Spriggy Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 10 hours ago, Ben from Plaion said: Yesterday...Ben walks into the Atari Age forum Today...."I think I've made a huge mistake" 😂 1 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Philsan Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 22 hours ago, Ben from Plaion said: - Will the Atari 2600+ consoles sold in Europe be compatible with 2600 PAL50, PAL60 and NTSC cartridges? Or will European consoles only support 2600 PAL50 cartridges? The console sold in all territories is the same unit, it runs both PAL and NTSC 2600 cartridges. Obviously NTSC60 and PAL50 cartridges will run and have correct colors. PAL60 cartridges will run too but what about colors? Nowadays many homebrew games are PAL60 because they run at the same speed of NTSC games and are easy to convert (only colors have to be changed). Thanks for answering people's questions! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 8 minutes ago, Philsan said: PAL60 cartridges will run too but what about PAL60 cartridges? I figure you are asking about PAL60. They will of course run, but most likely with wrong colors, because Stella cannot not know that they are PAL. Usually you tell Stella with the filename or with the properties. But the former cannot be influenced and the latter will most likely not exist or found. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dionoid Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 13 hours ago, Ben from Plaion said: Here are a couple of photos of a specially made cart PCB that is used in production to test that each pin on the consoles cartridge socket works Wow, look at the wear on those connectors; that’s a lot of testing being done! 👍🏼 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 2 minutes ago, Dionoid said: Wow, look at the wear on those connectors; that’s a lot of testing being done! 👍🏼 BTW: The text on the PCB says "Atari host cassette test light board"/"front" 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trebor Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 On 9/22/2023 at 5:29 AM, Ben from Plaion said: - Which emulator is used for the 7800? The 7800 developer and beta tester community would prefer "a7800" emulator to be used. It was forked from Dan's original Mame a7800 driver, and is nearly cycle accurate, allows for mid-scanline graphical changes, has faithful pokey emulation, ym2151 emulation, etc. Prosystem 1.3. I was advised to use a7800 and we did try, but I dont beleive it was fully compatible with arm based chips like the Rockchip 3128 we use. Leveraging ProSystem core, JS7800 sources should really be utilized then. There is a plethora of updates to the ProSystem code that makes it perform closer to hardware accuracy, in addition to support of a slew of newer homebrews. Here are some updates to the ProSystem code from just this year alone: - TIA fidelity issue fix (contributed by RevEng @ AtariAge) - Pokey rewrite (contributed by RevEng @ AtariAge) - RIOT interrupt mirror fix (contributed by RevEng @ AtariAge) - Updated palettes (contributed by Trebor @ AtariAge) - YM-2151 default volume level adjustment - Cartridge header fix for television type - Banksets support - Maria background color fix (Keystone Koppers) - Cartridge headers fix (Fixes several ROMs that required special versions) - Improved cycle accuracy (resolves several game glitches) - YM-2151 homebrew auto-detect support - Pokey filter support (contributed by RevEng @ AtariAge) - Support for 7800 Diagnostic cartridge 5 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bitsized Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 On 9/20/2023 at 8:48 AM, Thomas Jentzsch said: In the store these games are marked as "Melody-enhanced". Edit: I don't think that's gives the complete list. E.g. Loderunner will not work too and is not marked. Was it confirmed by @Ben from Plaion or @Albert that Melody-enhanced cartridges might not work on the 2600+? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ben from Plaion Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 16 hours ago, Giles N said: @Ben from Plaion I hope the AA-crowd aren’t too hard on you. As a gamer thats been using this forum/site since 2019 (actually before that, without account), I’ve found it both an invaluable technical resource and gaming-guide, as well as socially stimulating. I see how really indepth the coders (games, emulation). homebrewers and hackers go … it feels they have answers to everything after they’ve been doing Atari for many decades. And as a gamer among the gamer/user/buyer-crowd, it may sound like we want and expect everything… for less than 99$s, £s or €s. Thats because we tend to do! Because we don’t think too deeply about production-costs all the time. Yet, I hope the questions can bring issues to the surface, which - even though they sound like endless demands -, can actually help this become as good a product as possible (and true-to-form: play as many 2600 and 7800-titles as possible😁) I hope this will become a very solid retro-game system, and I do hope it will be successful and make gamers happy. And, hey, I will throw in this: I really appreciate that producers/manufacturers show up to interact directly with us here (even though many of, including me at least, can be a bit of a whiner whishing all-&-everything and what-not). Nice to see the interaction going on, and my hopes a synergy will help create a good product and help future-production through Atari-to-AA-communication! Thanks for this. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ben from Plaion Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 16 hours ago, turbo graphics 220 said: Hi Ben, nice to see you. Don't have a question but want to say I'm happy to see new Atari games in store and I hope you might decide to do more 2600 games or even some old 7800 games or new games for the 7800. It would be cool if for next year had the 2600+ in the jr shell or the Darth Vader shell. Keep up the good work. OK 1 question, are you able to achieve a 5.51 in Dragster. 😄 Anyway on the eb games website it now shows that Bezerk is out of stock. The paddle bundle sold out really quick but I wasn't sure how people would take to buying carts so this means sales are pretty good 😄. I really don't know what reaction someone who hasn't played atari for 30 years would have seeing newly programmed games for Atari. Really if you buy the all the games and the system thats 16 good games, a pretty nice bundle I think. Surprised to find Hero is now $50, I own it because I brought a box of junk back in the day for $5 because I mainly wanted the boxed copy of columns for Sega Megadrive and it just happened to have some extra stuff including Polaris and Hero. I had noticed that Atari stuff had been getting cheaper since about 2007 which is why it was surprising. Possibly the best Willyvania on the system As for not working with Pitall 2 etc, the developers were upfront in the video saying that this is for someone who has 10 old games and no way to play them anymore and it will do that. This should be enough to decide if this is for you, for certain people this is perfect. A fortnight player having fun with the gamestation, yes I think they will. I have personally never known anyone owns these 100 in 1 systesms or keeps it near their tv for long, I always thought they get played for a couple of months after christmas then get thrown out. I don't think there will be anyone in 5 years still playing their gamestation. I mean there are lot of good games on the old 100 in 1 systems but they are now all broken or old or have some other reason not to use them. I can certainly see people still using the 2600+ in 5 or 10 years. Thanks I'm going to be testing around 250 original 2600 and 7800 carts in the next week, again concentrating on any I can find that have 'not tested' in the compatibility list. Hopefully they have Dragster there and I will give it a try. 👍 Indeed nice to see solus carts selling well in Australia. 8 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ben from Plaion Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 15 hours ago, atwwong said: Hello, Ben, welcome to AtariAge! I know it's niche, but does the AtariVox work with the 2600+? (Sorry, but I haven't seen this answered anywhere.) Sorry to sound like a broken record but I havent had access to this device, but if I did I would try. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ben from Plaion Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 On 9/21/2023 at 9:53 PM, donjn said: No doubt, but if I want to play HERO on this thing I gotta go on Ebay and spend $30 or $40. Yes, a lot of games are $5 but there are also a lot that are over $20. Very old games, that might not work all the time. Sticking these old, corrosion-filled games into a shiny new unit...How much testing have they done on that front? This is a very pertinent point. I've personally tested myself around 300 original carts. Many carts looked like they hadnt been used in 30 years. A considerable amount, maybe 20% of carts tested would need the cartridge contacts cleaning with isopropanol fluid and a qtip - you should of seen the Embracer archive guys face when I first started blowing carts and trying to wipe them with my finger! Almost all carts out of the 20% that initially failed worked fine after a isopropanol clean. Clearly this is important for people to note when trying out a old dusty box of carts from the loft that havent been touched in decades. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dr Karnov Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 Has anyone had a chance to test Commando 7800 or Midnight Mutants yet? 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ben from Plaion Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 1 hour ago, Trebor said: Leveraging ProSystem core, JS7800 sources should really be utilized then. There is a plethora of updates to the ProSystem code that makes it perform much closer to hardware accuracy, in addition to support of a slew of newer homebrews. Here are some updates to the ProSystem code from just this year alone: - TIA fidelity issue fix (contributed by RevEng @ AtariAge) - Pokey rewrite (contributed by RevEng @ AtariAge) - RIOT interrupt mirror fix (contributed by RevEng @ AtariAge) - Updated palettes (contributed by Trebor @ AtariAge) - YM-2151 default volume level adjustment - Cartridge header fix for television type - Banksets support - Maria background color fix (Keystone Koppers) - Cartridge headers fix (Fixes several ROMs that required special versions) - Improved cycle accuracy (resolves several game glitches) - YM-2151 homebrew auto-detect support - Pokey filter support (contributed by RevEng @ AtariAge) - Support for 7800 Diagnostic cartridge Thanks for this I'm reading all the info and supporting links you post. 3 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcinJ Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 18 hours ago, LatchKeyKid said: I say go for it regarding the homebrew. And obviously welcome! When I discovered this forum after watching some youtube videos about later 2600 games (like Solaris and Kung Fu) that blew my mind and were way better than the pong style games I remembered, I lurked for a bit and then decided to make a less ambitious hack since I hadn't coded anything since high school sophomore year in the early 90s. When I got here, I saw the homebrews made in the decades since and was even more impressed. Thanks!!! Yes I am also very impressed by the quality of homebrews here. Well it will not start any time soon. I did not program any game since early 90s as well and even then it was very simple thing. I am scientist, who works mostly with python nowadays. Obviously programming a game is very different thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+karri Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 The Atari 2600+ appears to have 256M of RAM. My guess is that the cart is not connected to the databus and addressbus directly which requires the game to be read into RAM. Crossbow is 50k game and it is mentioned in the list for good games on the Atari 2600+. So at least you can write games using the full address space which is great! I will be actively following this thread to see if any homebrew extensions can be used on the Atari 2600+. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dionoid Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 (edited) 3 hours ago, karri said: The Atari 2600+ appears to have 256M of RAM. My guess is that the cart is not connected to the databus and addressbus directly which requires the game to be read into RAM. Crossbow is 50k game and it is mentioned in the list for good games on the Atari 2600+. So at least you can write games using the full address space which is great! I will be actively following this thread to see if any homebrew extensions can be used on the Atari 2600+. The Atari 2600+ has a cartridge dumper, which basically dumps an inserted 2600/7800 cartridge into a rom file. Then this rom file is automatically passed to the 2600 or 7800 emulator running on the Atari 2600+ to actually play the game. So games are not directly interacting with the 2600+'s Rockchip microprocessor or its 256MB DDR3 RAM. Crossbow (2600 version) is 16k and Crossbow (7800 version) is 144k, so I'm not sure why you say it's a 50k game. Also I'm not sure what the cartridge size has to do with the address space, as bank-switching is commonly used in these cartridges. Edited September 23, 2023 by Dionoid 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
uberwolf6688 Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 @Ben from Plaion Thanks for the forthright answers. If I may ask a few questions of my own: 1. Does this system work with trackballs? Either the original Atari or a Wico trackball. 2. Speaking of Wico, do the Command Control sticks work with this system? I'd assume this is an obvious yes, but these are my controllers of choice and I'd love to use them. 3. Does the Smurfs Save the Day game work on this? There is a way to play it without the KidVid attachment, but it requires a combo with the difficulty/color switch, I'm curious if an emulator can do this. Here's a link with details on the combo:https://forums.atariage.com/topic/7293-smurfs-save-the-day-without-kid-vid/ 4. This is perhaps not directly a question for you, but what is special about the Popeye cartridge that marks it as untested? I notice that the Retron 77 doesn't support this game either. I've never heard anything unique about that cart though. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zonie Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 On 9/16/2023 at 1:12 AM, sramirez2008 said: Me too. I think their too cool for school! "Use with Many Controllers" LOL On 9/16/2023 at 12:22 PM, famicommander said: This is the most baffling attitude. You don't know if it's good, but you're going to buy one anyway, and if it's not good you hope they make another one so you can buy it next year and hope it's good? This is why we got horrible AtGames products for 10 years in a row. You don't get it. Some people will collect every iteration of a thing. Think label variants, for example. If you don't like it, don't buy it. Just stop bitching about it here. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zonie Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 @Ben from Plaion Welcome to AA. Sorry if this was asked, I missed a few pages. Why was the decision to make a single button joystick when the plan is to be 7800 compatible? 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
desiv Posted September 23, 2023 Share Posted September 23, 2023 1 hour ago, Zonie said: Why was the decision to make a single button joystick when the plan is to be 7800 compatible? I know, I'm not Ben... Just thinking out loud... I'd guess because that original Atari VCS joystick design is iconic. Neither the Proline or the Europads have much of a retro appeal... Also, most 7800 games work fine with a single button... That said, I'm pretty sure they will be coming out with a 2 button stick for those who want to upgrade... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JPF997 Posted September 24, 2023 Share Posted September 24, 2023 8 minutes ago, desiv said: I know, I'm not Ben... Just thinking out loud... I'd guess because that original Atari VCS joystick design is iconic. Neither the Proline or the Europads have much of a retro appeal... Also, most 7800 games work fine with a single button... That said, I'm pretty sure they will be coming out with a 2 button stick for those who want to upgrade... Some company like power A will probably make third party controller's so that we can play the 7800 game's, the original joystick just had to be included though, it's way to legendary for it not to be included with the 2600+ 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
donjn Posted September 24, 2023 Share Posted September 24, 2023 3 hours ago, desiv said: I know, I'm not Ben... Just thinking out loud... I'd guess because that original Atari VCS joystick design is iconic. Neither the Proline or the Europads have much of a retro appeal... Also, most 7800 games work fine with a single button... That said, I'm pretty sure they will be coming out with a 2 button stick for those who want to upgrade... You should let @Ben from Plaion answer this question though. Im not saying dont give him an out, but I am really curious because they could have easily kept the iconic CX40 look but still add a button on the right side. 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trebor Posted September 24, 2023 Share Posted September 24, 2023 On 9/23/2023 at 8:53 AM, Ben from Plaion said: Thanks for this I'm reading all the info and supporting links you post. Truly hope it is given some strong consideration and integration. As mentioned in this post, what is furnished by leveraging ProSystem 1.3 core files has many significant and obvious issues. It would be a very poor showing of the 7800 system and library if left as is currently. Hoping @TrogdarRobusto is involved as well, from a community and public relations perspective. 3 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted September 24, 2023 Share Posted September 24, 2023 7 hours ago, uberwolf6688 said: 4. This is perhaps not directly a question for you, but what is special about the Popeye cartridge that marks it as untested? I notice that the Retron 77 doesn't support this game either. I've never heard anything unique about that cart though. Popeye did not work back then. But since then the 2600+ dumper has been improved and now supports E0 (Parker's bankswitching). Therefore it should work. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fluxit Posted September 24, 2023 Share Posted September 24, 2023 1 hour ago, donjn said: they could have easily kept the iconic CX40 look but still add a button on the right side. Plus, if the 2600 compatibility with it(as a 7800 stick) was proper, both buttons should be usable with 1 button 2600 games, providing ambidextrous support at the same time. Of course it would still be a somewhat suboptimal 7800 joystick, due to the button placement. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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