Playtesters Wanted for Angband NDS Port

Playtesters Wanted for Angband NDS Port

September 29th, 2006, 23:07 Posted By: wraggster

onigiri posted this:

Hi All,

I'm in the process of porting Angband 2.8.3 to the DS. I picked 2.8.3 because it was the version I played the most when I was in school! The port is in a state where I think the game is playable (I've played a few hours and died plenty of times).

As such, I'm looking for some play testers before I release it. It is pretty much a straight port and only uses the top screen. I wanted to retain the same tactile feel as the original, so touch screen entry, virtual keyboard on the touch screen are all out. All the commands have been remapped to button presses. Some commands have become multipurpose to accomodate the lower number of buttons. For example the inventory command is used to eat, use an oil flash, wear equipment etc.

I mostly made this port so that I can play Angband on my DS lite. I have a G6 lite, so Angband plays entirely out of GBFS and SRAM. I didn't want to play angband with something sticking out of the slot. It shouldn't be difficult to add fatlib so that the port supports carts without SRAM (if there is demand). The other good reason I went this direction is that the port generally works in an emulator, which is much easier for me. The port seems to work well in no$gba and dualis. The sram support doesn't work in these emulators, but it's possible to use the snapshot features.

Requirements
o A DS capable of playing homebrew.
o A flash cart with 64KBs of SRAM. I'm not sure how large the save files get. If they start getting too large, I should be able to zlib compress them to fit.

Features
o High score list saves to SRAM
o Save file saves to SRAM
o subpixel rendering font by Sylfurd
o All commands remapped to DS button combinations. Buttons generally have similar functions. ie x button for inventory, x+RSH for drop item, x+LSH for take off item, LSH+RSH+x for destroy item.
o Implemented console style text and numeric entry.
o Implemented console style selection for menus.

Possible Enhancements
If I have time, I might add some additional features to the port.

o I was thinking about using the bottom screen as an informational screen. It can be toggled to show a zoomed map around the player (normal large sized font with colour) and a screen that describes the available key combinations.
o Remappable buttons in game.
o Port the newest version of Angband.

If you're interested in play testing, send me a message. Only prior players for now please. I basically need people who have different types of cartridges and who will play different types of characters to test their playstyles. I'll have a build ready in a few days for those interested.

For more information and downloads, click here!