Jump to content
IGNORED

Supercharger conversion hacks...


Nukey Shay

Recommended Posts

Say it ain't so!!

 

I can't even believe I'm talking about a 2600 arcade port, I can't stand most of them but I stumbled upon Joust today and it's quite good in it's own right. I'm quite impressed.

 

Any chance it can be split like the larger multi-load proprietary supercharger games?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Pretty much any game could be. The 2600 has a limited amount of time to execute a single frame...and 2k of space should be plenty for a sparse display like Joust's. This would require a complete reverse-engineering of the game and an understanding of the SC's bankswitching logic tho...so it would probably be easier to retool a game from scratch to take advantage of the SC's capabilities from the ground floor. As anything, a lot of determination sets the bar. Because it's impossible to create cartridges from such a program tho, a homebrew effort would be time better spent creating one that utilizes added ram IN the cartridge (SARA, etc).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

They need to be converted from binary to audio first (Mark posted a link on the previous page for most of them that he already converted to audio). But yeah, the Supercharger hardware is pretty flexible...most anything that can play audio through a headphone jack should work fine. Switch off any audio effects the player has (for boosting bass, etc), and experiment a bit with the volume setting.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

Bugs, NTSC and PAL60

 

The original game jumped between 263 and 264 scanlines...this has been fixed and bumped down to 262. Also, the difficulty switches were set in reverse order. These were swapped, and I also slowed down the bug speed for the easy difficulty (it originally only set the bullet size).

Bugs_Supercharger_.zip

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Shuttle Orbiter: NTSC & PAL60

 

Original game alternates between 261 and 270 scanlines. This is changed to an -almost- steady 262, but I had to rob it from the text font (was 8 points, now 5). The game will still jitter when moving from the title screen to the ingame screen, and sometimes when colliding with objects.

 

The game used the B&W switch to pause, with the difficulties not used at all. I altered it so that the right difficulty pauses (so it functions on a 7800), and added a trainer mode to the left difficulty (B = fuel is not decreased).

Shuttle_Orbiter.zip

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Spitfire Attack: NTSC and PAL60

Original game is kinda goofy...a TON of cycles being wasted everywhere (including offscreen, curiously). I trimmed out a bunch of fat to add in a few things.

 

The scanline 262-263 jitter has been corrected by bumping up INTIM values slightly (I robbed a scanline from the reserve plane display to even it up back to 262). Dennis made a hack to swap a flightstick for a regular stick (i.e. forward = gain altitiude)...so I assigned that to the unused right difficulty switch to swap between those methods (the left difficulty is still used to select a more-erratic enemy). The B&W switch was also unused, so I put an autofire mode there (7800-compatable, too). It looks like just a regular 5-byte data table was interfering with the Supercharger, so I relocated that. Also, the glitchy "road" looked more like a river...so I altered the color there. Still a lot of free space (and RAM) that I didn't find a use for.

Spitfire_Attack.zip

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This Planet Sucks!: NTSC and PAL60**

 

I didn't realise it at first, but the original game has a scanline jitter right when crashing (due to some variable changes done with a JSR). Adding redundant lines solved that problem. Also, the display drops down to 64 scanlines when game reset is used. This has been fixed. In addition, the game no longer immediately starts on powerup. Instead, a title display screen has been added 8)

 

 

** A couple of things are currently beyond simple color conversion (fuel display color and player ship color).

This_Planet_Sucks_.zip

post-222-1223583561_thumb.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Pooyan: NTSC, PAL, and PAL60

 

Pretty easy to fix this bizarre game. A table for the digit gfx exists right at the end (which crashes the Supercharger). Blank space was called from another page if leading zeros are present...so the table was stored as 2-byte "words" to gather the address. Oddly, they still stuck a zero value to the end of each bitmap. These are never displayed on-screen...so I gathered up all of those unused bytes to make space for a blank bitmap on the same page as the digits...so the table only needs the LSB's of the addresses :)

 

I also fixed the waggling color at the top...and bumped the PAL version to 312 scanlines (the original PAL runs @ 310).

Pooyan.zip

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

Knight On The Town / Lady In Wading: NTSC and PAL60

 

Scanline count corrected (original was @265), the pause mode made 7800-compatable. The original game used a checksum routine (common among all "adult" titles), that has been removed.

 

Some free space and free ram if anybody wants to try to make a full game out of this thing. IMO infinite time and infinite chances doesn't really fit the definition ;)

Knight_On_The_Town.zip

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Crypts of Chaos: NTSC & PAL60

 

Original game jittered when pressing a console switch. This has been fixed. A lot of free space left over after trimming out fat, so I added a few things:

 

-Increased the font size to 10 points for digits and 8 points for icons (tho icons are currently still the same bitmaps as they were).

 

-Added 7800 detection code.

 

-Implemented a "trainer" mode when using B&W (infinite rings and hit points). When selected, a red line will appear above the icon list as a reminder.

 

-The second joystick automatically selects and moves the lower marker. The change is incomplete, so the first stick still retains this function too (by pressing down first). Just as with the original game, pressing up returns control to the upper marker.

Crypts_Of_Chaos.zip

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

Galaxian is 8k. Only 4k and 2k roms can be made Supercharger-compatable (without seriously altering the game). Basically, the game roms are altered to ignore the unit's native bankswitch method so that it never occurs. Most of the 2k/4k library already does this, since the "hotspot" trigger exists at the end of rom addressing. This thread is for those that don't.

 

PB Frogger only has an "intro" in the way of the starting tune. I know that forcing value #$80 to ram location $DE enables movement...but the starting tune would need to be altered as well (since when it ends, it automatically resets the player's variables). A possible solution is to remove the starting tune altogether.

 

Starpath's own version of the game is filled with self-modifying code (which gives me a headache just looking at). Good luck with that one. I thought that you were working on a homebrew version?

 

Anyway, here's some mess to look at. It can be reassembled with Dasm, but a new loader would need to be added. There's a lot of unresolved stuff here, because these roms are seriously over my head ;)

SP_Frog.zip

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Galaxian is 8k. Only 4k and 2k roms can be made Supercharger-compatable (without seriously altering the game). Basically, the game roms are altered to ignore the unit's native bankswitch method so that it never occurs. Most of the 2k/4k library already does this, since the "hotspot" trigger exists at the end of rom addressing. This thread is for those that don't.

 

PB Frogger only has an "intro" in the way of the starting tune. I know that forcing value #$80 to ram location $DE enables movement...but the starting tune would need to be altered as well (since when it ends, it automatically resets the player's variables). A possible solution is to remove the starting tune altogether.

 

Starpath's own version of the game is filled with self-modifying code (which gives me a headache just looking at). Good luck with that one. I thought that you were working on a homebrew version?

 

Anyway, here's some mess to look at. It can be reassembled with Dasm, but a new loader would need to be added. There's a lot of unresolved stuff here, because these roms are seriously over my head ;)

 

i am i am just looking at it for refference to figure out how in the hell they did something XD that is in effect in there rom anyways thxs, and i was wanting to get rid of that damn tune bwecuase its so anyoing!!!

Edited by DarkPortrait
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

Running out of decent games to convert. Here's a couple of mediocre ones...

 

Grand Prix - the PAL option is incomplete, since the program uses EOR's and such to obtain color values. Bushes would crash the SC (this has been fixed). NTSC only here.

 

Squeeze Box - Original game ran @263 scanlines, and the ending devil character would crash the SC. This is corrected. NTSC & PAL60 versions here.

Grand_Prix.zip

Squeeze_Box.zip

Edited by Nukey Shay
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...