Ikari Warriors eprom dump

[+Mitch]

I just verified that the two incomplete ROMs that I got (RS Boxing PAL and Save Mary NTSC) are identical to the second half of the known ROMS.

 

I have not matched the two unknown ones.

 

Mitch

[Thomas Jentzsch]

2 hours ago, Mitch said:

I didn't attempt to check the two unknowns or the two half ROMs.

• "unknown E4D9.Bin" is the first half of the known Xenophope (NTSC) ROM.
• "unknown 47DC.Bin" seems to contain no data. Though, the highest two bits are always set. So maybe something went wrong when dumping, or the chip is broken.

[Tempest]

12 hours ago, nanochess said:

I think I did good 😁

 

You did good...

 

You have some interesting ones in there.  Beyond the ones with clear names you also have:

 

Desert Falcon 9/23/87 (the one that ends in 140A) - I would assume this is the final version given the late date

 

Millipede 9//29/87 - This is an odd one.  Why they made a new EPROM of Millipede and put the current date on it is a mystery.  I would assume it's the same as the released one, but you need to check.  I know the released Millipede has issues with the 2600jr (it would hang after the bonus level unless you died) so maybe they were trying to fix that bug? 

 

Dig Dug (the one that ends in 077A) - No date on this one but I assume it's the final

 

Atari Logo French (Atari XL) - Has this ever been dumped?

[Tempest]

Looking through all those EPROMs here are the new ones I haven't seen before.  I'm assuming these are all the final versions due to them matching parts of existing roms and personal experience with protos that had these labels:

 

Ikari Warriors NTSC - 4/26/90

Dark Chambers NTSC - 5/9/88
Dark Chambers PAL -  7/26/88

Double Dragon PAL - 5/20/90

Klax PAL - 10/24/91

RS Boxing NTSC - 8/25/87
RS Boxing PAL - 9/24/87

Motorodeo PAL - 2/23/90

Xenophobe PAL - 8/6/90

Desert Falcon NTSC - 9/23/87

 

This one is perplexing.  See my comment above

 

Millipede NSTC - 9/29/87

[+nanochess]

I've dumped all the memories, and I've sent the binaries to @Tempest

 

The unlabeled EPROM were empty.

 

atari_protos_from_nanochess.zip

[Tempest]

12 minutes ago, nanochess said:

I've dumped all the memories, and I've sent the binaries to @Tempest

 

The unlabeled EPROM were empty.

 

Please post them here as well.  I'm not the expert on piecing these together or examining code.

Looking through them they all seem to be the same as the final versions (even Millipede unfortunately).  The Dig Dug one has a few differences, but only being one rom it's hard to tell what they are.  Maybe @Thomas Jentzsch can tell?  I also didn't look at the French Logo one since I don't have a copy of the released rom (it was released right?).

 

I really have no explanation for the odd Millipede proto.  Maybe they were considering doing some changes but didn't?  Or perhaps someone just needed a copy of that particular EPROM for some reason and put the current date on it?  Odd...

 

atari-logo-french-hi-fc45.bin ntsc-2600-c300042-077a-hi-6c82.bin

[jer10571]

19 minutes ago, Tempest said:

Please post them here as well.  I'm not the expert on piecing these together or examining code.

Looking through them they all seem to be the same as the final versions (even Millipede unfortunately).  The Dig Dug one has a few differences, but only being one rom it's hard to tell what they are.  Maybe @Thomas Jentzsch can tell?  I also didn't look at the French Logo one since I don't have a copy of the released rom (it was released right?).

 

I really have no explanation for the odd Millipede proto.  Maybe they were considering doing some changes but didn't?  Or perhaps someone just needed a copy of that particular EPROM for some reason and put the current date on it?  Odd...

 

atari-logo-french-hi-fc45.bin 8 kB · 0 downloads ntsc-2600-c300042-077a-hi-6c82.bin 8 kB · 1 download

@Tempest I assume you have the ones I uploaded as well? I also have some eproms of different sizes if you need them, I think most are some sort of network cards or something, however there is 1 486 bios Lol.

[Tempest]

41 minutes ago, jer10571 said:

@Tempest I assume you have the ones I uploaded as well? I also have some eproms of different sizes if you need them, I think most are some sort of network cards or something, however there is 1 486 bios Lol.

Yes I do.  Thank you.

 

My guess on where these all came is Atari's own program library.  These suspiciously look like they're supposed to go in large folders which Atari used to keep archival copies of the final version of each chip.  I owned a few of them at one point and they were full of duplicate EPROMs that looked just like these (maybe 10-20 pairs in each folder).  I'm guessing that when Atari was merged with JTS (or possibly later when JTS sold their assets to Hasbro) that these archives were seen as junk to be sold and Jameco bought them to resell.  This would explain why they're all the final versions, why there are so many duplicates, why you have unreleased games in there, and why there are odd non-game EPROMs in there too (Atari kept folders for all their chips IIRC). 

 

Of course this is purely a guess, but it fits the known facts.  I wonder how many they initially had?  At least we were able to rescue some of them.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

1 hour ago, Tempest said:

The Dig Dug one has a few differences

Dig Dug?

 

That Millipede Char ROM seems to contain something like shaded or two color character definitions, e.g.

|######  |
|##   ## |
|##   ## |
|##   ## |
|######  |
|#       |
|#       |
|        |
| #####  |
| #    # |
| #    # |
| #    # |
| #####  |
| #      |
| #      |

And no, that's not meant for bold chars. Other definitions have gaps.

 

Definitely not for the 2600.

Edited February 24, 2023 by Thomas Jentzsch

[Tempest]

2 hours ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

Dig Dug?

Yes.  Isn't that what the 77 rom is?

 

 

ntsc-2600-c300042-077a-hi-6c82.bin

[Supergun]

I didn’t know about those eprom folders and the Atari program library. But it does sound logical and it does make the most sense.

 

And I definitely hope that it was the original source of where these EPROMs came from because just the thought of someone having plucked these EPROMs off of dozens and dozens of proto boards, and then just tossing the boards in the trash, was making me lose sleep at night!

 

But with juicy games like Shooting Arcade and Save Mary, it leaves us with the anxiety of what other unreleased games could have also been there.

[Tempest]

3 hours ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

That Millipede Char ROM seems to contain something like shaded or two color character definitions, e.g.

|######  |
|##   ## |
|##   ## |
|##   ## |
|######  |
|#       |
|#       |
|        |
| #####  |
| #    # |
| #    # |
| #    # |
| #####  |
| #      |
| #      |

And no, that's not meant for bold chars. Other definitions have gaps.

 

Definitely not for the 2600.

Is it maybe for the Atari 800 or 5200?

[+Mitch]

17 hours ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

• "unknown E4D9.Bin" is the first half of the known Xenophope (NTSC) ROM.
• "unknown 47DC.Bin" seems to contain no data. Though, the highest two bits are always set. So maybe something went wrong when dumping, or the chip is broken.

I confirmed that E4D9 it is indeed Xenophobe NTSC Lo Final. Good detective work on that.

Looking at 47DC again and I think it may have been partially erased. That is why the data looks so strange.

 

We'll see what my next batch looks like in a couple of days.

 

Thanks,

Mitch

[+Mitch]

5 hours ago, Tempest said:

My guess on where these all came is Atari's own program library.  These suspiciously look like they're supposed to go in large folders which Atari used to keep archival copies of the final version of each chip.  I owned a few of them at one point and they were full of duplicate EPROMs that looked just like these (maybe 10-20 pairs in each folder).  I'm guessing that when Atari was merged with JTS (or possibly later when JTS sold their assets to Hasbro) that these archives were seen as junk to be sold and Jameco bought them to resell.  This would explain why they're all the final versions, why there are so many duplicates, why you have unreleased games in there, and why there are odd non-game EPROMs in there too (Atari kept folders for all their chips IIRC). 

 

Of course this is purely a guess, but it fits the known facts.  I wonder how many they initially had?  At least we were able to rescue some of them.

I am assuming you are talking about this type of folder? It is for the 7800 but I think Atari used them for the 2600 and XE lines as well. Maybe the 5200 too.

 

Mitch

[Tempest]

1 minute ago, Mitch said:

I am assuming you are talking about this type of folder? It is for the 7800 but I think Atari used them for the 2600 and XE lines as well. Maybe the 5200 too.

 

Mitch

Yes that's it.  I think the logo was a different color for each system, but they all looked like that.

[+nanochess]

49 minutes ago, Mitch said:

I confirmed that E4D9 it is indeed Xenophobe NTSC Lo Final. Good detective work on that.

Looking at 47DC again and I think it may have been partially erased. That is why the data looks so strange.

 

We'll see what my next batch looks like in a couple of days.

 

Thanks,

Mitch

 

I would suggest to polish the pins on the sides were the programmer catchs it.

 

I did that myself with several memories.

 

[+Mitch]

47 minutes ago, nanochess said:

 

I would suggest to polish the pins on the sides were the programmer catchs it.

 

I did that myself with several memories.

 

I generally do that on all of them but it doesn't hurt to try it again.

 

Thanks,

Mitch

[Thomas Jentzsch]

14 hours ago, Mitch said:

Looking at 47DC again and I think it may have been partially erased. That is why the data looks so strange.

Is it possible to erase only certain bits (6+7)?

 

@Mitch Maybe you have to clean the pins?

Edited February 25, 2023 by Thomas Jentzsch

[Thomas Jentzsch]

8 hours ago, Tempest said:

Is it maybe for the Atari 800 or 5200?

Maybe, but I am not familiar with these consoles/computers. And the screenshots I found for Millipede on these platforms do not show this effect.

 

Plus: The font looks different than the one usually used in Millipede. E.g. here is a "2":

| #####  |
|##   ## |
|##   ## |
|   ###  |
| ####   |
|#       |
|#       |
|        |
| #####  |
| #   ## |
| #    # |
|    ##  |
|  ###   |
| ##     |
| ###### |

When we combine both, we get:

| #####  |
|##   ## |
|##   ## |
|   ###  |
| ####   |
|##      |
|####### |

The Millipede "2" does look different:

"0", "8", "E" and "G" are also different. But then, many other, quite distinctive chars match, e.g. "3", "S", "M" and "W". Maybe they were experimenting with font variations?

Edited February 25, 2023 by Thomas Jentzsch

[+nanochess]

On 2/23/2023 at 7:42 PM, jer10571 said:

So I was looking at the eproms I got again, and the eprom on top had this yellowed sticker under it. I double checked the rest of the eproms including the Ikari #2 and they were all blank. Maybe if someone gets a #2 they can upload it. Not sure how to put the two together to make one rom, but would be cool if I could put it on an sd card and play it in either my flashback 8, 9 or Retron 77.

 

Would also be cool if y'all can read and upload the eproms you get, maybe they are something cool that we already don't have access too.

 

I had a similar trouble with a labeled EPROM that appeared as blank. I just polished the pins by the internal sides and it got alive.

 

Once you dumped both you can easily concatenate both in DOS:

 

COPY /B ROM1.BIN+ROM2.BIN ROM.BIN

 

Or in macOS:

 

cat rom1.bin rom2.bin >rom.bin

 

[jer10571]

1 minute ago, nanochess said:

I had a similar trouble with a labeled EPROM that appeared as blank. I just polished the pins by the internal sides and it got alive.

 

Once you dumped both you can easily concatenate both in DOS:

 

COPY /B ROM1.BIN+ROM2.BIN ROM.BIN

 

Or in macOS:

 

cat rom1.bin rom2.bin >rom.bin

 

Thanks @nanochess I didn't think to clean the pins. These things are pretty old, so it's probably a good idea! I'll do that and test them again. Maybe I'll get lucky.

[Tempest]

3 minutes ago, nanochess said:

Or in macOS:

 

cat rom1.bin rom2.bin >rom.bin

 

That works for Linux too.

 

7 hours ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

The Millipede "2" does look different:

"0", "8", "E" and "G" are also different. But then, many other, quite distinctive chars match, e.g. "3", "S", "M" and "W". Maybe they were experimenting with font variations?

 

So it's the arcade character rom?  Interesting.  Maybe they changed things in the different revisions of the game?  I guess we'd have to ask over on KLOV or some other arcade forum.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

8 minutes ago, Tempest said:

So it's the arcade character rom?  

What makes you think so?

[Tempest]

2 minutes ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

What makes you think so?

 

Process of elimination?  It's not for the 2600, 5200, or 8-bit.  Unless this is for the lost 7800 port (is there a way to check for that?) then it has to be for the arcade version.  The only other version I know of was for the NES and Atari didn't have anything to do with that.  It would have to be for a system that Atari was designing games for during their original time in business (up to 1996).  I suppose it could be for a previously unknown Lynx or Jaguar version though.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

3 minutes ago, Tempest said:

 

Process of elimination?  It's not for the 2600, 5200, or 8-bit.  Unless this is for the lost 7800 port (is there a way to check for that?) then it has to be for the arcade version.  

I checked all these platforms (incl. Arcade) via screenshots and videos and found no match.