Changelog

v0.9.23 – March 2024

started implementing junit test cases for Vector2D math class
added a new 2024 build splash image to the project
updated the project from using ProGuard version 7.3.2 to version 7.4.2
fixed a bug where the game statistics dialog could not be opened anymore
rewrote gathering of all statistics metrics for the statistics dialog
added more log warning output for the game statistics
removed obsolete setters in the game statistics class
implemented replay method to determine if the replay version is compatible
tried fixing massive swing problems that have occurred for no reason
implemented a test window class to find the cause of the swing problems
removed old jar in jar loader dependency from eclipse runnable jar feature
added creating a dst folder for distribution of dependencies/libraries
all jar dependencies will now be extracted and repackaged when building the jar
the runnable fat jar of the game now also works with Java 17 again
removed showing an unnecessary warning when parsing an empty level patch configuration
confirmed that the game client runs with Java 21 but the audio is broken then
switching to Java 21 actually solves the mysterious Swing problems with all dialogs
fixed including duplicate library classes in the proguard ant targets
cleaned up the build process and removed redundant folder handling
added several demo classes for software line audio mixing and tone generation
started rewriting audio playback using software mixing for a single source line
implemented fixes for narrow no-break spaces appearing in newer java formatted time
fixed a bug with debris explosions being drawn when their base explosion is inactive
fixed an old bug in the station trapper that prevented creating more than one mine layer
deprecated an old station trapper method and removed redundant call to trap index setter
fixed a bug that left the starlaser without a weapon after station trap placement
tried finding a way to retrieve another mixer on newer Java versions under linux
added icedtea-sound.jar including libicedtea-sound as a dependency to the game libraries
implemented loading the shared library libicedtea-sound.so located in the workspace
implemented retrieving a PulseAudioMixer as default audio device with Java 21
finally the game can play more than one sound simultaneously again using PulseAudioMixer
modified the ant build script to include icedtea-sound and its native library
implemented extracting native libraries into the game folder to allow loading them
the jar file can now extract the native icedtea-sound library and use it for audio
implemented initializing the audio playback device and showing information and warnings
fixed potential problem with the wrong object being terminated when enemies collect ware
implemented object based collision handling methods for collisions with floating aliens
implemented object based alien collision handling method for the player ship
implemented default implementation alien collision handling for enemy ships
the level will now check all enemies for collisions with all alien objects
added some header echo output for certain java properties in the ant build script

v0.9.22 – November 2023

implemented utility methods to determine hostname and ip address of the current machine
starting the multiplayer server now logs the hostname and ip address that it is using

v0.9.21 – September 2023

implemented enemy ships having their own tailspinning duration values
reduced tailspinning time for maforian enemies and increased their bounce mass
reduced acceleration for maforian enemies to the same value as the players ship
implemented object based collision handling methods for station collisions
changed maforians to just fly through the station while delivering stolen cargo
fixed enemy ships exploding when being despawned by the station during delivery
fixed redeployment for piraton enemies after object based station collision handling
removed now redundant destroy method from neutralroamer and neutraldeliverer class
rewrote generic returnware enemyship method to handle returning stolen ware
removed two older returnware methods that contained lots of redundant and bad code
rechecked all 16 mothermaforian mono sprites by comparing to the SHL file
recreated all 16 mothermaforian mono sprites for the sprites archive
created all 16 mothermaforian color sprites and added them to the resources
added SPI_DTAM shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
removed the 16 mothermaforian mono sprites from the png file resources
implemented returning shapes for the mothermaforian object
implemented an enemypool class for stations which handles instantiating enemies
implemented creating maforian formations when they are detected in the enemypool
rewrote enemyship deployment and redeployment for stations to make use of enemypools
stations will now be able to (re)deploy several enemies at once if the queue suggests it
fixed neutral ships accidentally destroying stations upon arrival
deployment of mothermaforians with two maforians as a group now basically works
implemented maforians following the mothership and turning towards the target
maforians in formations will now get unlocked as soon as their mothership is destroyed
implemented object based collision with station handling method for the playership
fixed playership being able to interact with stations that are not alive
simplified enemy deployment logic in the level and removed redundant code
implemented a play method that makes use of basic sound panning
changed the default line audio format from mono to stereo
reimplemented using pan or balance audio line controls if they are available
finally got a single sound to play with panning enabled successfully for the first time
implemented more methods in the sound engine to get mixer lines and line formats
implemented debug methods to get and print a list of available audio formats for a line
rewrote all the sound engine methods to get mixers, audio lines and audio formats
implemented methods to print all combinations of audio lines and supported formats
implemented method to print all mixers with all audio lines and all supported formats
using stereo channels seems to destabilize the audio of the game, so only mono for now
tried finding a way to get the maforian formation code to work authentically
confirmed that maforians locked to mothership can steal cargo, but won’t return it
fixed a bug where the time played was cast to the wrong type in the statistics
readded idle time after deployment to help deploying maforian formations
added follower number as a maforian attribute to define their position in the formation
maforians in formations will be pulled towards certain wing points behind the mothership
finally got the maforian formations to work and it looks almost fine for now
fixed a bug where neutral deliverers exploded when delivering their cargo
removed code that despawned neutral roamers as soon as they touch a station
fixed generating shieldmothermaforian images for the ship selector buttons
fixed ship selector animations not using shapes for the mothermaforians and harakiris
created empty dummy method for gameobject collisions with ware objects
implemented object based ware collision handling method for the player ship
implemented default implementation ware basic collision handling for enemy ships
moved delayed playback of ingame song into delayed game event handler
fixed a bug where maforians would never return their ware even when no longer locked
changed define invader can shoot parameters from local to global in the levelstxtparser
the level will now check all enemies for collisions with all ware objects
added cantina call powerup to the ‚grant all powerups command‘
moved all cantina call code into the powerup manager and thus made it player specific
removed check tick events method in the solar system class
implemented an update method for the powerup manager to handle updates to powerups
removed shield and cantina call checks from the playership update code
confirmed that the players motion is taken into account for cantina call enemy behaviour
increased the time that enemies need to reach their cantina call flight motion
implemented vector2d methods to merge base+current motions or merge them into base
implemented method to unlock a formation maforian from its mothership
fixed a bug where a formation maforian loses most of its momentum when unlocked
implemented a method to help explicitly updating a base object for any derived object
tried fixing problems with unequal object updates becoming apparent at high speeds
implemented a single method to add all new game objects for all types
new game objects will now be added only at the beginning of every game update
renamed old remove-methods in the solar system to reflect them removing all entities
implemented a single method to remove all inactive game objects for all types
dead or inactive game objects will now only be removed at the end of every game update
changed all remaining types for object type specific collections to gameobject
fixed cast to wrong data type for mileage statistics after ending a level
implemented log warnings when level script commands are not terminated properly
implemented floodfilling modifier for asteroid level script command
confirmed that station script command without fill modifier is not applied to the level
reconfirmed all default values and value ranges for the station script command
added new level station parameters constants with proper naming to the game config
removed some redundancy in station config modifier code and added more cleanup code
properly inserted all station default values and value ranges in the levels text parser
refactored station deployment variables and used the new default values
confirmed that sector range parsing must use 0 as default value for all unset params
switched order of parameters for sector range parsing in level scripts from x-y to y-x
rechecked all 8 explosion ‚e‘ mono sprites by comparing to the SHL file
recreated all 8 explosion ‚e‘ color sprites and added them to the resources
added SPE_SPR5 shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
removed the 8 explosion ‚e‘ mono sprites from the png file resources
fixed the order of explosion animations to make SPE_SPR5 to become explosion ‚e‘
implemented returning shapes for the explosion ‚e‘ object
added a sprite from the space trader palm os game to the optional project graphics

v0.9.20 – August 2023 (Laid-Off & EPS version)

updated the project from using ProGuard version 7.3.1 to version 7.3.2
started implementing observer code to allow gameobjects to react to certain events
created reaction triggering interface and added empty dummy methods to all ship classes
rechecked all 16 maforian mono sprites by comparing with the SHL file
fixed 5 incorrect maforian mono and color sprites where the original designs differ
recreated all 16 maforian color sprites and added them to the resources
rechecked 3 enemy shield mono sprites by comparing with the SHL file
added 1 missing enemy shield mono sprite that seems to be unused but was in the designs
recreated existing 3 enemy shield mono sprites and added them to the resources
created all 4 enemy shield color sprites and added them to the resources
added SPI_DELT shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
removed the 16 maforian mono sprites from the png file resources
removed the 4 enemy shield mono sprites from the png file resources
implemented returning shapes for the maforian object
changed statistics text descriptions for levels played and distance travelled
the weapon factory class now decides whether an enemy ship needs any weapon at all
removed redundant playback of shot sound for decoy launching code
started rewriting enemy shooting code to make it more dynamic
pulled weapon type and reaction event type enums into their corresponding classes
implemented reaction event handler for player shot & enemy shot fired events
implemented adding player ship and enemy ships as listeners for shot events
added convenience method to find out whether a solar system runs a replay
added enum for all saved metrics in the game statistics class
added generic method to set values for any statistics metric utilizing common checks
avoided repeated replay playback checks by using the generic setter method for stats
implemented gfx mode aware method to return either mono or colored image for a shape
fixed shipdecorator methods to draw enemy shield shapes on maforian shapes
implemented generic methods in the classic gfx engine to draw a shape on an image
added ticks value output to gameobject and playership tostring methods
gameobject tostring method now reusing short tostring method for code deduplication
implemented convenience method to determine if a ship has any weapon at all
implemented code stub for ships colliding (docking) with a space station
renamed checkstation method to updatestation and refactored some smaller methods
started implementing multiple weapon handling for all the ships in the game
pulled reaction shots for decoy and mine weapons out of solar system into ship classes
implemented keeping an index on the currently selected weapon for easier reference
the selected weapon index will be decreased whenever the weapon is removed from the list
implemented code to select next and previous weapons for any ship
fixed an NPE when ships were removed from the reaction event handler listeners
fixed an old, stupid bug where all player shots were always added in an unsafe way
fixed a bug where collected powerups were logged as empty powerup before depleted
fixed peashooters to allow them to shoot again after shoot handling rewrite
implemented aligned duration counter for ships to check how long they are aligned
fixed enemyships to only shoot decoys at objects of type playershot
fixed showing log message even when removing a non-existant reaction event listener
implemented a neutral ship generator for the enhanced version
in the enhanced version now up to 50 basic neutral ships will roam the level
implemented separate tostring methods for all shot subtype game objects
implemented separate tostring methods for all general level game objects
implemented separate tostring methods for all enemy ships
implemented convenience method to determine if two level coordinates are float-equal
implemented convenience method to determine if an object attaches with a coordinate
created two types of neutrals: deliverer and roamer, being generated constantly
implemented methods to actually count the number of enemy ships and all ships in level
fixed enemy spawn limit prematurely reached when neutrals are also spawned in the level
rechecked all 16 harakiri mono sprites by comparing to the SHL file
recreated all 16 harakiri mono sprites for the sprites archive
created all 16 harakiri color sprites and added them to the resources
added SPI_KAMI shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
removed the 16 harakiri mono sprites from the png file resources
implemented returning shapes for the harakiri object
refactored some enemy ship variable names to make their meaning clearer
started writing a prototype enemy ship class intended as an AI enemy construction kit
pulled code for determining sector number and position from playership into gameobject
generalized and simplified sector number and position calculation for gameobjects
simplified sector change handling and refactored method name
fixed an NPE when updating the missing weapons of the turrets
created ai.original package and moved all original AI enemy ship classes there
cleaned up, simplified and restructured much of the maforian enemy AI code
improved maforian enemy behaviour and fixed some of its navigation problems
finally the maforian enemy behaviour seems to be getting near-perfectly accurate
enabled ship selector to spawn shield maforian enemies
implemented non-destructive tailspinning for shield maforian enemies
simplified code for tailspinning either clockwise or counter-clockwise
fixed tailspinning for maforians to either use clockwise or counter-clockwise
implemented gamemath convenience method to get boolean clockwise/counter-clockwise spin
simplified direction-aware tailspinning for all those enemies that use it
removed old tailspin method that also caused gameobject vectors to get updated twice
reduced some more excessive code and refactored navigation for maforian enemies
fixed maforian shield animation which used an additional sprite that is obsolete
removed a redundant cantina powerup handling method in the enemy ship class
made mothermaforian enemies extend the maforian class to have their behaviour shared
implemented ship selector button deploying shieldmothermaforians on demand
added shield option information to the gameobject types and enemy deployment setups
finally fixed redeployment for maforians and mothermaforians with or without shield
implemented maforians and mothermaforians being destructible by player mines
moved mine explosion effects from playership collision check into own destroy methods
fixed log output when ejecting cargo on playership destruction
reconfirmed that all cargo is immediately ejected although hud is still unloading
added visible particle count to the debug output text
fixed neutral ships filling the entire level with acceleration particles
this also fixed explosion particles not being created anymore due to particle limit
added gamescreen diagonal and half diagonal constants to the mainconfig file
neutrals will only generate acceleration particles when they are visible on screen
added minedroppershot and -debris collision destruction as default for enemy ships
fixed counting escaped enemy ships for the game statistics after exiting a level
again introduced separate classes for shield maforians and shield mothermaforians
fixed tailspinning maforians not losing their stolen cargo
fixed code for ejecting cargo not actually removing cargo from the enemy ships
implemented mothermaforians stealing ware when destroying the player
removed losing ware on tailspinning since that never happens in the original game
added mothership parameters with getters and setters to the maforian enemy
started implementing formation handling code where maforians follow their mothership
readded missing tostring method to maforian class after the rewrite

v0.9.19 – April 2023

split up rendering process into several smaller methods to enable using them separately
implemented non-finalized version for rendering simple images to the screen
implemented rendering initializing method as opposed to finalizing rendering
started simplifying creation and disposal of graphics objects for the screen
mirrored several rendering methods to allow reusing previously created graphics objects
implemented keypress handling for Shift+Space and Shift+Backspace in the controls
implemented intro solar system class that allows showing ingame scenes during the intro
created methods to enable using the blur filter in the core modules
finally it is possible to show gameplay demos during the intro title animation
implemented a delayed camera object that follows a locked object within a given delay
implemented vector methods to allow getting and setting positions as copies
the intro replay now uses a delayed camera movement that makes the action more dynamic
pulled camera initialization code into separate method to allow overriding
rechecked all 16 pirateturret mono sprites by comparing with the SHL file
recreated all 16 pirateturret color sprites and added them to the resources
added SPI_TGUN shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
removed the 16 pirateturret mono sprites from the png file resources
implemented returning shapes for the pirateturret object
fixed and cleaned up some of the game engine launch code
moved gem text editor and particles test launch code into their own threads
fixed gem text editor branching directly into the game after pressing esc
removed some redundant game statistics calls during the game

v0.9.18 – March 2023

added a new 2023 build splash image to the project
updated the project from using Launch4j linux version 3.14 to version 3.50
updated the project from using ProGuard version 7.2.2 to version 7.3.1
implemented menubar function to log which menu item has been selected
implemented always logging whenever a menu item in the menubar is selected
fixed a textscroller bug due to a deprecated drawing method used in the billing module
rechecked all 10 explosion ‚d‘ mono sprites by comparing to the SHL file
fixed 2 explosion ‚d‘ mono and color sprites that were not cut out pixel perfectly
recreated all 10 explosion ‚d‘ color sprites and added them to the resources
added SPE_SPR4 shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
removed the 10 explosion ‚d‘ mono sprites from the png file resources
fixed the order of explosion animations to make SPE_SPR4 to become explosion ‚d‘
implemented returning shapes for the explosion ‚d‘ object
fixed several entities to use the correct explosion spriteset d
changed the label for number of new highscores statistics value
implemented statistics for total aliens lost
when the player is gameover then this will also increase stats for lost ware and aliens
quitting the game via ESC now also increases stats for lost ware and aliens
enemies delivering ware will now also deliver their lost alien buddies
shortened all those lengthy calls to game statistics class in the solar system module
cleaned up code for the game mode selector and simplified logging user interactions
implemented a text resource method to determine if a key exists in the bundles
implemented text resource methods to replace keys in compound texts
completely rewrote initialization and configuration of the menubar
menubar configuration now happens more centralized after gfx engine initialization
selecting menu items now allows logging the actual untranslated default texts
simplified code to change the language for the menubar
modified key replacement in compound texts to allow replacing multiple keys at once
implemented solar system methods to get all sector objects in the current level
implemented solar system method to get a random station in any sector
implemented solar system method to get a random powerup container in any sector
implemented solar system method to get a random sector object in any sector
implemented showing percentage values for statistics entries
implemented statistics for levels won in percent
the playership object now keeps track of the highest speed that it reached in a level
implemented statistics for highest speed
fixed a bug where the player ship was destroyed infinitely on gameover
fixed showing only 3 lost lives on gameover in the statistics when there are actually 4
ware and aliens that are currently floating in the level are counted towards lost values
implemented solar system methods to count floating ware and aliens currently in the level
implemented solar system methods to count all ware and aliens in the game
fixed counting lost ware and aliens on win, lose or esc conditions in a game
modified stats to counting only surplus aliens in enemy ships as lost aliens
fixed counting lost ware twice on gameover when cargo is ejected immediately
cleaned up ogg decoder class and refactored lots of unreadable variable names
cleaned up fadeable ogg clip class and refactored some variable names
rechecked all 4 cycle mono sprites by comparing to the SHL file
created all 4 cycle color sprites and added them to the resources
added SPI_CYCL shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
implemented returning shapes for the cycle object
removed the 4 cycle mono sprites from the png file resources
fixed a calculation error for overlap testing in the level generator
prevented the players starting position from being too close to sector objects
implemented storing custom level configurations in the savegame for custom games
implemented replaying and resuming games using custom level configurations
in the game statistics output removed blank between the value and the percent sign
created new package for gfx converter classes and moved all converter classes there
started implementing an Atari ST Dongleware PAC bitplane file format converter
implemented utility methods to convert atari bytes to unicode chars and vice versa
implemented Dongleware bytes reader class that allows reading Dongleware specific data
implemented a method to return the next bit in Dongleware byte reader
finally the Dongleware PAC bitplane file converter can at least read the oxyd title image
fixed an error with skipping quadrants in PAC bitplane decompression
some more PAC bitplane files can now be successfully converted, still unreadable ones left
implemented the missing draw block uncompressed function for the PAC decompression
implemented a missing undocumented dithered xor invert mode for the PAC decompression
finally the Dongleware PAC bitplane file converter can read all the original PAC files
implemented finishing images when all block data ends prematurely
oxyd and spacola title images are now rendered completely up to the last line
simplified xor invert mode code and pulled invert modes into separate functions
cleaned up some more WIP code in the Dongleware PAC bitplane file converter
pulled lots of utility methods out of enum gfx library into graphics utility class
removed redundant utility code from the Dongleware PAC bitplane file converter
pulled lots of utility methods out of classic gfx engine into graphics utility class
created new gfx.lib package and moved all gfx library related classes there
created a new pac bitplane gfx library class for Dongleware packed bitplane files
moved two dithering related methods from graphics utility class into dithering class
fixed a bug in the packed bitplane converter with rows that end prematurely
fixed inverting images that have the xor invert flag set and have been xor’d properly
added TITLE.PAC to the resources and implemented loading it in the library
reimplemented showing the original title screen when starting in classic mode
added SPA_RENT.PAC to the resources and implemented loading it in the library
added SPACOLA.PAC to the resources and implemented loading it in the library
implemented getting both the hud and radar image from the original SPACOLA.PAC bitplane
added DONGLE.PAC to the resources and implemented loading it in the library
fixed bad order of parameters for the image+filename+transparency gfx constructor
fixed redundant dollar characters in the menu bar keys which led to two wrong captions
removed all monochrome view png files for certificate, hud and radar
fixed not loading colored radar image as png file
fixed a serious bug in handling player termination when traversing the object tree
created a copy constructor for the shape object
fixed accidentally modifying the rectangular debris sprites when loading decoy sprites
added two implementations for blur filters and allowed enabling them in the gfx engine
improved and simplified adding and removing filters and put some log output there
replaced pausing the engine with drawing a black screen which leaves the game responsive
implemented additional playback mode of a replay on repeat
created a new menubar submenu for filters and added invert, interpolate and blur filters
fixed adding filter menu item listeners and filters always twice per mouse click
prevented enabling filters twice by accident
fixed counting replay gameplay events towards player statistics during playback
implemented simulating highscore status events in replay playback
fixed a bug where recollected ware was dropped from the game upon player destruction
added missing parameters to ware and shot tostring methods
added a replay solar system class that is intended to be used for replays only
split up the game content rendering methods and made rendering much more flexible
pulled more rendering composition code into the solar system module
renamed gfx engine methods to show that they render images finalized (thus exclusively)
implemented finalized and non-finalized version for all the different rendering methods

v0.9.17 – August 2022

finished rewriting game object termination for all relevant classes in the project
simplified debug methods for destroying/removing all enemies in the solar system
fixed debug methods to also remove newly added enemies, dissolves and score indicators
rechecked all 16 peashooter mono sprites by comparing to the SHL file
fixed 7 peashooter mono sprites that have never been cut out pixel perfectly
also fixed 7 peashooter color sprites respectively
recreated all 16 peashooter mono sprites for the sprites archive
recreated all 16 peashooter color sprites and added them to the resources
added SPI_PIG shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
removed the 16 peashooter mono sprites from the png file resources
implemented returning shapes for the peashooter object
implemented statistics for total games completed (aka full playthroughs)
implemented a method to iterate all solar system sectors and check their visited status
implemented statistics for total sectors visited
rechecked all 10 explosion ‚c‘ mono sprites by comparing to the SHL file
recreated all 10 explosion ‚c‘ color sprites and added them to the resources
added SPE_SPR3 shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
removed the 10 explosion ‚c‘ mono sprites from the png file resources
fixed the order of explosion animations to make SPE_SPR3 to become explosion ‚c‘
implemented returning shapes for the explosion ‚c‘ object
implemented statistics for total mines destroyed
added last level gameplay „statistics“ for binary win/lose/start/complete states
fixed ship selector using images instead of shapes which made them being centered wrong
implemented statistics for total new highscores set
implemented statistics for total collisions with asteroids
fixed object termination code for ship and asteroid collisions with several game objects
fixed several game objects calling their own destroy method directly
fixed modal confirmation dialogs not having their window title set
implemented drawing of shapes in the vortex animation
fixed npe when trying to draw non-shapes in the vortex animation
renamed rocket game object type to missile
implemented basic decoy launcher weapon code
added a method to remove all aliens at once from an enemy ship
fixed a bug where not all surplus aliens are ejected when an enemy ship is destroyed
fixed a log output error in the ware class where the wrong class was referenced
the peashooter can now launch decoys to stop incoming player shots
added spawning a small explosion when the player shot has hit a decoy
renamed decoy shot object type to decoy
pulled code for handling player shot hit by a decoy into the destroy method
added sound effect on decoy hit for player shots
fixed peashooter launching decoys while already tailspinning
fixed log output errors in the abstract shot class
implemented decoy animation and max distance logic
implemented choosing the decoy launcher as a usable weapon for the player
made the discovery that decoy sprites are actually square debris sprites but inverted
implemented shapelist fixes for inverting the square debris sprites
implemented returning shapes for the decoy shot object
removed the 6 old mono decoy sprites that were always wrong and unnecessary anyway
created 8 colorized decoy sprites and added them to the resources
fixed old playonce logic for the sound lib, explicitly playing sounds once works now
implemented a soundfx player window that works just like the jukebox window
implemented methods to play sounds exactly once, even if they are set to looped
all the entries in the jukebox and the soundfx player will now be sorted
implemented methods to play sounds exactly once but per given game object
fixed explosion constructors that always abandoned the origin object
implemented a game object method for a shorter tostring output
implemented handling of terminate object and root object when the player is destroyed
implemented statistics for total destroyed by enemies
turned the enemyfactory (used in the station) static, just as the weaponfactory
changed all enemies constructors to allow setting their origin object
pulled station code for random enemy creation into the enemyfactory class
the decoy launcher will aim directly at the target if there is no smart aim available
fixed order of parameters for several methods in the aim helper class
fixed order of parameters for several methods in the enemyfactory class
enemies deployed from a station will now have the station set as their origin object
rewrote the method to handle the terminate object to allow traversing the object tree
implemented statistics for total destroyed by mines
changed the border colors for the window title panel to fix the border looking too short
allowed selecting single rows in the statistics window and the highscore window

v0.9.16 – July 2022 (Lost Eye version)

fixed a bug in the scale image 2x method where it returned the original image size
fixed using localized title for the modal dialog instead of supplying title text key
implemented logging exception stacktraces when using unknown text resource keys
implemented a utility method to count the number of lines for a given string
finished the generic modal dialog class which can be used for action confirmation
renamed modal dialog to modal confirmation to express what it asks for
implemented executing a given task when confirming the modal confirmation dialog
replaced the swing optionpane for resetting the highscore with a modal confirmation
fixed using text content in the modal confirmation instead of text resource keys
successfully implemented loading and saving of game statistics to the filesystem
the game is finally able to keep track of and display detailed game statistics
implemented statistics for both the last game played and the current session
implemented statistics for total levels played
implemented statistics for total credits gained
implemented statistics for total credits lost
implemented statistics for total powerups collected
cleaned up powerup collecting code a little and removed redundant code
implemented statistics for total levels successfully completed
implemented statistics for total levels failed or quit
implemented method to theoretically allow the player to lose more than one life at once
implemented statistics for total time played
implemented statistics for total ware delivered
fixed a bug that prevented piratons from collecting aliens when they have stolen cargo
implemented statistics for total ware lost
implemented statistics for total mileage
fixed not rounding the double values when displaying the total mileage
implemented methods for resetting some or all of the game statistics
added a button in the view statistics window to delete the statistics
fixed not reloading the content of the view statistics window after deleting its data
pulled methods for opening cargo bay, ejecting aliens and ware into the playership class
implemented statistics for total enemies destroyed
the statistics will now be saved directly when leaving a level instead of client exit
the statistics will now also be saved directly after resetting the stats
implemented statistics for total enemies escaped
implemented statistics for total asteroids destroyed
fixed still image when exiting a level prematurely while saving statistics
started fixing and rewriting obstacle avoidance for the bot player once again
extracted 3 gem dialog icons for question, exclamation and stop signs
created colored versions of the gem dialog icons
added 3 colored and 3 mono gem dialog icons to the resources
implemented only resizing small 16×16 icons in the modal confirmation dialog
modal confirmation dialogs will use 32×32 gem dialog icons for a more authentic l&f
modal confirmation dialogs will use colored or mono dialog icons depending on game mode
implemented statistics for total aliens collected
removed possibility to add negative amount of or zero lives to the player
added convenience method to the flap display to subtract the whole value at once
implemented method to subtract an arbitrary number of extra lives from the player
rewrote subtracting lives code on player ship destruction, simplified the process
the force gameover command will now properly report all lost lives to the statistics
started rewriting game object destroy logic to allow naming the cause of destruction
implemented statistics for total shots fired
added game object fields for termination position, time and the causing game object
implemented a terminate method for the game objects to record the destroy circumstances
pulled bomb, shield and surfing checks out of the player ship update method
simplified player ship update method by always calling seperate check methods
implemented statistics for total black hole flythroughs
increased the height of the view statistics window
implemented a convenience game object method to restore a previously terminated object
started rewriting major parts of the player ship destruction logic to gather more info
fixed broken bomb animation code after rewriting player ship destruction logic
pulled bomb animation handling code into a separate method in the hud class
added the game object label to the string output method for all game objects
log messages for player ship destruction are now unified and will always show the cause
reverted an earlier edit that removed acceleration particles from the enhanced game
removed all direct calls to the destroy method in the player ship class
implemented statistics for total pirate stations docked
updated the project from using ProGuard version 7.1.1 to version 7.2.2
fixed some more ugly code formatting that eclipse ruined again
replaced dozens of calls to the alive setter with call to new terminate method
implemented setting game object termination values for tailspinning enemies
prevented resetting previously set game object termination values

v0.9.15 – June 2022

started restructuring the bot player code
rechecked all 10 explosion ‚b‘ mono sprites by comparing to the SHL file
recreated all 10 explosion ‚b‘ color sprites and added them to the resources
added SPE_SPR2 shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
removed the 10 explosion ‚b‘ mono sprites from the png file resources
fixed the order of explosion animations to make SPE_SPR2 to become explosion ‚b‘
implemented returning shapes for the explosion ‚b‘ object
fixed using the wrong number of sprites for the explosion ‚f‘ spriteset
fixed line lengths for the debug output to beautify the generated debug overlay
created a simple view game statistics window and added an entry in the game menu
implemented showing the overall collected score bonus in the statistics window
added current value for score bonus collected during this session only
removed some unused code in the view highscore window class
created a generic modal dialog class to replace the default swing optionpanes

v0.9.14 – March 2022

implemented a game object method to traverse the origin object tree upwards to the root
implemented a shot object method to find out if it is a player shot
implemented a ship object method to find out if it is the origin of a specified shot
minedropper shots will now spawn debris objects depending on who the origin object was
fixed calls to various shot constructors that have changed
started implementing object based collisions and destruction for player shot updates
implemented shot collision methods for various enemy types and other game objects
simplified rescue capsule opening logic by removing redundant opening attribute
cleaned up huge and complicated update method for player shots
started implementing object based collisions and destruction for sector object updates
fixed updating enemies and bouncing enemies even though they might be already dead
finally rewrote all the game object update methods to use object based collisions
finished rewriting game object classes to offer object based collision handling
reverted removing objects before updating them because of regression problems
fixed regression with collecting aliens where they could be collected several times
added more log output messages to collecting aliens and triggering status messages
pulled alien collecting code from the solar system class into the playership class
added more log output messages to collecting ware
pulled ware collecting code from the solar system class into the playership class
fixed regression with collecting ware where it could be collected several times
fixed regression with enemies not being removed when trying to deliver stolen cargo
implemented a menubar item to quickly start a demo game from the file menu
fixed the player bot to always wait until the vortex animation is finished
made the player bot fly a little more naturally by implementing a motion threshold
prevented the player bot from shooting at cycle and spermbird enemies
implemented a method to easily find an enemy that is currently stealing cargo
made the player bot intercept enemies stealing cargo if the player needs to
started implementing some basic dodging intelligence for the player bot
added methods to try to determine the next collision with a nearby object
fixed a regression bug where a hurricane shot would always destroy the player
made the player bot try dodging asteroids, enemy shots and enemy ships
the player bot kinda manages to dodge dangerous objects if it has enough time to do so
fixed missing destroy method for minedroppers where they spawn mines
increased priority for cargo hunting in the bot players behaviour
implemented the player bots ability to decide whether to turn left or right for dodging
added method for collision prediction using custom object sizes to allow safety distances
rewrote finding a course for object dodging using radians analysis
tried improving the bots dodging abilities but somehow made it even worse
rewrote calculation of a flee vector once again and finally made a little progress
the bot will use increased virtual object sizes for all collision prediction tests
fixed the player bot cease actions when an enemy has stolen cargo
implemented a separate method to cancel a running level
added a new command in the command manager to cancel the running level
fixed looped acceleration sound effect keep playing when the level has been cancelled
all sound effects and the level timer will be stopped before the level is cancelled
implemented target arrival logic for the player bot for powerup containers and stations
the player bot will now smoothly arrive at those targets and brake just in time
this accidentally fixed the player bot not collecting all rockets in a container
fixed the player being able to collect powerups while surfing animation is ongoing
fixed a problem where container magnetism could be applied to non-existing containers
implemented waiting logic for the player bot when visiting a powerup container
pulled calculation of arrival flight speed into separate method
implemented proper bot methods to determine every collision time and position
implemented calculating a correct avoidance force for the most threatening object
the player bot is finally able to maneuver around asteroids in most cases
implemented a method to get a description of which direction a given vector points to
added id to the string representation for generic game objects
fixed a bug in the string description for vectors
added speed value to the string description for vectors
implemented graphical highlighting of game objects that the bot is targetting
fixed a regression bug that enabled asteroids to collide with containers and blackholes
implemented vector method to allow adding two simple double values to the motion vector
added a convenience method for radians calculation that takes a double array
implemented drawing arrows for all the game objects motion vectors
fixed trying to draw vector arrows for objects standing still
implemented drawing highlighted particles on the game screen to show collision points

v0.9.13 – February 2022

rechecked all 8 explosion ‚a‘ mono sprites by comparing with the SHL file
recreated all 8 explosion ‚a‘ color sprites and added them to the resources
added SPE_SPR1 shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
fixed the order of explosion animations to make SPE_SPR1 to become explosion ‚a‘
implemented returning shapes for the explosion ‚a‘ object
fixed cycles not being destroyed by the players shield like in the original game
started moving collision handling logic into the object classes themselves
started rewriting all game loop update code for game objects regarding collisions
oxyd rotors are the first game objects to define their own collision handling
implemented a default collision handling for collisions with the player ship
implemented object based collision handling for peashooter enemy types
split up collision handling method into ship collision and shot collision handling
fixed wrong log message for the destroy station command in the command manager
fixed enemies carrying ware possibly throwing a ware item with a different type
implemented object based collision handling for all previously defined enemy types
moved generic cargo throwing logic into the enemyship class
replaced all ship collision code with object based collision handling logic
created object based collision handling method for colliding with asteroids
made peashooters bounce and tailspin from the players shield for a better effect
removed duplicate code for handling dead enemies in the game loop
reduced method complexity from delegating collision handling to the objects themselves
deprecated lots of old methods that do not use object based collision handling
moved default implementation for game object collisions into ship object class
several more enemy ship types can now be deployed directly from the ship selector
created object based vanishing logic for game objects that need to despawn
implemented object based vanishing logic for aliens, ware and shots
cleaned up the way aliens and ware are being removed from the game object lists
game objects will now only be added or removed at the beginning/end of an update
destroy methods for all game objects will now be called upon being marked dead
missile objects will now handle their own emitting of spark particles
refactored update methods for ware, aliens and rescue capsules to improve readability
fixed the way rescue capsules are being removed from the game object list
fixed destroyed enemies possibly losing a ware item with a different type
implemented many missing getters and setters of addlists for different game objects
added calls to game object destroy methods before removing them from the object lists
created common methods for ejecting aliens and ware for enemy ships
destruction of enemy ships will now call the common eject aliens and eject ware methods
cleaned up update methods for enemies, enemy shots, rescue capsules, aliens and ware
cleaned up update methods for explosions, dissolves and score indicators
refactored addlists in the solar system class to clean up their names
removed ugly getters and setters for all addlists in the level
replaced all addlists getters and setters with simple to use delegate methods
decided to check objects for alive status in all update methods before updating them
added addlist delegate methods for also adding multiple game objects in one call
fixed setting wrong object type in the decoy shot class
moved piraton exact shot speed aiming into the aim helper class where it belongs
fixed shooting for the piraton enemy which will now shoot properly using the aim helper
simplified peashot class to remove redundant code in the object initializers
fixed initialization for all the shot classes to properly define their origin object

v0.9.12 – January 2022

finally added my favorite code metrics/LoC plugin (now Metrics3) to Eclipse again
added a new 2022 build splash image to the project
updated the project from using ProGuard version 7.1.0beta4 to version 7.1.1
rechecked all 16 piraton mono sprites by comparing with the SHL file
recreated all 16 piraton color sprites and added them to the resources
added SPI_GLID shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
implemented returning shapes for the piraton object
reordered key and modifier constants in the levels txt parser
added new modifier constant for harmful invader setting in the levels txt parser
implemented global level setting for harmful invader in the levels txt parser
fixed a bug with global harmful setting not being checked correctly
fixed a bug where the piraton used the wrong sprites
compiled the game with Java 17 and confirmed that it works perfectly using it
improved performance for writing sector difference debug text
created 4 colorized rotorstar sprites and added them to the resources
implemented a utility method to easily join two arrays of the same type
implemented a temporary fix to allow returning ship decorations as centered shapes
ship decorations will now work with ships that use shapes for drawing their appearance
implemented a method to floodfill enemy setups in a given sector range
implemented parsing the floodfill invader modifier and generate the level accordingly
implemented a basic cycle enemy ai that at least manages to circle around the player
implemented a method to retrieve a random position in a given distance around an object
fixed cycle animation not being updated anymore
vastly improved the cycle enemy ai which looks much more like in the original game
started slowly rebuilding my ST Spacola playtest and debug environment under Linux

v0.9.11 – September 2021

implemented methods to retrieve a player ship for a given name or an index number
added player name to the virtual cursor instances
implemented a gamemode enum class that contains all the game mode specific information
implemented a playerstatus class that contains all savegame related player information
implemented adding players to a running game and updating all players equally
implemented updating all inputs for all players equally
implemented hashcode and equals for new playerstatus, solarprogress and replay classes
rewrote replay recording and enabled multiplayer recordings
started rewriting initializing playback for a replay
tried fixing the currently broken verification of the replay objects
generated new toString methods for all savegame and replay related classes
fixed a possible NPE when closing an OGG stream too quickly
fixed replay verification by removing custom enums from serializable classes
fixed not getting control actions for the main player from a replay object
got the replays to run again but they always get out of sync after a while
painstakingly fixed lots of the broken code formatting that eclipse ruined somehow
added a method to return a simple string representation for a ticks counter
added ticks indices to lots of log output during the gameplay
tried fixing the async replay problems by changing the player initialization
fixed a hard to find bug, that caused the replay to become async by collecting aliens
at least the singleplayer replays should now work perfectly again
unified and simplified alien object initialization in the game
generated toString methods for a lot of additional game logic objects
fixed initiating game mode in a totally wrong way which resulted in graphic artifacts
fixed initiating bot players in multiplayer
the multiplayer game finally launches successfully again with bots
added a solar selector module prior to launching a multiplayer game
implemented a method to select non-existing codebook pages for multiplayer levels
recording of multiplayer replays is now basically possible
implemented a way to take some random seed and derive a book page and code tab from it
implemented a utility method to generate random strings up to a maximum length
fixed several off by one errors in the code to generate random strings and book pages
implemented deriving singleplayer and multiplayer book pages from random strings
fixed animated buttons to also handle SHL shapes instead of images
changed the ship selector window to make use of 5 animated buttons with shapes
rechecked all the 16 laser shot sprites by comparing with the SHL file
created 16 new colored laser shot sprites with their new sizes and using SHL offsets
added SPI_LASR shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
implemented a method to fix an original error in the offsets of the 16th laser sprite
implemented returning shapes for the laser shot objects
implemented generating random texts with fixed length instead of variable length
fixed generating random texts with zero length when calculating the variable length
rechecked all 4 rotor star sprites by comparing with the SHL file
added SPI_ROTS shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
the SPI_ROTS SHL file fixed wrong sprite order and offsets in my old rotor star sprites
implemented returning shapes for the rotor star object
removed call to laser shot shapelist fix again, since i am unsure if this was intentional
recolorized all 8 asteroid sprites exactly like the ST Megaroids game in colored mode
renamed sprites folder to shapelists to show that it contains original SHL files
created 3 colorized minedropper sprites and added them to the resources
added a new 2021 build splash image to the project

v0.9.10 – August 2021

fixed audio looping issues under Linux & Java 16 but introduced clicking noises
now the audio code will open the audio line with the actual requested buffer size
finally fixed audio sample looping completely for Linux & Java 16
audio is still somehow broken for Linux & Java 8, still no idea how to fix this mess
replaced deprecated explicit Integer constructor calls with better valueOf calls
tried implementing some safety code for safely stopping the running music thread
removed several calls to drain the audio line to see if it improves the stability
slightly improved powerup collecting code for the player bot
the player bot will now decide if it wants to collect the duplicator powerup
fixed a problem where the bot tried to keep playing in level win state
added checks to prevent player bot from shooting and accelerating when not allowed to
fixed player shots bouncing infinitely inside the station in enhanced mode
fixed ogg clips only playing once successfully and staying silent afterwards
the game engine will now only play ingame music if enabled and if enhanced mode active
finally fixed both sound and music playback for Linux & Java 16 at least
fixed level numbers not actually being set for the played solar system
switched development environment to Java 16 for now, since Java 8 is broken here
from now on Java 16 will be required as minimum version to run with (i.e. for audio)
fixed rocket powerups not being initialized correctly with random amounts
the player bot enabled menu status is now retained in the game engine
fixed too high volume for master gain line controls by reducing the value
added a volume offset to get the volume line control value from a master gain value
implemented a fix to prevent the bot from being stuck at the start with a mine around
enabled the player bot to turn twice as fast when trying to target a dangerous object
fixed potential NPE when closing the splash screen too quickly under Java 16
implemented a new kind of fadeout for the intro music which is much more authentic
found absolutely perfect timing values for the new fadeout
implemented methods to determine if a player has the max amount of aliens or credits
implemented a method to determine if a player has the max amount of cargo items
the player bot will now decide whether it wants to collect free-floating ware or aliens
implemented the bot being able to intercept and collect ware and aliens in reach
vastly improved targetting of the bot by extending the target motion calculation
increased the cargo and alien collecting range for the player bot
the player bot will now intercept and collect cargo or aliens like a champ
implemented a method to get the actual client version without build number
implemented a color highlighting when there is a version mismatch for a replay file
audio in Java 8 will freeze only when launching from inside Eclipse, the JAR file is ok
fixed several GUI error and warning windows not being centered relative to the frame
fixed several GUI error and warning windows not being translated
fixed being able to start a replay while another replay is already playing
figured out middle mouse button emulation in Ubuntu should be disabled for this game
stopped the bot from shooting at tailspinning enemies
created 2 new icon subfolders for devices and paint icons and separated the icons
created 5 new menu icons and added them to the resources
replaced the printer menu icon with a better one from an actual Atari ST program
created 2 more new menu icons and added them to the resources
added a game cursor interface to allow using and controlling more than one cursor
rewrote major parts of the cursor code to separate the main cursor from virtual cursors
implemented the control action executor to persist actions on any given cursor
fixed the bot code to use any player ship instead of always the main player ship
implemented retrieving the nearest or any near sector object using a given max distance
pulled update code for game cancelled event into separate method
moved player dependent cargo bay fill and unload logic into the playership class
fixed all the unload, refill and refill+unload methods always changing the main player
the multiplayer solar system can now spawn bot players, but they’re still broken
fixed a bug where calculated level coordinates from mouse coordinates would persist
finally the bot can properly navigate in a multiplayer level next to the player
fixed a regression bug that broke mouse button release events in the input receiver
fixed shooting in the multiplayer solar system
the level will now be properly generated using level configuration in multiplayer
fixed a bug in the levels text parser when parsing an almost empty configuration
implemented using the last available configuration for unavailable level numbers
implemented multiple powerups parsing and generating in the level generator
pulled some more multiplayer code into the common level preparation block
implemented a game random method to retrieve a random position near a reference object
adding bots to a multiplayer game is now handled more dynamically
the multiplayer game now works with adding three or more bots simultaneously
removed some obsolete audio playback code that didn’t make any sense in the game
implemented sound effects on a per gameobject basis for isolated playback controls
multiple playerships can now play the accelerate sound effect simultaneously
fixed multiple calls to accelerate the playership in multiplayer games
implemented switching cameras between playerships in multiplayer games
implemented disabling the main cursor if the camera is locked to another player
fixed multiplayer game launching even when the server startup failed
fixed not shutting down the multiplayer server properly after engine shutdown
added player names to all log messages for the player ship
renamed game client to SpacolaClient class since it contains implementations
extracted a game client interface from the implementation
implemented a gametoken class that is used to authenticate clients in multiplayer games
rewrote parts of the client registration process for the multiplayer server
implemented several game remote exceptions to represent the different multiplayer errors
registering with the game server now returns a game token that is used for communication
added a game remote exception for invalid tokens (client not registered)
added a remote input receiver to the client entry upon registering a client
implemented drawing the actual hud for the currently viewed (camera locked) player ship
declared two older hud drawing methods deprecated to reduce the risk of reusing them
added game tokens to all the former remote server calls
changed throwing remote exceptions to always throwing game remote exceptions
fixed not setting the solar system object in the game class for multiplayer games

v0.9.9 – June 2021

implemented a simple mathematical function to determine correct tailspinning direction
enhanced game mode uses calculation of clockwise or counter-clockwise tailspinning
classic mode only has tailspinning counter-clockwise, as it is done in the original game
unified usage of positive and negative radians for clockwise and counter-clockwise spin
implemented another helper method to calculate radians for two simple positions
added a little more javadoc to some gamemath methods to make them easier to understand
implemented a method to return fixed ship angle degrees in 32 steps for classic mode
the player ship can now only accelerate in fixed directions in classic game mode
removed duplicate definitions of math constants in the ship angle class
pulled repeated calculations of constants in angle2d class into separate math constants
fixed about window with subpanels not being translated after changing languages
fixed fading in the ogg music code for linux volume controls
changed the fadeout index in the intro music to be closer to the original game

v0.9.8 – May 2021

started debugging the annoying linux java audio issues with the spacola samples
fixed concurrency issue with startup splash screen updating after closing on linux
fixed a splash screen problem due to linux using the headless version of openjdk8
fixed another concurrency issue for errors closing the splash screen prematurely
implemented a sound method to return the name of the currently used audio mixer
cannot fix splash screen not being centered correctly. It is plain linux jvm bullshit
fixed lots of linux problems where GUI update code was not executed by the EDT
implemented audio volume conversion methods to calculate integer volumes
improved the code that plays a silent audio sample to make it actually silent now
the audio system will now either use master gain or volume controls for linux systems
the project will at least start the build process for jar files on linux again for now
changed compile source and target version to 1.8 in the ant build script
fixed a problem with type safety in the spacola multiplayer server code
added another check to find out if we use java in headless mode
now a platform independent font and a font size are specified in the splash screen
fixed about-window being instantiated and opened by the menubar
fixed not resetting about window tabs to the first panel on subsequent views
implemented realtime updating values in the system info panel while viewing
renamed SpacolaSplash to SpacolashScreen to conform to own naming conventions
renamed Splash to TitleScreen to make it clear what this is supposed to be
created and added shield, speed slow and speed fast menu icons to the resources
created and added new mouse cursor from the atari st game ‚aliens‘ from 1992
started implementing a method to convert audio data to compatible format after loading
implemented converting audio data to different formats, but it still doesn’t help it
tried fixing pulseaudio for 6269 Hz sound, but the source data line always gets blocked
finally implemented a method to reduce the loudness of raw PCM audio data on linux
the sample playback on linux finally starts working better and might become usable
implemented sound methods to fix distortion for sdd files and to set their loudness
implemented converting all sdd and ogg sound files to a common sound format
i seem to have fixed the problem with blocking audio lines by converting all audio sfx
implemented a method to get sample length in microseconds
the loop points for the acceleration sound effect are now calculated dynamically
fixed the acceleration sound effect loop after the conversion broke it
implemented a utility method to create a reversed copy of a byte array
implemented a method to reverse a sound effect taking sound format into consideration
the sound engine is now capable of playing any sound effect in reverse
implemented a method to stretch and thus double the length of any sound effect
started fixing fadeout for the ogg music clip which is broken under linux java
changed the classpath separator in the proguard configuration which was wrong somehow
added platform dependent conditions for proguard targets
fixed jdk problems in the build script, the proguard targets can execute again
moved the keystore for the signjar target into the project dir
fixed signing jar files in the ant build script using the correct key store
updated the project from using ProGuard version 6.2.2 to version 7.1.0beta4
updated the project from using Launch4j windows version 3.12 to linux version 3.14
the complete build process finally works perfectly under linux, even exe file creation
tried implementing calculation of the length of ogg audio streams

v0.9.7 – October 2020

fixed exception with malformed resource URLs for the inconsistent JAR classloader
fixed wrong class for log output in powerup container
fixed wrong loglevel for several powerup container log messages
implemented set cargo method for the playership to allow setting cargo to any number
fixed duplicator powerup that wouldn’t work without the set cargo method
added log message to show when packaged files are accessed in contrast to folder files

v0.9.6 – September 2020

changed the spacolassic game mode image and added it to the resources
fixed setting cursors endlessly in the mouse entering and exiting handling code
implemented graphics methods to extend or scale images to a given width and height
custom cursors in the client now take into account the best toolkit cursor size
the game won’t try to use custom cursors anymore if the OS toolkit doesn’t support them
finally fixed a very old bug where NPEs occurred while creating 16x16px custom cursors
the game mode selector window now shows the atari finger cursor
fixed not delivering key typed events for some of the core modules through the controls
now the correct sound effect is played when typing in the fake TOS module
fixed the spacolassic game mode image again because the fill pattern was wrong
fixed client dialog windows not always being repositioned relative to the parent window
created a complete spacola font with full character set
renamed classic spacola font (with bigger spacings) to spacola HUD font
added complete spacola font and complete white spacola font to the resources
added whitespace character to the spacola and spacola white fonts
renamed spacola font class to spacola hud font
implemented complete spacola font class with mono, white and color styles
added the new spacola game fonts to the game font loader class
added enum constant names to the gfx lib initialization warnings
implemented a simple kerning feature to the spacola font as seen in the original game
removed unnecessary dongleware font graphics and styles that will probably never be used
simplified dongleware font style handling
added missing tilde character to the colored dongleware font
added missing square and curly brackets, and at character to both dongleware fonts
implemented altgraph event handling methods in controls
tried implementing square bracket keytyped events but it doesn’t work yet
java doesn’t seem to recognize any altgr key events properly on german keyboard layouts
implemented alt event handling methods in controls
implemented workaround to enable handling ctrl+alt as altgr replacement for windows
fixed locking either ctrl or alt keys when handling ctrl+alt and missing release events
implemented workaround to finally allow typing square/curly brackets, at, tilde, etc.
fixed text prompt exception when typing characters not supported by the used font
added methods for the gamefont classes to determine if a character is supported
implemented option in the gfx engine to extend images centered or top left aligned
added convenience methods to easily extend images top left aligned or centered
implemented a graphics method to create an outlined image from any given image
readded outlined dongleware font style since we no longer need a seperate resource file
set the number of stored highscore entries to 10 since storing more distorts the list
removed obsolete „show all“ checkbox from the view highscore window
implemented enter and return keys removing pause status like in the original game
fixed tab key not removing pause status correctly
fixed two wrong pixels on a kleptomara sprite that is different in the SHL file
created and added 16 kleptomara colorized sprites to the resources
fixed aliens managing their own ticks variable
fixed ticks and precise ticks values not being visible to subclasses
fixed asteroids managing their own ticks variable
spawned small asteroids will start with a random animation sprite now
fixed blackholes managing their own ticks variable
fixed explosions and debris explosions managing their own ticks variable
fixed starlasers managing their own ticks variable
fixed stations managing their own ticks variable
fixed lots of game objects not calling the abstract gameobject update method
fixed updating the missiles vector twice in certain cases
implemented immovable object attribute for gameobjects and set it for stations
in enhanced mode asteroids will now be reflected from stations upon collision
fixed an old bug that made the starlaser animation go too fast
simplified bouncing code and reduced redundancies in multiple bounce methods
bouncing code now checks for any immovable objects and handles them appropriately
fixed playership managing its own ticks variable
removed ticks handling in all of the enemy classes and probably broke everything
fixed an old bug when trying to determine if an angle is aligned within tolerance
rewrote major parts of the maforian enemy ai to reflect my latest playerbot findings
the maforian now behaves much more like in the original game, but still not perfect
managed to slow down the maforians intercepting algorithm which was far too strong
made lots of progress analysing the dongleware PAC file format used in the original game
rewrote maforian turning logic, to try and make it more rough and less perfect
added math methods to truncate or round floating point numbers to a desired precision
maforian enemies now behave better when returning ware to the station
reintroduced older maforian ai for the wafer enemy for the moment to preserve it
fixed stars background not resetting when restarting the game engine
measured, confirmed and finalized sector width to be exactly 4096 pixels
i might have discovered that the original game actually has only 36 updates/sec and fps
measured, confirmed and finalized player acceleration to be exactly 0.22 ppf @ 36 fps
changed maforian enemies to only make them turn once every 16 frames
fixed missiles updating their vector twice per update when tailspinning
simplified existence checks for all sector objects
fixed not creating a missing powerup container for the start and target powerup
fixed not stopping the accelerating sound effect when the player loses a life
fixed replay recorder recording inputs from several games without resetting

v0.9.5 – August 2020 (10 Years Anniversary version)

changed versioning scheme of the game client to show the exact state of dev progress
fixed dozens of more occurrences of old gamemath random calls
finally got the game to compile again after fundamental changes regarding PRNG calls
fixed wrong filename in enum gfx lib that prevented the game from loading
fixed selection of explosion sprite set not being deterministically random
fixed some more asteroid code not being deterministically random
fixed some vector and alien code not being deterministically random
fixed some enemyship code not being deterministically random
moved remaining deprecated random enum method from gameutility to gamerandom class
fixed several more indeterministically random method calls in many classes
fixed string output of gameobject direction vector details
fixed not resetting the asteroids class when restarting the game
fixed selecting an invalid rotation sprite index for the alien sprite
fixed random value generation for debris objects which was terrible
ticks should only be increased when the game is actually running and not paused
added the display of the current tick number in the debug output
fixed level timer not being reset correctly
implemented a check to prevent player input from being recorded while game is paused
removed the ‚b‘ for build version from all the filenames since it is obvious
implemented storing and retrieving the seed used to create a gamerandom object
fixed a bug with cargo refill that prevented correct replay playback after gameover
implemented exiting the game when the replay playback is finished before the level is
removed checksum from equals and hashcode in the savegames
implemented convenience method to get replay length in milliseconds
implemented loading and saving replay files to the file system
fixed playerships alive status not being reset after gameover
finally the replays seem to work just perfectly, even action-packed games with gameover
simple updating of a vector now internally calls precise updating for 1 time unit
started rewriting parts of the collision logic to fix some older problems
changed versioning scheme in build filenames, build number is part of version number
implemented more collision methods to get the point of impact on game objects
implemented menu bar options for loading and saving replays
implemented starting playback of a replay in a separate game engine thread
fixed verifying integrity of savegame and replay files twice for custom file loading
fixed playback of replays in an endless loop
fixed not exiting the playback of replays after shutting down the game engine
playback of classic and enhanced replays now works flawlessly through the menu bar
added a big timer font image to the resources for the timer class
created and added 4 monochrome and 4 colored (rotating) sun enemy sprites
added the sun sprites to the ship selector window
improved utility method creating a timer string to make it dynamic and include days
fixed being able to shoot when left clicking while game is paused
fixed being able to reset accelerate status while game is paused
confirmed in the original game that players can fully interact in intro animation
created a separate font class for the big digit timer font
fixed a bug that prevented the timer from being stopped correctly when finishing a level
fixed a bug that prevented the player from becoming invisible when finishing a level
fixed a bug that prevented the level from exiting after force win level command
separated the way the game is updated in pause mode
changed the timer logic to make sure time is only calculated once during update
moved method for generating a timer string into the leveltimer class
added a small timer font image to the resources for the timer class
fixed 5 general menu icons which all had either wrong size or color depth
removed 1 icon in the resources that somehow was kept in the wrong folder
created and added 10 more 16×16 menu icons for the menubar items
set new menu icons for a lot of menu items in the menubar
created and added 1 more sprite to the sun enemy for each mono and colored
removed unused layout code from some gui classes
started implementing a replay preview window to view replay details before playback
added more utility methods to generate a date string for a specified calendar
added additional methods to generate localized strings for dates and times
cleaned up some non working code from several gui classes
fixed a bug that prevented the replay from playing in enhanced state correctly
fixed a bug with a visible system cursor showing after stopping a replay
finished replay playback dialog with lots of information about the recording
fixed a bug where big asteroids would be drawn as medium sized ones
rechecked all the sprites from the 6 previously processed SHL files
added SPI_DEFN shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
implemented returning shapes for the square debris explosion objects
measured lots of new gravitational pull values for the blackholes in the original game
confirmed speed warnings being triggered even by gravitational pull from black holes
wrote a test method to find a better formula for the blackhole gravitational pull
found a better formula that kind of fits my latest measurements
found an even better formula when i noticed a weak pull near centers with a small radius
added SPE_PART shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
renamed minedropper shot explosion particles and moved them to the debris sprites
implemented returning shapes for the minedropper debris explosion objects
implemented returning shapes for the triangle and spark debris explosion objects
decreased blackhole gravitational pull since it somehow felt too strong
changed the blackhole gravition factor once again after comparing side-by-side
fixed being pulled towards a powerup container while vortex animation ongoing
fixed wrong animation sprites for the hurricane shot
fixed rant station animation not being triggered correctly in the delayed event handler
fixed a bug where the turrets could fire an infinite number of bullets at the player
implemented detailed toString methods for savegames and replays
added more helpful debug output for savegame loading and saving details
fixed wrong text keys for loading savegame error windows
implemented savegame loading and saving using the menubar items
fixed redundantly adding uppercase file extensions for savegames and replays
fixed saving savegames and replays always using uppercase file extensions
fixed using sector width instead of sector height variable to calculate Y coordinates
added another convenience method to simply set x and y position of a vector
fixed a bug where the x and y position of a vector was set without wrapping coordinates
fixed problems when changing the client language during playback of a replay
changed a bit of the short description and demo scroller text
fixed exception when selecting a replay file and cancelling the dialog
implemented toggling infinite shield by pressing the shift key during the game
changed the english text value of the options menu from preferences to options
implemented methods to retrieve the elapsed number of seconds in the level timer
implemented method to get the average ticks per second in the running game
removed some ingame collection information from the debug output
added information about average ticks per seconds to the ingame debug output
improved calculation of the average ticks per second to make the value more stable
added more known nicknames to the special thanks section of the credits
implemented several verification checks for the black hole generator
the black holes can finally be considered close enough and fine for now
fixed showing the verification module when loading an enhanced mode savegame
fixed always resetting the players score after loading a savegame
fixed not setting enhanced state correctly by savegames
implemented allowing to omit the SP parameter from level configurations
implemented positioning the player at the target station if no SP parameter present
changed levels txt parser to allow level configurations without any blocks
fixed shifting start positions when the level config explicitly sets it to 0,0
fixed exception when setting empty first and/or second parameters for the start position
added several more modifier key constants for invader generation in the levels parser
implemented multi invader setups in the levels txt parser which appears in level 2
implemented fill probability modifier for multi invader setups
pulled canShoot method out of several enemies and put them into enemyship class
fixed a bug where the kleptomara could fire an infinite number of bullets at the player
fixed playing panel sound effect when kleptomaras get a double shot weapon powerup
changed dongleware url protocol from http to https in the game info
failed updating the project to ProGuard 7.0.0 but its developer forgot the ant plugin
updated the project from using ProGuard version 6.1.0 to version 6.2.2
finally confirmed all the 3 DGST parameters in the level script
confirmed the definition ranges and the defaults for the DGST parameters
implemented station setups in the levels txt parser which appears in level 2
implemented floodfill, fill outer and fill probability modifiers for station setups
fixed not resetting flags for different setups in the levels txt parser
fixed reading empty tokens for excess whitespace in the levels txt file
added empty (0) and invalid trap parameters to the station trapper class
confirmed definition ranges and defaults for the remaining parameters of DGST and DGB
added constants and implemented defaults for all the values of the DGST parameters
station setups parsing in the levels txt can now be considered at least close enough

v0.94 – July 2020

created a simple jukebox window class that lists all of the music tracks used in the game
created a menu item that opens the jukebox
implemented a basic jukebox option that allows playback of any music track
implemented some convenience methods in the music library code
tried fixing a bug that prevents the jukebox from stopping the music playback correctly
fixed concurrency problem when music playback is stopped in a separate thread
implemented blocking playback of music, if the music playback stop thread is still active
the game client will now start playing back a startup music track after initializing
the currently played back music is now correctly detected in the jukebox window
the game client now supports opening the jukebox and changing the music at all times
replaced lots of occurrences of PRNG and replaced it by preseeded deterministic PRNG
moved all random related math functions from gamemath into gamerandom class
renamed all methods in gamerandom class to remove redundant ‚random‘ name part
added some more static indeterministic random methods to the gamerandom class
created and added 6 more 16×16 menu icons for the menubar items
set more menu icons for several menubar items
changed the message, pause, search and clipboard menu icon
added a star menu icon for the menubar

v0.93 – June 2020

cleaned up some code in the level initialization in the solar selector
removed deprecated array of available levels from solar selector and from saved games

v0.92 – May 2020

renamed pirateshot to hurricaneshot to conform to the original game files
created perfect shape template for the hurricaneshot and fixed wrong transparency
added the SPI_HURR shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
removed mono hurricaneshot png sprites from the resources
confirmed 4 of the sprites for the hurricaneshot to be pixel perfect
fixed minedroppershot and hurricaneshot objects to use the new shape files
fixed minedroppershot handling object logic in the draw method
fixed transparency pixels in color hurricane shot 1 sprite according to shapelist
created perfect shape template for the starlaser
added the SPI_STAR shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
removed mono starlaser png sprites from the resources
confirmed 2 of the mono sprites for the starlaser to be pixel perfect now
fixed transparency pixels in color starlaser 1 sprite according to shapelist
fixed updating object logic in the draw method of starlasers
fixed order of hurricaneshot color sprites in the workspace resources
added all transparency verification layers to the minedropper sprite shape templates
pulled general menu icons into separate general icon subfolder in the resources
created and added 16×16 miniature menu icons for tos folder, tos file and tos program
changed a lot of the icons for different items in the menubar, e.g. info and game menu
fixed pause logic for the menu bar, which clashed with pressing the space bar
implemented pressing F4 as well during a running game to toggle pause
created and added a floppy menu icon
set the floppy menu icon to the load and save game file menu items
fixed the last four menu icons to set their color depth to monochrome with alpha
created 7 more ST style menu icons and added them to the resources
set some more icons for several items in the menu bar, e.g. cheats and options
renamed atarihand cursor to atarifinger, which seems to be a more precise handle
added actual default atarihand cursor to the resources and the controls class
renamed hand menu icon in the GEM menu icon folder to finger
moved actual hand menu icon to the GEM menu icons subfolder
created and added three more general icons to the menu icons resources
moved all dongleware related menu icons to a dongleware menu icon subfolder
created and added a pause menu icon
changed several more menu icons for the menu bar, e.g. resume and pause engine
started rewriting the level creation logic to make it more flexible and cleaner
implemented a basic galaxy class for the selected codepage and tab and the rng seed
implemented the solar selector to always create a savegame before starting next level
readded spac_jurchen music track for the ingame music
added new track spac_avalanche which will allow to have a greater variety of music
implemented rotating the ingame music track regarding the current level number
implemented a method to find the position on the level grid for a given level number
the replay tapes now contain the solar progress and the playback level number
wrote a method to finalize (close) the replay tape and store the savegame in it
enabled automatically preselecting a level in the solar selector for the replays
finally got the game to compile again after rewriting parts of the level initialization
fixed not resetting the game random after restoring the replay savegame
fixed not properly initializing the level grid when loading a savegame
implemented a counter for calls on the game random class to verify identical usage
fixed NPE caused by taped replay when stopping and restarting the game engine
finally got the level generator to work deterministic randomly for the replays
implemented using the solar system in the galaxy object to create unique level seeds
the seed in the galaxy object is negative when no solar system has yet been selected
the solar selector now uses a different seed to create the panel layout
changed the galaxy object to separately allow creating seeds for the selector and level
loading a savegame or replay now restores the seeds for the selector and the level

v0.91 – April 2020

added clearscreen methods reusing existing graphics object instead of creating new ones
changed clearing the screen in the method to render the game content
added the SPI_FJET shapelist file to the resources and created entries in the library
removed mono minedropper png sprites from the resources
confirmed 3 of the sprites for the minedropper to be pixel perfect
fixed an error where the asteroid sprites were used for the lightball animation
added the lightball sprites to the ship selector dialog
created 7 perfect shape gimp templates for the first implemented shapelist files
implemented a minedroppershot sprite and animation fix to create the 4th sprite

v0.90 – March 2020

allowed the bot to use the previously set mouse position and continue steering from that
implemented a mathematical method to calculate the radians from one gameobject to another
programmed the bot to always target the current sector powerup container
wrote an algorithm to determine an acceleration vector for intercepting game objects
vastly improved the bots ability to maneuver in the level when targetting objects
implemented a method to determine the ships status regarding all known powerups
implemented the bot automatically aiming at all hazardous objects on the screen
implemented the bot automatically targetting the winning station whenever possible
fixed the bot AI not acting correctly in manual shooting mode
modified smart aiming helper methods to directly use vectors instead of game objects
implemented smart aiming for hypothetical vectors for the bot AI aiming
vastly improved the bots ability to aim at shootable targets except for certain cases
fixed player being able to accelerate during surfing animation while respawning
somehow fixed not drawing the current sector immediately after starting the level
fixed a stupid bug that prevented the player from destroying armed sector objects
fixed player ship being able to visit a station while surfing animation ongoing
fixed code deciding whether smart aiming is too far off, instead shooting normally
fixed player ship being destroyable after successfully visiting the target station
fixed concurrent modification in the command manager by adding commands separately
divided the sound resources into fx and music folders, fixed loading of audio
finally i was able to extract and confirm 39 resource files from the original game
managed to extract and confirm 26 more resource files from the original game
managed to extract and confirm 21 more resource files in various later levels
managed to extract the last „zirpweep“ sound effect that is probably unused in the game
finally extracted all 104 original spacola resource files using a debugger
started analysing the dongleware shapelist (SHL) format
figured out several attributes and lots of information in an SHL file
replaced all 48 sound effects with the perfectly extracted original sound files
all sound effects and their corresponding filenames are considered confirmed now
started implementing a shapelist converter class to load and read Dongleware SHL files
implemented SHL code that is finally able to read at least a few of the files
successfully converted a batch of 34 SHL files into regular PNGs
moved the unfinished shapelist converter class into the gfx source package
improved the SHL reader code and was able to convert 13 more original SHL files
implemented several more specifications of the SHL format into the reader code
successfully converted 6 more SHL files from Spacola, OXYD and Esprit
successfully converted 5 SHL files from Bolo
tried fixing the problem with oversized sprites for example in SP_STD.SHL
finally i fixed converting SHL files containing sprites with a wrong width
the SHL converter can now properly read and convert all known SHL files
confirmed sprites for SPI_MINE to be pixel perfect and to have the correct size
added SPI_MINE to the resources into the sprites folder for original SHL files
implented a shapelist library that loads original shapelist files
the gfx library finally uses the first original sprites from SHL files for mines
started fixing file access objects with open inputstreams not being properly closed
fixed error while trying to load shapelists in deployed JAR file
tried implementing a signed/unsigned raw audio autodetection
once again extracted 15 SDD sound files that have not been decoded in the debugger
fixed 4 asteroid sprites and confirmed all of them to be pixel perfect
added SPI_STON to the resources into the sprites folder for original SHL files
the gfx library now uses the asteroid sprites from the original SHL files
fixed 4 lightball sprites and confirmed all of them to be pixel perfect
added SPI_LBAL to the resources into the sprites folder for original SHL files
the gfx library now uses the lightball sprites from the original SHL files
fixed not adding shapelist resources into the number of loaded resource files
fixed 4 colored asteroids sprites according to the SHL file
figured out data for x and y offsets in the SHL files for centering sprites
fixed the SHL converter to allow retrieving bytes either signed or unsigned
implemented a shape class to represent the new sprites with predefined offsets
unified and moved common methods to create boolean bitmasks into the utilities class
implemented the SHL reader to also highlight the draw offsets contained in the SHL file
fixed reducing blank columns in SHL images even if the width becomes too small
successfully converted all 59 SHL files into PNGs containing the draw offsets
refactored and commented the SHL converter to explain the technical details
created and added 4 colored lightball sprites to the resources
implemented 1-layer-shapes in SHL files to invert pixels and use transparent background
made inverting of the 1-layer-shapes optional because inverting is not always correct
implemented drawing of centered shapes for game objects in the gfx engine
created a graphics utility class that contains common graphics operations methods
implemented creating and using mono and colored shapes in the enum gfx library
the mines will now be drawn using original shapes with predefined SHL offsets
started using global game statistics throughout the game for score and game completion
implemented big all-in-one constructors for the enumgfxlib enum objects
implemented shape animation objects in the shapelist library class
created shape enums for all types of asteroids in the enumgfxlib
fixed wrong sign for the default shape centers
removed asteroid, lightball, asteroids and mine sprites from the mono png resources
added enumgfxlib shapes animation entry for lightball sprites

v0.89 – February 2020

added stub methods for mouse wheel handling and added listener to the GUI window
implemented basic mouse wheel logic to allow for later usage in the game
renamed class Controls to Spacontrols to adapt it to own naming conventions
renamed class Controllable to Spacontrollable to adapt it to own naming conventions
implemented mines dropped by the playership to be left a bit behind with a slower motion
implemented basic control stub and ingame methods for moving the mouse wheel up and down
the game now plays the ST bip sound effect as an indicator when the mouse wheel is turned
measured and configured the size of the station objects
started implementing a feature that enables player shots to bounce off of stations
implemented a mathematical method to calculate bouncing off of immovable objects
the player can now shoot stations and the bullets will bounce off in all directions
added hitpoints logic to the station game objects and allowed reducing them
by shooting the station the player can now actually destroy it after all
measured and configured the size of the blackhole objects
fixed player shots destroying pirate ships currently deployed instead of bouncing off
moved handling of ejecting aliens on playership destruction into separate method
measured and configured the size of the cargo objects
measured and configured the size of the powerup container objects
measured and configured the size of the debris objects
measured and configured the sizes of both mine objects
measured and configured the size of missile objects
measured and configured the size of oxyd rotor objects
measured and configured the size of micro shot objects
cleaned up constructors for several shot objects
measured and configured the sizes of minedropper shot and minedropper shot ball objects
measured and configured the size of starlaser objects
measured and configured the size of (currently nonexistant) bolorotor objects
measured and configured the size of (currently nonexistant) shockerrotor objects
measured and configured the sizes of cargoliner and cargoflyer objects
measured and configured the size of (currently nonexistant) defender objects
measured and configured the size of (currently nonexistant) flyex fly objects
measured and configured the size of (currently nonexistant) lightball objects
measured and configured the size of harakiri objects
measured and configured the size of kleptomara objects
measured and configured the size of (currently nonexistant) megaroidship objects
measured and configured the sizes of (currently nonexistant) megaroidufo objects
measured and configured the size of minedropper objects
measured and configured the size of mothermaforian objects
fixed mothermaforian using the wrong bonus score value
measured and configured the sizes of (currently nonexistant) retaliatorjet objects
measured and configured the size of rotorstar objects
fixed rotorstar using the wrong bonus score value
measured and configured the sizes of (currently nonexistant) spermbird objects
measured and configured the size of tornado objects
fixed tornado using the wrong bonus score value
measured and configured the sizes of (currently nonexistant) tricore objects
measured and configured the size of wafer objects
fixed wafer using the wrong bonus score value
fixed several other enemy types using the wrong bonus score value
set bonus score value for the oxydrotor enhanced enemy to 80 for now
changed notation for sector diff string in the debug output to use symbols
created 7 ST style fill patterns that were used in oxyd, esprit and stad
rewrote respawn logic for the playership, enemies will now target respawning players
removed obsolete visibility getters and setters in the playership class
added proper math modulo operations for increase/decrease and add/subtract
fixed player being able to shoot while respawning animation is still running
implemented changing weapons upwards and downwards using the mouse wheel
implemented updating the radar screen during the gameover animation like in the original
simplified code for updating in the game loop and during the gameover animation
fixed not updating the current sector during the gameover animation
found an additional status message used in the original game: Trouble…
added mono and colored version of the trouble status message to the resources
implemented displaying the trouble status message when activating the bomb event twice
changed the colored systems k.o. status message to also show some red letters
created 5 colored score sprites and added them to the resources and gfx library
created a colored rescue capsule sprite and added it to the resources
confirmed the trouble message always appearing when activating bomb event twice
created another grey ball artwork for the enhanced HUD and replaced the HUD frame
fixed resetting the player lives never after returning to the intro after a gameover
fixed showing the menu powerup in the main menu in some cases after a gameover event
confirmed the original game not checking for highscore when cancelling a solar system
confirmed the original game checking for highscore when cancelling the solar selector
fixed showing shield status messages during and after gameover animation
created a new HUD frame border image for Bolo (1995) and added it to the resources
the colored PC Bolo HUD frame border can now be selected in the menubar
added the 8 realistic cargo item sprites to the resources and the gfx library again
the game can now be configured to use the realistic cargo sprites in enhanced mode
added more variables to hold the state of controls for a small mouse controls rewrite
created input receiver interface that allows defining methods to receive control actions
started implementing a mouse input receiver that handles direct mouse input
created a new package for core controls and moved all control related classes into it
added commands for switching to previous and next weapon to the command manager
turning the mouse wheel up or down now only triggers commands in the command manager
rewrote some methods to directly handle mouse clicks to consume control actions now
started completely rewriting the whole game mouse and keyboard control logic class
removed surplus controls instantiation in the game window class
implemented default string output for controlaction class
created new control action executor class for retrieving and executing control actions
finally indirect game controls via control actions works
added mouse catching and simplified indirect mouse handling for control action code
implemented mouse handling methods depending on a supplied player ship object
implemented a control action executor class which allows registering input devices
implemented replays, a replay recorder and replay input receiver classes
finally the game actually supports recording and playing ingame replays perfectly
started modifying the random number generation to be more deterministic for a given seed
created a bot input receiver and programmed a very simple bot AI for the player
implemented the bot randomly accelerating and shooting whenever a target appears
created a remote input receiver stub for use in multiplayer games later
created an item in the menubar to enable and disable the bot AI
implemented methods to dynamically enable mouse input, bot input or replay input
made the system cursor show up when the bot AI is in control of the ship
allowed enabling and disabling the recording of mouse input
fixed recording inputs when a replay is already played back
fixed exception when the replay file is finished, the mouse input will take over now
added log output for replay playback initialization and when it is finished
added a new 2020 build splash image to the project
fixed bot input receiver to determine mouse button release events correctly
also fixed mouse input receiver to only fire mouse button release events once

v0.88 – September 2019

created 7 colored magic gimmick sprites and added them to the resources
created 6 megaroids big and small ufo sprites as a homage to the original atari st game
added the megaroids ufo sprites to the enum gfx lib and to the ship selector
implemented fireworks particle explosions and sound effects in the closing credits
implemented more enhanced explosion particles being ejected on mine destruction
created 9 colored minedropper shot sprites and added them to the resources
implemented minedropper shots spawning enhanced explosion particles on detonation
fixed wrong pixels in 4 colored station rant animation sprites
created 2 colored station cola animation sprites and added them to the resources
fixed log output class for several commands in the command manager
implemented destroying station objects for future game options
implemented station destruction command for the command manager
changed classic gfx engine to avoid rendering invisible game objects
fixed not drawing mine objects on the radar when they’re deployed by stations
fixed not drawing the player surfing animation even when the visible flag is not set
added playing fanfare/credit sound effect in the beginning of the closing credits
kinda confirmed enemy ship modifiers DCSù to enable shooting and DCSø to disable shooting
fixed 3 weapon menu icons which were exported using the wrong indexed palette
fixed 3 general menu icons which were exported using the wrong indexed palette
fixed 3 gem menu icons which were exported using the wrong indexed palette
fixed the gem mac font image which was exported using the wrong indexed palette
fixed the mono sd software image which was exported using the wrong indexed palette
added an opaque variant of most of the transparent menu icons as an alternative
replaced the transparent cargo menu icons with better opaque ones
replaced the transparent powerup menu icons with better opaque ones
replaced the transparent weapon menu icons with better opaque ones
replaced the transparent general menu icons with better opaque ones
replaced the transparent gem menu icons with better opaque ones
changed and replaced 4 more general menu icons with better opaque ones
changed and replaced 8 more gem menu icons with better opaque ones
removed older redundant cola, cherry and toiletpaper menu icons
for now decorated several menubar items with menu icons to see how it looks
changed and replaced 5 more general menu icons
fixed 2 more general menu icons

v0.87 – August 2019

fixed frozen object logic in the 2d vectors time based update method
confirmed in the official table that there are 83 flyex fly gimmick sprites
created and added all 83 flyex gimmick sprites to the resources and to the gfx lib
started implementing a generic time based update method for the game object class
added time based mileage and ticks calculation methods
implemented a generic method to create an animation sample from an Anims type sprite
implemented a ship decorator method to create an animation sample for the flyex fly
added the flyex fly to the ship selector object for testing purposes
implemented an overriding toString method for the abstract shot object for debugging
implemented a basic laser weapon class
modified Kleptomaras, Tornados and Wafers to allow using the laser weapon
the laser shot will now be more flexible to use in the laser weapon class
fixed error when updating the laser shot, the shot is now drawn correctly
implemented convenience methods to calculate an object vectors radians and degrees
the player can now finally shoot with the laser weapon
added weapon enum constants for the weapon factory
implemented a weapon switcher debug menu and corresponding commands
added common tostring method for the abstract weapon class
fixed a bug that prevented ships from firing micro shots
fixed a labelling problem for mines in the weapon switcher menu
implemented calculating the correct laser shot alignment when using smart aiming
implemented the pirate weapon class which can also be used by the players ship now
the pirate weapon can now also re-steal cargo from enemies and steal surplus aliens
fixed pirate shots not dissolving when hit an enemy that has no ware or surplus aliens
added the rocket object to the ship selector dialog grid
fixed pirate shots destroying asteroids
fixed pirate shots destroying various other types of game objects and not dissolving
confirmed and fixed animation phases for the solar selector clicked field
started implementing a generic minedropper weapon class
measured and implemented the size of the minedroppershot debris objects
made all the minedropper shot objects extend the abstract shot
replaced references to the playership in the minedropper shots with generic game objects
replaced instanceof in weapon factory with flexible enum types and switches
the minedropper will now also use the weapon interface classes
fixed a bug where the players weapon is initialized before the playerships own type
the player can now use the minedropper weapon and drop mines itself
added weapon enum types to all the weapon classes to determine their types
removed redundant code from force gameover command
fixed a bug that left the player dropped mines without motion
the playership object now also makes use of the alive attribute
the player now drops mines on destruction just as the minedropper enemies do
created and added 16 megaroids ship sprites to the resources and to the gfx lib
added the megaroids ship sprite to the ship selector as a homage to the atari st game
turned the weapon, cargo and border selection menus into radio button menus
reduced log level for restoring default parameters in the configuration file
fixed a menubar bug where the screen was resized twice on startup
fixed a new bug that made missiles unable to target the player properly
fixed a bug that made the player respawn animation not show
the gfx engine will no longer silently ignore inactive game objects
fixed an exception when explosions were drawn after they went inactive
fixed a very old unnoticed bug that made armed sector objects not disappear completely
fixed explosion and alien updating code to properly check on alive status AFTER updates
fixed surf animation not drawing after destruction of the players ship
fixed a bug that made the piraton unable to target when the player is not alive
fixed a bug that made the wrong station show animations triggered by events
implemented more checks to allow piratons to update even without a given target
confirmed that dgss(1) (station trap) is pixel perfect
changed the playerweapon long distance constant to 252 pixels (half game screen width)
measured the max distance for laser shots of starlasers, which seems to be 215 pixels
created 15 colored debris sprites and added them to the resources
created 62 colored explosion sprites and added them to the resources
measured and guessed the upper limit for debris spark particles ejection
guessed the debris spark particles ejection limit
fixed debris particles being ejected with too much force
confirmed number of debris particles in debris explosions for mine h3/8 objects
pulled some of the debris particles constants into the game config class
measured rectangular debris alive time to be at least 2.3 seconds (168 frames)
moved debris particles alive time constant into the game config class
fixed an old bug that made rectangular particles not dissolve correctly
fixed a bug that made starlaser shots go on infinitely
made the starlaser at least basically use a laser weapon object
fixed removing of inactive debris particles in the debris explosion class
fixed animation handling of debris spark particles which always happens synchronously
fixed random animation phase for debris spark particles
reduced debris particles max alive time to 2.5 seconds

v0.86 – July 2019

created 16 simple colored pirate turret sprites and added them to the resources
added a utility method to reverse the contents in a byte array
created a new macintosh style gem font (chicago) that was used in unknown TOS versions
created an info menu icon from the macintosh style gem font and added it to the resources
created and added a bob dobbs face menu icon from the original gem font
created and added a bell menu icon from the original gem font
grouped all gem related menu icons together into a common resource folder
implemented gem mac font as a subclass of the original gem font
the game font loader now instantiates a gem mac font and a colored gem mac font object
only the menu resource class creates image icons from the gfx library
made all other gui classes take their icons from the menu resource class
created 16 simple colored deadly turret sprites and added them to the resources
created 2 simple colored mine sprites and added them to the resources
created 2 simple colored starlaser sprites and added them to the resources
fixed framestopwatch to set the target framerate as the limit for frameskip
added implementational game object type sets predefined for their related object lists
wrote a method to determine which game object lists are affected by a given type set
fixed framestopwatch to reset the time deficit when it exceeds a second
fixed a bug that enabled the player to shoot objects with 1 shot per frame
rewrote getting game objects in view and getting the nearest objects in view
finally auto aiming only targets shootable object types and ignores indestructable ones
implemented an abstract shot class with basic functions common to all shot types
made the player shot class extend the abstract shot and removed redundancies
measured and predefined the player shot size in the config
rewrote major parts of the weapons and shot code to allow defining variable limits
implemented a pea cannon class that is used by peashooter enemies
player and enemy shots are now optionally vanishing when out of sight
fixed laser shots and pea shots not extending the abstract shot class
added vector2d methods to also conveniently subtract a specified motion vector
fixed reversing the aimed shot incorrectly for the reverse shooting powerup
fixed exception when illegally casting missile object to shot
fixed changing the target update rate during the game breaking frame calculations
implemented a game speed menu in the menubar that allows reducing the current game speed
renamed some constants for radar area and gamescreen view area vanishing distances
vanishing distances for weapons and shots will now be set and checked dynamically
pea shots of players will now only vanish when leaving the players field of view
setting the update rate in the frame stopwatch will now also limit the number of redraws
created 7 weapon menu icons for the menu bar to allow implementing a debug weapon menu
created 8 cargo menu icons for the debug menu options changing cargo ingame
added cargo menu icons for the cargo switcher debug menu
added a method to completely reset the framestopwatch
fixed choppy graphics after setting/resetting the update/redraw rate in the stopwatch
compiled and tested the game under AdoptOpenJDK 8 with Eclipse OpenJ9, works great
the game client will now also show the current java vendor (which is not always Oracle)
implemented a debug method that outputs all (known) system properties to the console
fixed output and refactored method for java version details text
added a much better method to fetch and print all available system properties
added a simple utility method to also detect macOS as running operating system
implemented a debug method to fetch and print all system environment variables
the game client now offers 5 different game speed settings between 72 fps to 3 fps
removed all versions of Oracle jdk and jre, will develop solely using AdoptOpenJDK

v0.85 – June 2019

created 16 colored laser shot sprites and added them to the resources
removed tick inheritance in a game object constructor, which seems unnecessary and false
commented some methods in the game object class
removed tick inheritance for debris objects
fixed starlaser using the wrong bonus score
removed tick enheritance for station objects
fixed differentiating between ware type and gameobject type
fixed differentiating between minedropper shot direction and gameobject type
refactored lots of code to reflect the changes with the new gameobject type enum
got the code to compile again after changes in about 50 classes
fixed radar drawing to check if the object should actually be visible on the radar
created a method to draw game objects onto the radar dynamically
added convenience method to get the sector number for a given game object
all the gameobject classes can draw themselves onto the radar screen
drawing on the radar is now handled by the gameobject classes
fixed using the gameobject type prefix in the label by calling a long label method
fixed drawing gameobject info text onto the game screen with wrong colors
fixed blackholes and powerup containers not drawing their bounding circles when enabled
turned the ship interface into an abstract class
the abstract enemy class is now called EnemyShip
pulled weapon and angle objects and getters/setters into the abstract ship class
added three aiming methods to the new aimhelper utility class
the player ship and turrets will now use the aimhelper class to aim when firing
pulled shipdecorator and accelerating flag into the ship class
rockets will now finally create acceleration particles when launched
added method to detect the nearest enemy ship for a certain reference object
fixed rockets unable to detect enemies in in its own detection radius
fixed a bug in the algorithm for finding the nearest enemy within a given proximity
improved the algorithm for finding the nearest enemy within a given proximity
rockets will now actively hunt down the nearest enemy again
enemy ships can now also use the rocket weapon and launch rockets at the players ship
cleaned up the structure of the update shot methods to make it more clear what happens
enemy rockets can now collide with asteroids
hostile and non-hostile rockets will now properly explode in any case of collision
enemy rockets will no longer vanish beyond the players sight, instead keep following
started creating a reference table for all the confirmed and unconfirmed names
started renaming rocket to missile, since it’s actually a weaponized rocket
created 16 colored missile sprites and added them to the resources
the player can now destroy enemy missiles by shooting at them
fixed a bug with frame by frame that didn’t enable the corresponding menu item
enemy missiles shot down will now add to the players score
created 4 colored pirate shot sprites and added them to the resources
fixed some entries in the launch4j version info configuration file
fixed rocket powerup weapon to use the wrong launch speed
rewrote secondary weapon mechanism to make it easier to handle
fixed automatic shooting for secondary weapon
implemented an experimental auto aiming for the playership
added more helpful methods to determine the closest gameobjects in range
added methods to determine which objects are directly in front of the player
auto aiming now also targets close asteroids
improved auto aiming by only targetting at objects which are in front of the player
fixed manual shooting occurring outside the game thread, it’s now all in the main loop
fixed exception with synchronous manual shooting per mouse click with auto aiming on
fixed a bug in calculating the radians difference in the auto aiming mechanics
drastically simplified code for manual and automatic shooting and removed redundancies
implemented auto aiming as a cheat/debug command to enable during the game
pulled common calculation of radians difference into the gamemath class
rewrote code to find the nearest object in view to make it more efficient
fixed a nasty math bug in the algorithm for circle intersections at high speeds
auto aiming seems to finally work correctly when the player is moving at high speed
fixed a bug where explosion objects were handled even when they’re not alive anymore
fixed an old bug that made big exploding asteroids suddenly become much slower
fixed auto aiming to simply refuse shooting when there’s no clear line of fire
removed duplicate method to add another motion to a vector
added more methods for adding positions, motions and whole vectors to another vector
added nine big meta groups of common game object types to the game object type enum
renamed both station menu icons to sector and sector2
refined the small successdenied software logo for the monochrome game titles
created a completely new and much sharper successdenied software color logo
created and added a changed game window background image
created a new spacola eclipse floppy label with a sharper sd software logo
created a better sd software 3d-ish logo and reworked the game window bg once more
created a new header image for the spacola page on the successdenied website

v0.84 – May 2019

unified some log output for the multiplayer server class
added determining and logging clients IP address for joining requests
unified more log output for the multiplayer client
updated the project from using ProGuard version 6.0.3 to version 6.1.0
created 16 piraton sprites with simple colorization as a placeholder for better sprites
added the new colored piraton sprites to the resources and enum gfx library
the previous/next page buttons in the instructions window will now be disabled/enabled
fixed some (assumed) missing pixels in the hairdryer screen cargo mono sprite
created 8 colored screen cargo sprites
added the colored screen cargo sprites to the enum gfx library
created 8 colored asteroids sprites with simple coloring
added the colored asteroids sprites to the enum gfx library
confirmed transparency for 6 out of 8 screen cargo sprites in the original designs
added all 8 screen cargo sprites to the sprite accuracy checklist
implemented micro weapon (for deadly turrets) which shoots micro shots
improved colored telephone and toilet paper screen cargo sprites slightly
pulled game object list out of the gameobject class into separate enum file
added 3 character prefixes to the gameobject types for label generator
added several gameobject types to the enum that were missing all the time
fixed a bug where the vector of a spawned gameobject was initialized wrong
improved gameobject constructors and simplified initialization code
added recording the origin gameobject that is considered the parent of a spawned object
created gameoject instances will now be counted internally and given to objects as ids
gameobject labels will now use the object type prefixes to allow identifying them
tidied up the gameobject fields and sorted them
added methods to determine time since object creation and alive time for any gameobject
several fields in the gameobject class will now be final and set only during init

v0.83 – April 2019

added more log output to starting of a multiplayer server
fixed relative location for display mode window
fixed log messages for the multiplayer server code
fixed game client shutting down when a multiplayer server wouldn’t start correctly

v0.82 – February 2019

improved letters C, K and O in the spacola small font for the hud text scroller

v0.81 – January 2019

fixed redundant whitespace at the end of duration string when there’s one time unit only
fixed shorten text utility methods to work for really short max char limits
added a new 2019 build splash image to the project
increased initial capacity for game object collections to improve performance
improved some digit characters in the spacola small font for the hud text scroller

v0.80 – December 2018

implemented an enemy factory class that contains all the enemy object instantiation logic
fixed showing ’null‘ as java version, shows a proper ‚unknown java‘ message
briefly tested running Spacola Eclipse on OpenJDK11, which works fine for now
started writing a small powerup scan util swing application for the atlas powerups
implemented pressing and releasing the control key modifier to allow key bindings for it
implemented drawing all the powerups directly over the level grid in the selector
fixed draw height for the grid powerup overlay
completed the powerup scan utility that helps in transcribing all powerups from the book
transcribed and verified the powerups on the first 3 pages of the book
transcribed and verified the powerups up to page 29
transcribed and verified more pages up to page 39
transcribed and verified more pages up to page 50
transcribed and verified more pages up to page 75
transcribed and verified more pages up to page 103
transcribed and verified more pages up to page 115
transcribed and verified more pages up to page 131
transcribed and verified more pages up to page 151
transcribed and verified all powerups on all pages of the space atlas
replaced the raw space atlas file with the one containing all the powerups
rewrote the raw space atlas parser accordingly to allow parsing powerups
codes and ids will now be stored as integer values to save lots of space
added methods to get the code as hex values or integer whenever needed
tabs will now be stored as integer values and can be returned as string or int
allowed retrieving tabs from the codebook using integers or string identfiers
implemented writing and reading the space atlas from a compressed binary file
added constants for the space atlas pages, tabs and rows/columns
implemented a method to numerically calculate the page number for a given code id
implemented calculating the precise book position for any given code id
implemented retrieving the exact code element and code string for a given code id
added methods to load and handle packed bytes from files
the game client will now load and uncompress the compressed 46 kbytes binary atlas
fixed wrong field alignment in the solar selector, which was inverted the whole time
fixed old and buggy code for retrieving the start powerup for a given level number
the solar selector now uses the exact same powerup layout as used in the space atlas
scrambling the solar selector grid randomly is now deprecated and won’t be used anymore
fixed wrong tab number to tab identifier conversion in code tab and code element classes
made the level grid layout generation dependent on the space atlas randomizer
fixed project not correctly being built using java 8 compiler compliance level
fixed using wrong upper bounds when calling the game random from the solar selector
created 16 maforian sprites with simple colorization as a placeholder for better sprites
added the new colored maforian sprites to the resources and enum gfx library
removed time measuring from the main client window class
rewrote time measurements for startup time and overall uptime
fixed generated uptime string being empty if less than 1 second
added milliseconds to the text resources and considered ms in the uptime string
fixed milliseconds text output for single vs. multiple milliseconds

v0.79 – November 2018

added an extra weapons package and started implementing a weapons interface
the ship interface now features the powerup manager and the engine positions
all enemy ships will now basically be able to retrieve powerups
started implementing the players standard weapon as an exchangeable class
introduced a new enemyship abstract class which is used to share common ship behavior
fixed all available enemy classes to correctly extend the enemyship class
now there are plain enemies (i.e. turrets), plain ships (Player, Rocket), and enemy ships
successfully implemented the player weapon as an exchangeable weapon
fixed german text grammar for the unfinished alpha instructions message
rewrote parts of the powerup managing class to allow generic usage in other ship classes
unified enemy and enemyship classes again, didn’t improve code readability
pulled turret aiming behaviour into the common enemy class to help generalizing shooting
implemented weapon cooldown for the player weapon
implemented turrets being able to use the player weapon
introduced turret motion cooldown in contrast to weapon cooldown, turrets having both
enemy turrets can now perfectly use the players weapon if configured to do so
fixed player weapon shots fired by enemies not dissolving properly
implemented generic direct and smart aiming methods in the enemy class
improved encapsulation for player weapon shot speed and shot distance calculation
fixed turret code that handles aiming at the player and triggering the weapon
fixed log output class id determination for player ship
implemented weapon factory class that contains the weapon configuration for all ships
implemented a rocket weapon that can be used for active game entities
implemented rocket weapons as addons for the player weapon and activating it via powerup
fixed rocket weapon not working as a primary weapon
weapon cooldowns are broken for the moment, tried fixing it, but it’s more complicated
fixed powerups not being shown in the hud status display anymore
implemented a vector method to easily reverse any given vector by a simple call
changed weapon interface and player weapon to enable manual and automatic shooting
implemented getting nearest enemy type object for a given reference object
implemented getting nearest sector object in a 3×3 sector range
split up methods between get nearest objects for player object and for reference objects
implemented method to calculate current sector for any game object
implemented methods to get a 3×3 sector range for any given reference game object
fixed get random from list method with correct type parameter to set the return type
changed specialized sector retrieving methods to reuse the more generic ones
changed sector object handling to use concrete classes and not generic game objects

v0.78 – September 2018

started implementing a host game window that allows the host to set multiplayer options

v0.77 – August 2018

implemented a method to reset individual properties in the config file
tested and verified that 1920×1200 (3x scaling) game window runs perfectly smooth
added real screen scaling options menu, user can choose 1x, 2x and 3x graphics scaling
fixed startup init order of properties and text resources before spacola splash
improved loading, automatic verifying and fixing of properties from the config file
properties will now be validated against a list of accepted properties
confirmed that there is a 2 frames station animation delay on bomb and win events
finished the delayed game event handler and added sub events for bomb and win events
removed station specific delay methods from the station class
delayed game events seem to work, but introduced other bugs
fixed cargo bay bomb animation throwing exception on the very last frame again
fixed bomb event being reset when revisiting a pirate station after rant animation
removed spacola splash dependency of properties and text resources
the spacola splash screen now shows waiting/loading dots animation instead of text
fixed byte array log handler losing its content when changing the debug level
started implementing an obfuscation class that handles encoding text like the ST game
tested and fixed ROL and ROR bitwise calculations and added convenience methods
marked ROL and ROR bitwise calculations as broken because they all create wrong results
implemented utility methods to convert Atari ST chars to unicode and vice versa
implemented more utility methods to convert between a series of hex numbers and text
finally implemented the complete assembler text obfuscation encoding and decoding
added degree and bullet sign characters to the Atari to Unicode char conversion
fixed debug menu win command not triggering the delayed game event handler
fixed a bug where the win animation state is set for the wrong station
added unknown/undocumented powerup ‚E‘ to the powerup map and class for accuracy reasons
added starlasers to the (deployable) game object map for accuracy reasons
implemented being able to deploy starlasers as ships via level script or by command
fixed old drawing method used in the solar system game class
started rewriting the multiplayer game class to make it work again after lots of changes
added multiplayer level rendering methods to the graphics engine class
fixed several parts that got in the way of enabling multiplayer games
finally got the multiplayer game to start again without any errors
removed redundancies from multiplayer level class by adding a common preparation method
fixed code occurrences where the legacy game panel is modified instead of the canvas
fixed multiplayer game initialized with the wrong hud view image
game clients will not be validated every single method call, but instead once per tick
started implementing sending game objects back to the server to allow seeing each other
fixed sound effects not stopping when a multiplayer game ends
tried rewriting the code that is responsible for controlling the player ship
pulled control related acceleration and shooting code out of the controls class
simplified player shooting code and split between manual and automatic shooting
tried fixing some occasional, mysterious slowdown issues with 72 updates/sec

v0.76 – July 2018

fixed some of the letters in the modified dongleware title with the original letters
replaced the dongleware title image with a correct one
fixed some of the letters in the success denied title with the original letters
replaced the success denied title image with a fixed one
fixed border errors with the dongleware switch sprite used in several title designs
replaced switched off dongleware title image in the resources
replaced game client title image with a fixed one with correct letters
replaced the build splash image with a new one which has a fixed digit ‚8‘
converted the project workspace for the new Eclipse Photon release
updated the project from using Launch4j version 3.11 to version 3.12
updated the project from using ProGuard version 5.3.3 to version 6.0.3
once again confirmed 6269 Hz as the correct sampling rate, appears next to the filenames
tried to measure sector size more precisely, but encountered too much variation
confirmed radar to main display ratio of 1:64 pixels once again, 62 is the highest number
kinda confirmed sector size by radar measurement, flythrough time, and flythrough frames
kinda confirmed that the original game only moves objects on frame redraws, not inbetween
recalculated some measurements for the sector size. Found results to come close to 4096
kinda confirmed that the original game accelerates the player 72 times per second
confirmed the acceleration calculation for the remake, 72 updates/sec are correct
created a new spacola dongleware font derived from the oxyd color dongleware font
added the new spacola dongleware font to the resources
changed release date in the certificate class to 2021
created and added new dongleware title and switch images with the new color scheme
fixed wrong log output class in some log output in the levels txt parser
added a way to load levels.txt raw file as a fallback on startup
fixed a problem with the wrong encoding when loading raw text files
created and added a new encrypted levels pac file
the levels txt parser now ignores all unknown level data at the end of the file
confirmed speed warning limits by measuring star speeds to be exactly 25 and 100
these values seem to strengthen the fact that the player speedup is 0.1 per frame
changed the cargo bay background back to dithered blue
created two colored instructions button images and added them to the resources
added math methods to add or subtract integer values using modulo
added a basic animation class for simple image sequences
tried to add key events for pressed keys, but it doesn’t work like intended in java
the fake tos module now always starts with the full 72 Hz redraw rate
at least managed to add key events for pressed and released shift keys
implemented own logic to prevent subsequent same key press events for shift keys
the level numbers in the solar selector can now be shown by pressing shift
added enter key handling in the solar selector which enables all levels at once
removed LZH decompression libraries, since they won’t be needed anymore
improved the animation class and added max animation count, pause frames
renamed animation class to simpleanimation for better distinction from library classes
fixed errors in the shapes of the four monochrome cargo bomb sprites
renamed minestar enemy to starlaser (SL), which may be the original name or similar
moved starlaser sprites into their own sprite folder
created 4 colored bomb sprites from Oxyd Magnum colored version bomb sprites
fixed bomb drawing code to allow drawing colored bombs with xor effect
fixed a bug where the bomb animation starts with an exploding bomb frame
fixed the order of the bomb sprites, which was wrong for both mono and colored sprites
confirmed length of bomb state (8 seconds) and animation phases (72) in the original game
confirmed pause status message blink frames to be 36 frames exactly
created a status screen class and pulled all status screen code out of the hud class
split the status screen and hud update and drawing code
implemented a 2 frame bomb animation delay in the player ships code
the bomb animation in the hud is now frame perfect and delayed by 2 frames
created a delayed game event handler class that handles frame delays for game events
fixed an encoding bug that prevented parsing the levels txt in the built jar/exe file
cut out all 3 fly-ex cursor sprites
cut out all 24 of the fly-ex fly „flying“ sprites
fixed the bolo border design where i somehow screwed up the left wall
fixed more transparent pixels in the bolo border design which i got wrong

v0.75 – June 2018

fixed bug in method to create pre-dithered images for any given phase
set dithering animation to 40 frames and pause to 20 frames (between 8 and 64 ST MHz)
the uncaught exception handler will now also be removed on exiting the game
added a utility method to unload all used jdbc drivers from the classloader
started analysing the LArc’s PFX 1.13P (PFXPak) header for the original Spacola PRG
tried fixing all the parts of the complete selfextracting Level-0 LZH header
wrote utility methods to convert int<>hex and also switch the byte order (endianness)
collected all three known different Spacola PRG files (TOS-Demo, Release and Patched)
copied all the original file sizes and checksums of the Spacola data files
tried extracting any of the modified -lz5-Archives using LHARC 2.01, none worked
confirmed that the supplied compressed archive size is correct
found out that most of the game data is not part of the compressed PRG file
added LZH uncompression libraries to the source code and tried debugging the uncompression
started debugging the disassembled original PRG file in the STeem Debugger
finally i managed to extract the compressed/embedded PRG file from the executable
extracted all three different embedded PRG files from the Spacola versions
found out that the text for the short instructions is obfuscated in the game PRG
added utility methods to rotate bit masks/hex values/strings left or right
re-implemented complete decoding of the short instructions text, and also the encoding
replaced the levels.txt file with a correctly sized one, which contains more data
found a complete data file listing with compressed/uncompressed sizes and offsets
discovered the headers for SHL (shapelist, DSDF) and Dongleware PAC files in the data
found breakpoints in the disassembly for the decompression and decoding of the data
extracted several PAC and SHL files, also the IMG file for the SMS music
the uncompressed game PRG file at least shows the splash screen using the title.pac file
also this enables me to display the various Dongleware PAC files by changing filenames
extracted the spritesets and transparency masks from Esprit and OXYD
extracted the BIC (boss is coming) image from Esprit and OXYD

v0.74 – May 2018

ingame music will only be playable in enhanced mode from now on
changed some frame constants for the title classes
confirmed framerate independency for fake tos and splash modules
pulled some constants out of fake tos module class
removed creation of new gem font instance in the fake tos module
pulled some constants out of splash module class
measured the duration of the original splash screen, which is not consistent
fixed magnetic container pull effect being too strong after changing to fixed updates
pulled some constants out of the smooth text scroller class
changed the way the scroller text in the text scroller is initialized
confirmed framerate independecy for smooth text scroller and credits module
confirmed framerate independency for text prompt class
fixed a few decryption log messages
changed name in the closing credits module

v0.73 – April 2018

fixed wrong pixel on the mono toilet paper cargo sprite
fixed subsequent wrong pixel on the colored toilet paper cargo sprite
added all drawn colored cargo bay and pricelist sprites to the resources
created a method to draw a shield defender spriteset
fixed defender and shield defender spritesets in the ship selector window
moved defender shield sprites to the shield resources folder
added piraton size constant by measuring the shape
restructured piraton AI code to make it easier to modify
added (maforian) attack pattern to the piraton enemies
successfully encapsulated and moved the code to return cargo to the station
fixed a problem with the distance growing parameter calculated in the wrong place
piraton enemies now work in an acceptable way
tried measuring the piraton pattern time durations
implemented enemy flight pattern logic and code that decides which pattern to use
renamed shot game object types to pirate, micro, and pea
peashooters and piratons will now use a generic enemy shoot behaviour method
pulled shooting check out of the shoot behaviour method, didn’t belong there
created a colored solar selector frame image and added it to the resources
fixed using monochrome image for the solar selector panel
fixed using monochrome image for the solar selector fields
created some colored solar selector buttons and added them to the resources
created all the remaining colored solar selector buttons and added them to the resources
created a colored spacola cursor for the menus and added it to the resources
added a convenience method to change colors in a monochrome image using color objects
removed inverted gem font code and implemented general fonts with any coloring
the solar selector will now use yellow gem font instead of white (inverted)
started rewriting the acceleration formula for intercepting enemies
encapsulated some code for ejecting the cargo from players ship
started implementing a way to manually open the cargo bay for testing
fixed a problem which caused the intercept speed calculation to be ignored
implemented a utility method to get a random object from an object list
enemies will now target free floating cargo and aliens more randomly
piratons rescueing comrades and intercepting cargo works like a charm now
colorized all 12 status sprites and added them to the resources
fixed colored peashooter sprites which had too dark shading in some angles
fixed two colored player ship sprites to improve the shading
updated the rocket cursor shape and fixed the colored rocket cursor sprite
tried fixing the base motion problem with bouncy enemies
finally fixed a stupid bug that made bouncy enemies go nuts on moving player ships
fixed a potential problem with updating enemies too often upon collision with player ship
implemented player shield destroying bouncy enemies until i can sort out the collapse bug
cut out a small bolo rotor spriteset and added it to the resources for later use
implemented the players shield launching bouncy enemies far away upon collision
replaced copyrighted placeholder ingame song with own composition „Depth Dweller“
implemented mouse click effect on animated buttons to visualize button presses
made ship deploying in the ship selector window more dynamical
refined the ship selector window to make it look more finished
fixed graphics glitches on mouse button presses in the ship selector window
started implementing cargo passing for enemies, but the vector is still horribly wrong
fixed a bug where the direction for the passed cargo was not calculated correctly
finally destroyed enemies can pass their cargo to other enemies in close range
restructured the old maforian ai code to adapt it to the new piraton code
fixed a bug where maforians couldn’t reach the station after stealing cargo
fixed a bug where redeployed enemies forgot their harmful/dangerous state
fixed a problem with 3 hq audio files that couldn’t be loaded in the exe version
fixed a problem when launching the jar file and no log level was set explicitly
removed some old code artifacts from the main entry class
started writing an extra level timer class that does all the ingame timer handling
updated the project from using Launch4j version 3.9 to version 3.11
from now on Java 8 will be required as minimum version to run with (i.e. for encryption)
the exe finally contains lots of meta information displayable in the windows explorer
changed the name of the default savegame folder to /sav/
created a new multi resolution windows icon file and added it to the build process
exe files look much better in windows explorer now, they have smooth icons for all sizes
fixed wrong type of transparency for several images being loaded
created and added two more application icon images for sizes 16×16 and 32×32
the game now utilizes different images for the title bar, task bar and about window
finally the game icon looks better in all different size aspects
moved flags and icons to separate folders in the resources under miscellaneous images
moved truetype fonts to separate font folder in the resources under miscellaneous images
created new perfect templates for the tilted spacola icon, confirmed angle to be 21,43°
changed some logging text for serialization of objects
completed writing a simple level timer class that is used for measuring the ingame time
implemented level timer subtracting pause time to allow only counting played time
tried measuring the gravitational pull of grade 1 and 2 black holes
rewrote the gravitational pull calculation code for black holes
added factors that may reflect the gravitational pull for the original black hole configs
fixed short classnames logging messages for Alien, LevelsTxtParser and LevelGenerator
found a formula for the black holes gravitation that comes at least close to the original
by accident found a huge bug in the framerate-independent player ship acceleration
improved the black holes gravitation code, and it seems to mostly fit the level configs
the game engine will be updated 72 times per second from now on for a steady pace
added methods to retrieve the actual update and redraw durations for a frame
rewrote the frame stopwatch to allow a better frameskip logic on time deficits
fixed microsecond delays at the end of every second, because pause was miscalculated
significantly improved measuring accuracy of the frame stopwatch
implemented real support for any chosen redraw rate in the frame stopwatch
the classic mode will now be capped to 36 fps for authentic ST vibes
eclipse mode will allow setting the framerate, with 72 as default
confirmed correct players acceleration and speed values for 72 fps
seems like i accidentally fixed a timing problem in the frame stopwatch
frame pause will now be reduced if the remaining time in a second is not enough
fixed another bug in the new frame stopwatch code where the pause was negative
fixed too high redraw time if the following second has already become shorter
i think i finally fixed the jerky animation bug in the frame stopwatch for lower fps
fixed the smooth hud text scroller being too fast and not framerate independent
removed theoretical fps limit from the debug overlay
readded the framerate limiter for artificially reduced framerates
fixed magic cursor gimmick not framerate independent
split up magic cursor updating and drawing
fixed magnetic item pull effect being too strong after changing to fixed updates

v0.72 – March 2018

renamed class SpacolaCodes to Spacodes to adapt it to own naming conventions
fixed several log output lines for several classes
added utility methods to find and test the system dependant path separator character
removed adding old debug text to save some performance
removed redundant visible property from playership class
all the game objects mileage will now be recorded in the game engine
fixed mileage recorder reset when starting the game
added a method to „calculate“ travelled space distance in „light years“
fixed F9 and F10 not working in the intro module
fixed debug text option active/inactive status unused throughout all the modules
created black hole shapes and reshaped the mono and colored blackhole sprites
created monochrome inactive blackhole sprite
added mono and colored inactive black hole sprite to the resources
it is now possible to enable and disable black holes in the level
added methods to remove all or single black holes
changed travelled space distance unit to au (astronomical units)
wrote toString method for sector class which shows their hex coordinate
added convenience methods to fill all or single sectors with black holes
enabled level modification through the level generator during actual gameplay
moved black hole removal methods into the level generator class
fixed maforians not drawing thrust particles when targetting the station
wrote ship decorator method to create shieldmaforian spriteset
the ship selector dialog now contains two full rows of ships to choose from
added timer digit font to the resources and created a timer digit class
the timer will now be drawn onto the game screen
the enum gfx library can now create colorized versions of monochrome images
created a colorized timer for the enhanced version
wrote ship decorator method to draw rocket drives and create rocket cycle spriteset
identified an unknown enemy code in the level script: SL = StarLaser
wrote ship decorator method to draw shield mother maforians and create its spriteset
added timer enabled/disabled option to the menu bar
the timer can now be enabled and disabled during the game
added menu bar options to allow selecting the border for the game window
4 different borders can now be selected: Eclipse, Bolo, Oxyd, Oxyd Color
added a classic spacola border to allow setting monochrome border in enhanced mode
added several more enemies to the ship selector window
changed the way how animated buttons will appear and its hover effect
implemented some more ship decorator methods to generate spritesets for special enemies
added some more enemies to the ship selector window
created 8 tricore sprites from the original designs and the pricelists
added the tricore sprites to the resources and implemented them in the ship selector
fixed the dongleware copyright small number font digit 8 from an Esprit screenshot
added colored shield powerup container sprite
added colored double shot powerup container sprite
refined some icons in the colored hud for better emboss effect
created and added 16 colored peashooter sprites
created and added 10 more colored powerup container sprites for all powerups
created and added 5 shockerrotor sprites from the Hintzen & Verwohlt game „Shocker“
added the shockerrotor to the ship selector window and restructured the animated buttons
changed the colored shield powerup container sprite again
added some information to the levels txt parser class for the DCS modifier
added original german names for the powerups to the levels txt parser class
created a manually colored cigarette cargo bay sprite
created a manually colored toilet paper cargo bay sprite
created a manually colored candy cargo bay sprite
fixed wrong pixel on mono candy cargo sprite and changed all three resource files
fixed wrong pixel on colored candy cargo bay sprite
created manually colored scissors and hair dryer cargo bay sprite
fixed colored cola and toilet paper cargo sprites

v0.72 – March 2018

renamed class SpacolaCodes to Spacodes to adapt it to own naming conventions
fixed several log output lines for several classes
added utility methods to find and test the system dependant path separator character
removed adding old debug text to save some performance
removed redundant visible property from playership class
all the game objects mileage will now be recorded in the game engine
fixed mileage recorder reset when starting the game
added a method to „calculate“ travelled space distance in „light years“
fixed F9 and F10 not working in the intro module
fixed debug text option active/inactive status unused throughout all the modules
created blackhole shapes and reshaped the mono and colored blackhole sprites
created monochrome inactive blackhole sprite
added mono and colored inactive blackhole sprite to the resources
it is now possible to enable and disable black holes in the level
added methods to remove all or single black holes
changed travelled space distance unit to au (astronomical units)

v0.71 – February 2018

added new dongleware title with new original developer name
replaced the dongleware title in the application window background image
removed spacola classic title image from the resources since it was unused
added dongleware copyright small font to the resources
the copyright number will now be generated and drawn dynamically into the title image
added a new 2018 build splash image to the project
removed dithering fading for the closing credits module

v0.70 – November 2017

removed unused unfinished magic test class
turned sparkle particles into private inner class
improved 6 colored ship sprites
created a spacola small font from the status images and the radar text artwork
defined spacola small font constants
added graphics utility method to recolorize an image
added a utility method that removes german umlauts from any text
the smooth text scroller will now also use the spacola small font
added some more special characters to the spacola small font
created and added all digits to the spacola small font
changed the internationalized intro texts for the original game programmers
added Franko Elmaro to the special thanks block in the closing credits
fixed magic stars not reset after engine shutdown
moved add linebreaks method from log utilites to game utilities class
fixed too wide warning dialogs in the game by adding auto generated linebreaks
fixed error in add linebreaks method which didn’t respect preset linebreaks
created and added many more special characters to the spacola small font
started also adding ingame fonts to the fontloader class
renamed fontloader class to gamefontloader to avoid naming collisions
fixed text scroller classes to keep references to used fonts
simplified flap display initialization and removed keeping font references
removed keeping font references in the hud class
removed keeping font references in the solar selector class
removed keeping font references in the hud class
moved tos loading screen drawing into the fake tos module class
removed dependency on gem font in the enum gfx library class
removed all remaining kept font references in all remaining classes
fonts will now only be instantiated and updated in the gamefontloader class
fixed wrong and/or doubled sound effect being played when destroying mines
created new enhanced ’surf‘ sound effect from the beach boys song and added it
implemented playing enhanced surf sound effect in eclipse game mode
fixed the loudness of enhanced surf sound effect which was too low
added enhanced DADAPDAP and FALSCALL sound effects to the resources
implemented playing enhanced DADAPDAP and FALSCALL sound effects in the game
fixed black background in GEM texteditor module

v0.69 – October 2017

completed all 64 colored ship drive images and added them to the resources
improved 4 colored ship sprites
created string constants for developer and original developer urls
used the url constants in the closing credits module and about window
changed the text scroller text to show basic game credits and info
changed the test panel to allow drawing colors
the particles test module now draws colored particles exactly as seen in the game
fixed a bug in the particles class where particles would flicker after burning out
implemented switching between color and monochrome particles test
created two HQ sound effects from Dark Star for DADAPDAP and FALSCALL

v0.68 – September 2017

improved calculation of time durations to allow displaying months and years as well
refactored timer string and duration string utility methods to make clearer what they do
created a dithering method to create an image with a given dither phase
implemented dither-fading the credits in the closing credits module
fixed closing credits module using the wrong font in enhanced mode
fixed text prompt core element using the wrong font in enhanced mode
fixed billing tag height to allow drawing bigger sprites for enhanced mode
implemented methods to maximize, minimize and to remove all asteroids setups
implemented menu bar options to modify asteroids setups for the sectors
seems i got the billing screen pixel identical again. something got changed there
created a small image showing the atlas and original floppy to select as a button
the application name will be written in all upper case from now on
added a stylized application name using greek letters and numbers
added a method to stylize strings in the same way as the application name
recreated the manually colorized cola sprite that i seem to have deleted
added a simpler title artwork for the splash module and intro titles
added an application splash floppy image with a dark border
fixed short instructions windows content not being updated on language change
added a shorter menu and window text for the short instructions window
fixed instructions window not returning to page 1 when reopened
improved a few colored ship sprites
colorized the trademark and copyright symbols in the intro title artwork
fixed target sector being set in the enhanced version before game starts
the solar selector will reset the target sector in the enhanced version
the coordinate decoder will now only control the target sector flap display
added enhanced state to the solar progress savegame objects
fixed lower case game name in the text resources
added extreme asteroids debug options for the menu bar
fixed stylized letter A to make it look more like in the „RADAR“ hud text
fixed enhanced hud title artwork which was too narrow and used the wrong letter ‚E‘
fixed enhanced hud title artwork height positioning of the eclipse part
implemented a method to unload cargo and refill with another ware type
added german and english cargo identifiers to the text resources
fixed realistic bonbon cargo image width which was not correct
added menubar options and debug commands to select the ships cargo type
switching to another cargo type now considers the previous cargo bay load amount
implemented real cargo bay handling code which allows carrying different ware types
fixed wrong order for collected and lost cargo displayed in the cargo bay
fixed enemies carrying the wrong ware types after stealing from the player
measured and added billing sprite height offsets as variables
fixed billing for mixed cargo bay items and rewrote score calculations
fixed billing titles result width which was always too small
all billing titles sprite positioning is pixel perfect in respect to the original now
removed dithered background from enhanced cargo bay
fixed cantina flight enemy behaviour not respecting the player ship motion
readded enemies reducing the distance to the player automatically during cantina flight
fixed piraton enemies not showing acceleration during cantina flight
fixed calculation of nearest game objects now using reference object and max distance
fixed cantina flight not working for maforian and peashooter enemies
reimplemented pursuit and collecting of free floating aliens and cargo for piratons
implemented coloring of particles for the enhanced version of the game
improved coloring of particles to make them go from white to yellow to red to black
particles will now always live until they are burnt out
fixed direction markers to powerups to appear in the same colors as the glowing particles
started work on a ship selection window where all the different ships are displayed
rewrote piraton targetting code which allows better control over what objects to chase
fixed a bug in piraton intercepting speed calculation which made them go too fast
fixed a bug which made piratons intercept items instantly instead of waiting randomly
piraton item interception finally starts working really well
changed the application name in the build script
replaced shorten name utility function with two more generic shorten text functions
fixed message of piratons losing their target after they just collected it
reset speed warnings and pixel speed for the player when using full stop command
reset highscore message event flag if the players score has been reduced below top score
the invisible player ship won’t collide with asteroids anymore when the level is won
reduced the amount of particles emitted during acceleration thrust
made some particles burn out quicker
piratons will wait longer until they intercept aliens and ware

v0.67 – August 2017

added audio format aware conversion methods from frames to microseconds and vice-versa
loop points for sounds will be set based on microseconds from now on
fixed NPE for removing asteroids on sectors not being asteroided
asteroids now remember their sector of origin if they exceed its boundaries
calculated asteroids base speed in the original game by measuring various speed settings
implemented asteroids speed calculation based on original values
asteroid speeds seem to be really authentic now
fixed number of generated asteroids not based on the level configs value
fixed small objects not being ejected with a minimum speed
unified some small object ejection calculation methods
changed splitting asteroids so hit objects now influence split asteroid vectors
added methods to slow vectors down by a given percentage or randomly
implemented asteroid spawning frequency by using the fourth asteroid config parameter
implemented a way to convert level config asteroid spawning frequencies
fixed problem with Eclipse writing wrong characters in UTF-8 math class file
fixed removing asteroids from sector setup only if they have not already been split
confirmed that magnetic aliens stay magnetic after player destruction
added consequent magnetizing and demagnetizing of aliens and ware for the original mode
fixed small object magnetism code which is now closer to the original game again
even at higher speeds the small object magnetism code behaves correctly
improved the peashooter enemy to make it target the player wing points more randomly
implemented peashooters being left or right handed upon creation
weakened targetting of maforian enemies, which seemed to be too accurate
added min and max constants for asteroids creation in the random level generator
hugely improved peashooter enemy, which is now similar to the original finally
peashooter shooting is somewhat flawed but works ok at slow speeds
partly fixed the peashooter shot vector calculation, still misses at higher speeds
FINALLY got the peashooter shot vector calculations right
fixed player shot collisions not working correctly on high speeds
fixed a small possible bug in the turret aiming code using a false intersection
replaced distance calculation in aiming code with comparable square distances
added small code to make the peashooters miss the player with a certain probability
made peashooter navigation a little more random
created a new piraton enemy AI that is derived from the peashooter AI
added both invader can shoot modifiers to the levels text parser
fixed enemies deploying without alarm sound instantly playing
implemented playing zirp sound effect twice for each enemy (without spamming audio)
fixed particle effects not being enabled although set in the config file
the player will now bounce again upon destructive collision with an asteroid
fixed the ship accelerating sound effect not stopped on gameover event
the player can now collide with asteroids while the surfing animation is ongoing
fixed player ship not accelerating anymore if mouse button held during respawn
increased player orbiting distance for piraton enemies
piratons will now target the station when they carry ware
fixed piratons targetting the station without the correct ship alignment
fixed magnetic pull code to prevent objects from being ejected from the players ship
changed english text for new credit note to adapt it to the Megaroids text
fixed using colored spacola font variation only in enhanced mode and in the GUI
refined the spacolassic game mode image and improved the text art
fixed window title panels heights in the various GUI dialogs
fixed a background image centering bug in the image panel class
added a generic enemy method to shoot any game object with given shot speed
added a generic enemy method to shoot at the current angle with given shot speed
fixed possibly buggy comparison of current and target angles in the angle class
implemented an angle method to target a totally random direction
implemented a short instructions window accessible through the info menu
implemented functional page navigation for the short instructions window
removed mouse focusability for text panes in different dialogs
fixed default buttons for all dialog windows in the client
finally implemented the magic cursor TOS gimmick and integrated it into the gfx engine
readded a classic hud image and divided the game into classic and enhanced hud
modified the code responsible for drawing all the hud elements
added drawing of galaxy id and selected solar system into the classic hud
fixed a bug in alphanumeric flap display which could not deal with more than 2 digits
drawing of galaxy ids in classic mode now works perfectly well as flap display
enabled dithering class to create dithered backgrounds in color
created a separate fake tos image for enhanced mode which resembles a Low Res ST TOS
colored fake tos image now has its own „filename“, indicating it’s the enhanced game
cut out a few more Atari ST TOS icons for later use
also cut out two printer icons used in TOS
created two different sizes of 7 segment digit fonts used in TOS
created and added a colored radar image with black and green for enhanced mode
implemented a simple small text scroller to show below the radar in enhanced mode
also implemented a second text scroller with smooth (not character based) scrolling
the enhanced hud now features a text scroller which provides the player with info
fixed accelerating sound effect playing while player ship destroyed in enhanced mode
colorized the title artwork in the enhanced hud
fixed particle effects being shown in the classic game mode
started restructuring and modifying the original games manual
fixed errors with the letter A in the spacola font images
fixed several more errors with other letters in the spacola font images
colorized more essential parts of the enhanced hud
readded the arrows and added colorized ship to the enhanced hud
implemented flap displays also drawing colorized backgrounds in enhanced mode
reduced the palette of the colorized areas in the hud to make it look more retro
created a colored game mode image for the game mode selector
it’s finally possible to start the game either in classic or colored mode
fixed titles not starting colored when selecting enhanced mode
fixed radar screen drawn monochrome when the level starts in enhanced mode
changed sector boundaries in the enhanced radar to appear green and removed XOR effect
fixed text scroller to keep going in pause mode
added a method to remove cantina call effect from all the enemy ships
implemented shortening the length of all subsequent cantina calls to weaken the powerup
fixed deciphered coordinates and target coordinate scrambling not shown in enhanced mode
made deciphering the separate x and y coordinates a little more random
fixed deciphering showing the wrong coordinates
fixed a wrong pixel with the dollar sign in the spacola font
colorized some missing parts of the enhanced hud image
made smooth textscroller class to extend the standard text scroller
created very small spacola eclipse colored title images for ingame usage
added the colored spacola eclipse title image to the game resources
fixed missing transparency for several colored title images
fixed short instructions not accessible anymore after game has been cancelled
fixed wrong dongleware font variations used in the solar selector and the instructions
fixed player not being granted three lives when the intro titles start
added asteroid and mushroom menu icons to the resources
added lots of small rivets to the color hud and achieved an awesome metallic look
created another small spacola eclipse title image with a great embossed look
fixed several wrong pixels in the enhanced hud title artwork which i didn’t notice
fixed wrong pixel in both spacola font variations with the letter R
created a small embossed score text artwork for the enhanced hud
created another variant of the small text artwork for the enhanced hud
brightened text backgrounds in the enhanced hud to make text better readable
added monochrome and color dongleware switch sprites to the resources
added monochrome and color dongleware title (text only) images
implemented title centering methods that take an x and y offset
fixed dongleware title in the classic mode which had a delay between switch on and text
fixed dongleware title image shown in the closing credits module
created 4 new colored ship sprites for the enhanced version
completed 4 more colored ship sprites
fixed and colorized the galaxy icon in the enhanced hud title
created and added a colored spacola font for the enhanced hud
fixed colored spacola font not being used in the target sector display
completed another 7 colored ship sprites
finally completed all the colored ship sprites; still need to be improved
fixed wrapped elements not being updated in the intro vortex
fixed mouse cursor offset ignored in the particles test module
fixed catching the mouse cursor not working for non gamescreen draw modes
created a bolo style border overlay for the classic hud
also created an oxyd monochrome style border overlay for the classic hud
again darkened the spacola font and reduced the palette to 16 colors
fixed wrong class being referenced in log output for savegames
implemented storing a checksum in savegames and verifying them on load
created an oxyd color style border overlay for the classic hud
created bolo, oxyd and oxydcolor style border overlays for the enhanced hud
aliens, ware, rescue capsules and stations will also draw bounding circles
added all three custom borders to the colored resources
implemented drawing custom borders in the enhanced version of the game
fixed flap display fonts not being reset after game mode switch
fixed 3 colored ship sprites to improve their shading
created a colored cola ware sprite and added it to the game resources
level numbers and powerups in the selector will now only be shown in enhanced mode
created a more realistic cola ware sprite from using a photo
created realistic ware sprites for telephone and toilet paper by using photos as well
fixed using the wrong cherry ware sprite in the resources
colorized some remaining icons in the enhanced hud
fixed decryption error on load savegame not being handled correctly
pricelists sprite arrays will no longer be static objects
fixed pricelist sprite arrays not being updated after mode switch
fixed full 8 bit alpha transparency support for the enum gfx library
fixed less-than-half-transparent color sprites not drawing correctly
sharpened cola and toilet paper cargo sprites a little
created a realistic hairdryer cargo image from using a photo
fixed loading wrong image files for the screen cargo sprites
created a realistic scissors cargo image from using a photo
created a realistic cigarette cargo image from using a photo
created a realistic bonbon cargo image from using a photo
also created an alternative realistic cherry cargo image from using a photo
improved the realistic cola and telephone cargo images
improved (lengthened) the realistic cherry cargo image

v0.66 – July 2017

fixed wrong class being referenced in log output for spacola splash screen
fixed spacola default launch script not generating a spacola splash screen
converted the project workspace for the new Eclipse Oxygen release
added junit 4 library to the classpath of the project
started adding very first unit test stubs for the remake project

v0.65 – June 2017

added methods to allow saving images in JPEG, GIF and BMP formats as well
JPEG image saving allows setting the quality parameter
started implementing a more secure way of AES encryption/decryption
split up methods to write and test encrypted space atlas file
changed file encryption method from Blowfish to AES and reencrypted the packed resources
started recreating another original early dongleware logo in high res
tested saving JPG/GIF/BMP and PNG screenshots and using specified quality settings
added screenshot format and png default setting to the config file
added a more authentic dongleware high resolution logo to the atlas reconstruction
reconstructed a more authentic medium resolution spacola logo from the atlas
the game client will now remove all java cryptography restrictions at runtime
file encryption and decryption finally works with AES/CBC and full 256 bit key length
added a utility method to determine the java major version as integer value
moved raw atlas and levels config files into /raw/ subfolders and changed path values
implemented additional GZIP compression and decompression methods for resource packing
added a custom GZIP output stream class that allows setting the compression level
added zlib compression and decompression methods
implemented auto compression methods that determine which compression level works best
pulled all compression related methods into separate spacompression class
fixed a bug with GZIP compression where archives would not be finished
the game client now also parses packed text atlas files for compatibility
fixed problem where packed atlas object could not be loaded in proguarded client
fixed loading of corrupted highscores which won’t interrupt the startup process anymore
gzip compression resulted in smallest file sizes, will use that from now on
increased width of the audio device and display mode windows
added selected audio device and mixer description to the audio device window
fixed the utility method to determine the major java version since it causes problems
added number of packed resource files to the number of resources altogether
added thread names for singleplayer and multiplayer game threads
added three new asteroid sprites from the atari st game ‚Megaroids‘ as bonus content
implemented megaroids asteroid types into the enhanced version of the game
added more dynamical ways to generate asteroids of random type
added all four asteroid level configuration parameters to the sector class
created a special asteroids setup class for sectors to contain the asteroid attributes
huge asteroids will now spawn big and medium ones in enhanced mode
rewrote large parts of creation of asteroid objects
implemented checking and reducing the number of asteroids per sector
defined constant object sizes for all asteroid types
split asteroids motion vector fixed which was independent from the original one

v0.64 – May 2017

replaced the about image with a better one using smaller text and a proper background
fixed about image height in the about panel which was too low for the entire image
fixed log output when saving png image files
tried implementing the correct magnetic pull behaviour for collector powerups

v0.63 – April 2017

created and added three new surf sprites with correct black shading pixels (confirmed)
fixed centering of the colored grave sprite
added methods to save highscores as packed encrypted files
game saving and loading methods can now be used with any filename
moved all the project launch files into a separate /launches/ directory
implemented checking savegame filenames for the correct extension before saving
implemented loading and saving custom games with a file dialog
loading a saved game now actually works
added localized texts to the file dialogs
added error messages for when trying to load invalid savegame files
fixed problem when trying to load a properly encrypted file of the wrong type
added more human readable error messages for the spacryption class
added the filename to load game error dialog
added a splash screen class which shows a splash screen before the game client is loaded
some text is now also written dynamically into the splash screen
added log output to the splash screen class
implemented methods to allow pausing and resuming the ingame music
the ingame music will now pause playing while the player ship is respawning
added a delay where the music will only resume after surf sound effect has stopped
cleaned up and refactored some ogg music library code
returned to windows for development, since my linux doesn’t want to boot anymore
fixed workspace under windows not using utf-8 encoding by default
fixed not using system independent file separators for path variables
replaced mono sd software image with another one using the correct height spacing
renamed window „splash“ to window background image
added a new window background artwork which is more faithful to the original art
added new about image that fits to the new background artwork
created and added a special loading splash image (spacola eclipse floppy disk)
fixed startup message in the splash image not being localized
fixed swing link class referencing the wrong standard classes
fixed about image label in panel not wide enough to show the whole image
fixed wrong log levels for resource loader class
fixed build problems with ant once again
added fatal error log commands that also shut down the game client
had to fix lots of new problems due to using system independent file separators
added a default method to load the primary savegame file
added a menu option to resume the game
implemented checking if the resume file exists and setting the menu option accordingly
saving and resuming the game now really works perfectly as intended
the game will now optionally delete the savegame file on resume as the original game did
implemented starting the verification module after resuming a game
fixed a bug where the target hex code for the verification wasn’t set correctly
fixed a bug where the game returned to the saved game immediately after invalidating it
finally verifying a resumed game via space atlas works
added a pause after verification module to prevent the game from starting immediately
fixed radar screen not resetting after the game has been cancelled
fixed intro star motion delay only on the first run
fixed opening star motion delay on the first run for intro and solar selector
disabled star background in verification module only on successful verification
fixed a bug where the main menu always returned to the short instructions
fixed a bug where the instructions returned to the solar selector
fixed main menu module not appearing after leaving instructions module
fixed solar selector not appearing after starting a game after leaving instructions
fixed instructions button still being clickable during page transitions
the game will now check for highscore when a running game is cancelled in the selector
fixed solar selector being reset before the highscore entry has been saved
added a method to the solar system to determine if the base level has been set
enabled debug text overlay in the main menu module
updated the project from using ProGuard version 5.2.1 to version 5.3.3
updated the project from using Launch4j version 3.8 to version 3.9
implemented alien and ware collector powerups like they work in the original game
reimplemented uncollectable frames for ware after shooting them with pirate guns
fixed collecting of ware during uncollectable frames

v0.62 – March 2017

added two utility methods to allow simulating linux „tail“ on file access
now continuing development primarily under Linux Mint
set the swing gui to use cross platform L&F to avoid platform rendering differences
fixed problems with some source and text files not being converted to UTF-8
wrote a method to find the available L&Fs and set the preferred one
fixed window never resizing under Linux – code behaves differently under Windows
made sure the game window always tries to set the preferred L&F (Nimbus)
fixed dongleware fonts not showing special characters (yet another UTF-8 problem)
wasted half an hour saving all my source files manually as UTF-8 encoded files
wasted more time saving all source files once again as UTF-8 without BOM
added method to get any sound object directly from the sound library
tried fixing the loop problem on Linux for the accelerating sound effect
improved stopping accelerating sound effect earlier and more rapidly under Linux
fixed a bug where the accelerate sound effect is being stopped infinitely
rewrote the ship accelerate sound effect handling
fixed a bug where the accelerate status would not reset after ship destruction
fixed a bug where the wrong buffer is redrawn after window resize events
fixed linux related problem with the game window only showing a black screen sometimes
pulled the linux „tail“ methods into to the file access class
merged both „tail“ methods into one
fixed missing accelerate sound after respawning for enhanced mode
fixed the black menu bar problem under Linux by repainting
fixed a bug where the selected audio mixer is never used
implemented better control checks for audio device capabilities
worked out why there was no support for pan and balance for all audio devices
wrote a line sound test class to determine various parameters for supported audio devices
fixed client info panel dimensions in the about window
added and refined a jlabel link class to the gui elements package for hyperlink labels
also added a swinglink class that also enables using hyperlinks as labels
wrote a method to determine the perfect size of a hyperlink JLabel
finally added clickable links to the about window
the text in the about window is now created more dynamically
the about window now uses proper unicode copyright characters instead of (c)
fixed path problems for config and log file under linux, uses application directory now
added log output to show the number of decrypted bytes from packed resources
added log output for enum graphics library initialization and resource file usage
increased the height of the view highscore window to prevent scrollbars
fixed a possible bug with getting the top score from the highscores
the game can hold an infinite number of highscore entries, but only 10 are shown
highscores now have an internal limit for the number of highscore entries
added a checkbox in the view highscore window to allow viewing all existing entries
refined the output for the view highscore window
changed creation of randomized highscores
fixed changelog file where several characters got lost in the UTF-8 transition
fixed log output for spacola codes class
added a menu resource lib class that holds icons for the menu items and buttons
implemented close menu icons for the gui buttons
added a TOS check (accept) menu icon for the gui buttons
implemented TOS check/accept icon for the audio device and fullscreen mode windows
added TOS up/down, left/right icons for the gui
fixed too much constant text in the credits window
fixed language switch not working for the credits window
the credits window now replaces plain copyright sign with unicode character
improved text representation of current display mode for the system info panel
fixed two text fields not being shown in the system info panel
redesigned the about window panel and added a game icon and a short description
translated and outsourced the short description into the text resource files
created a new success denied software logo with the creators name in it
created a new spacola splash screen and added it to the resources
added the new success denied software logo to the mono resources
created and added a new about window image which is sharpened more
implemented and added a license panel to the about window tabs with the GPL license text
modified the splash screen once more and added more shadows to the components
fixed text output of current video mode in the client info
confirmed that the black menu bar bug (after changing the game resolution) is fixed
increased generated height for jlabel links to fix display problems under windows
fixed resizing window twice on startup due to a redundant method call
implemented a new way to calculate the target game window size and enforce it
fixed a bug in the solar selector with preselected level after cancelling a previous game
confirmed that adding a highscore entry consisting of 22 chars will distort the highscores
removed some redundant graphics canvas initialization code
rewrote small parts of the graphics initialization
fixed a problem where the enum gfx lib was initialized earlier than intended
finally fixed a nasty bug that resulted in black game screen in roughly 1/3 of startups
fixed stars no longer moving in the short instructions module
separated instructions updating and drawing code
separated billing updating and drawing code
separated highscores updating and drawing code
removed unnecessary redrawing of text in the highscores module
fixed allowing the player to enter name when not ranked in the top 10
it’s now allowed to enter empty player name only in non-enhanced mode
fixed a problem with decision whether a player score is highscore-worthy
separated closing credits updating and drawing code
fixed radar screen not resetting on billing module
fixed current sector flap display not delayed in the solar selector screen
rewrote delay code for flap displays, confirmed perfectly authentic now
separated certificate module updating and drawing code
separated verification module updating and drawing code
fixed separation of updating and drawing in the main menu module
fixed two methods not being static in the game utility class
added new fields instant and game completed to highscore entries
rewrote initialization methods and added a new table data output method
the view highscore window now features a real table to inspect the data
added a utility method that automatically defines table column widths
highscore table column widths are sized appropriately now
replaced huge calendar objects with much smaller timestamps in highscore entries
added game completed status to the enter highscore submodule
fixed playership not being pulled towards black holes when destroyed like in the original
fixed player being able to enter highscore with zero score
fixed powerup indicator disappearing only after highscore and mainmenu fadein
fixed highscore now showing only when the player has entered the highscore
confirmed turrets shooting the player when in target station or destroyed
fast radar refresh rate is now enabled for enhanced gameplay
changed fadeout method in the closing credits module
tried fixing fullscreen mode for linux mint which currently doesn’t work
added an atari st 8×16 system truetype font to the project resources
implemented a fontloader class that loads and registers truetype fonts
the fontloader class is now able to set the swing default font
the spacola eclipse gui now can be used with the atari st gem font as default
fixed overly high volume for sound effects under linux
tried fixing window sizing once again, since its either broken under windows or linux
fixed a problem with shutting down the game engine by pushing the coffee button
added a method to the fontloader to list all available fonts
fixed adding duplicate display modes to the list of available modes
fixed a bug where the intro titles were not reset properly when leaving the intro loop
fixed a bug where the dongleware button would flicker after the full intro loop reset
the default font will now also be used for the credits window
reduced the size of the font for the log messages window
implemented checks if a font character has already been defined
removed extra space after the last character in the gem font image
fixed a duplicate character in the gem font image and replaced it in the resources
added an apostrophe character to all the mono and color dongleware fonts
fixed using accent characters in the german text resources
rewrote getting and printing lists for fonts, display modes and mixer devices
the fontloader instance is now supplied by the gamewindow class and instantiated by it
fixed strange exceptions when trying to debug the game by removing breakpoints
readded filtering again which is now much faster on non-monochrome graphics
split up code for enforcing window content size and enforcing window size
figured out that the insets values for swing components change from init to pack to show
still trying to get a swing frame to have the same effing size on all the platforms
the canvas, contentpane and frame will now only be sized _after_ displaying it
started writing a debug overlay class that handles drawing debug info onto the screen
implemented overridden preferred/min/max size methods for the game canvas
added lots more checks to enforce the correct window and content pane size
the game client will now try to reset the window and content pane sizes several times
removed the default layoutmanager of the game window to prevent unwanted resizing attempts
started implementing a render screen again where everything is rendered on
added theoretical max fps to the debug overlay to indicate the actual render performance
fixed another nasty bug with a broken menubar that was caused by setresizable too often
fixed missing framestopwatch splitting calls in several modules
fixed missing checks if frames are supposed to be drawn in the solar system module
removed separate debug text handling code from several modules
reverted back to rendering everything to a single image before drawing to the buffer
post processing will now work much faster for higher resolutions
enabled debug text for faketos and splash modules
implemented utility methods to determine if a client is running windows or linux
added windows specific code that may help getting the correct frame size under windows
implemented a log method that adds suitable linebreaks to any error message for dialogs
implemented a log method that creates the current stack trace as string anytime
reduced the window sizing code to only the most basic stuff again to try a new approach
finally(!!!) found a way to get the frame to size correctly under windows and linux
fixed resizing problems once again that may have been caused by moving the window
fixed not resizing in the event dispatch thread in a running game
the frame can now be resized correctly under windows and linux without any glitches
fixed billing titles not being shown anymore after rendering method rewrite
added invert screen filter as an option to the menu
added a method to invert the render screen in any module on demand
created a new gfx filter package and moved all filter related classes there
implemented a filters class that handles enabling and disabling all the filters
corrected the real name of Peter „Petari“ Putnik in the closing credits module
added debug text method to controllable interface
rewrote debug text creation for the solar system module
fixed graphics rendering in pause after solar selector level selection
fixed adding and removing gfx filters which caused exceptions
fixed cursor being visible during game saving
confirmed that screen inverting only occurs in the hacked spacola version
fixed timings and animation for the game saving fadeout
rewrote loading and registering of atari st system truetype fonts
added 8px and 6px atari st system fonts
made the truetype fonts have their respective default size
fixed player winning a level without any cargo via debug command
changed highscore entries to reflect the game completion in percent
the game completion table column in view highscore window now has right alignment
changed log messages window font to atari st 6 px font
fixed about panel and system info panel spacings, margins and fonts
fixed text positions in the system info panel fields
shortened the short description in the about panel to fit the window height
checked and confirmed the filename for the savegame filename ’spacola.ply‘
confirmed the filename for the highscores file ‚hiscores.spa‘
implemented a less oxyd-like more spacola-y logo screen
added delay frames to the intro titles with empty frame and non moving stars
fixed preparation of intro titles which wouldn’t reset correctly before the loop
implemented a solar progress class which is able to load and save games
saving the game now basically works for the first time
added a method to save the game as packed and encrypted file to prevent manipulation
added a method to load a custom game that the user can select from the saves directory

v0.61 – January 2017

created a new eclipse title and build splash image with the year 2017 in it
renamed some uptime and elapsed time calculation utility methods
added a mathematical method to calculate intersections between a circle and a line
rewrote turret aiming once again and finally got it to look like in the original game
measured the pirate and deadly turrets sizes
all modules share one framestopwatch instance now which is declared in the gfx engine
implemented a manual frameskip setting in the framestopwatch
started creating a dongleware small font for the copyright year graphics
fixed frameskip being ignored in almost all other modules
pulled some game updating code out of the game loop into the update method
started readding frictionless magnetism/gravity code for the black hole objects
separated titles updating and drawing code and removed redundant parts
separated dithering fader updating and drawing code
fixed star background also updating in the drawing code of the gfxengine
fixed solar selector module dithering titles and star background updating
separated solar selector animation updating and drawing code
fixed dithering titles problems in solar selector after separating updates from drawing
fixed error in turrets code where shooting resulted in NPE
implemented a new black hole gravity formula which seems very authentic
fixed potential error in the new black hole gravity formula

v0.60 – December 2016

fixed serious problem with the gfx library never being ready before window initialization
game window finalization is now delayed til after graphics initialization is done
finally the graphics can easily be switched between mono and color
fixed the font initialization which now considers mono and color mode
color fonts can now be used in the game intro and also in the client windows
fixed strange logger class import problem in the enum gfx library class
fixed colored alien sprites not being loaded in the enum gfx library
confirmed SHOT and SHIPROCK sound effects by analyzing file order in a memory dump
switched and confirmed EXPL1 sound effect
switched and confirmed SHOTAWAY sound effect
switched and confirmed ALARM sound effect
switched and confirmed INVSHOT1 sound effect
confirmed FALSEPUT, LAUGHT, HELP, WINS and FINITO sound effects
confirmed CREDIT, GETALIEN and GETWARE and OHOH sound effects
confirmed SHIELDAW sound effect
switched and confirmed PANEL sound effect
switched and confirmed HURRICAN sound effect
confirmed COLA and SURF sound effects
confirmed INTRO sound effect
switched and confirmed EXPL5 sound effect
confirmed EXPL4 sound effect
switched and confirmed EXPL3 sound effect
confirmed EXPL2 sound effect
switched and kinda confirmed ZIRP sound effect
switched and kinda confirmed ROCKET and ROCKEXPL sound effects
kinda confirmed the order for the INVSHOT2, INVSHOT3 and INVSHOT4 sound effects
switched the zirpweep and falscall sound effects (zirpweep seems unused in the game)
resolved all the other sound effect assignments, seems good now
fixed player surfing animation not being loaded in the color library
added colored dongleware title cards taken from Oxyd Color
cut out several different dongleware button sprites from colored Oxyd versions
fixed color tone of dongleware title cards
started coloring the drive thrust sprites as indicated in the original designs
added successdenied software colored title card
simplified the way explosions are created in the code
fixed many wrong sounds that are played back since changing the filenames
fixed a bug where vortex elements could only be drawn in monochrome
minedroppers and minedropper shots will now use the new big explosion spriteset
fixed wrong explosion spritesets being used in different places
created and added a special spacola colored dongleware font style and tested it
implemented warnings for when invalid gfxlib enum elements are created
made it possible to create color only gfxlib enum elements
measured and confirmed the rocket turn speed (for the last time now)
fixed not using the rocket turn speed in the rocket object code
implemented parsing of black hole keys in the level generator
implemented methods to fill the level with black holes
added radius parameter to black hole game objects
implemented black hole radius check in the sector object handling code
fixed black holes being placed twice in each sector
measured and confirmed black hole animation phase duration in frames
fixed „Game resumed“ message appearing twice in the log
fixed missing linebreak in debug level script
fixed wrong shield bouncing sound effect
measured and confirmed peashooter turn speed (for the last time now)
measured and confirmed piraton turn speed
measured and confirmed maforian turn speed
measured and confirmed small asteroid animation phase durations in frames
implemented new small asteroid animation code
fixed powerup collecting sound effects for certain powerups
measured and confirmed the shield powerup durations and remaining shield warnings
also implemented a spacola bug/feature where the player gets infinite shield power
measured and confirmed tailspin turn speed for peashooters and turrets
confirmed that all ships in the game seem to always tailspin to the left
confirmed that rockets always tailspin to the right
measured and confirmed the station default deploy distance to be 2000 pixels
measured and confirmed the station no deploy zone to be 100 pixels and less
implemented station default deploy distances and no deployment distances
confirmed the third station config parameter to be the enemy deploy distance
wrote a floodfilling method for station configurations
changed some units from milliseconds to seconds
confirmed that there is an ST realtime clock problem with the emulation
fixed time measurement for deploying which was always suspiciously close to 5 seconds
measured and confirmed calculation of the original player speedup value
fixed wrong calculation of the target framerate player speedup value
fixed calculation of the hyperspeed and ridiculous speed limits and confirmed it
measured and kinda confirmed shield powerup stacking which the original game had
implemented shield powerup stacking in the powerup manager
pulled shield powerup code into separate handling method
measured and confirmed the default limit for active enemy entities in the level
confirmed the first station config parameter to be the limit for active enemies
implemented deploy limit for stations
fixed aliens shouting for help even though the player is invisible
measured the alien shout probability and implemented it based on the framerate
measured the alien shout distance which seems to be 220 pixels
measured the alien shout duration which seems to be exactly one second
fixed the ZIRP sound effect which occurred twice in the memory dump
added a ZIRPWEEP sound effect which seems to be just a copy of ZIRP in the original
fixed turrets being drawn at their position while vortex gameover animation is ongoing
measured and confirmed the level generation sector borders for containers and stations
measured and confirmed the level generation sector borders for black holes
implemented new gamerandom functions to generate sector borders specified in pixels
fixed level generation object positioning for stations, containers and black holes
fixed aiming for the turrets which is much better now
confirmed pirate turret shot speed again the for last time

v0.59 – September 2016

changed the font for the log window to Lucida Console
made all subwindows dispose on close to fix a bug with taskbar thumbnail preview
fixed closing credits text being generated statically for the credits window
the cheat menu will be disabled outside the game and enabled during the game
fixed speed warning events when the players ship isn’t even visible
fixed player powerups not resetting in the different submodules
rewrote parts of powerup resetting and resetting the powerup manager itself
when the game is paused any key will now resume it
added a test panel class which is used in the gem textedit and particles test modules
added particles test module to the menubar
started work on the particles test module to make it work inside the game window
fixed minor concurrency problem with the particles test class
fixed a bug where cursor offsets wouldn’t be used in the correct way
the gfx engine now distinguishes between cursor on screen and cursor on gamescreen
fixed problems starting/stopping the engine for the text editor and particles test
created a test class for the TOS-Magazin Magic gimmick effect
modified the frame stopwatch class to allow it being used without the gfx engine
added a simpleframe class which will eventually allow testing gfx effects separately
started rewriting gfx library to make it more compact and much easier to maintain
fixed a problem with removing transparency from colored images
finished new enum gfx library that combines mono and color images in enums
deprecated all four old gfx library classes
started removing references to the old gfx library classes from all the existing code
edited dozens of more classes to remove references to the old gfx library classes
added the new explosion spriteset to the explosion object class
added separate gfx library methods to get monochrome and color graphics directly
fixed score for kleptomara, cargoliner and cargoflyer enemies
edited another truckload of classes to remove old gfx library references
all occurrences finally replaced, the code compiles again

v0.58 – August 2016

added menu options to enable/disable the star background and debug text
linked setter for both options with the menu bar entry to synchronize them
peashooter enemies will now get destroyed by the players shield
fixed NPE for unset bitwise XOR composite for peashooters
measured and confirmed peashooter flight speed
changed maforian flight speed to same as peashooter flight speed, seems to be correct
changed piraton flight speed to same as peashooter flight speed
added method to calculate the direction vector for two points instead of two game objects
added method to Angle2D class to target a coordinate instead of a game object
started implementing the real peashooter AI
fixed peashooters facing the wrong direction
measured the peashooter player proximity in pixels
measured and confirmed peashooter turning speed
fixed an old bug where delta X and delta Y between two objects is calculated wrong
measured and confirmed tailspinning turn speed
measured tailspinning duration
added game math methods to convert seconds to frames and vice versa
measured the peashooter station patrolling distance to be about 640 pixels
measured the peashooter shot speed to be about 3,4 pixels per frame
removed enemy shots vanishing on level boundaries, unable to reproduce this feature
guessed the distance at which enemy shots vanish outside the players sight
implemented enemy shots vanishing when they get too far outside of the gamescreen
measured and confirmed the pirate turrets shot speed to be exactly 3,5 pixels per frame
measured and confirmed the deadly turrets shot speed to be exactly 3,5 pixels per frame
fixed turret shot speed not taking the target framerate into account
defined the pirate shot size
measured and defined the expand and fly distance for pirate shots
measured and recalculated animation phase durations for pirate shots
rewrote pirate shot animation code
rewrote level generation initialization since it didn’t work for turrets anymore
fixed a bug where an animation phase for the pirate shot was omitted
the station trapper will now override traps if they are set twice via level config
added utility methods to get sector coordinates as sector number and vice versa
added sector number attribute to sector objects
sectors now know their indexed mine types
rewrote the way how armed stations are recognized in the engine
added log output for each time when entering another sector
fixed a bug where more than one trap could be placed in a sector by accident
fixed a bug where sector shifting showed the wrong sector coordinates in the logfile
fixed stone menu icon not saved in indexed palette
fixed wrong sound effect being played when the player hits an asteroid with shield on
added color sprites for enemies micro shot and pea shot to the resources
fixed enemy shots being drawn above turrets
cut out a complete forgotten (big) explosion spriteset for destroyed minedroppers
added 10 new explosions sprites to the resources and gfx library
classic and color gfx library will now dinstinguish themselves in the log file
started analysing 1000+ screenshots to find out the order of drawing for all game objects
created a new color cherry cargo bay sprite based on the color palette of Oxyd Color
measured the turn speed for players rockets
found out that i miscalculated almost all turn speeds, will have to measure again
removed confirmed tag for all turn speed attributes in the configuration
fixed the radar not drawing objects correctly when the camera is focused somewhere else
the radar will no longer draw objects that the camera is focused on
the radar will draw other player ships, which is necessary in multiplayer mode
fixed powerup containers being drawn on top of the player ship
the station trappers random creation methods now use the game random object
fixed several occurrences where objects were illegally added directly to the collection
fixed jvm uptime calculation
added tabs to the about window
fixed following blanks in the uptime string generation code
added enum getter for number of audio resource files
added method to get the number of stored resource files
added methods to get date and time strings in longer format
added a system info tab to the about window where the user can see certain runtime info
fixed long date and time strings ignoring the preset language
enabled uptime calculation to show days
added a way to inject the application built date/time into the client and display it
added methods to find the current work directory and the current users home directory
added methods to get the java home directory and current username
wrote new methods to control the text prompt, set text, set cursor, remove text, etc.
the enter highscore screen can now fill in the current username for you
the enter highscore screen also refills the name prompt with the last name entered
fixed version number and built date not being replaced in the config files on build
changed the ordering in the powerup menu to the order of powerups appearing ingame
confirmed ‚F‘ to be the identifier for the cantina call powerup in the original game
confirmed ‚E‘ to be an unknown/unfinished powerup that makes the original game crash
added cantina call powerup to the levels parser to allow using it in the config
allowed built date/time strings to be created localized or unlocalized
output built date/time to the log at client startup
cleaned up displayed info in the system info panel
removed redundant timestamp and timestamp format in the build script
made the close button visible on all tabs of the about window
created a separate view credits window and added it to the info menu
changed the fonts for the view credits and view highscores window
the credits text from the closing credits module will be used in the credits window
created a more beautiful text representation of the highscores for the highscore window
turned remake copyright notice and dongleware copyright notice around in the credits
enabled uptime calculation to show weeks

v0.57 – July 2016

implemented a java version of the original Megamax Modula-2 linear congruential generator
fixed not using the sound effect enabled property from the config file
added a custom greeting in the closing credits when the player entered his name
fixed the closing credits module not centering multi line greetings correctly at the end
fixed dongleware dithering effect and perfectly reconstructed and confirmed the method
added a math real modulo method for long variables
added assembler style multiplication method for the linear congruential generator
wrote a vector method to find out if an enemy ship has reached the targeted base motion
fixed a bug with the base motion adaption where the adaptive value was miscalculated
finally got the maforian enemy AI quite close to the original
added delivering ware code to the maforian AI
changed the thruster distance of the maforian enemy
fixed a bug where the maforians didn’t target the player correctly at high speeds
fixed a bug where the particle effects had been re-enabled in the level
persisted particle effects option into the configuration file
renamed a few property names in the configuration file to remove spaces
fixed a bug where maforians wouldn’t navigate correctly after ware pickup
fixed a bug where the base motion wouldn’t gradually return to zero correctly
added more methods for bit manipulation in the Megamax Modula-2 LCG class
added utility methods to convert sector hex string to sector number and vice versa
removed redundant code in the vector class concerning base motion updates
added constant base motion adaption to have it work more like the game probably was
fixed incorrect AI motion adaption which adapted quicker in diagonal directions
measured and confirmed maforian default flight speed
added maforians randomly turning the ship as they approach their target
implemented maforians accelerating for a few frames on deployment
measured and confirmed maforian turn speed
measured and confirmed pirate turret turn speed
measured and confirmed pirate turret cooldown frames and recalculated for new framerate
implemented turrets no longer moving during cooldown phase
measured and confirmed pirate turret proximity distance
removed square root from pirate and deadly turrets and used comparable distances
changed screenshot saver to show error messages in the game client on write problems
changed logging class to hide the exception stacktrace in error dialogs
measured (kind of) the station deployment cooldown in frames and implemented it
measured (kind of) the ships initial thrust on deploy frames and recalculated for 50 fps
changed deployment process for enemy ships and removed frozen enemies on deployment
changed base motions only adapt when enemy ships accelerate anyway
split up base motion updates and adaption into separate methods
maforians now act more authentically in high speed chases
fixed a bug where maforians dragging cargo wouldn’t accelerate anymore
implemented maforians shooting
added multiplayer server methods to start the registry and server independently
added localized messages for starting and stopping the multiplayer server
implemented yet another way of base motion adaption with a buffer and a delay
fixed cantina call code for the maforian enemy AI
implemented final account balance display in the closing credits module
fixed F10 not quitting the game on main menu after closing credits
implemented stations redeploy queue and timer to work independently from deployment
implemented deploying maforians either harmful or harmless
implemented alarm sound for harmful maforians
fixed bouncing code for enemies with base motions where the base motion was left unchanged
rewrote maforian navigation to avoid using base motion at all – works easier, looks better
fixed player sprite being drawn out of center when enemies bounce it around
pulled speed limit checks out of the acceleration code
fixed speed limit events not firing when enemies bounce the player around
fixed game objects not appearing in the intro vortex (forgot to update current sector)
fixed invaders being deployed even if the number in level config was specified with 0
wrote a new magnetic effect method which is easier after all and looks better
changed the bitwise XOR composite class to allowing XORing both black and white pixels
refined magnetic effect to make alien and ware be pulled more smoothly towards the player
all aliens are now drawn to the game screen using bitwise XOR composite
fixed the black and white bitwise XOR which created false results
fixed camera set on current station, leaving the sector will now reset the camera
created and added the 4th oxyd rotor color sprite which is missing in the IBM OXYD game
fixed a mistake with the classic game mode image in the classic graphics library
added an inverted classic game mode image for the select game mode window
made the game mode image on the button appear inverted on mouseover
implemented a separate magnetism function for aliens and ware
implemented a frame by frame key option for debugging purposes
implemented two new menu cheat commands for filling and emptying convict aliens
increased the default force for ejecting aliens and ware
increased the distance at which aliens and items will be collected
added a new math function that creates a random vector with min and max speed
pulled lost alien score into the score configuration class
measured and implemented the maximum ejection force for aliens and items
set the minimum alien and item ejection force to 0.05
rewrote creating a random ejection vector for small objects like alien, ware and capsules
added another station menu icon which is not inverted
pulled all powerup menu icons into separate resource folder
fixed two menu icons not being initialized in the color gfx library
measured the alien turn speeds and tried to recalculate them to the target framerate
aliens will now be ejected with differing turning speeds
fixed the window manager now handling the game mode selector window
fixed many sub windows being disposed instead of hidden on close event
simplified code for debris ejection vector calculation
fixed completely resetting the player in the solar selector after every level
implemented frame by frame menu command
renamed cheat menu to debug menu
fixed an error when pressing cancel in the menu command for setting score
added new variables for solar selector fadeout timings that were more accurate for the remake
fixed destroyed asteroids being bounced before exploding
fixed destroyed asteroids being added to the explosion collection directly
increased the number of small asteroids spawned to 4
measured and confirmed the duration for explosion animations
increased the small object collect distance to 15 pixels
implemented explosion animation showing the first sprite twice as long
removed min speed for small object ejection vector again
measured the player ship respawning timings
rewrote part of the player respawning animation and implemented the right timings
explosion particles now use another method to get a random vector
deprecated a few old math functions

v0.56 – June 2016

added a fixed port RMI socket factory to allow more control for which ports are used
changed the port on which the exported game server object will listen
the RMI code will now use one single port for registry AND server/client connection
added some more debug output to the multiplayer game joining process
added a server method to retrieve the game version of the running server
added providing a password in case the multiplayer server is password protected
implemented showing the object ids and object types for any game object
implemented centering the object ids and object type specifiers at the object
implemented showing the player names, which may be necessary for multiplayer games
added menu options to reset the highscore list with a confirm dialog
implemented the menu option to save the highscore list whenever necessary
implemented menu options to set showing object ids/types and player names
fixed the station trapper placing mines on fractures of pixel positions
added game mode selector to the menu bar and implemented button events
added some more titles to the credits roll module
implemented final text message and fade out event to the credits roll module
the fadeout in the credits is now triggered per user input
added a missing solar selector clicked field image
turned the clicked solar selector field images into an animation
replaced the spacolassic game mode image with a better one
created a solar selector frame shadow image that is used to cover the stars
improved the way the solar selector field blinking animation is handled
the solar selector frame is now drawn as a shadow on top of the stars
fixed the game cancelling fadeout which should also fadeout stars and the cursor image
increased the pause after game cancelled or gameover to 3 seconds
fixed F9 not working in the dedicated main menu module
cancelling the game won’t show the highscores module, instead go straight to the menu
fixed old status messages showing in the solar selector after restarting the game
implemented hiding the last sector powerup only after main menu fadein
added a class for panels with tiled backgrounds
refined the solar selector animation frame by frame, is much more authentic now
fixed a mono oxyd rotor enemy sprite which had a wrong pixel in its white border
cut out and added all(?) three colored oxyd rotor sprites from the PC version of oxyd
renamed the credits roll module to closing credits module
removed the short main menu after the first intro title loop has been played
fixed not resetting the volume on music playback after song fadeout
fixed using the old successdenied software logo, was supposed to be replaced long ago
fixed not hiding the mouse cursor when the solar selector has been cancelled
fixed the window not resizing when the game engine was not running
added new titles and many names to the closing credits module
fixed a bug where the cursor position in the text prompt module would not be reset
started adding customized closing credits depending on the highscore entry
started designing a new splash screen and website header for the remake project
created a much bigger cover text artwork with the help of vectorizing software
added two more names to the special thanks in the closing credits module

v0.55 – April 2016

fixed a bug in the level generator where the defined space atlas code has not been used
added output of file sizes when loading files
added output of space atlas meta data when loading the codes
fixed a bug where the final 176th page of the space atlas was parsed but not saved
fixed a bug where the last bracket when parsing the raw atlas file has not been removed
fixed removing one more character at the end of the raw atlas file
wrote methods for setting and unsetting function key menu bar accelerators on demand
the certificate module now removes some accelerators to hijack the function keys
added control actions for all the function keys
fixed possible nullpointers on triggering key events for unset controllables
fixed no buffers being created after restoring from or switching into fullscreen mode
readded typo in the certificate printing screen as a comment in the german resource bundle
measured all the printer driver printout durations for the certificate mockup module
fixed a wrong pixel in the dongleware font letter ‚d‘ that was unnoticed for years
implemented the original certificate printing menu parts and all the options for it
added a method to redraw the previous frame again
fixed exceptions after recreating the canvas buffers
replaced pause after solar selector with repeatedly drawing the previous frame
fixed mouse clicks not working in the certificate module
removed some obsolete code for drawing onto the buffer in the graphics engine
made window resizing and fullscreen switch handling safer through the graphics engine
removed all synchronized statements from the graphics engine to speed things up
pulled initialization of the space atlas and the levels.txt parser into the client startup
removed wrong output at highscores initialization
added XOR mode in ship decorator class (for the shield and thrust animation)
implemented actually drawing the final winning certificate
implemented the certificate text being drawn either centered and left aligned
will use the left aligned option, since the original game seems to use it
the certificate module will now actually send the certificate to the printer
landscape orientation will now be preselected when choosing to print the certificate
printing the certificate now also uses interpolated image scaling to fit the whole page
created a new special certificate printer class that handles all the printing stuff
added a method to retrieve the list of available printers
added a cancelling method for printer jobs
implemented a credits roll module for the ending of the game
fixed line spacings and added all the intro titles to the credits roll
confirmed left alignment for the final balance in the drawn certificate

v0.54 – March 2016

fixed splash screen centering x and y offsets which are -4 and 2 in the original game
increased speed of dithering transitions. Still not satisfied with the values being used
fixed redundant code for toggling bomb event
removed unnecessary repeated casting in station handling code
removed redundant variable for station state
station states/animations are no longer static and now independent from each other
measured, confirmed and implemented the highscore display short period
fixed the height alignment of the new main menu modules titles
added the main menu core module to the game loop which displays after the highscore screen
fixed the highscore modules line spacings
fixed a bug where the level was marked as solved although the player went gameover
added valid and invalid input for the main menu core module
implemented some of the functionality for the F-keys during intro and main menu
implemented cancelling the solar selector with the ESC key
added any key event to intercept any key event for core modules
added the intro loop from price lists up to the main menu with 3 iterations in total
measured and confirmed the intro highscore and long main menu periods
enabled right mouse clicks for the main menu and the intro to start the game
found out that i already implemented the intro loop in a different way
fixed a bug in the flap display class where undelayed displays still had a small delay
implemented the ability for the flap displays to flap non numeric text values
added non numeric flap displays for the current and target sector displays
implemented a set score cheat that allows (re)setting the players score instantly
fixed cursor being shown when exiting the solar selector screen
removed delay from sector flap display in the solar selector
fixed a bug where the solar selector has not been reset properly after cancelling
implemented unloading cargo if the game is cancelled by pressing ESC
added resetting the HUD displays only shortly after the solar selector is shown
fixed adding the first three lives only after the dongleware switch is shown in the intro
added presetting the cursor to the middle of the solar selector panel
fixed a charset width error for the spacola and spacola white font
added a whitespace character to both spacola fonts
added teleport to random command and menu item
rewrote vortex code to also draw animations for game objects and stars
fixed converting object coordinates to screen coordinates to consider object size
added powerup containers to the vortex
added mine type objects to the vortex
started writing a better maforian AI from using minedropper patterns
replaced some more blank graphics creating code with using pregenerated images
added empty default actions for arrow keys in the controllable class
measured, confirmed and set shield blinking frame intervals to be 6 frames in the original
removed faster shield blinking code, because this doesn’t appear in the original game
rewrote some logic for setting/adding score and lives and added more sanity checks
implemented complete cursor logic for the highscores enter name module
tried fixing the bitwise XOR composite, because it still doesn’t work correctly on alpha
added method to the screenshot saver to allow saving any renderer content at any time
finally fixed the bitwise XOR composite where alpha channel conversion didn’t work
now the highscore name entering works perfectly with XORing the cursor into the text
relocated image writing to file via the gfx engine
added insert and delete key events to the controls and controllable classes
implemented support for the delete key in the highscore name entering
pulled everything text prompt related out of highscore into a text prompt class
added the new text prompt with implemented cursor logic to the verification module
renamed the FakeTOS module to FakeTos to be more class naming compliant
added a new core elements package and put controls, controllable and text prompt into it
added some more debug output to the level generation codebook lookup
the menu player now gets a random position in the menu level
fixed an error with unset last and current sector in the level
added frozen mouse cursor function (i.e. for the solar selector panel)
the mouse cursor now works more accurately in the solar selector panel

v0.53 – February 2016

sorted all the open issues for the first beta release version
added stub certificate module to allow displaying a message after the game is completed
fixed floating point floor modulo calculation which didn’t wrap around correctly
implemented parts of the gameover and game-completed handling code
changed raw SDD sound sample rate from 6289 Hz to 6269 Hz, which is the correct value
changed raw SDD endianness to big endian which is the default for Motorola/Atari ST
replaced LAUGHT.SDD which is now byte-perfectly reconstructed from Trashy gimmick source
confirmed the new LAUGHT.SDD through the Spacola memory dump
removed enhanced surf sound effect since it doesn’t fit the sample rate change
mines don’t automatically destroy the player on contact now. Only the flying debris will
corrected the loop points for the rocketing sound effect once more
added spacola classic game mode icon for the swing menus
added a game mode selector component which allows choosing classic mode atm
started implementing the savegame coordinate verification core module
rewrote redirecting mouse controls to the currently running module
corrected the text positioning in the verification module which is now perfect
fixed a bug where you could enter a character more than was supposed to be allowed
measured, confirmed and implemented cursor blinking timings
fixed centering of the entered text in the verification module
fixed centering of the entered text in the highscores module as well
finally implemented actual code verification in the verification module
fixed a bug where the entered text was centered incorrectly while fading out
implemented a max level number for the solar selector for the beta release
for the first time the game was played through source code wise
added german and english text resources for the certificate module
refined some text resources regarding the unfinished alpha messages
added the first screen of text (print options) of the certificate module
added a demo version message to the certificate module
merged some multi-line text resources which used several keys
implemented a main menu core module for the longer main menu breaks in the game
discovered that almost all titles in the intro are vertically centered incorrectly
measured all the intro title centering vertical pixel offsets
added intro title centering offsets and offset handling
all the intro titles now seem to be centered exactly like in the original game
fixed a bug where the star background moved too quickly between titles
cut out an oxyd magnum dongleware button sprite

v0.52 – January 2016

confirmed all the blinking stars timings
confirmed all the big stars timings
implemented frame perfect big star animation timing code
implemented sometimes reducing the number of small stars by one
finally the star background may be 100% done and true to the original game
confirmed menu player speed again to make sure i didn’t miss on something
measured and recalculated the exact intro vortex duration in frames
approximated the most probable intro vortex radius expansion per frame
changed the intro vortex from using a logarithmic spiral to archimedian spiral
tweaked the vortex rotation parameters to make it look better
measured and confirmed the number of vortex coils that were used in the original game
confirmed the vortex expansion rate to be accurate
the intro vortex animation now seems to be perfectly true to the original
removed square root calculation from rescue capsules opening detection
replaced real modulo formula with Java 8 floor modulo call
wrote a math function that allows using modulo for floating point values
star wrapping will now be calculated a little safer
fixed mouse cursor being outside the allowed game screen boundaries at the start
replaced 2015 splash logo with a new 2016 one
fixed intro titles not being drawn behind the stars as in the original game
readded separate titles for dongleware and sd software logos in the intro animation
allowed the music library to separately enable/disable ingame and title music
the state of enabled sfx/title and ingame music will now be saved in the config file
added jvm debug mode detection to the utility set of the game
added more efficient methods to draw stars onto the game screen
rewrote stars drawing in the classic gfx engine
added visualvm defense code to the game class
added a utility method to calculate the crc32 checksum for a given file
added utility methods to find the uptime and the start time of the running JVM
replaced spacola eclipse 2016 build splash image with new 2016 one
added utility methods to calculate the crc32 checksum for any string or byte array
added CRC checksum aware classloader that may be useful later for classfile protection
fixed output format regarding milliseconds for elapsed time strings
wrote a base resource verifier that locates and scans all available resource files
fully implemented the resource verifier to verify the integrity of all packaged files
wasted at least two hours trying to sort out JAR file path issues when loading resources
wasted another two hours trying to fix file loading errors that occur from other errors
at least fixed loading of encrypted resources in the JAR file
fixed possible miscalculation in level wrapping using the new floor modulo

v0.51 – December 2015

implemented square distance comparisons in mine h3/8 and alien classes
added more mathematical functions to calculate comparable square distances
implemented square distance comparisons to collision checks in game object class
fixed a bug where bouncing enemies stayed alive as ghosts after destruction
added a route guidance icon for the target sector
replaced unnecessary Math.pow calls by much faster multiplications in GameMath class
added a target icon for the route guidance / direction marker
rewrote retrieving certain sector objects from a sector
added optional direction markers for all the surrounding powerups
added a function to get powerup icons only from any sector container
removed some more square root function calls for attach and collision distances
cleaned up some code belonging to the new continuous collision detection
the graphics engine now also draws the proximity to automatic mines
added an option to the menu bar to enable/disable bounding circle drawing
added a way to patch the original level configuration from the source code
added an option to the menu bar to enable/disable sector boundaries drawing
the players shield will now dissolve debris explosion particles on collision
fixed a bug where the enemy ship deployment proximity has been calculated wrong
minedropper shot debris will now vanish on contact with the players ship
the minedropper shot debris will now release sparks when vanishing
fixed a bug with calculating the player ship acceleration particles deviation
fixed peashooter shots creating sparks on collision with the players shield
implemented particles emitting for minedropper enemies
implemented background resetting on level border wrapping
fixed a bug where x and y sector coordinates were exchanged when clearing a sector
fixed many redundant current sector calculations in each frame
wrote methods to shift the star background a few pixels in every direction
implemented star background shifting in the middle of the level like in the original game
confirmed star shifting values to be either 128, 256 or 512 pixels
rewrote the logic for star speeds and implemented methods to get their pixelspeed
fixed star shifting to use the original pixel values and not recalculated ones
allowed the game to always trace the last sector that a player has been
added debug output to show when the player surpasses the level center or the level edges

v0.50 – November 2015

updated Launch4j from version 3.5 to 3.8
pulled Launch4j binaries into the workspace to start using relative build paths only
removed obsolete eclipse_home property from the ant build script
added ProGuard 5.2.1 binaries to the workspace
added ProGuard tasks to the ant build script and wrote a simple configuration
added tasks for creating signed ProGuard binaries
will use absolute paths for logfile creation messages
added more precise output for text resource bundle error messages
finally got the obfuscated and shrunk ProGuard binaries working
added an ant property to control the verbosity of the jar signing task
fixed letter edges of the successdenied software logo in the titles
cut out two atari steem icons for the optional project graphics
the game client can now parse all the Spacola Space Atlas codes and use them
added package and wrote classes for Spacola Space Atlas code management
wrote a function to search for specific codes in the whole code book
added serialize to bytes function to the file access class
added game utility method to create output over a string array
added deserialize from bytes function to the file access class
fixed a bug in the encryption and decryption methods for byte arrays
the game client can now read, encrypt and decrypt the packed space atlas file
fixed a bug in the unzipping code of the resource loader
the space atlas data will now be compressed+encrypted and decompressed+decrypted
added the packed spacola atlas to the resources
moved all the third party programs for building into a separate directory
added a game utility method to remove an element from a string containing elements
added utility methods to turn a hex description of a sector into int coordinates
wrote toString methods for all the different Spacola Space Atlas classes
transcribed the powerups for the first galaxy from the Space Atlas
moved all the file compression and encryption methods to the resource loader class
fixed a linebreak bug in the text file reader code
the levels.txt file will now be encrypted to the resources
the LevelsTxtParser will now use the encrypted resource file instead
added a variable for the start powerup to the Space Atlas code classes
renamed the levels configuration file inside the encrypted archive
added some log output to the loading of encrypted files
transcribed the powerups for the second galaxy from the Space Atlas
added a custom file header for encrypted Spacola PAC files as in the original OXYD
fixed some more letter edges of the successdenied software logo
created some new splash image designs with the new successdenied software logo
transcribed the powerups for the third galaxy, thus completing the first page
fixed a bug with calculating base motion adaption factors in the vector2D class
fixed a division by zero error in the calculation of base motion adaption factors
added the latest game splash screen to the resources
implemented Minedropper basic motion logic
implemented special ship decoration for minedroppers
added minedropper shot game object type to the list
implemented simple minedropper shot game object
implemented minedropper shot debris game object
implemented minedropper destruction and shooting behaviour
added a position copying function for the vector 2d class
added sound effects to minedropper shots
measured and confirmed minedropper default flight speed
improved the minedropper behaviour to make them navigate more like in the original game
added vector methods to retrieve separate x and y combined motion values
implemented minedropper shot explosives and explosion code
fixed a bug with loading the encrypted Space Atlas codes
the game now really uses the codes from the Space Atlas as target sectors
fixed level generator not using the selected solar field
wrote a method to create a galaxy id as seen in the original game’s sidebar
fixed a bug where minedropper shot debris were not centered correctly
measured and confirmed minedropper shot debris ejection speed
increased the maximum distance that minedropper shot debris can go
added two missing minedropper sprites to the resources
counted and added the number of debris particles for minedropper shot explosives
implemented debris explosions to also allow debris particles to dissolve
measured and set the force for the minedropper shot explosive debris
minedropper shot debris will now stay alive until they leave the players sight
the graphics engine can now also draw sector boundaries to the game screen
reduced the „alive distance“ of minedropper shot debris
fixed sound effect for minedropper shot explosions
minedroppers will now drop mines exactly at the last point before swinging back
implemented minedroppers animation
enemy shots will now be drawn behind enemy ships
removed a sqrt calculation for finding the nearest object by comparing square distances
added functions to draw bounding circles and bounding boxes around game objects
added functions to check for AABB collision and AABB motion collision
fixed a bug where bouncing of two objects without mass causes division by zero
tried fixing the collision detection and prevention algorithm
added functions to calculate collision points for two game objects colliding
added a simpler bouncing code to the math functions
added a vector analysis function that calculates the time of impact for game objects
implemented a new ball physics engine
finally no more intersecting game objects when they should actually be colliding
removed simple bouncing code since it doesn’t really work
added a function to create a substitute bounding rectangle for circular objects
fixed a bug where oxyd rotor enemies were drawn to the wrong position during flight
finally fixed the bug where the penalty forced objects to bounce around too much

v0.49 – October 2015

made the instructions button go behind the star background like in the original game
measured/estimated the original games hyper speed and ridiculous speed values
fixed hyper speed warning not triggering when leaving ridiculous speed frame
fixed enabling max speed limit only in enhanced game mode
fixed calculation of speedup value not scaling correctly with target framerate
fixed formula for speedup value calculation, seems i finally found accurate values
fixed aliens and ware being repelled from the ship when approaching them
fixed NPE from uninitialized level when starting multiplayer session
finished and added all 16 colored alien sprites to the resources
cut out and added colored alien help sprite to the resources
finished and added 3 colored player surfing sprites to the resources
started creating the colored ship drive sprites
fixed the calculation of the level phases in the levels txt parser
fixed a bug where level 64 was always placed in the last position
enabled all 64 levels to be selectable initially in the solar selector
enabled the solar selector to show the selectable level numbers on the fields
created a method that allows creating all the remaining selectable fields at once
created a method that allows enabling and disabling level numbers in the solar selector
added some log output to the solar selector class
the level numbers are now drawn centered in the corresponding field
set the GEM font in the solar selector to inverted mode
started creating the colored ship sprites
again confirmed sector height by measuring the time the ship needs to fly through it
implemented a swing class for buttons with animated sprites
tried counting the actual number of stars in the original games‘ background
set the number of stars to 63
extracted some radar constants into separate variables
fixed big asteroid sprite shape by analysing dozens of screenshots
implemented oxyd rotors also bouncing from the players ship
fixed medium asteroid sprite shape by analysing dozens of screenshots
confirmed the number of small / big and blinking stars
fixed code for star background creation regarding correct amount of stars
fixed star background creation regarding layer total of small / big / blinking stars
fixed star blinking durations to be exactly like in the original star background
added a new class for big star animation phases sequence

v0.48 – September 2015

added utility methods for string reversing and multiple byte array concatenation
added a preliminary method to generate a secret key for data encryption
reduced number of voices for the audio engine from 32 to 8
confirmed original game had only 2 sound channels (voices) from Oxyd 2 and Spacola box
added default number of voices to the sound config
cut out tos icons for drive c, folder, file and executable program
implemented a log window updater thread which keeps adding incoming log messages
removed modality for the log window to allow keeping it open while playing
created a big oxyd title image from the original oxyd book cover
the log window will now autoscroll to the bottom of the log output
changed updating the log output only in the EDT
added thread name for the log output updater thread
added a new build script task that creates the latest source jar file
replaced source jar task with sourceonly zip task and sourcecomplete zip task
refined including files in the build source zip tasks
added the possibility to create an inverted (black) dongleware font object
added dongleware font written title to the log messages window
fixed an NPE with the log window updater thread
implemented hairdryer and telephone station animations
implemented scissors station animation, looks awful though
fixed oxyd rotors turning animation going too fast on deployment
added a window title background image
added a special image panel class which can hold a background image
created a window title header panel for the log messages window
created a windowmanager class that will handle all the subwindows
created a special window title panel class for all the subwindow headers
added log output to the log messages window and the windowmanager
fixed starting up log window updater thread twice
fixed log window updater thread not stopping when closing the window via the X button
moved audio device window to the window manager and added a window title panel to it
added a swing border to the window title panel
added monochrome oxyd dongleware font to the resources
introduced dongleware font style attribute
replaced „dongleware black“ with „dongleware oxyd style“ for the swing windows
added color oxyd dongleare font to the resources
added display mode window to the window manager
added window title panel to the display mode window
added border to the about window image
removed highscores title text from highscore toString method
moved all smaller (reusable) GUI elements into their own package
all other subwindows are now handled by the window manager class
fixed a design template for the HUD background image
fixed spacola eclipse 2015 title image and build splash image
created a better and wider window title background image
fixed drawing only the required clip bounds in the image panel
the image panel will now draw its image background centered in the panel
created a wide spacola eclipse title image
implemented drawing smaller images in a bigger image panel
implemented dongleware color and dongleware oxyd color style fonts
fixed spacola eclipse 2015 title image once more (letter S corrected, E’s widened)
fixed wide spacola eclipse title image too
created a better title artwork and added a new application splash screen
created a new about dialog image
created a new website header image
added oxklick1 oxyd sound effect for bouncing things
implemented enemies being able to bounce off of each other
implemented a way to reduce bounce noise when enemies are crowded in one place
added object intersection resolving when enemies collide
implemented a better way to resolve object intersections for collisions
created a new method for enemy collision checking
fixed object intersections not resolving on higher flight speeds
deprecated the old resolve collisions method
cut out and added 9 oxyd collision sprites to the resources
cut out black and white oxyd marble sprites from the original oxyd
cut out black marble sprites from the colored oxyd version
measured status message blinking durations in the original game
rewrote status message blinking logic which is now much more authentic
confirmed status pause message blinking duration to be half a second precisely
measured the radar update framerate in the original game being set to every 20th frame
fixed radar screen update rate at about every 14th frame
measured all frame durations for all the station animations in the original game
rewrote the complete station animation logic to allow more flexible frame timings
implemented all 10 station animations absolutely frame perfect
winning animation length is now depending on the type of animation being played
implemented delayed setting of station state as it is done in the original game
created an alternative ‚oxyd color‘ fun border design for the hud frame
the station state delay is now depending on the actual framerate
cut out a green killer marble from oxyd color
fixed reconstruction of the colored inactive blackhole sprite
changed some pixels of the colored blackhole shape 2 sprite
tried improving the collision resolving algorithm
added an undo and getNextPosition method to the vector 2d class
added willCollideWith and step forward methods to gameobject and vector 2d class
added step n times forward and back methods to the vector class
finally managed to improve the collision resolving algorithm, still more work to do
added more math methods to calculate two bounced motion vectors
added a new get motion vector method to the vector 2d class
added a new set motion vector method to the vector 2d class
merged both set motion vector methods
created all three variations of the shape 3 blackhole color sprite from oxyd color
replaced the colored blackhole shape 3 sprite in the resources with the simplest one
added the game cursor to the number of rendered objects
fixed a bug in the vector 2d class where the stop command would not reset the direction
added current base and target base motion logic to the vector 2d class
added more motion recalculation methods to the vector 2d class
added base motion consideration to the vector 2d copy constructors
fixed explosions being drawn far behind an object with base motion
fixed explosions being updated once more after enemy ships that exploded have been updated
fixed aliens and ware not being created properly from objects using base motion
set a name for the sound threads in order to identify them in java dumps
set a name for the spacola eclipse main thread
fixed calculation of travelled distance for game objects using base motion
added special collections for bouncing enemies
the collision resolving code will now only iterate through bouncing enemies
the collision resolving code will now apply penalty forces for persistent collisions
started writing a separate method that calculates all the collision forces in a crowd
fixed ware objects being drawn twice to the radar, making them invisible again
fixed aliens not vanishing at the edge of the radar
fixed aliens not being ejected after player destruction
fixed aliens being collected in the wrong frame (before update)
fixed vanished ware and aliens being processed after they have been removed
tried fixing the magnetic effect for ware and aliens
introduced tick checking to ensure that no object is updated twice per frame
measured and confirmed powerup container magnetism radius to be 50 pixels wide
finally found the perfect way to create a magnetism effect like in the original game
fixed an exception when moving the mouse on the solar selector after a gameover event
fixed billing animation titles loading the wrong sprites
fixed the player not setting the visited flag correctly when not enough cargo
changed the way how the magnetic effect pulls objects to the center
measured and confirmed the three different star speeds for the background
tried finding the correct speedup value for the player ship, looks better now
fixed stars still moving when the player has landed on a powerup container
changed the magnetic effect again, to add some kind of braking mechanism
improved the magnetism effect once more, this time it is absolutely authentic
fixed yet another problem with the magnetism effect

v0.47 – August 2015

created 6 colored radar sprites from the original designs
confirmed 3 enemy shield sprites transparency and size
fixed mine h2-43 sprite transparency and size inspired by mine h3/8 designs
confirmed transparency, size and order of triangular debris sprites
confirmed transparency and size of debris spark sprites
fixed accidentally using an old version of the toiletpaper cargo sprite
fixed remains of menubar repainting code which didn’t quite work
fixed not using interpolation in splash screens
wrote a screenshot saver class which allows taking screenshots of the game engine
implemented screenshot saving function into the menubar
pulled all existing sprite subfolders into /img/mono to prepare for adding color sprites
copied all 21 color sprites into /img/color
created a prototype color gfx library from the existing mono gfx library
started writing a class that decides whether to retrieve classic or colored sprites
implemented a way to create sector range objects from discrete values
started implementing the level generation process from a given level configuration
added log output to find the currently selected level number in the solar selector
added rocketcycle, defender, spermbird, rocketgun and shielddefender gameobject types
added tricore gameobject type
added gameobject and powerup maps for level config key to level object mapping
wrote a simple token recognition for the levels config block parser
added some token constants for the default level configuration
extended the sector range class to get their width and height
sector ranges now also calculate how many sectors are affected by them
implemented parsing of any number of parameters from a given script token
implemented retrieving all affected sectors from a given sector range
implemented methods to fill/floodfill level sectors with powerup types
added minimum and maximum value constants for the level generator
changed toString method for gameobject class that expresses its contents more precisely
fixed sector range span not considering the center sector of the range
finished creating a generic gfx library which allows to switch between mono and color
replaced lots of occurrences of classic gfx library with the generic gfx library
finally playing with colored graphics is possible from now on
created base level class that holds all parameters for a fresh generated level
fixed sector range logic which centered around the start sector and not the target sector
created methods that handle teleporting the ship to the base levels starting position
fixed powerup container creation logic because it didn’t check for existing containers
the level parser now successfully parses and fills level sectors with powerups
the level parsing/generating process via level script finally works
deprecated old methods in the level generator class that may not always work correctly
implemented an unload cargo „cheat“ for testing
powerups in the solar selector will be shown upon game configuration
implemented enemy setup logic and deployment for space stations
implemented parsing and creating enemy setups in the level parser/generator
fixed log output of collected powerup which has already been unset
fixed missing menu captions for unload cargo cheat
fixed level parser mistaking powerup fixed number with powerup probability
added more methods for parameter parsing for when tokens may deliver empty parameters
implemented parsing and setting up asteroided sectors from the level configuration
added methods for filling and floodfilling minefields to given sector ranges
confirmed and enlisted station sprites as perfect
confirmed station wave animation sprites and sprite order
confirmed station rant animation sprites and sprite order
resized all 40 station animation sprites and added them to the resources
confirmed station cigarette animation sprites and sprite order
confirmed station cutter animation sprites and sprite order
confirmed station cherry and bonbon sprites and sprite order
confirmed existing design parts of the station toilet animation sprites and sprite order
created a shape for big and small asteroids
confirmed existing design parts of the shapes for big and small asteroids
implemented parsing of station trap placement from the level configuration
the level parser is now able to read all tokens from level 1 configuration
added log warnings for illegal sector ranges and unknown level configuration tokens
finally fixed the stupid bug that prevented rockets from chasing after enemies
rockets will now be shot slower than standard shots like in the original game
added log output when a players rocket hit something
renamed uppercase method names in the GameMath utility class
added methods for calculating the horizontal or vertical distance between two objects
added 3 convenience methods to GameObject for finding the distance from other objects
fixed conversion of level coordinates to screen coordinates which used wrong screen size
added menubar cheat for granting all weaponry
added german and english text translation resources for all 12 powerups
created a submenu under cheats where each powerup can now be selected manually
added commands for every available powerup
fixed long shot powerup not using a higher maximum distance anymore
implemented redeployment of enemy ships that have delivered their stolen items
fixed a very old bug that made single engine ships emit particles incorrectly
implemented hud status message for cantina radio call powerup
measured enemy fleeing distance and duration value for the cantina radio call powerup
removed powerup collecting sound effect on collecting cantina call powerup
finally implemented the cantina radio call powerup. All powerups functional now!
added a global cantina radio call timer to allow logging when the powerup has worn off
added 12 menu icons for all the powerup symbols available on containers
added icons to all the cheat powerup menu items
replaced the phone menu icon with the narrower one from the hud cargo bay display
the gfx lib now also creates a black dongleware font for the certificate printout
fixed transparency and size for all 12 powerup sprites as given by original designs
fixed the cantina call menu icon reflecting the latest powerup sprite changes
fixed toiletpaper menu icon reflecting the latest cargo screen sprite changes
cut out megaghost and megamax modula-2 logos from bolo screenshots for later use
added oxyd sound effect ‚oxmagic‘ for taking screenshots
added F12 as accelerator for taking screenshots
added a check if the game engine is actually running when trying to take a screenshot
the screenshot function now plays a sound effect to indicate if it was successful
fixed controls initially having not set any context
key typing will now make a sound effect in the opening screen
created new shapes for all 9 minedropper shot sprites
fixed transparency of the 9 minedropper shot sprites as given by original designs
started creating alternative ‚bolo‘ and ‚oxyd‘ fun border designs for the hud frame
pulled some of the highscore constants into the score config class
fixed an uppercase letter in the resource bundle keys for the solar selector header
implemented methods for the gfx engine to draw many contents centered with x offset
fixed solar selector panel not being drawn with an offset of -4 as in the original
implemented special demo version message for the solar selector footer as in the TOS-Demo
removed unnecessary recalculations per mouse move event in the solar selector
added a note to the solar selector showing that this is an unfinished version
implemented ’saving game‘ message for the solar selector
clicking the coffee button now works a lot more like in the original game
confirmed transparency for defender sprite
fixed size and bit depth for defender sprite and both defender shield sprites
removed fading out of the solar selector panel and the special demo message
added the special demo version message for the instructions and translated it
implemented target coordinate deciphering which reveals the target sector after a while
added a bolo rotor menu icon to the resources
added a shocker heart menu icon to the resources
created a new dongleware monochrome font with borders which was used in OXYD
cut out a falcon tos atari logo for later use
created a new dongleware color font with black shade which was used in OXYD Color
confirmed pirate shots sprites order in the game and transparency in the designs
confirmed last two maforian sprites (11 and 15) once and for all. Done three times!
implemented minimum and maximum coordinate decoding time which is randomized
implemented an arrow pointing to the direction of any game object in the level
prevented drawing the arrow if the player is directly in front of the object
the arrow now points directly to the object on screen when the player gets close to it
fixed tailspinning peashooters vanishing again when hit by the player
added pixel doubling and interpolation user preference to the config file
fixed a bug where the preferred dimensions of the game canvas have been calculated wrong
added direction marker cheat to the cheat menu and implemented enabling/disabling it
fixed rare NPEs when resetting game components before the thread is really stopped
added an unfinished version note to the instructions pages
cut out 4 OXYD rotor sprites, which could be used as a bonus enemy somewhere
added OXYD rotor sprites to the resources and to the gfx library
fixed color gfx library not loading a certain image
confirmed the player shot standard speed to be 5,5 pixels per frame
set the player shot standard speed to 7,92 pixels per frame for the target framerate
confirmed the player shot rapid cooldown to be 12 frames @ 72 fps, thus 8.33 @ 50 fps
set the player shot rapid cooldown to 8 frames for the target framerate
confirmed the player shot long speed to be also 5,5 pixels per frame
set the player shot long speed to 7,92 pixels per frame for the target framerate
transcribed the back of the original Spacola disk + space atlas box
fixed size, rotation and order of all 32 spermbird sprites as given by original designs
created 64 new engine thrust sprites from the designs with fixed size, rotation and order
replaced the old 128 engine thrust sprites in the project with the 64 new ones
rewrote drawing of the engine thrust sprites in the shipdecorator with less image files
changed Eclipse SDK in the titles to Eclipse IDE
turned some more translation keys in the resource bundles to lowercase only
created a new header image for the spacola eclipse website
fixed size, center and transparency of all three surfing sprites as given by designs
fixed grave sprite size which needed a center fix to resemble the original accurately
finally all original designs have been evaluated and used as monochrome sprite templates
measured the dangerous enemy alert interval and set to about 4,86 seconds for now
rewrote most of the text for the spacola website
cut out TOS drive a and b desktop icons as well as the trashcan icon
confirmed the rocket speed in the original to be 4 pixels per frame @ 72 Hz
set the player rocket speed to 5,76 pixels per frame @ 50 fps
shot speeds and cooldowns are now calculated regarding the target framerate
player acceleration value now also changes with target framerate
confirmed the minestar shot speed in the original to be 5,5 pixels per frame @ 72 Hz
set the minestar shot speed to 7,92 pixels per frame @ 50 fps
confirmed the minestar shot cooldown in the original to be 5,09 frames @ 72 Hz
set the minestar shot cooldown to 3,53 frames @ 50 fps
changed how the game interprets frame logic for single parameter frames, i.e. (-1)(-1)
fixed trying to interpret the block identifier token which has already been parsed
wrote a function to retrieve the sectors for the FO (Fill Outer) range modifiers
created colored station rant and station wave animation sprites from the original designs
added 8 colored station animation sprites to the resources
added audio device, fullscreen mode and switch to fullscreen to the menu bar options
added default buttons to the audio device and display mode dialogs
rewrote maforian shield logic and added the shield to the ship decorator
increased the distance at which the ware items are drawn at the enemy ships
deprecated ShieldMaforian enemies since they are obsolete now
increased the mass of the maforians to make them bounce off with less force
fixed using the wrong rapid shooting cooldown value
fixed enemy shields sometimes not being drawn by the ship decorator
fixed exception in the ship decorator when the direction sprite index buffer is empty
implemented shielded mothermaforians dummy ai
the player can now trigger stations while surfing, bomb event will be reset though
implemented Oxyd rotor enemy
improved the magnetism effect code
cut out a smaller Atari logo from the TOS GEM about dialog
added a method to retrieve an audio mixer object for a given name
started adding audio capability detection to the audio device window
started adding parts for an encryption key to the config

v0.46 – July 2015

added two utility methods to convert Date into Calendar objects and vice versa
recreated original spacola crosshair cursor using the original design shape
created a colored spacola crosshair cursor using the original designs
replaced crosshair sprite with new crosshair cursor to the resources
improved the colored cherries sprite using some gradients to make it look more plastic
all monochrome cursors reported as perfect recreations now
fixed powerup container sprite, removed unnecessary black border making the sprite smaller
created colored powerup container and space station sprites
created colored gameover/grave sprite
fixed all 3 blackhole sprites again using the perfect shapes from original designs
cut out all 3 colored blackhole sprites from the colored OXYD version
introduced pixel doubling and interpolation menu items in the menubar
it is now possible to resize the window during a running game
gfx interpolation can now be enabled and disabled through the menubar
tried fixing exceptions that sometimes occur when resizing the game window
fixed exceptions by adding synchronization for drawing onto the game canvas
added log output for hyperspeed and ridiculous speed warning events
fixed wrong top border alignment for drawing simple images
added an empty sound effect used for silently initializing the audio subsystem
peashooters will now tailspin upon asteroid collision
fixed a bug in the controls where the cursor was being drawn at the wrong position
finally implemented rocket powerup objects and firing rockets
added log message for showing the available accelerated graphics memory
implemented mechanism to show the starting powerup for the next level in the HUD
implemented levels.txt parser class into the solar selector to determine actual levels
added force win level and infinite rockets cheats to the commandmanager and menubar
increased the station magnetism effect distance after winning a level
fixed not resetting displayed powerup in the solar selector if mouse leaves panel
implemented an optional setting that makes magnetism effect independent from distance
the force win level cheat now actually pulls the camera towards the target station
fixed stars not correctly being faded out on level winning animations
fixed keeping HUD pause event after engine restart
fixed radarscreen not being reset after engine restart
fixed splash and intro modules being cut off through language reset
removed initial setting of menubar captions which was redundant anyway
the game client is now able to persist application settings to a configuration file
added more logging to the text resources and client properties classes
text resources and client configuration will be loaded before the window turns visible
the game client will now persist and restore the chosen client language
added init methods for controlled initialization of static utility classes
fixed transparency and rotation for all 16 rocket sprites as given by original designs
fixed transparency and order of player shield sprites as given by original designs
created both colored player shield sprites
fixed transparency and rotation for all 16 deadly turret sprites as given by original designs
fixed transparency and rotation for all 16 pirate turret sprites as given by original designs
fixed transparency and rotation for all 16 harakiri sprites as given by original designs
fixed transparency and rotation for all 16 piraton sprites as given by original designs
fixed transparency for all 4 rotor star sprites as given by original designs
fixed transparency for all 4 cycle sprites as given by original designs
fixed billing module displaying float values using american „.“ instead of european „,“
started fixing the billing modules price tag drawing
fixed horizontal rule spacing in the billing module, which needs to be 5 pixels
readded all 8 title cargo images for the billing module only
fixed horizontal rule first spacing actually being a pixel less wide than the others
fixed horizontal rule drawing which handled spacings wrong
finally fixed billing module again with pixel perfect spacings (apart from the sprites)
fixed rotation for all 16 cargoliner sprites as given by original designs
fixed rotation for all 16 cargoflyer sprites as given by original designs
fixed transparency for all 16 cargoflyer sprites as given by original designs
fixed rotation for 4 alien sprites which were wrong, as given by original designs
fixed transparency and size of all 16 kleptomara sprites as given by original designs
fixed rotation for all 16 laser shot sprites as given by original designs
fixed order and size of all 16 rocket drive sprites as given by original designs
fixed a mothermaforian sprite that had a spare black pixel
confirmed perfect transparency for all 16 maforian sprites
again corrected rotation for 2 maforian sprites (11 and 15), confirmed all the others
confirmed perfect rotation for ship sprite as given by original designs
fixed transparency for all 32 ship sprites as given by original designs
fixed ship sprite size
fixed shield sprite size to compensate wrong alignment
fixed aliens and ware items not being updated in enhanced mode
the other players‘ ships in multiplayer mode will be updated between network updates
enabled the multiplayer game to display every players own cursor for everyone
added some message dialogs and log output when joining a game didn’t work
fixed strange audio static from playing empty sound by setting volume to near zero
confirmed player ship and shield being centered perfectly on the gamescreen
fixed transparency for 250 and 500 score sprites as given by original designs
added 3 new score sprites for 50, 100 and 1000 points as given by original designs
fixed transparency and size for mine h3/8 sprite as given by original designs
fixed transparency and size for all 8 square debris sprites as given by original designs
fixed transparency for screen cargo cola and cherry sprites as given by original designs
confirmed transparency for screen cargo bonbon, cigarette, telephone and toiletpaper
fixed transparency and size for minedropper sprite as given by original designs
cut out all 8 „internal“ spacola original design sprites, may be useful later
fixed player shot transparency and size as given by original color designs
created the colored player shot sprite from the original designs
confirmed shot dissolve sprite transparency
created 3 colored shot dissolve sprites from the original designs

v0.45 – June 2015

added some basic image scaling method to the gfx engine
added only private constructors and final modifiers to all utility classes
added a faster image inverting filter which sadly cannot be used with indexed graphics
the gfx engine will no longer output monochrome images, but pseudo monochrome RGB images
added some RGB screen clearing functions to the gfx engine
finally fast inverting works perfectly throughout the whole game
started working on a way to scale the graphics to a higher resolution
rewrote drawing of simple images to the backbuffer
scaling now works kind of, it’s just extremely and unplayably slow
scaling is now also possible using interpolation which makes it even slower
scaling uses the correct scale factor for the required output size
fixed exception handler not exiting the game properly as was expected
fixed playing sound effect when unpausing the game on spacebar
fixed player ship not turning towards the cursor when unpausing the game
first successful test for adding colored sprites to the enhanced gfx engine
finished adding all the setters for the game statistics class
added an audio device panel to allow selecting the mixer device later
added a utility function to easily set GUI components final size
created a levelstate class with serializable ingame variables that may be useful or not
declared many variables now transient in the solarsystem class
created a small title image for the about dialog
fixed some sub-windows now being aligned along the parent frame
redesigned the about dialog to include the new title image
finally managed to read parts of the original (b&w and colored) graphics files
fixed resolution in the macpaint? header and managed to extract some distorted graphics
designed a new splash title image and added it to the game
renamed AudioDevicePanel to AudioDeviceWindow to conform to own naming conventions
made all window classes align along their parent frame
added icon to all sub-windows
removed unnecessary reference to gfx engine in view highscore window
changed refresh rate for radar screen to reflect the original feeling more
simplified radar screen drawing code a little
fixed missing text translation keys after renaming some of them
finally implemented deploying motherharakiri dummy enemies
implemented rescue capsules logic, deployment, bouncing, shooting and opening
fixed a bug where shots dissolved by absolute and not relative travelled distance
added an error message if two people try to host a game at the same time
implemented some more multiplayer game logic, managed to start hosted games
finally the client can see the server player ingame
fixed duplicate score indicator object type
added appearance enum value that will replace unserializable ship animation
implemented client-side game joining error messages
implemented client-side game timeout handling
added error handling for trying to start a multiplayer server twice
allowed multiplayer games to end correctly
the server will shutdown a multiplayer game if all clients are gone
renamed ServerSolarSystem to MultiplayerSolarSystem
added ‚incorrect password‘ response to the multiplayer server
added all intro score values to the scoreconfig class
replaced all fixed texts in the titles with values from the score configuration class
added ware duplicator and rocket powerup items to the game
added powerup container logic for collecting rockets and activating the ware duplicator
confirmed rocket powerup lifetime and ware duplicator powerup cooldown
finally implemented the ware duplicator powerup
removed rescue capsule mass to prevent the players ship from bouncing off of them
replaced gamerandom reference in rescue capsule creation with true random method
implemented lots of video output handling code
finally the game client is able to switch to fullscreen exclusive mode and back via F8
fixed gamepanel clipping area outside of graphics buffer boundaries
fixed player ship suddenly being unable to collect any standard powerups
the gamepanel will now always create buffers that are compatible with the graphics device
changed the code to retrieve a list of all available audio mixers
implemented functions to set and unset the selected audio mixer device
implemented a selection dialog to allow choosing a fullscreen display mode
finally managed to read and convert the original Apple QuickDraw PICT template files
set black gamewindow background to fill the empty space in fullscreen modes
fixed rescue capsules not being drawn on the radar screen
fixed JAR manifest implementation attributes
added build time to the JAR manifest
added ALT+Enter shortcut for fullscreen mode
the game window now tries to regain focus after restoring from fullscreen
added a function to get the current screen size
the game window will now stop passive repainting while the game engine is running
implemented an experimental (seemingly much faster) active rendering engine
the gfx engine is no longer drawing to an intermediate buffer when active rendering is used
the gamescreen is now using a compatible (accelerated) image
active rendering now considers the frame insets correctly, at least in windowed mode
enabled the menubar to stay on top of the AWT canvas in active rendering
all subclassed Swing components will now correctly call their super constructor
fixed using wrong insets in fullscreen mode
prevented launching game engine multiple times when it is already running
tried fixing the problem where the game engine sometimes won’t shutdown
fixed missing immediate repaint after game engine has been stopped
fixed clearscreen function for active rendering
finally fixed engine shutdown problems by removing toolkit syncing
started adding functions to convert images in the gfx lib into compatible (managed) images
active rendering is finally fast enough to allow realtime scaling graphics output
implemented fully functional scaling for active rendering, even with interpolation
window resolution is now determined by game resolution times scale factor
the whole gfx library is now converted to managed images for performance reasons
added interpolation as an optional feature that may be activated through menu command
the game panel now also uses a completely black background
started reconstructing the back cover of the space atlas
confirmed all-systems-KO status message to have a 25% probability
implemented all-systems-KO status message
the players shield now neutralizes enemy shots on contact as in the original game
fixed asteroids playing shield bounce sound effect for any object that collides with them
rescue capsules will now also bounce off of asteroids
objects crashing into asteroids will now also bounce off while they explode
added log output to events in the command manager
fixed a timing issue on creating the graphics buffers
fixed playing sound effect in an infinite loop in the asteroids bouncing code
tried fixing menubar repaint graphical glitches during running game engine
added a dedicated canvas object to fix the menubar issue, no more drawing into the JFrame
finally the ugly menubar glitches are gone for good (i hope!)
readded the splash screen for the canvas, however still has repaint artifacts
implemented a gamemath function that tests for floating point equality
subclassed canvas and moved all new drawing functions into it
fixed splash image repaint glitches with a new splash drawing code
deprecated the old gamepanel class that used painting on Swing components
fixed NPE when enemies tried to target the player, which has not been set
added log output for when instant highscore command failed
tried taming an extremely buggy Eclipse Mars, while making the workspace ready
perfectly recreated the Spacola rocket cursor with transparency and shadows
replaced old Spacola rocket cursor sprite with the new one
fixed instructions module not catching the mouse correctly
fixed offset for mouse catching in the solar selector and the instructions module
fixed rocket menu icon to resemble the newest rocket cursor recreation

v0.44 – May 2015

replaced all 16 harakiri enemy sprites with newly rotated ones (more like maforians)
fixed score indicators now blinking perfectly like in the original game
added a utility method that converts target frame rate to frame time
the frame stopwatch class can handle differing update rates and frame rates
created a much better algorithm to distribute a reduced number of redraws among updates
made vortex updates independent from draw calls
fixed a recently introduced bug where tailspinning turrets would vanish by shooting at them
fixed precalculating 0 vortex coils for some stars, which looked awful
fixed a bug in the vortex class that ignored random coils if enhanced transitions were disabled
fixed a calculation bug in the methods that convert level coordinates to screen coordinates
fixed a bug in the vortex class that made objects be drawn off centered
finally implemented game objects being used in the vortex intro animation
fixed a newly introduced bug where the vortex would not be updated during gameover animation
finally implemented game objects in the vortex gameover animation too
fixed a bug in the vortex which made it unable to determine the distance of a vortex element
reinstated hiding elements that are very close to the vortex center
added origin attribute to game objects to allow calculating their distance in pixels
added method to game objects to get their distance from origin
confirmed and added the value how far player shots can go without LONG powerup
implemented incrementing travelled distance attribute for all game objects
changed the way how the game calculates when to dissolve player shots
added more log output to audio playback methods
changed all derived game objects to always update the base object instead of only their vector
renamed rotatingstar enemy to rotorstar
recompressed pension certificate
added pension certificate to the project
added motherharakiri rescue capsule sprite
implemented basic rescue capsule game object
pulled some utility and math methods out of SolarSystem into actual utility/math classes
renamed Capsule to RescueCapsule
added method and collections for rescue capsules to the games update cycles
tried to confirm 640 pixels as rescue capsules opening distance, not sure if correct
added motherharakiri dummy enemy AI
prevented most of the fields in the highscores class from being serialized to file
extracted easily serializable highscorelist class from the highscores module
added new log methods for trace and verbose logging (finer than debug)
added some more methods for the gamestatistics class and implemented handling host players
pulled gamestatistics and all three highscore classes into a new statistics package
removed obsolete stationary enemy interface and unified enemy updating
implemented real volume control for the audio subsystem
fixed rescue capsule lists not being initialized correctly
resolved dozens of previously unnoticed exceptions by fixing audio initialization
wrote utility method to print all available audio mixers for the system
resolved maybe hundreds of more unnoticed exceptions during gameplay by fixing pan controls
fixed java logging leaving many unused lock files. Forgot to close the filehandlers
game window is now also possible to exit the game client with error code
pulled actual client exiting out of the logging class and into their respective locations
all log methods will now accept throwable objects instead of exceptions only
added shutdown hook to allow changing the way how the game client will be exited
copied all relevant shutdown code into the shutdown hook thread
changed unspecific exception handling on initializing the graphics engine
added methods for the gfx engine to set or unset bitwise XOR mode

v0.43 – April 2015

created a Dongleware color font image from an online source
added four new characters to the Dongleware mono font ( \,[,],Command )
fixed # character height in the Dongleware color font
added ß character to the Dongleware color font
replaced äöüß characters from video with screenshot cutouts
added ÜÖ characters from screenshots
confirmed letter X cutout
redid the complete Dongleware color font from scratch using a colored OXYD version
recompressed the Dongleware font with indexed palette
removed faked square brackets from mono Dongleware fonts again
improved the english translation of the instructions using international OXYD version
recompressed all 746 PNG files again (w/o bg color) to save another 36 kbytes of useless data
added 3 defender sprites and included them in the gfx library
recreated 4 blackhole shapes from TOS-Gimmick, OXYD and OXYD Color graphics
redid all 3 blackhole sprites using the new shapes
pulled VortexElement and Star into their own dedicated class file
version of the JRE and the operating system will now be written into the logfile on startup
added utility methods to generate date and time strings
the text resources class will now keep a default resource bundle for logging etc.
the max number of characters allowed in the enter highscore screen confirmed/set to 22 chars
the fallback highscore name entry prompt also enforces max number of characters now
replaced the DOLLAR.SDD sound effect with OXGELD oxyd sound, which is identical
added OXKLICK6 and OXKEY oxyd sound effects to the audio library
BING sound will be played if you exceed the max number of characters in highscore prompt
OXKEY sound will be played when someone presses keys during the game
added sector shifting and extralife events for the CommandManager
rewrote events through keyboard input to be invoked only in the CommandManager
rewrote logging for keyboard input
rewrote CommandManager to allow setting multiple commands per frame
pulled player being destroyed by bomb event out of the HUD drawing code
created 3 wafer sprite shapes, but i doubt that i got it right
added all 16 wafer (WA/WAFF) sprites to the resources
implemented wafer as a dummy enemy to the station deployment
added all 4 „lightball“ (L) sprites used as an enemy in levels 59 and 60
added all 5 „retaliator-jet“ (RJ) sprites used as an enemy in level 58 only
recentered the mothermaforian sprites using the shield sprites; considered pixel perfect now
fixed first rocket drive shape which was missing a lot of shaded pixels
fixed 4 rocket drive sprites (axis aligned) which had wrong shading
added a lightball intro title image
fixed third rocket drive shape which seems to be actually two different shapes
fixed another 4 rocket drive sprites (diagonal aligned) which had wrong shading
finally figured out how the game draws the rocket drive sprites onto other sprites
created 3 (finally correct) rocket drive shapes
fixed all 16 rocket drive sprites with correct shadows below their shape
recentered and trimmed all 16 rocket drive sprites
again fixed 5 rocket drive sprites by comparing them to rocket gun sprites
added legacy intro title images for shieldmaforian and shieldmothermaforian
verified through the manual the first blackhole sprite to be pixel-perfect
added oxyd stone, cherries and telephone menu icon
fixed 7 (shape 2) rocket drive sprites for the last time. Def pixel-perfect now
fixed wrong score for kleptomaras in the intro titles
fixed larger sprites (big asteroid) being drawn correctly in the price lists
fixed some horizontal margins for the generated pricetags with sprites
reduced margin between dotline and the price to 9 pixels minimum (seems correct)
inserted all (but one) of the new enemy and bonus object sprites to the price lists
deprecated old method that draws a dotline, becauses it may use wrong margins
fixed two white pixels on the toiletpaper cargo bay sprite
created 40 pricelist images that will be used instead of actual ingame sprites
rewrote parts of the price list code that generates price list items
removed sprite centering in the price lists since all images are the same size
finally completed intro with all price lists, even all the margins are pixel-perfect now
fixed a bug where enemies could retrieve cargo from the player, even if he has none
added some navigation and acceleration methods to enemy class
all enemy AIs are now able to see the whole level
rewrote Piraton enemy AI to make them smarter
Piratons can finally collect free floating aliens/ware, and deliver ware to the station
fixed a bug where destroyed pirates were able to recollect their own pilot
allowed the pirates to go faster if they try to collect aliens or cargo
added last two ware type images to the ShipDecorator, Ware and Hud class
fixed a bug the ShipDecorator where the wrong cargo sprites would be used
pirates which collect fellow aliens will now also release more aliens on destruction
wrote some automatic braking logic for enemies which are refocusing
the enemies will no longer unnecessarily reset the target on each frame
wrote a method that determines if a pirate ship is perfectly on course
created 3 harakiri enemy sprite shapes
fixed 3 harakiri sprites with wrong pixels

v0.42 – March 2015

created 3 tornado shapes
added all 16 tornado sprites to the resources
implemented a new FlapDisplay class that will replace ScoreFlip and Hud methods
replaced the old way of saving and drawing score in the players class
reinstated charging the social security contribution in the billing module
fixed a bug where the level timer would not update anymore
fixed a bug where the final score in the billing animation was calculated wrong
deprecated the old ScoreFlip class for now
added some Javadoc to the FlapDisplay class
removed unnecessary updating in the FlapDisplay class
lives display in the hud now also uses FlapDisplay
fixed a bug where FlapDisplay backgrounds were saved statically and became too wide
allowed a way to make FlapDisplays ignore delays and always flap digits instantly
added a magic cursor gfx effect class stub and copied the Modula 2 source as comment
added dummy enemy AI for tornado and enabled it to shoot single laser shots
allowed the debug text to display throughout the winning animation
added dummy enemy AI for cargoflyer
wrote a method for the station trapper to create indexed traps as in the classic campaign
increased to and confirmed the inner most ring trap radius to be 50 pixels
added station sprite center offset to the trapper and confirmed it to be 3×1 pixels
added the first one out of 14 indexed traps: DGSS(1), which is 4 pirate turrets
switched from position downcasting to math.round which seems to be closer to the original
increased to and confirmed mine h3-8 proximity to be 220 pixels
set and confirmed the inner ring trap radius to be 80 pixels
added indexed traps DGSS(2) to (5)
fixed loop condition in the station trapper that was cut short if radians offset was specified
added indexed traps DGSS(6) and (7) (halfway done with this)
increased allowed elements per pixel circumference by using small mines as reference
fixed 4 player ship sprites that have been aligned wrong from the first day on
confirmed all other player ship sprites to be aligned pixel perfectly
added indexed traps DGSS(8) to (14); finally all classic campaign traps rewritten
increased maximum allowed trap radians offset from pi/2 to pi*2, which is a full circle
fixed mines popping up at the game screen edges
fixed many game objects missing object type and size values
added log warnings if game objects are not initialized correctly
the gfx engine now keeps track of the number of rendered game objects on screen
debug output shows the number of currently rendered game objects
fixed alien object size not set in all constructors
implemented dummy mine star and added it to the station trapper
the station trapper will now randomly create classic traps instead of experimental ones
implemented a „destroy all enemies“ cheat and added it to the menubar
fixed player shots being able to hit several mines per frame
fixed mines being placed twice on the same spot
the level generator will no longer put objects inbetween integer positions
fixed stations jerking around compared to mine movement on the gamescreen
confirmed all 11 powerup identifiers in the level configuration by hacking level 64
fixed black holes using the wrong value for size
the level generator now takes objects sizes into account when finding valid positions
deprecated old level generator methods that always used the station sprites size
added empty constructors for black holes, stations and powerup containers
the level generator now warns if it was unable to find a valid position for objects
implemented a way to enforce minimum distance restrictions for object placement in the level
measured and set object sizes for ship, maforian, peashooter, motherharakiri, cycle and alien
rewrote collision and attach distance calculations by using actual sizes instead of sprites
added a multiplayer game event class, that encapsulates game objects with a given action
wrote two methods for the gfxlib that creates a rotated spriteset for a given first sprite
fixed stations, containers and black holes missing attributes in the default constructors
added an enhanced flag for the game that removes limitations from the original game
wrote a method that checks and enforces maximum object distances from the players ship
aliens and ware will now vanish from the level as soon as they drift too far away
fixed debug position methods showing the players sector for any game object
added a doctype to the ant build script to remove a warning
fixed another warning by selecting Java 8 in the ant build script
added a utility method to get the currently running java version
simplified and improved performance on updating/checking ware and alien
fixed the gravestone flying out of the screen in the gameover animation
fixed highscore module background keeping the players movement after gameover
fixed ware magnetism still active in the gameover animation
removed a duplicate line of code in the tornado dummy class
fixed concurrent modifications on particles collections through menu commands
fixed another concurrent modification on enemy collections through menu commands
implemented mine star shooting behaviour and colliding/exploding
fixed mine stars keeping shooting after the player has been destroyed
renamed CheatManager to CommandManager
the CommandManager will now act as mediator between menubar and game engine
implemented all cheats from the menubar as commands for the game engine
added some log output to the powerup manager
added log output after the game initialization to show Java version and used memory
added some more log output to the solar system methods
removed a duplicate constant for the max number of cargo items allowed
it is now possible to quit the gameover highscores screen by clicking the left mouse button
created a new auxiliary source file package and moved some helper classes into it
wrote a method that converts mouse coordinates on the gamescreen to level coordinates
cleaned up some methods and getter names in the controls to make it clearer what they do
wrote a method that converts level coordinates to gamescreen pixel position
implemented a way to make the player ship unable to navigate, which will be used later
implemented freezer methods for Vector2D objects to freeze any object motion instantly
the shipdecorator class now uses actual object sizes for calculations
finally pulled bomb event logic out of the HUD into the PlayerShip class
added new utility methods for CSV to List conversions and vice versa
added a utility method to receive the name and version of the running operating system
added a game statistics class that keeps track of all possible events and numbers
rewrote the uptime utility method to allow returning localized text
added time unit names to the resource bundles
fixed atarimouse and tosbee cursors transparencies which have been always been wrong

v0.41 – February 2015

designed a few more title artworks
recompressed all 13 frame border graphics
recompressed all 5 mouse cursors
recompressed all 4 font images
recompressed both instruction button images
fixed missing transparency for music menu icon
recompressed all 23 menu icons
recompressed the build splash image
recompressed all 7 solar selector images
fixed alien sprite order to match them to ship sprite ordering
resized and recompressed all 16 alien sprites + help bubble
fixed a typo in the manual transcript
recompressed all 5 asteroid sprites
recompressed all 3 black hole sprites
recompressed all 20 cargo sprites
recompressed the container sprite
recompressed all 16 deadly turret sprites
recompressed all 16 pirate turret sprites
recompressed both HUD view images
fixed size of the year in the intro game title image
recompressed all 4 intro title images
fixed size of the year in the build splash image
added a few enemy acronym constants for the levels txt parser
recompressed all 12 hud status images
fixed the size of the station sprite
recompressed all 41 station sprites
recompressed all 128 engine thrust sprites
recompressed all 32 spermbird sprites
recompressed all 32 shot sprites
recompressed all 3 enemy shield sprites
recompressed both score sprites
recompressed all 4 rotating star sprites
recompressed all 16 rocket drive sprites
added a utility method to count occurrences in a text
added a utility filewatcher class that may be used some time later
recompressed all 16 rocket sprites
recompressed all 6 radar sprites
recompressed all 12 powerup sprites
recompressed all 16 piraton sprites
recompressed all 16 mothermaforian sprites
recompressed all 5 minedropper and mine sprites
recompressed all 7 magic sprites
recompressed all 16 kleptomara sprites
recompressed all 52 explosion sprites
recompressed all 3 dissolve sprites
recompressed all 6 decoy sprites
recompressed all 15 debris sprites
recompressed all 4 death sprites
recompressed all 16 cargoliner sprites; finally done recompressing – saved 62 kbytes
extracted 31 SDD sound files from Spacola byte-complete using a hex editor
extracted 2 more SDD sound files (laser2, toilet)
extracted 6 more SDD sound files (swon, swoff, dollar, laught, panel, dadapdap)
extracted 2 more SDD sound files (foehn and cherry)
implemented an audio library method to load original Spacola SDD audio files
fixed that i actually cut the cigar station delivery sound effect short last time
extracted 3 more SDD sound files (cigar, cutter, telefon)
extracted 3 more SDD sound files (bonbon, drop, zirpweep)
removed the sound effect falscall where i mistook junk data for the actual sample
somehow confirmed 6289 Hz to be the correct (closest) sample frequency
reconverted all SDD files to OGG sound files
recompressed 8 title cargo images and readded them to the project
fixed renaming peashot sprite wrong
modified LineSoundLib to allow loading and playing of unsigned 8 bit PCM sounds
the game client now successfully imports original Atari ST Spacola SDD sound files
added all SDD sound files to the project to be used instead of OGG
added a better utility method to count text occurrences
added alphanumeric ignorecase string ordering methods to the utilities
fixed loop points for shiprocketing sound
reduced buffer length for SDD file playback to fix loop for shiprocketing sound
added a spacola properties config handling class
added timer utility methods that take a specified end timestamp into account
added timer utility methods that take premeasured durations as parameter
the level timer will now stop as soon as the player reaches the target station
created 3 cargoflyer shapes
added all 16 cargoflyer sprites to the resources
fixed a bug where SDD sound files could not be found after JAR/EXE building

v0.40 – January 2015

figured out and defined all starting powerups for levels 9 to 16
replaced 2014 splash logo with a new 2015 one
fixed a very old bug that prevented the player from ejecting aliens on destruction
decreased the alien shout probability from 0.01 to 0.004
started implementing a method that detects if a game object is actually on the screen
defined some enemy and powerup constants for the levels.txt parser
added duplicator powerup sprite
added 4 rotating star (RS) enemy sprites
added minedropper ball shot sprite
fixed transparency of warecollector and credit powerup sprites
added all 16 rocket sprites
added the minedropper drop sound effect to the resources
implemented rocket loaded and last rocket status message events
added 3 hair dryer station animation sprites
added the rotator/star mine shot sound effect
renamed lots of sound effect files to consider the latest additions
added a TSA timestamp URL to the signing process in the build script
added the cherry station sound effect
figured out and defined all starting powerups for levels 17 to 24
added 3 cherry station animation sprites
added cherry ware hud sprite and gamescreen sprite
figured out and defined all starting powerups for levels 25 to 32
added cutter (scissors) station sound effect
added 2 scissors station animation sprites
added scissors ware hud sprite and gamescreen sprite
added all 16 enemy rocket drive sprites (for cycles, turrets and pigs/peashooters)
added 4 wheel (cycle) enemy sprites
added all 32 sprites for the spermbird „enemy“
fixed destroyed asteroids playing the wrong explosion sound effect
added cigarette ware hud sprite and gamescreen sprite
added the cigarette station sound effect
added 6 cigarette station animation sprites
replaced the buildsplash image with a new 2015 one
figured out and defined all starting powerups for levels 33 to 40
added all 16 cargoliner enemy sprites
restored all 3 original maforian shapes by rotating and mirroring the ship sprites
fixed transparency and shading for all 16 maforian sprites
renamed KleptomaraDecoy to Decoy only, since many other enemies will be using it
renamed PiratonShot to PirateShot
renamed PeashooterShot to PeaShot
renamed KleptomaraShot to LaserShot
renamed MaforianShot to MicroShot
created a new package for all the different shot types and moved the classes there
removed dependency of the framestopwatch of the controllable objects
the framestopwatch will now use a better timer to perfectly fit the target framerate
fixed framestopwatch to calculate the actual framerate instead of a theoretical value
fixed vanishing shield powerup playing the wrong sound effect
restored all 3 original mothermaforian shapes
fixed transparency and shading for 11 mothermaforian sprites
created 3 shapes for rocket drives, still not perfect though
started including my old particles test program with the core modules
fixed english translation in the billing screen being too long
added cherry, scissors and cigarette ware drawing code to the hud and the gamescreen
fixed the ShipDecorator drawing only cola bottles, disregarding the actual ware type
Controls class will now calculate both gamescreen and actual screen mouse coordinates
restored all 5 original player ship shapes
fixed all 32 player ship sprites transparency and shading using the shapes
renamed shot sprite files, moved all player shot and enemy shot sprites into folder
created a shot dissolve spriteset containing 3 sprites
removed integrated dissolve spritesets from player shot and decoy sprites
created a dissolve game object that will be created once certain shots start to dissolve
different sounds are played when the player gets ware stolen by flythrough or pirate shots
a dissolve object will be spawned whenever a pirate shot hits the player
changed how the acceleration sound is played, keeps up better with fast rightclicking
fixed playing the wrong sound effect on tailspinning enemies
fixed dissolves not being updated
reduced the dissolve distance to half the framerate = half a second
reduced the player shooting distance to account for having a dedicated dissolve object now
resolved a race condition when stopping music on game engine shutdown
created separate build targets for signedjar and signedexe since they need internet access
added cigarette station animation as a station script
added a method to copy a vector to another vector
implemented a Camera object which allows switching the camera perspective in the game
with the TAB key, the Camera can now be switched between player ship and space station
fixed station trapper so that it doesn’t directly add sector objects
fixed a bug where enemies were able to bounce off the player while he is still invisible
resolved usage of a lot of deprecated drawing methods in the gfx engine
fixed an NPE that was caused by resetting stars on repeated TAB press
the graphics engine now uses methods to determine if an object needs to be drawn
restored all 3 original peashooter shapes
fixed transparency and shading for all 16 peashooter sprites; considered pixel perfect now
fixed a new bug where game objects would not be drawn centered correctly anymore
implemented a level timer that might be useful for time trial modes or timed highscores
level timer can now display exact 3 digit milliseconds values or 1 digit values
wrote a simple SpacolaServer class that starts an RMI registry and a multiplayer server stub
added a multiplayer menu with host/join game menu items
wrote a simple client that attempts to join an existing „game“
restored all 3 original cargoliner shapes
fixed transparency and shading for 10 cargoliner sprites
implemented ping logic for the spacola multiplayer server to determine lags for clients
set the default port for multiplayer games to 1702
the spacola multiplayer server will now be properly shutdown on exit
the RMI registry will now be properly shutdown on exit
fixed 2 piraton sprites that have initially been mirrored the wrong way
recentered the maforian sprites using the shieldmaforian sprites; considered pixel perfect now
added 3 maforian shield sprites for the shieldmaforian enemies
implemented a basic timeout logic which throws unavailable players out of the game
implemented a multiplayer client version check which disallows differing client versions
created a score indicator object and pulled related code out of debris explosions
wrote methods to copy only position or direction portions from other vectors
score indicators will now follow the players movement, as in the original game
implemented cargoliner dummy enemy ai and made stations deploy them
fixed the wrong sound effect being played when bouncing off from other objects
fixed small explosions that actually have never even worked
implemented shield maforian dummy enemy ai and made stations deploy them
the player can now shoot the shield maforian which in turn will lose its shield
renamed wheel enemy to „cycle“, as it seems to be called in the original game
implemented cycle dummy enemy ai and made stations deploy them
implemented rotating star dummy enemy ai and made stations deploy them
wrote a utility function that generates random IDs
all game objects now have generated unique IDs to identify them in network games
implemented minedropper dummy enemy ai and made stations deploy them
restored all 3 original motherharakiri shapes
added all 16 motherharakiri sprites; need rotation axes fixed soon
figured out and defined all starting powerups for levels 41 to 48
added bonbon (candy) station delivery sound effect
added 3 bonbon (candy) station animation sprites
added bonbon cargo and gamescreen sprite
turned Controllable interface into an abstract class to enable default implementations
implemented new execution engine methods for Splash controllable
recentered all the motherharakiri sprites
improved centering of mothermaforian sprites for now
created a few designs for „WA“ (Level 51+) enemy ship shapes
added telephone station delivery sound effect
figured out and defined all starting powerups for levels 49 to 56
added telephone cargo and gamescreen sprite
successfully extracted the Rentenbescheid template image from an ST memory dump
also extracted a filled Rentenbescheid image
improved the edges of the big Spacola Eclipse artwork text
designed two alternative hud artworks
started recompressing the monochrome pngs as actual 1 bit (4 bit with alpha) png files
removed an unused new dongleware test image
renamed maforian shield to enemy shield, since it will be used by other ships also
moved player shield and enemy shields together into own shield sprite folder
resized all 32 players ship sprites so they have less unnecessary border area
resized both player ship sprites also
recompressed all 32 player sprites as indexed palette images which makes them smaller
figured out and defined all the remaining starting powerups for levels 57 to 64. done!
finally fixed edges of the Spacola Eclipse artwork text
added 4 telephone delivery station animation sprites
added a special alpha composite class for oldschool bitwise XOR drawing
modified the bitwise XOR composite to allow keeping alpha channels
added notes for the included third party classes about where to get those files
the bomb sprites in the cargo bay are now drawn using bitwise XOR. still not perfect
recompressed all previously recovered artworks from the manual as 1 bit PNGs
recompressed all 16 harakiri sprites
recompressed all 16 maforian sprites
wrote a function for the classic gfxlib to create background masks for any sprite
the gfxlib will now generate background masks for the bomb sprites XOR effect
added a TestPanel class which makes it easier to add small test routines to classes
created testing function for drawing any gfxlib sprite on an empty frame
rewrote HUD cargo bay drawing code to allow more flexible XOR drawing operations
finally perfectly recreated the original Spacola bomb XOR effect
resized and recompressed all 16 peashooter sprites
again recompressed the harakiri sprites, effectively making them even smaller
again recompressed the maforian sprites, effectively making them even smaller
recompressed all 16 motherharakiri sprites
resized and recompressed all 4 cycle enemy sprites

v0.39 – December 2014

rewrote some german text creation parts for intro and titles
translated and added intro, billing and title texts to the resource bundles
created a method for the game that redraws everything on changing the language
removed a lot of unnecessary object casting in the game class
unified the way how titles are instantiated and where to pass the dependency
fixed fallback highscore name prompt displaying wrong title
extracted all texts from highscores and short instructions into the resource bundles
short instructions texts are now constructed more dynamically
fixed a problem with billing and intro sharing a titles object
fixed a bug where ogg stream fading boundaries were calculated incorrectly
extracted and translated all swing gui element texts
menubar events are now distinguished on gui objects and not on captions
fixed a bug where titles wouldn’t be reset for the splash module
added a languages menu with 2 flag icons to the menubar to allow switching languages
the language on application start is now preselected in the menu
fixed handling events for language switch if the same language was already selected
fixed the GEM text editor to make it run inside the game engine
added a modules menu with the GEM text editor to allow running it inside the game engine
fixed a bug where the game engine would not shutdown during GEM text edit module
fixed a bug where the solar selector wouldn’t reset after the player lost a previous game
inserted a linebreak for the gem text editor warning on launch
created a new splash logo with the year 2015
started work on a more flexible module execution engine, which may be controlled much easier
translated all the short instructions cards into english
short instructions module now also allows switching languages
fixed tailspinning enemies‘ explosions being positioned one step behind
fixed NPE on unselecting music if the audio lib wasn’t initialized yet
the game window will only appear after all the initializations are done
fixed instant highscore cheat which added score instead of setting it to a calculated value
created a cheatmanager class that handles all the various cheats for the menu bar
pulled check for new highscore into a dedicated method
fixed restarting music on reenable after the game engine has been shutdown
the player will now reset score, lives etc. properly on gameover again
added alien overload status message sprite to the resources
implemented alien overload status to the HUD and the players ship
raised max number of aliens to 40, which is the value in the original game
lost aliens will now add 20$ to the players score, when they’re recollected
fixed a rare NPE by trying to stop the currently playing ogg stream twice
fixed player stats getting reset actually only for the wrong player object
all core modules now share the same solar system and player object
by pressing the + key in a game the player will receive an extra credit (for debugging)
powerup containers and alien/ware have a differing magnetic radius multiplier now
increased the magnetic radius multiplier for aliens and ware to 4
added the last rant sprite that i forgot in the animation
rewrote animation logic for the station sprites to allow much easier „scripting“
deprecated all old station animation code, will keep as fallback
corrected and fine tuned station waving, station rant and station cola animation
added toilet paper station animation
implemented ware type switches for hud, billing, game screen, sound playback and stations
it is finally possible to deliver toilet paper instead of just space cola
started writing a level generator class which handles the complete level creation process
it is no longer possible to have sector objects overlap each other
added several additional distance calculation methods for use of point classes
made use of the game random class in the level generator and the solar system
wrote more methods to determine random level and screen coordinates for the game random class
fixed switching X and Y values in the sectors matrix (results in strange gfx behaviour)
fixed random powerups using game random class now
game random can now also return random enum values
fixed a bug where the target sector was no longer determined correctly
fixed a bug where the target station was not provided to the solar system module
added more solar system methods to get current and target sector/station/game objects
fixed a bug in determining if the current sector is asteroided
alien and ware magnetism radius measured and set to be 100 pixels
fixed a bug where empty lines were left out when parsing short instructions texts

v0.38 – October 2014

replaced the surfin usa enhanced sample with a correctly pitched version
changed star speeds and player acceleration again
sector width/height is now confirmed to be 4096 (64×64 = 65536/16) pixels in the original game
default station trigger proximity confirmed to be 2048 pixels, so half the sector size
the player is now able to shoot as rapidly as the mouse is clicked
piraton shots will no longer steal the players cargo through activated shield
fixed the animation of dissolving player shots
introduced new enemy attribute ‚dangerous‘ which will trigger the alarm sound on deployment
Mother maforians will now destroy the players ship on collision
Kleptomaras can finally shoot the player
started storing initial sector powerups for every level
wrote a method for the level configuration parser that shifts starting positions
enforced a maximum number of particles that can be managed at once
replaced particles hashset with an arraylist
fixed alignment for all pirate turrets and deadly turrets sprites
increased the shot frequency for rapid shot
implemented tailspinning for turrets (and optionally for all enemies)
implemented interfaces for rotating objects, positioning objects and ships
increased tailspinning turn speed
decreased shot mass from 0.5 to 0.4 to reduce bouncing effect
created a tailspin enemy method that may be invoked using any enemy
kleptomara shots will now be removed if they hit the player
fixed a bug in the fading calculation for the fadeable ogg clip
it is no longer possible to have fadein and fadeout to accidentally overlap
ant build script will now also create a selfsigned jarfile
ant build script now only creates selfsigned jarfiles with a keystore validity of 10 years

v0.37 – September 2014

added „toggle shield“, „toggle bomb“ and „full stop“ cheats to the menu
added stop command to Vector2D class
pulled some AI constants into the config classes
increased player ship acceleration to resemble the original game more
star speeds differ a little more between layers now
wrote method to determine if an enemies targetting is aligned within a given tolerance
added a splash screen showing a text and an image to the ant build script
wrote new game object drawing code that works using generics
removed all direct modifications to explosion lists outside of the update method
turned the object list for explosions into a list of explosions
successfully resolved an instanceof occurrence with explosions
resolved a call to a deprecated collision method for explosion objects
wrote some log methods that will output messages with exceptions
wrote utility methods to copy text to and paste from system clipboard
started reworking the complete Spacola guide as an open document file
added original esprit method source for trough effect as a comment to the magnetism code
removed all direct modifications to the list of aliens outside of the update method
turned the object list for aliens into an actual list of aliens
created a cursorghost object which represents the visible mouse cursor of another player
fixed close, maximize and resize GEM menu icons which were missing transparency
added small white and grey oxyd ball menu icons to the project
finally fixed the shield bouncing code, works perfectly now!
added a mass dependent bouncing method for ricochet shots
implemented ricochet shots and tailspinning for Peashooter enemies
added the cantina powerup status message to the resources
tweaked star speed constants, debris explosion force and ricochet force values
fixed a bug in the OGG decoder which crashed on buffer sizes bigger than small samples
replaced 41 OGG audio files with MUCH smaller, correctly pitched, authentic 6289 Hz samples
replaced 3 spacola sounds (EXPL1, LAUGHT, DOLLAR) with perfect equal sounds from the OXYD demo
set the OGG decoder buffer size as low as 256 bytes
reset the acceleration sound loop points
added player color enum for multiplayer modes
fixed tailspinning enemies to have the pilots eject on first hit
added the hairdryer sound effect
added many new sprites for hairdryer cargo, minedropper shots and kleptomara decoys
added one more player shot sprite, since there seemed to be missing an animation phase
wrote a class for deterministic random position generation for procedural level creation
added a utility class for bidirectional maps (might be useful sometime)
fixed all 16 mother maforian sprites to have their rotation axis corrected
started cutting rocket sprites
added mothermaforian dummy enemy and made stations deploy enemies more rapidly for the moment
started writing a parser for the levels configuration file including the original LEVELS.TXT
the levels configuration parser will now parse defined blocks of sectors and starting positions
the parser will now also parse coordinate spans for sector blocks and starting positions
allowed the parser to parse configurations with different level order
added a constant base seed for the deterministic game random generator

v0.36 – August 2014

implemented usage of actual java resource bundles for ingame text translations
started work on english and german language ingame texts
scanned all the artworks from the manual for possible later reworks
created several 100% monochrome reworks for all the relevant pictures from the manual
the game client will now try to create the log directory if it doesn’t exist
restructured logging class and created a way to reset log directory during runtime
implemented an Angle2D class which handles targetting and ships alignment on screen
rewrote all enemy dummy AI classes and the player ship to finally use Angle2D
added more log output for some debug/cheat methods (teleporting, shifting etc.)
added a way to put log output into a GUI window for debug measures
added Javadoc documentation to some methods in certain classes
added field counter methods to easily calculate the number of solved/unsolved levels
wrote an OGG to PCM decoder that allows combining the benefits of JOrbis and LineSound
replaced all WAV sound effects with OGG files and got the sound library to decode them to PCM
added some more utility/convenience methods for sector calculations
moved all mathematical classes into a dedicated util.math-package
implemented some more calculation methods to find the nearest object of virtually any type
pulled the inner highscore entry class into its own class file
added some utility methods for first and last n lines removal on strings
fixed a bug where the current angle was used for target angle representations
fixed a bug where the player ships engine positions were not always updated
fixed a bug where enemies were unable to accurately target the player
fixed a bug where „null“ was added into the highscore by declining to enter a name
fixed a bug where the game screen is shown again after the gameover animation is finished
added the grave sprite and made it show in the gameover animation
the gameover animation will now show and animate lost ware
added a log output dialog and implemented a menu item that opens it
renamed some GUI window classes to better reflect that they are actual GUI windows
removed non-working key listener logic from the game window
started implementing key bindings to allow application wide typing (menubar/panel and game controls)
implemented an easy way to inject typed letters into any controllable (e.g. highscores)
fixed a bug where no position wrapping occurred when adding pixels to a Vector2D
fixed a bug where the sector coordinates would not be logged correctly on sector shifting
the player can now shift sectors using the cursor keys in a game
added all keys a-z and A-Z (with shift modifier) to the key bindings
keystrokes will now also make a BIP sound effect, which will later be optional
started implementing a FadeableOggClip class which enhances OggClip functionality
thus removed dependency from Easyogg 0.6 library
updated JOrbis/JOgg libraries from 0.0.15 to 0.0.17, which is said to have better performance
fixed a highscores initialization endless loop that was introduced in 0.34
finished fading for OggClips. Spacola intro music will now fade out just like the original
added an „instant highscore“ cheat to shorten debug cycles for highscore submodules
also allowed explosions to be visible during gameover animation
fixed a bug where the player was able to recollect cargo during gameover animation
finally implemented the highscore submodule which allows entering the players name
renamed SEFont class to GameFont
added a „force gameover“ cheat, to shorten debug cycles for highscore submodules
fixed a bug where the entered name in highscores module would not fade correctly
inserted a pause between gameover screen and entering highscore
started rewriting drawing lines of game fonts for highscores, deprecated old methods
a running game can now be quit by pressing the escape button
the solar selector now displays the currently selected solar system in the HUD
pressing buttons in the FakeTOS module plays the BIP sound effect now
pressing the ESC button during a running game now plays the Bolo gameover sound effect
added bomb animation and pirate rant animation sprites
fixed a bug in the selector where the displayed solar system could be changed during fadeout
implemented station rant event and animation, plus bomb logic for the HUD
fixed a bug in the selector where the displayed solar system could be changed during fadein
fixed the cursor in the highscore prompt being two pixels too far to the right
typing in the highscore prompt will now play the OXYD typing sound effect
implemented a „teleport to target“ and a „bomb event“ cheat in the menu bar
fixed the XOR mode for bomb animation drawing over cargo being white over black
rewrote the code for gradually unloading and refilling cargo events
added a refill cargo cheat to the menu bar
added most of the special characters for the enter name highscore submodule
fixed a bug where no spaces would be shown as leading characters while entering a name
added almost all numpad keys to the controls for the enter name highscore submodule
pulled the inner title entry class into its own class file
additionally implemented fade-in logic for FadeableOggClip
removed sprite constants for deadly turret shots, since it uses maforian shots
added all 16 kleptomara shot sprites
replaced all 128 dual engine drive sprites with 128 more dynamical single thrust animations
added 4 new icons for the menu bar
finished ShipDecorator which is now responsible for drawing shields, stolen cargo and thrust fx
enemies finally have single engine thrust effects, which is now calculated more dynamical
deprecated now obsolete EngineThrust class
fixed spacings in the ShipDecorator to move the thrust animation 3 pixels closer to the ship
moved center of the thrust animation 1 pixel to the right, and decreased engine distance
made the refill cargo cheat take away lost cargo from all enemies
added 7 magic (tos gimmick) star sprites, will be useful later
added 9 station toilet paper animation sprites for the second wave of levels
renamed all the station animation sprites
added an enhanced version of the ’surfin u.s.a.‘ sound effect
renamed MusicLib to OggMusicLib
introduced a music library interface to allow different types
introduced empty sound and music library to enable starting without audio processing overhead
fixed a bug where turrets were always destroyed twice
fixed a bug where destroying turrets would add the score to the players account immediately
fixed a bug where the controls were initialized twice
fixed a bug where enemies were able to remote steal cargo in high speed flight
fixed a bug where the player was unable to recover cargo during high speed flight
fixed a bug where explosions of enemies would be left behind during high speed flight
fixed a bug where the players shots would fly through enemies during high speed flight
fixed the peashooter not actually shooting anymore
fixed handling „friction“ on magnetism effect differently for containers/black holes/alien/ware
fixed a bug where adding score for collecting aliens wouldn’t fire events (extralife and highscore)
implemented a score flip display that changes digits one at a time
fixed the winning animation not working anymore after implementing escaping the game
added an unload cargo effect for the winning animation
removed the displaying of cargo again in the billing animation
black holes will no longer be shown on the radar, if the player is not in the same sector
black holes will no longer attract the player while a vortex animation is ongoing
implemented price tags powerup handling where each cargo item is billed with its value doubled
started writing a Kleptomara decoy that they will be used in some levels
added keys 0-9 on the main keyboard area for the controls
fixed 3 engine thrust sprites that had one false pixel with partial alpha each
implemented methods to directly set the degrees or direction vector in an Angle2D object
fixed forgetting to apply modulo in Angle2D
unified conversion for degrees to radians and other way round, no more using polar coordinates
prevented the player from visiting stations when the ship has just been destroyed
implemented the logic for visiting pirate stations more than once before the bomb detonates
asteroids will now destroy mines if they collide
fixed adding an explosion while iterating through explosions
the player will now get destroyed by colliding with mines and their debris
fixed player getting destroyed by debris from harakiri enemies
fixed pirate ships getting destroyed twice if they are hit twice at the same time
removed all breakpoints, debugging works at appropriate speed now again
implemented piraton shots and made pirate turrets steal cargo from the player
piratons will now shoot the player
fixed enemies shooting the player while still not visible
added some debug log output for different collision scenarios

v0.35 – July 2014

stored the eclipse project launch configurations as shared files inside the project
logfile output is now dumped into the /log/ project subdirectory
fixed log output when there is an exception while initializing the log handlers
created a /doc/ folder for game documentation (changelog, todo-list etc.)
reorganized and described ant build script targets and added eclipse ant favourites

v0.34 – June 2014

wrote a mathematical function for real (as in correct) modulo calculation
improved ship sprite index calculation to fix wrong ship turn animation thresholds
wrote functions to trap stations in a random layout for testing purposes
lowered the proximity distance for H3/8 mines
implemented the pirate turret and therefore introduced stationary enemies
fixed a bug where Peashooters and Pirate turrets were allowed to shoot without targetting the player
implemented the deadly turret, although other shots need to be implemented soon
implemented the maforian shot and added them as the default shot for deadly turrets
rewrote utilities to use blowfish as encryption algorithm and SHA-256 for hashing
added convenience game object position addition functions
rewrote some logic for game object updating and adding/removing game objects
added dozens of player ship centering, teleport and sector shift functions
implemented black holes and added them to the level creation process
rewrote magnetism effect since the old one didn’t work very good for the black holes
implemented a better formula for more accurate gravitational pull
fixed duplicator powerup being confused with the ware collector powerup
renamed magnet powerup to alien collector powerup
included sprites and constants for pricetags, cantina, rocket and alien collector powerups
unified the way how containers, player ships and black holes gravitational pull are calculated
implemented both the alien collector and ware collector powerups, working great so far!
wrote a powerup manager and drew all powerup related code out of the playership class
fixed a small bug where the enemies engine thrust particles were a little off centered
finally implemented winning a sector with magnetic station pull, cola animation and fadeout
started declaring constants for many magic numbers used throughout the functions
intro animation is now handled by the unfinished vortex class
intro animation will now be triggered whenever the players ship falls into a black hole
big stars in the star background are no longer blinking synchronously
implemented an optional smooth transition for intro animation to actual star background
fixed a rare NPE bug where the highscore and/or font was not initialized quick enough
implemented a mathematically correct way to enable smooth intro star transitions
gameover vortex animation is now included, players can finally lose the level
dedicated highscore controllable has been implemented, players can save their entries now
fixed a bug where the number of lives would drop below zero and show incorrectly in the hud
converted the project workspace for the new Eclipse Luna release

v0.33 – April 2014

readded gem sound effects after I accidentally deleted them from the project
the Spacola Eclipse workspace will now use Java 8 for further development
tried to reconstruct a perfect mapping for original filenames to game sounds
fixed a bug where the player was unable to recover its cargo
finished the debris explosions
on ship destruction the player will now lose its cargo items one after another
changed the current year to 2014 in the about box
implemented methods for rectangular mine field placement around space stations
implemented the first two standard mines (H2-4.3 and H3/8)
H3/8 mines are now equipped with their proximity sensor
fixed some bugs with rectangular mine placement in the station trapper
proximity sensors of mines will not trigger if the player is currently invisible
implemented a score bonus for destroyed mines
created a way to draw game contents more dynamically and slightly faster
now you can see whether the piraton carries stolen ware
restricted the radar screen to only detect mines in the current sector
fixed enemies and mines being destroyed by an already dissolving shot
fixed animation speed of explosions being too slow
implemented the blinking score bonus when destroying a mine
fixed flying debris in debris explosions to be emitted more powerful
fixed spark debris being emitted too powerful
fixed debug output to display both number of pixel particles and debris particles
replaced the name of developer T. Güdelhöfer with his current name T. Schuhmann
added dummy AI classes for the enemy ships Maforians, Harakiris and Kleptomaras
stations will now deploy all kinds of enemy ships with the exact same behaviour
substituted some more sprites for the bonus lists and enemy lists
enabled the new dummy enemies to either steal cargo or destroy the player
cut out and added sprites for both station turrets and black holes
added radar sprite for black hole and powerup sprites for rockets and price tags
started work on a ship sprite decorator class for ware and thrust effects
created a list for known bugs and a todo list with detailed implementation aspects
added sprites for mothermaforians and for rocket powerup statuses

v0.32 – March 2014

replaced the old application icon and exe icon with the corrected ones
made the classic graphics library dynamically construct the TOS bombs overlay from icon
removed now obsolete tos bombs overlay PNG image
combined the dongleware + SD software screens
started including the GEM text editor into the game window
designed a new presentation artwork for the website
fixed the atarimouse cursor by adding a white border
added 19 mine and mine debris related sprites to the image resources
replaced all the type and state constants with enums to allow more flexible code
rewrote sector logic and level creation, split free objects from sector-bound objects
unsuccessfully tried rewriting level object iteration to achieve a better performance
added a way to determine whether a game object is alive or visible on the radar
implemented a class for debris elements for the fireworks style explosion on mines
fixed a bug where sectors would not be created when there was no powerup container
the player ship sprite can now easily be replaced by any enemy ship sprite
several small performance improvements (e.g. redundant function calls, use of iterators)
renamed some packages and classes and moved them where they actually belonged
added a sprite for 250 score (standard mine)
wrote utility functions to randomly choose elements from any type enum class
wrote new generic functions to detect any game object collision
added new copy constructors for game objects to allow for easier vector initialization
started implementing a manager class for debris explosions which spawns debris
made the debris explosion class extend the standard explosion class
wrote new mathematical functions to generate shifted particle motion vectors
added lots of new sprites for score, mines, statuses, powerups, pirate shots and cargo
added the whole maforian spriteset. Finally another enemy sprite finished!
added the whole spriteset for the harakiris. That makes 5 complete ships
wrote a station trapper class for mine field placement
started adding some javadoc to classes and methods
renamed some classes (like PeaShooter -> Peashooter)
renamed audio path to /snd/ and pulled path constant into soundconfig class
readded all spacola samples in better quality, as well as some additional ones
started giving all audio files the same names as they had on the original disk
scanned and edited three different versions of the Spacola Rentenbescheid
changed filename of the highscore file to comply with the original game
added all sprites for the kleptomara enemy ship. 6 enemies so far
pulled some highscore constants into the scoreconfig class
added a new small explosion spriteset for enemy shield loss effects
implemented calculation for the monthly pension on the Rentenbescheid
figured out how the monthly interest is actually calculated and implemented it
prepared multilanguage support for the ingame texts

v0.31 – February 2014

Near-perfectly recreated the complete cover artwork of the Spacola space atlas
created a new (MUCH better!) text character artwork for Spacola Eclipse
starting to create a new cover artwork for Spacola Eclipse splash & website
replaced ingame SE 2013 title with a new 2014 one
removed unused old title image with crappy font
finally also transcribed the blurb of the Sternenatlas (manual)
created new spacola artwork fonts: slim (from floppy disk) and standard (used in the book)
cut out and added 13 border sprites for the extended border class
added Atari ST GEM font image and declared constants for using it
put each audio library implementation into its own package
finally got the game to compile again after rewriting the whole audio subsystem
shortened the intro title delays about a second each
tried to fix the accelerate sound effect loop points since they magically turned wrong somehow
added german characters as an enhanced Atari ST GEM font image to the resources
wrote a simple GEM font class and a small test program
shortened the fading time to better fit the music to some of the titles
wrote a typewriter GEM font test class using the font
added GEM sound effects for pressing a key and the system bell
implemented GEM sound effects for the text editor
fixed the GEM typewriter test class to create a window with the correct size
implemented a better way to specify only the size of the the drawing area of the game window
fixed an NPE in the music library when stopping a song
implemented a security check to make sure Java created a correctly sized window
now using the GEMTextEditor as a core class
fixed the accelerate sound loop points and put it in an extra class for sound constants
fixed the hotspot of the crosshair windows cursor
implemented some missing drawing functions for the GEM font class
introduced text alignments with the GEM font
put all font drawing related classes into their own package
made the classic graphics library dynamically construct the TOS loading screen
removed the obsolete TOS loading screen image file
prepared a graphics filter class for realtime inverting, scaling etc.
introduced inverted text drawing for the GEM font
ingame debug text can now optionally be drawn in GEM font for authenticity
replaced the SD Software logo with another design

v0.30 – December 2013

added utility function to safely delete a folder
added several utility functions for memory usage
fixed a problem with the pause functions where an exception was rethrown unnecessarily
simplified pause functions, deprecated old code
simplified code to generate solar system Hex coordinates, deprecated old code
added unfinished dongleware sprite definition format loader to the project source
implemented a spritesheet loader which creates a spriteset from a specified spritesheet image
readded old vortex code as a comment for backup purposes
readded all three old (deprecated) audio libraries as fallback implementations

v0.29 – August 2013

fixed exceptions caused by pausing the game for changing the menu bar
added launch4j configuration to the project
added windows exe icon to the project
wrote a fully working ant build script for compiling, jar and exe file creation
added eclipse jar-in-jar classloader to the libraries for the ant script
changed minimum java version to 1.7 in the ant script and launch4j config
introduced build numbering with the ant script
added more information to the jar manifest file
moved particles into the level class because they’re placed in the level
started implementing a special vortex effects class for level intro and gameover
ant build script now changes the version number in source files
changed the way the stars in the background are drawn
changed the version number format displayed in the game client

0.28 – July 2013

fixed an issue with short instructions margins and line heights
fixed a final issue with button controls on the short instructions module
renamed the title bar to „SPACOLA Eclipse“ rather than lowercase Spacola
added new menu to the menubar for all original main menu commands
added six little icons from the game’s original art to the menubar
added six more icons for the menubar
created ant build file with eclipse
added auxiliary name prompt to the highscore class
implemented safer way to add and remove highscore entries
fixed too early log output of solar selector module execution
implemented highscore functions for safely extracting entries
implemented auxiliary dialog for entering new highscore
started implementing Controllable functions for entering and showing highscore
added four new icons (GEM window icons and a music icon)
added the Atari ST GEM hand as icon and added hand and mouse pointer as cursor images
added all five Atari ST cursor images as real OS usable cursors (e.g. for dialog boxes)
fixed an NPE where I missed to comment out a single line
implemented basic top level logging, so in the future no uncaught exceptions remain unlogged
added GEM hand icon to the menu bar

v0.27 – June 2013

added 128 sprites for oldschool player ship engine thrust animation
renamed „Halt Engine“ menu item to „Suspend Engine“
now playing sound effects when activating cheats
implemented a class for oldschool engine thrust effects
implemented a direction index buffer as a delay for engine thrust animation
fixed small rotating asteroids being animated during pause
added WindowListener implementation to the game window to allow for my own quit handling
added log entry with uptime when the window is closed
added yet another hud frame image with wider arrows and another star sprite
readded old audio library with simple audio clip format as a fallback solution
wrote toString method for highscores, which will be used in the JMenu later
added menu items for viewing and saving highscores
implemented a dialog window which displays the current highscores
wrote vector addition functions to the vector class to simplify combining two vectors
added calculation functions for opposite direction vectors
started implementing better enemy ship navigation and targetting functions
started implementing drawing of short instructions module
started writing a new and more flexible AI class for Piratons
wrote a function for absolute positioning of content on the game screen
fixed a bug with game client uptime calculation
fixed uptime log output for singular/plural differentiation
wrote a function for stars drawing code on transparent backgrounds
fixed an ugly bug in the dongleware font class. Margin for the first line was mostly wrong.
fixed a bug where the score field would get drawn over the lives field
fixed music still playing after engine shutdown
fixed a problem where stopping the title music would make the game engine drop frames
implemented short instructions and added F9 shortcut and menu item to the menubar
increased alien and ware scattering speed

v0.26 – June 2013

rewrote station animation code, completed waving and cola delivery animation
station sound effects now only occur in the station class and not outside
fixed a bug with crashing on station drawing
once again tried to fix the bouncing code. Might as well rewrite this thing.
added 17 alien sprites
added shouting alien sound effect
implemented „helpless alien“ class
added more debug output for deployed enemy ships, enemy shots and aliens
added radar sprite for flying ware
added debug output for ware and shortened the text a little
changed the directory structure of some sprite collections
added onscreen sprite for flying cola bottle
implemented ware object
pirates which stole ware disperse it in case of destruction
pirates now also disperse any number of aliens when destroyed
added drawing ware on screen and on radar
fixed a bug where objects on the radar in sector rows or columns D are not drawn
added size attribute to all game objects to make some calculations easier
adjusted the magnetic effect for powerup containers a little
added magnetic code for all game objects, but especially player ships (to drag aliens and ware)
added collect alien sound effect
the player can now collect aliens and ware
the player is now invisible after dying
an invisible player can no longer collide with asteroids or ships, nor does he attract aliens/ware
the shield gets reset only after being visible again
the player now disperses his cargo and all aliens when destroyed
the player now loses all his powerups when destroyed
added a ScoreConfig class that holds all the score for every game object
the player now gets score for destroyed pirates only after collecting the alien
added correct ware score calculation
fixed the billing animation to actually show the real score
added some more log output for collecting flying stuff
fixed a bug where selector click sound effects would still be played with closed game engine
fixed the player ship still turning while invisible
fixed acceleration sound effect still being able to play after dying
added all systems ok status event after receiving a new player ship
implemented player receiving new ship animation after getting destroyed
fixed the player getting killed again or his cargo stolen while invisible
readded dying from colliding with asteroids
added the player getting destroyed from colliding with PeaShooters
added some checks so that a max of 99 lives and 9999999 score is guaranteed
shortened the duration of billing items to show before the next is displayed
added 3 surfing sprites
implemented the surfing animation after player ship destruction
fixed a bug where player ship would not get destroyed properly after asteroid collision
switched to asteroid style explosion effect after player ship destruction
prevented the player from getting destroyed or stolen from instantly when visiting a deploying station
the player gets 1 cargo back only after he regains his ship
fixed a bug where player ship would not get destroyed properly after enemy shot collision
fixed a bug where the player would stay invisible after completing a level
aliens now rotate randomly in a different animation phase
added 10 new sprites for original style enemy ship explosions
implemented enemy ship explosions as a substitution for particle effects explosions
fixed a bug where explosions would be updated one tick too early making them jump ahead
fixed a bug where explosions would be drawn over the station sprite which should be topmost
added another status screen sprite for bomb greetings event
reshaped menu a little and added menu items for ingame music and particle effects
rewrote audio library to allow looping and toggling of ingame music
decreased volume of ingame music
ingame music will now automatically restart if re-enabled through menu during a game
created an abstract Gfx library class with several useful methods for loading sprites/spritesets
started implementing a real game pause mode (as opposed to completely halting the engine)
implemented animation for pause status in HUD status screen
fixed aliens shouting calculation code being handled in draw method
fixed particles blinking probability code being handled in draw method
fixed cursor being movable/seen during pause mode
fixed player being able to shoot/accelerate during pause mode
fixed aliens rotating endlessly in some cases during pause mode
fixed stars blinking code being handled in draw method
fixed pause menu item still clickable after engine shutdown
made particle effects optional through the menu now
shortened the interval for pause status blinking in HUD to 0.5 seconds
improved the station wave animation to get it closer to the original
implemented a small cheat menu for max lives/shield/all powerups and self destruction
fixed halt game engine menu item not working properly
fixed cursor sprite not drawn in pause mode
changed the way how engine halt is visualized: tos bombs are drawn over the screen

v0.25 – June 2013

made ingame music optional from the configuration classes
got the game to finally compile again, still needs a lot of bugfixing
added a few more ingame debug messages for enemy ship deployment and station delivery
fixed displaying the wrong cola cargo sprite in the price lists
removed tons of unnecessary code that only caused the IDE to throw warnings
successfully implemented complete highscore loading and saving (to disk) through serialization
started implementing the billing animation, needs some more adjusting
fixed a bug with wrong drawing/updating time duration calculation
completed billing animation and made it launch after every solved solar system
fixed a bug regarding wrong shot speed
fixed solar selector and billing module always forgetting the player stats
added a 2 second delay before the billing animation starts
allowed the billing module to remove cargo and add score to the player (hardcoded for now)
made HUD status events display during billing animation as well (highscore!)
created an „animation“ for slowly loading the cargo into the ship before each level
fixed a bug where the Piraton ship gets deployed at the wrong location
fixed deployment log message displaying not the actual position of the deployed ship
pirate ships now also throw sparks (particles) as soon as they accelerate
fixed pirate ship location being updated before particles are created
added a much better ingame soundtrack which almost fits the general game pace
implemented enemy ship collision logic, player can now bounce or die from enemies
Piratons are now able to steal cargo from the player on contact
prevented the player from visiting the friendly station if all cargo is lost
fixed the player having one life less than actually displayed in the sidebar
the player now receives some more cargo if he has lost everything and loses an extralife
added a single maforian sprite for the price lists
substituted placeholder cargo sprites with some enemy sprites in the price lists
fixed a bug where the accelerating state keeps set after level has been completed
added sprite and class for PeaShooter cannon shots
merged two functions for enemy collision detection
fixed enemy ships from jerking around the players ship on flythrough
implemented PeaShooter shooting and player dying from getting hit
changed and unified the way collisions are resolved before bouncing occurs
fixed the PeaShooter ship already shooting while still in the station

v0.24 – May 2013

implemented utility class for text encryption and decryption
implemented utility class for file access and object serialization to file
made the highscore class serializable
made the solar system class serializable
completely rewrote vector arithmetics and stuffed everything in a separate class
everything broken for now, started fixing about 20 classes which also need to be rewritten now
created a new abstract class for enemy ships
removed obsolete overridden methods for updating/moving
removed unnecessary and slow multiple function calls in looped calculations
added empty class for billing controllable (after the player solved a solar system)

v0.23 – April 2013

added support for ingame music (during gameplay)
added first dummy gameplay music for testing purposes
added volume handling for sound effects
tweaked the volume values for sound effects and music
added hud events for all the other status messages
fixed displaying „systems ok“ message in case of new highscore
added game events for hyper speed and ridiculous speed
created new mathematical function for calculating actual pixel speeds
implemented a ship speed limiter
added all the sprites for the peashooter enemy type
implemented dummy peashooter enemy ai for the game
drew collision detection method out of piraton enemy class into gameobject class
made the ingame music play in a loop instead of simple playback

v0.22 – February 2013

implemented proper bonus lists / highscore / main menu intro loop
improved graphics and audio library initialization and additional log output
implemented real highscore class with several functions that replaces dummy highscores
integrated new highscores with intro titles and main game class
added some log messages for Highscore events and intro
added debug function to randomize highscores
implemented displaying powerup container in status screen
replaced slow string concatenation code with StringBuffer in Titles class
renamed SpacolaFont to DonglewareFont, since we’ll be introducing the actual Spacola font sooner or later
created abstract class SEFont for different fonts used throughout the game
replaced occurrences of DonglewareFont with abstract class SEFont to make the code more flexible
prepared ant build script
after the first level is completed, only 7 more fields get selectable in the solar selector
added object name and powerup name variables for log output
fixed particle explosions being updated too late, made them look out of place
wrote methods for string representation of game object positions
started implementing special Vector2D class for any game object motion/positioning
started removing old motion/positioning code from some game objects
fixed several types for GameMath and added some new functions
implemented HUD code for score fields, extra life fields, and both sector fields
created two missing spacola fonts and added them to the resources
wrote a new (real) SpacolaFont class for all the hud texts
finally added score, extra lifes, current and target sector to the hud
added first bonus points for destroying asteroids
removed the number of asteroids existing at once
added new graphics functions for faster image copying
removed hud fields pixel dependency from the window insets (because it was wrong)
corrected some pixel coordinates for fields
implemented cargo drawing and added it to the hud
rewrote some parts of the hud drawing code and removed ugly code bits
added status message events to the hud status screen
added shield shutdown message and all systems ok (after losing a ship)
fixed showing an empty container in the status screen if it has already been collected
added Piraton score
added ingame new highscore event
added a new hud screen with edited symbols, to make them represent their new meaning
added extralife powerup event, so that the player wins a ship
added status message sprites for highscore, speed levels and pause
added sprites for instructions button
changed the format of the changelog file, added month and year to the versions changes
transcribed all the 13 pages of the short instructions from the game
created a new controllable class for the short instructions
added tos bombs error sprite
increased shield duration to 30 seconds
added some more log messages
implemented new logarithmic spiral algorithm for the intro star animation (wormhole)
increased the length of the intro star animation to 2 seconds
fixed status message blinking to make it look more like the original
changed the time/date format for logging

v0.21 – December 2012

added small asteroid animation
added correct sound effect for asteroid explosion
made the animation of small asteroids more random
fixed sound effect not playing when enemy ship collides with an asteroid
fixed the code for sector navigation calculation
added makeshift explosion particles on enemy destruction
added station animation, needs to be improved
fixed a bug in collision detection that caused an infinite loop in some rare cases
made particle explosions look better
fixed old enemy ships reappearing after switching to the next level
added four asteroid explosion spritesets with eight sprites each
fixed line spacings in wanted lists, which needed to be smaller
implemented explosion objects to the game
started rewriting 2d vector related stuff to make it unified
started pulling out sector generation stuff into a separate class
fixed player ship facing the wrong direction on beginning of the next level
fixed asteroid probability, to make them appear less often
shortened some durations for the intro titles
added a new eclipse logo for the titles
added a new success denied logo for the titles
started writing a new LogUtility class which is there to handle simple JUL logging
implemented log output to a logfile
removed standard global (root) console handler for logging
implemented a new log output format
renamed resources folder to /rsc/
rewrote initializing of audio lib and graphics lib, logging the number of loaded files
prevented audio library from initializing more than once
rewrote part of the logging for libraries
keeping loggers in memory if they have already been used once

v0.20 – November 2012

wrote new functions for sector coordinate handling and string representations of coordinates
implemented debug text help for coordinate difference towards winning sector
removed asteroid bouncing if shield is down
implemented handling code for lives, cargo and player score (including earning extra lives)
it is now possible to get your ship destroyed and lose the game
implemented stubs for all kinds of collisions and win or lose situations in a solar system
added four new sounds: surfin usa, game over, oh oh and collect ware
implemented a stub for a future funny fatal error message
drew acceleration code from solar system class into player ship class
implemented different blinking speed for the shield and changed the interval
made it possible for the player to control the ship during the level intro animation
implemented the players ship to regain shield for a few seconds if the ship gets destroyed
fixed a bug with calculating the sector coordinate differences
fixed a bug where the solar selector progress and the player object would not be reset after game over
created new player, shield and shot sprites without the black border, making it more transparent
added a missing player shot sprite and fine tuned the dissolve distances
added a new sound for bouncing from objects with activated shield powerup
added a new sound for winning a solar system (fanfare)
implemented the first enemy: the piraton
implemented the piraton behaviour, it is very close to the original
implemented the piraton sprites
improved the piraton behaviour by adding player vector with piraton vector
implemented a filter for inverting monochrome graphics, doesn’t quite work
added menu item for inverted graphics
identified and removed duplicate code in the graphics engine
started removing a soon obsolete pause drawing method from the graphics engine
made the radar screen update far less often to create a more oldschool graphics look
tried to improve the piraton behaviour and the performance a little by removing unnecessary calculations
implemented proper acceleration for the piraton ship to make its flying look more natural
implemented basic enemy ship deployment by stations on a given distance
added „alert“ sound on enemy ship deployment
fixed accelerate sound getting stuck and playing even if a level is finished
enemies can now be shot and destroyed and they can collide with asteroids
finished inverted graphics mode, but it takes a lot of CPU power, so it is not recommended
fixed rapid shoot cooldown
limited asteroids to certain sectors only now
reduced framerate of radar screen even more to make it more authentic
made sure that no new asteroids are generated if the players hits a certain speed
fixed a problem with player shots being updated before the ship has been updated
created a slightly modified project image for the website
created a slightly modified splash screen for the game (better sprites)
created another modified splash screen with smaller sprites
added proper text credits to about screen with scrollable text area

v0.19 – November 2012

implemented asteroids code and sprites
collision detection implemented for shots, ship and asteroids
it is now possible to shoot and destroy asteroids, bounding box seems a little too big
bouncing off from asteroids almost works, just not exactly as it should
made player shots turn harmless as soon as they start to dissolve
tweaked shot animation distances / dissolve distances
increased shooting cooldown
reduced bounding box sizes of asteroids
introduced four more powerups: distance shots, backwards shooting, item duplicator and extra life.
rewrote shooting code to reflect forwards/backwards single/double rapid/distance shooting
wrote logic for either objects bouncing off with shield or getting destroyed
tried tweaking the loop points for acceleration sound, to make it more authentic
started implementing winning sector coordinates and successfully completing (or losing) a solar system
added explosion sound effect on hitting asteroids
added ranting sound effect for docking at the wrong station and receiving a bomb
rewrote game maths bouncy code on collisioning objects. Should work as intended now.
rewrote math functions for random vectors (asteroids, particles etc.)
added sound effect and code for shield low warning
pulled shield handling code from draw() into update(), duh!
implemented random speed for asteroids movements
changed the value for initial shield length (5 seconds) and thus making it dependent on framerate
the game now returns to the modified solar selector after succeeding and to the intro after losing
modified debug output to display target sector and remove unnecessary information
changed spawning of a random number (between 1 and 3) smaller asteroids
changed solar system creation so that powerup containers are placed only with a certain chance
removed spawning chance calculation of big asteroids, just spawn them all at once
added all missing price lists to the intro titles using dummy prices and dummy sprites
also added all the correct prices according to the original game
wrote new function for calculating the right distance for station docking
implemented a way to resolve collisions so that the weird bouncing behaviour might disappear
changed shield low warning timer to 3 seconds
finally found and fixed the reason for concurrentmodificationexceptions on the player shots
fixed a bug with generating small asteroid velocity
fixed bounce code for now, makes it look a little better, but still not good enough
fixed a bug that generated -1 as a winning sector coordinate

v0.18 – October 2012

added better splash screen
removed non-working code for station identification
created interface for alternate graphics engines
further implementing new audio code with better performance, still silent atm due to errors
rewrote game object drawing and radar code to fix a performance issue with iterating over all objects
substituted concrete implementations (Controllable, GfxEngine) with interfaces where possible
transcribed all the chapters from the Spacola Sternenatlas (manual) for Spacola Eclipse
added another HUD frame with better title („magic“ star included)
partly getting sound again now, loops still don’t work
finally fixed the problem with broken loop points. Game audio works like a charm now!
implemented code that prevents powerup containers to be placed directly beneath space stations
tweaked the sector border that prohibits placement of stations and powerups too close to borders
reintroduced dual sample playback during double shots again, works perfectly now

v0.17 – July 2012

implemented radar screen with sector boundaries as dashed lines
fixed a NullPointerException with the secondary sound channel
added a math function for orthogonal vectors (double shooting and acceleration particles)
implemented the third powerup: double shots
had to remove dual sample playback during double shots, sounds awful and works too slow
fixed a bug where the double shots had different directions each
reduced the number of blink cycles in the solar system selector screen
started integrating code for a better audio system which works much better than JavaSound’s awful „Clip“
improved coordinate wrapping by writing a more generic mathematical function for x/y delta values
wrote two other functions for distance calculation even beyond level boundaries
added most of the radar sprites to the resource folder
implemented drawing of stations and containers on the radar screen
coordinate wrapping also added for powerup containers, even though we won’t need it
a little code cleanup for the solar system class
rewrote price list creation and drawing, should be much closer to the original now
added all eight cargo sprites to the resource folder and the price lists
made the sector boundaries in the radar screen move along with the players ship
fixed the max width of the price lists
fixed a bug in the dithering that made the background go blank for a moment
added random starting position generation for the players ship
wrote almost new controls logic and slow ship turning (like intended)
fixed some bugs with the new controls
finally fixed a bug that caused the players position to turn NaN, which caused the game to crash
added a slightly modified splash screen featuring a station, space-cola, toilet paper and a hair dryer
added the shield down sound and implemented the effect on shields down

v0.16 – July 2012

fixed the game title of the HUD frame, moved it more to the center of the surrounding box
rewrote pixel particles logic, so that it can be integrated into solar system level architecture
rewrote particles drawing with correct wrapping algorithm
implemented a particles acceleration effect that (temporarily) replaces the acceleration sprites
stations and powerup containers are now prevented from being generated near sector boundaries
implemented the magnetic/gravitational pull effect of powerup containers
fixed game objects (shots) not being drawn centered properly on screen
implemented functions to include sprites in titles, needed for price and bonus lists
implemented first proper price and bonus lists that fade in, show line by line, and then fade out
changed blinking delays in the solar system selector once more to make it true to the original
fixed yet another bug with the wrapping algorithm, should be perfect now
fixed a bug in the solar selector that prevented the blinking delay to occur
changed the loop points for the acceleration sound, seems better now
fixed spacola cursor disappearing in the solar selector in the wrong moment
implemented the very first powerup: shield generator
added a cooldown time for shooting, the player mustn’t be able to shoot more frequently than rapid firing powerup
rewrote particles logic for acceleration, so that both rocket engines emit particles while accelerating
added rapid shooting powerup
tried to implement a simulation of two audio channels to compensate for poor JavaSound performance
fixed a bug with wrong positioning of player shots (once again)
yet again shortened the click delay for the solar system selector
shortened the lifespan of acceleration particles
fixed a bug where the player uses rapid shooting without collecting the powerup
shortened the cooldown for non rapid shooting, compensates for „unheard“ mouse clicks
changed the title image a little, added some lines as a matter of aesthetics

v0.15 – July 2012

added neat splash screen to the window if game engine is not running
solar system selector now behaves almost perfectly like the original thing
enabled/disabled start and stop engine menu items depending on engine status
fixed a bug with pause menu item staying enabled when the engine went offline while game running
fixed solar selector margins and heights, now looks exactly like the original
fixed a bug in the solar system selector with clicked field index 0/0
the coffee button now shuts down the game engine, will later save the game & shutdown
added dummy highscore screen with standard entries
added menu item for disabling and enabling audio with F5 key
created better eclipse title image featuring the ship model
new icon for the game, looks much better in the task bar, still not so good in the window
fixed a bug in the selector where the player could still click on other fields after selecting a level
delayed the solar system selection sound a little more
wrote new and more generic drawing function for stations, containers etc.
this also fixes all the coordinate wrapping problems with level borders
fixed a bug where the player could still shoot while in pause mode
pause mode is now achieved through both F4 and space bar keys (as written in the main menu)
fixed exception with player shots due to concurrent access from EDT while iterating over it
rewrote major level/sector code, few optimizations, improved readability
pulled coordinate wrapping into abstract class, since this works the same for all game objects
implemented simple hexadecimal sector number calculation for the HUD

v0.14 – June 2012

made the game engine launchable from the window menu
made it possible to shut down & restart the game engine whenever we want to
wrote a small dirty fix for a JavaSound bug with looping of an audio clip for the first time
centering windows on the desktop now finally works (needed to set the location AFTER we set the size)
made the game pauseable, added menu items for it
rewrote major game and controls OOP structure, much easier to understand and extend now
added first key binding for the menu items, revealed problems with focused GUI elements
fixed IllegalThreadStateException when restarting engine thread
improved calculation of star speed, to fix stars moving too slowly
added „PAUSE“ text when in pause mode
disabled pause menu entry while level is not running
fixed resetting pause mode after engine shutdown and restart
decided to focus menu bar, fixed key bindings to disable Windows behaviour for F10 and override it
fixed restoring of system mouse cursor when in pause mode
added several new ingame debug/verbose lines
added spacebar key binding for game pause mode
added all game assets to the pause screen (only ship and cursor stay invisible)
finally split star background drawing from updating
cleaned up some code in the gfx engine

v0.13 – June 2012

fixed mouse clicking for the solar selector
made the coffee button clickable, but it does nothing for now
started reimplementing the turning logic of the player ship
added player ship sprites, to make the ship visible again
fixed problems with the controls, works MUCH better now
fixed a bug where the player already moved after level start
reimplemented old method of star randomization, might be able to choose later
reimplemented auxiliary sprite rotation method for testing
implemented player shields and timing
made the player ship visible during level intro animation
added several mathematical functions for vector arithmetics
replaced my bad angle calculation algorithm with a proper trigonometrical formula
added basic acceleration code and right click logic to the controls
acceleration slowly starts working again
added acceleration sample with looping points, but it doesn’t work properly
rewrote click handling for the solar system selector to make it more authentic
added a short pause before sample playback after selecting a solar system (more authentic)
tried fixing the acceleration sound loop bug, will have to continue some time later
split the drawing functions for the solar system selector to allow for flexible redrawing
rewrote accelerating in order to narrow down the code, also much easier to read now
started reimplementing the drawing of player shot sprites
started reimplementing the drawing of stations and containers, seems a little buggy though

v0.12 – June 2012

using invokeLater with all AWT/Swing classes now, at least where i think it is necessary
quit button in the menu bar ends the program now
pulled the intro code into its own class
wrote a method that creates a „grey“ background for the HUD fields
added KeyListener to handle keys in the main menu
added context logic to the mouse / key controls class
added almost empty dummy title screens for the bonus and wanted enemies lists and the highscores
added betatesters and a few other titles to the intro
started reimplementing level intro animation
rewrote the audio lib to make it use Javax.sound
wrote additional functions for monochrome image creation
made use of monochrome image class for the stars background
started reimplementing level architecture again, slowly we’re getting there again
redesigned the hud frame, book code info removed and created eclipse title
rewrote mouse listener and key listener related stuff, F10 works now
tidied up the graphics engine, significantly narrowing down some parts
fixed unnecessarily complicated parts of the game cursor controls
implemented methods for drawing content vertically fixed (highscore, level selector, bonus lists)
lots of code cleanup for certain classes
started very early preparations for possible multiplayer mode
rewrote animation code of the solar level selector
added samples for level intro and solar selector
created threads for music playback and stopping

v0.11 – June 2012

a few tweaks to the intro (star speed, spacings, fade-in-only)
improved dongleware style dithering fade, looks better now
implemented double click handling
finally done implementing pixel identical dongleware fading
made it possible to use the framestopwatch without using split times for update and drawing
changed the graphics engine so that the cursor is not drawn if it has not moved yet
changed the line spacings for the titles to make them identical to the original
changed the timings for the titles to make them as close as possible to the original
now uses sample player for WAV instead of OGG audio, since it is much faster and easier to handle
included the dongleware switch ‚click‘ and a few other samples
started implementing the level selector screen
added ‚ß‘ character to the dongleware font, since I forgot it in the first place
fixed a bug with the framestopwatch introduced earlier with the optional split times
bug fixes for the level selector, added sprites for it
fixed a very small part in the hud frame graphics for ease of use
implemented an interface for runnable core components like splash, intro, level etc
created required action listener and a dummy about dialog to fill it with information later
improved the stars Gfx class to let it create differently sized images and fit enough stars in it
created extra classes to outsource splash screen and intro stuff
new method for the Gfx engine to also draw chosen images remotely in a HUD frame
added oxyd sound as a gag for the spacola splash
added dithering for the splash
dummy class for rolling credits, maybe will use them for the about dialog
started porting the parser for dongleware sprite definition format from php to java

v0.10 – May 2012

embedded my own small pixel particles library with Spacola Eclipse for simple explosion effects or so
added a few methods to the GameMath class for directional and coordinate calculation
FrameStopwatch now works using nanoseconds, not milliseconds, to make it more precise
added a blinking feature to the particles
implemented the use of a primary and a back buffer for drawing instructions
implemented a special class MonochromeImage for monochrome graphics and effects
improved performance of my graphics library
better code for transparency that avoids too much CPU usage if not necessary
renamed a lot of classes again and put them in their packages
resumed writing some code for double buffering my monochrome gfx engine
implemented the complete code for the Spacola font and wrote functions for creating titles with it
Dongleware style dithering fade is finished and works after a lot of corrections
first sample for playback included and tested during titles, works great
included classic titles and new titles, looks almost perfectly like the original game

v0.09 – May 2012

fixed a problem with redrawing of the game canvas region
inserted a menu bar with dummy entries for the most usual functions
fixed a problem with redrawing concerning the menu bar height
fixed a problem that occurred with mouse cursor coordinates which also concerned menu bar height
added alert boxes in case of a fatal error (file not found etc.) to notify the user something went wrong
changed the look and feel to system default, because Java-LaF looks so crappy
made the system mouse cursor visible in the menu bar
preparations for implementing a very basic controlled double buffering

v0.08 – May 2012

implemented a completely new (small) 2D graphics engine with more efficient repainting
reduced target framerate from 72 to 40. This should still be enough for everyone, but it reduces CPU load
no longer drawing images directly onto a JFrame (duh!), instead I added a special JPanel for painting
added java logging to write debug/error verbose output to the console (and later into a logfile)
paintComponent method for special JPanel to allow the OS to draw only regions that need redrawing
added title images for the developer company, for „Spacola Eclipse“ and the classic one
the Spacola window now uses a special icon image instead of the ugly java cup. Looks nice in the taskbar
started implementing the main menu with a special player configuration
implemented a fake TOS loading screen with the TOS bee as a gimmick

v0.07 – May 2012

started rewriting the whole game again (since the code was a nightmare object-orientation-wise)
first preparations towards development for Android platforms
started implementing a simple sprite library
new basic class for spacola font processing
new classes for configuration values (keeping magic numbers together)
separated the graphics engine from the actual view window
implemented a special stopwatch class for framerate limiter + automatic framedrop on low fps
made the stopwatch class optional and more resistant to errors
implemented proper repaint functions for the actual window (so it can redraw its contents if the OS asks for it)
made debug output optional as commmandline flag
fixed a bug with repaint functions (better framerate), still a lot of work to do
improved stopwatch class, displays current fps on debug output
renamed a lot of classes to make them describe their tasks more accurately

v0.06 – August 2011

started renaming some functions to fit java naming conventions
created an abstract superclass for enemy AI, removed old static AI class
added stubs for maforians, peashooters and piratons AI classes
started adding some abstract methods for enemy AI
fixed title screen not showing up sometimes
shooting now works kind of, still buggy though
shooting algorithm improved, direction is now almost correct
better algorithm for shooting, still some bugs to fix
implemented space stations and empty containers in every sector
fixed a bug where a single mouse click resulted in firing two shots
flight speed now more like the original game
star movement slowed down, was looking stupid as stationary game elements were introduced
fixed a bug where the crosshair cursor coordinates could get behind the HUD
started implementing classic dongleware style dithering fade

v0.05 – September 2010

changed cursor sprite to make less pixels transparent
implemented sector logic for levels
stars now reset themselves when leaving a sector

v0.04 – August 2010

cleaned up some code, need to do a little structural rewriting
star speed fixed again
improved performance by removing some unneeded paint() calls
started working on blinking stars
started working on the level design
fixed a bug where accelerating stopped on left mouse click
rewrote some code to achieve some kind of framerate limit
implemented blinking stars
implemented medium sized blinking stars
increased number of stars to 70 (looks more like in original Spacola)
started writing a wormhole algorithm for the level beginning sequence
wormhole algorithm works but doesn’t quite look like the original
wormhole algorithm improved, looks better now
fixed a directional bug that caused rotations to be applied backwards
started implementing slower turning like in original spacola
slower turning works now
implemented some debug output lines

v0.03 – August 2010

acceleration thread is used for speeding up
increased game speed a little to make animation more fluent
fixed stars popping up right on the edge of gamescreen during high speed flight
spacola mouse cursor implemented, windows cursor hidden
accelerate animation for player ship works a little
acceleration animation now includes one frame and works great for now
stars are no longer visible through the ship
started working on firing

v0.02 – August 2010

started rewriting some structural code
added stub for sound engine, level engine and AI
finally got image loading to work again
image drawing works better now, still alot of work to do
removed gui thread again because of timing issues
switching images now works
started implementing star behaviour
started working on issues with jar export
stars, speed and direction implemented
fixed jar export issue (path problem)
ship rotation implemented
started implementing mouse control
mouse control works great
started working on mouse clicks for shooting and acceleration
changing direction works now

v0.01 – August 2010

started working on the graphics engine
added serial version UID
Spacola main window implemented
able to load spacola frame into window
removed empty space above spacola frame
game window not resizable anymore
default close operation for window added
started working on filling the frame
game screen added
added serial version uid for game screen class
radar screen added
added spacola 2010 title screen with a 3 second delay
added thread usage for gui
fixed repaint in paintcomponent loop (recursive repainting)

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