PunyInform v2.2 by Fredrik Ramsberg and Johan Berntsson is a library written in Inform 6 to create adventure game (pure text, no graphic support contrary to DAAD) using the Z-machine virtual machine which will run on 8bit computers (or more recent computers too). PunyInform has a parser, knowing of common verbs and a framework to write adventure games.

PunyInform is based on the Inform 6 library written by Graham Nelson. Its goal is to make easily adventure games in Inform 6, with a manual describing the differences between the official library and PunyInform..

Games using PunyInform can be compiled in z3, z5 and z8 format (z3 being the best format for 8bit computers, other formats have more features). Compared to the Inform 6 library, it means that there is no support for the Glulx virtual machine but z3 format is important as Inform 6 doesnt support it.

To compile games written with PunyInform, you should use the Inform 6 compiler maintained by David Kinder. Binaries are available on if-archive. PunyInform needs Inform v6.34 (or more).

They are tutorials to write adventure game with PunyInform (end of the page).

To try your game after compilation, you can use WinFrotz by David Kinder, to create map easily you can use Trizbort.

PunyInform v2.1 by Fredrik Ramsberg and Johan Berntsson is a library written in Inform 6 to create adventure game (pure text, no graphic support contrary to DAAD) using the Z-machine virtual machine which will run on 8bit computers (or more recent computers too). PunyInform has a parser, knowing of common verbs and a framework to write adventure games.

PunyInform is based on the Inform 6 library written by Graham Nelson. Its goal is to make easily adventure games in Inform 6, with a manual describing the differences between the official library and PunyInform..

Games using PunyInform can be compiled in z3, z5 and z8 format (z3 being the best format for 8bit computers, other formats have more features). Compared to the Inform 6 library, it means that there is no support for the Glulx virtual machine but z3 format is important as Inform 6 doesnt support it.

To compile games written with PunyInform, you should use the Inform 6 compiler maintained by David Kinder. Binaries are available on if-archive. PunyInform needs Inform v6.34 (or more).

They are tutorials to write adventure game with PunyInform (end of the page).

To try your game after compilation, you can use WinFrotz by David Kinder, to create map easily you can use Trizbort.

The last version of the C compilator for PC and MacOS z88dk v2.1 is out since early February 2021, more details here.

Z88dk supports many more platforms, including the Amstrad Notepad NC 100/150 (480x64 pixels) and 200 (480x128 pixels).

Turbo Rascal SE (TRSE) v0.12 is out. It's a complete suite (IDE, compiler, programming language, image sprite level resource editor) intended for developing games/demos for 8 / 16-bit line of computers, with a focus on the MOS 6502, the Motorola 68000, the (GB)Z80 and the X86. TRSE currently supports application development for the C64, C128, VIC-20, PLUS4, NES, Gameboy, PET, ZX Spectrum, TIKI 100, Amstrad CPC 464, Atari 2600, 8086AT, Amiga 500 and the Atari ST 520 (complete list here). With the benefits of a modern IDE (error messages, code completion, syntax highlighting etc) and a bunch of fast built-in tools, it has never been easier to program for your favorite obsolete system !

Join TRSE on Facebook !

Among the many changes of this 0.12 version (download link also), there is the source code of the Amstrad CPC demo Mørketid which I really did like.

Keith56 is known for his Amstrad CPC games and now he is an author for a programming book on Z80, 6502, 68000, 8086 and ARM assembly.

You can buy the book on Amazon :

• US amazon link
• UK amazon link

A new articles is available on 64 NOPS, a blog about programmation on Amstrad CPC by Hicks (Vanity) and Toms (Pulpo Corrosivo). The subject of the article is : Perfectly accurate Z80 flags and CPC timing.

Orgams is an assembler in ROM for Amstrad CPC, created by Madram, Drill and Hicks. A new version is available.

The documentation in french and english is available on Dorgams' wiki.

Download the last WIP version (5th January 2021)

New articles are available on 64 NOPS, a blog about programmation on Amstrad CPC by Hicks (Vanity) and Toms (Pulpo Corrosivo).

Infocom is a company created in June 1979 by Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.) staff and students. This company has created well known adventure games (interactive fiction).

They choose an interesting solution to create their adventure games, they could have created games and adapt them on other platforms, instead they choosed to separate the game engine and the game data. So they only have to write an new game engine for each computer.

This game interpreter or virtual machine is called the Z-machine. It was created by Joel Berez and Marc Blank in 1979. The original compiler by Infocom has been lost but Graham Nelson has written in 1993 Inform which can ccompile the source of an adventure game for the Z-machine virtual machine or for the Glulx virtual machine (which removes some limitations of the original virtual machine by Infocom).

The compiler Inform 6 since the v6.30 can compile either for Z-machine or Glulx virtual machine. There is also a version 7 of Inform.

And now comes PunyInform v1.8 by Fredrik Ramsberg and Johan Berntsson which is a library written in Inform 6 to create adventure game (pure text, no graphic support contrary to DAAD) using the Z-machine virtual machine which will run on 8bit computers (or more recent computers too). PunyInform has a parser, knowing of common verbs and a framework to write adventure games.

PunyInform is based on the Inform 6 library written by Graham Nelson. Its goal is to make easily adventure games in Inform 6, with a manual describing the differences between the official library and PunyInform..

Games using PunyInform can be compiled in z3, z5 and z8 format (z3 being the best format for 8bit computers, other formats have more features). Compared to the Inform 6 library, it means that there is no support for the Glulx virtual machine but z3 format is important as Inform 6 doesnt support it.

To compile games written with PunyInform, you should use the Inform 6 compiler maintained by David Kinder. Binaries are available on if-archive. PunyInform needs Inform v6.34 (or more).

They are tutorials to write adventure game with PunyInform (end of the page).

To try your game after compilation, you can use WinFrotz by David Kinder, to create map easily you can use Trizbort.

Turbo Rascal SE (TRSE) is a complete suite (IDE, compiler, programming language, image sprite level resource editor) intended for developing games/demos for 8 / 16-bit line of computers, with a focus on the MOS 6502, the Motorola 68000, the (GB)Z80 and the X86. TRSE currently supports application development for the C64, C128, VIC-20, PLUS4, NES, Gameboy, PET, ZX Spectrum, TIKI 100, Amstrad CPC 464, Atari 2600, 8086AT, Amiga 500 and the Atari ST 520 (complete list here). With the benefits of a modern IDE (error messages, code completion, syntax highlighting etc) and a bunch of fast built-in tools, it has never been easier to program for your favorite obsolete system !

TRSE runs on Windows 64-bit, Linux 64-bit and OS X. Development began on Feb 24th 2018. The TRSE framework contains a number of project examples for multiple platforms, including almost 200 runnable tutorials. TRSE also contains a real-time ray tracer that can export (compressed) data for demo and game production.

Join TRSE on Facebook !

Leuat has written an Amstrad CPC demo with TSRE : Mørketid released for the Syntax demo party 2020. The group is Proxima with code and graphics by Leuat and music by Mibri.

The last version of RASM is v1.3 (24th November 2020).

Rasm is now available on Github (documentation included).

This multi platform assembler (linux, windows, but not only like MorphOS on Amiga) let you program for Amstrad CPC.

Changelog is :

• extended cartridge support
• new directive LZSA1, LZSA2 for crunched code sections
• new directives INCLZSA1 and INCLZSA2 for binary import and LZSA crunching
• new directives XORMEM and SUMMEM to generate checksum of a memory area
• new directive TIMESTAMP to output date/time
• new TAPE option for SAVE directive
• new DMA import options with INCBIN directive (new checks & warnings)
• new enhanced instructions LD IX/IY,BC/DE & LD BC/DE,IX/IY
• new tag {SLOT} for extended cartridge management
• new suffix .HIGH and .LOW to split 16bits register in macro definition
• new option -msep to specify separator for labels inside modules
• new option -amper to use ampersand for hex values
• directive BRK now generates #ED,#FF opcode
• bugfix byte order for Microsoft real format
• bugfix DSK header with nightly build
• bugfix 16bits PCM wav import
• do not warn for missing file with INCLUDE in disabled condition
• do not export struct definition with symbols
• many warnings removed, cleanup, some draft for future functionalities

The finale version of the adventure game Tristam Island by Hugo Labrande is available for 3,99 dollars only. The demo version limited to the first chapter with a gameplay estimated to 1 hour-1 hour 30 (first part of the game) is still available.

This adventure game uses the PunyInform engine by Fredrik Ramsberg. It is in fact available for 36 platforms (8, 16, 32 and 64 bits), including the Amstrad CPC and PCW.

Visual Studio Code is a programming IDE for many languages and now also thanks to an extension by Cebe74 the Locomotive Basic with syntaxic coloring, renumbering and running thanks to CPCBasic Unchained by Marco Vieth directly inside VSC.

CPCBasic Unchained is an interpreter of Basic Locomotive written in javascript, so you can add it on a web site if you wish.

There is another possibility to write Locomotive Basic programs : using CPC Basic 3 by Dinoneno which I wrote about earlier. There is a forum about CPC Basic 3.

Something to follow closely, a demo of the famous PC adventure game for Amstrad in the work. You can see a video of game screens, no gameplay though.

64 NOPS or the art of doing nothing (NO OPERATION) 64 times on Amstrad CPC by Hicks (Vanity) and Toms (Pulpo Corrosivo) is a new programmation blog for the Amstrad CPC.