Where Time Stood Still - NEW AMIGA GAME finally gets ported from ST version

Over on EAB, Galahad has announced that the conversion of the isometric classic Where Time Stood Still has finally been finished. In 1988, Ocean released the Denton Designs made WTSS for the Spectrum, DOS CGA and Atari ST. However an Amiga version was never forthcoming from them. Until now...

Galahad on EAB:

"The way this conversion has been tackled is to let the Atari ST version of WTSS run in Amiga memory, and patch the routines in the game that tell the ST to display a picture. By intercepting those routines, we can divert it to a specific routine that will convert the Atari ST image into something the Amiga can understand on the fly as fast as possible.

The great thing about doing it this way is you don't have to worry about coding collision detection, or map clipping, or redrawing objects on screen, as the Atari ST code has already done all of that, you're simply diverting the ST screen to be converted, which means that in most cases, the game running on the Amiga screen is 100% going to be the same as that on the Atari ST, no extra bugs added, no problems introduced. 

However, the downside I mentioned before. This screen conversion routine has to run constantly so as to capture any changes on the Atari ST screen, if we don't, then there is the possibility of flickering or objects not moving correctly, or horrible scrolling.
This of course slows the game down quite a bit. The Amiga is having to run the native Atari ST game code, and then convert the screen in realtime.
On the 68000 it slows the game down a touch. 

On 68020+ however, because its all pure CPU code with no hardware banging on the Atari ST side, the Amiga can surge through the code VERY fast.

So long story short, Play it on an A1200 or above, either real or emulated, and this ties up with my quick endeavour to play it last night... It will run on a vanilla A500, but you'll probably want some acceleration for the best experience.

Other treats include a new Cracktro, intro graphics and sound/music updated by ADRDesign to make better use of the Amiga's capabilities.

Visit Galahad's thread on EAB for full details and to find the download for it (currently in the members only 'zone' or various other locations which are subject to change) or in the files section of the Commodore Amiga facebook group

-Alistair Brugsch
@ABrugsch

UPDATE : There's also been a post update regarding the WHDLOAD version that should be available today!

Where Time Stood Still will be in the zone. 

Some rules/notes 

1). When using WinUAE, ALWAYS use Cycle Exact, its the most accurate method of emulating.
2). WHDLoad version is being worked on by Codetapper and will be available soon.
3). You are welcome to host this version anywhere you like.
4). It may NOT be cover mounted on a physical magazine, nor can it be sold. I didn't do this for zero money for someone else to make money off it!
5). Trainer makers...... do NOT remove the intro this time Plenty of space on the disk, use it!
6). Amiga options activate with a press of F8 on the title screen.
7). Music/SFX option on the character select box (activated by SPACE BAR) do not do anything. So no bug reports on that ta!
8). Enjoy the game, it took longer than I wanted, but I wanted to deliver the best version possible.