Jeremy Penner
8dc252d70f
subrepo: subdir: "jsnes" merged: "d8021d0" upstream: origin: "https://github.com/bfirsh/jsnes.git" branch: "master" commit: "d8021d0" git-subrepo: version: "0.4.9" origin: "???" commit: "???"
315 lines
12 KiB
Plaintext
315 lines
12 KiB
Plaintext
_ _ __ ___
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| | (_) / / / __|
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| | _ / /_ | /__
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| | | | | _ \ |___ \
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| |_ | | | (_) | .___) |
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\__|_| | \___/ \___/
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|__/
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LJ65
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an NES game
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by Damian Yerrick
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See the legal section below.
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_____________________________________________________________________
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Introduction
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LJ65 is an action puzzle game for NES comparable to the popular
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game Tetris(R), except distributed as free software and with more
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responsive movement controls.
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_____________________________________________________________________
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Installing
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LJ65 is designed to run on Nintendo Entertainment System (called
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Family Computer in Japan) and accurate NES emulators. It is
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distributed as source code and an iNES format binary, using mapper
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0 (NROM). Separate binaries for NTSC and PAL systems are provided.
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This program has been tested on NES using a PowerPak. It also works
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on the current versions of Nintendulator, Nestopia, and FCE Ultra.
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(Do not use the outdated Nesticle emulator anymore.)
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To run LJ65 on an NES without buying a PowerPak, you'll need to
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solder together an NES cartridge with at least 16 KB of PRG space
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and 4 KB of CHR space. A modded NROM-128 or CNROM board should be
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fine. Chris Covell has put together instructions on how to replace
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NES Game Paks' mask ROM chips with writable EEPROMs.
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http://www.zyx.com/chrisc/solarwarscart.html
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To build LJ65 from source code, you will need
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* CC65 (from http://www.cc65.org/ but you don't need the
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non-free C compiler)
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* GNU Make and Coreutils (included with most Linux distributions;
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Windows users can use MSYS from http://www.devkitpro.org/)
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Modify the makefile to point to where you have CC65 installed.
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Then run make. (Windows users can run mk.bat instead, which runs
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make in the correct folder.) On a desktop PC from late 2000 with
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a Pentium III 866 MHz, recompiling the whole thing takes about one
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second. To build some data conversion tools, you'll need a GNU C
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compiler such as MinGW; I have included Windows binaries of the
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conversion tools for those who want to quickly get into hacking
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on LJ65.
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_____________________________________________________________________
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Game controls
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Title screen:
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Start: Show playfields.
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Game over:
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A+B: Join game.
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Menu:
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Control Pad up, down: Move cursor.
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Control Pad left, right: Change option at cursor.
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A: Start game.
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Game:
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Control Pad left, right, down: Move piece.
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Control Pad up: Move piece to floor.
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Control Pad up, down once landed: Lock piece into place.
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A: Rotate piece clockwise.
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B: Rotate piece anticlockwise.
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Start: Pause game.
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_____________________________________________________________________
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Play
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At first, press Start to skip past each of the informational screens.
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Then press Start at the title screen to display the playfields.
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At this point, either player can press the A and B buttons at the
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same time to begin playing.
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The pieces in LJ65 are called tetrominoes. (The word comes from
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tetra-, a Greek prefix meaning four, and -omino, as in domino or
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pentomino.) Each of the seven tetrominoes is made of four square
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blocks and named after a letter of the Latin alphabet that it
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resembles:
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_ _ ___ ___ _ ___
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_______ | |___ ___| | | | _| _| _| |_ |_ |_
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|_______| |_____| |_____| |___| |___| |_____| |___|
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I J L O S T Z
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When you start the game, a tetromino will begin to fall slowly into
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the bin. You can move it with the Control Pad and rotate it with
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the A or B button.
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The goal of LJ65 is to make complete horizontal lines by
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packing the pieces into the bin with no holes. If you complete
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a line, everything above it will move down a row. If you complete
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more than one line with a piece, you get more points.
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As you play, the pieces will gradually fall faster, making the game
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more difficult. At some point, the pieces will fall so fast that
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they appear immediately at the bottom row of the playfield. If you
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fill the bin to the top, to the point where more pieces cannot enter,
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you "top out" and the game ends.
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If you have an overhang in the blocks, you can slide another
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piece under it by holding Left or Right as the new piece passes
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by the overhang:
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_
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_| |
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|___|
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_ _ _ _ _
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_| | => _| | | | => _| | |
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| _| | _|_| | | _| |
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|_| |_| |___| |_|___|
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Or in some cases, you can rotate pieces into very tight spaces:
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_
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_| |
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|_ |
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|_|
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_ ___ _ _ ___ _ ___
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| | |_ | => | |_| |_ | => | |___|_ |
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| |_ _| | | |_ |_| | | |_ _| |
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|___| |___| |___|_|___| |___|_|___|
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_____________________________________________________________________
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Rotation systems
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LJ65 supports two rotation systems, which it calls "Center" and
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"Bottom". Center implements rules more familiar to Western players,
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while Bottom pleases fans of the Japanese arcade tradition.
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In Center, pieces start out with their flat side down, and they
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rotate around the center of an imaginary 3x3 or 4x4 cell bounding
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box. If this is blocked, try one square to the right, one square to
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the left, and finally one square up.
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Up locks a piece into place immediately, and down waits for another
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press of up or down before locking the piece.
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After a piece locks, the next one comes out immediately, but after
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the pieces have sped up enough, the next piece waits a bit.
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Colors match the so-called Guideline: I is turquoise.
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. []. . []. . . . . []. . [][] . []. . . . []. .
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[][][] . [][] [][][] [][]. [][]. . [][] . [][] [][].
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. . . . []. . []. . []. . . . . . [] [][]. . [].
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Figure: T and S rotation in Center
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In Bottom, the J, L, S, T, and Z pieces start out with their flat
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side up, and they rotate to stay in contact with the bottom of an
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imaginary 3x3 cell box. S and Z pieces also keep a block in the
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bottom center of this box. If this is blocked by a wall or a block
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outside the piece's central column, then try one square to the right,
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one square to the left, and finally (in the case of T) one square up.
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Down locks on contact, and up waits for another press of up or down
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to lock. After a piece locks, the next one waits a bit to come out.
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Colors match those from a game with a monkey: I is red.
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. . . . []. . . . . []. . . . []. . . . . []. .
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[][][] [][]. . []. . [][] . [][] [][]. . [][] [][].
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. []. . []. [][][] . []. [][]. . []. [][]. . [].
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Figure: T and S rotation in Bottom
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_____________________________________________________________________
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Scoring
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Use up or down on the Control Pad to drop pieces, and you'll get
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one point per row that the piece moves down.
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You also get points for clearing lines. Clearing more lines
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with a single piece is worth more points:
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SINGLE (1 line with any piece) 1 * 1 * 100 = 100 points
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DOUBLE (2 lines with any piece) 2 * 2 * 100 = 400 points
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TRIPLE (3 lines with I, J, or L) 3 * 3 * 100 = 900 points
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HOME RUN (4 lines with I only) 4 * 4 * 100 = 1600 points
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Making lines with consecutive pieces is called a combo and is
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worth even more points. In general, the score for a line clear
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is the number of lines cleared with this piece, times the number
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of lines cleared so far in this combo, times 100. For example,
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a double-triple-single combo is worth a total of 2300 points:
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2 lines 2 * 2 * 100 = 200 points
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3 lines 3 * 5 * 100 = 1500 points
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1 line 1 * 6 * 100 = 600 points
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When you start clearing lines, the game shows how many lines you
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made in this combo. If you leave a 2-block-wide hole at the side
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of the bin, you might manage to make a combo of 12 lines or more.
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But then you have to weigh this against keeping your stack low
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and earning more drop bonus.
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There are some grandmasters who can get millions of points in
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some puzzle games. There exists a known corner case in this
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game's score computation, and scoring is expected to fail beyond
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6,553,000 points.
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If two players are playing, and you have GARBAGE turned on in the
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menu, and you complete more than one line with a piece, the other
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player's field rises by one or more rows:
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DOUBLE: 1 line
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TRIPLE: 2 lines
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HOME RUN: 4 lines
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This is not affected by combos.
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_____________________________________________________________________
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Keypress codes
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Some of the lesser-used features of the game are hidden so that
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players interested in the most common features don't become confused.
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At title screen:
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* B + Left hides the ghost piece.
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_____________________________________________________________________
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Questions
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Q: Isn't this a copy of Tetris?
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Yes, in part, but we don't believe it infringes Tetris Holding's
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copyright. It was developed by people who had not read the source
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code of Tetris. We disagree with Tetris Holding's claim of broad
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patent-like rights over the game. Any similarity between LJ65 and
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Tetris is a consequence of common methods of operation, which are
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excluded from U.S. copyright (17 USC 102(b)).
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Q: Where's (feature that has appeared in another game)?
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If it's mentioned in the "future" list at the bottom of CHANGES.txt,
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I know about it, and you may see some of those issues resolved in
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the next version. Otherwise, I'd be glad to take suggestions,
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provided that they aren't "network play with no lag" or "make the
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game just like that Japanese game I saw on YouTube".
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Q: Why aren't the blocks square on my TV?
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In NTSC, a square pixel is 7/24 of a color subcarrier period wide
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in 480i mode or 7/12 of a period in the so-called "240p" mode.
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But like the video chipsets in most 8-bit and 16-bit computing
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platforms, the NES PPU generates pixels that are not square:
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8/12 of a period instead of 7/12. Games for PC, Apple II, or any
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other platform with frame buffer video could correct for this by
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drawing differently sized tiles, but games for NES are limited to
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an 8x8 pixel tile grid. PAL video and widescreen televisions make
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the problem even more pronounced.
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Q: Why do some pieces change color subtly when they land?
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The NES's tile size is 8x8 pixels, but the "attribute table"
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assigns palettes to 16x16 pixel areas, or clusters of 2x2 tiles.
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Only three colors plus the backdrop color can appear in each
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color area. So the game approximates the color of each piece as a
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combination of blue, orange, and green throughout the screen.
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The MMC5 mapper has ExGrafix, which allows 8x8 pixel color areas.
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But the only source of MMC5 hardware is used copies of Castlevania
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III: Dracula's Curse and Koei's war sims, unlike the discrete mapper
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boards that retrousb.com sells.
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Q: Who is the fellow on How to Play, and where are his legs?
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Who are you, and where is your tail? ;-)
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_____________________________________________________________________
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Credits
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Program and graphics by Damian Yerrick
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Original game design by Alexey Pajitnov
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NES assembler toolchain by Ullrich von Bassewitz
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NES emulators by Xodnizel, Martin Freij, and Quietust
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NES documentation by contributors to http://nesdevwiki.org/
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Music:
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TEMP is "Tetris New Melody (OCRemoved)" by Am.Fm.GM
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K.231 is "Leck mich im Arsch" by Wolfgang A. Mozart
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_____________________________________________________________________
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Legal
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Copyright (c) 2009 Damian Yerrick
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This manual is under the following license:
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This work is provided 'as-is', without any express or implied
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warranty. In no event will the authors be held liable for any
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damages arising from the use of this work.
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Permission is granted to anyone to use this work for any
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purpose, including commercial applications, and to alter it and
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redistribute it freely, subject to the following restrictions:
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1. The origin of this work must not be misrepresented; you
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must not claim that you wrote the original work. If you use
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this work in a product, an acknowledgment in the product
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documentation would be appreciated but is not required.
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2. Altered source versions must be plainly marked as such,
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and must not be misrepresented as being the original work.
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3. This notice may not be removed or altered from any
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source distribution.
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The term "source" refers to the preferred form of a work for making
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changes to it.
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The LJ65 software described by this manual is distributed under
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the GNU General Public License, version 2 or later, with ABSOLUTELY
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NO WARRANTY. See GPL.txt for details.
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LJ65 is not a Tetris product and is not endorsed by Tetris Holding.
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