Name: ADV
Author: atomicdude

New: ADV 1.0

Online play. Up to four ADVs in one game: Windows, Android and the web, all mixed. Host a game, send your friend the code, play. On the same Wi-Fi you don't even need the code. Try it in Zap Rally, Tank Duel or Blob Bump.
New games: Blob Bump (sumo blobs for up to four), Tank Duel, Box Shove and Road Rush.
More in every game: arenas, power-ups, medals, modes, silver bricks and new levels.
Jumpy's big adventure: four worlds, a world map, secret stars and the Slime King.
The modem under the console, game controllers, a LEARN lesson for making your first game, and ADV Lite that fits any website.

About

ADV is a little fantasy console: a pretend games machine with tiny limits that make games fun to make and fun to play. It has a 128 by 128 pixel screen in 24 colors, four channels of chip sound, two players, and a little green LCD on top that games can draw on too.

Games come on cartridges, and every cartridge is a picture: a colorful square that looks a bit like a QR code, with the whole game hidden inside it. Share one like any other picture and anyone can play it, right here, on Windows, or on an Android phone. Making games is part of the console too: the Developer Kit has editors for code, sprites, maps, sounds and music, and when your game is done you can send it to ADV online for everyone to play.

Specs

Screen128 x 128 pixels, 24 colors

Aux screen72 x 18, four-shade green LCD

Sprites256 of 8 x 8, with 8 flags each

Map128 x 64 tiles

Sound4 channels, 8 waves, 8 effects

Music64 sounds of 32 notes, 64 patterns

CodeLua, blocks, or the game kit

Players2 per ADV, up to 4 online

Saves8K per game: high scores and more

Speed60 frames a second

Cartspictures (.adv), text (.advt), Lua

Runs onWindows, Android and the web

How it works

Every frame, sixty times a second, ADV runs your game's Lua: _update moves things about, and _draw paints the 128 x 128 screen. A little sound chip mixes four channels of triangle, square, saw, noise and more, with slides, vibrato and arpeggios. A game's sprites, map, sounds and music all live in its cart, right next to its code.

To make a cart picture, ADV squashes the game, adds error correction (the same trick QR codes use, so a smudge or a wobbly photo doesn't spoil it), and paints it as squares of eight bright colors, with a color key around the edge. Reading it back finds the corner markers, even in a photo taken at an angle, and turns the colors back into the game. This web version is the very same code as the Windows and Android apps, running in your browser.

Online play

Up to four ADVs can play one game together: Windows, Android and the web, all mixed. In Zap Rally, Tank Duel or Blob Bump, press up on the title to host: ADV shows a code. Your friends press down in the same game and type it in, and the ADVs link up directly, player to player, through the little modem under the console. On the same Wi-Fi they find each other without a code (and the host has to let each one in).

What's shared: only button presses, sixty times a second, and a check that everyone's game still matches. No names, no chat, no pictures. To find each other, ADVs leave notes on ntfy.sh, a free public message service, locked with the code: without the code nobody can find them or read them, and ntfy.sh throws them away after a few hours. To learn its own internet address, ADV asks your router, or Google's address service if the router can't say. Like in any online game, linked ADVs can see each other's internet address, so only send your code to friends you know.