I.      Introduction

This is a remake of a game called Snake Byte by Sirius Software Inc. published
in 1982 for, according to Moby Games, the Commodore 64, Vic-20, Apple II & 
Atari 8-bit.  This remake has no audio.

From Wikipedia: The player controls a snake, crawling into a rectangular area.
The aim is to eat 10 apples per level. If an apple is not eaten during the
given deadline, three extra apples are to be eaten. The snake becomes longer
with each apple eaten. The snake loses a life when crashing a wall or its
tail. Higher levels have more fences, making the game more difficult. An
optional difficulty are the "plums" (one or two pieces), which kill the snake
when hitting its head.

It's a game I loved to play back in the 80's and it gave me a lot of pleasure
to recreate the game using cc65.

I uploaded a video on YouTube that shows the different versions and some 
gameplay.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7Y4HVXVzoI

II.     Distribution

The version packaged up here comes in a few different flavours:
1.  The 4-colour hi-res version that closely resembles the original
2.  A text-based, colour version for the Commodore 64
3.  A conio version that runs on several platforms (slow!)
4.  A Commander x16 version for the "new" 8-bit computer

The conio version was done so anyone that wants to attempt a port has
an easy starting-point.  It contains no assembly.  It's worth noting that
I wrote the game for the C64 but made it so it's as portable as I could.
If your conio display isn't at least 40x25, you will miss some info.  On
the Atari with 24 rows, for example, there's a screen that asks how many
plums right before the game starts.  That question is on the 25th line
and isn't seen so it looks like a blank screen.

III.        Building from source

This distribution is available in github at https://github.com/StewBC/snakebyte

The Makefile has the following credits:
###############################################################################
### Generic Makefile for cc65 projects - full version with abstract options ###
### V1.3.0(w) 2010 - 2013 Oliver Schmidt & Patryk "Silver Dream !" Łogiewa  ###
###############################################################################

I found it at the link:
http://wiki.cc65.org/doku.php?id=cc65:project_setup

The following command will build all platforms:
make TARGETS=c64,c64.text,c64.conio,cx16
if you have vice or the cx16 emulator in the path, you can use test to make
and run, i.e. for the cx16 it would be:
make TARGETS=cx16 test 

IV.     Porting

The source files can be found in the src folder inside the project.  Inside
the src folder are other folders, namely c64, c64.text, c64.conio and cx16.
These are the variant specific files that make up the different versions of
the game, or different platforms, which are all collectively called the
variants.  The file that's really needed is the target or variant-specific
implementation for the functions in plat.h.  If those are provided, and some
can have empty implementations, the game can be made to work on a target.
These are the files and why they exist in the C64 folder:
c64
    crt0.s          - Moves DATA and RODATA segments into place
    logo64.c        - The graphical image of the snake logo
    logo64.h        - Accompanying header
    plat64.c        - Implementation of c64 specific functions
    snakec64.cfg    - Custom memory layout (VIC hi-res in the 0x4000 bank)

See the other folders for their files.  They all have less files.  Only a
plat.c is actually required to make a target go.  To add the nes as a target,
simply create src/nes and add a file, let's say platnes.c, and you are off
to the races.  The conio version complains about no cgetc() on the nes.  You
really should be able to make a target work by just working in the plat file,
no other editing should be required.

There is a Misc folder that contains a file SnakeLogo.txt.  This is a string
version of the snake logo with the pixel colours represented by the letters
y for yellow, G for dark green and g for light green.  This may help with the
creation of that logo in the native format of the target.

V.      Credits & Misc.

Credits for the Commodore 64 version:
Game design by Chuck Sommerville
Programmed by Dan Stanfield
Music & Sound effects by Ray Elzey

Links for the original:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snake_Byte
http://www.mobygames.com/game/snake-byte

VI.     Contact

Feel free to send me an email if you have any comments.  If you do make a port
or something else, I would love to hear about it!

[email protected]

VII.    Thanks

To people who did great work back in the 8-bit days, and now, making the tools
to make this possible.

VIII.   Update (Major Changes Log)

I added the Commander x16 version in Oct 2019.
Frank Buss added audio in Oct 2019