Modernising hack for GB Tetris - Rosy Retrospection

hippy dave

BBMB
OP
Member
Joined
Apr 30, 2012
Messages
10,356
Trophies
2
XP
36,380
Country
United Kingdom
http://www.romhacking.net/hacks/5813/

Release Notes
==================

ABOUT

"Tetris - Rosy Retrospection" aims to combine the joyful nostalgia of playing
classic GameBoy Tetris with the established comfort of modern gameplay
mechanics.

INSTRUCTIONS

This hack is published as patches in BDF and UPS format for the original game.
You don't need to apply both, just choose the format that's more convenient
for you to use.
MD5 of the unpatched file: 982ed5d2b12a0377eb14bcdc4123744e

For UPS, there is a great browser app at https://www.romhacking.net/patch/.

FEATURES

This hack consists of the following additions and improvements:

- Implement Super Rotation System
Test multiple locations for collisions when rotating a piece.

- Shadow piece
A shadow piece indicates where the current piece would touch the bottom.

- Three previews
Two more preview pieces got squeezed next to the original one.

- Use SELECT to hold
You can stash one piece for later use using SELECT. This HOLD piece is drawn
in shadow-style so it doesn't distract from the preview.

- 7-Bag with new pseudo-random number generator
The original pseudo-random number generator was fully replaced. The new one
offers better randomness with a more even distribution and entropy that's
sourced from user input during gameplay.
This generator is used to draw the next piece from a "bag" containing each
of the seven pieces once.

- "Hard drop" and saving from my previous hack
Pressing UP drops the piece in an instant. And you get to keep your
highscore.

- Redesigned screen layout
An extensive redesign of the layout for Mode A, B and 2Player was necessary
to accommodate all new features.

- New demos
All these changes got the original demos out of sync, so I had to record new
ones.

- Award spin clears
If a locked piece clears one or more lines without being free to move up,
left or down, it's honored as a spin clear.
Spin clears earn four times as much points in Mode A and count twice the
number of lines for Mode B. In multiplayer, they always send four lines of
garbage to the opponent.

- Faster "delayed auto shift"
Gets you faster to the edges of the field when holding LEFT or RIGHT.

- Lock delay
A piece locks after 30 frames without movement. Moving it resets the delay,
but only up to 15 times. Pressing DOWN cancels the delay and locks
immediately.

- Faster line clear
Keeps up the pace by clearing lines more quickly

- Extend the field by four invisible lines
Now there are four more off-screen lines extending the usual 18 lines on
screen.

- New game over condition
If the piece locks without being visible at all, it's game over.

- Adjust difficulty
Level 20 becomes more of a kill-screen as it is known from the NES version.

- Higher start location
A new piece spawns above the field and not at the top-most line.

- Fix two bugs in the original game
Pressing START right before finishing a Mode B game could lock up the game.
The second bug would repeated the first line after a clear.
Both issues are gone now.

In addition to hard drop, it includes all the other features of my previous
"Classic Harddrop" hack:

- Hard drop
- No more waiting for rockets and disclaimers (START to skip)
- Scores are saved to SRAM
- Independent Highscores for 'Heart Levels' <3
- Character input recalls the last name entered
- Pressing B at name input deletes the current character

Please contact Ospin on romhacking.net if you notice any issues.

Enjoy


FAQ

"Why not release it as IPS/BPS?"
I'm a bit paranoid about releasing copyrighted material. IPS etc. are fine if
you only do in-place changes or insertions. But as soon as you relocate
existing code or data, it will end up in the patch file. But this hack
relocates a lot of stuff in order to fit everything.
BDF is able to identify those relocations, so the patch will only include
meta-data to move the data and patch differences, but not the data itself.
Unfortunately, there aren't many implementations of BDF around and I got many
complaints about usability.
After looking more closely at other patch formats, I identified UPS as a
viable alternative. It's as naive as IPS and thus easily implemented. But it
only stores the difference of a given byte. The original intend is
reversibility, but it also has the advantage that the information stored in
the patch is useless without the original data.

"Tetris DX please?!"
Sorry, not enough nostalgia for that one.


Changelog
==================
v1.1
- Fix HOLD for L-blocks
- Reset DAS delay at spawn, even if L/R is pressed already
- Fix a shadow update optimization and improve speed
- Prevent HOLD during line clear
- Avoid possible hang with PAUSE vs line clear
- Disable hard drop for 10 frames after spawn
- Offer a UPS patch
v1.0
- first release

Honestly "to combine the joyful nostalgia of playing classic GameBoy Tetris with the established comfort of modern gameplay mechanics" is exactly what I wanted. It's not even a mentioned feature on the romhacking page (tho is in that long readme I just quoted) that it also saves high scores, which is a big win. Have fun!
 

FAST6191

Techromancer
Editorial Team
Joined
Nov 21, 2005
Messages
36,795
Trophies
5
XP
28,518
Country
United Kingdom
I am not sure I would want all those, says me that mostly plays Tetris DS or DS TGM homebrew for most of those features, but sounds like a nice hack for those that do. I am always wary of randomness changing, and bag random* I don't find that enjoyable vs true random, though I am now curious what the user sourced randomness plays as.

*for those unfamiliar random is random and thus you could get a run of things, bag places a bunch of things in a virtual bag and then draws it out meaning a more even distribution of things. You usually see it more in board game discussions where it is compared to dice.
 

hippy dave

BBMB
OP
Member
Joined
Apr 30, 2012
Messages
10,356
Trophies
2
XP
36,380
Country
United Kingdom
This has had enough views to score me more XP, but very little interaction - I hope some of you have tried it out, it's well worth a go
 

edgeworthy

New Member
Newbie
Joined
Mar 6, 2022
Messages
1
Trophies
0
Age
30
Location
Florianópolis
XP
36
Country
Brazil
hello! just wanted to say thanks SO much for this hack!! i've been looking for something like this for a long time because i love the dynamicity of modern tetris but i also love playing tetris on my gameboy so this was a dream come true. congrats on your hard work! :D
 
  • Love
Reactions: hippy dave

hippy dave

BBMB
OP
Member
Joined
Apr 30, 2012
Messages
10,356
Trophies
2
XP
36,380
Country
United Kingdom
hello! just wanted to say thanks SO much for this hack!! i've been looking for something like this for a long time because i love the dynamicity of modern tetris but i also love playing tetris on my gameboy so this was a dream come true. congrats on your hard work! :D
It absolutely wasn't made by me, the creator is called Ospin, I was just sharing it and I'm happy you're enjoying it!
 
  • Love
Reactions: edgeworthy

lordelan

Well-Known Member
Member
Joined
Jan 4, 2015
Messages
6,100
Trophies
1
Age
44
XP
7,233
Country
Germany
http://www.romhacking.net/hacks/5813/



Honestly "to combine the joyful nostalgia of playing classic GameBoy Tetris with the established comfort of modern gameplay mechanics" is exactly what I wanted. It's not even a mentioned feature on the romhacking page (tho is in that long readme I just quoted) that it also saves high scores, which is a big win. Have fun!
This is indeed the best Tetris handheld version ever imho with this hack. I just wish there was a colorization for this.
 

ciaomao

Well-Known Dude
Member
Joined
Feb 20, 2014
Messages
628
Trophies
1
XP
2,296
Country
Albania
I have only recently discovered the patch myself and was about to post it here. The patch is insane.
Post automatically merged:

...and thanks to the hold feature it is much easier. Anyone here for a challenge?
1665660797509.jpeg
 
Last edited by ciaomao,

lordelan

Well-Known Member
Member
Joined
Jan 4, 2015
Messages
6,100
Trophies
1
Age
44
XP
7,233
Country
Germany
I have only recently discovered the patch myself and was about to post it here. The patch is insane.
Post automatically merged:

...and thanks to the hold feature it is much easier. Anyone here for a challenge?
View attachment 331674
Nice. Just turned on my Miyoo Mini only to find out that I'm not as good as you but now I have someone to compete with. :P
Rosy.jpeg
 

hippy dave

BBMB
OP
Member
Joined
Apr 30, 2012
Messages
10,356
Trophies
2
XP
36,380
Country
United Kingdom

lordelan

Well-Known Member
Member
Joined
Jan 4, 2015
Messages
6,100
Trophies
1
Age
44
XP
7,233
Country
Germany
Oof, 3rd place - but not too far off!

View attachment 331729
Damn, glad I didn't know when I made my top score that you were that close behind. Would have sweated like a forked pig lol. :D
This is getting me excited haha. So we've got a Game Boy Pocket, a Miyoo Mini and a Game Boy Micro (if I saw that right) in here. That's pretty cool. I'll try my best to give it another shot this weekend! Feels almost like the yard breaks back in the 90's where we would compare our scores in different games or just fight each other in Pokémon. :wub:
 
  • Love
Reactions: hippy dave

Site & Scene News

Popular threads in this forum

General chit-chat
Help Users
  • No one is chatting at the moment.
    kijetesantakalu042 @ kijetesantakalu042: good night +1