Cannonhead Clash - Atari 2600 homebrew game (now on cartridge)

[Deleted member 23046]

Looks fun, like it could have become a classic if released at time.

Cannonhead Clash (previously Bomb Game) (Atari 2600)

Hi all, I'm back, and I bring with me my new homebrew, tentatively titled "Bomb Game." It is a two player competitive game where there's two things chucking bombs at each other. Controls are pretty simple, left and right to move, fire button to shoot. Holding down the button longer makes your bom...

atariage.com

Also available for free on a Pico-8 build : https://bluswimmer.itch.io/ - the dev is active on Twitter.

 

[sox]

Neat idea and execution. Wasn't aware that pico-8 -> Atari 2600 was a path people went but I'd be interested to see how much rework there is to port from pico-8 projects.

 

[samred]

what a great, clever design. thanks for sharing. the Pico-8 version is great, and buying it from itch.io gets you multiple regions' version of the 2600 ROM to load into your own homebrew carts or whathaveyou.

 

[flyinj]

I agree, this would have been amazing if it was released in the early 80s at the 2600's peak.

No other game had multiplayer like that at the time. I would have played the crap out of that with my friends.

 

[xir]

Warlords energy in the best possible way

 

[Deleted member 23046]

Nice to see I am not alone to admire this game, sox, samred, flyinj and xir.
I have discovered it on a french retrogaming website, MO5.com

- The destructible AND bordered environment forcing you to move on a limited space.
- The time needed to aim giving more impulse to the canon bowl, but at the cost of making you vulnerable.

The result a great mix of fast-pacing decision, eye+manual coordination and some strategical adaption. Simply brillant.

 

[bluswimmer]

Hey all,

Glad to see interest in Cannonhead Clash! Just wanted to pop in here and clarify a couple things about the game.

• The 2600 download follows a "pay what you want" model. If you want, you can download it for free!
• The Pico-8 version actually came AFTER the 2600 version. That one was largely made as a quick Pico-8 programming exercise.

Thanks for all the kind words, and apologies for the late response. If y'all have any additional questions, feel free to ask.

 

[xir]

Hey all,

Glad to see interest in Cannonhead Clash! Just wanted to pop in here and clarify a couple things about the game.

• The 2600 download follows a "pay what you want" model. If you want, you can download it for free!
• The Pico-8 version actually came AFTER the 2600 version. That one was largely made as a quick Pico-8 programming exercise.

Thanks for all the kind words, and apologies for the late response. If y'all have any additional questions, feel free to ask.

Click to shrink...

is it a 4k cart? assembly seems hard.

 

[bluswimmer]

is it a 4k cart? assembly seems hard.

Click to shrink...

Yes, this is a 4K cartridge. The game has seven bytes of unused ROM, and uses all 128 bytes of the 2600's RAM.

Truthfully, the hardest part of development was maintaining a solid 60 FPS! Certain parts of the code were rather computationally expensive and had to be optimized so that there was no rollover.