[Coco] Homebrew CoCo Games

[Mark McDougall]

On 12/12/2015 5:47 AM, Nick Marentes wrote:

> I am designing the game to utilize 64K. That's the smallest I can make
> it currently and I've had to remove a large sound sample which was going
> to provide a musical sound track in the background while the game played.
>
> When the game is eventually completed, I can look into the hardware for
> the game pak rom.

My Lode Runner cartridge will require more than 32KB, so I'll probably 
stick a decent flash chip on there and make it a multi-cart. The idea is 
also to have an I2C EEPROM for non-volatile storage. Probably won't be 
dirt cheap though.

I'm hoping to squeeze my new project into 32KB though...

> What would ultimately be good is a generic rom pak pcb with an option to
> plug in a small sound chip. The chip could be omitted if the game
> doesn't require it to lower costs. Several games cartridges on other
> platforms icluded a sound chip to enhance the game audio.

Great idea! I think an AY(3)8910 is a good option, also used on the 
Apple II Mockingboard as well as a plethora of arcade games. My 
colleague did an implementation in an FPGA, and I believe original chips 
are hard to come by. Not sure at this stage the best (cheapest) option 
is for such a cartridge...

Regards,

-- 
|              Mark McDougall              | "Electrical Engineers do it
|  <http://members.iinet.net.au/~msmcdoug> |   with less resistance!"