Atari/Legends Flashback Expansion Builds

[pimpmaul69]

1 hour ago, rocketfan said:

@pimpmaul69 BTW, I got all the parts I think I need to mod an FB1 7800 style controller for the FBX two-button 7800 games.  I mentioned this to some EE folks I know and they think you can get single-layer PCBs done so cheap now that it could be possible to do a modified PCB for the controllers in the $20 range.  So like adding through holes for soldering the diodes and making the traces match what is needed for the modded version.  I have never done one, but with help from these folks I think it could be possible.   Could you pass along any other info. you have?  It's probably a winter project for me, so no hurry.  If I need to just study the pictures you posted before I can do that also.

so i was correct in my work on all file extensions but zip. that is because its config file saved in the mame 2003 extreme cfg folder. now i have a weird issue. using .zin fb neo file ( i have an fb neo romset that has been fully compatible with neo fb) so running street fighter 3 3rd strike, it plays no issues in the game folder. playing from arcade folder with all-games.ini, it wont boot. using different roms from the same  roms set it boots but it locks up almost immediately. but all play from game folder just fine. do you know why that would happen? also i cant get redearth to work cause it needs chd files but i dont know where and how the chd files need to be placed on system. as for the afb1 controller i will make a schematic for you. 

Edited November 11, 2022 by pimpmaul69

[pimpmaul69]

3 hours ago, rocketfan said:

 

here is a crude but efficient schematic for the afb1 joystick mod. if you are in the us i would be interested in one of these boards when you get around to it

 

Edited November 11, 2022 by pimpmaul69

[pimpmaul69]

i had to edit schematic image for error if anyone saved the old image in my last post

 

[rocketfan]

@pimpmaul69 Thanks - I think that's all I need.  I'll see those EE guys in a week or two and try to get more specifics on doing boards.

[Batchman]

Been away for a while, and kind of sad to learn this project largely disappeared. Thank goodness I still have NEXUS v9 sitting on my hard drive. Hopefully I'm not too far behind the final version of the game.

 

But the biggest thing I was hoping for, from this, was the ability to play paddle games well on the Flashback units ... and that never worked out for me, because the Flashback 9 and 10 (the two I managed to get a hold of) didn't have paddles. And trying to use original Atari paddles wouldn't work.

 

So, I just have to ask ... with the new 50th anniversary gold Flashback, which includes paddles, has anyone found a way to mod them and add a USB drive? If so, how difficult would it be to add the software updates to be able to use the NEXUS on it? I could finally have access to proper paddle games on my Flashback.

 

Please, note, I am in no way asking for the files or roms, just asking if anyone has found a way to make them work ....

[rocketfan]

On 11/20/2022 at 1:11 AM, Batchman said:

has anyone found a way to mod them and add a USB drive?

It's entirely depending on what atGames did with these.  I'm assuming the hardware inside is unchanged from an X.  So, they may have included the support for "External USB Drive" games placed in a /Game folder out of the box.  It would still be done by using the USB splitter approach that worked for the Flashback X.   If anyone owns one of the 50th Anniversary units and is willing to try it, it would be greatly appreciated!  Just add the drive with a file in a /Game folder and even with stock fimrware you should see the USB menu item in the lower left light up. 

 

DO NOT apply any firmware update for an X to one of these - it could be the end of your nice mini 2600.

 

The other thing someone could do is dump the Firmware and post it someplace.  We could then tell if they re-used some parts of the FBX firmware exactly by comparing to older dumps.  atGames can change the whole personality and content of the device by modifying only some content in the /rom and /emulator partitions, and that would be the most cost effective way to get a new revision of the product out.  On the other hand, they may have rebuilt things to tweak performance or some other detail in some way, or even make adding games harder.  Who knows!

 

If they become available at a reasonable price here in the US, I'll pick one up and do those things. 

 

BTW, original paddles work OK for me on the X, though not like on a real 2600.  I thought the 9 had specific incompatibility with the original paddles that were improved on the X?

 

[pimpmaul69]

20 hours ago, rocketfan said:

It's entirely depending on what atGames did with these.  I'm assuming the hardware inside is unchanged from an X.  So, they may have included the support for "External USB Drive" games placed in a /Game folder out of the box.  It would still be done by using the USB splitter approach that worked for the Flashback X.   If anyone owns one of the 50th Anniversary units and is willing to try it, it would be greatly appreciated!  Just add the drive with a file in a /Game folder and even with stock fimrware you should see the USB menu item in the lower left light up. 

 

DO NOT apply any firmware update for an X to one of these - it could be the end of your nice mini 2600.

 

The other thing someone could do is dump the Firmware and post it someplace.  We could then tell if they re-used some parts of the FBX firmware exactly by comparing to older dumps.  atGames can change the whole personality and content of the device by modifying only some content in the /rom and /emulator partitions, and that would be the most cost effective way to get a new revision of the product out.  On the other hand, they may have rebuilt things to tweak performance or some other detail in some way, or even make adding games harder.  Who knows!

 

If they become available at a reasonable price here in the US, I'll pick one up and do those things. 

 

BTW, original paddles work OK for me on the X, though not like on a real 2600.  I thought the 9 had specific incompatibility with the original paddles that were improved on the X?

 

So there is going to be 4 resistors around 500k ohms that need to be changed to 100k ohm resistor to correct the problem. Afb 9 never got compatible paddles. I changed the 5k ohm resistors to 100k ohm resistors to make them properly compatible. Im 1700 miles away from home but i ordered 200 100k ohm resistors to send people resistors to fix their 9/x/50th and not the really tiny resistors that are impossible to solder to either. So mid December i will send you resistors for your systems if you want them. 

[Batchman]

Bought a set of Atari paddles, but could never get them to work even close to properly on either the 9 or X.

 

Most the time they would give the message about plugging in the joystick. Once in a while, they would seem to pretty much randomly shoot the paddle to the other side of the screen or something.

 

Have no familiarity or facility with resistors, soldering, or anything like that.

 

Don't have one of the new systems, was just considering getting one if I could use it for *all* the paddle games ... until I discovered that almost nobody even seems to know the anniversary edition exists. Don't know if I could get a hold of one, anyway.

[pimpmaul69]

12 hours ago, Batchman said:

Bought a set of Atari paddles, but could never get them to work even close to properly on either the 9 or X.

 

Most the time they would give the message about plugging in the joystick. Once in a while, they would seem to pretty much randomly shoot the paddle to the other side of the screen or something.

 

Have no familiarity or facility with resistors, soldering, or anything like that.

 

Don't have one of the new systems, was just considering getting one if I could use it for *all* the paddle games ... until I discovered that almost nobody even seems to know the anniversary edition exists. Don't know if I could get a hold of one, anyway.

So without swapping resistors or modifying your paddles, they wont work on an afb 9. On the x if they dont work, its a problem with your paddles and they probably need a proper cleaning. For the paddles to work like an actual atari on the x it needs to be modified with some new resistors as a state above. 

[rocketfan]

On 11/24/2022 at 10:21 PM, Batchman said:

Bought a set of Atari paddles, but could never get them to work even close to properly on either the 9 or X.

Yes, it's very common for these 40 year old paddles to be very poor even on original hardware until cleaned.  There are instructions around for that if you google it, this guy does an "easy version" he says will work on most of them.

 

 

 

[rocketfan]

Happy holidays to all out there!  I have been working on a Legends Flashback update to include a few things.  It can be found here:

Spoiler

https://archive.org/details/lufbdec-24-22

 

 

Not a ton in this one:

 

Added a firmware folder with the firmware backup and additional detailed instructions.

Added a Jump n' Bump section with levels for the jumping bunnies game.  This is a two-player game.

Added many Capcm arcade games with box art, thanks to a helpful AtariAge contributer! 🙂  These games are larger and can take quite a while to load from an SD, so wait patiently (20 or 30 seconds I think) while they start.  There are over 500 arcade entries now, and this dramatically increases the "better games" content on the device.  I'm not sure they all play at full speed, but several I tried do.

Enabled bezels for A26 section.

 

The upload process gave me fits this time.  One thing I learned about uploading that content to Archive.  I had zipped with the Windows 10 standard zip functionality "add to compressed folder".  That way, uploading failed over and over - after a few hours waiting.  I finally re-zipped using the 7zip utility to make a regular ".zip" file and it went up first time.

 

I also heard a renewed rumor that an updated Nexus build coming at some point.

 

Thanks @pimpmaul69  for the updates which are a big part of this version.

[CapitanClassic]

@rocketfan Thanks for the 2022 update. A couple questions about the Arcade emulation and Pico-8.

 

If I wanted to add arcade games like Violence Fight and/or Mutant Fighter (Death Brade), what version of MAME does it need to be compatible with? (Should I just check the /emulator/mame_2003 folder)

 

For Pico-8, it looks like it is using a port for ARM fake-08, but an older version so I don’t know if it would support some of the newer multi-load carts Poom, Frozen Knights, Into Ruins. Fake08 v0.2.2 is the newest version.

https://github.com/jtothebell/fake-08
 

is updating the emulator just a matter of building the newest source with the site listed toolchain?

[rocketfan]

On 1/5/2023 at 1:58 AM, CapitanClassic said:

Thanks for the 2022 update. A couple questions about the Arcade emulation and Pico-8.

You are welcome!

 

I wish the post numbers were still on posts to make it easier to reference them  - on which mame ROMs to use, just copying from an earlier post here:

=====================================================

For the LUFB you have:

.zip = lr-fbalpha.so  (FBA)

.zim = lr-mame2000.so

.zia = lr-fbalpha.so (FBA)  - So it's dul[picating .zip - Maybe this one was done to be compatible with roms from the Atari unit?  Not sure...

.zi3 = km_mame2003_xtreme_libretro.so

.zin = fbneo_libretro.so

.fbn = fbalpha2012_neogeo_libretro.so

 

When we were settings things up originally, a lot of work went into figuring out which games ran best on a given emulator.  You can't just rename a rom (generally) because different rom sets need to be used for any particular core.  A lot of games that stutter or lag on a different emulator will run better as .zim or .zi3, but there might be other reasons to use one of the others - like the games are not all in every romset.  Also, it seems like by default the FBN core did better at getting the aspect ratio of games right.

 

lr-mame2000 needs MAME 0.37b5

km_mame2003_xtreme can work with a lot of 0.78 roms IIRC, but see here for more info - find a mame-2003-plus reference set:

https://docs.libretro.com/library/mame2003_plus/

 

I always look for romsets which are "non-merged" for these.  These sets are really big, but each file has everything in it and is not going to depend on parent roms being there.

 

I believe that .zip, .zin and .fbn use FBN_v0.2.97.44 roms.

========================================================

The fake-08 emulator on the device (.f8 extension) is actually a custom standalone emulator I built using a buildroot toolchain which gets used for all the stuff - basically arm neon hard float.  The emulator actually does not use the atGames front end like all the other emulators.  At one time I had posted the sources here on AtariAge, since it was a good and pretty straightforward example of a custom application on these devices, but that is part of what got flushed when the other threads went away.  There is also a pico8 libretro core (.p8 extension) on these, but it had really poor cart compatibility.  I think you may still see some duplicates in the pico-8 game list, and if so it is a case where the same cart is set up with each of the two emulators.  The standalone emulator was built in October of 2021.  Now looking at the github repository, I can see that it has been updated since then, and it looks like now maybe even can be built as a libretro core.  I can look into updating the emulator and see what can be done.  When you say multi-load carts, I'm not sure about those - wondering if those are definitely supported by fake-08?

[rocketfan]

I picked up the 50th Anniversary Flashback (Flashback 11) Gold unit.  A couple of experiments went well:

 

1) It supports "Arcade Play Link" or using the Legends Ultimate Control deck if you hook your HDMI to a legends ultimate standup cabinet.

2) Out of the box it supports adding additional 2600 games in the /game folder via the USB splitter + USB stick method.  (Thank you atGames).  So for the guy on Amazon who gave it a poor rating because Pac-Man is not on there - you have an option man! 

 

Tonight I dumped the firmware using the rkflashkit utility in Linux.  It's a mixed bag, some of the partitions are identical to the Flashback X (I still have a stock unit I purchased from Menards a couple of years ago as a backup) and a couple are not.

 

A lot is exactly the same.  For example, the "resource" partition being identical proves to me that the overclock update should work fine.    rom partition is different as expected - that stores the stock games provided with the device.   emulator being different however, is the worry.  It is different and that means you CAN'T just apply the Nexus FW to these without breaking something (maybe everything).

 

In the end, to see if a version of Nexus could work on these, a new custom FW package is needed that modifies a script in the  emulator partition made from the one on the Flashback 11.  I have a very good idea of the change needed,  but have never modified the emulator partition contents, and not sure exactly how to rebuild the required partition image.  If @Brad_from_the_80s or @rmr_md want to lend a hand or maybe give me some extra hints, post here or PM me - it would surely be appreciated.  

 

Edited January 12, 2023 by rocketfan

[Brad_from_the_80s]

1 hour ago, rocketfan said:

In the end, to see if a version of Nexus could work on these, a new custom FW package is needed that modifies a script in the  emulator partition made from the one on the Flashback 11.  I have a very good idea of the change needed,  but have never modified the emulator partition contents, and not sure exactly how to rebuild the required partition image.  If @Brad_from_the_80s or @rmr_md want to lend a hand or maybe give me some extra hints, post here or PM me - it would surely be appreciated.  

 

Yeah, I actually have one of these now (Gold).  Shouldn't be too big of a problem to apply the same type of hack, if they didn't get too cute with the emulator partition or executables.  I'll maybe try to look at it this long weekend and see what I can do, or at least send you some pointers.

[rocketfan]

@CapitanClassic

 

Here is the updated fake-08 standalone emulator for Pico-8 - this will work on Atari Flashbacks with Nexus, and Legends Flashbacks with the "Ultimate" release.  Place it in /emulator replacing the original file in there.

 

I don't know what functionally is improved, but certainly there have been quite a few as a lot of time went by since the original build.  A few minor adjustments were needed to make it compile with the newer fake-08 code-base. 

 

I tried to figure out multicarts, and I did find that on the fake-08 Github page it says this:

 

Quote

If you are trying to play a multi cart game, it should be noted that you must provide all the carts required by the game as FAKE-08 currently does not have cart downloading capabilities. All carts should be placed in the same directory.

Now, that said - if an additional cart is provided it will certainly NOT want to have the .f8 extension - the .f8 just causes our launcher script to run the initial file with the fake-08 emulator, but internally it will still want follow-on carts named as per calls in the Pico-8 code (with the .p8 extension).

 

I tried experimenting with multi-cart last night, but could not find the second cart for the game I need.  For the submarine game "Peral" you have the initial cart called peral-1.p8.png, which I renamed peral-1.f8.gme to run from the /game folder on the LUFB.  This is a two-button game, BTW.  If you look at the code (which I think I understand - but maybe not), when you exit the initial menu and start the game it tries to load a second cart called "peral_game.p8".  I just couldn't figure out where/how to get that, because on the Lexaloffle BBS site I could only find the one cartridge to download.  When you try to start the game from the initial menu, an error screen appears - I think expected since the second file is not in the folder?  That's where I gave up.

 

Here is the Peral BBS page:

https://www.lexaloffle.com/bbs/?tid=43156

FAKE08.uex

Edited January 15, 2023 by rocketfan

[CapitanClassic]

Thanks @rocketfan, I will update my LFB, and try a couple different things to load a multi cart. If I am successful with Poom, Into the Ruins, or one of the other multi-cart games I will post what I had to do. And maybe create a zip folder of some of the best newer Pico-8 titles from the Featured Lexaloffle website.

[rocketfan]

21 hours ago, CapitanClassic said:

If I am successful with Poom, Into the Ruins, or one of the other multi-cart games I will post what I had to do.

Sounds good!  I see there is something called "Splore" which may give greater access to additional carts if you own a copy of the real Pico-8.  I haven't looked at the website much, but I did and see there are a lot of new "demakes" (which I find fun) of classic arcade games.  I saw Joust, R-type, Tutankham, and Time Pilot!  

[CapitanClassic]

No luck with the multicarts. My next step will be to check the documentation on Fake-08 website. Looking at other forums, like for the PSP Vita, they have gotten similar errors like the one I am seeing below.

 

Quote

FAKE-08

 

Welcome to Fake-08

A homebrew Pico-08 emulator

currently in alpha (v0.0.2.19)

Place P8 carts in /media/usbhd-s

—No cart found—

Select to cycle screen sizes

L + R to exit

 

 

 

> no LUA to load. aborting cart

I have attempted to place the other .p8 and .lua files in several different folders. (Including /media/usbhd-s, which I believe is just the Linux way of labeling the root of the mounted USB stick. Also placed in root, emulator folder, etc)

Hopefully some PSP or other forum has the answer for why the games fail. Possible that load() isn’t supported in the most recent version yet.

 

 

[rocketfan]

23 hours ago, CapitanClassic said:

Place P8 carts in /media/usbhd-s

OK - I found where that path is coming from and it's something I modified in the source of the emulator I ported way back when.  I even made a comment about "this won't matter" because I figured we always point the emulator right at the cart!

 

/media/usbhd-s is a truncation of /media/usbhd-sda1  which is where your thumb drive gets mounted on an Atari Flashback.  I got this running on the AFB first.  On an LUFB, the SD card is "/media/usbhd-mmcblk0p1"

 

So, I modified the source to hardwire it for LUFB for now at least, because I can't imagine multi-cart games being one button too often, if ever.   As far as I can tell what I changed will make it look for carts in a /p8carts folder on the root of your SD card.  

 

Please give it a try with the extra carts in /p8carts (lower case) and see if you get anywhere.

 

 

FAKE08.uex

[Cthulhu8u]

Thank you for this thread, as I recently purchased the 50 game Flashback Boom. The conversion packs have made this go from an OK device to a really great purchase.

I am wondering, now that I am playing around with it a bit, how people are adding games. Is there a media scraper and/or automated way to add games to the all-games.ini file? For example I've been manually adding a couple of games to the Arcade section, but I'm wondering if there is some more automated process or even tips on how to do it more quickly. Manually editing the .ini and finding, then resizing .PNG files is a bit tedious.

[rocketfan]

Surprising to me, but the Legends Flashback "1" - 2018 version is being sold "new" on Amazon now in 2023. 

 

https://www.amazon.com/At-Games-Legends-Flashback-Boom-electronic/dp/B07FK2GQFY

 

It's a third party seller but "ships from Amazon" so eligible for free shipping and returns.

 

Of course those can generally be picked up used for a pretty good bargain if you keep your eyes open.

Edited January 21, 2023 by rocketfan

[rocketfan]

 

@CapitanClassic Got me going again playing Pico-8 again on my Legends Flashback.  I was playing a bit of Tutankham and "The Merciless Deep" tonight.  (BTW, Tutankham is just a great little port of the original with some extra power ups thrown in).

 

Here those carts are, renamed to drop in the /game folder for anyone interested.

 

I also made yet another tweak to the emulator.  The Atari Flashback has had the ability to swap the buttons via one of the difficulty switches, since the one-button games might arbitrarily use the wrong action button.

 

In Tutankham the left/right direction of fire for your gun was backwards from the location of the buttons, so I made it so the Y button on the LUFB control pad will toggle the A and B buttons reversed.  So now you can shoot in the correct direction.  🙂

 

Now you have: x - change screen size, y - toggle reverse of action buttons, z - exit the emulator.

 

Here is also the updated emulator which can be placed in /emulator overwriting the old one.

 

 

tutankham-0.f8.gme deep-0.f8.gme FAKE08.uex

Edited January 21, 2023 by rocketfan

[CapitanClassic]

Thanks @rocketfan for the updates. I will get to work testing these this weekend. 

[rocketfan]

On 1/20/2023 at 10:07 PM, Cthulhu8u said:

I'm wondering if there is some more automated process or even tips on how to do it more quickly. Manually editing the .ini and finding, then resizing .PNG files is a bit tedious.

Yes, agreed - it is time consuming and needs lot of work with text editor and so on.  So far, nothing to automate it in Windows or allow import on the device ever got implemented.  The on-system way would be kind of neat, but really not as convenient as a Windows utility, and getting something like that working (making a long story shorter) is really time consuming due to the debugging on these being all trial and error.  The guy who built 95% of the distribution could really crank through the process, and had suggested a set of tools that allow you to do it in batch. 

 

If you peek in the Instruction_Manual.txt at the root of the Nexus distribution (90% similar to what's going on on the Legends Flashback) you will see this:

====================================

 

*********
* TOOLS *
*********

In the /emulator/tools folder you will find all kinds of programs and help for these devices and the Exit Game Shortcut. Advanced Renamer lets you remove spaces, periods and brackets, change or add extensions, etc. to large numbers of filenames at once. Flexxi Art Resizer does just what it says to large batches of images, you can even convert files to .png format. The all-games.ini maker was lifted from the Legends Flashback. While it should be noted that it won't fill in every section of the all-games.ini entry correctly, it is a huge time saver and ensures that ROM filenames match. There are also drivers, tools and instructions on how to flash the AFBX and AFBX Deluxe 2019 models without the reset hole on the bottom of the console.

====================================

 

Most of that stuff is all also embedded on the Legends Ultimate Flashback builds in /emulator/tools.  So if you were adding lots of games for some reason you could use those tools to help.  Like there is a script you can run in a folder with just the games to build a big chunk of the all-games.ini.

Instruction_Manual.txt

Edited January 22, 2023 by rocketfan