Jess Ragan Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 http://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/711-53200-19255-0/1?ff3=4&pub=5574883395&toolid=10001&campid=5336500554&customid=&mpre=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.com%2Fitm%2Fcommodore-vic-20-wizard-of-wor-proto-cartridge-%2F300950638605%3Fpt%3DVideo_Games_Games%26hash%3Ditem46120e500d Holy crap, holy crap, holy crap! There's a prototype version of Wizard of Wor on eBay, and it's just ten dollars! Oh man, I hope whoever gets it would be willing to dump it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
awhite2600 Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 If you look at the pictures in the eBay listing, the ROM chip appears to be a standard ROM, not an EPROM as you would expect to see on a prototype. Are there any lists online that would show the part numbers of the ROMs on production VIC-20 carts? This could just be a misidentified production cart. The labeling was certainly done with a fairly recent electronic label maker. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
R.Cade Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 Yeah, someone is just having a little "fun" 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess Ragan Posted August 18, 2013 Author Share Posted August 18, 2013 You think this is fake? Aw man, that would suck horribly. I don't believe Wizard of Wor exists as a production cartridge; I've never seen one in the wild or elsewhere. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zylon Posted August 19, 2013 Share Posted August 19, 2013 You think this is fake? Aw man, that would suck horribly. I don't believe Wizard of Wor exists as a production cartridge; I've never seen one in the wild or elsewhere. Ditto. I've been collecting VIC-20 a long time and never saw one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
R.Cade Posted August 19, 2013 Share Posted August 19, 2013 I can virtually gaurantee that it's fake... Production rom, non-period label. No way it's real. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess Ragan Posted August 19, 2013 Author Share Posted August 19, 2013 It's odd that a guy with a 99% feedback rating would risk flushing his reputation down the toilet for the sake of a joke... or a fleeting payoff. I'm wondering if the highest bidder will verify its authenticity, or just treat the cartridge as a trophy and keep it behind glass. I will say this, though. I've been waiting thirty years for this game, and if this turns out to be a hoax (and it's increasingly likely at this point), I will not be a happy camper. It's too bad nobody has attempted to write a homebrew port of the game for the VIC-20, as others have done for 2600 and ColecoVision vaporware. Sadly, I suspect the machine just isn't popular enough to warrant the effort. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carlsson Posted August 19, 2013 Share Posted August 19, 2013 (edited) I suppose the seller may have obtained it from someone else playing a bit of fun with him, but I also remember from back when I was active on Denial that someone with the same username claimed he had a very rare Space Snake cartridge that got sold before he had a chance to take a picture of it. The "buyer" even appeared on the site a few days later, only to post four times about how honest the seller is. Besides, it was noted that the cartridge in the auction is wired up to such ROM banks that it won't autostart. That is perfectly fine for Basic extentions and Scott Adams' text adventures, but most action games would be wired to $A000 so you don't have to SYS xxxxx in order to start the game. Edited August 19, 2013 by carlsson Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess Ragan Posted August 19, 2013 Author Share Posted August 19, 2013 That sounds incredibly fishy. Okay, I guess I won't be getting my Wizard of Wor on anytime soon. Blast it all! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carlsson Posted August 19, 2013 Share Posted August 19, 2013 I tried to locate ROM number lists, but they're scattered about. Ruud has a partial list which mainly concerns hardware, not so many game cartridges. However the ROM in the auction MOS 325338-01 looks like it would wedge in a little prior to the MPU in the 1520 printer, which may be perfectly fine if MOS assigned part numbers from a common pool. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carlsson Posted August 19, 2013 Share Posted August 19, 2013 In this thread on the Vintage Computer Forum, a couple more ROM part numbers were listed: http://www.vintage-computer.com/vcforum/showthread.php?t=32691 Here is yet another part number list: http://www.c64-wiki.de/index.php/MOS-Chip_Liste_(Ossi64) So this ROM chip is inbetween the VIC-1112 IEEE-488 interface and the 1520 printer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
20ohm20 Posted August 19, 2013 Share Posted August 19, 2013 I refuse to believe that someone that thinks they have a "prototype" wouldn't have done a little research, and especially since he's selling, find out how much it's worth. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
6502Dude Posted August 19, 2013 Share Posted August 19, 2013 I have two of the MOS 325338-01 PCBs, but no label maker They have been tested and are fully functional. MOS 325338-01 is Scott Adams Adventure #4 - Voodoo Castle. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carlsson Posted August 19, 2013 Share Posted August 19, 2013 Ah yes, I just opened my Pirate's Cove (Scott Adams Adventure #2) and it is 325336-01 so I was going to suggest this is yet another in the same series of text adventures. We should take the opportunity to document all those chip numbers, just in case. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess Ragan Posted August 19, 2013 Author Share Posted August 19, 2013 Crap. This is pretty clearly a phony now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
6502Dude Posted August 19, 2013 Share Posted August 19, 2013 (edited) We should take the opportunity to document all those chip numbers, just in case. I have a box with quite a large number of Vic-20 cart PCBs. I use the cases for another project A while ago I had the idea of creating a cross reference list, but haven't found the time for the project. I posted a few MOS Rom numbers in Wizard or Wor thread on Denial forum. Edited August 19, 2013 by 6502Dude Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carlsson Posted August 19, 2013 Share Posted August 19, 2013 I just did the same, but on the Vintage Computer Forum (see link above). It probably is wiki material. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
20ohm20 Posted August 20, 2013 Share Posted August 20, 2013 The seller pulled the auction. I wonder if someone directed him to this thread? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mayhem Posted August 20, 2013 Share Posted August 20, 2013 Actually, more the one on Denial (Vic20 forum), but the same principle applies. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carlsson Posted November 6, 2019 Share Posted November 6, 2019 By the way, a little bit of necro posting to an old topic, but it struck me a while ago during discussions on Facebook that the C64 version of Wizard of Wor (by Jeff Bruette) was entirely (?) reprogrammed compared to the MAX version by HAL Labs. I believe most of the other early C64 cartridge games would be somewhat patched MAX games, rather than reimplemented. Jeff posted a picture of his printed source code, but he never seems to have heard about any plans to port it to the VIC-20. However in an internal development memo posted by Michael Tomczyk, there is a note about a VIC or MAX version of the game, which may be one of the sources of the long lasting vaporware discussion, combined with other promotional stuff as noted elsewhere. There were several games in the spring of 1982 planned to be implemented for the VIC and/or the MAX, where the later was favored at that point though the system was delayed by another half year and never made a commercial impact. Given the MAX version is considered one of the worse versions of WoW all systems combined, perhaps it was best that we were spared this from HAL Labs. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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