5200BAS Programming

[skywalker2000]

Ok.. I finally decided to give this 5200 programming a shot. I only have a few months of BASIC Programming skill in a University of ORT and that was 14 years ago. I learned more from my C64 instruction manual. I must admit that most everything I read in postings is Greek to me. I think I forgot everything I learned. I downloaded the Antic 4 and found it to be incredible. But I have not Idea how to use the compiler nor that TASM thingy.

 

Is the Antic 4 program made to make it easier to draw the characters in the game? I guess I need to do a lot of reading to try to understand all the programming talk. But if I learn how to make a game. I will make sure to make a few cool ones. ; )

I been wanting to do this all my life. : )

[calamari]

Is the Antic 4 program made to make it easier to draw the characters in the game? I guess I need to do a lot of reading to try to understand all the programming talk. But if I learn how to make a game. I will make sure to make a few cool ones. ; )

I been wanting to do this all my life.  : )

 

You can use Antic 4 to simplify making a custom character set and also a screen based on those characters (like a title screen), background, etc.

 

I would recommend that you familiarize yourself with the Atari 400/800 line of computers. Get the Atari800 emulator and get comfortable with how it works (for example, the debugging monitor). Then, you'll want to learn about the 6502 processor. You'll need to know the limitations of your programming environment. There are some documents on the links page that can get you started with the 6502 and assembly language. After that, start reading about the Atari 5200 arcitecture in my Atari 5200 System Reference Manual. I haven't finished it yet, but the first few chapters are posted. BTW, if anyone finds ANY inaccuracy in this document please let me know.

 

Have fun,

calamari