Talk:Alley Cat (video game)

Atari version

This game was also released for the Atari800, with 16 color graphics. I in fact know the Atari version better than the PC version. Shouldn't the article include detail about that, as well as a screenshot?

I might edit it later myself, but I would appreciate it someone else could help out.

CGally81 23:49, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I replaced the screenshot of the MS-DOS version's title screen with a picture of gameplay, from the Atari 800 version. I feel that it better represents what the game is actually like, not to mention that most people are probably more familiar with the Atari 800 version anyway.

If you feel this is inappropriate, I apologize. I figured it was the best thing to do.

CGally81 00:42, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I contest your claim that "most people are probably more familiar with the Atari version". — Timwi 15:22, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Yeah. Keep the picture of the other version, that's fine, but I *highly* doubt more people are familiar with the Atari version. Anyone who had a PC in the 80s probably had this game. This is definitely one of the classics of the PC. (Until now I had no idea there was an Atari version too.. and I've read up on this game online before.) 207.59.86.5 20:05, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The Atari version should actually be noted as 128-color, not 16-color. Although noting the color count seems questionable since that sort of information falls more under the technical specs of the platform than anything unique to the game. Also, since the Atari version of Alley Cat came first (the PC version is a port), it really should be given precedence in this article. Relative popularity of the two versions is unverifiable and irrelevant. Also, this is my first Wiki comment ever, so please let me know if I've done anything wrong. Thanks. Clayhalliwell 16:58, 10 August 2005 (UTC)

I don't agree with you that relative popularity is "unverifiable", much less "irrelevant". – Timwi 16:43, 12 August 2005 (UTC)

I partly agree with Clayhalliwell. Relative popularity isn't completely unverifiable or irrelevant, but it is extremely difficult to verify - how do you survey a representative sample of everybody who's played Alley Cat? It'd be a problem just finding them. Let's omit any such claim for now. Mentioning that the PC version is a port is quite verifible and interesting. Deco 11:43, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

DOS version colors

There seems to be some disagreement about the color list in the article, so I thought I'd explain my changes here in the talk page before I change it again. The current color list says "(with either black, white, cyan and magenta or black, red, yellow and green being onscreen at once)." These may be the correct colors, but this does not account for all possible combinations of colors.

For example, when inside the fish bowl the initial colors are black, cyan, magenta, and white (if I remember correctly). When under water for a few seconds, black is replaced with blue. Then if you remain under water for a few more seconds blue is replaced with pink, and a few seconds later pink is replaced with red. Another example is in the love game, where the black is again replaced with blue once a gift is picked up, and they are switched back if the gift is dropped. So while the colors described in the list are the most common color combinations, there are other combinations that are used.

Color information shouldn't be listed anyway, for any platform. That's a property of the hardware platform, not the game. Clayhalliwell 17:01, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

No, it's not. The 4-color palette is chosen by the game from a larger set of available colors and very much defines the visual appearance of the game. Unsigned user: you are correct though that occasionally palettes other than the two basic palettes are used for short periods, for effects. I don't think this needs to be mentioned. Deco 11:40, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

i think it depends on the screen that you use in the game - EGA, VGA, CGA. i remmember playing with only black and white and no colors at all. Thelord23 11:34, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

PC version

Is the PC version really a DOS version and not a PC Booter? I think it's a PC Booter, because you can't exit to DOS and PC Booters were more common in 1984 than DOS games. Calvero2 23:42, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

It is actually possible to exit the game using ctrl + y 213.93.105.126 20:13, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

I didn't know that. But that ctrl + y option is not displayed on screen with the other ctrl + letter options. This exit option could be added by the same person who converted the PC Booter to DOS.

Anyway, MobyGames says Alley Cat is a PC Booter and not a DOS game. And I've seen Alley Cat PC Booter images on the Internet.

It was probably originally a PC Booter and ported to DOS. So both versions exist. Dcoetzee 03:51, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

But is the DOS version an official version or is it just an unofficial hacked version of the PC Booter version? Calvero2 18:59, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

The original version was a PC boot disk. The boot sector was very simple and just loaded the rest of the sectors on the disk into memory. A brief inspection of the easily found ALLEYCAT.COM or CAT.EXE, etc. shows that the first half of this "emulates" the original boot sector, including relocating the origin from 100h to 0h. For this reason, I have removed the DOS requirement from the wiki page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.228.66.194 (talk) 19:57, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Categorization

It is difficult to classify into a particular genre because rather few similar games ever existed. Today it might be considered an arcade game with adventure elements, more precisely, a platform game with mini-game elements.

I just removed this line because it's the very definition of WP:NOR – evaluating it based on the gameplay itself, an original interpretation. As noted, I hated to do this becuase this is a really, really obscure game with a high likelihood of no WP:RS review existing that would categorize this article. Anyway, I guess I came here just to make a note of it so the line doesn't disappear into obscurity. hbdragon88 00:25, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Added animated image

I added the animated image to the place of the other bright and colorful one. That bright and colorful screenshot is most likely tampered (not original), I played Alley Cat back in the day and really don't remember the colors being so vivid and bright. I don't know what should be done with it, so I moved it down to a new "Images" section. If it's not necessary then I guess someone can delete it.NeoGenPT (talk) 03:50, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

For some reason the cat seems to be running too fast on Firefox. And in IE8 the shrinked image isn't being properly displayed, the cat leaves a trail. Is anyone else having these same glitches? (Or others with other browsers?) —Preceding unsigned comment added by NeoGenPT (talk • contribs) 04:05, 18 December 2009 (UTC)