MSXdev’20: #06 – Litter Box | MSX Resource Center

According to a popular theory, cats are really plotting to take over the world. And arguably, that could be for the best. It’s not a far stretch to suppose that our hairy friends would do a better job than us, warmongering humans.

Regardless if this theory holds any truth or not (even if the MSXdev Team sure hopes so), it seems that cats have started their would-be world-conquering campaign by trying to take over this year’s edition of MSXdev!

As is the case, you might remember that recently, we presented “Landing” to you, a game starring one of our future leaders. Today, another fine specimen steps in. Contrary to “Landing”, in which we were tasked to aid our hero to land safely, in this game, we’ll guide the feline in his quest to practice every cat’s favorite hobby – eating!

As we do this, we’ll have to beware of the eternal arch-enemy hunting us down though, which are – ofcourse – dogs.

And while cats are great, even they aren’t perfect, so this one will have to get rid of all that cat food once in a while, which, being the well-raised kitty it is, requires to take place in the titular litter box.

Are you up for the challenge? Meow!

Name of the game: Litter Box
Game size: 16KB
RAM size requirements: 16KB
Genre: Maze
License: Freeware
Individuals involved: RAY2DAY MSX SOFTWARE

Relevant link:
Download at MSX.dev

Comments (18)

By tfh

Prophet (3321)

11-07-2020, 23:24

And of course you can play this game online: https://www.file-hunter.com/MSXdev/index.php?id=litterbox

By hamlet

Scribe (4106)

11-07-2020, 23:28

Nice Idea! But should'nt it have seven lives?

By CASDuino

Champion (330)

11-07-2020, 23:48

hamlet wrote:

Nice Idea! But should'nt it have seven lives?

You mean nine right? ;-)

By hamlet

Scribe (4106)

11-07-2020, 23:59

I just learned that in GB cats got two more lifes than on the continent. Must be a very cat friendly country.

By Uninteresting

Champion (352)

12-07-2020, 10:13

Or maybe less cat-friendly if they need those extra two lives?

Again, glad to see new entries.

By ray2day

Paladin (733)

12-07-2020, 11:33

9 lives!? Come on the game isn’t that hard!

Anyway, everybody thanks for the good reactions and the great response to my new game. Cats and MSX rule!!

By mzoran

Master (155)

12-07-2020, 11:37

A classic game, in my opinion the cat should move faster though.
But yay to a new entry, let's reach 10 entries.....

By FiXato

Scribe (1742)

12-07-2020, 14:59

Lovely animations Ray
Those who play it on an emulator and want it to run a bit faster, can just increase the CPU speed a tad. I found it played a lot smoother on 2x speed.

By ray2day

Paladin (733)

12-07-2020, 17:30

Quote:

Those who play it on an emulator and want it to run a bit faster, can just increase the CPU speed a tad.

Also to increase speed; Use the latest development build of openMSX. Download it on Fixato’s website openmsx.fixato.net. Emulation of the current release is incorrect which cause the game functioning incorrect; the game gets ‘caught’ in the ON SPRITE GOSUB routine slowing down the game, mistuning the sound and bugging the mouse-eat-routine.

Quote:

in my opinion the cat should move faster though.

In my opinion people play too much on emulators, it’s better to play games on real MSX machines! And to my opinion -for a MSX-BASIC game- the speed of the game on a real machine is very good.

Thanks again for the comments and feedback (good or not good). Keep it coming and enjoy playing the game!

By the way who did the nice artwork here on MRC? My compliments! Can I use it for the cover of the physical release??

By FiXato

Scribe (1742)

12-07-2020, 17:32

ray2day wrote:

By the way who did the nice artwork here on MRC? My compliments! Can I use it for the cover of the physical release??

That's likely hamlet's fine work. Not sure if he made it from scratch, or put it together with other images from the web.

(I've edited your post slightly btw to link to the openMSX builds subdomain, as my main domain doesn't really have a clear link to that )

By mzoran

Master (155)

12-07-2020, 18:42

Quote:

In my opinion people play too much on emulators, it’s better to play games on real MSX machines! And to my opinion -for a MSX-BASIC game- the speed of the game on a real machine is very good.

Yes, initially I tried in an emulator. Trying now on a real thing it does play better. Could simply be caused by the input lag of emulators. I do achieve better scores in various games when playing on a real thing.
Anyway congrats for making the game.

By Gloriou

Master (204)

12-07-2020, 18:51

Nice game,
you should have only 1 trial at this, challenging!

By tfh

Prophet (3321)

12-07-2020, 19:04

mzoran wrote:

Quote:

In my opinion people play too much on emulators, it’s better to play games on real MSX machines! And to my opinion -for a MSX-BASIC game- the speed of the game on a real machine is very good.

No, there is a big in the sprite collision emulation. Because of this bug, it continuously notices a sprite collision, causing the slow down. It's fixed in the current OpenMSX beta, but WebMSX still seems to be bugged.

By tfh

Prophet (3321)

12-07-2020, 22:46

The version on file-hunter.com is fine now. The emulation problem has been solved

By TheKid

Paragon (1238)