In 1985 Capcom released one of the greatest side scrolling platform game series we have ever known. It featured a knight, creepy enemies and was rather difficult to the point of frustration. The game I am talking about is none other than ' Ghosts 'N Goblins ', the first game in the Ghosts 'n Goblins franchise. A game which appeared on systems such as the Amstrad, C64 and ZX Spectrum. Well if you played this game, you'll be interested to know that as of today, Skyzoo73 has made available the first demo of an AGA edition for the Amiga. As in his words "I created this to see how GnG could be on the Amiga by breaking free from the limitations of the Amiga 500 classic"
And here's the full details from the itch io page. "Small demo of the great arcade classic Ghosts'n'Goblins, ported to the Commodore Amiga (AGA) with the Scorpion Engine. This demo includes only the 1st level of the game, was created as an exercise with the S.E., and makes no claim to be complete or perfect. It was created to see how GnG could be on the Amiga by breaking free from the limitations of the Amiga 500 classic. Of course many things are sub-optimal, such as enemy behavior, and various bugs are present throughout the game. So take it for what it is, an exercise and nothing more. I may make some changes from time to time, eventually I will update this page with the relevant update details".
- graphics found on the web from various sources partly, and partly grabbed from the mame by me (skyzoo73)
- ‘programming’ also done by me with a little help from Griffon
- music created by IM76 (https://soundcloud.com/user-874944132)
- the game resolution is 256x240 px at 64+16 colours
Looks great. Hope you can do more 😀
ReplyDeleteFantastic conversion, spot on
ReplyDeleteWOW! Well done! Smashed it!
ReplyDeleteIf only we had Scorpion Engine in the 80s
ReplyDelete"If only we had Scorpion Engine in the 80s
DeleteThat would have been REALLY bad, as no one would have coded from the ground up on Assembly language...thus squeexing every ounce of power from the Amiga.
Great! Still no 1 button joystick support?
Delete"by breaking free from the limitations of the Amiga 500" This must be a SEVERE Scorpion Engine Issue. An A500 can run 2 Ghost N Goblin games at at the same time...not a problem. I suppose porting it is easier and quicker than creating from the ground up in Assembly. The Amiga then can easily do a better version than the arcade with more colors (64).
ReplyDeleteCan the 500 do 2 GnGs together? I don't think so. As much as believing it possible would be nice, you are overestimating the capabilities of the 500 in particular the little memory available. I believe that the original version is very close to the maximum humanly possible, and it is already slow as it is, let alone at 64 colours... However, I reiterate the concept that this is just a personal exercise in the use of the s.e., with no claim to perfection. If anyone thinks they can do better, I encourage them to get to work. I will be the first to praise him and play his game.
DeleteMany thanks for the response , we appreciated and we would like to thank you for the amazing effort and support. You got my point exactly when ECS is programmed with only 1MB then yes the capabilities cannot be covered! And this is a scorpion engine game. I mean when we have seen in the A500 ECS games like kid chaos then we just wonder for the capabilities of ECS. The comments are made in a well made manner and not to criticize anyone. Apologies if that happened,
Deletewhen i look at Robocod, which is not even ECS, but 1 mb OCS, it's clear that the A500 was capable of an even better GNG.
DeleteThe A500 can do GnG no problem. Two at the same time is just a figure of speech.
DeleteSir, it would be nice to have a look at your arcade perfect port of GnG on a plain ECS with 1Mb of RAM
DeleteAmiga already had a fantastic version of Ghosts'n Goblins. Why not try porting Ghouls'n Ghosts, whose conversion was utter trash?
ReplyDeleteYep, this.
DeleteThat would be great!
DeleteLooking very good but it seems like it's running too fast.
ReplyDeleteGiven it was mentioned the resolution was 256x240, perhaps it might be running in NTSC mode?
DeleteAs usual, you forgot the "S" :) ... The good typo is: GHOSTS'N GOBLINS
ReplyDeleteAhem "Small demo of the great arcade classic Ghost'n'Goblins, ported to the Commodore Amiga (AGA) with the Scorpion Engine.". Only relating what the source said! So no not as usual. I've changed it here though
Deleteyes I had made a typo, sorry. But I should have corrected it now.
Deletethis is very true to the the arcade. i agree that the A500 version was already very good, but lets take this for what it is: a homebrew project that brings the almost exact arcade version to a (presumable) stock amiga 1200. what's not to like?
ReplyDeleteThere are plenty of horrible arcade conversions on the Amiga, like Black Tiger, Rolling Thunder, Shinobi, Bionic Commandos, Out Run, and so on. There are plenty of nice arcade games from the '80 that never got a conversion on the Amiga, like Rastan, Contra, Bonze Adventure and many others. They would have been perfect for the Amiga OCS hardware (I mean, obviously, you couldn't do a pixel-perfect conversion, but a very close one with some compromises). So why try to convert an arcade game that already had a nice port?
ReplyDeleteLove for the original arcade, and curiosity of how it could be on the Amiga with greater fluidity, more colours, better music and sounds.
DeleteWell this time really AGA is not needed, sorry guys the excellent A500 version is based on assembly and it is really better at least that this demo at this stage of the development. Better resolution, more smooth and better sound. Of course this is not a commercial project but dont write that you need aga for this and it is better because its not. There are some basic effects that missing from the original version like the water effect but i am sure that is could be easily replicated also to the original version. Its so unfortunate that even on ECS the developers are creating games withour a 2MB at least memory which simply provides more to the chipset. Thanks to all the devs that support the Amiga you are fantactic but our standards should be based on Agony and beyond...
ReplyDeleteI agree using assembly would benefit A500 versions of these games without question and I would love to see more A500 ports. However, being able to use modern programming tools lets people that do not have the time and resources for the traditional methods a door to doing these conversions. It is a trade off with demands on the machine, but there a not many people that are willing to go that route.
DeleteWell, the original Amiga 500 version is more impressive, because it runs on inferior hardware and still looks almost as good. But don't forget to appreciate the people out there doing new stuff for the amiga. We shouldnt take it for granted. If the guy likes to port this game, its perfectly fine, and to the people who dont like it: Just play something else.
ReplyDeleteThe A500 version is good, but this one play a level up. Just hope it will be finished.
DeleteThe Ghosts 'n Goblins port for the Amiga is perfectly fine. Why not remake the Amiga version of Ghouls 'n Ghosts instead? That one was horrible and unplayable.
ReplyDeleteThe real question is: worth converting old arcades for the Amiga... in the MAME era? 😁
ReplyDeleteI suggest to add something in the game that is missing in the arcade version to entice us to opt for your version. Also because there was never a port better that the original.
ReplyDeleteAll new quality Amiga game ports are good, we need to establish the Amiga platform as a new standard and as an alternative to modern playstation 4/5 and PC games. For this we need more quality titles, and sales of new Amiga hardware in the millions, be it then new FPGA Amigas, FPGA custom chips with Pistorm or new Motorola/ Freescale 68060 Model B 1-2 GHz CPUs. We don't need modern 3D games, but just good enough hardware for older style 3D that also has good frame rate.
ReplyDeleteAlways good to see remakes of Amiga Arcade conversion... But personally I feel that if you're going to use AGA and not OCS, it should have even more eye candies than the original arcade version, not the same or less. I'm sure even the Scorpion engine can handle that...
ReplyDeleteVisually speaking, the original game has over 80 colours on screen, in some levels even more. Even using AGA I think the reasonable limit is 64 colours, more than that the amount of chipram needed for assets becomes too much and performance also suffers drastically. As for creating that extra something, one could add remixes of the original songs, redesigned and reimagined maps, but that's not my goal. As it is, the task is hard enough, believe me.
DeleteI see, so it does seem like the Scorpion Engine has limitations even for AGA. And that's probably where people are confused and they start comparing this to Assembly-coded OCS games like Kid Chaos, Super Frog, the various SOTB games or even the OCS Ghosts 'N' Goblins - but as we know those games requires utilizing every programming tricks in the toolbox and likely years of full-time effort.
DeletePerhaps the Scorpion Engine will get better at taking advantage of AGA capabilities in the future. AGA platform is actually quite good and based on what I've seen, can go toe to toe with SNES games or some PS1 games if all the hardware tricks are utilized. The problem is that when the Devs figure out these hardware tricks they keep the secret to themselves and I was hoping Scorpion Engine could level the playing field so everyone can do these 'impossible arcade ports'. I guess we'll just have to wait...
Having said that, the original Amiga Ghouls 'N' Ghosts is absolutely horrible - which doesn't surprise me since it's published by US Gold (the infamous publisher behind crappy arcade conversion like Street Fighter2 and Outrun), where as Ghost 'N' Goblin was done by Elite (Commando, Ikari Warrior).
A standard A500 doesn't even have Fast RAM. If you assume that someone expanded the computer, it's no longer the ‘original’ - hello Dungeon Master. In this respect, if the project requires it, you might as well use an A1200 with Fast RAM or whatever.
ReplyDeleteThe reason why some Amiga games looked so good was because they were optimized and heavily utalizing tricks, which required knowledge, skill, time and individual tailoring for each game.
Assuming that most games are played via emulators, it's primarily a matter of settings, apart from the emu performance. The less, the better. You shouldn't waste resources, but you can also use the possibilities of the technology of the time.
If a project needs the extra performance offered by Fast RAM, AGA and faster CPUs, then they should be used - as long as the game is good. Better two good games for the A1200 (+Fast) than just one for the standard A500.
Regardless of this, some Scorpion Engine games look bad and are no fun. A game should also fit the platform. I find good new games more exciting than old conversions, but everyone can decide that for themselves.
The appeal of developing a game for the Amiga lies in the fact that it runs on the Amiga, a real, beloved computer.
It would also be fun, and easier, to develop for a well-specified fantasy console.