MSXdev'18 #1 - Burn Us | MSX Resource Center

Here it is, ladies and gents: the very first entry of this year's MSXdev! This game gives you the experience what it’s like to be a member of a weird, masochistic sect. Make your wishes come true by burning yourself at the altar. Avoid the snakes, kill them if you need to, and navigate your way in the dungeons to find the lighter and the gasoline.

With its ladders, walls, enemies and puzzles to resolve, "Burn Us" reminds of Konami’s classic “King’s Valley” games. In order to add to the excitement, it features a catchy piece of music by chiptune composer Evgeny Shvaryov, a.k.a. “Royal”.
The MSXdev Team hopes that you will enjoy this year’s first entry!

Are you working on an MSX game, or even have one finished? Please consider to submit your work as an entry for this legendary MSX contest, and have the guarantee of a wide audience as possible, gain the attention of potential cartridge producers and even contend to win some prizes!

Relevant link: MSXdev - Burn Us

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Comments (12)

By tfh

Prophet (3423)

30-03-2018, 22:01

The first release! Really love the intro screen!

By Konamito

Paragon (1041)

30-03-2018, 22:02

Weird and original concept being a guy who wants to be burned alive

By Pippo

Hero (521)

31-03-2018, 07:30

Very nice this first-entry.
Congratulations for the very, very original game goal! --> To Burn Yourself!
The music is interesting as well.

By santiontanon

Paragon (1830)

01-04-2018, 03:14

"a man who wants to be burned alive" also got me! hahaha

Nice game!! It took me a while to find that F5 resets the level though. Instructions would have helped

By Thom

Paladin (709)

03-04-2018, 21:23

Which tracker have they used? Outstanding tune! It sounds more like SID than PSG

By JohnHassink

Ambassador (5684)

04-04-2018, 05:44

@Thom: The song itself was created with ASC Sound Master for the ZX Spectrum. The replayer for this game is most probably the assembly PT3 (+ayfxedit) replay routine for MSX. PT3 is the music format generated by Vortex Tracker II, which can, among others, convert ASC files.

About that sawtooth that you hear, it's like this because of extensive (and really good) use of the PSG hardware envelopes (waveform presets). Use of this feature is not encountered often in (MSX) PSG music because it's tricky to use in a melodic sense, and may, on a sound design level, not fit every (especially "Japanese") composing/arranging style. Konami has used it for percussion sometimes, as it lends itself to create extra 'punchy' kicks and snares with (in which case it's a matter of relative volume envelopes).

While it's used for the lead in this game's song, similar use of PSG HW envelopes is done in for instance the bassline of Six Miles High by Matt Westcott a.k.a. Gasman.
Other examples on MSX of this are the intro tune of Seleniak and that of Retaliot.

By gdx

Enlighted (6424)

04-04-2018, 10:48

Nice game! I found a bug: When I jump on the entrance I do not move anymore.

By Thom

Paladin (709)

04-04-2018, 15:39

@John: thanks! Really interesting stuff.

By JohnHassink

Ambassador (5684)

04-04-2018, 18:28

@Thom: No problem! I forgot to mention some pointers for if you'd like to experiment with this.

Under BASIC, you can use the SOUND command. Register 13 determines the waveform and can hold values from 0 to 14. For instance, 8 and 12 are two different types of saws, while 14 is a pure triangle.
Register 11 and 12 both range from 0-255 and determine the frequency.

If you want to try it in MML, then the S (0-14) command is for the waveform, while M (0-65535) dictates the frequency.

Another option is the several PSG trackers around, like Vortex Tracker II, WYZTracker or Arkos Tracker. I think they all support it. TriloTracker (all versions) does, too.

By Grauw

Ascended (10819)

04-04-2018, 19:04

If you combine the envelope with the tone generator, to make the best sounds use the same base frequency (so mask the rightmost bits of the tone generator frequency). Sync is a problem though.

A while ago I posted some thoughts here:

https://www.msx.org/forum/msx-talk/general-discussion/what-t...

By mariocavalcanti

Expert (114)

05-04-2018, 01:36

I love when MSXdev has subscriptions at the beginning. I hope it's a great edition.

By foody

Champion (496)

12-03-2019, 22:59

Where can I download it and get it?

MSXdev'18 #1 - Burn Us

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