XEGS game missile command in ST mouse mode?

[Swami]

 

 

Dan Kramer owns the only known copy to still exist. That's 3-Base Missile Command that the Atari Engineers played in-house with their custom Trak-Balls that Dan made. It's on a floppy that a 1050 will read and it definitely plays on an 800XL. The custom Trak-Balls used the Paddle Lines in order to have the 2 extra fire buttons. I think I have a pic of Dan's custom Trak-Ball in my user gallery here.

 

Using the Paddle Lines should be the standardized way to support multiple fire buttons on A8, IMHO, if folks want to patch existing games for multi-button action. Then one could make an adapter so Sega Genesis Pads could use their buttons. It certainly wouldn't be a good solution for native Paddle games but oh well...it would definitely be an improvement for a lot of existing games.

A slew of two button genesis pad games were made for the 2600.

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/158430-rom-hacks-to-support-2-buttons-with-genesis-controllers/?p=1945798

[Level42]

Yep exactly, Dan showed it on his Facebook (the custom trackball with 3 buttons.).

 

Would be awesome to have that version of MC

Edited December 27, 2017 by Level42

[Swami]

Hypothesis: most of our confusing results do NOT have to do with:

• 400/800 vs XL/XE hardware
• 400/800 OS vs XL/XE OS
• Missile Command ROM versions
• CX22/CX80 versions (all official schematics of these from Atari are the same, so I've always been skeptical of the widely held belief that there are incompatible versions)

But rather, variations among mice, including different versions of the STM1 mouse.

 

I have not found documentation of differences among STM1 mouse versions, just that there are more than 8 or 9 different versions, with many different hardware variations inside.

 

A true trackball reading software routine on the Atari would be expected to work with all CX22/CX80 trackballs, and in some cases may also turn out to work with at least some STM1 or compatible mice. This would describe what we see with Missile Command.

I wanted to get to the bottom of this mystery, so I bought three different colored Missile Command carts of eBay. Some may argue they are all the same and just weathered differently; We may never know.** I also have Missile Command Plus and some unknown missile command rom on my ultimate cart. I played them on an Atari 800XL. One cart is reddish brown, one cart is dark brown and one is light brown. The dark brown was right out of a NOS box, a standard large 400/800 box with a sticker that said "also plays on XL/XE". All three carts worked flawlessly with Control+T with a Logic3 ST/Amiga mouse, a Kraft Triple Track ST/Amiga/1350 trackball in ST mode and the CX22, as did the missile command plus and unknown MC rom. The three carts and unknown ROM do not change from STIK to TBAL in the header with Control+T, but stay as SKIP0, but the screen flickers once. For Missile Command Plus the STIK changes to TBAL.

 

**Edit: But notice the dark brown cart background is monotone, while the red has two tones and the light brown has three tones. Also, the red one looks like it must definitely be a different printing from the brown.

 

One thing I did notice was a couple days ago, I could not get the STIK to TBAL change in MC+ or use the mouse or CX22. After turning the 800XL on with no cart in it, it went to the ready screen and typed an unending string of "Y's" (stuck key, even though it bounced). After some work I found the Y and "/" key large springs had become compressed over time, stretched them out a little and put it back together with no more repeats (after I fixed the Y, the "/" started repeating and had to fix it also). BTW, they now sit higher than all the other keys in their row. So, a lack of change from STIK to TBAL is normal and an MC cart that doesn't switch to mouse/TB mode may have a stuck key. It also does not appear to be affected by a keyboard code change.

 

All I can think of regarding the ST mouse is that it was designed to be backwards compatible with the XL computers and 400/800 MC game(s), since, as we know from hacks, games can be made to work exclusively with the CX22/80 or the ST mice. Has anyone tried anything like the above with the 400/800.

 

Also, the below link is a 3-button, 3-base missile command hack for the 2600. It uses a joystick in left port and a track and field controller in right port. It works pretty well with CX22 in stick mode and T&F controller but would be better with a TB/mouse hack.

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/71805-missile-command-arcade/?p=1109279