QB Express

Issue #12  ~  July 20, 2005

"A magazine by the QB community, for the QB community!"

In This Issue



From The Editor's Desk

Written by Pete

Twelve issues.

One year.

Wow.

Last August when I started QB Express, I had no idea that it would become this huge and successful. One year later, QB Express has printed more articles than any other QB magazine ever.

And it's not like we just barely surpassed the record set by previous magazines. Every month, QB Express clocks in at between 100 and 145 pages. QB:TM averaged about 40-50 pages per issue back in the day, and those issues were considered HUGE. People that say the Qmunity is dying don't know what they're talking about.

On this special anniversary issue, some major congratulations are in order for everyone involved in the past year of QB Express. There have been over 100 contributors, and I thank each and every one of them. This month, Adigun A. Polack took it upon himself to write two articles congratulating QB Express contributors and legends from the past year. As you'd expect from articles by AAP, they're gushing with fanfare.

This issue isn't just a celebration of the last year of QB Express though -- it's still got all of the regular features and articles that you've come to expect from this mag. We've got six fresh new tutorials and a record twenty-two other articles for your reading pleasure. There's 312KB of text alone in this issue, and every bit of itching to be read. So I won't hold you any longer.

Enjoy this issue, and don't worry -- you can look forward to another great year of QB Express to come! Unlike QB:TM, the magazine which QB Express was heavily modelled after, we're not going to stop after just twelve issues. This is an exciting time for the QB/FB community, and QB Express intends to be here to cover it!

Submit To QB Express

You all know the drill. This magazine can't exist without people SUBMITTING articles, editorials, tutorials, reviews, news and feedback. This is not just a solo effort by me... it's a group effort by people throughout the QB community. If you have anything to submit, or have time to write something, DO IT!

If you want to write about something, but can't think of a topic, or need inspiration, email me! I'm good at thinking of stuff to write about, and I know quite a bit about the QB community and about QB programming. If you're interested in getting your own monthly column or just want to write an article or two, by all means, do it! Anything that is submitted will be included!

I also want feedback and letters to the editor regarding this magazine. I want suggestions and critiques. What do you like? What don't you like? What could be done better? Let me know!

All submissions and feedback can be sent to pberg1@gmail.com. You can also PM me on the Pete's QB Site or QBasic News message forums. If QB Express is going to continue to be so good, YOU need to contribute!

-Pete



Letters

Letter From Lachie Dazdarian

It's been around two months since my last letter and the amount of things/events I wanted to comment and write about accumulated to gigantic proportions. This letter simply had to be written. I need to share these thoughts with others. It's a disease. I already had a letter written about issues #9 and #10 but continuing on that letter would be foolish since that letter was HUGE(4 pages in Notepad, in full screen window mode and in 800*600 resolution) and no one would read it(well, maybe you). Anyway, I'll try to wrap up my thoughts on issues #9 and #10 and mention the things I want to comment the most. I'm leaving the most current comments about issue #11 for the end.

The issue #9. Letters section, gallery and the awards section were excellent as usual. News brief section was brilliant as always and by my opinion, it's the backbone of the magazine. Your work on it is priceless! Space Invaders competition was really nicely featured and fun to read.

anarky's interview with Jorden Chamid was awfully fun to read. It's interesting to see how, by my opinion, Jorden has false ideas about the influence and quality of Future Library. Not all might agree but let's be honest, there aren't so many games made with Future Library compared to other libraries. And the VESA incompatibility. Ugh! I also never found QB45.com to be a community opened to newbies and/or very helpful. The number of files it hosted(and still hosts) is to admire but as of a community I don't have good memories of it. All help and friends I found in QBasic News forum. It's just my personal experience.

Rob Adam's(Deleter) article about keeping your project simple and fun to code was very interesting. He detected that apathy emotion so well and all programmers know it. On the other hand, I don't agree with his concept of making your game the simplest possible because how much over-detailing can be bad so much ruining a great concept with poor graphic and presentation is a shame. But it's nice to see people having a different approach to game design than yourself.

I must thank Vincent Peters for starting his "Writing a simple BASIC Interpreter" series. I thought that writing an interpreter is rocket science. That article was a real eye-opener for me.

Adigun's tutorial about implementing icons to FB exe files is simply great. I like programmers who can detect what pseudo-programmers like me want to know.

I was slightly disappointed with the tutorials section in the issue #9, after the first skimming through it, since I was under the impression of the new version of FreeBASIC(v.0.13) and the huge amount of new libraries it featured. I felt so impotent not knowing what 90%+ of them does nor I found the example programs useful. Although now I found most of the things I need to make the games I want in FreeBASIC, some of you elite programmers, and especially those who ported the libs in FreeBASIC, should take time to write more dummy level tutorials about using those libraries. More documentation, that's what FreeBASIC is dying for.

The issue #10. By my humble opinion, this issue what definitely premature and the update you did on it didn't changed my opinion. I really don't know why you had to release it on the 25th and not 5-6 days later(after you return from the long weekend). The main problem with the issue #10 is that it was released right after that QBasic News scandal, which I completely missed. Comments about the mentioned event couldn't have been written in the worst time since the comments will be completely different, more accurate and constructive only few days later. Now I'm glad that I'm online every 3 weeks or so and had missed the whole debacle. I just felt, reading the comments regarding the event, that most of the people(especially you Pete) went all too apocalyptic too soon. So instead of the regular A+ for editing I'm giving you B+ for this issue and you know you deserve it. Maybe we can all learn something from this. To be relaxed and to the do anything in haste. Haste is evil. :P Then again, I'm might be wrong which I realized after getting online again after 3 weeks(on June 23rd), reading the issue #11 and seeing the serious negative impact that QBN downtime had on the community. Uh, I'm so ambivalent. Still, I think it's a debate why the community is the way it is and what really is the problem. Think about it.

Other than QBasic News related, your other work in news brief, poll, gallery and awards section is great as usual and deserves all the compliments you get. Also, I think that in the issue #10 some of the text that shouldn't have been in bold was(Robert Hambly's AI tutorial and Na_th_an's "Coding A Parallax Scrolling Platformer" tutorial). But maybe that was done for a reason which I failed to notice. Or maybe the page was badly saved on my account(I always download QB Express and read it at home). Not really important.

Rattrapmax6's comic. The last thing I expected from you Rattrapmax6 is to go lower with the comic quality. I mean man, if drawing a comic to you is such a drag do something else. Scanning is ok, but at least try to write a readable text in the text bubbles. It looks like something it took you 30 minutes to do, if not less. I can't appreciate sloppy work.

Na_th_an, 1000 times thank you for starting "Coding A Parallax Scrolling Platformer" series. I was pondering on the idea of creating a neat platform game for quite some time, mostly inspired by great platform engines in QBasic like Space Commando, Fox or Martian Venture but was not keen in doing it all by myself. Now I can leach on your knowledge(evil laugher)!

I couldn't mention all the articles from issues #9 and #10 though I have written the comments on them. I just don't won't to turn this letter into a big drag(if that already didn't happened). Not that magazine contributors are especially needy for my feedback but I know how much I enjoy getting it.

Not about the issue #11. While being brilliant as usual this issue is also quite controversial and you can pretty much guess why, Pete.

I really have to mention the news section again. Sorry, I know you are tired of my compliments but your ability to keep it so great issue after issue amazes me. It always reminds me or informs me about the things I'm completely unaware. The fact I'm so seldom on the internet is probably another reason why I'm so impression with this section. I'm sad to admit that I still didn't downloaded any of QBXL Audio Editions. But after reading about it in the issue #11 back home I'm finally putting it on my to do list. Nice to see that QB45.com is back. I don't know how much I'll be frequent in their forum(it just doesn't sit well with me) but the fact it's updated and will continue to be is wonderful to hear. I just loved their first news after the relaunch. Very funny. I'm really sorry that TBN 1000 Line Platformer Compo failed but I personally never found attractive compos that limit you in the very programming. A lot of more useful news and things to download/check were added on my to do list.

Really nice work in the Gallery section. Made me very curious about The Griffon Legend. Looks like a very cool game. Can't wait for it's release.

Matthew R. Knight's and Gianfranco Berardi's stories about their QB history and life in general were terribly fun and interesting to read and are really something that give this issue that special mark.

Rattrapmax6 kind of pays off for the comic in the previous issue but more in the script department than in the art. PLEASE, try to write nicer in the text bubbles. I feel like you don't respect the people who will read it.

Very nice move with opening Project Updates section. It's nice to keep that kind of news on one place.

Now THAT interview with Sumo Jo, which I think will be remembered as quite controversial. Despite that it was a very enjoyable interview to read and gave me valuable insight on your thoughts regarding the current state of the community and the things that happened with QBN I think it will do more damage that good. Seeing you Pete criticizing someone so openly was quite a shock. Maybe that's just a problem with my subjective impression of you. I always pictured you as super-kind, all-friendly guy who can't comprehend the idea of a negative thought. Not that I force you to be like that but the very interview was, by my opinion, simply too harsh. I'm mainly talking here about your thoughts on Nek. Not that Sumo Jo wasn't equally harsh(if not more) but you as the editor have more responsibility toward the magazine. I just wouldn't like to see the community splitting into clans. I think this interview seriously opens a chance for some people to boycott his or her contribution to the magazine and starting some sort of negative campaign about QB Express. I'm not sure if the current situation in the community is the reason but where are Na_th_an's tutorials in this issue? The ones he announced in the issue #10. I've noticed him in TBN forum so I don't know if you ever had some sort of heat discussion with him about QBN and Nek which might have leaded to this. I sure hope you didn't and that this is not the reason why he didn't contributed anything for the issue #11. Then again, I'm not sure how big friend with Nek his is. Maybe I mixed it all up. As for Nek and his BIG friends/admirers I don't know how much they will be want to submit now. Also, Sumo Jo pointed out in the interview Nek's strange readiness to reopen TBN when QBN was down. This brings a fear in me that he might start releasing his old QB mag "QB ON ACID" again and try to be a competition to QB Express. Having in mind that we are not such a big community and the reason why QB ON ACID would be released again I don't think that kind of situation would be constructive. In fact, it could be devastating for the overall state of mind in the community. There are some other things that I didn't liked in the interview. I got the impression Pete that you think that most people who stayed in QBN forums are boring and not that worthy as the ones that left. I know you didn't thought that but it sounds like that. Not good. Like I said before, I fear that this interview will do more damage than good but I live in hope that most people will take it in good will and like adults.

The tutorials section in the issue #11 is a bit lacking. And I'm not talking about the quality of the very tutorials featured in it. I really think that community needs more FB, novice level, game design oriented tutorials to help us bring more flesh blood and energy in the FB game design scene. Also, there was couple of tutorial series that simply stopped to be released/written. The mentioned Na_th_an's series, Vincent Peters's "Writing a simple BASIC Interpreter" series, 19day's PHP series and couple of others. Some of these definitely stopped to be released while Na_th_an's and Vincent's might be just missing issue #11. I wish this wouldn't happen. Of course, this is not your fault. I'm just stating this sad fact. I must mention Deleter's "Ecosystem Simulation Through the Use of AI" tutorial. Amazing and very educational stuff. Thank you Deleter.

Anyway, that's it(for now :P). I hope everyone will take my comments and critics in good will since they were written in good will. I used the phrase "good will" 3 times in this letter. Well, 4 times now. FLAME ME! :P

Best wishes all,
Lachie "The AWARE Glory Hog" Dazdarian :P

Thanks for the huge letter! You're pretty much the only person that ALWAYS gives *constructive* criticism on QB Express (instead of just being all happy and giving only positive feedback, heheh).

First let me respond to your criticism of Issue #10 for being thrown together in haste and not covering the QBN debacle thoroughly and intelligently. You're right that it was thrown together right amid the QBN scandal when the community was in an uproar. However, that was precisely the reason why I released the issue early. I felt that it was important for somebody to cover the events surrounding the QBasic News shutdown, so I opted to release Issue #10 early while the scandal was still fresh in everybody's minds and everyone was still looking for answers.

I do agree with you that the news coverage was pretty pathetic, but in the "news biz", being timely with a story is just as important as covering it well. Covering old news, no matter how thoroughly and intelligently you do it, just doesn't have the same resonance. However, I can understand why why you have a different opinion, having missed the shut down entirely. For those of us who were there during those few days, it really looked like the sky was falling. Now that everyone realizes we were all Chicken Littles for a few days, we can look back and see how silly the whole matter was in the first place.

But, moving on...

The interview with Sumo Jo in Issue #11 has been very controversial, but I think that your doomsday theories are a bit overblown. QB Express isn't going to lose any readers, and there's only one person who even considered not submitting to QB Express because of that interview (but it was also because he didn't like the formatting / gray boxes in the mag and didn't want his article messed up). Nekrophidius wasn't mad at all about the interview, as you can see by the counter interview he did in this issue. You'll also get a better idea of what I think about the matter too.

What you have to realize is that that "interview" with Sumo Jo started as a private AIM chat. Sumo Jo mentioned that he wanted to post his opinion on the QBasic News shut down in the next issue of QB Express (since Issue #10 put a negative light on the site), and we got to talking about the Qmunity. Halfway through the conversation, after we had made all the disparaging remarks, I asked Sumo Jo if I could just publish that conversation as an "interview" in the next issue, since it contained most of his thoughts on the QBN shut down that he wanted to share anyway. Anyway, you can find the debate on this article, including responses from both Sumo Jo and myself, in this Basic Network thread.

As for your fears of QB On Acid returning and stealing QB Express's thunder...I can't agree with you there either. Personally, I would *love* for that that magazine to come back. First of all, it was a great mag. Very fun to read, and had some unique editorials that you simply wouldn't find in other QB zines. Secondly, I want there to be as many QB magazines as possible -- that's the sign of a healthy community. I'm only doing QB Express to help breathe some life into the Qmunity. I mean, look how many tutorials, articles and reviews are published each month. Ninety percent of those would never have been written if this magazine didn't exist. If more magazines were running, even more articles would be published every month. The goal of QB Express is to get the Qmunity talking and sharing with each other...and if other magazines help me reach that goal, more power to them.

As for your other praises and criticisms, thanks a lot! You were very, very thorough. Hopefully future QB Express writers will take your suggestions into account when they write their articles. (I know I will!)

-Pete

Letter From Na_th_an

Hi there, Pete. As always, congrats for running the best BASIC ezine of all time, without a doubt. Gray boxes/unindented code issues appart, this is one of the things I'm eager to get and read each month.

I'm writing this 'cause I think that some people would like to know my views about the recent debacle and why I am acting the way I am. I have read several statements that don't have to do with the truth at all, I know some people are calling me extremist, colourful or even part of Nekrophidius' sheep, in case of such a thing exists. Also, I'd like to make clear that this letter hasn't been spawned by your conversation with Sumo published in last issue of QBE only.

First of all: I never wanted glory. If there's such a thing as a "QB hall of fame", I don't want nor deserve to be in there. I don't hold a grudge against anybody nor I'm upset nor depressed nor anything like that. I think that we all, sane people, have true lifes outside the internet. But that doesn't mean that I haven't felt trashed.

About March 2001 I arrived to the QBasicNews forums from the VPlanet forums. Someone told me that QBN was much more populated and full of nice people. That turned to be true, and I began hanging around there trying to be helpful. I used to spend a lot of time coding my practical homework for college, so I kept a browser and posted from time to time to have a break. After one year or so, noticing that I kept searching for my own posts and reposting them to help people (who apparently didn't know how to use the search feature themselves, but meh), I suggested Wildcard to add some kind of wiki editable by a few, so we could add answers to the most common coding questions, then link to its entries in case someone asked for something covered in there. Haexadecimal Disaster kindly moded a simple yet efficient piece of software and Wildcard activated it, adding it to the forums. For some time, I dag in my posts to copy the text to the new FAQ, and everytime I answered a new question not covered in the FAQ I always added it as a new entry. My work, plus the work of many other contributors, helped building a good base of knowledge, awesomely organized by Agamemnus (this guy has a horrid coding style, but is an awesome coder and did a great work organizing the FAQ).

More recently, I found that the ABC packets, that huge collection of snippets which helped me learning both QB and MSDOS programming in general, were no longer available online. I thought that, as the packets were stored without compression and using a very simple (yet effective) encoding, it would be relatively easy to create a nice frontend to be able to view those snippets online and download them individually. I used Oracle's excellent GeShi to syntax-highligh the code and wrote the frontend using my humble php skills. I offered it to Wildcard and he accepted and uploaded it, placing a link to it in the forums.

The FAQ, the ABC viewer, and almost 7,000 posts made by me in three years were sent to the dust bin.

Now try to understand how I felt when I saw the QBN closure notice. I wasn't even posting in there, I was in some kind of hollidays from the forum 'cause some people got on my nerves and I began reacting violently, something which I dislike at all 'cause we log into the Internet to have fun, not to get angry. So it was something like "hey, QBN has closed!" in MSN Messenger and me noticing how just the freeBASIC forums were left up "temporally". The best thing of it all is that Wildcard didn't even bother on explaining what happened. His message was just a "I'm shutting this off".

Nice, thousands of bytes of my own work directly sent to shit. Now understand me. I got mad. Luckily, Nek was kind enough to reopen The Basic Network. I still can't understand how people look this action with bad eyes, 'cause he reopened the fucking site 'cause it was needed. He wasn't taking advantage of anything, he was offering people a place to express themselves. When a highly populated and active forum such as QBN suddenly shuts down without further explanations, people feel confused. I felt confused, and discovered TBN was on so I at least had a place to ask what the hell was happening.

TBN was opened some time ago for the first time. When Nekrophidius noticed that it was dead, that nobody but the admins posted, he closed it. When QBN was shut down, he was fast to reopen it. Is that taking advantage of the situation? What advantage? Does the government pay you for having people in your forum? There's some kind of QBN religion, or at least it seems so. Every attempt to open another forum is considered rebellion, or something like that. That's the most stupid thing I can think of, but since TBN was opened for the first time it was considered an attack against the almighty QBN. Attack my ass. Forum wars my ass.

I don't visit QBN anymore 'cause I feel bad when I think about all that happened. Not good mojo. I don't hold a grudge against the forum, as it is a bunch of bytes... it would be stupid to hold a grudge. But I just feel to calm down and ease my mind.

But people like to simplify things. There are some "dissidents", those guys who usually rambled and bitched against admins at QBN. Who are those? Many. How are the ones who shout more? Rhiannon, Nekrophidius, aetherFox, me, followed by some people who, while they disagree, maybe the are not as rude or as mean or as insistent. Who's the one who bitches most? Nekrophidius. Then, every other person who thinks alike does so 'cause Nek "convinced that QBN is evil and he knows all". That's 'cause the bandwagon culture people tends to have. It's easy to think about Nekrophidiusgnan and the Three Musketeers.

But that's not true. Nekrophidius hasn't convinced me of anything. I have my own ideas, my own thoughs and my own opinions. That my opinions very often are in the same ship than Nek's doesn't mean anything but that great minds think alike. There are tons of things upon which Nekrophidius and I disagree. As there are tons of things upon which aetherFox and I disagree, upon which Rhiannon and I disagree, and every other possible combination.

Nor other people who are TBN regulars aren't sheep. I don't think Nekrophidius convinced barok, cha0s, deleter, DrV, Frobozz, Josiah, KiZ, Lachie, lurah, Marzec or SJ Zero that QBN is evil and that they should come to TBN.

Luckily QBN is now being ruled by Sumo. I've always stated that I like his work as a webmaster and I know for sure that he's more than qualified to run QBN in the best of ways. I wish him luck as I do to Wildcard, whatever he's doing and whenever he is. He fucked up QBN with a childish action driven by pure angst, throwing thru' the window more than 5 years of excellent work. But I won't hold a grudge.

Cheers, keep this mag going and keep Lachie's reviews on, I love them. He's a great reviewer and goes straight to the point.

Na_th_an

You know, when QBasic News shut down, I had the same exact reaction as you did -- "how could anyone delete all that work and destroy such a wealth of knowledge!?" Of course, that's coming from someone who had made fewer than 250 posts there and had only been really active in the Qmunity for a year (not counting 1997-2000). So I can only imagine how you must have felt, with 7000 posts, and the FAQ/Wiki and ABC Archives to your name. I've said it before and I'll say it again: Wildcard had no business shutting down the site like he did. He may have owned the server, but he didn't own the content -- and it was totally unfair for him to shut it down without warning. Had he given a few days' notice and offered a copy of the site archives to someone to back up on another server, I don't think anyone would have reacted like they did. Just because he wanted out, he didn't have to take the whole community with him.

As for the Nek interview and the "sheep" thing, thanks for sharing your thoughts. I myself never really considered the TBN people to be "sheep", and I certainly didn't think anyone there worshipped Nek. I agree with you that everyone that has abandoned QBN for TBN feels kind of like you. The QBasic News "experience" was ruined by Wildcard's shenanigans, and now the community that was once there is a shadow of its former self. I do think it's kind of extreme to swear off posting there for good... but I also see another better reason not to post there -- "why bother?" QBasic News really doesn't have much to offer with all the people gone. Unless you're going there for reference, it's kind of ... dried up. It just isn't a fun or interesting forum anymore. And this is coming from someone who still posts there regularly.

-Pete

Letter From MystikShadows

Hi Pete,

I read QB Exress #11 this morning at 5:30 AM sipping my first coffee of the day. House is quiet at that time and it's the best time to soak up everything that QB Express has to offer. One thing I love about the magazine is not knowing what to expect when you first start reading. That's always a good different surprise from the typical computer related readings one gets to do in this world :-). Life really is full of surprises and a magazine that can add to that is a successful magazine. What can I say, QB Express delivers more than what a magazine is required to :-). And like you say in your introduction, it really is a particularly excellent issue. As they say in the X-Men movie, every now and then, evolution leaps forward. Sure they talk of mutants in that movie, but this quote applies to QB Express, I believe. It's evolving quite well and the contributors finding their ideas and writing them now is just proof of that. :-). And as for me being a mod now at QBasicNews, well Sumo posted the "help wanted" sign so to speak, and I applied :-) I guess they liked something about me to decide to make me a mod (what? I have NO idea LOL). But I'm proud to be a mod now, and I'll do my best, that's all that can be expected :-).

I have my own theory as to why GUIs are so popular in the Qmunnity. My first theory is of course people are gettting tired of Windows and any GUI that is similar to it. although the envelope the new releases are presented under look better and better, they contents they have inside the envelope stays the same. Let's face it, sonce 1996, when Windows 95 came out (that should tell you something right there ;-) Windows didn't really change much, it just broadened itself to reach more and more stuff (internet, document, gaming world, etc etc) All in all, Windows is still an Icon based system where you either double click on a file or on an application and start using it. I believe people are waiting for a breakthrough GUI that can really revolutionize the world as we know it. As such they are always hoping someone makes something that just works better. I really wish one representative from ATI and one from nVidia (and a couple printer manufacturers too) would get to read this. Windows isn't what it used to be. Alot of hardware vendors are now sold to Windows so to speak and I think they are sealing their faith with that, not their success. Over the years I've seen some great ideas and concepts dissapear (OS/2 being the more popular alternative (it's not a mainframe only product, and BeOS too has dissapeared completely). I always say if Windows was the real solution, people wouldn't be developing GUIs and I'm not just talking the Qmunity either. :-). windows is shooting itself in the foot, especially with all the trials they have to go to for copyright enfringments and all, but also by the fact that they seem to want to give users less and less control over their system. No user likes that cept the ones that have no idea what goes on in the windows registry.

As far as the Magazine contents go, I have to point out that I think I'm gonna enjoy the "Searching For The Unknown" series alot. It's very true that alot of games, tools utilities and others really don't get the recognition they deserve today or deserved back then. I think it's an excellent initiative made by Lachie Dazdarian. Also, The interview with Sumo Jo was interesting to read :-). I don't agree with everything that was mentionned about Nek however and I had to point that out :-). At least I don't agree with the fact it was mentionned in an interview with Sumo Jo. Maybe, if you can, you should have an Interview with Nek in the next issue ;-). I guess different people have different opinions about users. Nek an I represent the older side of the Qmunity (with a few others ;-) and with my dialogs, emails chats I've had with Nek weather for a project or for a simple conversation, my opinion of him is not the same as yours and Sumo's :-). Nek is blunt, no two ways about that, but aside that, I didn't recognize Nek in the little I've read about him in the interview. None The less, the interview was a good read, again some great points were made and I think it answered alot of questions alot of users had about QBasicNews and it's future. :-).

Like I mentionned in my previous letter to the editor, A.I. has always been a personal favorite subject of mine so needless to say, I really enjoyed "Ecosystem Simulation Through the Use of AI" by Deleter I really like his perspective on ecosystems and how he explained it for all to read. Great work there. Take a popular or hot Item in the Qmunity and put it in a horse humor comic and it's amazing how much better the comic turns out ;-). Good choice of subject Rattrap :-). I liked Moneo's view about "Data Validation Implementation" some good points were made in his article, you can tell research was put into this article :-). Pyrodap's tutorial on Roguelike RMG couldn't be better timed since there is the Roguelike Compo going on. Great timing on that and the tutorial was a good read :-). As for the Commercial and Professional development Series well they're mine so I guess it was good ;-). a 6 part series coming to an end, what will I write about next? ;-) Stay tuned to find out. There's definitaly more on the way ;-).

All this to say that all in all the whole Magazine took, yet again, a big leap forward and you, and the contributors are all to thank for that. Everyone knows the Qmunity wouldn't be where it's at if it wasn't for QB Express today. So shut up and take the flowers when we throw them at you man. Or i'm gonna be on the plane to where you are and i'll make sure you can't part with them ;-) LOL.

-MystikShadows (Stéphane Richard)

Great letter again! Your enthusiasm for QB Express every month sure is flattering. :-)

While I agree with you to a degree on your "why QB programmers love GUIs so much" theory, I'm not sure if the real reason is that people are getting "tired" of the Windows layout. The reason I say this is -- the vast majority of QB GUIs I've seen have been Windows clones! In fact, there have been dozens of them where the name is a derivative of "Windows"... Windos, Windoze, Win-Doze, Windoof, WinGUI, etc. You get the point. I think the majority of QB GUIs just copy established GUI formats, whether from Windows, Mac OS or some other OS.

Also, thanks for the suggestion that I interview Nekrophidius. As you can tell from the table of contents, I did just that this month. But... I'm going to refrain from typing my thoughts on this issue again here, since I've already done it a half dozen times in this issue and I'm sure everyone's getting sick of it!

-Pete

Letter From Kevin D.A.G.

Dear QB Express, Pete, and mostly Lachie Dazdarian,

Kevin D.A.G. here. (Creator of Astral Worlds)

Thank you, Thank you!

I really appreciate the listing, review, and upgrade of my game engine. I know it’s sort of a weak program but I’m happy to hear that some enjoyment could be found in it. I made it as an example of what could be accomplished in Q-Basic for my twelve year old brother. I’m not much of a programmer but more of a bored hobbyist. Thank you both for all the time and effort spent. I especially enjoyed reading the game overview and Dojoepa walk through. I promise to submit a new, more stable program that I’m currently working on. It’s a two player dungeonering card game. It will be in raw basic, so I could really use the help to make it an Exe. File.

Thanks again.

A true fan of your page and work,

Kevin D.A.G

Thanks for the kind words! Lachie's "Searching For The Unknown" column is one of the best things that we've had so far in QB Express in my opinion. After all, if he didn't write it, the majority of our readers would have never even heard of Astral Worlds.

-Pete

Have a letter for the editor? Send all your rants, raves, ideas, comments and questions to pberg1@gmail.com.


Express Poll

Every issue, QB Express holds a poll to see what QBers are thinking. The poll is located on the front page of Pete's QBasic Site, so that's where you go to vote. Make sure your voice is heard!

What was the most devastating QB site shut down?

Shut DownVotesPercentGraph
QBasic: The Magazine (1999)48.2%
QBT50 (1999)12%
QuickBasic RPGs (2000)36.1%
Pete's QB Site (2000)714.3%
Enhanced Creations (2000)12%
NeoZones Productions (2001)510.2%
QB45.com (2002)714.3%
Darkness Ethereal (2002)612.2%
QBasic News (2005)918.4%
Other612.2%
49 Total Votes

Now that the Qmunity has recovered from the traumatic QBasic News shutdown in May, I thought I'd bring up some of the other "devastating" QB site shut downs that have happened in the past. There have been literally thousands of QB sites on the Internet over the past ten years, and most of them have lasted for only a couple years at the most. If there's anything we know about the Qmunity, we know that it's certainly not constant. The QB scene ebbs and flows, routinely switching forums, watching beloved websites come crashing down while fresh new ones sprout up and replace them. And somehow, every time a major QB hub comes has an unexpected closure, people panic and declare that the QB scene will never recover. And as we know, it always does.

Nevertheless, I thought it would be interesting to look back over the years and find out what everyone else felt was the most devastating QB site shut down. After all, with ever QB site that goes down, the Qmunity loses something that will probably never recover, whether it's simply content, or a bustling forum community that will never truly be restored. When the votes came in, the recent QBasic News shut down came in first (predictable, since it was fresh in our minds and also the only shut down that many of the QB scene's newer members remember). Justifiably, QB45.com's 2002 crash came in 2nd, tied with my own site's abandonment in 2000. Other top vote getters were QBasic: The Magazine, NeoZones Productions and DarkDread's RPG group Darkness Ethereal. All of these sites had a strong and lasting effect on this community, and old QBers look back fondly on the golden days of these sites. It's a sad fact that the wonderful communities that inhabited these sites, and their pages upon pages of interesting content had to disappear into cyberspace. But don't worry -- what the stood for, the QB/FB community -- is here to stay.



News Briefs

News from all around the QB community, about the latest games, site updates, program releases and more!

QB Site News

QBasic.com Scare

QBasic.com had a few days of downtime at the beginning of the month, which stirred the site's regular visitors into quite a frenzy. Meanwhile, the shutdown ignited talks of squatting the covetted domain name among many opportunistic webmasters. Many people saw the "loss" of QBasic.com as a devastating blow to the Qmunity, while many others said "good riddance", glad that we were finally rid of the decrepit haven of broken links and outdated software that would invariably greet new QBasic programmers when they looked up "QBasic" on the Internet.

Anyway, it turns out that the ruckus was all in vain, because QBasic.com didn't shut down -- it just switched servers. The same old site is back up at http://www.qbasic.com . Take note of the "www." in the URL -- that's required now. If you want to see what QBasic.com looked like during its downtime, just visit http://qbasic.com.


FB Wiki Almost "Complete"

FreeBasic's official documentation, the FreeBasic.net Wiki, is nearing "completion." Only a handful of commands are still missing entries. However, just because almost all the pages have had *something* written on them, they are by no means thorough. So all you FB coders out there -- get off your butts and add to the Wiki!


One Man Army site reopens

Apparently one QB/FB site just isn't enough for SJ Zero. Now in addition to QBXL.net, SJ has re-launched the site for his game "company", One Man Army Games. The OMA development page is for his programming projects, while QBXL is for the "editorial side of things".

The funny thing is that he announced the creation of the site by saying: "it's time to drop any pretenses and just create a site dedicated to One Man Army Games and the various projects we're working on.." Sounds like a contradiction to me, but I'll just pretend like I didn't catch it. :-) Anyway, visit the site to get Quest for a King or Star Phalanx or Rambo vs. Kitty Cat (pictured to the left), if any of them strikes your fancy.


QB45 Keeps Updated

Over at the recently-relaunched QB45.com, Jofers has been keeping things fresh. The site gets regular QB news updates, all written with a healthy dose of Jofers' offbeat humor. Plus he's added a few dozen new programs to the File Downloads section in the past month, all of which he's highlighted on the front page. So... QB45.com and Jofers -- for your efforts, I salute you with a solitary clap. (Clap!)


Redesigns! Redesigns!

This month, two relatively new QB sites have had major redesigns. First, Jacob Palm's GUI site JacobPalm.dk got a fresh new design, featuring brighter shades of blue and an overall more eye-pleasing appearance. Spiffy!

QBasic Network, anarky's site, also got a redesign. Instead of the Blue Steel layout that many people detested, he switched the site to the Microsoft Frontpage "Highway" template. In addition to the new look, anarky relaunched "Blobworld Comics", the comic strip that Seph used to do before he left the scene. The thing I find unique about the QBasic Network redesign is that now this site doesn't have a single trace of "QBasic" content on it. In fact, anarky removed the QBasic forum from the site entirely. Meanwhile, there's quite a bit of FreeBasic stuff. Wouldn't "FreeBasic Network" be more appropriate?


Fling-master Passes On RPG-Dev.net, QBRPGs.com

It seems that Fling-master is gradually pulling himself out of the QB RPG scene, letting his wide collection of RPG programming websites switch to new ownership.


A few weeks ago, Fling-master posted the following message on RPG-Dev.net, his multi-language RPG coding site:

As you may have guessed, not much is happening with this site. It's not that I've lost interest in the site, it's just a lack of motivation combined with other projects on the go, combined with not a lot of free time for all of them. So, I'm cutting out a few projects, one of which is this site. So, that being said, if you would like to own this site AND are willing to put forth the work to keep it going (you MUST have proven PHP/SQL experience and be into RPG development of course... need to make sure that you CAN continue to run the site and that you are at least interested in it heh), then reply to this topic and we'll talk about it further.

As of right now, nobody with the proper credentials (ie: their own server) has volunteered to take over the site, so if you're interested, drop in at the RPG-dev.net forums and plead your case.

In other news, Fling-master has allowed the QBRPGs.com domain name to expire. That means that all of the sites that we used to access through a QBRPGs.com address -- QBRPGs.com, The QB RPG Top 50, QB Chronicles Magazine and Jocke The Beast's site -- are now only accessible through their alternate addresses on the QBasicNews.com server. Jocke The Beast has spoken to Fling-master about acquiring the domain name himself, but at the moment, QBRPGs.com points to nothing. Hopefully this will all get sorted out soon, and the hosted QBRPGs sites will get restored to their normal, *working* selves.

Update at the last minute: Well, it appears that Jocke has already moved his site to a new host -- Plasma's PhatCode.net server! You can now access his site in all its glory at: http://jockethebeast.phatcode.net/


FBTK Roguelikes Compo Marches On

Probably the most popular QB / FB competition of recent memory, the FBTK.net Roguelike Competition has continued to thrive this past month. You can find out all about it at the Rogue Compo Forum, which contains an official rules thread, a "messy discussion" thread and threads for many of the individual teams that have entered the competition. This month, there have been a few demos released, and a lot of discussion has gone on. I'm not gonna even begin to try to sort out and summarize it all. If you're interested, visit FBTK.net to check it out for yourself. Maybe next month we'll have a feature story about the competition that will cover it more substantially.


Project News

Star Phalanx for... Xbox?

Indeed! SJ Zero managed to compile and run his space shooter Star Phalanx on Microsoft's popular (and x86-based) game console Xbox. Check out the *photographic evidence* to the right. To my knowledge, this is the first time anyone has managed to run a FreeBasic game on an Xbox.

What does the future hold for FreeBasic and Xbox? I don't know, but it sure does look promising.

You can read all about SJ Zero's experiment in this thread.


Lachie Ports Rel's Pixel Scrolling Engine to FB

Lachie Dazdarian has released a FreeBasic port of RelSoft's impressive QB pixel scrolling engine which he created to demonstrate the power of RelLib a few years ago. This could be a very useful start for a wide variety of FB games.

Lachie said: "I've notice quite few people, including me, having problem switching to FB so to help myself and others I decide to port this lovely engine and heavily comment it. It uses GFXLib 2 graphic statements and Eric's FB PUT file loader(Pixel Plus 256 standard file format). You can create any kind of ZELDA style game in it, from an action game to a RPG."

The package comes complete with all the features of RelSoft's original, plus a lot of Lachie's own additions such as a lot of PP256 support. Also, you'll find two compiled demos by Lachie to show off his work. Download this useful package: FBScrollEd1.zip, and then check out Lachie's forum thread to find out what's in store for future versions and how you can help him out.


FreeBasic Joystick Support, Courtesy of AAP
Adigun Azikiwe Polack released a program that supports up to simultaneous four game controllers in FreeBasic, with up to sixteen buttons each. In case you're wondering, Xbox controllers and many other modern gamepads have 16 buttons, so Adigun's routines could be very useful. You can download this program here.

Unstable/Testing FreeBasic v0.14b Released

The title says it all. V1ctor announced the latest beta release of the FB compiler on July 16th. "The Windows version can now be used to compile and link DOS, Linux and Xbox apps (including the compiler itself for those platforms), if the proper GNU binutils for cross-compiling are available. " Yummy.


Robo Raider 3D Motion Test

Rattrapmax6 is working on an updated 3D FreeBasic version of his QuickBasic game Robo Raider, and a few weeks ago he released a 3D test program that shows off one of the new polygonal robot models that will appear in this game. In the demo, you can drive around the Radio-Controlled robot from a fixed camera perspective. Nothing especially impressive yet, but it's nice to see that Rattrap's got some cool stuff in store for us in the future.


FBIde v0.5 Features Announced

VonGodric's FBIde v0.4 is widely considered to be the best for FreeBasic, but the next version will be even more impressive. VonGodric announced the new features in this topic... and here they are:

  • Full debugging support
  • to enable/disbale the sub/function only view ( Yes to hide all other as in QB's IDE )
  • Add function/sub Tree view
  • Bookmarks
  • Full project support -project templates, settings, ...
  • Advanced global ( in all files, project, ... )search
  • Support for automatic upper/lower/mixed case for the keywords.
  • Write real FB syntax parser for scintilla ( so far I'v been using modified VB's parser )
  • Support for single instance of FBIde ( instead of opening new IDE for every file that is loaded outside of teh FBIde )
  • Documentation
  • Help support, costomisible Help menu
  • File history
  • Support and SDK for plug-ins, but that's a bit utopic right now... or not?

VonGodric also mentioned a possible Linux port sometime in the future. You can find out more about FBIde at the official website: http://fbide.sourceforge.net/


LoKing's Dungeon Maze Generator

Roguelike programmers take notice: LoKing has released a very nice random dungeon generator for FreeBasic, which is available on his website. I could definitely see a quality Roguelike game being made from this engine. It generates very large maps, and also has a map-view feature that keeps track of which areas the player has visited. In an updated version, LoKing added a 3-level light radius feature that can make the dungeon even more dark and scary than it was to begin with. Nice!


Power ASCII Lib by Rattrapmax6

Rattrapmax6 has begun work on a FreeBasic library that will "get some of the FreeBasic graphic commands as ASCII text, then some effects text commands!" So far, the commands include:
Graphics -- ACSII_INIT, ASCII_LINE, ASCII_LINEB, ASCII_LINEBF, ASCII_PSET, and ASCII_CIRCLE,;
Text Display -- ASCII_ALIGN, ASCII_TYPE, ASCII_ATYPE , ASCII_FADE and ASCII_AFADE.

This reminds me of Nekrophidius' old Useless Sock textmode "graphics" library. You can check out Power ASCII Lib in this thread, or just download this early version directly from his Rattrapmax6's website.


Three More Demos at The Junkyard

RelSoft has updated his website, Genso's Junkyard, with three spectacular new demos based on these tutorials. The demos look great. Here are some screenshots:


Check out all three of the demos: Ascaris (An undulating fake tunnel) , Jejunum (Camera based movement inside the PQ torus) and Peristalsis (A torus and a PQ torus with fake textures)


Neo MD5 and Image Alteration/Effects Libraries

Neo Deus Ex Machina has released early versions of two new libraries:

The First FreeBasic MD5 Implementation
Well... just like it says. Contains a routine you can use to digest a message of any size to 4 UINTs (128 bit checksum). Note that this will most probably not return the same checksums as e.g. the PHP MD5() because of the different startup values used (called Magic Numbers in the algorithm). Also note that the download on Plantasy seems to contain an older (inoperational) version.

FreeBasic Image Alteration and Effects Module
A nicely sized library containing routines to alter and modify BSV images in memory (PUT compatible). Contains most functions you could think of and probably some you didn't think of. Note that some functions are multi-usable, suitable for different purposes, so don't think it's missing something until you know what all routines can do. It contains a test program that takes some sample BMPs and executes each routine on 1 different way on them. (There's a lot more than the output shows tho). Usually considered very complex for the ones just taking a look at it. It isn't very suitable for realtime rendering either, more for preprocessing.

What are you waiting for? Check 'em out!


Wallace Software wishes you a Merry Christmas

Wallace of Wallace Software announced that his anticipated QB shooter Contact 2 will be released on Christmas Day of this year. In recent weeks, Wallace has done some updates to the game's engine, including making "it a little bit more gruesome. Now enemies die in more than one ways, if they are killed with a pistol then they simply fall to the ground, but a rocket will cause their bodies to explode and spray blood all over the place, pretty cool."


Lithium's Phone Dialer

Lithium posted a very interesting FB phone dialing program at FBTK recently. Here's the story:

The phone at my home was broken in the way that the buttons wouldn't make any sound, so we couldn't call out -- so I wrote a program that dials for the phone.

I just looked up the frequencies for each button on the internet, made wav files for each and wrote a quick little FB program to dial the numbers.

You just have to type in the number, hold the reciever up to your speaker, and press enter.

Talk about ingenuity! If you're living in an area that still uses old-fashioned, tone-based telephone systems, you should check this program out. (Click here to download it.)

The Griffon Legend Released

After only about two months of development, Syn9 has released the final version of his FB action RPG The Griffon Legend (which I previewed in the last issue).

In this issue, Josiah Tobin has reviewed TGL for us, plus Syn9 has gotten some other recognition from QB Express for this awesome game. :-)

The Griffon Legend is the first finished RPG written in FreeBasic...and I'll get straight to the point: this game rocks. I implore you to check it out. You won't regret it. In my opinion, this is the best FreeBasic game that has been released to date.


Xerol Bombards us With Shooters

In the past month, Xerol has released at least two different demos of two different shooters (of sorts). The first is called Bombard, which features you shooting bouncy balls through a bunch of rotating squares. This was an unfinished entry for one of SJ Zero's FB coding competitions a while back. (bombard-0_2.zip) The other shooter is called ... Shooter. It's still in its early stages, but Xerol's planning on finishing this shooter sometime in the future. Check the FBTK thread for more info about the development of this game. (shooter.zip)


Other News

Hear QBers Sing!

Aetherfox has begun a music "Cover Competition" over at The Basic Network where participants challenge each other to sing and play a song in a certain style, such as "Nekrophidius, I challenge you to sing a high energy Japanese pop song or Anime intro!" or "I challenge Aetherfox to sing any song performed by David Hasselhoff.". So far, Aetherfox, SJ Zero, Na_th_an and Cha0s have taken the challenge. So if you want to hear these guys stretch their vocal chords and show their...ahem...talent, check out the thread. It's an interesting thread to say the least.



QBasic GUI News

Written by Jacob Palm

I feel like writing an article. In fact, I really like writing articles. So, I'm gonna write you an article. Or, in fact, more of a news brief. Although QB Express already has a news brief, this one will only have GUI-related news. Below you'll find some information about new (and upcoming) GUI releases, GUI pages and everything else going on in the QBasic GUI community. So, I'll just get to it right away.



It looks to me like the QBasic GUI community is really starting to blossom, right now I can think of 7 GUI pages. When I started my GUI page in February 2004 I only knew of 2 pages. There are not many GUI's still in development, but the few ones that still are being developed looks great. I think maybe if more GUI tutorials were available more GUI's would be developed. But maybe that's just me :) Anyway, I'm currently working on a tutorials series on GUI programming in QBasic. Maybe I'll submit them to QB Express, so keep your eyes open ;)

Well, I don't have much more for you this time. I hope you liked it, though it really nothing special. I just felt like writing something, so, well...

Visit Jacob Palm's GUI site at http://www.jacobpalm.dk/


Gallery

Written by Adigun Azikiwe Polack

For that past eleven issues of QB Express, I've taken it upon myself to write the Gallery article. This month, however, we have a guest writer. Adigun A. Polack sent me a full already-written gallery article for his upcoming game Wetspot 10th Anniversary Remix, and I couldn't resist. Considering that I didn't have any game submitted yet for the gallery and that Adigun did such a great job on his own article, I present to you: this month's official QB Express Gallery article!

-Pete

Wetspot 10th Anniversary Remix

As we are now nearing the 10th anniversary of one of our most fondly beloved (and even greatest, too!) QB classics of all time, let us celebrate this by taking you back in the day in such grandest style possible! And the newest upcoming game entitled “Wetspot 10th Anniversary Remix” is just the perfect thing to do it!!! Are you really ready for this? !

You know, ever since I have actually been granted special permission by the game’s original creator Angelo Mottola (aka lillo) for me to make the new additions to the original Wetspot game ever since it has first been ported successfully from QuickBASIC to the rather hot FreeBASIC compiler from this past January of 2005, it has become such an absolute GRAND honor for me to work on one of the most powerfully splendid QB classics indeed, all as a surefire way of thanking him on such outstanding work he has done on both the game itself and the port thereof!! =b

And, just take a good whiff at *plenty* of the new awesome screenshots that are gonna be implemented for this very special edition of this classic QB game in FreeBASIC!!!


Now, for this 10th Anniversary Remix edition here, many of its classic game features will be faithfully retained, plus a dash of PLENTY of great new stuff that players everywhere are gonna really be shouting about in such sheer fun and excitement, including:



Also, this new game combines all of the original excitement of Wetspot from 1996 with some cool features of Wetspot II from 1998, but with much better stuff than ever, I must tell ‘ya!! And I promise you, there is an extra-special surprise for those who think they can clear the game with all 21 of its original levels beaten, so stay tuned!!



Things that I plan to add to truly put the icing on this splendid anniversary cake here are the game’s true ending sequence, some new cinemas, and a lot more new sound coding and some other stuff to code for this one. So far, the completion of this game is over the 60% mark already, but if it gets done at last and all goes smoothly well, then expect this game to be released somewhere in (or just before!) 2006, just to ring in this most special anniversary of one of our most immortally precious QB relics of all time in FB!!! d==b


Just think of all this as a bit of Super Mario All-Stars in a sense, too, you know what I mean? Anyway, this will hold you *very* nicely until Wetspot III arrives!!

This is Adigun Azikiwe Polack, out!

Visit the AAP Official Projects Squad, or get the original QB versions of Wetspot 1 and Wetspot 2.


Searching For The Unknown
Trek by Brian Watson, 1998

Written by Lachie Dazdarian

Introduction

Welcome to the second edition of Searching For The Unknown column. I'm not featuring Star Trek: The Capture in this issue as a promised. Unfortunately, this game ended up being too untested and buggy for my taste. I just hate when a game contains bugs that seriously influence on the plot development or the gameplay. The very designer of the mentioned game admitted in the documentation that he didn't find time to completely test his game(play it through). How nice. Taking wild guesses why I can't finish some part of the game, wondering is it because of the bug or me, I find very unappealing. Star Trek: The Capture might appear in one of the next issues but I doubt.

As you see from the title, this issue is dedicated to Trek by Brian Watson and it's a complete coincidence that this game happens in the Star Trek universe too. While I was cruising through my last scoop of games downloaded from www.qb45.com I've found 3-4 very good candidates for the column. Trek was one of those games and since it appealed to me the most I've decided to feature it in this second edition of the column.

About Trek

Trek is, as it's designer calls it, Star Trek strategy turn based simulation and that's probably the best description of the game.

It's quite obvious that Trek isn't a result of an ambitious project since it doesn't feature a lot of content. Trek also isn't a very polished game though it's bug free, well coded and features balanced gameplay. It does have that mini-game charm but you'll notice more the places where the game looks unpolished.

Trek is not your typical turn based strategy game since you only control one(1) Federation ship while other Federation ships are computer controlled same as enemy ships. The objective of this game is very simple. You must destroy all Klingon and Borg ships on the level map and when I say "you" I'm referring to the entire Federation fleet. You are just a small wheel in the whole battle machine and that's what about Trek gameplay really is. Game controls are very intuitive and are done by mouse. You move your ship with right mouse button while with left mouse button you perform a function. You have seven function at disposal: set phasers, set torpedoes, ram, dock with a base, show map, pass a turn and self destruct. By moving the mouse cursor over any ship or base in your vicinity you can check it's status.

Both sides, Federation and Klingon, have bases and by docking on your bases you can repair and rearm your ship when needed. Playing Trek is pretty much consisted of attacking enemy ships, getting back to a Federation base for a quick fix(:P) and getting back to battle again. You fight against enemy ships with phasers and torpedoes. Your ship can carry only a limited amount of torpedoes and they are, of course, more powerful than phasers. All ships are equipped with shields and armor. When your shields are down your armor will decrease with enemy hits and your ship systems will receive damage too. Your shields are restored in each turn but can't go above the armor strength. If any of your systems gets heavily damaged you won't be able to shoot torpedoes, your phasers won't be effective, your crew will start to die and similar, depending on the damaged system(s). So once your shields are down get out of the battle! All this applies to other ships as well(Federation and Klingon).

Trek's graphics are average. The game is coded in SCREEN 12 mode and the designer didn't show any interest to work with more than 16 colors. Ship sprites are ok, as much they can be in 16 colors. I mean, they function perfectly in this game but they sure won't get praised for their quality. I did disliked the look of Klingon base which in the chosen graphic style should have been done better. Also, Borg cubes simply look wrong with them purple lines and they are too small compared to Federation and Klingon ships. If the designer took some trouble to code so that a Borg cube fills 4 sectors and decided to work in 256 colors Trek would look much better. Other objects that appear in the game are only suns and they are nothing but yellow circles. I don't want you to get the impression that the game graphic is bad. I'm just saying it leaves so much space for improvement. I wouldn't like to see someone making a remake of Trek and not taking that minimum effort to advance the look of the original.

Trek features nice sound effects, mostly speech messages which seem to be made with some sort of speech synthesizer. The game really benefits from having sound effects though some silent and non-intrusive background music would be cool too.

Since I already explained how the game is played I should say something more about the very gameplay. Like I said before, in Trek you only control one ship while other 15+ Federation ships are controlled by computer which makes you feel very insignificant in the whole conflict. The game is consisted of 10 levels and each level ends when all the enemy ships(both Borg and Klingon) get destroyed. A cool thing is that Borg attacks both Federation and Klingon ships. By destroying enemy ships and bases you get better ships with better shields, higher number of torpedoes and similar. If you destroy Federation ships you will get demoted and get weaker ships. I should warn you that your torpedoes can hit friendly Federation ships even if you have aimed one toward an enemy ship. A Federation ship mustn't be in your line of fire if you are shooting torpedoes on an enemy ship. Suns can also block your line of fire(this rule only applies on torpedoes).

There is four classes of Federation ships and you start with a class 2 ship. You will be mainly worried about getting "kills" in order to be promoted and to get better a better ship. Your ship is pretty much powerless against two enemy ships unless they are class 1(or class 2 if you have a class 4 ship) so you will be mostly attacking in groups. Once the enemy ship is damaged it will try to escape the battle in order to reach his base to repair. Federation ships follow the similar if not the same tactic. You will also find yourself in situations when you are heavily damaged and are trying to escape from 2 or more enemy ships. In these situation you won't hesitate from luring enemy ships onto another Federation ship so they would leave you alone and pick on another prey. A very cowardly and low thing to do but the only way to survive in this game. Don't get me wrong, the gameplay is highly addictive and fun just the whole way of playing the game feels weird. You will very rarely feel that you have participated in the final level victory and when you reach level 10 you will so wish you could somehow control the other Federation ships. I won't reveal it more but you won't like it.

Trek is one of those games which easily could have been so much more. Brian Watson was definitely on to something with Trek gameplay since this is a very fun game to play. Too bad he was not interested to expand it on so many possible ways. Trek would really benefit from things like a save game option, highscore/kills counter or send orders/messages feature. Emergency messages when in bad situations and ability to give orders to other Federation ships once you get promoted to class 4 ship would be so cool. And finally, the ability to play the game in the classic turn based strategy mode, where you control all the Federation ships. Still, how much we miss these things while playing Trek so much these flaws leave us, game designers, space for a BETTER remake. And that's another reason why I'm featuring this game. If you are looking for an idea for a new game Trek might help you. Or not. Not important. If nothing else, this game will definitely provide you several hours of top notch fun.

Final score
5/10

Download: trek.zip

Run the INSTALL batch file first(unless you unpack the game in c:\trek directory) and then run the shortcut(RunMe!.pif).

That's it for this issue. Hope you enjoyed my article and will try out Trek. For the next issue I'm preparing something special, Lunatix. I think Na_th_an will especially like this game. ;)

I hope I'll be able to submit it before my summer break. I won't be able to get online during the summer(well, it's not very convenient) so I won't be able to submit anything from around middle of the July till somewhere in early September. Cheers!

Visit Lachie's site, KENTAURI.


The Hidden Art of Game Development

Written by SJ Zero

OK, now forget everything.

The *hidden* art of game development.

Today I'm going to let you onto the secret of how I manage to get game engines with art popped out in 24 hours for the QBXL competitions. It's such a simple secret, that the only reason you don't know it yet is that it's too simple.

Stop creating complex worlds with super complex, interrelated, interlocking systems!!

I know what you're thinking next: "But if I don't have super-complex, interrelated, interlocking systems, I can't make a game!". You're dead wrong. In fact, I'm a little disappointed in you. You should really know better by now. How long have you been programming? How often has the most painfully complex and experimental design been the most correct one? Do you use fractal linked lists to draw a sprite? Do you have built-in software to dynamically create all your textures? If not, why would you want to write a 100% accurate physical world simulator laced with AIs and metaphase bilateral pulse regulators?

That last one was made up, by the way.

The answer has stared you in the face if you've ever played a game for more than five seconds: Cheat. Make something that acts just like you'd expect it to, and that's more than enough to fool a gamer into thinking you've got some sort of big-ass behaviour system under the hood. Not that most gamers really give a damn! These are the same people who enjoyed Pac-Man. Do you think there was a lot of high level physical world simulation in that? Maybe if you're a raver, but otherwise there isn't much simulation involved in a game of Pac-Man.

The original Grand Theft Auto would play quite happily on a 486, and if it's all you had, it would play on a 386 a little slowly. Neither of these had more than 16 megabytes of RAM. Do you think that DMA Design modelled every person in the game world realistically, choosing way points, giving these individual people hopes and dreams and ambitions?

NO!!! They didn't have to! Once they left your screen, you stopped caring about them! The only reason you would care about a pedestrian is when you decide to run them over. The same happened in The Elder Scrolls: Daggerfall. Unless you're asking for directions or killing some guy to rack up experience and slaughter guards, odds are you really don't care that Celestia Tubthumpington painstakingly walks from her home at 7.00h to her workplace, The Groggy Sportsman, where she serves an average of 14 customers (who independently arrive at her shop) before she leaves at 20.00h! These people can appear randomly, follow simple rules to appear to be living their everyday lives, and nobody needs to care. Except you, because you just stopped yourself from accidentally coding a world simulator where you could have coded a game.

The same goes for space simulations. Unless you happen to be creating the next Astro Battle, odds are you don't need to individually model each booster rocket. Complex models for rockets? Why not save that CPU time for something useful? The same goes for car games. Unless you're planning on creating Gran Tourismo, odds are you won't have to model the traction of four tires to realistically react to the conditions below it. For an overhead 2d racing game, being able to move forwards, backwards, and turn left and right is a pretty damn good start. Even if you DO decide to use a complex driving model, that doesn't automatically mean that every object in the game world has to be capable of pulling a hand break turn only to be hit in the side by the car behind it. Only your car needs to be able to do that!

Imagine an RPG with great AI, capable of defeating you quite easily given the tools to do so. Would that REALLY be so fun? Given the balancing difficulties, would it be more fun than an enemy with a few powerful attacks who chooses them randomly? Would it be more fun? Would it be so much more fun that you want to get into complex AI routines just to pull it off? The final fantasy series Final Fantasy cheats and simply has a random set of complimentary attacks which it fires off at mostly random times. Is this less acceptable than telling your enemies to make complex decisions?

In platform games, Mario's dirty little secret is that his jump doesn't correspond to the laws of physics. I know! Difficult to believe! His enemies follow pre-established patterns which are so simple a beginner could have coded them! Don't hurt me! I speak only the truth!! The important thing is, rather than being a complex system of physics around which the game play is designed, there is no physics, and it's all just game play. And you are completely oblivious. Why? Because the game works the way it's supposed to.

Next time you're reading an article about volumetric fellatio shaders with scalar Von Godric compensators, or fully fleshed out NASA level AI to tell your space invade when to shoot, just ask yourself: "Do I really need to have this to make my game convincing?"

You may find the answer a bit suprising.

Visit SJ Zero's QBXL Magazine.


Behind the Screens: Interview with Dr.Robo

Written by Rattrapmax6

Here is a different type of interview, it features characters from the games itself... Maybe something more enjoyable from me for this mag. How ever far I can take this before I run out of game characters I can gather information on, I dunno. Anyway, here it is.. Enjoy.. hopefully...

^_^

-Rattrapmax6


Rattra: Today I am with Dr.Robo from the simple Robo Raider game. So, Dr., tell us about yourself..

Dr.Robo: Well, I have four years of Robotics Engineering, and Archaeology. I been using both skills in studying old ruins, and places that are hard for the average man to go. As you know I hire people to be my Robo Raiders, just because I build robots doesn’t mean I'm too skilled at driving them.

Rattra: Right,.. What’s the story behind the whole dislike of crashed robots?

Dr.Robo: Well, as much as I put into them, its very heartbreaking to seem them get destroyed. And I refuse to employ anyone that crashes one of my hard works!!!

Rattra: How much work goes into these bots?

Dr.Robo: Allot! I have to custom machine most of the parts I use. The motor, radio equipment, tracks, and cameras I can buy. Almost a month or two designing and building these robots. And they aren’t cheap, Scorpion in the end is worth over $1000, and the Dill-Bot well over $1500.

Rattra: So, one crash can really hurt your wallet I see,. Does a Robo Raider build any points as they go, I mean, if they go years without a scratch, you’ll just drop them over one crash?

Dr.Robo: Normally I don't keep the same Robo Raider for that long, most are just part time help, and soon leave for greater things, or what they consider great. To each their own.

Rattra: So, what’s your favorite Robot?

Dr.Robo: Ah, that would be, Super Bot, Scorpion’s big brother so to speak, but over all in use, Scorpion.

Rattra: What happen to Super Bot?

Dr.Robo: It lays deep below the earth in hundreds of pieces *cries*, It was the first case of faulty piloting in which I fired.

Rattra: What made Super Bot so special?

Dr.Robo: It had the functions I now have in two different bots.. An over head crane (Scorpion) and a grapple (Drop-Bot).. This made it more versatile.

Rattra: What Robot was the hardest to fabricate?

Dr.Robo: Drill-Bot, getting the drill to work, the camera to see, and the claws to work right was a great challenge. I think I might sew if someone crashed that machine.

Rattra: Yeah, I remember that one, looks like a concrete drill bit with tracks... Do you plan to make another bot soon?

Dr.Robo: Yes, a two piece bot. A track bot that carries a submarine bot. This will expand my exploring range past land and into wells and rivers in underground caves.

Rattra: What will you name that one?

Dr.Robo: Sub-Tracker maybe,. but I haven’t made any solid thoughts on it.

Rattra: Oh well, I’ve probably taken too much of your time by now, and I’m out of things to ask, so I’ll wrap this up.

Dr.Robo: Yes you have, but no, I enjoyed the talk.

Rattra: Right..

Dr.Robo: Thanks..

Rattra: For finally leaving you alone, or for the interview?

Dr.Robo: Both..

Rattra: Heh

Visit the x.t.r.GRAPHICS FreeBasic Site or get Robo Raider.


Review of The Griffon Legend by Syn9

Written by Josiah Tobin



Well, where to start...

I suppose this is a somewhat anticipated title, even more so as it is developed almost entirely by Syn9, known most for his extremely impressive 3d demos. While this particular game is indeed 2d, Syn9 certainly doesn't let that stop him. The moment you encounter the first boss, a strange nearly cactus-like dragon-- bringing back memories of Zelda 3's Moldorm yet somehow being completely different as it bobbles and sways dangerously to and fro-- you catch a glimpse of just what the game is capable of.

The Griffon Legend makes extensive use of a chain-like style of animating large monsters (the 'proper' title I'm not sure of, though I've come to know it as bio-animation), linking many smaller sprites together to form massive, rather fearsome bosses and mini-bosses. Without revealing too much, I will say that if you think you've seen it all after the first boss, you are most definately quite wrong.

However, despite such impressive techniques, the rest of the game's graphics are at times somewhat... confusing. While some of the tilework certainly shows the skill of Syn9's capable hands (though there are some that seem a bit thrown together), it often becomes far too busy-- more than once I found myself wondering just why I couldn't leave the screen when it looked very much like I should be able to, or pausing for a moment to 'decipher' a room. Sometimes there is almost no difference in appearance between a 'high' floor and a 'low' floor, making it seem like there is simply an invisible barrier between the two.



The game's sprites do the job fairly well; while being nothing too flashy they certainly aren't dull either. Everything that isn't done through the chain-style of animating mentioned earlier is well enough animated; standard four-frame walk cycles and usually as many attack frames. Your character attacks by leaping forward and doing a mid-air flip with his blade out, effectively lunging at the enemy in a whirling ball of feathers and steel.

While I'm on the topic of characters, I might as well elaborate. There really isn't that much character development or even any other griffons or friendly characters in the game apart from the one you play, but to be honest that's really not a problem. I have a feeling the focus of the game is to be a fun experience, not to have an overly deep or compelling plot and characters. The only hints of a story you receive are in the intro and outro of the game, but they are sufficient to let you know what's going on. Both are fairly well-written, and while I did spot an error or two, they get their point across quite well, especially the ending.

There's nothing bland or drawn-out, really-- the moment you start a new game you are presented with the short intro text and are then immediately plunged into the game without further dialogue or hinderances, and left alone to battle your way past your foes, the Dragons. While some spots may seem a bit difficult, I never had too much of a problem after a few tries. Apart from a couple screens that are devoid of opposition, the action never really stops, so you can be assured it's far from a boring experience. However, such an approach does have its flaws. There were a couple rooms that seemed a bit crowded, reminding me slightly of some of the more... chaotic rooms of the later dungeons in the original Zelda for the NES. Of course, it's a small complaint really, hindering the game only slightly and occasionally.

I cannot comment on the music, as my computer's sound is currently not working all too well, so I can't say much about that aspect. However, I quite enjoyed the game without it, and if it's at least half-decent then I'm sure it will only enhance the experience.



Now, moving back to the more technical aspecs-- the actual mechanics of the game: For the most part it's simple. Below your character is a set of three (two at first, actually) bars: Health, Attack, and Magic. The 'attack' meter fully depletes itself each time you attack, and slowly charges back up again immediately afterwards. (it recharges faster as you gain levels) The higher it is, the more powerful the attack. The same applies to the magic meter, except for spells. The spells themselves are executed flawlessly; after beating the first boss you receive a crystal-- now, I'm not exactly sure of the usage, but 'using' this crystal (used just like a spell, which I'll get to in a moment) in either different areas or around different enemies (as I said, not sure exactly) causes you to 'find' spells. There are four spells in total, each of them quite useful. Be sure to discover them all! To cast a spell, you simply access the submenu (pausing the game) and choose your spell. You then choose your target (play is still frozen at this point, likely so the action doesn't get too chaotic) and select it to cast the spell, at which point the game resumes. Each spell has a meter that charges up after each use; you may only use the spell when this meter is full. This, coupled with the more general magic/attack meters, adds a good dose of strategy.

The game has its more subtle touches are well: when all its fellows are killed off, a single enemy can and will attempt to run from you and hide feebly in some protected corner of the map, only resorting to a futile final brawl when you approach to finish it off. Indeed, for the most part the enemy AI is quite well done, with the exception of some bosses-- as long as they do not posess ranged attacks you can usually 'trap' them by getting them up against an obstacle and hiding on the other side, repeatedly pummelling them with spells until they succumb. However, given the difficulty of the later bosses and mini-bosses, this often seems to be more of a blessing than anything.

As one final gripe before I conclude this review, I'd like to address the load time at the start of the game. The moment you open the .exe, you are presented with a small dialogue box in the center of the screen with a green bar inching its way across; I say 'inching' because it truly does seem to take an overly long time for such a game. Perhaps it's the .OGG soundtrack I never got to hear, or the sound effects, or even perhaps the initialization of the subtle graphical effects like the ambient fog or transparent flame that some of the stronger foes occasionally belch. Regardless, it is a bit of an annoyance, though thankfully it is the only load time in the entire game, and the rest of the experience is seamless.

While not being the longest game around (somewhat of a mini-rpg really, I beat it in roughly a couple hours), it offers a good chunk of some classic gameplay without any needless droning cutscenes or overly flashy bits. Of course, it's not the most polished game, lacking enemy death animations even for the larger baddies and bosses (which can look a bit odd at times, suddenly seeing them wink out of existence without any transition whatsoever) and posessing a fair share of bugs-- nothing too serious, though-- but it all has some sort of charming appeal. Maybe it's just me: perhaps it's the use of the wonderful chain-like animation, or the fact that the main character is a sword-wielding, tail-bearing griffon knight, or the direct and to-the-point gameplay... But regardless of personal opinions and preferences, I can see this becoming a fairly popular little game among the community. Despite its flaws, Syn9 has created quite a fun and entertaining experience.


Graphics:
Sound / Music:
Gameplay / Fun Factor:
6/10
(didn't get a chance to hear either)
8/10


Overall rating:
7/10
You can download The Griffon Legend at syn9.thingie.net.


Why Doesn't The QBasic Forum Ever Make The QBasic News?

Written by mennonite (and others)

Despite six years of inactivity, QBasic.com still has an extremely active forum community, one of the most active in the QB scene. Its popularity can be attributed partially to the constant stream of visitors filtered to the forum from QBasic.com (still one of the most visited QB sites -- and number one on all the search engines), or its high search engine ranking in its own right (#6 on Google for a search of "QBasic"). But high search engine ranking is just a part of its popularity. The unique culture and QBasic programming-centered discussion keep people coming back to The QBasic Forum.

And yet, despite the constant posts and huge number of visitors, The QBasic Forum barely ever makes it into the QB Express news briefs ... there's simply not much newsworthy going on at the site. I wondered why this was. How could such an active, programming-centric community produce so little? This month, mennonite, Mac (the forum administrator) and the rest of the forum commmunity answer this question.

-Pete

i was talking with someone about the qbasic forum, and they were actually curious why there wasn't news from there, so as usual i wrote an entire article about it. for those who are curious, here is an article describing the forum...

and it's possible the purpose of the qbasic forum isn't really understood... that is, we aren't developing any big games or anything. for one, we aren't there to be developers, which isn't to say we don't have them. we get posts from relsoft, shadowwolf, z!re, and drv. jacob palm posts regularly unless i'm mistaken. (there are two "walrus"'s that post on the forum. goo goo ga joob.)

so what's it like in there?

well, ildûrest says there are 100 kinds of people there... "those who know binary, ... those who love programming but don't know binary quite yet, those who are willing to give it a go but probably won't get far enough to learn binary, and those who aren't going to learn anything because we do their homework for them. We like the first 3."

of course, it's where all the newbies come to, because if you type in "qbasic.com" you get the ancient site that we can't update (which i think is just as well, since it works on every browser on the planet) that leads you to us. this has a huge impact on the content and theme of the forum.

if you're looking for game-dev stuff, we mostly have newbies making their first rpg - which i think is cooler than cool... but it's possible i'm in the minority. i love helping newbies... i mean, newbies are the only people that eventually become programmers, get it?

whether any of this is "news" per se is really a matter of opinion, but we do have posts about everything. mac knows archaic system stuff even i don't know, i know a fair bit about dos, sometimes i'm amazed what i know about dos that they didn't know (i take it for granted that some of them really know everything.) and michael calkins knows asm, but yeah, it's a more humble site, that's what i like about it.

michael originally came in (i'd say more as a novice than a newbie) for help with a few things and stuck around for the community and amusement. (he's probably one of the most patient people on the forum too, he's a fantastic guy.) as he's mentioned, our love of qbasic is something that brings us together.

as far as the atmosphere, we've got no shortage... some of us even get an image in our minds of a clubhouse, coffee shop, or (personally,) a giant living room: it's got crappy old carpet, as opposed to new carpet that you can't get comfortable on anyway, where a bunch of people are hanging out and eating pizza and playing video games... and some of the geeks in the corner are working on some project. (damnit, i wish i had a pizza.) actually this sort of echoes computerghost's description of a walk-in tech support office: "Newbies walk in and get information then leave and come back next time they have a problem. When there are no people to help, [we] chat around snacking on junk food around the lounge."

we talk a fair bit about small fun projects, (which are usually smaller than the regulars are capable of, but we aren't really pushing for anything.) we get posts about errors and guis and games, and we have a sub forum for magazine info and other forums that pete posts to whenever the new qb express comes out.

but what we've always focused on is "how to write QBasic programs", not the programs themselves, but the techniques etc. that are appropriate to QBasic.

not too long ago, someone came in with a homework question, which we have a policy against unless the person has already shown an attempt. mac, our moderator, explained this policy. in one of the greatest qb quotes of all time, the poster replied something like "okay, i've got CLS. now what the fuck do i do?"

mac deleted it of course. i'd rather be able to use language like that in our forum, but i understand. lots of kids come in, too.

actually mac helps the forum the most by doing two important things: one is that he helps keep the forum uncluttered by occasionally nudging us towards the appropriate sub forum when we get way, way off topic. (he thinks i don't appreciate this, but it makes it easier to follow the threads, and it keeps the place looking nice and more like home.)

the other thing he does that's really important is he basically stays out of the way. he posts challenges and participates in some of our discussions, which is great, but it would take you a while to even guess he's the moderator. it probably takes a fair bit of restraint (more than i have) to not put your own two cents in on every post you agree or disagree with, but he's got it. the upshot of this is the forum feels like it's unmoderated, which is nice. but it isn't unmoderated, which is nice too.

so this is probably a lot more than you expected to hear anyone say about the forum: our big tech support office, as it were...

except for the difference, computerghost points out: "Instead of being paid, we have to pay rent for the office building. But that's okay. We enjoy doing it."


* Thanks to everyone from the forum who helped with this article. *

Visit The QBasic Forum or mennonite's site.


Reflections on QBasic.com

Written by NEWKid

Hi. I’m known as NEWKid on the Qbasic forum. I was the one who originally discovered that Qbasic.com was down and then when it went back up, I discovered it again. I guess I’m among the last people to actually use Qbasic.com frequently, so that’s why I am always the first to notice things about it. I don’t really like it when people talk about how much they hate qbasic.com. Even though it hasn’t been updated since the late 90’s, it still has some nice information and loads of downloads (no pun intended). And besides that, without Qbasic.com, how would new people (like me. I’m still quite a newbie.) find the Qbasic forum, which is still active. That’s how I found the Qbasic forum. So, I guess it still serves a purpose. And now, with out further ado, (its “ado”, right?) here’s the story of all my experiences with Qbasic.com!

Discovering Qbasic.com

Before I had the internet, I had to go to my brother’s house and get on his computer to access the internet. Then this March, I had been programming in QB for almost a year when I came across Qbasic.com. It didn’t take me too long to realize that it hadn’t been updated for ages but I notice that the forum was alive and well, so I posted on it. Basically, my post said that I loved QB and that I didn’t have internet access so I wouldn’t be back for a while (You can go and see that original post.) So, around two months later, we finally got internet access and the very first site I visited was Qbasic.com. I downloaded all sorts of programs from the files archive on QBasic.com and ran them on my old DOS computer. (which I soon wouldn’t need because a few days later, I downloaded Qbasic 4.5 from a site somewhere.) I eventually killed that computer because I put a bad program on it. The people on the forum never really went to Qbasic.com , but nevertheless, I went there daily. After a bit, I even made it my homepage!

The day that was lived in infamy.

And that is the reason that I noticed that it shut down first. I tried to get on the internet, but when Internet Explorer opened up, the first thing I saw was the “could not find server” message. So naturally, I assumed there was something wrong with my computer. But I connected and disconnected and did it again and again in fact, I even restarted my computer several times. But it was to no avail. At some point, I decided to go to another website and it worked that time. So I surfed the internet for a while before I decided to go to Qbasic.com and it still didn’t work! Then instead of typing the URL in, I tried Googleing “Qbasic” and clicking on the link to Qbasic.com that it inevitably provided. It still didn’t work! I tried accessing it several different ways, but I soon realized an awful truth, a truth that I thought for sure I would never have to face, a truth that was simply to horrible to even think about: Qbasic.com was shut down! I immediately put a post of the Qbasic forum. Here’s how it goes:

“I just tries to get on to Qbasic.com and no matter how I try it, It still doesn't work! I wonder if it got shut down! Qbasic.com is actually my homepage so whenever I turned on my internet browser, the message saying that it couldn't get to the site came up, so I just assumed that my computer was broken, but I eventually discovered that it wasn't. Maybe its just my computer. I would like other people to check on it as well to determine if it is just my computer or not. Tell me if you can get on it because I honestly can't!
May the Force be with you!
-NEWKid”

So bp posted back saying:

“its definitely down”

Then I posted once again:

“I know it hasn't been updated for a while, but I still LOVED that site! All of the downloads! I never downloaded everything like I wanted to! Those were good tutorials too! Fortunately, I got all of them already. It was the original Qbasic site! How could this be! This is a sad day for all QB programmers.
-NEWKid (In mourning)”

Then after that there was a flurry of posts that I couldn’t keep track of. Many thought that it would just come back online in a few days or weeks and would be upgraded! And even after the original thread was over, the subject kept popping up again and again in later threads. After several days, the subject interested less and less people. I don’t think a lot of them really cared about it anyway. Honestly, I wasn’t nearly as upset as I let you believe in those posts. It wasn’t like Qbasic in its entirety just decided to cease its existence right there! We still had the Forum, we still had Pete’s Qbasic Site, we didn’t lose anything that important. But I wasn’t kidding, I really wanted to get all of those downloads! Qbasic.com did have its upsides: without it, how would new people find the Forum? That’s how I found it, remember? And it still had some really nice tutorials! That Mallard guy must have worked his rear off for those Tutorials (although, I have seen much nicer Qbasic tutorials)! But for the most part, nobody gave a horses rear-end. Including me.

And that’s the way it was for several days. Discussion of the subject had totally ceased. We thought we were finally rid of Qbasic.com. We were wrong. Once again, it was me who made the next significant discovery about Qbasic. I accidentally clicked on it in my favorites list and before stopping I thought, “What the heck! Why not!?” so I continued, and lo and behold! Qbasic.com was back! So much for the “upgrade”! It was the some old Qbasic.com that we all grew to love (when we were new) and then eventually grew to hate. As for me, I don’t really know what to say about Qbasic.com. On one hand, it has lots of nice downloads, good resources, and it brings people to the Forum which hardly anybody would go to since it comes up either ninth or sometimes even tenth when you Google “Qbasic”, but on the other hand, I hasn’t been updated since the late 90’s, most (all?) of its links are dead, and no one has any idea what happened to Mallard, so when you email him an important question, it never gets to him. Whether I like it or not, I will continue using. Kind of like how a lot of people hate Windows XP, but they still use it.

Hopefully, someday Qbasic.com will be updated and made better. Or maybe, it will be shut down for god, and someone else can take that domain name. It is quite a shame that a domain name like that is wasted on an old dilapidated site. You don’t even have to Google “Qbasic”! A lot of people will just assume that there has to be a www.qbasic.com some where! So whatever happens. It appears that Qbasic.com is here to stay for a while. So we’ll just have to live with it! Don’t like it? Deal with it!

Happy coding, y’all!

-NEWKid, aka Nick Warren

Visit NEWKid's Website or The QBasic Forum.


Review of Pixel Snake Gem Hunt! by Steven Danglis/My Pet Robot

Written by Adigun Azikiwe Polack

Ever since FreeBASIC first came out late last year (2004), there have sadly not been very many new games released through QuickBASIC itself. But thankfully, few and far between are some really good new games in QB that are suddenly thrown into the spotlight and show their *truly* amazing colors to make players wanna come back to them over and over and over again! And Pixel Snake Gem Hunt! by Steven Danglis/My Pet Robot is one of the highly-promising ones right here, BUT, is it really as good as it looks? Keep reading now and find out!


G A M E • S Y N O P S I S :

When this game is first running, you are instantly taken to a pretty cool-looking title screen and (if you run the game with sound!) are greeted with a some notes of simple chiptune-like music along with a robotic-like voice telling you what the name of this game is called. Press a key then, and you got five options to choose from, including a two-player “Versus” mode, a single-player “Practice” mode, and an opportunity to configure your keyboard controls for both players.


Now, once you have selected your game mode, you then have a choice of five (5) stages to select from, including Mud Flats, Grasslands, and the “experts-only” Ancient Ruins stage, to name just three. Once you decide here, the gem-hunting season is on!!

If you can remember the classic 1990 QB game called Nibbles by Microsoft (and I’m sure a *whole lot* of you do!! ! ), then you should know what you are in for right here. But this time, you are met with monstrously giant-sized playfields in which your snake(s) initially have plenty of breathing space. Also, instead of numbers, you have four different colored types of gems, which are these:


In the “Versus” mode, the object here is to win all six (6) games against your opponent in order to become the top snake of them all!! To accomplish a game successfully, you must make deviously blocking paths for the opposing snake to collide on (just think of that famous lightcycle scene from the movie Tron, and you know *exactly* what I am talking about! =b ). The only way you can get a “draw” game, however, is if both snakes collide head-on with each other, so please be very careful about that! ! Also, do keep in mind also that some of the gems themselves — especially the purple ones — can even alter the whole outcome of the game itself, with some shocking results ( )!!

For solo players, it is recommendedly a good idea to try out the “Practice” mode first to get you into the taste for the real thing! You have unlimited lives in this mode, which is necessarily a good thing in itself for what this mode is designed for, really!

In both modes, the added challenge (and even a major obstacle as well!) is that the playfield slowly gets shorter and shorter as time elapses more and more, so be wary of that also!



T H E • B R E A K D O W N :

First and foremost of all here, the idea and concept of Pixel Snake Gem Hunt! is *really awesome* stuff up front. But as you are playing the game though, picking up the the pixel-sized gems can sometimes be a hit-or-miss affair, making play a little frustrating at times. BUT, if you got a really sharp eye and careful keen instincts, you can gather them up more easily. It will take you some number of play-throughs to get used to it, believe me.

About the graphics, the problem I had with them is that they have an awful lot of dithering in them, especially in some of the digitized pictures, making them look pretty drab and boring at times. They could have truly been a lot better, with a lot less dithering and a few more amounts of custom colors to make the graphic details more and more realistic. On the plus side though, some of the graphics do look good, like the Mud Flats and Dungeon stages, for example.

The keyboard-based play control in this game is pretty good, but not great. It will take some time at first to get you used to the controls, but hey, once you got it all nailed down pat, then there is plenty of fun in store for you right here!

As for the huge playfields in this game, it can be both good and bad in a way, and here is why. While they themselves can present much advantage for the snakes to slither on, it can also make for quite a few bouts of frustration in the later stages if you are not even prepared for them. For example, when first starting the Ancient Ruins stage, this puts you in a sort of a *rather* small maze at first, just itching to get out and into tons of open space! ! Strong chances are that you will likely end up crashing and crashing into walls A LOT before you get out of that maze into the large space indeed where big points and other bonuses await you in the clear (warning: plenty of skill and extra-long patience is desperately required for this very task!). Fortunately though, from the earlier to later stages, I think they are balanced in a way in terms of the design of them, and they are pretty interesting in a way, too! I even liked the Grasslands stage where you have to avoid the three people in order to make your way through. Very nice!

If there is one MAJOR plus in this game I can think of, it is the player’s location marker, something that apparently *no* Nibbles-based clone in QB or FB has ever done before, and it is so masterfully used to great extent. What this does now is that it keeps close and accurate track of where you are so that you will never end up lost in your own trail at all, even if the game is paused by pressing the “ESC” key during play, too! I absolutely love it, and I personally think it should be implemented in all games of this kind in both FB and QB, I most strongly believe!!! d==b !


As for the sound effects, they are so *amazingly* good for a snake game fresh from good ‘ol QB! ! It puts you right in the thick of things here, and sets the mood well! The robotic-like voice even lets you know how much time is left, too. I think all of this is a VERY effective use of QB’s limited .wav capabilities, in my humble opinion.

Despite some misses here and there, I believe that Steven Danglis/My Pet Robot has done a very good job on this game. He stated in the game’s documentation that he has only tested the game on Windows XP Professional, but I have tested the game on Windows ME, and yet the game worked so marvelously well there as well!! =b So apparently, it should work on any operating system, even pure MS-DOS, too! Also, you can choose to play the game without sound as well, which is another plus even for people trying to get the game to work properly. Still, a pretty fun game overall! !



T H E • F I N A L • V E R D I C T :

7.2/10

This game may not be the best Nibbles clone around, but it sure has some truly interesting concepts, inventively challenging stages, very large playfields, really fun sound effects, good control, and well-thought-out play modes to boost this game really much above average! Nicely done on this one, Steven! =b !

Download Pixel Snake Gem Hunt, or visit the AAP Official Projects Squad!


The Evolution of Graphical User Interfaces

Written by Stéphane Richard (Mystikshadows)

INTRODUCTION:

Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs for short). One of the hottest topics today in the Qmunity. In my letter to the editor in this issue, I gave my vision as to why I believed GUI development was so popular and those reasons even goes beyond the Qmunity itself. The first official GUI was released back in 1973 by Xerox and since then, the competition has been on to bring forth the best Graphical User Interface to the users. GUI development is far from a new idea and still today GUI development is still a popular topic in the community and beyond.

In this article I'll review the GUIs that really made their marks in the GUI timeline. as well, will talk about their strong points to give you an idea of what made these GUIs as successful as they were when they came out. For all of you wanting or thinking about creating a GUI this should prove very informative. Note that I'll only be convering the commercially available GUIs of the time periods or this article would turn into a whole book.

The Xerox Alto - 1973

The Xerox Alto was the first system to hold everything typical of a modern Graphical User Interface. At the time it was more of a collection of Graphical DOS programs that worked with a mouse. But it did however bring out the main characteristics that are still in use in today's Graphical User Interfaces. When you booted the Alto you ended up at a command prompt, not an interface however any programs available were mouse driven and featured lists, buttons and other GUI elements we all know and love today. When you think of the year it came out (1973) these applications were well ahead of their times. The link shows screenshots of the Xerox Alto and it's operating environment in detail.

This system wasn't available to just everyone, it's niche market was the big corporate world but it was a breakthrough in the way software would be cre