Keen: Modding

EDIT: I went to the keen4 engine with its built in imf player, so the TSR music is not a problem any more and changed the title.

Hi eveyone I just discovered this amazing modding comunity and started to make a mod using keen3. The game will have nothing to do with commander keen, because it is a port from a demo i made for game boy.

SO I made a cute level, added some mods to the tiles and tested it on pcem (a pc emulator that emulates a specific cpu).

The game works even on a 8086 8 Mhz with ega or vga and the 640Kb of ram.



I don't know if it is a pcem bug, but the changing palette patch is working partialy on 8086, the green mountain and the sky are still in the original ega color.


This one is working on an emulated 286, suuper smooth (I think 30 fps) and the palette patch is fully working.


Thanks!

I don't know anything about hardware, but does your emulator emulate soundcard hardware that can play the .mid music? I don't know if TSRMusic needs more speed or memory than the platform offers, or if its code uses some instructions not supported by the 286 processor. I know my reply is quite useless but I mainly wanted to say I love the way that mod looks, can't wait to play it. I hope you will replace the collectiables (I know it's an early screen still). Welcome to the Keen modding community.

KeenRush wrote: ↑Wed Jan 24, 2018 4:43 am I don't know anything about hardware, but does your emulator emulate soundcard hardware that can play the .mid music? I don't know if TSRMusic needs more speed or memory than the platform offers, or if its code uses some instructions not supported by the 286 processor. I know my reply is quite useless but I mainly wanted to say I love the way that mod looks, can't wait to play it. I hope you will replace the collectiables (I know it's an early screen still). Welcome to the Keen modding community.

Thanks, I wish I still had my old pc to play this on it :).

hi Mills and welcome to the forums,
the cute sprite and new tileset and look very juicy. a very happy snappy world. concerning your hardware issue: it might be best to talk to keenmaster486. he knows a whole lot about low end hardware stuff.

Nisaba wrote: ↑Wed Jan 24, 2018 3:35 pm hi Mills and welcome to the forums,
the cute sprite and new tileset and look very juicy. a very happy snappy world. concerning your hardware issue: it might be best to talk to keenmaster486. he knows a whole lot about low end hardware stuff.

It looks like I have no pernissions to contact keenmaster486, the web tells me to log in again and never works.

By the way, as there is a lot of stuff about modding, I'm a bit lost, so I'll ask another question.

Can I patch the keen3 game to make something like a minigolf? (this would be another project)

I mean, disable gravity to make a top-view game, in which the "player" is a ball that bounces against some tiles. And also some not-solid tiles, push the ball in a direction (left,right,up,down) acting like slopes but in a top view perspective?

I saw a lot of patches that alter sprite speed, but I don't really know how to use them.
The most difficult part, I think, would be to made the top view slopes, I think I could change gravity direction if the player touches certain tiles, or something like that.

Thanks.

oh, well... I forgot to mention. pckf.com is an additional Keen related forum where you can reach out for keenmaster486. of course you'll have to create an account first. my bad!

let me point your attention towards our KeenWiki as well, especially the patch section: http://www.shikadi.net/keenwiki/Category:Patches there are tons of solutions for many ideas/issues.
concerning your question: yes, it is possible to change the gravity values / create something more top down feeling and looking. but I'm the wrong person to generate answers to this kind of question. but we have some wonderful people around here who are more capable to handle such tasks. KeenRush and Commander Spleen know a lot about Vorticon patching, but of course - when it comes to unconventional patching - our beloved and venerated mastermind Levellass is the one who knows all the magic tricks.

Nisaba wrote: ↑Wed Jan 24, 2018 10:18 pm oh, well... I forgot to mention. pckf.com is an additional Keen related forum where you can reach out for keenmaster486. of course you'll have to create an account first. my bad!

let me point your attention towards our KeenWiki as well, especially the patch section: http://www.shikadi.net/keenwiki/Category:Patches there are tons of solutions for many ideas/issues.
concerning your question: yes, it is possible to change the gravity values / create something more top down feeling and looking. but I'm the wrong person to generate answers to this kind of question. but we have some wonderful people around here who are more capable to handle such tasks. KeenRush and Commander Spleen know a lot about Vorticon patching, but of course - when it comes to unconventional patching - our beloved and venerated mastermind Levellass is the one who knows all the magic tricks.

Oops.. I can't believe it.. I thought they were the same page lol.

I always thought Keen required 286 minimum. Surprising to see it running on 8086 specs.

Does tsrmus give you any kind of error when you try to run it?

I wonder if there's anything around for modifying Paragon. It was a Gamer's Edge/Softdisk game made using the same tools as Keen. At least level editing would be pretty straightforward.

CommanderSpleen wrote: ↑Thu Jan 25, 2018 5:29 am I always thought Keen required 286 minimum. Surprising to see it running on 8086 specs.

Does tsrmus give you any kind of error when you try to run it?

I wonder if there's anything around for modifying Paragon. It was a Gamer's Edge/Softdisk game made using the same tools as Keen. At least level editing would be pretty straightforward.

I didn't play keen games in my old 8086 8 Mhz but other games now i'm checking and they work as I remenber in PCEM emulator.
So I tested keen 4 and it runs very smooth!, (if you use the Fix Jerky Motion option), even the map scrolling runs at about 40 fps, (so smooth for a dos game and an 8086 cpu...). The only limitation is you have to disable sound effects to be able to play the music inside the platform levels, if not, 640 Kb is not enough and the game will disable it.

So I think I'll make the mod in keen4 engine.

I'll check that paragon game, just in case it is also usefull for my other project.

Sorry for the stupid question, but... How do you activate switches in the game?.
I want to make cistom doors and use gems and things like that, but even in the original levels, I can't open any door nor use any switches :(.

Stand in front of the switch and press 'up'. To open doors you collect a coloured gem and then place it on that thing near a door that is the same colour as the gem you collected, simply by walking on it.

I changed the keen sprites size, but i forgot to resize the frame in which keen in facing the wall while activating switches, and that caused the engine to go a bit crazy.. :) now the switches work as espected.

I played Keen1 first on an 8086 machine and years later ported Keen4 over to said machine via the 'Laplink' software from an early 21st century computer and it played perfectly (sans Adlib sounds), albeit taking a considerable time to initiate. That said, that fleeting "Please Wait" image in Keen 1 was something you familiarised yourself with over 10 seconds or so before you could play Keen1.

Looks awesome! ♥_♥