Kobo Deluxe 0.4.1 released--------------------------
Too many other projects, and as Kobo Deluxe is one
that doesn’t bring food to the table, it tends to
get rather low priority. However, for various
reasons, I’ve decided it’s time to start actively
working towards a 1.0 release.
Lots and lots of changes in this release of
course, but there are still a bunch of patches and
quick fixes left for a soon to be released 0.4.2. I
just figured you lot might want to have a look, now
that I FINALLY have it all working properly (or so
I hope) again. 
Five skill levels
-----------------
Early experimental stuff, but there are now five
skill levels, one of which is of course the good
old 100% true to XKobo "Classic" mode. The others
have slightly modernized game logic with player
health and cannon overheating. That is, you can
take some damage before you lose your ship, and you
lose some firepower if you keep firing constantly.
This makes for smoother and less frustrating
gameplay, or at least, that's the idea.
New graphics
------------
Not much of it yet, and some is just quick playing
around in GIMP - but the new graphics is drawn for
640x480 mode, as opposed to the original 320x240.
Scaling by any N:16 factor is now supported, which
means it's still possible to run 320x240, despite
the new "native" resolution of 640x480.
New sounds
----------
Some new sound effects were added pretty long ago
(0.4pre7, IIRC), and there is more to come. There
will be new music, specifically written for Kobo
Deluxe.
However, I decided to stay away from this for
now, as I have new technology in the works, and I
don't feel it's worthwhile to spend any more time
on the old Kobo sound engine.
ChangeLog:
http://www.olofson.net/kobodl/ChangeLog
Some interesting highlights, somewhat decrypted:
* Simplified the configuration menus, and and
cleaned up the menus in general.
* Losing window focus now pauses the game.
* Hammering on Escape is trapped and aborts the
game when loading, or switches to a safe video
mode when running.
* It is now possible to play the game even if the
scores for some reason cannot be written to disk.
* Sound effect timing has millisecond resolution
regardless of audio buffer size. That means you
always get correct sound; you just get more delay
with more buffering.
* Sound effects can now be cached on disk so you
don't have to wait for them rendering every time
you start.
* The playfield area is now square, with only
slightly rounded corners. Better looking and more
true to the original.
* Widescreen displays properly supported - the game
is not stretched to fit! (Provided you select a
video mode suitable for your display, of course.)
Known Issues:
* Some page flip flickering in the transition
effects in glSDL mode on some OpenGL drivers.
* The new skill levels need proper balancing, and
most importantly, tougher settings should make
the enemies smarter and/or faster - not just
speed up the whole world and cut down on
firepower, as they do now.
* The title song is supposed to be looped, but the
current one (old placeholder) isn't.
* A game in progress is aborted afer toggling
fullscreen/windowed mode on some platforms.
* Y/N keys no longer work in the "ask" dialogs.
Home:
http://www.olofson.net/kobodl/
Download:
http://www.olofson.net/kobodl/download.html
Direct download:
http://www.olofson.net/kobodl/download/KoboDeluxe-0.4.1.tar.gz
//David Olofson - Programmer, Composer, Open Source Advocate
.------- http://olofson.net - Games, SDL examples -------.
| http://zeespace.net - 2.5D rendering engine |
| http://audiality.org - Music/audio engine |
| http://eel.olofson.net - Real time scripting |
’-- http://www.reologica.se - Rheology instrumentation --’