Atari 2600 / VCS - Berzerk - NTSC - Game 6 (Points) - 419,650 - Steve Germershausen

NTSC - Game 6 (Points)
Score Track	https://www.twingalaxies.com/scores.php?scores=2306
Rules	Difficulty switches are not used in this game and can therefore be set to either A or B position. Any other settings should remain default upon boot-up.
Submission Message	Hello, humanoids. Back on April 28th, 2019, Garrett H was the first TG gamer to discover the kill screen glitch on Berzerk game 6. This glitch is very prominent on game 1, causing most runs to die out at around 150K. On game 6 we see scores go well into the 300K before the glitch takes hold. I'm not sure what causes it on game 6, but here's an observation: Garrett's run, and my 2 runs seem to have a certain robot "reset" around 79K and every 79K thereafter. (Or this can be calculated as to how many screens or levels have passed) - the robots revert back to their old level 1 shooting speeds, gradually increasing the bullet speeds until maximum is reattained. My 1st game 6 run in October 2018 was stopped on purpose at 333K, not knowing there was a kill screen coming. D'oh! I found the Garrett kill screen on this current run, but only when well into 400K. I don't remember doing anything differently in this run, like continually moving the human. Score: 419,650 Starts at: :22 + :43

Haha!
Just staring on this, easy accept unless some strange occurance.

So...
You noticed my plan, eh?

Lol, I actually think you know better, if I can, I'll surely try to catch you, but if I had a specific commitment I wouldn't be bouncing back and forth from every system I can get my hands on.
But you better watch yur back, that 2 spot isn't too many ESI away!!!!
;P
(Actually- think my 2600 well has run dry, the reason I am entering the next Atariage compo...)

Tough game, Excellent score!!!

Oh, hey...
No way this could be right, but never know...
You Guys know that on the real Berzerk for Vectrex(there is a "fixed" rom, that breaks the spirit of the game), if there are too many things going on on screen at one time, i.e., too many enemies shooting at once, etc, the game goes "Berzerk". and the score gets stupid, attempt is annulled.
I wonder if the "killscreen" on this can be anticipated and controlled?

I'm pretty sure the issue is here >>Attachment 88542

... and manifests itself here. 2^8 x 2^8 = 2^16 iterations (65,536) with no player motion and no button push instantiates attract mode.
Attachment 88543

... this tells me the programmer did this on purpose >:-(

Assuming each frame is 0.0333s, then the aggregate time allowance for idling is 2184.51s, or 36m 24.51s. Lame. LOL!

Thanks for the research and info, Garrett, you did some digging to find that 'non-movement' glitch. Any word at the 46 minute mark when the robots revert to no bullets / slow bullets? Is it another screen counter that kicks in? Glitchzerk.

According to the assembly, "gamelevel" is incremented by one each wave, and also sets the values "ROBOT_MOVE_DELAY" and "ROBOT_MISSILE_DELAY". Since each of these three variables are one-byte values (value = 00 to FF, or 0 to 255), and unless coded specifically to overcome it, all Atari 2600 1-byte values that increment will return to zero when incremented while the value was FF. This will necessarily mean that programatically, Berzerk behaves on wave 256 exactly as it would on wave 0.

TL;DR: The entire game other than the score and reserve lives are reset at wave 256, and every 256 waves thereafter.

oh yeah ... and that stupid idle-time increment counter. Unfortunately, that doesn't get reset. I'm going to conduct a little test ... Turn on the console, start game 1, kill all the robots on level 0, and let it sit there until it borks out. My guess is it will after 36m 24s. Then, I'm going to reboot, start game 1, kill all the robots on level 0, and let it sit for 10 minutes, push the reset switch, and let it sit until it borks out. This will determine whether or not hitting the reset switch resets the idle-time increment, or continues where the last game left off. Based on the assembly, I'm thinking you have to power cycle in order to reset the idle time, and not only that, it looks like it starts incrementing upon power on whether you start playing immediately or not.