8BIT 1337

Is there any documentation on disassembling .atr's with copy protection? My plan is this: I loved (and still love) Micro League Baseball. I'd love to be able to rip apart the game to see how it works. And I'd love to be able to rip apart the GM/Mgr disk to build my own with modern teams (and without having to enter everything by hand). When I disassemble the main disk it it seems pretty obvious that it's copy protected though, and I haven't a *clue* how to go about cracking it. Suggestions?

I've had my CC2 for awhile now, but just got around to getting it running this morning (and yes, I made lots of the same mistakes others have listed before me, like trying to recognize .a78 files and trying to use an SD card instead of MMC 'cause I didn't know there was a difference ). What a *fantastic* product. I'm totally glad I bought one (the conversion rate killed me but what are you gonna do...) My favourite part is the menu - I spent all day Wednesday setting it up and you really reap the rewards for your efforts (I've organized everything by company and included a year of release - looks sweet!)

I'm thinking "Zone Ranger" - but I think I might be thinking of the 5200 version...

I just Googled "Gateway to Apshai" because I couldn't remember the controls (who uses Start/Select/Option in a game anyway?) and my search revealed an AtariAge page! Well of course I clicked on it and found the cart picture, box picture, and a rom (on the 'traditional' AA screens)! Are we close to an 8-bit section here? Hope hope hope...

Pinball Construction Set. I can't remember who made it but I remember making a lot of my own pinball machines..

The lighting thing *can* be an issue but it doesn't have to be. Depends on how often you play, though, and *where* you play (I find myself playing on planes/in airports mostly, and the lighting there has never been a problem). What I like best about my GBA is it's comfort. For $10 I bought a plastic set of handles, similar to a PS2 controller. It's *way* easier to hold than my GBC was (I'm still looking for something similar for the GBC that doesn't involve rechargable batteries). Having said that, I'd *still* probably pick up an SP today if I had the choice between the two. Rechargable batteries and backlighting are nicer features IMO, and I can always attempt to find another handle-like work around for it's size.

I was hoping you'd miss that part

But it's also a matter of opinion - games you might think suck I might enjoy and vice versa. Why turn somebody off of something just because *you* don't like the game they make? They're doing this for *fun*, not to make a living at it. I won't argue that point because I agree. But the criticism itself falls under the same category. Once you post it for the public it's out there for a response. And if you cross the line towards attacking people are going to call you on it. That's the line I'm worried about - I'd like to see it crossed a bit less often. You're welcome! I probably mixed the word criticise in that last post too much. I definitely don't see criticism as a bad thing. But you have to pick when/where/how to go about it. Saying something is crap doesn't *count* as criticism IMO. I can't speak to that, having never homebrewed anything. I was refering to my own job, where I've definitely not had the option and I've had to produce stuff I wasn't happy with to meet a deadline. I can see situations where you wouldn't have the option though. If my wife were pregnant I'd probably set a deadline where I *had* to be finished by the birth, because I knew I'd never finish it otherwise. And yet we've had an entire mini-discussion in which you asked me for a specific example at first and I never provided one. I think it can work. Examples can be helpful I suppose, but unless you're going to use your own work I think it's the wiser course to leave examples out of it.

There are definitely homebrews I wouldn't buy/play because I don't enjoy them. Heck I'd even call them crap. But why would I ever tell the homebrewer that? The criticism argument came across as weak in my eyes. I agree that criticism is a good thing. I agree that homebrewers need criticism if they want to become better homebrewers. But if they don't ask for it, I don't see why anybody would feel the need to give it to them. I see homebrewing as a labour of love. Just because you choose to sell your work as well as offer it for free (and thank you for that Thomas) doesn't make it *less* of a labour of love. How can you criticize a labour of love to it's artist? I won't. Even if I don't like the game, I love the fact that the game was *made*. That the homebrewer took the time to do something. I totally respect that. Plus some of us who have dabbled in hacking and thought about homebrewing totally take a step back when we see attacks. If I do ever produce something it's only because I love the challenge and the hobby and I want to give something back. If I feel I'm going to be attacked I won't bother - I'll either share with just the few people I know (family/friends) or give up totally. You've got a critical eye and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. I hope you don't feel you have to apologize for it because you shouldn't have to. Just be wary that criticism offered at the wrong time/under the wrong circumstances can easily be construed as an attack, even if that wasn't it's original intention. I can't/won't ever compare games like Pac-Man or E.T. to homebrewing efforts. Well, that's not totally true - on the one hand I'm totally impressed with how *fast* those guys coded those things, even though the result is less than satisfying. Obviously quality is more important than speed, but being a programmer myself I also know that sometimes you just don't have the option. The pressure side of things is unfortunate - it suggests maybe that homebrewing is getting caught up a little too much in the business side of things. But that's an issue that can be dealt with without ever actually mentioning a specific project. Once you start naming names you start attacking.

The biggest problem I've had with the criticisms lately is that it seems to me people are treating homebrewers like they were major publishers, and that just seems totally off base and wrong to me. As you suggested, Thomas, the term 'rude' is subjective. But some people are crossing what seems to be an *obvious* line. It seems to me that the homebrewing community is akin to raising kids who have an interest in the guitar. You don't tell them they suck, even if you find their attempts unappealing. If they ask for help (or you feel like offering it), you do so in a manner that doesn't crush their spirit, don't you? Why should homebrewing be much different? Just because you don't know these people other than the words they type? It's not like homebrewing is ever going to become big business - why bother trouncing something unnecessarily (especially after it's *finished*)?

This might seem trivial but I've been wondering about this for *ages*. As a newbie it's still hard to look at a disassembled game and figure this out on my own. And when coding my own little 'hello world' type stuff I couldn't stop thinking "jeez, it's taking me a lot of time here just to draw my playfield and player graphics - how am I gonna do anything else?" You 'da man Thomas

Yup - I made sure my total scanlines were still 262 (using z26 to verify my math was correct). Seems like it would be simpler to use the 67 scanlines all together in one place instead of splitting code up into the 37 VBlank and 30 Overscan portions. Generally speaking of course.

I understand what you're saying, but I've played with this a bit (I had a simple playfield with only one scanline of overscan, the rest under VBLANK) and the image was still centered as far as I can tell. Was that 'cause I was using an emulator?

This might be a stupid question, but does altering the number of scanlines affect the number of FPS displayed? Seems to me that if you went with, say, 280 scanlines (keeping 192 for the picture), that the FPS would drop below 60. Or is there something else that comes into play that I'm not aware of? (I'm just talking NTSC numbers here). Another semi-related question - what if I decided to 'use' all my overscan time under VBlank? Why do the non-picture scanlines get split before/after the picture? (Or is that just a best practices standard - if so, what game(s) have done this out of curiousity?)

I think there's a bug in it. I played it a couple of days ago (got it on Tuesday) and the computer beat me on Tournament mode. That's not supposed to happen Good job on the cart - there's nothing like *not* waiting for a game to load, and the label looks really good. Thank goodness #39 made it through

- never even occured to me to try that. I haven't used DOS in *way* too long...

I know you're not attacking me, but I did try to find this stuff in the manual before I asked. The documentation I had with Distella didn't mention -f at all. Maybe I missed it though.

I'd be willing to bet it's been done. One of them was Space Invaders (the other was Astrosmash). I know I could ask somebody for it (or find it at The Dig say), but (a) I don't want to bother anybody and (b) it's more fun (and educational) doing this stuff on my own. I'm sure I'm missing *tonnes* of stuff, but I never would've known about -ltext or .w if I hadn't gone out on my own and asked the experts. Then again maybe *that's* more of a bother to you guys

I *really* like the '-s' addition. It's great for those of us who haven't memorized everything yet and saves me from having to recheck my counts. But I like the fix for RESP1 maybe more. That drove me nuts (I think it's my German side - I like things nice and neat and tidy and correct ).

I see. The actual address displayed in both disassemblies is $00xx, but the .w is forcing the Absolute Address. I was a little confused at first - I thought DEBRO meant that the actual address would've been converted to just $xx in my disassembly, not that it would be assembled as such even though the disassembly showed $00xx. I'm wondering if maybe I switched DASM assemblers or something. I swear I didn't see this when I did my first disassemblies. Does 2.02 work differently than 2.12 in this regard perhaps? It's always nice to put an AA name to a Stella List 'face'

The funny thing is I don't see "STA $00xx" in the disassembly without the -f (I used -pas and -pasf between my two disassemblies if it makes a difference) I do understand though, I think. Using the .w wastes enough cycles (and uses that extra byte). Is there any documentation so that I lookup what the '.w' stuff means? My disassembly also contains a "STA.wy $00F6,Y" - which I'm assuming is similar (and maybe the y is there because of the Y register reference) but I'd like to know for sure. Or is this it? Thanks for your help DEBRO!

FYI: I'm using Distella 3.0 here and DASM 2.12. I disassemble a .bin without -f, and it reassembles 1 byte short (i.e. 4095 instead of 4096). I disassemble the same .bin with -f, and it reassembles to the correct size. The former doesn't run properly. The latter does run (although I noticed that, in PCAE, it takes longer for the initial screen to pop up than the original .bin on it's own). When I compare the two source files I notice that in the former a line will read "STA $001F", whereas in the latter it reads "STA.w $001F" I've looked through the distella txt and did some searching online and I can't find anything detailing what '-f' is nor what the ".w" is for. Help

I think my favourite so far has been Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem. Partly because it's not one of the established franchises so it came as a bit of a suprise which is cool. But mostly because I really, really dug the game. I played it at night, with the wife out, and all the lights off. Fantastic experience. I've tried Resident Evil since then and I don't understand what the fuss is about (nor why Capcon thinks it should have flown off shelves). Mind you I haven't played everything I own quite yet. I've got Pikmin, Starfox Adventures, and Metroid Prime (all of which I picked up used for good prices) sitting on the sidelines until I finish Wind Waker.

Only if you want to pause it. You're good to go baby!

Sweet! I guess '39' is my new lucky number...