THE Bally/Astrocade FAQ Version 1.5 Created by Lance F. Squire 6/3/95 Updated 10/21/95 Much Info taken from Arcadian news letters 11/5/82 to 10/31/84. * The existence of NEW or updated information will be denoted with a vertical line "|" in the left border. Spelling & grammatical corrections will NOT be marked. ;-) In order to keep this information as accurate & complete as possible send any Corrections, Additions, or anything of interest,to me & I'll mention you right here on the top! (No, Below this paragraph naturally.) Thanks to: G. Chance For giving this FAQ a home! And providing a wonderful service to all the curious among us! Mike Curran Former Esoterica play tester ;-) for the possible existence of the Soccer cart. Jay Fenton For linking to us from his Personal Biography page! Glenn Saunders For asking some questions. Brett Bilbrey For a wealth of NEW knoledge. (Well, new to me anyway.) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Contents: --------- 1) What is a Bally/Astrocade 2) System Specifications 3) Hardware & add-ons List 4) Computer expansion 5) Cassettridge/tape List 6) Games written by users, slow and clunky? 7) Publications of note 8) People of Note 9) Connecting to a monitor 10) Joystick rewiring (Bally/Atari) 11) Bally/Astro Basic Why only 1800 Bytes? Command list Keypad overlay 12) Sources of Bally/Astrocade Stuff 13) Closing --------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1) What is a Bally/Astrocade ------------------------- A short history In 1978 Bally/Midway introduced a home video game system called the "Bally Professional Arcade". Due to "stiff competition" they withdrew the system some time later. (Date anyone?) A group of users who had enjoyed the system's games & learned its potential through the Basic Programming Cartridge got together & bought the system from Bally. They re-introduced it in about 1981(?) as the "Bally Computer System". When you purchased this system they gave you a Basic Programming Cart FREE. The New company's name was Astrovision. In about 1982 it changed its name to Astrocade & now labeled its system as the Astrocade. The system continued till about 1985(?) 2) System Specifications --------------------- Res: True 160x102 Basic 160x88 Colours: 8* 2 Graphic type: Bitmap, 2 plane bitpacked Palette: 32 Colours 8 intensities 256 total Cpu: Z80 | Speed: 3.579Mhz Rom: 8K Ram: 4K Cart Rom: 8K Expansion: 64k total Sound: 3 voice +Noise & Vibrato Ports: 4 controller 1 expansion 1 light pen * The bitmap structure of the Bally actually only allows for 4 colour settings. However, through the use of 2 colour palettes and a left/right boundary control byte, you could have the left section of screen (lets call this the play field) use 1 set of colours while the right side (Info field) used an entirely different set of colours All versions of the system were physically the same except for the name plate. The Astrocade version had small changes in the internal BIOS to display the longer name on the built in menu screen. Usually seen in Black with wood grain sides & gold trim there apparently was a beige/white version advertised. The case measured 15" wide, 10 3/4" deep and 4 3/4" high. Under a smoke coloured lid that covered the back half of the unit, when viewed from above, was the built in cart & overlay storage bin with slots for 15 carts & 14 overlays. The front half sported a 24 key calculator pad, (where overlays went when used) a reset button and a spring loaded cartridge port, labeled "Insert Cassette", with Eject button. Diagram: Top view Power-+ R/F cable+ | 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 __|_|_-__---__---___================___---__---__==_____ |\|____________________________________________________|/| ||| ||| ||| ||| ||| 8 ||| ||| ||| |||____________________________________________________||| ||\ ======9====== / || || |-------------------------------------------------| || || | ___________________________ | || || | |.... | _________________ | | || || | |.... | | | | | || || | |.... | | | | | || || | |.... | |_______________| | | || 3/4 s->|| | |.... | __ _____ | | || ||| |.... | R- Eject | | || ||| --------------------------- | || |/------------------------------------------------------\| -------------------------------------------------------- 1. On/Off switch 2,3,5 & 6. Controller ports 1,2,3 & 4 respectively 4. Expansion port break out panel 7. Light pen port break out panel 8. Smoked storage bay cover 9. Name plate s. channel select switch R. Reset button Unlike MOST other video game systems, the Bally's cartridges do not protrude from the port. Instead they lay flat. The cartridges were designed like audio cassettes. Being the same width, height, and thickness as a cassettes opening. Where the write protect tabs for an audio cassette would be are two openings for the Eject button to hold on to. Where the tape in an audio cassette is exposed, there is an opening where the pins in the Bally's "Cassette" port press against the single sided board in the Cartridge. For this reason I personally like to call them "Cassettridges". To load a cart into the unit, you slide the open end in over a spring loaded guide then press down until the Eject spikes latch into the holes. You then press Reset to see the new selections on the menu. Also Unlike MOST systems you were instructed to load carts WITH the power ON! (In the 14 Years I have owned my system this has never produced a problem) All Bally/Astrocades came with an on screen menu system that displayed the 4 built in programs (2 games 1 calculator 1 doodle) + any games on the inserted Cassette. The Bally's Controllers were also unique. They consisted of a large pistol grip, appropriately contoured and knurled, a TRIGGER (NOT a button),a badge on both sides with the BALLY label, (See BALLY fitness ;-) SAME BALLY). Plus a brown knob on top that functioned as both a paddle & an extremely short throw joystick. On the top of the knob is a gold plate with controller number 1-4. On the Astrocade the Bally logo was removed but the badge spots are still there. To date I have never found a controller or joystick more responsive than the Bally's. I actually use a modified Bally controller on my ST's, Amiga and VCS. The Bally controller does have 1 major weak spot that I have found. The wire to the trigger usually falls off as it's extremely difficult to get the trigger spring contacts hot enough to bond with the solder. After the 5th resolder I actually placed the springs on an electric burner till the solder melted, shut down the burner and placed the wire into the pool of solder. I have NEVER had to fix my controller again! 3) Hardware & add ons ------------------ Hardware Known to exist Name Comments -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Extra Controllers Usually labeled 3 & 4 Audio Cassette interface for use with Original Bally Basic Blue Ram 16K or 32K Ram expansion with ZIF connector for adding keyboard or other peripherals. Usually accompanied by a Blue Ram Extended Basic. allowing access to extra ram. R&L 64K Ram Board Expansion board sold with NO ram on it but all the necessary hardware support. Use of Blue Ram Ex. Basic recommended. Viper 1 16K computer add under with keyboard. Optional 4 RS-232 ports. Viper 5 16K or 32K Computer add under. As above. Astrocade Arcade style Styled Like a real Arcade machine This Game system display cabinet is beautiful! Bottom section display Cabinet! Features glass door & racks to hold the Many cartridge boxes the store would need. |Light Pen Comes with Creative Crayon cart. | Brett owns one! (but not the cart...) =========================================================================== Hardware Hoped to exist (Can anyone confirm release) Name Comments --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Viper Z-Grass System Complete computer add under. Features: 64K Ram, 32K Rom, keyboard, 2 RS-232s 320x204 colour graphics, 3 channel Stereo sound, 4 channel DD 5.25 drive controller 8231 Math Processor Z-Grass programming language, C/PM compat. =========================================================================== 4)Computer Expansion? ------------------- Alternative Engineering Corp. contracted to create the Z-Grass ad-under, decided it was in everyone's best interest to release the unit them selves. In August 198?(5) they sent an order form to anyone who had ever shown interest in such a device on the Arcadian mailing list. The units were then to be made on an on order basis. Unfortunately I being a kid at the time had no funds to send my self, so I ordered the Manual, offered for people to determine if they actually wanted the system. It took over a year (I think) to receive my manual. If any units were produced they were surely in extremely limited quantities. Probably only those who ordered the unit it self know for sure. (If ANYONE has or has seen one of these I want to KNOW!) 5) Cassettridge/Tape List ---------------------- Name Comments --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Built in -------- Gunfight Colour version of Boot Hill (Perfect!) Checkmate Game that TRON Light Cycles is based upon. 0 players = demo Calculator 5 function, 10 memory, "Printing Calculator" Stores a video papertape of 92 entries Scribbling Doodle program. 0 players gives kaleidoscope Action/Skill Series ------------------- 2001 280 ZZZAP/Dodgem Like Night Driver & any vertical racer 2002 Seawolf/Missile 2 variations of target shooting 2003 Panzer Attack/Red Barron 2 player Tank battle & 2 Player Dogfighting Good! 2004 Brickyard/Clowns Breakout/Circus (Very well done) |2005 Star Battle a simple 'star wars' like game that two | people played in a 'trench' like setting. You | could move up or down the trench while moving | around to try and get the best attack angle | on your opponent. Good sounds, but as many of | the games of that time, very simple. (Not | that simple is bad, it was fun to play a | simple game that you did not have to memorize | 50 functions to play - like Mortal Kombat.) | (Brett) 2009 Astro Battle Space Invaders!!! Only they will LAND! 2010 Dogpatch 2 player skeet(can) shooting 2011 Galactic Invasion Actually Says "Galaxian"!!! when on menu Very good conversion. 2012 Space Fortress Better than the original! Extremely FAST! (I forget the arcade name) |2014 Grand Prix/Demolition Derby Racing & Drive around and crash into | other cars for points! | (Brett) |2015 Pirates Chase A grid of 'pieces o' eight' (something like | 10x15) where one or more players tried to | gobble them up with a bad guy that would | chase you around. Sort of a Pac Man without | the walls. (Brett) 2017 The Incredible Wizard Wizard of WOR 2018 Solar Conqueror Like Asteroids 2019 Cosmic Raiders Like Defender |2020 Missile Attack "never made production" They may have put it | on the list anticipating working out a deal | to buy ICBM Attack from me. (Brett) Sports Series ------------- 3001 Tornado Baseball, Tennis, 2 player only Hockey and Handball Like the Old PONG games with little men Instead of paddles. Baseball is decent. 3002 Football 2 or 4 player 3003 Demolition Derby/Grand Prix Moved to 2014 |3004 Drag Race/Desert Fox Released??? [I saw a proto, but I never saw | it at a point that would be worth selling. | (Brett)] 3005 Bally Pinball Label change with release of the Astrocade. Astrocade Pinball 2 versions on 1 cart. Very good play! |3006 Bowling Brett has one. "Not impresive" 3007 Soccer Mike Curran (Former Esoterica play tester) & Dan Dresher report a recollection of owning this cart. In a prototype form. | Brett has one. "Not impresive" Educational Series ------------------ 4001 Bingo Math/Speed Math 4002 Letter Match/Spell 'N Score Crosswords 4003 Music Maker 4004 Biorhythm 4005 Creative Crayon "never made production"? colouring book? 4005P Creative Crayon W/ Light Pen " " Strategy Series --------------- 5001 Amazing Maze/ Tic-Tac-Toe Can you do the maze before the Cpu? 5002 Blackjack/Poker/ Acey-Ducey Good card games 5004 Conan the Barbarian "never made production" | Conan was never close to production. It | was a pipe dream. (Brett) 5005 Artillery Dual Can you shoot over that hill and hit your buddy before he gets you??? Functional Series ----------------- 6002 Bally Basic Basic programming on your Bally Professional Arcade. Needed Audio interface to save to Tape. 6004 Bally Basic Originally released under the BALLY label. Astrocade Basic Either version has the audio cassette interface built into the cart its self. |???? Dealer Demo I have the dealer demo, it does some | interesting things. Like playing checkmate at | 10 times speed. It also has a Bach fugue | programmed in that plays in three part sound. | (An interesting note is that although the | demo cartridge plays three part sound, it was | not till I wrote the three part sound player | that anyone made three part music, either for | a cartridge or for basic games (like George | Moses).) (Brett) Independent Carts ----------------- Muncher (Ltd. edition) Originally Bally's version of Pacman. Not (Esoterica) released by Bally due to Atari/Odyssey^2 Law suite. Excellent if slightly buggy. Treasure Cove (Spectre Systems) Collect the treasure from the bottom of the |(Distributed by Esoterica) Sea, watch out for poisonous fish! Featured | 256 colors concurrent on screen with three | part music. To date, the only game that ever | did this. (Brett) Blast Droids (Esoterica) Like Asteroids Machine Language Manager Wright programs in Z80 Machine language (Bit Fiddlers) Ms. Candy Man (L&M) Ms. Pac Man type concept, but different. Sneaky Snake (New Image) Centipede clone Sea Devil (L&M) Protect your food stores from under sea creatures & invading divers! MAZEMAN (Dave Carson) Pac-Man type game with 12 different Mazes No Sound. All Game play? |ICBM Attack (Spectre Systems) A missile command rip off. but with a twist. | Instead of the missiles coming in from the | sky, a plane would fly by and drop the | missiles. You could hit the plane or the | missiles, and their were three bases to fire | from and 6 cities to protect. Sold with a | home manufactured Keypad that featured a TRUE | XY positional joystick, 'pinball' like | flipper buttons on the side, and a keypad for | entering data. Sadly, I do not have one left | (we sold them ALL). (Brett) Tape Software Load these into Astrobasic to play. ------------- ----------------------------------- Chicken! (Bit Fiddlers) Frogger variant L&M Soft -------- 1. Claim Jumper/ River City Gambler 2. Cosmic Saucer Battle/ The Black Lagoon 3. Bombardier/Meteoroid 4. Target/Mind Bender 5. Search & Destroy 6. Star Base 2000/ Space Quest 2001 7. Phantom Star Fighters/ Space Checkers 8. Crazy Ball/ Ayatollah dart board An update would be the Husein Dart board ;-) 9. The Mummy's Treasure/ Galactic War 2002 10. Coyote-Roadrunner Desert race/ Atom Smasher Does Warner Bros. Know about this? 11. Sink the U-Boat/ Rescue Air Drop 12. Mission: Impossible/ 3-D Tic-Tac-Toe 13. The Fox & The Hare/ Space Sleuth 14. Alien Invasion I & II 15. Secret of Pellucitar Find your way through the maze. 16. Exitor's Revenge Space invaders with a few twists 17. Nautilus Sequel to Exitor's 18. Candy Man Pac Man but different. Wave Makers ----------- Max (Robot from Space)/ Horse Race Clue/Flying Ace Fly your TV at on coming biplanes. Maze Race/Obstacle Course/ Space Chase Slot Machine/Perversion Perversion?!?!? Music Composer/Yahtzee Does Parker Bros. Know about this? :-) Mouse in the Hat/Speed Math/ Note Match Guitar Course/Tune/ Progressions Bankgammon/ Obstacle Course Tournament Pack-Rat I & II Lookout for the Bull Whiz Quiz Trivia game Castle of Horror/ Four Famous Freebies Monkey Jump/Gong the Kong Donkey Kong derivatives Collision Course Same as Arcade game of same name! Character Analysis Dungeons of Dracula Wrap your chain around the monsters & complete the mazes. L.T. (Little Terrestrial) Based on the movie E.T. "1000 times better than Atari E.T." Gate Escape Lady bug clone Tiny Arcade ----------- T100 Space Gauntlet/ Quadron T101 Omega Valley/ Prevent 18 ships from landing in 3 valleys Astro terror or defend your space station from missiles T102 Viperian/Cruncher T103 Vindicator/ Looks to be a defender clone Art Show & Fire Works T104 Gamma Wars Space invaders? T105 Beep! Maze game.(or is it Pengo-ish?) HARD soft. ---------- Gamepak G1 Caterpillar Centipede clone Tic Tac Tollah Tic Tac Toe that Cheats The paper Chase Based on those "Don't squeeze the sharmin" commercials Micro Pac Pac-Man clone Galactic Hitchhiker "Three dimensional graphics" GM (Gorge Moses Co.) -------------------- Make your Arcade Sing series: Tape 1: Bach's 15 two part inventions Tape 2: 27 Christmas Carols Tape 3: Scott Joplin Ragtime Classics Tape 4: Screen Ram 3 Voice Music Assembler Tape 5: Sinfonia to Cantata 29 By Bach Beatles Greatest Hits and Flight Simulator Other tapes: Tape 6: Home Budget Keeper |Life/Nuke the !$&! ...should read "Life/Nuke the Bastard." |Life/Soundvision Nuke the bastard was a simple game that Jay |Life/Macromind Director Fenton wrote. It later became a Soundvision, | then Macromind Director demo. (Brett) Esoterica --------- Treasure Island/ Can you figure out the Map before your Pal? Fox & hound Wildcatter/ Can you successfully run an oil company? Bomb Squad Defuse the Bomb! The Great American Jigsaw/ Put the U.S. of A. together. Big City Slick US city quiz Garbersville/ Missile command? Ten Pins Bowling. Starship Command/ Star Trek theme. Mini Golf Road Toad Frogger Super Slope Like Atari's Alpine Ski coin op Hangman/Home Budget Keeper ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 6) Games written by users slow and clunky? ----------------------------------------- Although It's true that games written entirely in Bally/Astro basic were prone to be slow and somewhat Clunky, Most of the companies selling programs quickly began to use Machine Language routines from the Built-in games to power their games. This type of hybrid programming produced good results with the limited space available in the unit. Others took to using complete Machine language coding for their games. By hiding the ML code at the bottom of the screen, by reducing the vertical resolution it was possible to have 4-8 colour Cart Quality games on tape. 7) Publications Of Note: --------------------- Service Manual PA-1 Parts lists, Schematic Diagrams, ETC. Peek N Poke Manual Useful information for the Basic Programmer. On-Board Rom Subroutines Helpful for improving your ML programs. Handbook of Hardware Source of most of the programming support & Software AKA for most of the arcade quality games made The Nutting Manual for the Bally/Astrocade systems Arcadian Newsletters From which a wealth of information can be obtained Astrocade Underground A news letter by ABC Hobby Craft. Contents unknown. 8) People Of Note: --------------- These people had a lot of influence in what you saw/heard or read about the Bally/Astrocade systems Robert Fabris For the Arcadian news letters. Without which this FAQ would be a few pages shorter! Bob Ogdon Programmed "Bally Pin", "Brickyard/Clowns" and probably Others. Scot Norris Credited with most of the music & sound effects on the various carts. Jay Fenton Creator of the Bally BASIC cart! Others? NOW has a Home Page of his own on the Net. http://www.communities.com/people/jfenton.html Gorge Moses For continuously poking around with the Bally's sound chip and writing various music makers & other programs for the Basic enthusiasts. Dave Nutting For having something to do with the creation of this system and writing the Handbook of Hardware & Software. Referred to by some as The Nutting Manual. |Brett Bilbrey For writing the three voice music routine, the ONLY 256 | colour game, and some new info here 9) Connecting to a monitor ----------------------- Yes, you can connect your Bally/Astrocade to a composite monitor. Unfortunately the method described in the pages of the Arcadian (V5 #8 P129) only gives a monochrome output. First you will have to open your machine. Not to worry you can't void any warranties as there isn't one anymore! ;-) However I cannot take responsibility for what YOU do under the hood. A little soldering will be required, but NOT near major parts. Now that you have the cover off. Only the TOP please. you will notice on the left (the front of the machine Facing you) an RF box. Lift the left edge & pull out to the left. There are now a row of 8 large square metal pins coming off the motherboard. For the sake of this job we will number them from front to back 1 to 8. solder a 300 ohm resister between pin 1 and the shield. Now get 2 single ended RCA cables. Solder their shield wires to the shielding. Solder the centre of the Video cable to pin 1. Solder the Audio cable to pin 3. Be sure to attach them close enough to the board to allow the RF box to be replaced. Replace the RF box & close up your machine. You're ready to go! OPTIONAL: --------- If you don't really want new cables coming out of strange places in your machine You might try what I did. I mounted a 5 pin din connector to the back left corner of the case bottom. Fit's nicely if installed with the mounting holes 45 from horizontal. Wire to this and use a Commodore 64 monitor cable to connect. This allows you to remove the cable for storage, & is virtually invisible when not in use. Din Pinout: O---NC--O Video-----O O----Audio O-Ground OPTION 2: --------- | Thanks to the people at Active Surplus, and Brett Bilbrey I now have |a complete pinout list for the RF box inside the Bally/Astrocade systems! |Pins will be numbered as above. | | | Pin Tech Comment | 8 GND Ground | 7 B-Y Blue-Luma | 6 R-Y Red-Luma | 5 Chrom Bias Chroma no sync??? Guessing. | 4 Chrom 3.57Mhz Chroma with Sync?? " | 3 Sound Sound | 2 +12V Power for RF | 1 Video Luma + snyc. | | Any techno whizzes that can fill in the ????s or gets a full colour |RGB video working please let me know. I will try myself some time Next year. | |Note from Brett: The 'video' is really just the luma ('Y') portion of the |video signal, the chroma is made up of the Red minus the luma, and the Blue |minus the luma. With this, you have enough information to reconstruct RGB |information. The reason Y, R-Y, B-Y signals are used is they conserve |bandwidth. The chroma signals can be half the bandwidth of the luma and |still maintain the full signal content. High-end broadcast digital tape |machines use this format and it is called 4:2:2 sampling. As far as being |able to provide you with a circuit, I don't have the time to play |(sorry), but it is not hard. 10) Joystick Rewiring ------------------ As I indicated earlier I use a rewired Bally controller on other systems. There are 2 ways to do this. 1) remove the existing cable and use a joystick extension cable to rewire.(Ok if you don't need to use it with the Bally any more) or 2) make a translation plug or "Gender Bender" of sorts. Those wishing to keep the knob function should note that the Bally uses a different restive value for the pot than Atari/Commodore. To this end I actually removed the resistive board from the Bally pot & replaced with 1 from an Atari Paddle. (Tricky but doable) It's also possible to wire an Atari/Commodore joystick to replace a Bally/Astrocade one. However I'm not sure how to include the Knob function. In anycase the important wiring chart is Below. Bally/Astrocade Atari Controller port Joystick port 1. Trigger 1. Up 2. Right 2. Down 3. Left 3. Left 4. Down 4. Right 5. Not Connected 5. Paddle B 6. 50K Pot (Knob) 6. Fire button 7. Ground 7. +5v 8. +5v 8. Ground 9. Up 9. Paddle A DB9 1 2 3 4 5 (Looking at Plug end) 6 7 8 9 11) Bally/Astro Basic ----------------- As you may have noticed above there are 2 versions of the Basic Cartridge, and possibly 3 Labels. So what's the difference & why should I care? The original Bally Basic is a robust & serviceable programming language. The only complaints could be the extra purchase of an audio cassette interface. The package came with a ring bound manual & Tutorial. The "Basic Expansion Kit" included a tape library pak with some programming demos, and the audio cassette interface. The interface saved data at 300 baud. The Second release of Bally Basic, later called Astrocade Basic, Had the tape interface built in! The speed of the interface was also increased to 2000 baud. This made the Old Bally Demo tapes virtually useless, but allowed more data to be stored on a tape & shorter load times! There is a translation |program available for those owning BOTH the Interface and the NEW basic. For the sake of ease of identification the news letters & Tape manufactures referred to any Basic Cart with the built-in Audio cassette interface as AstroBasic or AB for short. Other new features to Astro Basic were the introduction of Music Processor Commands, allowing direct control of the sound chip without using the memory consuming port access array. Why only 1800 Bytes? ------------------- Q: Why with 4K of Ram does the Bally/Astrocade only get about 1800 Bytes of program space, when a PET or TRS-80 had a lot more? A: The Graphics! Both the PET and TRS-80 use character based graphics and were only B&W. The Bally/Astrocade uses Bitmaped graphics in 4 colours. Lets look at the PET first. 40 columns by 25? rows equals 1000 Bytes used for screen display. This leaves 3096 minus operating expense (say 16 Bytes or more). With the TRS-80, 64x25?=1600 Bytes leaving 2496 minus operating expense.(BTW within 2 months My TRS-80 got a RAM expansion!) Now the Bally. 160x102x4, 160 pixels at 4 colours a pixel(2 Bits) = 40 Bytes, (But Astro Basic only gets 2 colours! Ya, Ya, I'll get back to that.) 40x102=4080 Bytes leaving *16 BYTES!* That IS the operating Expense! ----------------------->*THERE IS NO FREE MEMORY!!!*<------------------------ AND NOW... The Wizardry of Jay Fenton...... or How to get 1800 Bytes out of 0! This must have been the question when Mr. Fenton took to programming the original Bally Basic Cart. The answer IS use every other bit for code. This would leave a terrible mess on the screen, and it does. So you hide it! Set & keep the colour palette so Code+Graf=Grafcolour NoCode+Graf=Grafcolour Code+NoGraf=Background and NoCode+NoGraf=Background. Or simply Colour1&2 are always the same, as are Colour 3&4. If you have a Bally/Astrocade you can set &(9)=80 and half the screen will show the program underneath. As this is not the place for a tutorial of Bally/Astro Basic, I shall simply include the entire list of Astro Basic commands. For those who have the cart and no manual to try out, and those familiar with other Basics to marvel at! Astro Basic Commands: --------------------- Basic Statements & Commands BOX X,Y,A,B,1 Draw a box at position X,Y of Width A and Height B, Mode 1 Modes available: 1 Foreground Colour 2 Background Colour 3 Reverse box (xor) 4 Invisible (Useful?) LINE X,Y,1 Line to X,Y, mode 1 (See above) from last Pixel location. Use BOX, XY or mode 4 to set start location. CLEAR Clears screen. Not memory. FOR/TO/STEP/NEXT Same as any For/Next loop function IF NO THEN E.G.: IF A=5GOTO20 is not only valid but actually preferred to save ram!!! INPUT A Wait for Keypad Input INPUT "HOW MANY?"A Prints message & waits for input LIST AS all Basics LIST ,5 List the FIRST 5 basic lines LIST 100 List starting at line 100 LIST 100,5 Start at line 100 list next 5 lines PRINT "A" Print Character A PRINT A Print Value of A PRINT #A,B Print A spaces then B value GOTO A Goto line number A GOSUB 100 Gosub line 100 RETURN Return to GOSUB RND(A) Generate number between 1 and A RUN Execute program General Functions ABS(A) Absolute Value of A CALL(A) Goto assembly routine at A RM Remainder of last division SM=A Scroll Mode A Modes: 0 Normal 1 No Scroll 2 Clear screen, Cursor at bottom 3 Clear screen, Cursor at top 4 Auto Pause. press key to continue STOP Stop program here SZ SiZe of available programming space XY Location of last Box or LINE command PX(X,Y) Is PiXel on or off? Input Output Functions JX(1) Joystick 1 horizontal position -0+ + JY(1) Joystick 1 Vertical Position 0 - TR(1) Trigger for Joy 1 KN(1) Knob (Paddle) position for Joy 1 A=KP Wait for key press, store ASCII in A TV=A Display ASCII character A to TV MU=A Play MUsical Note value A MU="A" Play same note as character A (All characters in Bally Basic Produce a Tone when displayed unless NT=0) FC Foreground Colour BC Background Colour NT Note Time, Duration of note play CX Cursor X position CY Cursor Y position Tape Commands :PRINT Save Program/Variables & Screen to tape :PRINT @(0),100 Save contents of @ array 0-99 :INPUT Load program from tape :INPUT @(0),100 Load data into @ array locations 0,99 :LIST Check stored program against memory. Used to confirm saves. :RUN Load & execute ML programs Punctuation and Operators +,-,Multiply and Divide symbols Standard math functions ; Separate multiple statements on same line , Continue printing on same line. E.g.: 10 PRINT "A", 20 PRINT "B" Gives AB . REM statement # NOT equal to B=%(A) PEEK A,B %(A)=B POKE A,B @(N) First array in Bally Basic *(N) Second Array Astro Basic Only &(N) Read/write port N Down Arrow Stop ALL sounds Music Processor Commands Astro Basic ONLY MO Master Oscillator Freq. NM Noise Mode NV Noise Volume NM must be 1 VR Vibrato Range NM must be 0 VF Vibrato Frequency TA TB TC Tone A,B or C VA VB VC Volume A,B or C Error Messages WHAT? Syntax error SORRY Out of Memory HOW? Catch all Error Code E.G.: GOTO 50 No line 50 HOW? GOSUB A A=10 NO line 10 HOW? NEXT Y NO FOR Y HOW? Bally/Astro Basic Overlay -------------------------- Most keys on the keypad have 5 functions. Except for the 4 bottom keys which are your shift keys. Default Values: GO Pause Halt Divide 7 8 9 Multiply 4 5 6 - 1 2 3 + Space 0 Erase = green red blue WORDS(gold) Green Shift: Blank blank blank blank A D G J M P S V Y <- up aro & $ < ( # GREEN red blue WORDS(gold) Red Shift: Blank / blank [ B E H K N Q T W Z ' . @ , " ; % green RED blue Words(gold) Blue Shift: Blank \ blank ] C F I L O R U X ! -> dwn aro * ? > ) : green red BLUE WORDS(gold) WORDS shift (GOLD): Go+10 blank RUN LIST FOR TO STEP NEXT GOSUB RETURN RND IF CLEAR LINE BOX GOTO blank INPUT blank PRINT green red blue WORDS(GOLD) I realize that this format may not be the best to work from. If you devise a more usable & understandable format Please send it to me. 12) Sources for Bally/Astrocade Stuff --------------------------------- Well, The usual yard sales & thrift shops. If you can't find anything there. (Not much luck here.) You could try those listed below. I neither endorse nor condemn the services of these parties. I merely list them for those whom may wish to acquire systems, carts or other related paraphernalia. (Usual legal crap ;-)) Jerry G Jerry G Visionaries jerry@hevanet.com Steven Tucker classics@nacs.net These gentlemen carry a range of systems and carts for most of the Classic systems. Drop them a line & they'll tell you what they have in stock! 13) Closing All of the information in this FAQ is as accurate as I have info for. If there are any errors omissions or other things of note that belong here please let me know so I can expand & enhance this FAQ. No special formatting is necessary, I'll sort it out & plug it in! ;-) If anyone is interested, I have a number of Basic program listings here from the Arcadian news letters. Although I'm uncertain of the Legalities involved in reproducing this material(Mr. Robert Fabris Did smartly (c) every page!) I would like to hear if anyone would be interested in reprints of the listings or preprogrammed tapes. Whether I actually DO this will depend mostly on the response & my available time. It takes a long time to type a 59 line program into a 4x6 keypad! Also If anyone Knows Mr. Fabris (or anyone else associated with the Bally/Astrocade) I'd like to talk with them & possibly include some of there information here or in an additional source. Lance F. Squire komb1@io.org Web www.io.org/~komb1 -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- | Lance F. Squire | Now featuring a Home Page at: | komb1@io.org | http://www.io.org/~komb1 -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-