(WIP) Single-screen racing game for MSX1

Nice li'l game idea, hope you continue working on it. Like I said before, if I wasn't so darn busy, I probably would have cooked up some music for ya...

@mk These are space ships, actually; I just haven't added the stars to the background. I'd rather explain the lack of inertia somehow, or I'd need to make it something fantasy-like. The ships themselves are more or less finished; I'm hoping the fake 3D will help in creating the illusion the ships are actually moving a bit vertically halfway up the wall (and hide the shortcuts I took with collision detection).

I hadn't considered limited fuel as an option, but hmm. The races are pretty short, though, so I'm doubtful on how good that idea is.

@Jorito Let's see if I can get the rest of the game finished first before thinking about adding any music. 2019 and 2020 are just around the corner...

@mgoulart The only thing in the list I can see happening are the new tracks, which I'll need to create anyway, and maybe adding the fourth player.

@QBee Sam: I don't think I had ever heard of that game before, but that looks surprisingly interesting.

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I've been updating the ROM file at this link. New gameplay video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vCArLBHdyfE (repeated Smiler track because I mistakenly used DW instead of DB when describing tracks in the cup...)

"Major" new features since the first version:
- starting lights
- four cups with five tracks each (single player only now, track selection for cups not yet determined)
- now 22 tracks, 20 of which are in cups
- level features "attraction fields", speedlossless bouncers, "portals" added (that should be enough...)

Functionality not yet added in order of priority:
- class selection does nothing right now, will be like 50cc/100cc/150cc in Super Mario Kart)
- ship selection (will have three base options: trade turning speed for acceleration)
- naming Unnamed1, Unnamed2
- cup details: playable with a joystick + multiplayer, changing starting grid order
- time trials (does nothing at the moment)
- sound effects: no ship-to-ship collision sounds, startup, thruster sounds
- 60Hz to match 50Hz
- graphical polish (menus, better + more tilesets, trophy screens)
- menus to work better with multiple players

Known bugs:
- ships may get stuck on one another in a race (ship-to-ship collision detection probably to blame)
- yellow ship in Liimbo gets stuck at the start
- the ships may get stuck at the top in Suaeves (similar AI problems appear elsewhere)
- bouncers feel like they occasionally increase the velocity instead of just reflecting
- there's something wrong with showing the sprites
- haven't added :, /, - to the "font" yet.
- race results always show "Race 1/1" regardless of the number of tracks in the cup

I think that's enough progress report for now.

Time to throw in thanks again to santiontanon and ARTRAG - this time for the former's thread in 2016 and the latter's answer on how to change page 2 to show as the ROM instead of RAM.

Updates since the last... download link is the same, and some new footage here.

Bigger changes:
- fixed the stupid sprite bug
- added race time record, timer and racer sprites at the bottom of the screen
- added title screen image
- adjusted the tile graphics noticeably
- ships, speed classes now implemented (I hope. I don't feel much difference between the ships, so I may need to redefine them.)
- hopefully fixed the racers-getting-stuck bug
- redid the "conveyor belt" effect (applied more frequently but with lesser effect)

Time trials will get the ax from the menu. The game keeps track of the fastest races by human players, and that'll do.

I hope the AI is now needing only incremental improvements, now that I fixed bugs in the AI training program. Some bugs apparently still persist, so the AI might still get stuck in a corner.

Updated to-do list:
- implement a horizontal/vertical speed limit (either 400 pixels per second to avoid phasing through walls, or 200 pixels per second to avoid going straight through other ships.)
- sound effects: no ship-to-ship collision sounds, startup, thruster sounds
- graphical polish (more tilesets, trophy screens)
- 60Hz to match 50Hz

Known bugs:
- the AI ships may get stuck at certain corners
- bouncers feel like they occasionally increase the velocity instead of just reflecting

Things I really don't want to feel obligated to do:
- shipclass-specific sprites
- thruster flames
- better tiebreakers for results/rankings than "Racer X beats Racer Y, if X < Y"
- second player on keyboard
- music

With luck, this is the last update before I submit the ROM file to MRC. The link above still points to the latest version. I also recorded some new gameplay video, although the sound volume is pretty darn low. Eh, better that way.

Not many changes since the last time. NTSC "support" is done by repeating every 6th frame (lazy, yes, but probably better than nothing) and all tracks have at least some level of human-made race and lap record for all speed classes.

I also wrote a bit longer writeup on the game on Destructoid's community blogs. It's not a very technical document, so it's of very limited interest for the average reader here.

There are still at least one bug (broken collision detection mostly apparent in Counter), but fixing that can wait until next summer.