Classic Game Postmortem - Marble Madness

In this 2011 GDC Postmortem, Sony's Mark Cerny gives a breakdown of the development of the gaming classic Marble Madness
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[@ikaikaikaika2419]

When he said "It did not happen because we'd locked the guy in the room too long" I thought Atari had fucking killed the man

[@andywatts]

Loving these classic game post mortems.

[@DJ_POOP_IT_OUT_FEAT_LIL_WiiWii]

The classic post mortems are the best. No BS just game development.

[@PhilShary]

@@DJ_POOP_IT_OUT_FEAT_LIL_WiiWii Exactly! Not only the games are iconic, people are the real professionals and care about the games only.

[@WalkerRileyMC]

To be fair, the Uncharted code most likely makes extensive use of various libraries, totaling far more than just 750 lines.

[@silasmorgestern3834]

"everything you know is wrong" is actually my favorite line of text from any video game besides the very obscure "take them out before they're ready" from destiny of an emperor. this was such a great presentation- Mark did a terrific job of explaining his thoughts and simplifying the tech stuff. it's more than passion conveyed here; it's genius.

[@sideburn]

Being that the game is really static 2d bitmap and not true 3d geometry, I always wondered how the collision detection/ball positioning and physics worked. I wish he would have talked about that more.

[@Thegamecheats]

Using a 3D grid but displaying 2D graphics. It's the same as collisions on a 2D grid plus a dimension

[@sideburn]

I even emailed him like 15 years ago asking but no answer

[@sideburn]

Right but curious about the coding aspects. I mean he had to home brew it and the ball “moves” on an x y z plane. Is the ball scaling? How does it look so right being just “stamps”. It’s crazy to think about how it was programmed. At least for me.

[@chroma.z]

I think it helps that it's basically just a 2d heightmap, not a full 3d environment. So if your ball is on a square it just needs to check the height of adjacent squares. And it's isometric, so no perspective scaling, the ball can just be a regular sprite. But yeah it would be interesting to know more technical details. I'm also curious how it would clip the ball sprite when it's behind an object.

[@sideburn]

MadsterV that too

[@Nightlurk]

Turns out, that "Property of Atari" T-Shirt was no joke at all!

[@SendyTheEndless]

They sorta got the dynamic environment part in with that wavey platform at the end of the third level.

[@richardbird1596]

Played so much arcade Marble Madness! I can win it (almost) every time, and even when I don't beat my score, I like when I make it to that final goal with less than 1 second left.

[@AndrewAHayes]

If this game had had a revision or ROM upgrades with more levels it would have been a big money earner, I remember my interest in the game just dropped off once I had completed the levels

[@sonidojamon]

There's an unreleased version of Marble Madness II that had like 70 levels. Can be found online I think

[@grendelum]

and now i know why that game sounded so incredibly good relative to everything else at the time... amazing story !!

[@RayR]

Classic game and one of my top 25 games from the 80's.

[@geckoo9190]

cristal castle as a rookie game? wow that is amazing, I mean the playability can use some work, but the isometric perspective, that is insane and seems very hard in general to program, also it bundles a maze, platforms and even strategy game

[@user-qf6yt3id3w]

Mark Cerny is a legend.

[@transfire]

One of my favorite games! Wish I could play it and sequels today.

[@DubsBrown]

Marble blast ultra and marble it up kinda keep it going

[@error.418]

Thanks for posting this!

[@DarkHorseSki]

This was one of my favorite games in the arcade from the day it arrived.

[@Robert-nz2qw]

Great talk (I’ve been watching quite a few)

[@dtvjho]

24:00 The 68000 is awesome, learned how to do assembly on it on a Mac after learning 6502 on an Apple II+ 24:18 I've seen many engineers with that edition. When I went to the store, I ended up with the ANSI edition, still have it. I burned EPROMs from 1985 through 1993. I wonder if the Marble C code still exists. If the basic design (physics engine) for ball movement, and the algorithm for the playing field are still known or extant, it may be feasible to recreate the game on a modern PC, and like the classic Loderunner game, include a level editor. We wouldn't need to assemblerize the C code, and the stamps would become tiles or similar on newer platforms.

[@sonidojamon]

This was fascinating. Thank you!

[@ClassicTVMan1981X]

How many levels did Mark Cerny expect Marble Madness to have, besides the six that wound up in the final version? Cerny flashes back and wished he'd be able to do more, but at the time he couldn't since to do that would have required more ROM space which was costly and would have meant more development time which would have caused Atari's production facilities to go idle, which is important to know especially when you consider the company's financial outlook following the video game crash of '83.

[@DubsBrown]

Such a good game, Marble Blast Ultra/Marble it Up are spiritual successors but we need sixty more levels in Marble Madness II. Random arrangement would have been great for the Arcade as well.

[@MetalHorrorGamer]

This was great. A very enjoyable video

[@mnmlst1]

I love this game so much.

[@NeilRoy]

Atari produced some very brilliant men though. If it wasn't for them, we might never have seen the Amiga computer. Jay Minor came from Atari and was a brilliant engineer that designed the Amiga.

[@3dkiwi920]

Great guy, amazing talk.

[@Clay3613]

From Marvel Madness to the PS5, this man is a genius!

[@yank3970]

thanks for sharing GDC

[@johndough8115]

A Motorized Trackball could have been accomplished, by motorizing the two main axis rollers. That said... I think the effect of merely braking the drive shaft (frictionally slowing it), would have created a feeling of force feedback, that simulated momentum effects, as well as textured / bumpy surfaces, and falling onto the floor. Basically put.. there would not be a need to spin the ball on the downhills, if it did not operate mechanically well in such a manor. Simply pulsing a magnetic system, to create frictional braking... would be more than enough for the effect. That said.. driving the shafts probably would work fine. Look to Race Drivin's (sitdown) wheel motor, which had a pass through shaft, that also had an encoder wheel on it. It worked flawlessly. It would just be a smaller motor. Since the overall speed of the ball (in game) was slow... they probably should have used a much larger diameter sized trackball set. Use of actual bowling balls, would have been great.. as their natural mass would have been hard to spin up to full speed + hard to stop their full momentum. It would have better matched the arcades relative physics / speeds. The assemblies would have cost more... but they would have been even more durable.. with the larger bearings needed, and less tolerance issues. They also would have worked as better advertisement, as they would have created a real spectacle.

[@darxim7291]

Marble Madness is so great on the arcade machine.

[@nom928]

37:48 Happy cyclops (o

[@TheHUhelps]

This was a really well-made game. I sucked at it, but it was still a great game.

[@hunterdavis3003]

What’s the secret to “everything you know is wrong” stage? I always got stuck there! Always loved this game!

[@fenzelian]

The gravity isn't exactly inverted, but the uphills speed you up and the downhills slow you down. There are a few spots where you need to hit a downhill with momentum or you're not going to be able to get past it.

[@Ybalrid]

41:53 I know that voice... Is that Jason Scott asking a question? xD

[@wellbury]

I thought the same thing. It looks like Jason was there (see ascii.textfiles.com/archives/3395> and ) so I think it's highly likely.

[@reniferZiolo]

i wish he discussed physics more but still a great talk

[@SionynJones]

I really hope we see the day where marble man is dumped. So far the greedy private collectors make all sorts of fallacious excuses why they won't make them public. Ignoring the fact their own greed is the real reason they won't release it. idk maybe they acquired the marble man prototypes nafariously and scared of litigation who knows? But I think Its time to free marble man that game belongs in a museum not in a private collection! Rant over. Great talk Mark. Really interesting stuff especially the challenges of writing marble madness with c apposed to asm. I've always preferred writing in asm due to the intimacy you have with the hardware apposed to high level abstraction. Loved the talk love marble madness :)

[@scorchmon]

You only had to wait 4 more years from when you wrote this! 😂

[@turrican3839]

I wonder what he thinks about Marble Madness II :)

[@witeshade]

Awesome talk, although it seemed like he couldn't hear or wasn't paying attention to the questions very well at the end, because his answers didn't relate much to the questions. But, the presentation itself was excellent. I can't even imagine the frustration involved in working with such slow processes to develop the game.

[@thesnare100]

Is the source code available for this game? I read about c and want to see what functions were used to do the graphics.

[@emolovetree]

tech.quarterarcade.com/tech/MAME/src/atarisy1.c.html.aspx?g=1685

[@thesnare100]

Thank You! I've been looking for it for a while!

[@emolovetree]

thesnare100 no problem i got lucky when it popped up in a search. it doesn't include any of the header files and cause of all the specific pokes and loaders it does it looks like c with inline assembly almost

[@thesnare100]

I figured it did look a little incomplete, I was going to ask if it was the whole game's source code. Now, after googling a lot and skimming some books I'll get to see how the graphics were actually done (well, at least some of it) There are some header files on lines 119-120-121. Actually, if I wonder if this is just software for some of platform the game runs on, it mentions a few others in it as well

[@snooks5607]

@@emolovetree what are you two even talking about? that is the mame driver for sys1 hw, nothing to do with game code

[@sanseverything900]

Wow, in that era it took literally days for a computer to render those levels. Nowadays I bet most gaming rigs could procedurally generate the playfield in realtime as you're playing the game! No more 4 minute games lol.

[@marckferrari]

Easily

[@papayacatproductions]

I'm visualizing Jim Rash delivering this talk.

[@Euquila]

Marble Madness made me and my older sister start crying... very sad... waaaah!

[@MrSTVR]

And to think he had yet to bring the world Knack

[@Omnipotent2013]

Do they make a marble madness game for the PC that is modern? If not would be a good idea maybe.

[@desktorp]

_PC Modern Marble Madness_ was set to be a highly cinematic, single-player, action/adventure game, starring a tortured but strong, black marble heroine, locked in a death battle against the wicked patriarchy of white marble society. However, it was cancelled after Donald Trump's annointment as Godking of the Known Universe.

[@eartianwerewolf]

you are a potato mr david lol

[@o_o_o_o_o-o_o_o_o_o]

I don't know why anybody would need anything except Super Monkey Ball 1 and 2

[@unknownfilmmaker777]

I had no idea David Spade designed Marble Madness.

[@kristianTV1974]

My first Amiga 500 game (UK 1988) was MM. Almost arcade perfect. Played to death, and the only port ever that plays okay with a mouse (not great - but okay)

[@JustAnotherAlchemist]

Everything you know is wrong.

[@realunoriginal]

MARBLE MADNESS REBOOT 2019 CONTACT THE CREATOR!!! Hit like V

[@realunoriginal]

Imagine Marble Madness mobile version where you can tilt your iphone or ipad to change your speed and direction!!! Mark Cerny give me a job!!!

[@WalkerRileyMC]

@@realunoriginal Right...but is Mark going to be responsible for ripping his credit out, or are you?