Denial

I have a few different copies of Pole Position, either called Pole Position-a000.prg or Pole Position-6000.prg but neither works with Vice.
Could anybody point me to a working version please?

Select full RAM.
Load $A000 first, type NEW, then load $6000. After that, perform a soft reset.
It should work.

Thanks for the reply. I tried to follow your instructions as follows:
Settings-> Preferences -> Machine -> Model -> Memory Expansions -> All
SmartAttach -> Pole Position-a000.prg
new
SmartAttach -> Pole Position-6000.prg
File -> Reset -> soft reset

But I just ended up with a boot screen with 28159 bytes free.

Nope, you really should put both files in the same directory/disk image, and follow my instructions issuing the commands directly in the emulator.

You don't need to add any RAM to Vice for this to work, as they are cartridge images.

or far far easier, load the MegaCart ROM into VICE and just play it from the menu

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BypVxY ... _6RXcExhmw

That's great, thanks for the link to the ROM!
Sorry to be a pain but how do I use it in Vice? I don't find the menus very logically laid out in Vice. Please could you be specific about each step, i.e.

Preferences -> settings -> Cartridges -> Megacart -> Browse to ROM
Having done that, I just get the boot screen. Is this the right start, do I need to do something else next?

Thanks!

Not sure what version of VICE you are using, but in 3.2 it's

File --> Attach Cartridge Image --> Megacart Image
Browse to ROM

in GTK it's similar but choose MegaCart as cartridge type and change filter to all files.

topcat wrote: ↑Mon Dec 19, 2022 3:54 pm Preferences -> settings -> Cartridges -> Megacart -> Browse to ROM
Having done that, I just get the boot screen. Is this the right start, do I need to do something else next?
Thanks!

That's setting the NVRAM. Use the File menu as mentioned above.

topcat wrote:I have a few different copies of Pole Position, either called Pole Position-a000.prg or Pole Position-6000.prg but neither works with Vice. Could anybody point me to a working version please?

As you should have noticed by now, these are not "different copies" of Pole Position, but rather the two 8 KB parts of a 16 KB ROM dump. The dump can be made to work in VICE as is, like thus:

When VICE is started up, first:

Settings > VIC20 settings... > Memory, No expansion memory

(which removes all RAM expansions), then:

File > Detach cartridge image(s)

(VIC resets), then

File > Attach cartridge image ... > Add to generic cartridge ... > 4/8/16 KB at $6000... > "Pole Position-6000.prg" (from file requester)

(VIC resets again), and then finally:

File > Attach cartridge image ... > Add to generic cartridge ... > 4/8 KB at $A000... > "Pole Position-a000.prg" (again from file requester)

... et voilà, Pole Position starts!

beamrider wrote:or far far easier, load the MegaCart ROM into VICE and just play it from the menu

... which does, however, not add any understanding into the actual issue at hand.

Some background is found here - where I copied my instructions for Donkey Kong and adapted them for PP -, and also here.

In the meantime, there had been quite some efforts by the VICE team to establish a workable *.crt format for the VIC-20 emulation, and in principle, PP could be made into a such, so one would not need to go through the hoops I laid out above to get a multi-part ROM dump running in VICE. Trouble is, PP isn't near the only one of those, and thus far no one had bothered to convert them all.

Alternatively, the two parts could be packaged into a *.d64 file, together with a boot loader - and this time, requiring the necessary RAM expansions, so the ROM dump could be soft-loaded. That *.d64 file could then also be used on real hardware, from real disk or SD2IEC.


(mod: topic moved to the Emulation and Cross-Development section, as it ultimately doesn't concern faulty ROM dumps, but rather a user interface problem with VICE.)

Mike wrote: ↑Mon Dec 19, 2022 10:14 pm

beamrider wrote:or far far easier, load the MegaCart ROM into VICE and just play it from the menu

... which does, however, not add any understanding into the actual issue at hand.

Perhaps some people don't care and just want to play the game.

beamrider wrote:Perhaps some people don't care and just want to play the game.

topcat asked how to get a specific cartridge game running in VICE, and described the issues in a way more detailed than "It doesn't work!". For me, that's not exactly a "don't care" attitude.

Conversely, 'selling' people a much more expensive product in lieu of something that exactly fits the bill is possibly a good virtue for a pushing salesman, but that's not what I think Denial is about.

He asked for someone to point him to a working version even though the versions he has already "work" if loaded in the necessary convoluted manner.

I provided a solution that IMO is much more suitable to the intent behind the question.

The metaphor of "expense" seems an ill fit here as everything being discussed is free. Sledge-hammer to crack a nut maybe...

Many thanks to you both beamrider and Mike, I can confirm both your methods work.
@Mike, I do appreciate your description of how to attach the ROMs, suddenly now I understand why so many files have hex addresses in their file names!
@beamrider, I also appreciate your description of how to start up the mega cart which I have never managed to use before!

HI

Happy new year.

Trouble is, PP isn't near the only one of those, and thus far no one had bothered to convert them all

It should be fairly easy to do automatically for nearly 100% of the existing VIC20 cartridges - the only question would be which would be the autoritative archive to use and where to upload the fixed files =)