landscape and flying rockets
• level 2: shoot UFOs
• level 3: avoid fireballs
• level 4: same as 1, just more difficult
• level 5: navigate up and down without hitting the walls
• level 6: destroy base

If you complete all the levels, game restarts at level 1, but this time fuel decreases faster.

CREDITS:

• Jean-Francois Fabre (aka jotd): code and gfx/sfx conversion
• hajodick (EAB): game map rips from the arcade
• Andrzej Dobrowolski (aka no9, from EAB): music & sfx loops (plus sfx advice)
• Scott Tunstall: brilliant reverse engineering work of the arcade version
• Frank Wille (aka phx): sfx/module player (and of course vasm assembler!)
• ross (from EAB): help with screen centering
• 125scratch: sprite rips https://www.spriters-resource.com/arcade/scramble
• DanyPPC: icon
• meynaf: random routine
• eab.abime.net forum: useful advice, invaluable testing & support
• konami: original game :)

MINOR ISSUES:

• level 4/5 filler bricks are inverted (brick then square) in the bottom section or is it the odd/even tile pattern? well, who cares? not me.
• when a highscore is entered, the flashing doesn't work that well
• fireball stage fireballs are flickering on some configs (maybe ok now)

BUILDING FROM SOURCES:

Prerequesites:

• Windows
• python
• Amiga NDK
• sox (included)
• vasm 68k (included)
• gnu make

• besides the .bin files created from png by python, the rest of the process could be built on an amiga with phxass or some other assembler and sox for the amiga, but you have to be really mad to attempt it in 2021...)
• could be done on Linux, just rebuild vasm

Build process:

• To create the ".bin" files and some palette .s asm files, from "assets" subdir, just run the "convert_sprites.py" python script, then use the "convert_sounds.py" python script (audio).
• python and sox must be installed to be able to perform the wav2raw conversions
• get "bitplanelib.py" (asset conversion tool needs it) at https://github.com/jotd666/amiga68ktools.git

Binary assets must be created first, then makefile must be called to create the main program