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Converting to 5200


classicgamer74

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It's possible for some games to be converted with many ifs and buts.  The length of the process depends on the game.  Many have already been done, probably most of what's feasible at this point.

 

If you've got a particular game you'd like to see converted, be sure to speak up and make your request right here in this forum.  People love that around here and will not get bent out of shape at all.  Tell 'em Ray Jackson sent ya'.

 

 

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14 hours ago, MrTrust said:

If you've got a particular game you'd like to see converted, be sure to speak up and make your request right here in this forum.  People love that around here and will not get bent out of shape at all.  Tell 'em Ray Jackson sent ya'.

In that case, and now since I no longer own an XEGS (or a 7800 as I had to sell both and fold up The Atari Report due to both financial and low numbers circumstances) I still would like to see a few A8 titles converted over,. What worries me is that with some titles you would have to get the A-OK from a developer of a particular game in order for that to happen, I would still like to see some like Bug Attack and yes even @Thelen's improved (now works with both PAL and NTSC A8 units it switches which one) version of Yar's Strike to go along with Paul Lay's brilliant version he did for me 2 years ago. There are also a few other ones but I'll go through my 8-bit library of ROMS to see which ones (I can't remember off the top of my head). So yes there is some unfinished business when it comes to those.

 

But yes even though there are those who would both welcome it, do it and give the A-OK on it there are others here on AA who won't.

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20 hours ago, classicgamer74 said:

Thank you. I'd really like to get the . McDonald's prototype for the Atari 8. 

 

Yeeeah... Evidently my sarcasm is too subtle.  My advice would be to get yourself a flash cart, enjoy all the conversions that have been done, maybe cough up a few bucks for an single cart, and leave it at that.

 

If you just can't live without this thing, it's good form to at least do a little of the legwork yourself before you ask.  Like, make sure it can run on a 16k machine and a 32k cart (probably can, but you never know), and source a good dump of the ROM.  Make sure to make it clear you understand nobody's under any obligation to do this, be willing to at least offer to pay for the service if someone is willing to take you up on doing it, don't tag or pester anyone about it, don't get your hopes up, and be very gracious if you skip one past the goalie here.  Also, don't make a habit of it.

 

Or, you can be like our friend Ray here and be utterly immune to relentless ball-busting from half of the forum and people being incredibly annoyed with you all the time.  I mean, I can't say it didn't work for him.

 

6 hours ago, BIGHMW said:

There are also a few other ones but I'll go through my 8-bit library of ROMS to see which ones (I can't remember off the top of my head). So yes there is some unfinished business when it comes to those.

 

big brother pop GIF by Big Brother After Dark

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6 hours ago, BIGHMW said:

There are also a few other ones but I'll go through my 8-bit library of ROMS to see which ones (I can't remember off the top of my head). So yes there is some unfinished business when it comes to those.

Great - I've marked this day on my calendar so I'll know to look for your next post asking for a conversion which will definitely hit before March 23rd.

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43 minutes ago, classicgamer74 said:

I was simply asking. If course is be willing to pay for it. Is be more than happy to. That game has a special place in my heart. 

I would do the same thing too. I do work and I don't want any freebies, I don't want developers and/or converters to think I want a free ride off of their backs, as long as they're willing to make a conversion, I would be more than willing to pay someone to do it as well.

 

.....and since there is nobody here in the Northwest (WA/OR/ID) that knows how to or is willing to do them (A8-to-5200, as O no longer own an XEGS) I would be more than willing to offer $$$ to guys like Paul Lay who have been doing them best and have been doing them for a long time.

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That game is what inspired me to start my channel. I guess it was because I was a kid during the McDonaldland years. This would be the only one I'm interested in getting a cart of. I've become a real 5200 enthusiast. I have been repairing joysticks and have been trying to get all the titles. It would be great to have a 5200 cart of this game with a label. And I'm willing to put my money where my mouth is. 

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9 minutes ago, BIGHMW said:

I would do the same thing too. I do work and I don't want any freebies, I don't want developers and/or converters to think I want a free ride off of their backs...

 

I'm not saying you do.  I assume that's why anyone's been willing to indulge you.

 

I'm not sure it's so much an issue of free riding as it is an issue of people not wanting the 5200 forum to turn into just a long series of "Can X be converted from 8-bit?" threads.  

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  • 1 month later...

Well for what i,ve readed is that the both the atari 400 pc and atari 5200 are basically the same system with the only exception that those adress registers and memory locations are in different places ,so to make those atari 400 games  IN THEORY compatible with the atari 5200 system,we need to create a cartride interface adaptor to line up those adress registers and memory locations with each other to make those atari 400 games work on the 5200 and vice versa,but i think that atari didn’t bother with that fearing to getting sewed by coleco for tricking the game industry because atari only owned the rights for donkeykong on pc’s and not game consoles wich coleco did had, and if atari did had make such cool adaptor,that would,ve they violated the rights by making their computer(“pc” ) games compatible with their game console,this is pure speculation BUT i definitely do believe in these theories?

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Sorry but no, the differences in those 'same function but different address' registers in lower memory make things more than just remapping the POKEY/ANTIC/GTIA addresses. Along with that the keypad and joystick differences would be problematic and the 400's interrupt handling is more involved too, e.g. Immediate and Deferred VBI routines along with countdown timers.

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On 4/6/2022 at 12:29 AM, Wrathchild said:

Sorry but no, the differences in those 'same function but different address' registers in lower memory make things more than just remapping the POKEY/ANTIC/GTIA addresses. Along with that the keypad and joystick differences would be problematic and the 400's interrupt handling is more involved too, e.g. Immediate and Deferred VBI routines along with countdown timers.

Ouch if that’s true then i wonder how atari was able to convert ataro 400 games into atari 5200 format,sure all controller signals had to be remapped,timers had to be adjusted,memory & adress register locations had to be lined up among other tweaks,but it should,ve be that easy as 123,but i found it interesting to read that both the atari 400 and atari 5200 are barelly the same hardware

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Of course, if you the sources then it's easy to build the two variants from that.

 

But if all you have is the resulting binary image then that's what I'm saying is the problem.

 

Hence for my A8->5200 ports I've had to disassemble the original code, come to a good understanding of what it is doing, be able to rebuild it from my sources for the A8. If needed, re-jig the memory layout to suit the limitations if the 5200. Make sure that still runs on the A8. Start on and test / debug the 5200 modifications to the code. Release an image for testing.

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23 minutes ago, Wrathchild said:

Of course, if you the sources then it's easy to build the two variants from that.

 

But if all you have is the resulting binary image then that's what I'm saying is the problem.

 

Hence for my A8->5200 ports I've had to disassemble the original code, come to a good understanding of what it is doing, be able to rebuild it from my sources for the A8. If needed, re-jig the memory layout to suit the limitations if the 5200. Make sure that still runs on the A8. Start on and test / debug the 5200 modifications to the code. Release an image for testing.

So there's a ton of work that goes into an A8-to-5200 conversion, so much more than even I thought. I assume I am right, so every time I ask (or request) what for us what seems to be like a simple re-coding for a conversion turns out to be much more than just that. I guess even for doing something like a conversion of Lennart Bown's reworked PAL/NTSC-detecting version of Yar's Strike or even the Centipede-inspired Bug Attack, despite Yar's Strike being only 4K and Bug Attack being (at the most) 8K, there is a lot of legwork that goes into doing a conversion, I assume.

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