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MSXdev'07: 48kb ROM - 16kb RAM more ROM = penalty points (perhaps this would make the comparision small v.s. big fair-er) more RAM = penalty points (easier for developers but less MSX1 compatible.)

Sounds like a very good. I don't think more than 16kB ram makes it less MSX1 compatible though but I assume you mean runs on fewer MSX1 machines.
Don't make the penalties too big though. It should be possible to make a game that worth the extra ROM/RAM and still have a fair chance of winning.

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.......and bonus points could be given for games that can be runned on MSX1 with 32 kb RAM or 16 Kb RAM

I like the idea of bonus points vs penalty points indeed. Penalty points are kind of harsh. "Oooh, your smooth scrolling never-seen-before-mega-RPG uses 32kB RAM, now you don't win anymore!" just doesn't really cut it. It's much nicer to award bonus points for 'very efficient memory usage'. To make YabYum on a 16kB machine doesn't take much effort. To make UU on a 16kB machine does. Just reward games which manage to accomplish a lot using little hardware, that way everyone's happy. Same could apply for ROM size, tho perhaps with an upper limit so people don't get too ambitious in their projects. We don't want people trying to make sample-playing-rotating-sprites-animating-background Gradius IV clones either!

Just RAR a .ROM, the less gets compressed away, the better the game, if a game uses 32kb then you can assume it's used for a reason ^_^

I think it is a bit funny how some feel that 16kb of RAM is too little... I'm used to code for the NES/Famicom, and it has only 2kb of RAM. Sure, later games could have 8kb more on the cart, but many many good games only use the standard 2kb. These 2kb have proved to be enough for most of my designs, and that included some pretty big complex games (unfortunately never finished any!). So, the 16kb on the MSX are a world to me. I can't even imagine how to use all of it.

The only clear advantage of using more RAM is compression. If the level maps in a game are compressed in ROM, you'll surelly be able to squeeze a lot more of them in the same cart. But if ROM size isn't an issue, RAM use can be minimal.

Well, there are ways to have compressed levels without using much RAM also, but I guess more efficient compression can be achieved otherwise, where you can treat bigger blocks of data as units to be compressed.

Anyway, in the end, I'd rather have limited RAM than ROM.

Theres not a person who could say that '16kb ought to be enough for everyone' .. the biggest computer-industrial tried something similar in the 80's.. he failed deeply.

If 32kb would be allowed, some ppl *are* going to use it. In the most likely case, games get bigger. Ppl use whatever there is to use... beit 16kb or 32kb. 32kb is ideal for compressed games. Typically compressed games also tend to be the somewhat larger games. Now, if dev6 would be aimed at small MSX1 games, like dev3/4 en perhaps dev5, then 16kb would prolly be enough..

But! Guess what..! dev6 has increased ROM specs up to the MegaROM.. ideal for bigger games! So on one point they increased the ROM specs for bigger games, but at the same time limit the RAM usage. It's a little bit of a contradiction.

And yes: about Konami games running with 8kb.. those games couldn't been bigger if better compression would be used. But.. we seem to run in circles .. I think the dev organisers have seen enough motivations to form an opinion.

I'd like to express a wish :
I'd like to see some games ported to MSX system.
and some others to be improved and like originals ones.(when possible)
I mean , In the 80' I played a lot with Popey,Charley Circus,Iron horse ,Mario Bros, Green Beret,Gyruss..... standing in a bar or a videogame room.
I played Some of them with MSX1 version and I did like them , but since MSX2 came out I have been keeping on wondering if something better could be done
No matter if it requires 128k and use of diskdrive .

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Theres not a person who could say that '16kb ought to be enough for everyone' .. the biggest computer-industrial tried something similar in the 80's.. he failed deeply.

Actually, he didn't.

So he denies? That's just what he says

In any case, you got the point, rite?

Hi, I just have a little question I hope you could answer for me. I have a prototype game for Nintendo which, instead of having PRG and CHR eprom chips, uses one PRG eprom and one VRAM chip. The prototype was originally ported from the famicom disk system, so the graphics had to be manually copied from ROM to VRAM. When I open up the ROM image in Tile Layer Pro, the graphics appears "shifted" or compressed. I would really like to be able to decompress the graphics to see what it contains. Anyone knows what can be done? Very thankful for any information!

Johan

This is highly offtopic (you're better off asking Nintendo questions at nesdev.parodius.com/bbs/)!

If you can get the game to run in an emulator that has this feature, you can export/dump the pattern table data (the tiles currently being used) to a file. I know Nintendulator, for example, has this feature when debugging is enabled.

Now, if you can't get the game to run, and it processes the CHR data somehow (decompressing or whatever) before sending it to VRAM, there is no way to rip the graphics from the ROM unless you know what compression/coding was used. You'd probably have to study the decompression routine for that.

Can't we just drop the MSX1 thing? Please also include MSX2

I think that MSXDev should stick to the MSX1 tech specs

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Can't we just drop the MSX1 thing? Please also include MSX2

Why? Aren't the current MSXdev games not good enough. And have you ever wondered why this contest is a succes?

I think the specs need to be set based on the contests goals. The goals I read between the lines in these posts:

- Having a contest for the sake of having one?
- More games for the MSX?
- Keeping the MSX alive?

The problem is that everybody has one of those goals in mind and react according. For me it would be goal nr. 2 and with this in mind the only limits I would see is not allowing external hardware to run a game. But I think the people who participate do it for goal nr. 1. Why do I think goal nr.1 because if it wasn't they would make games outside the contest. But here a problem arizes because some people make a game alone and others in a team, also not everybody is skilled to keep the game small (in bytes) or in getting the max out of a MSX1. This results in a conflict where the skilled teams can use less resouces (read: less bytes) to do the same a less skilled person.

I hope somebody did understand something I am trying to tell
My vote would be splitting the contest in 2. One with limit resouces like MSX1, limited bytes. And another with MSX2 and loads of bytes. But one thing should be 'not done' is allowing external hardware (like SCC) in order to be able to play the game.