The Sinclair QL Forum

So I finally got this thing running!

Source code is available from here:

https://github.com/neozeed/hack-1.03

I'm using GCC to cross compile from my PC, and I have it running on native hardware.



I'm not all that sure on how to 'package' this up... It needs a ludicrous 600kb of disk space although 256kb can be reclaimed if you know how to send binaries properly. Im using Minerva, TK2 and a Trump card to for the ram and whopping 8MB card which fits it all just fine.

What does it do?

bwinkel67 wrote: Wed Dec 28, 2022 3:32 am What does it do?

It’s one of the most famous games ever written

This is really cool! I spent waaayyyy too many hours on the university computer playing NetHack (a more complex version of Hack). Feels great to be able to play Hack on QL, thank you for the porting effort!

XorA wrote: Wed Dec 28, 2022 8:54 am

bwinkel67 wrote: Wed Dec 28, 2022 3:32 am What does it do?

It’s one of the most famous games ever written

... and it was already old when the QL was launched. But still a marvelous game idea that spawned a whole genre.

bwinkel67 wrote: Wed Dec 28, 2022 3:32 am What does it do?

You play as the @ and go around the ascii dungeon descending to the depths to find treasure, and haul it back up without getting killed.

Its a lot harder than it looks!

ppe wrote: Wed Dec 28, 2022 12:07 pm This is really cool! I spent waaayyyy too many hours on the university computer playing NetHack (a more complex version of Hack). Feels great to be able to play Hack on QL, thank you for the porting effort!

Yeah considering that public release of hack was in 1985, its really cool to see it running on the 'affordable' 32bit computer of 1985. Although it needs 512kb ram, and realistically a floppy/hard disk, but still now the QL feels like a legit minicomputer for the home!

Hi,

Can this program not be written in assembler saving a lot of space and increasd in speed.

I want to do more programming, so will have a look at this...

Derek_Stewart wrote: Wed Dec 28, 2022 2:09 pm Hi,

Can this program not be written in assembler saving a lot of space and increasd in speed.

I want to do more programming, so will have a look at this...

it's 436,299 bytes of C, or roughly 20,227 lines of code. It'd be a significant undertaking. It'd be easier to write some kind of runtime linker to impliment overlays.. and that would not be easy by any stretch.

Not to completely discourage you, but the code is in the link above. It'd just be an astronomical amount of work. I think rogue was signicantly smaller, hack just kind of took on a life of it's own, and begat nethack.

Hi,

Just downloaded the Git Hub zio file, quite big program.

Writing in assembler was just wild idea... maybe C is better.

Can this be compiled with C68 instead of GCC?