May/June/July 2011

Submitted By: Juju Date: August 05, 2011, 04:33:27 pm Views: 2006
Summary: May, June & July 2011 Volume 1, Issue 5


May, June & July 2011
Volume 1, Issue 5



Announcement

We are sorry for the lack of newsletters for May and June, but because of the rapid succession of Contest Announcements, we did not have time to construct one.  So this month's newsletter will be a combination of May, June, and July's newsletters.


Notable releases

May 2011
MazezaM(TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus games)
A-Map: Online Map Editor(TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus utilities)
A-Sprite: Online Sprite Editor(TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus utilities)
AxeSynth(TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus utilities)
Crabcake for Axe(TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus utilities)
Crabcake(TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus utilities)
Sudoku(TI-Nspire games)
Nspire-Lua Wiki(TI-Nspire utilities)
Online Lua Sprite Editor(TI-Nspire utilities)
PNG to TI.Image Converter(TI-Nspire utilities)
TI-Nspire Scripting Tools(TI-Nspire utilities)
Obliterate Beta(Casio PRIZM Games)
June 2011
Devrays(TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus games)
Axe Parser Wiki(TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus utilities)
Gossamer v1.0(TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus utilities)
Myst 89(TI-89 games)
Pegs(TI-Nspire games)
Pixel Escape v0.8(TI-Nspire games)
Space Invaders(TI-Nspire games)
Conway's Game of Life(TI-Nspire games)
TI-Basket(TI-Nspire games)
DowngradeFix(TI-Nspire utilities)
nPlayer(TI-Nspire utilities)
TILP v1.15(TI-83+/84+/89/92+/v200/Nspire utilities)
PRIZM Micro-SDK v1.00(Casio PRIZM utilities)
July 2011
Axe Parser v1.0.0(TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus utilities)
TruVid Demo(TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus utilities)
Flashy(TI-83 Plus/TI-84 Plus utilities)
Bobby Carrot(TI-Nspire games)
OCLua(TI-Nspire utilities)
Lua onCalc(TI-Nspire utilities)
LuaTerm(TI-Nspire utilities)
PRIZM Video Player(Casio PRIZM utilities)


2011 Omnimaga Contest Results for Part #1 (Axe Parser Game)

We are happy to announce the contest results for the 2011 Omnimaga Contest Part 1, for those of you who haven't read about it yet.
Congratulations to Leafiness0 for winning First Place!
Congratulations to Tloz128 for winning Second Place!
Congratulations to Squidgetx for winning Third Place!
And Congratulations to all the participants of the Contest for many great new games!
For more detailed reviewing, click here.


TI-84 Pocket.Fr's Boot 1.03 attempts anti-downgrade protection - Hacked by Flashy

Once again, Texas Instruments attempts to control our freedom and add an anti-downgrade protection to their newest TI-84 Pocket.fr.  With the new boot code 1.03, you can no longer downgrade to any TI OS below 2.55MP, install third party OSes, or even install a patched 2.55MP OS.  And as a side note: the OS validation screen alone needs 6-7 minutes, in the best case.  TI is really making OS 2.71MP come true...
But luckily, BrandonW has released Flashy to counter this.  With Flashy, you are able to upgrade, downgrade, customize, and even swap boot codes.  However, you should know what you're doing first, otherwise you could instantly brick your calc.  And that would be very unfortunate.
 

Long Awaited Axe 1.0.0 Finally Released!

After a long time of waiting and multiple intermediate updates, Axe Parser has finally reached it's 1.0.0 version in mid July!  Unfortunately, there were some major bugs discovered.  However, Quigibo responded immedately to all bug reports, and released an update within the span of a day.  A week later, he released the latest version, 1.0.2, to fix all reported bugs and add even more features.  Last February, when Quigibo first announced this project, it had no screen shifting, sprite support, but only loops, getKey, and other control commands.  The Compiler compiled your source into a program named LOL, and there was no UI to speak of.  Contrary to many other attempts at a new language, Quigibo perservered, and released an update every week up until Version 0.4.5, when he adding more features between updates.  The first reply to Quigibo's thread, Axe Parser, DJ_O stated that "I am confident this project will reach states where we can build entire games with it and maybe even get finished."  Axe has come a long way and obviously has been finished, and many great games have been made with it.  50% of the current TI staff projects are made in Axe, and many more in the Community projects board.  More and more features were added, and Quigibo never gave up.  At first, Axe was a language that was almost exactly like BASIC, then it became different enough that it's still connected to BASIC only because of the same editor being used and the same tokens.  And even later, many tokens were changed, and now it only shares an editor with BASIC, plus the easy learning curve.  It has become much more powerful than BASIC, and more widely used as well.


Invasion of the Nspire Lua Games

Recently we have reported many great new Nspire Lua Games.  Ti's adding this language to OS 3.x has really initiated many game developers to move to the Nspire.  These games include: Bobby Carrot, an amazing puzzle game with awesome color graphics for the CX models and 50 levels of gameplay; Space Invaders, featuring great monochrome graphics and smooth gameplay; Conway's Game of Life, a sweet simulation of the classic; TI-Basket, a Basketball Aiming game where you try to sink those shots; Pixel Escape, a smooth copter clone with obstacles; and Pegs, a port of the TI-83+/84+/SE game, where you push objects to eliminate them, featuring full color graphics for the CX calcs.  With all these brilliant Lua games, the pool of Nspire games get bigger and bigger.  Another reason could be the cause of these games, On-calc Lua editors.  Already, there are three stable Lua editors, LuaTerm, by jimbauwens, Lua onCalc, by Dyar, and Oclua, by ExtendeD.  These should make Lua programming more portable and convenient.


Video Players for 84+ and PRIZM/

Thepenguin77 has recently released a demo for TruVid, a program with plays a 4-level greyscale video with sound for the TI-83+/84+/SE Family calculators, not including the TI-83+.  According to him, the 83+SE and 84+ SE can each hold about 45 seconds of video while the 84+ can hold 15 seconds.  This program is Truly revolutionary and pushes the limits of the z80 calcs.  Another Video player in the works is MPoupe's PRIZM Video Player.  It runs at about 2 frames/second, has no sound, but supports 16-bit color.  As an amazing accomplishment on such a new platform, he must be congratulated, and we wish him good luck.


New TI-Nspire Chinese Models

In addition to the newly released TI-Nspire CX models, Texas Instruments also has plans to introduce three more new Nspire models exclusive to the Chinese market.  Two of these new calculators, the Nspire CX-C and the Nspire CX-C CAS, are essentially the same as the other CX models when considering hardware, but they contain a Chinese-exclusive OS that contains an English and Chinese dictionary.  The third model, the TI-Nspire CM-C, looks quite different when compared to the CX models with a rounded design, sleek white color, and USB port on the side.  The CM model also has half of the ram, 32 MB, as the CX.


Great TI-Nspire Lua Contest 2011
The TI-Bank and Inspired-Lua sites have teamed up to host an Nspire Lua contest!  With great prizes, the contest sure presents a great incentive to learn Lua.  TI-Bank and Inspired-Lua have provided 3 TI-Nspire CX CAS as prizes.  However, the program must be in French, but that doesn't provide a major dilemma for most non-RPG game programmers, "as some of them simply have no text."  Critor has announced in this thread that three categories of programs will be accepted: Math, Games, and Physics/Chemistry, with a CX CAS going to the winner of each category.  Programs must be submitted before the September 30, 2011 23:59 GMT+2 (France summer time).  You may enter a program started before the contest, and you may even submit your program from the Omnimaga Contest #2, as long as you translate it into French.  We wish anyone who enters good luck and hope the contest turns out many great new games!


Credits

Yunhua98 - CGPN founder
Apcalc - Contributor
DJ_O - Contributor
All the people who helped create the news
All Omnimaga Coders of Tomorrow and Managers - Editing, Formatting, Ideas, and Support


Miscellaneous

If you have any submission ideas for next newsletters, feel free to PM yunhua98 on Omnimaga or Cemetech. He will forward them to the CGPN team in Omnimaga staff section.

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