Welcome
Entry posted by Guest
648 views
New Year--maybe time for a new blogI've been doing 6502 coding for many years, having started with a VIC-20 many years ago. It wasn't until I had my Commodore 64 that I started trying to figure how to really "push the envelope", though looking at what people have done since I moved on to the PC makes my efforts seem puny by comparison (I did, by myself, figure out how to scroll sprites into the left and right borders, though).To this day, I take great pride in figuring out efficient ways to code things. I like working with small micros, and as an embedded systems engineer I get to use them a lot. Mostly I work with the PIC micros, but I've also worked with 8x51, 68HC05, 68HC11, 68HC16, 680x0, 8x86, Z80, TMS3205x, and of course the 'lovable' 6502. Maybe it's because it's what I grew up with, but I still have a soft spot for that 6502 (though in some ways I must admit the 14-bit PIC instruction set does seem better designed).I enjoy both hardware and software design, and enjoy figuring out ways to use the two together for optimal efficiency. I am currently working on getting a second proto run of my 4A50 bank-switch cartridge which attempts to provide maximal programming flexibility in a fairly simple piece of hardware, though I'll admit I'm suffering a bit from what Chris Walton (CD-W) refers to as "Shiny Object Syndrome". Though at present the objects aren't new, but old.In particular, in 1994 I started two projects for the Atari. One was an attempt at a "Columns"-style game, and the other was an attempt to code "Wormy". I actually produced some working code for the former back in 1994, but didn't know how to use the RIOT timer with the higher divide-down ratios to allow for game code that could take highly-variable amounts of time to execute. On the latter, I didn't get much useful code done but did plan out how a lot of things were supposed to work.Well, after finding AtariAge I suddenly got the urge to look back at my 1994 efforts. And Strat-O-Gems is the first result. Having had such success with that, my new "shiny object" is the other 11-year-old abandoned project: Wormy.I'll probably take a break from Wormy to work on my 4A50 cart once I get the next batch of boards in. I've already done a proof-of-concept to show that it should be feasible, though parts of the design look like they'll be annoying, so I should probably take a break before I get to the annoying parts (if I take a break AT the annoying parts, it will be harder to resume the project later).Anyway, I figured since the new year was here I may as well start my blog. Hope you enjoy it.
Like us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
AtariAge on Instagram
Watch us on YouTube
Chat on Discord
4 Comments
Recommended Comments