Hooray.. JTR worked on Pac It for two entire weeks! It was not easy to spend the time, but it worked out!

The following was achieved:

• All disks examined and backed up (oh boy, Pac It was spread over 100 discs and some data has even been lost. Finally there is an overview and backup copies on multiple hard drives. To JTR’s confusion, a few pieces of music are still missing…)
• Bugs in the intro fixed: broken graphics corrected, loader fixed and fixed a very nasty monster bug. Insight: Better do not overwrite IRQ vectors with data…
• Finally text appears in the intro. That was more difficult than it sounds, because he writes three lines of text into sprites, while masses of graphics are being scrolled in the background. He had to change some things in order to have enough space for the sprites and the new code.
• Highscore system worked out and mostly installed (now there are 4 hiscores, depending on the number of players)
• Highscore screen massively improved (new score system installed, checking and adding scores, scores get saved now – for which it is required to deactivate and then re-install the loader)
• Titel menu massively improved (hiscores are now loaded, some bugs fixed, keyboard layout updated)
• Interlude screen scores started (after each level, there’s a distribution of score)
• Interlude Screen information started (used to view information in the tutorial, or later on passwords)
• End sequence started (at least it is now known what can be told to Veto, how many steps of animation can be installed)
• Data management (lots of data has been moved, space for global variables has been created, which will never be overwriten now etc.)
• Reassembly of the Game Over screen. Unfortunately, the source code of the Game Over screen had been lost. However, it could be restored with JTR’s own reassembler in surprisingly good quality: Without changing even a bit, the code could be moved and commands included. Soon it will be checked here whether there is a high score and acordingly either load the high score screen or titel menu. JTR’s reassembler will also be released “soon”… It also detects hidden code and lo/hi byte of relative addresses…Well… Once again, a great piece of progress for Pac It. Unfortunately, it’s nowhere near completion! But it is no longer about decades but only about years until it comes out… JTR does his best to at least get it out of the fridge!