emulation and real Atari equipment

[AtariDude]

I have a question that seems simple enough but I am not sure if the answer is at simple as it seems.

 

I noticed that Star Fire needs to use z26 since other emulators don't support the illegal opcodes that it uses.

 

Assuming that someone could get a program to work with an emulator, would that program work on a real Atari 2600 / 7800 machine, assuming that the bin file could be converted to a real game cartridge? I would think that the answer is yes but maybe there is a reason that it might not work.

 

I am just curious since creating a real game cartridge from a bin file would probably cost at least $20 or more and unless I am planning to sell the game, I don't think I would like to have to spend $20 or more.

[Thelen]

Well it worked on a real atari (tested it 10 minutes ago with my self made sram cartridge. I'm planning to make a site with detailed instuctions on how to make the programmer/reader and cart layout)

 

but with one exeption when you pull on you will see already fIRE standing beneath when it draws STAR. when it goes drawing FIRE the beneath FIRE will disappear when it's at FI.

(strange)

 

the rest acts normally like at Z26

 

(maybe it could be because i'm using a PAL tv)

 

TheleN

[DanBoris]

quote:

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Originally posted by AtariDude:

Assuming that someone could get a program to work with an emulator, would that program work on a real Atari 2600 / 7800 machine, assuming that the bin file could be converted to a real game cartridge?

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Star Fire obviously works because it's been tested, but in general the answer to this question is not necessarily. Just because a game runs on an emulator doesn't mean it will run properly on the real hardware.

 

Dan

[Eckhard Stolberg]

@ thelen:

This might be a problem with your RAM cart. I just tried the Star Fire demo on my Cuttle Cart on a PAL system, and it behaves just like it does under z26.

 

@ AtariDude:

As Dan has said, there is no guaranty that a game that works on an emulator will also work on the real system. So it is advisable to do the final round of fine tuning on a real VCS. But if you don't get too fancy with your programming, there usually are only some small things that need to be changed, if any. So you can do most of the testing on an emulator and only post your binary occasionally to the Stella mailing list asking the members to try the program on the real hardware for you. Other homebrew games like Gunfight, Qb or Thrust have been developed this way too.

 

 

Ciao, Eckhard Stolberg

[Thomas Jentzsch]

quote:

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Originally posted by thelen:

but with one exeption when you pull on you will see already fIRE standing beneath when it draws STAR. when it goes drawing FIRE the beneath FIRE will disappear when it's at FI.

(strange)

---

 

This is due to some debugging code I forgot to remove.

 

Use the right difficulty switch to make it (dis)appear.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

quote:

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Originally posted by AtariDude:

I noticed that Star Fire needs to use z26 since other emulators don't support the illegal opcodes that it uses.

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That's not 100% correct anymore. The newest version of PCAE should work too and there are also plans for updating Stella.