DEVELOPER Q&A
TROY LYNDON ON CODING THE C64 VERSION OF GUN SMOKE
How did you land the job of converting Gun Smoke to the Commodore 64?
My company at the time was Lyndon And Associates. In early 1987 we signed a 15-title deal with Capcom USA to convert its many coin-op games to the PC and C64. Gun Smoke was one of them.
Did you receive any assets or assistance from Capcom, including access to the coin-op?
Yes, Capcom provided all the graphics and we used software to convert them into a format we could use. So we did have to create the graphics, but not from scratch. Capcom also provided the music – its resources were amazing. I remember having the insides of the coin-op laid out on my desk. The monitor had the tube behind it, so it wasn’t even enclosed [don’t try this at home kids].
What would you say was the most challenging aspect from a coding point of view?
I wrote the main code on PC which we converted to the C64. My colleague Michael Knox, now deceased, wrote the graphics driver. On the C64 the difficulty was in achieving a smooth scroll, while reusing sprites in the vertical blank.
What are your memories of working with Michael?
Mike was a wonderful person and my best friend for a long part of my life. We later created a new company, Park Place Productions, and we went on to create the first 3D Madden football game for the Sega Genesis in 1990, and again in 1992. We also developed the first NHL Hockey for the Genesis in 1991.
Gun Smoke was advertised and reviewed in UK magazines, but it was never actually released. Do you know why?
Are you sure? I thought it had been released. I guess Capcom’s main business outside of the arcades was the NES, so it spent about $500,000 with us just as an experiment to publish their games for home computers. In the end, it kept its main focus and scaled back its focus on computers.
How pleased were you with the finished game and the reaction it received?
The game was fun, just like the coin-op game. It was an interesting way to keep the normal gameplay dynamics of shooting games, but instead of shooting alien spacecraft you could shoot bad guys in the Old West. I think we made a fun game of it. I don’t remember fine-tuning the later levels, so perhaps that’s something we could have improved.