Amiga Longplay Wings of Fury

[@OccamKant]

Wow. I wrote this game. Talk about a blast from the past. It was my first real video game, for USI, which later became Electronic Arts Canada. This was back in the day, when you had tiny teams. One programmer, half an artist and 1/4 of a sound guy. There is actually a set of cheat codes - for unlimited weapons, planes, etc, but I don't remember what it was. it was over 20 years ago after all.

[@badmoonrising3861]

OccamKant THANKS!

[@rav781]

I know it's an old post, but could you perhaps give us more details about it? What was the language used, how long did it take to code it, any anegdotes at all? For me (and for many others) this a part of the childhood, so every detail is more than fascinating! I'm a programmer myself and I just can't imagine writing games this complex back then :)

[@Jayce_Alexander]

Thanks for the awesome game. Still playing it on my Amiga in 2018. :)

[@colonelminus]

OccamKant the code was to write “Colin was here” but it already confirmed after putting “colin wa...”

[@stuffesen]

Thanks for an awesome game! I have some great memories with my best friend from childhood playing this game. Please tell us more about the process of game development.

[@OccamKant]

To those curious - I wrote this game in 100% 68000 Assembly language. At the time I didn't know C - I had taught myself Basic on the 64, then 6502 assembly on the same 64, and then when I got my Amiga I taught myself 68000 Assembly (SO much nicer than 6502!) - and before I go any further, I would NOT recommend anyone write games entirely in assembly language. It became a HUGE chore towards the end. I was quite proud of the display, as I used some copper tricks to do resolution switching several places on the screen. For the default view (close up on the plane), the top was in low-res 320x200, but there was a resolution switch between the upper display and the dash, switching it to "hi-res" 640x200. This allowed more details in the mini-view and the instruments. Then for the scrolling text at the bottom, I switched again but to a singlle hi-res bitplane and then set the foreground colour to a gradient from the top of the text to the bottom. This made scrolling the text easier, since there was only a single bitplane to scroll, but it was a different colour per line, so it looked nicer than just a monochrome font. When you fly up and zoom out, the upper display again switches to hi-res to better show details. All of the art was done in Deluxe Paint. If anyone has any questions, I'd be happy to answer them as best I can, keeping in mind this was a LONG time ago!

[@Midwinter2]

Thanks for contributing. This was - and still is - an excellent game, with some innovative ideas, great sound and lovely animation. My only issue is that I have always been disappointed that the scrolling wasn't smoother. Was this because of the demands of the mini-view in the dashboard? Would it have been possible to get the game to scroll any smoother on the Amiga?

[@OccamKant]

@@Midwinter2 Actually, this was my first game, and it was written entirely in 68000 assembly language. I was pretty comfortable with 68000, but I didn't have all that much experience with optimization, either through better coding practices or through taking more advantage of the hardware. My later projects managed to squeeze a lot more performance out of the machine, but this was basically my first 'at-bat'. Also the project was starting to run late, and there was a lot of pressure just to get it finished, meaning not a lot of time for polish.

[@Midwinter2]

@@OccamKant Thanks very much for your reply. It only occurred to me seven (!) months later to see if there was an answer to my question. I understand what you're saying. Many developers were under terrible pressure to complete games in very short time-periods back then. Even with those constraints, your version of Wings of Fury is an excellent achievement. Stunning for a first game! Best of luck.

[@sebastiencorbeil585]

@OccamKant I have a question !!! Do you feel bad for the millions of little.soldier that was injured during those battles :)

[@hiamaraldvaan7221]

"Colinwashere"

[@SuperCokeStar]

memories that was one of my dad favorites game. R.I.P dad 2008

[@fallengod8950]

@Little Gremlin Maybe he's dead too

[@DJJAW11]

Bless your dad, he had darn good taste !

[@DooM1981x]

My dad love this game to. He is gone 2020.. with 61 years.

[@Iceblueeye]

@@DooM1981x My Dad too. In the same Year with 68...fucking cancer. I remember he played this Game with my Brother and me in the early 90s. I also remember how he laughing about the yellings of the japanese enemys. I never forget you Daddy, love you forever!

[@OccamKant]

Yes, I am the Colin Fox listed in the credits :) I'm glad you enjoyed the game!

[@badmoonrising3861]

OccamKant THANK YOU!

[@amiga512k]

Brilliant good , you should be very proud of this

[@jonarerakvag747]

Colin was here!

[@Adskew]

Thank you Colin! One of my fave Amiga games as a kid. I've now been developing games for 20yrs but still remember this so well.

[@daszieher]

Thank you! After decades of having played that game, I still remember it quite well!

[@OccamKant]

I was quite proud of this for all the trickery involved. On that display the upper portion is in low res high colour, the dash is in medium res 16 colour, and the scrolling text area at the bottom is actually only 1 bitplane deep, and I use raster interrupts to change the colour for the gradient. You can't do tricks like that with video cards today. :)

[@robertwilson3866]

Did you ever think of making a sequel?

[@thehumbleone1983]

Is possible to port this to the Mega Drive

[@konradfraczek6482]

GOSH childhood with AMIGA and titles like this. Best years! Thanks, Dad!

[@drfaul]

The bass in the beginning alone just took me back in my childhood- with overwhelming memories.

[@konradfraczek6482]

Same here!

[@mattx5499]

This is a well made game. The graphics, plane movement are great and engine and explosions sounds still give me the goosebumps. And the music is a cherry on the top.

[@brokko_le3]

This game made me buy my first Amiga. I was still on the C64, but after seeing this I just had to have one. It feels like yesterday somehow. I remember so much about this game still, even though I wasn't very good at it. The bombing and shooting precision on this longplay is really amazing. It wasn't that easy to pull off as far as I remember.

[@Mavermick1]

It's probably 20 years since I played this, loved it. I'm pretty sure all you had to do to land was press up, flying from right to left. This descended the plane with the nose up a little so it caught the wires.

[@Kasiagolabek]

This game has a special place in my heart, one of few games my dad used to play and one of those Amiga games that got me into loving gaming in general

[@jaspervandenbos4768]

You are that Colin? No kidding? My my, that i ever meet the person of the game that i played sooo much. Still remember my first time i saw that title screen with that amazing song. Lying on the couch with a broken leg after i had a accident as little kid. My dad installed the amiga next to the couch so i could play games non stop.. Its a honor to meet you!

[@Derethevil]

Watching this and remembering one of my best friends who played this with me on his Amiga. I was like 8 back then. Always tried but was bad at it. A few years ago he commited suicide. The real reasons are unknown. He didn't leave a letter or anything. But we know that it is probably due to the tumour he had in his head that blinded him more and more. Back then already he wasn't able to see very well. Had to go very close to the screen to see.

[@Bezirksverwaltung]

Oh man..seems like it was just yesterday when i spend hours and hours on my amiga600..staying inside on a sunny summer day...walking around with your disk box and swap games with your friends.

[@steveduerr6367]

I had soooo much stuff for the amiga 500 and the 2000.

[@Tclans]

As a kid I found this game super intriguing but I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how those elusive deck landings worked. You can imagine I saw ‘The End’ quite regularly. Had tons of fun though!

[@spitefulwar]

For it's time this game was just crazy good and terribly addictive.

[@Greensbororoadsideassistance]

Awesome game, great gameplay. Hours of fun back in the day.

[@rafachrzaszcz6997]

I still have thrills hearing the main theme. Childhood memories!

[@andrewcampuzano6728]

Did no one ever draw a line on the screen so you knew what height to fly your plane, then a couple of markers on the horizontal so you could bomb each target bang on with only 2 bombs and at a height you wouldn’t get shot, awesome. Simple trigonometry.

[@Yoshi1478]

Remember to fool the Japanese fighters to turn around when they were on my tail, just quickly flippping the joystick backwards.

[@tonysoprano9370]

I had this on my amiga 600. Me and my bro played this non stop.

[@LiezAllLiez]

Man i used to love this game...

[@PhalanX2650]

Nice to meet you! An honor to meet you actually :p Yeah I played this alot and never completed it, as I recall.. I was a little kid and have no clue how the code "got out" - I remember getting a sheet of paper with codes for Amiga500 games from my friends dad who was a bit of a pioneer (or what its called) when it came to programs and computers back then.

[@redsonja7941]

Play this game 100 times, never land always crash lol

[@AloanMoreira1]

just like AVGN in Top Gun :D

[@jesperhallberg6687]

Same here 😂

[@bewatermyfriend7355]

you have to pull up :D

[@OccamKant]

It was actually a port of an original Apple ][ game of the same name, though "port" is not really correct since I didn't have any of the original source code or game assets. We had to basically generate everything from scratch, though I did email with the original author.

[@rav781]

A game of my childhood. I would draw the bunkers on paper, with the flags guns etc. And remember drawing numerous ships, especially japanese battleships, they looked so badass! Always wanted to play like them. They bomb resistant bunkers were so freakin' cool! Btw from today's perspective the dying japanese sound effect is just comic : D

[@PhalanX2650]

"COLIN WAS HERE" was the code.. Then you had to press single letters for the different things! You wrote this game as in the code? Im not the best at English. I am 33 years old today, this game is a part of my childhood along with Moonstone and many other Amiga games! I will never forget this!

[@PhalanX2650]

I just fell over this conversation I had with OccamKant, his comments are gone and now it just seems like I am talking to myself. xD

[@ciacho86]

You could easily destroy enemy planes by faking you turn around (but still going forward). They would turn around right away, then you really turned around like 1 second after they started turning and it put you right on their tail for easy kill.

[@pihi1068]

True. I remember this used to be my trick 🤠

[@TheGameCollector1]

One of my Favorit games on my Amiga 1000, when i was a child.

[@fuqupal]

This game was so simple, yet super fun!!

[@murder.simulator]

The squeals of the dying echo across time, forever imprinting on the minds of those who heard. Oh the tragedy, the humanity. I'm getting PTSD and I never even played this

[@LinuxIsBeter]

I remember this game ! Man did i enjoyed this game , really mis that good old time ( all games where magic )

[@drubber007]

Such a great game. There should be a version of this today.

[@StormsparkPegasus]

I had this game for the Apple IIe and loved it...this is WAY WAY WAY better though. I often asked my parents if I could get an Amiga but the answer was always no. So I didn't get to experience Amiga games (except at a friend's house) until I had moved out on my own.

[@Mythricia1988]

Oh my good god. I remember now.

[@cleanthegreen]

One of my first memories of any kind of computer was watching my Dad play this game. Then after a while he’d let me play too.

[@Hatatitla76]

i used to listen to "unchained melody" in the background while playing this. added some kind of strange satisfaction to this game.

[@MrSmith130]

Remember this and the WW1 game 'Wings'. Played Alien Breed, Chaos Engine and Desert Strike alot too but spent most of my time playing Sensible World of Soccer. Remember Falcon Patrol on my C64 as well. Great days. Games don't feel as exciting now as they used to; may be my age.

[@RenerDeCastro]

*"WAAAAGGGHHH!!!"* - Japanese Army soldiers

[@MightyVginy]

The Amiga Sound was awesome ! :)))

[@Slamraptor]

Exactly what I were thinking while watching this.

[@Crustenscharbap]

Amiga has the best Sound-Chip at this time. There were also great music programs like New Tracker.

[@drsnova3585]

Rob Schmitt The best? That honor goes to the C64-SID, I would say, with Amigas "Paula" a close second.

[@MightyVginy]

***** the Omen was awesome too...;)

[@erebostd]

@@drsnova3585 he said "at the time". The C64 was quite earlier.

[@atlehunekonge]

THis gave me so many good memories to whatch! I played the hell out of this game

[@daviebaggins]

I remember flying back on captain after destroying some of Those double gun bunkers, leaking oil barely landing in time !! Such an amazing game. Halfway tempted to hook up the Apple and try again.

[@ijontichy6247]

Next to River Raid on the C-64 this is an example of a game with little graphics to speak of (in case of higher altitude flight anyway) but incredible playability. You could spend hours on it. In fact, it was the only game my friend's father recognized, dismissing everything else as childish crap. ;) And whenever he returned home (which wasn't too often due to the sort of work he had), he occupied the Amiga till early morning hours. Of course to the utmost dismay of my friend who was effectively locked out of his own room. :)

[@MrZodac]

You should reduce speed when the enemy plane is in your reticle. If you do so you can spit much more lead on the sucker before he turns away.

[@toddc6682]

I wish I had my childhood Amiga 500 again! This game was Epic for the day!

[@Chris_Oblivion]

Oh man, I had this for my Amiga 2000.. I wasn't very good at it though! Loved it all the same, such a great game!

[@tournication]

can't get the screams out of my head! *lol*

[@SeinSchatten]

WWII flashbacks

[@jimbojonez376]

Yeah, it's just terrible. People who play this game and have fun are just wrong

[@NoctumusTV]

A clear case of PTSD, if you ask me ;)

[@DieCoOps]

I just remember one thing as i see this... "collinwashere" :)

[@duer1081]

2019 and still like this game

[@javvyjavvy]

Played this on my apple ii back in the day. This version is amazing. Got this game and shogun for christmas one year along with Dark Heart of Uukrul.

[@22lalen]

I miss when games were good. Good ol Amiga 500. I still have my Amiga 500+ left. Tons of games. But this is one i don't have anymore 😭

[@xMehL]

YES, FINALLY! I've been waiting so long for this upload. Love the Title Theme! ^^

[@marcelnijkamp4270]

this game was awesome! nice to see it again

[@Alturis2]

That's some damn nice flying Eino!

[@GummoNZ]

Wow, you were finishing missions so fast. I played it slow and methodical, it took me hours and hours and I got 99+ kills.

[@StephenDelRosario777]

*There are pilots like you in every generation, and I've felled every last one of them*

[@kuntosjedebil]

the scrolling intro text has always been the test of my english reading skills. now after 20 years i can finally read it before it disappears :)

[@Strap1205]

Great game - almost impossible for me to beat but I liked it! ^^ The screams were epic! xD

[@MrJibble]

All these years later and I've only just noticed the grammatical error in the game's intro text!

[@steffenreiner6917]

Die Betonflaks konnte man am besten mit Raketen ausschalten.

[@johnsonmckay2894]

Spent countless hours playing this as kid

[@bryan-po8dn]

You really get an idea of how much better the Amiga was when you compare this to the Apple IIe version. I was a huge IIe fanboi when I was a kid but, honestly, the Amiga was lightyears ahead.

[@Mitgardxxl]

I played that game over 4.000 hours. But never saw Level 2

[@super-8]

It was one of the mysterios games of amiga, no one now how far the user can get in, that was the fastzination of the 1980 Centaury - it will never come back , we die now...

[@blackbirdone8204]

The homebase is on a weak US-Carrier, because it has no FLAK.

[@SendyTheEndless]

When I got my Amiga, this was one of the games that came with it, and also, my best friend at the time was Japanese. That was awkward.

[@tomarkadi6612]

loved this game..great memories

[@brendongyde]

Its funny how you remember back... and think I'm sure those graphics were crisp and clear

[@clinicalpsychologist]

Such an amazing game! used to play in on a CGA version for some odd reason, although my screen was a VGA.

[@manuelkluge383]

ColinWasHere ❤

[@moonybaboon2624]

Great inspiration for our game.

[@FoGGeRdk]

I remember this being rly hard. I was about 8-10 years playing this i think. Especially landing on the hangar was a big problem :( was I a n00b or was it rly hard?

[@christosvozikis881]

FoGGeRdk Same, same....

[@tubelev]

+FoGGeRdk once you got the hang of it, it was ok, you needed to level your flight according to the little screen in the bottom middle and land it by pushing up. once it connected, hit it right to slow it down. i remeber it so clearly because it took me a long time to figure it out.

[@pkj77]

+FoGGeRdk well i figured out a easy way of landing by flying far to the right turning the around and pushing the joy stick half way between up and the left then it slowly descending and after a few tries bingo you had the right height and speed

[@maghreb700]

u were noob, i had no problem landing.

[@FoGGeRdk]

Ah ok. Good to know

[@bobekkontour809]

NUMBER ONE! AMIGA 500! child-memories

[@mpbrickteam708]

I love this Game. Played in my childhood🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

[@ragonsoft]

hehe no cheats here.. here the tips of a me a good old Wings of Fury hardcore player! I played it very often: - Landing = Joystick up, no more speed. - Enemy planes behind you. Dive much, then climb much. alternative: start turn, but interrupt. - Ships and planes first. Buildings then all Bunkers. have fun! i loved it! Sound, atmosphere, all.

[@sverduijn1]

Best to clear the islands near your carrier first. Then you have some airspace to battle other planes without getting hit by bunkers.

[@OccamKant]

And yes, now I do remember that that was the cheat code - though I'm curious how anyone figured that out, because as I recall, that string doesn't appear in the game anywhere, I just check for each letter independently, to make finding it harder. Did someone actually disassemble the code and figure it out?

[@collinjohnson5500]

I think it may have been hidden in the manual.

[@Vesalempinen]

Ahh.. This game is still great!

[@oldfrittenfett1276]

Friendly fire was not a thing back then.

[@ElectroPunk79]

Colin was here.

[@tenuke]

did you notice that Colin is here in the comment section too :D Coder of the game

[@sebastiandenenfeld9886]

I was playng this game many hours,it was awesome!

[@gerardmurray1770]

I bloody loved this game on my Amiga!

[@Fiilis1]

God damn I played this game a lot back in 90's with A500

[@seethingmad]

Amazed I never played this one, I take it the inspiration came from Choplifter, one of my faves

[@artoodiitoo]

brings back memories ;D "Uh oh, oil pressure!"

[@carloscastilhojr]

Esse jogo era demais, muito bom

[@poxdaccy]

I loved this game, still do

[@peterarensbach1242]

i MISSSS THIS GAME SOOOOOOO mush damn i played it every day 💯

[@madzen112]

One of those games that might require a bit of tweaking today or I imagine some complaints about the strafing parts. Downloaded this for emulator in highschool. Old games were free online and easier to fit to floppydiscs, so we did that a lot. Good times.

[@sekretariatoddzia167]

When I finish Mission 3 of Captain, the game starts again at Mission1 of Captain. Does it ever end?

[@sverduijn1]

Good question... seems like a neverending game....

[@citizenph1L]

Colinwashere

[@EAmodified]

the ultimate cheat for it^^

[@tgchan]

Damn you're good... ALSO hello, childhood~!!

[@peterdes6792]

thanks for preserving this game for posterity

[@mark12358]

still have the original floppy for Amiga :) nice game

[@simoncollett4524]

I get the feeling you've played this before! :)

[@GrumpyScamp]

This game was so much fun!

[@kajetanbarczak6604]

colin was here :)

[@MrNocturno2401]

Colinwashere, Only real in one word. :p

[@DJJAW11]

I used to love this game on the old Amiga ! ! :) . I did have it on pc, emulator version, if i recall :) !,

[@Taarnafeather]

I loved this game too! :) I played it on C64 and i think i once i wanted to play it to the end i stopped because it was bugged. Things like people running on the surface of water and indestructible bunkers... I managed to sunk the whole island with torpedo and sometimes i would destroy everything and the level was not finished. Weird things... But still i loved it! :)

[@tammylokstedt8697]

I always told my brother not to push the fire button at the starting screen since i loved the music so much

[@eXtreamAngel]

So "Rogue Aces" is some kind of a remaster :D Got it free on PS4 with PS Plus. PLayed a lot. Very interesting mode with conquering islands and destroying enemy ace.