[HN Gopher] Lode Runner (HTML5 Remake) ___________________________________________________________________ Lode Runner (HTML5 Remake) Author : memalign Score : 252 points Date : 2023-12-28 12:24 UTC (10 hours ago) (HTM) web link (loderunnerwebgame.com) (TXT) w3m dump (loderunnerwebgame.com) | memalign wrote: | Source code: https://github.com/SimonHung/LodeRunner_TotalRecall | jddj wrote: | I spent many hours as a child playing load runner (the legend | returns) but I have no idea where we got it. | | I think our Compaq Presario at the time must have come packaged | with a sierra disk. | theandrewbailey wrote: | I remember having a Compaq computer in the 90s (some 486-based | all-in-one with a CD drive), and had The Legend Returns. I | kinda grew into liking it, but I'm not sure where the disc | ended up. I found an ISO of Mad Monks Revenge (an expansion/re- | release) on an abandonware site 15+ years ago. Works great on | my retro PC. | a1o wrote: | Compaq Presario did come with Loderunner - and also The | Evermore Incredible Machine! | intrasight wrote: | Great memories. Was our favorite game on my Macintosh 128K. My | nephew brought my Mac back to Italy with him just so he could | continue playing. I don't think I've played it on any other | computer since. | todotask wrote: | Issue: stuck at name input field. I cannot run! | _0ffh wrote: | Same here, I just get a beep on "enter", nothing going... | sltkr wrote: | I think the site requires you to pick something unique (???). | For me, entering AAA doesn't work but entering HJFDKFDSGHK | works. | kleiba wrote: | The classic ASS worked for me. | Cerpicio wrote: | I remember spending a lot of time playing this game. Even my mom | liked it, and she never played video games. I wonder if she'll | want to play this version. Great to see it again! | eddyfromtheblok wrote: | I played this as a kid on a Franklin PC, an Apple II clone. It | was more interesting than Pac-Man at the time and IIRC you could | design your own levels. | buescher wrote: | Lode Runner was the first game to impress me with its play | mechanics and its level builder. It was really an elegant little | game. I don't think it would make my all time top 10 today but it | would probably make a "top 10 to date of release". | subtra3t wrote: | What would be your all time top 10? | didgeoridoo wrote: | That Broderbund triple crown never fails to bring me back to the | half-underground computer software shop on the Main Street in my | town some time in the early 1990s. I would read about upcoming | games in PC Magazine, and visit almost daily when a new game came | out to see if they had it in stock yet. | | Either that shop was pretty casual about staying on the cutting | edge, or release dates were fuzzier back then, because it would | often be months of agonized visits before the game showed up on | shelves. By then, of course, I'd have gotten another PCMag, and | my attention had leapt to a different -- clearly far more | advanced and interesting -- game that was "only days" from | launch. | | Anyway, during one of my Saturday morning visits to the musty- | smelling and over-dehumidified shop, I ended up idly browsing | through the Borland section and a Turbo C box caught my eye. My | dad was incredibly pumped that I was showing an interest in | something that could actually be productive and creative, so he | bought it for me. | | Unfortunately, nine-year-old me did not turn out to be a natural | prodigy. My dad's coding experience stopped somewhere south of | FORTRAN (he had juggled some accounting systems for ABC in the | early 1980s) so he tried his best but couldn't really make it | click for me. | | So Turbo C went back on the shelf. Dark Forces was coming out | next month, and I didn't have time for twiddling with | incomprehensible runes when there were stormtroopers to kill. | | What could have been. | wenc wrote: | I tried Turbo C as an 8 year old and got as far as printf hello | world and scanf. The pointer stuff seemed obtuse to me (coming | from BASIC) and it was strange it didn't have automatically | sized string types (it was char[7] or something). In retrospect | I should have gone the Turbo Pascal route as an 8 year old. | codetrotter wrote: | When I was around 12 years old I convinced one of my parents | to buy a little book about C++ for me. I read the first | chapter with great interest and wrote variations of input and | output things with pen and paper. | | Then I tried to follow the instructions on how to build and | run a program on a computer. | | I managed to install the IDE they recommended; one called | Bloodshed Dev-C++. I managed to type the code for hello world | into the IDE, and I managed to compile the program. | | It produced an exe file that had a black terminal icon. | | I double clicked the exe and it opened and closed very | quickly. | | It would only be several years later, when I started at the | university, that this confusing interaction made sense to me. | | At the time I thought I had made some mistake and I didn't | understand what or why. | | But what happened of course was that the program started, | printed its output and exited, and it all happened so fast | that I just saw a window open and quickly close. | | Fortunately I did eventually get better introductions to | programming. But that first experience was a bit unfortunate | heh. | keerthiko wrote: | If it makes you feel any better, I was (am) a game-addicted kid | who did indeed pick up Borland C++ and coded a graphical DOS | version of hangman alongside my older brother when I was 12, | and made a tank game with a map editor solo when I was | comfortable with pointers before I was 14 -- it hasn't made me | a prodigal pioneer of computer programming or a wildly | successful silicon valley C[E/T]O. While I do still enjoy | coding/gamedev and earn a modest living from it, as a more | evenly matured adult I have other interests that I care about | just as much and keeps me occupied instead of poring over the | latest and greatest in tech or gamedev. | | I guess what I'm saying is that being interested enough to | become competent at a young age doesn't necessarily equate to | becoming an industry-leading savant by age 34...nor is it a | prerequisite. If you are passionate today, I bet you could | still level up to the forefront of whatever niche you care | about with enough commitment. | sliken wrote: | I did have IBM's C compiler and a full set of printed manuals. | Never clicked for me. I did however get turbo pascal, it was | amazing. Compile/edit/run cycles measured in seconds. Online | docs/examples, etc. | | Ended up reading PC Tech journal, wrote an EGA driver for Turbo | pascal, and even a few games. Had some silly mine based game | written in Turbo Pascal that showed how many mines were | adjacent, with the revolutionary idea that you didn't have to | hit enter after every move. It floated around as shareware on | BBSs, someone even binary edited it make amusing changes to the | text when you died. I allowed mines to cause chain reactions, | people were amused that past a certain point increasing mine | density made the game easier since the chain reactions got | larger. | | Certainly a different world back then. | mock-possum wrote: | Hey dark forces was my introduction to modern 3D first person | shooter level design - I played it before I played quake, | before I even played DOOM. I made handfuls of custom levels for | it over my childhood years, before moving up to half life / | source. Still have a very strong nostalgia for Dark Forces. | samstave wrote: | So funny! I too was nostalgically brought back seeing that logo | again - I literally stopped and evaluated it for a good moment, | letting memories wash in. | | Also, I suck at LodeRunner. | oflannabhra wrote: | I remember going quite deep on lode runner's level editor in | school with friends. I think there were a variety of edge cases | that (almost like exploits) that allowed our levels to be | incredibly complex and harder than any of the pre built level. A | great reminder that giving people tools is almost always a | creative boon. | Red_Tarsius wrote: | I haven't played the original, but _Lode Runner: The Legend | Returns_ is one of my favorite games of all time. The later | levels can be very challenging and I don 't remember ever | reaching the final stage but it was an addicting experience. You | can download a faithful remake of Legend Returns here: | https://mmr.quarkrobot.com/. Highly recommended! | nlitened wrote: | Oh God, I used to be obsessed with Lode Runner: The Legend | Returns | morkalork wrote: | I sank countless hours in the level editor. | a1o wrote: | Lode Runner: The Legend Returns is the best version of the game | I think, the old one is too pixely (like the classic version on | iPhone) and the later 3D ones lose the simplicity of the | original. | sillywalk wrote: | (Thanks for that link.) | | Agreed, one of my favourites. I also liked the background art, | and the animated clips in between some of the different levels, | and the CD's Redbook audio soundtrack. It kind of reminds me of | the game Creaks. | | I also remember it was one of the games that used WinG[0], | before DirectX game out. | | [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WinG | thriftwy wrote: | https://okgamer.ru/dendi-igry-onlayn/2356-lode-runner.html took | five seconds to boot, whereas on this web site it took ten | seconds to get to 25% after which I have up waiting. | | HN hug of love? | rgrieselhuber wrote: | Man I used to love this game. | wiredfool wrote: | Damn, got 30 levels in, 7 men left, and it reset when I went to | the bathroom. | | I wasted so much time on this as a kid, and this is the most | faithful to the //e version that I've ever seen. | nsxwolf wrote: | It resumed on my highest reached level when I revisted the | page. | the__alchemist wrote: | Oh man! I played the sequel when I was a kid after it came | included on my dad's work computer. Entertainment on several | family trips! | wg0 wrote: | Seeing and playing this for the first time and... it's really | very interesting game. | | Is there a value in a total remake (different graphics, art | style) of this game? I'm sure many already exist. | mmphosis wrote: | The original loaded pretty much instantly. Software of that era | didn't have minutes long "Loading ... Please Wait" screens for | everything. | | Also, the original didn't <s>try to data collect</s> ask to enter | a name. For some odd reason, it took a while to get past this | annoying dialog box on this web game. | | On the original, the player would keep running whereas this new | game is laborious in that you need to hold down keys to keep | moving. The original keyboard layout is: UIO = | dig up dig JKL = left down right | flymasterv wrote: | "Software of that era didn't have minutes long "Loading ... | Please Wait" screens for everything." | | Someone never played an Electronic Arts game on C64. | ddingus wrote: | Right! The Apple ][ game loads are very fast. Those are the | ones I remember. | thwarted wrote: | _> The original loaded pretty much instantly. Software of that | era didn 't have minutes long "Loading ... Please Wait" screens | for everything_ | | Huh? Just about everything that didn't come on a cartridge took | forever to load, especially on a C64. That's why there were | "fast load" extensions. Most games would load once at the | beginning, but sometimes you'd "need to insert disk 2" or "flip | the disk over" to finish loading. What was truly impressive is | that games like Times of Lore could entirely fit in 64k and | only hit the disk when initially loading. | | _> On the original, the player would keep running whereas this | new game is laborious in that you need to hold down keys to | keep moving._ | | The original worked with a joystick, where you'd hold it in the | direction to keep running. I'm not sure I ever played the | original with the keyboard. You need to be able to stop in | loadrunner in order to direct and avoid the movements of the | enemies and dig holes in the right spots. | nsxwolf wrote: | > The original worked with a joystick, where you'd hold it in | the direction to keep running. I'm not sure I ever played the | original with the keyboard. You need to be able to stop in | loadrunner in order to direct and avoid the movements of the | enemies and dig holes in the right spots. | | I believe you would run endlessly on the Apple II version, | because it had a non-centering joystick and it was more | nimble of a game that way. You could stop the character with | the space bar. | | The MS-DOS version had a nice control scheme with the numeric | keypad. You character would run endlessly left or right, but | the "5" key on the keypad (right in the center of the arrows) | would make him stop. | thaumasiotes wrote: | > Huh? Just about everything that didn't come on a cartridge | took forever to load, especially on a C64. | | Taking a long time to load doesn't mean having a minutes long | "Loading ... Please Wait" screen. | | _Civilization_ needed a lot of time, on a contemporary | computer, to create the map. While doing so, it plays a | slideshow with captions: | | _In the beginning, | | the Earth was without form, | | and void. | | But the Sun shone upon the sleeping Earth | | and deep inside the brittle crust | | massive forces waited to be unleashed._ | | This goes on for quite a while, accompanied by appropriately | epic music. | | How do I even know that this is actually a loading screen? | Simple - the animation is not skippable on a low-powered | computer. You can try, but the actual skip will only occur | later, when the computer is ready for it. On a Windows-95-era | computer, you can skip the whole thing; the game will be | ready before the slideshow starts. | | But just because the game _required_ a loading screen didn 't | mean the designers thought it would make any sense to punish | the player by making them spend minutes staring at a message | saying "I bet you feel pretty stupid for buying this game | now, huh?". The Civ I intro is famous and well loved. You can | watch a youtube video of it here: | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtK388b9drE . You can read | the entire text on TvTropes, where a fan has posted it as a | memorable quote: | https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Quotes/Civilization . | It is the first thing listed on that page. | justsomehnguy wrote: | There is a repeat action toggle. | solardev wrote: | I'm curious, why does it take so long to load? | MourYother wrote: | Loads for ages, prompts for player name. smh... | foresto wrote: | > prompts for player name. smh... | | Also triggers Firefox canvas fingerprinting protection, but | doesn't seem to need it to function. What's it doing there? | inetknght wrote: | Ahhh I remember many (well... maybe not so many compared to | current games) hours playing Lode Runner on a Mac Plus when I was | 3 years old. I remember editing the maps and my dad thinking I | was editing a locked floppy disk... when really I just figured | out how to unlock it and re-lock it afterward. | RomanPushkin wrote: | What framework/libraries did you use while making the game? | wiredfool wrote: | My guess is that this is a 6502 emulator plus the original code | in wasm. It's too close to the //e version to be a | reimplementation. | xbar wrote: | Crap. If this ruins 2024 like it ruined 1987, I am in deep | trouble. | olvy0 wrote: | This brings back so much memories of playing the original on my | Apple IIe. | | Glad to have found about Lode Runner: The Legend Returns, Lode | Runner Online: The Mad Monks' Revenge, and its remakes from the | comments here. There goes my weekend... | | Another very good and free remake (which doesn't even include | ads!) for mobile platforms is/was Lode Runner 1 by Nexon. It | appears it's no longer on Google Play, but it can be found on | APKMirror. I still play it from time to time. | | Review: https://toucharcade.com/2017/05/19/lode-runner-1-is-a- | well-m... | thealienthing wrote: | It goes without saying that I could easily Google this myself, | but I'll ask anyway for those who are also wondering: what is the | significance of HTML5 for this implementation? I'm not a web guy | have gotten by with simple html css js and occasional templating | when needed. Is HTML5 supporting some native programming? | rijoja wrote: | The canvas element I suppose, and yeah maybe gamepad and | joystick support as well. | archsurface wrote: | Wow. Memories. Loving it. | nikolay wrote: | One of my favorites in the past. This implementation is pretty | good! | ddingus wrote: | This looks and plays great! | | My favorite version of this game runs on the Apple ][ and I am | going to fire mine up and have a go this evening to hear the | goofy 1 bit sounds. | | To play on Android, I had to connect a keyboard. | dvirsky wrote: | This is pretty great, I used to love this game as a kid. I played | it on a PC in the late 80s. Besides being a fun game, it was | probably the first game I've played where you could design your | own levels, which was awesome, we used to challenge each other to | custom levels in our school's computer lab. | lovegrenoble wrote: | Love this game | squarefoot wrote: | I don't remember playing Lode Runner back in the day, although it | was quite famous. Back then my favorite games in the same league | were Pharaohs Curse and Montezuma's Revenge. | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBSW6r9-lQo | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aq7xwDrKwBs | foresto wrote: | Anyone else find that pressing a key while another key is pressed | causes the game to forget that the first key is still being | pressed? I don't remember this being a problem in the original. | Browser limitation, or bug? | harha_ wrote: | It shouldn't take this long to load. Honestly it should just | launch into the game without a loading screen at all. | bitwize wrote: | See also xscavenger, old-school X11 Lode Runner clone: | https://www.linuxmotors.com/linux/scavenger/index.html | | Enjoy it now, while X11 is still quasi-relevant and runnable on | today's computers! ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2023-12-28 23:00 UTC)