TI-99/4a Curated Software List

[+wavemotion]

So I'm ramping back up on DS994a - my emulator for the DS/DSi/XL/LL to add a few new features and cleanup some of the MBX handling (converted/hacked MBX carts run fine but the original binary/grom versions perform hellish bankswitching which was was using a slow 4K memcpy() and I have now switched to just moving pointers to memory around to provide a smooth and full framerate).

 

In looking back at the last year since the first official release of the emulator, one of the things that perplexes DS994a users the most (and I get lots of help requests for) is the c/d/g/3/8/9 file formats - it dosen't help that every emulator seems to want things packaged slightly differently (I only recently discovered the not-that-new switch in MAME to individual 6K GROMs though I understand it also supports single-file GROMs).  Most users of DS994a want to just pick game, play game without any fuss.

 

Even for someone like me who is at least semi-savvy about how this all works, it's confusing when you look at WHTECH (a National Treasure-Trove of TI stuff!!).  Stuff is strewn about in various directories like the clothing isle at TJ-Maxx after a big sale.  There is ample duplication and most everything is in 8.3 file format (yes, I realize FinalGROM and some older emulators need it that way...). Even MAME which attempts to clean things up a bit is still living with 8.3.  A bunch of stuff uses the PHMxxxx file naming convention though it doesn't appear consistent. The FinalGROM collected sets are nice but I prefer to use the original binary/grom files whenever possible as my emulator accurately handles them.

 

To that end, I'm working on a highly curated list of software for DS994a that would provide a clean set of roms with some standardization of naming.

 

All GROMs would be single-file with 0x00 bytes in the 6K-8K region (preferring the MAME .zip versions where possible and padding the 2K between individual GROMs).

 

Filenames would be reasonably short (128 chars is the limit for DS994a with 32 as a limit of what can be shown on a single filename line that auto-scrolls if the filename longer). An example of the format as follows:

 

Alpiner (TI - PHM3042, 1982)_c.bin

Alpiner (TI - PHM3042, 1982)_g.bin

 

The emulator is smart enough to only show "Alpiner (TI - PHM3042, 1982)" in the list of games (hiding the _8 or _c and only showing one game even if _d or _g files are present).

 

The curated list I have so far are these games... I wanted 50-ish of the most recognizable games and including some of the rare games that are too good to miss on the system... I've also put a half-dozen homebrew / compiled XB games on the list. Mainly I wanted a smallish set of games that would really showcase the TI-99/4a system with the focus on games we played in the early 1980s plus a smattering of later homebrews.  Most users of DS994a would not go beyond this list - though they are free to delve deeper into the rabbit hole as they wish.

 

Edit: Updated List of 50 games... 16-Feb-2024:

 

Plus 2 disks... one for Adventure (with the most common Scott Adam's games) and one for Tunnels of Doom.

 

Before I get too far down the line... some questions:

• Has anyone attempted some descriptive/better naming convention for the TI-99/4a ROMs? Most other systems have some kind of 'goodset' or similar with proper naming and I'm happy to follow suit.
• Can anyone think of any games I should remove or add to this list? Remember, this would be for people who are either new to the TI-99/4a or returning to the system via Emulation and want a quick-pick-and-play experience so I don't want the list to be overwhelming. I'd love to whittle this down to 50 titles.
• If I did put together a folder of such curated games, properly named... could that be hosted somewhere on WHTECH?  Who would I contact?

[+OLD CS1]

Living in an 8.3 world, and I am just an LFN girl...

[Tursi]

There's a goodset for the TI, but the filenames include things like (Part 1 of 2), which complicates the emulator automatically finding the other parts.

The MAME RPK format probably remains the best option for simplifying the mess* IMO (when it includes the XML metadata file), as it's a single file ZIP with everything inside. I still (really?) intend to support it in Classic99, I just haven't got around to it for... what... 12 years? Heh. I always dreamt of extending it to include a screenshot and manual like the Win994a cartridge format supported, since that should be trivial to add.

 

*haha... MAME, MESS, see what I did there? I need sleep...

 

[johnph3]

What about Treasure Island

[Asmusr]

I'm happy you have chosen Flying Shark as an example of a home brew game. For another, I would choose Bouncy's Obstacle Course because it has smooth scrolling and doesn't need any expansion RAM.

[+wavemotion]

36 minutes ago, Asmusr said:

I'm happy you have chosen Flying Shark as an example of a home brew game. For another, I would choose Bouncy's Obstacle Course because it has smooth scrolling and doesn't need any expansion RAM.

Honestly, it was hard not to populate the entire homebrew list with your games   But Bouncy also made the cut - you can see the updated list in the first post.

 

I've decided to cut out some of the original games to make room for more homebrews - I've painstakingly cut it down to 50 titles which was my goal and it's roughly a 40/10 split.  Still hemming and hawing over what a really good representative set of games would be to show off the system with a high likelihood that someone will find the game they may have played in their youth.

[+wavemotion]

In the background, I continue to clean up my ROM set for the TI-99/4a - my full set is about 150 carts and Wavemotion's Highly Curated list still stands at 50.

 

I'm checking all the GROMs now - as TI (and partners) generally used GROM chips that were only 6K in size, I ran a little script I wrote to check if there was any data in the upper 2K of each 8K GROM segment. 

 

71 of my 76 GROM files were "CLEAN" (meaning it was 0x00 bytes at every upper 2K segment) which is correct for the vast majority of TI released games (well... not correct, but reasonable... I'm still not sure what a real 6K GROM chip will do if addressed at >1800+) . Many of the legacy GROM dumps have garbage in this upper 2K area possibly as a result of how they were dumped (maybe using a GRAM Kracker or similar?)

 

The following 5 GROMs were marked "DIRTY" (meaning at least one byte in some upper 2K segment was not 0x00):

 

 

I assume the two prototypes (one by PB and one by MB) would similarly have used 6K GROM chips had they been released and the upper 2K is just unused garbage bytes.

 

Less sure on Avaris II and the two XBs by Tony... maybe they are utilizing that upper 2K of each GROM segment?  Before I go and just clean out that area of the GROM and see if it has a detrimental effect... I figured I'd best ask.

 

Thoughts of any kind?

[+Torrax]

Extended Basic 2.5, Extended Basic 2.7, and Avaris II use the upper 2K GROM segments.

A GRAM device or FinalGROM99 is needed for those, as they supported 8K GROM's.

 

Only a few commercial modules had full 8K GROM support.  For example Triton's "Super Extended Basic"

and Mechatronic's "Extended Basic II+".

[RXB]

RXB 2001 to 2020 all use all GROMs from >6000 to >FFFF

RXB 2021 to 2024 all use all GROMs from >6000 to >FFFF also.

 

Odd RXB was not listed above as it has been around since 1993 before most other 3rd party XB versions.

And since 1991 I bought and released the XB 110 Texas Instruments GPL and ROM source code for free.

[+wavemotion]

7 hours ago, RXB said:

Odd RXB was not listed above as it has been around since 1993 before most other 3rd party XB versions.

And since 1991 I bought and released the XB 110 Texas Instruments GPL and ROM source code for free.

I'm one man on borrowed-hobby-time... so it's taking me some effort to go through and test everything with my emulator and standardize to my naming conventions. Rest assured that RBX 2024 (a) is in my "sift-and-sort" pile.

[+Vorticon]

11 hours ago, RXB said:

RXB 2001 to 2020 all use all GROMs from >6000 to >FFFF

RXB 2021 to 2024 all use all GROMs from >6000 to >FFFF also.

 

Odd RXB was not listed above as it has been around since 1993 before most other 3rd party XB versions.

And since 1991 I bought and released the XB 110 Texas Instruments GPL and ROM source code for free.

Rich, the community owes you a lot for your dogged efforts at improving XB and for freely sharing. Perhaps it doesn't get said enough, so thank you.

[GDMike]

Thank you!

[+Torrax]

17 hours ago, RXB said:

Odd RXB was not listed above as it has been around since 1993 before most other 3rd party XB versions.

And since 1991 I bought and released the XB 110 Texas Instruments GPL and ROM source code for free.

 

Sorry there Rich.  I was trying to list the commercially released 8K-GROM modules that were listed in the Tenex/Tex-Comp/Triton catalogs back then.  Not sure if there were any other module releases, besides a limited run of Extended Basic 3 Super Module (1993 - Asgard).  There was also a Multi-Mod (John Guion) upgrade for the Super Extended Basic cart.  This used the review module library function to add E/A, TI-Writer, Disk Manager 3.0 from a second GROM bank.

 

There were a plethora of module hacks, extensions, disk conversions, and homebrew releases for the various GRAM devices over the years.  With emulation you are no longer limited to owning one.  Making it easier to develop for GPL now a days.  You can now stuff a EA-OPT5 program in a GROM image and run it from a FinalGROM cart along 32K RAM expansion (interal/side-port).

Edited February 22 by Torrax
Added SXB upgrade

[+Ksarul]

On the Parker Brothers files, they didn't actually use TI GROM chips. They developed their own GROM-workalike chips called PCROMs. They were also 6K devices though, so your instincts are right. Starship Pegasus was intended for release by TI for the MBX, so its GROMs should also be 6K, but there is no guarantee of that until you do your slicing test.

 

I included the documentation on the Parker Brothers chips here, in case they come in useful.

wickstead_ti994a_PCROM_overview.pdf

[+Torrax]

Here is a list of the Parker Brothers & Atarisoft titles to help you with your renaming efforts.

 

Parker Brothers

 

 PB1610 Frogger (1984)

 PB1650 Popeye (1984)

 PB1620 Q*bert (1984)

*PB1640 Super Cobra (1984)(NR)[no known copy]

*PB1630 Tutankham (1984)(NR)[Proto]

*PB16xx Astrochase (1984)(NR)[?no known copy?]

 

ATARISOFT

 RX8500 Pac-Man (1983)

 RX8503 Centipede (1983)

 RX8506 Defender (1983)

 RX8509 Dig Dug (1983)

 RX8512 Donkey Kong (1983)

*RX8515 Super Storm (1983)(NR)[Proto]

 RX8516 Protector II (1983)

 RX8517 Picnic Paranoia (1983)

 RX8518 Shamus (1983)

*RX8519 Robotron: 2084 (1983)(NR)[Proto]

*RX8522 Stargate (1983)(NR)[cancelled]

*RX8525 Joust (1983)(NR)[?no known copy?]

 RX8528 Jungle Hunt (1983)

 RX8531 Moon Patrol (1983)

 RX8534 Pole Position (1983)

*RX8537 Missile Command (1983)(NR)[cancelled, all platforms]

*RX8540 Galaxian (1983)(NR)[cancelled]

 RX8543 Ms. Pac-Man (1983)

*RX8546 Battlezone (1983)(NR)[cancelled]

*RX8549 Vanguard (1983)(NR)[cancelled]

 

[+hloberg]

attached is my game list from my https://ti99resources.wordpress.com/

it's about 200 games. feel free download as you will.

note: all games also have manuals in the documents portion of the website.

gameslisting.pdf