MobiusAqua

Drat! And here I thought they were leaving together! We'll all miss them so... (okiday, I'll stop, now.)

The header should go at the top of the A78 file. It should be the first 128 bytes, exactly. Your program code would go under the line "ACTUAL CART DATA STARTS HERE", if I remember right.

I second that. Don't mind me, either. I actually suggested a TBS because I was thinking about making one, two or three projects down the road, and wanted to see what others thought. Wait, don't tell me... umm... no, wait, I'll get it... it's on the tip of my tongue... (or laying on my keyboard someplace) Of course, I wonder if there's also some that are working on games, but aren't sure when they should post a public alpha/beta?

My pleasure! Glad I could help. And sure! I'll attach it here. bb-prealpha_sep11-2015.bas.list.txt

I'm not sure if this is a bug, or if I'm still getting the hang of things (and it might be, since I'm giving myself a crash course on bankswitching, after I figured out that my game won't fit into 48KB), but I wanted to bring this to RevEng's attention, just in case. Recently, I switched the ROM size for my game, from 48KB to 128KB, and turned on POKEY support (even though I haven't programmed in anything besides set pokeysupport on, yet). After a bit of trial-and-error, and playing around with code, just to test things, I started to rebuild the game to how I had it, before I switched to 128KB ("set romsize 128k"), and started putting code into the DMA hole in bank 1 (it's half sprites, and half code). Here's where things get interesting: After I started using bank 1's DMA hole, the compiler started telling me I had negative free space available in bank 1, but everything compiled just fine, and the game still runs, without any graphical glitches whatsoever. This is the output from my most recent compilation (I was adding the fourth round's code back in; before switching to 128KB, I had five rounds programmed in, and started to run low on space): [email protected]:~/7800projects/bubblebobble$ 7800basic.sh bb-prealpha_sep11-2015.bas Using dasm version: DASM 2.20.11 20140304 Starting build of bb-prealpha_sep11-2015.bas 7800basic 0.3 Jul 15 2015 19:45:55 *** (): INFO, bank #1, GFX Block #0 starts @ $A000 digittop alphatop digitbot alphabot rounddigits round001 round001large round002 round002large round003 round003large round004 round004large round005 round005large *** (): INFO, bank #1, GFX block #0 has 432 bytes left (27 x 16 bytes) *** (): INFO, bank #1, DMA hole #0 starts @ $B000 DMA hole code found and imported *** (): INFO, bank #2, GFX Block #0 starts @ $A000 digittop alphatop digitbot alphabot rounddigits *** (): INFO, bank #2, GFX block #0 has 1568 bytes left (98 x 16 bytes) *** (): INFO, bank #2, DMA hole #0 starts @ $B000 no code defined for DMA hole *** (): INFO, bank #8, GFX Block #0 starts @ $C000 bubblunleft01 bubblunleft02 bubblunleft03 bubblunleft04 bubblunleft05 bubblunleft06 bubblunleft07 bubblunright01 bubblunright02 bubblunright03 bubblunright04 bubblunright05 bubblunright06 bubblunright07 bubblunleft11 bubblunleft12 bubblunright11 bubblunright12 bubblunleft21 bubblunleft22 bubblunright21 bubblunright22 bubblunleft31 bubblunleft32 bubblunleft33 bubblunleft34 bubblunright31 bubblunright32 bubblunright33 bubblunright34 bubblunleft35 bubblunleft36 bubblunleft37 bubblunleft38 bubblunright35 bubblunright36 bubblunright37 bubblunright38 bubblunleft41 bubblunleft42 bubblunleft43 bubblunleft44 bubblunright41 bubblunright42 bubblunright43 bubblunright44 *** (): INFO, bank #8, GFX block #0 has 1152 bytes left (72 x 16 bytes) *** (): INFO, bank #8, DMA hole #0 starts @ $D000 no code defined for DMA hole *** (): INFO, bank #8, GFX Block #1 starts @ $E000 bubblegrn0 bubblegrn1 bubblegrn2 bubblegrn3 bubblegrn6 bubblegrn7 bubblegrn8 bubblegrn9 bubblegrn0a bubblegrn1a bubblegrn2a bubblegrn3a zenchanleft1 zenchanleft2 zenchanleft3 zenchanleft4 zenchanright1 zenchanright2 zenchanright3 zenchanright4 *** (): INFO, bank #8, GFX block #1 has 2816 bytes left (176 x 16 bytes) 7800basic compilation complete. User-defined 7800.asm found in current directory -> -7808 bytes of ROM space left in the main area of bank 1. <- 384 bytes of ROM space left in DMA hole 0. 8192 bytes of ROM space left in the main area of bank 2. 4096 bytes of ROM space left in DMA hole 0. 12186 bytes of ROM space left in the main area of bank 7. 0 bytes of ROM space left in the main area of bank 8. 4096 bytes of ROM space left in DMA hole 0. pokeysound assembly: 282 bytes Complete. Read $C000 bytes of cartridge data. Cartridge hash area is from $F000 to $FFFF. Cartridge signature for 'bb-prealpha_sep11-2015.bas.bin' appears to be empty. Encrypting... 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 success! A valid cartridge signature is: 03 3c 09 f5 18 35 1e 70 8c a1 bd b6 82 b5 d5 3f 8a 5e 29 e1 49 38 a4 3c 5b 06 eb 8b ad ac 7e 6c 4e 46 e5 ef 5f a4 2e 74 e4 70 ba c0 03 8e be 71 25 1d 0d 6f 34 bc 56 9d f4 b1 37 7a 1d 59 e5 d7 7c 0a 1e 34 f7 0e 62 17 a3 ce b9 0b ad e0 10 e9 08 06 f6 d6 4d 57 4e 17 86 61 07 9a b2 a2 ef 11 7a 24 3c 1d aa 26 52 0a f3 b1 2d 0a d3 7f fd 27 bb c7 ee 2a 39 53 89 c5 Wrote back 120 bytes to 'bb-prealpha_sep11-2015.bas.bin'. 7800header 0.2 Jul 15 2015 19:45:57 opened parameter file a78info.cfg set rom size: 128k set cart option: supergame set cart option: [email protected] [email protected]:~/7800projects/bubblebobble$ Here's how the banks are set up, as well, if this helps: Bank 1: 8KB code, 8KB graphics. Bank 2 through bank 7: 16KB code. Banks 3 through 6 are currently unused. Bank 8: 16KB graphics. I've only noticed it do this, when I put dmahole 0 somewhere in bank 1's code. If I take it back out, it stops showing the remaining bytes as a negative number. But since it compiles and runs (in MESS 0.164 64-bit) fine either way, I was wondering if it was some sort of bug, something I did, or just what you thought about it, RevEng. The source code is attached, and I can also send you/attach the graphics, as well, if you wanna do a test compile of your own. Thanks in advance. bb-prealpha_sep11-2015.bas

That's definitely true. And that also makes me wonder about turn-based strategy games, too... like Fire Emblem, for example? Something more like one of the... two or three games (I think?) in the series, that the Famicom got?

This is definitely gonna be epic. Great job, Mord! Now I wonder how long it'll be, before there's a request for a Dragon Warrior/Quest port?

Well, there's always any of those games that are listed in this topic, that either haven't been made, probably will be made in the future, or are already being made in the background (not speaking for anyone, but I'm just suggesting). Personally, a few of those games would be really cool to try to make with RevEng's 7800basic. I'm working on one, but after it, and another game I'm planning to do, maybe I might give one of those a shot (but I don't wanna say/announce/guarantee anything just yet). Pengo looks pretty cool, and probably something the 7800 could do pretty well (maybe with some TIA experimentation).

Daaaaang, Eduardo! Congratulations!

That's a great list, and all of those (even though a couple have already been made, and probably one or two on that list are in the works) would be epic releases for the 7800. I'd also suggest a couple mid-1980s games, like The Goonies, or Gyruss, for example. Even though something like Venture or Gauntlet would be cool, as well.

Have you heard RushJet1's remixes of Mega Man 3's soundtrack? He did an entire playthrough, replacing the game's music with his own remixes of each song. For example, here's his version of the title track:

Those look really good, especially the backgrounds! I don't have a ColecoVision yet, but that would still be epic. The second I saw the skyline in the second picture, the first thing I heard in my mind, was "AH HAAA!!"

Actually, the gigantic smiley face can only mean one thing... Al's signed an exclusive deal with Wal-Mart! *Kevin McCallister places his hands on his cheeks; Jeremie calls out "Oh, no!"*

Ah, interesting... I've always been slightly curious about the GUMBY. But that'll be good, if it does work. Especially concerning what I've heard about the Hokey. But I'll tweak it, if it doesn't work.

My pleasure! Glad it could be helpful.

That's great! Thanks for testing it under ProSystem, Mord.

I wanted to try my hand at making a fun little utility, that programmers, whether they code in machine language, or 7800basic, could use to help them write commands to send to the POKEY chip in their own programs. It's a program that lets you set the volume, frequency and waveform settings for each of the POKEY's four channels, and hear what kinds of sounds each combination makes, to help you make music and sound effects easier. Kind of a "what you hear is what you get" sort of thing. I call it "Prickle", because the chip is called POKEY, and GCC was going to make a low-cost sound chip called GUMBY for the Atari 7800, so I figured I'd stay within that character set. This was inspired by Random Terrain's Tone Toy 2008, which I find is a great help for programming the TIA's two sound generators. When I started to think about adding POKEY sound and music to the game I'm working on, I looked to see if there was something similar for programming the POKEY. I don't know if I didn't look hard enough, or if there really wasn't anything like that (unless Raster Music Tracker counts?), but I couldn't find anything that worked like Tone Toy, so I decided to make my own, and share it with you guys, hoping that you might be able to use it, as well. Here's a screenshot of the interface. It's not much, but since it's more of a utility, I figured I'd draw up something basic. I am thinking about making it look a bit more graphical in a future update, though. Basically, you have a context-sensitive help bar at the top of the screen, which tells you what each of the joystick movements (and the fire button) do, at any given moment. All four channels are laid out, for you to tinker around with, until you find a combination of settings that you like. It starts out with the word one highlighted, and if you move the joystick up or down from that point, you can switch between the other four channels, as well. With any of the channels by themselves highlighted, pushing the joystick to the left or right highlights one of the channel settings, like volume, frequency and the waveform ("square wave", "sawtooth wave", "pink noise", etc.). With any of these highlighted, moving the joystick up or down will change that setting. It'll increase or decrease the volume or frequency, and in the case of the waveform selector, change the type of waveform. If you hold the fire button down while you do this, it will slow down the increase or decrease, so you can have a bit finer control over what you want to change each setting to. And, when you push the joystick to the left or right, so only the channel number is highlighted, you can press the fire button to mute or unmute that channel. I figured that might be helpful, if you're trying to program in a two-, three- or four-part harmony with the other channels, and wanted to adjust each one, without hearing the others, and without needing to turn the volume all the way down on each channel, first. This is version 0.9, which I put the finishing touches on about an hour ago. It's version 0.9, because aside from the idea of making the interface look a bit more graphical (and because I've been itching to try 320B mode out), there's one thing I'm not sure how to do, that I'm pretty sure might come in handy: 16-bit mode. If anyone knows how to do this, and would like to help me add it in for version 1.0, that would be great. I'm going to release this under version 3 of the GNU GPL, but if that's not a good idea, I can change it. Here's the attached files: prickle.zip contains all of the source files 7800basic generated, along with the font I used, the A78 and BIN files. I figured I'd include everything, just in case. prickle-v09.a78 is the program itself. I tested it under MESS, both with and without the XM, and it worked both times. I haven't tried it in ProSystem, but if it doesn't work for you (or it complains of no POKEY chip), please let me know. prickle-v09.bin is a BIN file, because I wasn't sure if anyone would wanna try this on a Cuttle Cart 2, or CPUWIZ's MCP development cart, while they're programming. Maybe I'm just being silly. ​ If you have any questions, the interface is too confusing, or you found a bug, please feel free to let me know. prickle.zip prickle-v09.a78 prickle-v09.bin

I agree with the others. This looks great. It definitely looks like it has potential, and it'll be fun to see how it looks, after a bit more work has been put into it.

In my opinion, Nintendo's Tetris for the NES had the original Tetris theme, "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy". But, yeah, the one I'm pretty sure you're referring to, "Korobeiniki" (sp?), didn't come until the Game Boy version, by Bullet Proof Software.

Well, he's gotta get his pearls back, first. Then he can worry about locking his doors and windows, so they aren't stolen, again! lol

I hope he does, but I guess that would depend if the TMS9918A in the Master System is backward-compatible with the TMS9918 in the ColecoVision. I know the SMS's 9918 is like a 9918 on steroids, with hardware vertical/horizontal scrolling, and 64 colors max (whether on-screen, or in the palette), but that's about it. As for the sound, they both use an SN76489(AN?), so maybe that'll be one less thing to worry about? Even though if he wants to combine it with an MSX later on, the MSX1 standard calls for an AY-3-8910, which is similar (3 square wave channels, and one noise channel, but the AY-3 has it mixed together with the square wave channels, while the SN has it separate?), but has extra features (as far as I know; like duty cycles, perhaps?).

I'm surprised nobody's mentioned the Hammer Brothers, particularly from SMB1, even though they're slightly more tolerable in SMB3, and somewhat easier in SMW. But with those things, you're going through World 7 or 8, you die half-way through one of the levels, and start right near one of them as small Mario, and if they're not in groups of two, on those two rows of platforms above you, you're staring at them, waiting for an opening, thinking "how long is this going to take...?!" The one I really can't stand is on... 5-3, I think. There's one standing on a block stairway, right after a set of two short platforms... have a fire flower, and he's easy, but die half-way through the level, and restart near that point, as small Mario... oh, boy... Unless maybe someone knows a better way to take them out, when they're on the same platform as you, and you have no power-ups? (Speaking of SMB3, I always thought its death sound was interesting: the first few notes that sound like Mario crying out, in the NES version)

Forgive me if this is technical ignorance speaking, but I wonder if all it would take, for something like that, is a big enough circuit board, and the POKEY and SID mapped to different memory addresses? Or is there more to it, than that?

This really is starting to look better and better!

I second this. I've never tried that routine I showed you in any ROM configuration bigger than 48KB (even though I feel like I might have to, at some point), so it might very well be that the graphics are in a different ROM bank than the program itself. I might do a bit of messing around of my own, and see if that's why it didn't work for you.