February 2002

New Pac Man's All Around
2/27/2002 by K3V

First up is a new release of the original NUON Pac Man, courtesy of Skah_T. Here's the latest additions:

  • Sprite graphics can now be 16x16 or 8x8 in addition to the normal 32x32. The program will auto-detect the size and scale them as appropriate. Since the graphics get scaled down so much anyway this will reduce the size of TGAs. It also makes some sprites look better since scaling a 16x16 image loses less information than scaling a 32x32 one. As a result I have reduced the size of some images to 16x16. (8x8 should only be used for walls, if at all.)
  • Slightly reduced Chomp and enemy scale so that they no longer overlap the walls.
  • Updated "custom.txt" as appropriate.
  • Added a new "metal" wall theme.
    • Also released is an updated version of Atari 2600 Pac Man, which now contains many more levels (well, actually the same level but the game is much longer now). The latest downloads can be found on the Media Page.

    Atari 2600 Pac Man!
    2/23/2002 by K3V

    Tim from the NUON Forums has released a Chomp modification that very faithfully recreates Atari 2600 PacMan on NUON. You can download the file here, or from the Media Page. Here's what he had to say:

    I've created a version of the Atari2600 PacMan game for Nuon.

    I did quite a few mods to the Chomp source to get what I wanted.
    The game is not exactly challenging, but it's a nice taste of that old-school flavor (!)

    Hopefully this will convince somebody to port Stella to Nuon! (hint)

    - Get it here:

    http://www.nevsound.com/Atari2600PacMan-Nuon.zip

    Note: I created this on a Mac (under VPC) so it can be done!

    I'd love to hear how you like it. Have fun!

    So give the game a try and then be sure to head over to the forums and leave him some feedback.

    NUON Pac Man Version 1.2 is Released
    2/17/2002 by K3V

    Skah_T has taken over the programming reigns for NUON Pac Man and has been hard at work putting a bunch of new features into the game. Those who had issues with the last release's controls (via the c-group) will be happy to hear that this release features controls via either the D-Pad OR the analog stick! Here's what else has been added/improved:

    • Split main graphic file into separate TGAs.
    • Added support for custom graphics - see custom.txt for details.
      Every level will select a new set of graphics randomly from the ones available.
    • You can now use the analog stick to control Chomperman.
    • Increased number of Chomperman animations from 3 to 4.
    • Chomperman now uses the same set of graphics for all four directions.
      The program rotates/reflects the image as appropriate.
    • New fruit, ghost and level graphics added
    • More levels added, now up to 37
    You can grab the binary file, PacMan v1.2 or the source, Source. Any artists should take a look at the custom.txt file included in the source .zip to find out how to create levels, ghosts, pills and more to be included in future releases!

    N501 in Canada
    2/14/2002 by K3V

    It seems that Canadians can finally get their hands on a Samsung DVD-N501 without having to get one from the US. Mike Morais, a NUON-Dome reader, reports that "the Samsung N501 is available in Canada (well, Toronto, ON. at least) at HiFi 2000 for $299 Canadian. (They've also got the N2000 at $499 though!) Future Shop may get it shortly - HiFi 2000 had the N2000 a few months before Future Shop apparently, so perhaps Future Shop is just slow in getting the product on the shelves."

    The N501 at $299 Canadian sure beats the N2000 for $499, so if you're a Canadian who's been waiting to pick up a NUON DVD player at a brick and mortar store, now's your chance.

    Glimpse into the future...
    2/12/2002 by K3V

    Just a tidbit of information on the future of VM Labs/NUON from the NUON Forum admin:

    "The chapter 11 auction of VM Labs' assets will conclude by the end of this month. Shortly after that time I hope to speak to the emerging management about their plans for the platform at which time I will make an announcement to the board."

    NUON Emulator v.0.0.3 Now Available
    2/9/2002 by K3V

    The next release of the NUON emulator is now up. You can download it at http://www.tripoint.org/riff/nuonem.zip

    "As promised, version 0.0.2 of the NUON Emulator is available with added support for MV_V and MIRROR instructions. I'm quickly running out of the easy stuff. PUSH and POP will probably be next, followed by ABS. After that, I have no idea. Maybe the non-pixel loads and stores that don't use bilinear addressing."
    Update: The above link now leads to version 0.0.3, which includes PUSH and POP, allowing nested subroutines to be executed properly.

    Emulator Update
    2/6/2002 by K3V

    Riff has updated the NUON emulator with some new fixes and features. Here's the latest:

    Skah_T pointed out an error in the emulator. DEC should not decrement a counter if it is already zero. The emulator incorrectly decremented in this case. This has been fixed. I have also implemented the MV_S instruction so that programs can load immediates (and move scalars). The MV_V and MIRROR instructions will inevitably not be far behind.
    Here's the updated file.

    NUON Emulator Available
    2/4/2002 by K3V

    Riff has been quietly toiling away at getting a NUON Emulator together for the purpose of speeding up debugging for those developing NUON software using the public SDK. Here's what he has to say about the release:

    Although this release is not going to be much fun for most people, the first cut of the nuon emulator is available at the following address:
    http://www.tripoint.org/riff/nuonem.zip

    This is a single step debugger environment only. Only RCU and ECU instructions are implemented. Some sample binaries are included in the zip file. Please read the readme.txt file. This build requires Pentium Pro instructions and at least 48 MB of available memory. Having the SDK is useful but not needed.
    The file has been added to the Downloads section of the Media Page as well.

    Dr. Dobb's Looks at NUON
    2/1/2002 by K3V

    Dr. Dobb's Embedded Systems has published an article which details the dynamic object-oriented language Bob and how it's used with NUON. You can read the article in Dr. Dobb's Journal (on newsstands now), or online by clicking here.