99 replies to this topic

[Danno]

Ok - so what are the chances that either this or Beef Drop are going to make it to cart form any time soon?

[Ferris]

Oh damnit.... now you got me. April Fools!

Here's to all of us who run *real* 7800 hardware!

[Albert]

Goochman said:

Kenfused posted a Q*Bert style avatar recently

Yeah, that was before we decided to release this ROM on April 1st, although he did let the cat out of the bag a bit for those who were paying attention.

..Al

[DracIsBack]

Gregory DG said:

Mmm--kay...  

Dude -- your site is hacked.

[Ferris]

Curt!! ....Ken! .....where ARE you guys???[shouts from the Atari look-out fort that I built in my back yard when I was 10]

[Albert]

Ferris said:

Curt!! ....Ken!  .....where ARE you guys???[shouts from the Atari look-out fort that I built in my back yard when I was 10]

I'm sure they'll post later today--most of us have to work during the day and can't spend as much time surfing the web as we might otherwise like.

..Al

[kenfused]

Ferris said:

Curt!! ....Ken!  .....where ARE you guys???[shouts from the Atari look-out fort that I built in my back yard when I was 10]

I am here where are you?

[kenfused]

Actually I am spending most of my time off and on waiting for stuff to come up here and hoping it doesn't time out and mark all the topics as read like it does from time to time.

I just got home from work a couple of hours ago and am working on recovering some of my 7800 beef drop source.

[mimurphy]

To get the new 7800 Q-bert ROM to work with the EMU7800 emulator (.bin or .a78 format, doesn't matter), add the following line to the ROMProperties.csv file found in the emulator executable folder:

Q-bert,,Parker Bros,,A7832,A7800NTSC,Prototype,,,66e7230f7ef9d14db82d76b06b241bc0

EMU7800 is an Atari 2600/7800 emulator implemented in .NET for the Win32 platform and is available at http://emu7800.sourceforge.net.

Mike

[Mitch]

Why is there a 1989 copyright on it? Seems like Q*bert would have been a pretty old license by then.

Mitch

[Vic George 2K3]

Not bad for a proto, though it could use more work.

[TheWriteDude]

OK, I give up. I'm confused. Is this ROM legit or a really good recreation of Q*Bert? I managed to play up to Level 4, and still I see no "April Fools!" message or whatnot.

If it's a fake, wow, what a fantastic fake then -- a fully playable game trying to pass itself off as a lost proto. I think I'll be more impressed if it's a fake, and not a real proto. It will be even BETTER if it's fake, because then the author can simply add the finishing touches to it to make it into a full-blown reproduction of Q*Bert. So I actually hope it's fake.

Thanks, AtariAge. This is what I would call a "good" April Fool's joke, where the prankee directly benefits from the joke too.

[kenfused]

I guess I am left with the difficulty of proving it is for real
A. Convert a page of the original source code into PDF
B. Post the PDF here
Repeat until the truth is known.

Good enough?

[Bruce Tomlin]

The "April fools" was an april fools. And announcing a real proto on April 1. The ROM is apparently real.

One interesting thing I noticed when looking at it was that the two copyright strings (Atari and Gottlieb) were written backwards for some reason. But a 1989 copyright? I didn't notice that. That's waaay late in the 7800's lifetime.

This was also an excuse to get the pair of 29C256 flash chips I found recently desoldered and working with my 7800 proto board. Turns out I needed a wire from pin 1 (/WE) to +5 volts, but now it works. So in a way, it has now been put on a cartridge, even if temporarily, and without a cartridge shell.

[Clint Thompson]

Wow... and it looks mucho better than the 5200 version!
Nice....

[Clint Thompson]

As in legit it plays and runs on the 7800 ? but if you mean it's actual code that was used in development who knows. Time will tell I guess...

[Clint Thompson]

I take it you can't record video using the emulators? I don't use the emus so I dunno?

[kenfused]

kenfused said:

I guess I am left with the difficulty of proving it is for real
A. Convert a page of the original source code into PDF
B. Post the PDF here
Repeat until the truth is known.

Good enough?

Too subtle?

[kenfused]

Bruce Tomlin said:

I just noticed that this came from scans of a source code listing?  Any chance of the source code getting released?

Here is a little bit:

	LDA SWCHB

	AND #64

	CMP ZLASTB

	BEQ NOCH

	INC CHEAT

	STA ZLASTB

NOCH:

	LDA CHEAT

	CMP #8

	BCS TITLESC2

	JMP LPMAINTITL

[Clint Thompson]

Maybe I don't know what I'm talking about... but even if you had the code don't you still need graphics or is that just part of the programming?

[rockman_x_2002]

Well I refuse to weigh in on this because... well I'm confused.

I will say this, however. Joke or no, this game begs to be finished! Absolutely astonishing!

[Clint Thompson]

Good to hear... I LOVE Q*Bert (haha, gameboard, trashcan, wheres the plush!?) in my gameroom

[Robert M]

kenfused said:

I guess I am left with the difficulty of proving it is for real
A. Convert a page of the original source code into PDF
B. Post the PDF here
Repeat until the truth is known.

Good enough?

I there any chance the original source will be made public? It would be highly educational to budding 7800 programmers.

Cheers!

[batari]

kenfused said:

	LDA SWCHB

	AND #64

	CMP ZLASTB

	BEQ NOCH

	INC CHEAT

	STA ZLASTB

NOCH:

	LDA CHEAT

	CMP #8

	BCS TITLESC2

	JMP LPMAINTITL

I know what this code does... but should I say anything?

[Gregory DG]

DracIsBack said:

Gregory DG said:

Mmm--kay...  

Dude -- your site is hacked.

LOL.