Wonderball
Platform: Commodore 64
Gametype: Undefined
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Wonderball

1992 Hi-Tec

Status: Full Game, Findability: 4/5
Coding: Stefan Toftevall
Graphics: Stefan Toftevall
Sound: Magnus Karlsson, Stefan Toftevall

Now for a start, we’re not 100% certain if this was intended for release on the actual Hi-tec label, as you will find out below.

Wonderball has been floating around for a while and is a simple platform game with a ball that bounces around platforms. Coder Stefan Toftevall started the game when he was just 16yrs old and finished the development. After being part of several groups, Stefan got in touch with a guy called ‘Per’ who was apparently a person who had some contacts with a game company who could help Stefan get his game released.

Sadly Stefan heard no more from Per, and many years later the game was found on the web with copyright listed to 1992 High-tech Software. Stefan therefore believes tha the game was given to Hi-tec software to try and release it behind Stefan’s back.
 It seems that Per failed in the attempt though if this was the case, as David Palmer was not aware of the game and Hi-tec went under anyway in 1992.

Overall Stefan never got paid for any of his work, but it seems luckily no-one made any money out of his work either. What exists on the web is believed to be everything of the game, and complete. No more of it exists.

Stefan has kindly given his Creator Speaks story, so take a read and then download this cute little game…

Case closed…

Contributions: John Christian Lønningdal, Stefan Toftevall

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Stefan Toftevall talks about work on Wonderball...

"I guess I can blame my father, in early years like 12 years old (1987) I begun to develop a huge interest for computers. From the start, it was only to play games.

I remember running to my friends with tapes full of games, ready to be loaded by the C64 cassette player. The “MR.Z” turbo was widely used to decrease loading times.
 As days went on I became more and more curious about how the games were programmed and my dream was to gain knowledge and create something myself one day.

I remember I bought an “Action Replay” cartridge which I believe was a extremely useful tool to get up and running. I used the Machinecode monitor inside that cartridge all the time to write my code. I never used an assembler. I thought the features of the Action Replay was so sharp and useful that I never had to look for something else.

Of course, in the early beginning of programming, I wrote different BASIC programs, but realized soon the lack of speed in the running BASIC programs. Machine code was the answer! This could make miracles in no time!

I slowly began to do more and more complicated things with the C64. I gained more and more knowledge about rasters, sprites, scrollers, special graphics effects and such. I coded lots of different “demos” in various groups, my handle was “IZE” in the years 88-89 and afterwards I changed to “ICE”. Don’t remember why but ICE was cooler…

I was a part of groups like Newtech, World Wide Expressive, Science 451, Exact, Level 42, and I may have forgotten a few else… Beside the coding I enjoyed drawing graphics and also making music, which I did a lot. I also coded my own music player, but I never finished the music editor unfortunately. I was impressed by the work of other C64 musicians like Martin Galway, Rob Hubbard, Mark Cooksey, Chris Huelsbeck, Moppe and many others.

Interest for game coding developed as time went and I started several different games, many should perfectly suit the recent C64 market. Everything from car driving games to arcade shoot em up games which I enjoyed most. In 1991 when I was 16 years old I started to code Wonderball, a 2D platform game which actually was finished. In some strange way I came in touch with a guy called “Per” – he was a person who “had some contacts with a game company” and who could help me to get my Wonderball game released. Unfortunately something went wrong along the way and I’ve never heard of him anymore. Today I believe he gave the game to Hi-Tec software and tried to release it behind my back. I don’t know if he got any money for it…

One thing’s for sure; I didn’t get any and all the work I did with Wonderball is 100% completely unpaid work. Except for the joy getting the game finished of course.
 A few years ago I saw some screen shots from my dear game and memories start to arise. It looked like it was actually realeased by Hi-Tec software, but I don’t know for sure.

Anyway, it was great fun to develop the game and I’ve learned a great lesson. Never trust a stranger!"



http://www.gamesthatwerent.com/gtw64/wonderball/
