Tapeworm Disco Puzzle OUT NOW on playdate

[wallmasterr (Alastair Low)]

Hi,
Last year we ran a kickstarter for a new NES came called tapeworm disco puzzle.
one of our stretch goals was to create a version for playdate. Everyone who backed will get a download and the game will be available on itch in the near future
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/flea-game/tapeworm-disco-puzzle
the games original inspiration was from thinking of games that would suit the playdate. I liked the idea of a worm being wound back inside a cassette tape with the crank. A design which in reality may feel a little aquard on the actual device but you can play using the buttons to to make it less crampy.

I got my playdate a couple weeks ago and we've been working on the port. Valdir has done an amazing job.
the nes game was coded in c and was the base for this c port.
The playdate has the same vertical resolution as the playdate so on the art side it was just a case of converting all the tiles to 1 bit then we added screen borders to the sides to fill out the widescreen. Some was automatic but most was redrawing over existing tiles. I realy like the 1 bit limitation.

The game is currently playable from start to finish but we are working out some bugs and adding some more polish.
Here's a gif from a couple days ago

we got it running on device and I think it looks great

The animated card image is coming together too

[AdamsImmersive (Morgan)]

Very slick! Using the crank seems like it would be a fun way to play.

[wallmasterr (Alastair Low)]

ye , i also wanted to get the fishing rod controller working for the dreamcast version at some point

[matt (gingerbeardman)]

Having not got round to playing this yet, I'm hyped!

[Whitebrim (Denisov Yaroslav)]

Music worms you said?

[wallmasterr (Alastair Low)]

We keep getting a error when trying to install the game through the sideload webpage.
It works fine through installing from simulator. is it anything to do with the pdxinfo file?

[matt (gingerbeardman)]

Is the error on the website or on the device?

• Try a different zip
• Upload the pdx unzipped
• Check for any odd characters in filenames?

I had a space character at the start of one filename that caused this behaviour.

[MagicMan]

If you are looking for a beta tester let me know I have a playdate and am usually really good at finding problems with things :p.

[wallmasterr (Alastair Low)]

Thanks ,
Iv been using windows 10 built in to zip, is there an automated wiy to check for special characters?
Its an error when trying to install on device
after trying to install on device, it dose all the downlaoding and gets to 100% install then pops up the error
"Error
there was a problem installing this game."

then says download error on the games page in settings on device

we are coding in c in visual studio 22. The relese /debug options in vs dont seem to build a version that can run on playdate. we run the nmake comand in the vs comand prompt to generate the arm build that dose work when sideloaded through the simulator.

[matt (gingerbeardman)]

No automated way that I know of, and I can't remember if the error log text file had anything useful in it.

I think process of elimination:

1. Try to sideload the pdx unzipped.

If this works the problem is the zip app. Windows 11 zip is known to be problematic. Maybe Windows 10 is also?

2. If pdx unzipped does not install

Problem must be in a filename.

Successful sideload through Simulator indicates filename problem, this is the same problem I had.

Sideloaded installation process fails if zip includes certain files

@robbie? (Robbie Trencheny#4800 on the Playdate Squad discord server) let me know that they could not sideload the Daily Driver (Demo) and I was able to reproduce it. Bug Sideloaded installation process fails if zip includes certain files Repro sideload offending zip to developer website refresh games list download completed 100% installation stopped at 14% "Download Error" should be "Installation Error"? [IMG_1665] The problem In the old zip there was a symlink (filename <space-char…

[wallmasterr (Alastair Low)]

Thanks Using winrar may have done the trick. or something else we did. Need to test some more.

yip just seems like the windows zip makes it not work so hopefuly this step can help people in future. winrar zip option works through the sideload site.

[sssetz (Seth S. Scott)]

Man this looks great, cant wait to play!

[wallmasterr (Alastair Low)]

I think we may be ready for beta testing. Il try and send u a code.

[UnbelievableFlavour]

Starting to look really cool guys. Keep it up! Will definitely buy this when my playdate arrives in a month or so!

[wallmasterr (Alastair Low)]

were trying to get a continue feature in
we can save to a file and i can see its updating but we cant then read from that file.

when saving we get this error
"file error unknown uC-FS error: 0710"

get this error when trying to load
"loadGame 1
[0] file error unknown uC-FS error: 0710
[1] file error unknown uC-FS error: 0710
"

heres the C code were using for loading and saving
"
void loadGame(PlaydateAPI* playdate)
{
char buf[4];
SDFile* file = playdate->file->open("savegame.txt", kFileRead);
pd->system->logToConsole("[00] file error %s", playdate->file->geterr());
playdate->file->read(file, buf, 3);
pd->system->logToConsole("[01] file error %s", playdate->file->geterr());
continueLevel = atoi(strdup(buf));
playdate->system->logToConsole("loadGame %d", continueLevel);
playdate->file->close(file);
}

void saveGame(PlaydateAPI* playdate)
{
char buf[4];
itoa(currentMap + 1, buf, 10);
SDFile* file = playdate->file->open("savegame.txt", kFileWrite);
pd->system->logToConsole("[0] file error %s", playdate->file->geterr());
int err = playdate->file->write(file, strdup(buf), strlen(strdup(buf)));
pd->system->logToConsole("[1] file error %s", playdate->file->geterr());
playdate->file->close(file);

}

is there anything we need to do in c to read files?

[jaames (James)]

I replied to this on Discord but I'll leave it here too in case anyone else stumbled across this issue!

When you write to a file, it's always written to the game's data folder, even if the file was originally read from the pdx. Passing kFileRead to file->open will only read from the game's pdx. Here, you need to do a combined kFileRead | kFileReadData to get data folder read permissions

[wallmasterr (Alastair Low)]

Thanks this worked. hope it can help someone else down the line. No i think were feature complete and good to go

[wallmasterr (Alastair Low)]

The game is now live on itch with a lunch discount

Tapeworm Disco Puzzle Playdate by LowtekGames

[matt (gingerbeardman)]

Congrats on the launch!

[wallmasterr (Alastair Low)]

We fixed a couple bugs and were fiddling with the pdx info to try and make it show up as an update when sideloaded through the website.
We got this error when we got it to recognize an update
"Update needed
this game must be updated to run on the current system version"

Il share our pdx info files contence here for refrence.
(initial release)
"name=TapewormDiscoPuzzle
author=lowtek Games, Itd
description=Tapeworm Disco Puzzle!
bundleID=uk.co.lowtek.tapeworm
imagePath=tapeworm-card
pdxversion=11000
buildtime=707313126"

(Version with error)
"name=TapewormDiscoPuzzle
author=lowtek Games, Itd
description=Tapeworm Disco Puzzle!
bundleID=uk.co.lowtek.tapeworm
imagePath=tapeworm-card
version=1.0.0
buildNumber=2
"

(new working version)
"name=TapewormDiscoPuzzle
author=lowtek Games, Itd
description=Tapeworm Disco Puzzle!
bundleID=uk.co.lowtek.tapeworm
version=1.0.0
buildNumber=2
imagePath=tapeworm-card
pdxversion=11000
buildtime=707692269"

Seems to be the pdx version missing broke it in this way.
Whats the difference between pdx version and version is?