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Thursday 20 March 2014

ST Classic "Oids" Finally Released for the Amiga

Earlier today English Amiga Board forum member meynaf, announced that the much-loved Atari ST game "Oids" had finally come to the Amiga. The latest in a string of ST titles he'd converted over to Commodore's machine, this release came completely out of the blue.

Oids was originally released for the the ST by FTL Games way back in 1987. An Apple Macintosh version followed, but for whatever reason this failed to receive an Amiga conversion.

The game is similar to the Firebird classic "Thrust", where you have to navigate your craft across a number of landscapes, avoiding the scenery, artillery installations, and battling with gravity itself.

Although little has been revealed detailing just how the game was converted over to the Amiga, meynaf does explain that it wasn't easy;
...I've just made another game port from the Atari ST. 
It was hard to find my way; this one had TOS calls scattered everywhere and even GEM calls (trap #2), in addition to a very messy keyboard handling code, file i/o storing 16-bit handles where it should have not, and a fearsome protection scheme which i am not even sure to have fully removed. But here it is. 
As I never played that one on the ST (and have no PC to run an emulator), it would be good if someone with a great knowledge of the game could test this version, to see if everything behaves as it should. I'm not too confident with that one, many bugs are probably lurking in here, ready to explode in your face - so beware. Only thing i can say is that it seems to work for me". 


I've not had time to try this out yet, but initial feedback from other members of the English Amiga Board seems to indicate that you'll need a machine with a 68020 processor or greater.

If you'd like to download and try the game for yourself you can get to it directly by going to http://meynaf.free.fr/pr/oids.lzx

To follow the Oids thread on the English Amiga Board go to: http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=72992

So, what ST game does meynaf next plan to bring to the Amiga? Well, it looks like rather than another conversion he's working on something brand new;
"I don't think I'll make any more game ports, at least for some time. I now prefer writing my own game from scratch"
Watch this space!

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