MININIM 0.9.2

A free software implementation of Prince of Persia 1.
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oitofelix
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MININIM 0.9.2

Post by oitofelix »

[Edit: FOR VERSION 0.10 AND NEWER, GO HERE.]
MININIM 0.9.2 (February 17, 2016)
*********************************

MININIM is the Advanced Prince of Persia Engine — a childhood dream,
the free software engine for Jordan Mechner’s masterpiece, developed
from scratch by Bruno Félix Rezende Ribeiro (‘oitofelix’).

MININIM aims to have detailed documentation on all matters concerning
the original 1989 Prince of Persia world, ranging from its design
concepts to the engine’s practical use and development.

MININIM supports GNU/Linux and Windows operating systems. A
Windows MinGW build is available at its homepage.

News
====

• First release

Download
========

Here are the compressed sources and a GPG detached signature:
http://oitofelix.github.io/mininim/mininim-0.9.2.tar.gz
http://oitofelix.github.io/mininim/mini ... tar.gz.sig

Use the ‘.sig’ file to verify that the corresponding file (without
the ‘.sig’ suffix) is intact. First, be sure to download both the
‘.sig’ file and the corresponding tarball. Then, run this command:

gpg --verify mininim-0.9.2.tar.gz.sig

If that command fails because you don’t have the required public key,
then run this command to import it:

gpg --recv-keys 0x28D618AF --keyserver hkp://keys.gnupg.net

and rerun the ‘gpg --verify’ command.

This release is signed by _Bruno Félix Rezende Ribeiro_. His key
fingerprint is ‘7CB1 208C 7336 56B7 5962 2500 27B9 C6FD 28D6 18AF’.

This release was bootstrapped with the following tools:
• GNU Autoconf 2.69
• GNU Automake 1.14.1
• GNU Texinfo 5.2

Links
=====

Homepage
http://oitofelix.github.io/mininim/
Atom feed
http://oitofelix.github.io/feed.xml
Forum
index.php
IRC channel
irc://irc.freenode.net/mininim
Bug reporting
https://github.com/oitofelix/mininim/issues
VCS
https://github.com/oitofelix/mininim

To do
=====

MININIM is already a complete and fully functional replacement
for the original game. The following additional features are planned
to be implemented eventually.

• Joystick support
• Native level format
• Level editor
• Level generator module
• Guile scripting
• Network play

Please, support MININIM development!
====================================

*MININIM* development is voluntary. If you like this game and want
to thank the author for the work he has done so far, or want to enable
him to spend more time improving it, please make a donation! For values
equal or greater than 50 US$ or 0.12 BTC your name will be acknowledged
in the manual section “Donors” and in the donors page at the author’s
website (<http://oitofelix.github.io/funding.html#donors>). If you
decide to make recurrent donations, the total amount of your donations
will be updated every month for all records. Please, donate at
<http://oitofelix.github.io/funding.html>.
*Thank you for your support!*
Bruno Félix Rezende Ribeiro (oitofelix)
MININIM author
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by Norbert »

Impressive; interesting features!
I also like the extensive documentation.
As far as "Suggest new features." goes, networked multiplayer would be super.
(I saw you already wrote "Network play" in the TODO file.)
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by Falcury »

Impressive work!
I really like that you also created the "missing" dungeon graphics for the tiles that were palace-only in the original game (mirror, lattices and tapestries, etc). And you also added a palace version of the skeleton tile! And like Norbert said, the documentation is excellent. Overall, very well thought out.
I did a quick playthrough. All the levels work, and the graphics are quite close to the original game. I couldn't pass the guards without cheating at first, because I only found out later that I had to press Enter to draw the sword. Perhaps the kid should draw the sword automatically when he is facing a guard, just like in the original game? (I do like that you can draw the sword at any time, though.)
The kid's movement feels slightly different from the original game (takes some getting used to, sometimes there is unexpected behavior). Suggestion: if you want to get the movement even closer to the original, you could consider using the information from the original sequence table, which contains most of the original x/y movement offsets and frame sequences (you could get the info from SEQTABLE.S in the Apple II source code, or alternatively SDLPoP's seqtbl.c)
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by oitofelix »

Norbert wrote:Impressive; interesting features!
Falcury wrote:Impressive work!
Thank you! :D
Falcury wrote:Perhaps the kid should draw the sword automatically when he is facing a guard, just like in the original game?
Personally I think that manually drawing the sword adds to the sense of control over the battle system, that is fundamentally different from the original (improved in my humble opinion). In MININIM guards are smarter than in the original, for instance they can see the kid across rooms autonomously. Sometimes (more often than one may think) you just want to run. Having control over when the kid draws the sword is good overall and fit all cases.
Falcury wrote:The kid's movement feels slightly different from the original game (takes some getting used to, sometimes there is unexpected behavior). Suggestion: if you want to get the movement even closer to the original...
I consider the way MININIM handles kid's movements an improvement over the original game.

I started using the exact offsets (not by looking on those tables, but by studying the original's behavior very closely, frame by frame in Gimp), then I saw that they are not even close the optimal sequence in my understanding. Almost every movement of the kid in the original is shaky (it just happens that we get acquainted to them). See the hanging or vertical jump, for blatant examples.

Then I constructed each movement frame by frame, by trial and error, until I found the optimal transition between frames (of course, based on my taste). The result is that MININIM has much more stable movements.

By the way, what's that "unexpected behavior" about? Could you give a reproducible example to illustrate the point?
Bruno Félix Rezende Ribeiro (oitofelix)
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by Zaknafein »

Very interesting! I'll try to beat the game with in MININIM. I think that new movements are more natural than the original game. There are tricks than can't be done in MININIM, like passing throught walls. I guess that these tricks appeared in the original game because of unexpected situations, that are solved now.

There are other basic tricks that cannot be make in MININIM, like the long jump in 2 floors with a wall in one side. Maybe there are tricks in MINNIM that can't be done in the original game :?: :?:
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by oitofelix »

Zaknafein wrote:Very interesting!
Thank you!
Zaknafein wrote:I'll try to beat the game with in MININIM.
You may be the first. I myself have never beat it.
Zaknafein wrote:I think that new movements are more natural than the original game.
Nice to hear it.
Zaknafein wrote:There are other basic tricks that cannot be make in MININIM[...]Maybe there are tricks in MINNIM that can't be done in the original game
Efforts to systematically study the applicable tricks are more than welcome. You might want to help with that. Please, report your results in this thread.
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by doppelganger »

I must say that combat is a bit tough in MININIM. How do I counter-attack?
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by oitofelix »

doppelganger wrote:I must say that combat is a bit tough in MININIM. How do I counter-attack?
That's because it's quite different from the original. See the section 2.8.5 "Counter attack and counter defense" of the MININIM manual.
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by doppelganger »

MININIM MANUAL wrote: Holding SHIFT and UP puts the kid in counter attack and counter defense mode.
The only thing kid does is block.

EDIT: Oh I see, your skill should be high enough for a counter attack.

EDIT2: Graphical Bug: Occasionally, guards 'flicker'.

flicker_guard.avi
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by oitofelix »

doppelganger wrote:EDIT2: Graphical Bug: Occasionally, guards 'flicker'.
flicker_guard.avi
There is something wrong with the video you captured. I couldn't see the bug you described, because the image is corrupted to a great extent.
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by David »

oitofelix wrote:There is something wrong with the video you captured. I couldn't see the bug you described, because the image is corrupted to a great extent.
I can play it correctly with VLC player: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by Norbert »

David wrote:
oitofelix wrote:There is something wrong with the video you captured. I couldn't see the bug you described, because the image is corrupted to a great extent.
I can play it correctly with VLC player: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/
Just wanted to comment that.
I'm guessing oitofelix tried it with mplayer.

Attached is what I think doppelganger means with guards flickering.
A palette issue, it seems.
Attachments
Animation of a guard's flickering.
Animation of a guard's flickering.
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by oitofelix »

doppelganger wrote:Graphical Bug: Occasionally, guards 'flicker'.
I couldn't reproduce it. Do you have a recipe for triggering this bug?
David wrote:I can play it correctly with VLC player: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/
Norbert wrote:I'm guessing oitofelix tried it with mplayer.
I've tried it with both, unfortunately obtaining the same bad result. Perhaps it has something to do with the configuration of this machine of mine, but I don't know what it is.
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by doppelganger »

oitofelix wrote:
doppelganger wrote:Graphical Bug: Occasionally, guards 'flicker'.
I couldn't reproduce it.
Now the palette bug doesn't occur. Strange.

Unfortunately, I don't know what caused it or how to reproduce it.

EDIT: Another thing I have noticed is that if you restart the game (Ctrl + R) while the game is paused, and press a key in the title screen to begin again, the game is still paused. But you can't 'unpause' it, and the game is stuck.
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Re: MININIM 0.9.2

Post by oitofelix »

doppelganger wrote:Unfortunately, I don't know what caused it or how to reproduce it.
Please, let me know if you find out.
doppelganger wrote:EDIT: Another thing I have noticed is that if you restart the game (Ctrl + R) while the game is paused, and press a key in the title screen to begin again, the game is still paused. But you can't 'unpause' it, and the game is stuck.
Fixed in commit 3a4faaa. Thank your for reporting!
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