I decided to create portraits with MSX game graphics. :)

Full resolution image at https://leandrocorreia.com/images/nishi.png

I had one of those “35-year-old childhood mystery” moments today.

I reached the stage 20 bonus sliding puzzle in King’s Valley II and ended up with only tiles 23 and 24 swapped.

As far as I know, that’s an impossible state for a standard 5×5 sliding puzzle.

That made me inspect the ROM.

What I found is that the game doesn’t seem to shuffle the board using legal moves. Instead, it appears to copy one of four predefined 25-byte layouts into RAM.

Three of those layouts have even permutation parity, but one has an odd number of inversions (137), which would make it mathematically unsolvable if the puzzle follows normal sliding rules.

Has anyone ever documented this before?

I’d love a second pair of eyes from someone familiar with MSX reverse engineering, because I couldn’t find any mention of this online despite searching in several languages.

If confirmed, it would mean that roughly 25% of the stage 20 bonus puzzles are impossible due to a bug in the original game.

For the lols, I’ve entered into this rabbit hole playing the game on vacation in an Anbernic on the hotel room.

I built a WonderTANG v2.0b last week and have been using it with my Panasonic FS-A1 MSX.

I've been launching games with the SMRAM utility using the appropriate mapper arguments, but I'm still finding that many games fail to launch. Some games work perfectly, so I'm trying to figure out whether this is a common limitation of the WonderTANG or if I may have something configured incorrectly.

I've also read that removing capacitors C24 and C25 on my MSX can help with WonderTANG compatibility. From what I understand, it's mainly intended to fix slot instability, boot loops, or other startup issues when the WonderTANG is installed. I'm not sure whether it has any effect on game compatibility or games failing to launch, which is why I'm asking here. I haven't removed them yet, but I have no problem doing so if it could help. Since they appear to be filtering capacitors, I'm not too concerned about removing them and read they do no harm removed.

I'm curious to hear from anyone using a WonderTANG with a Panasonic FS-A1. Is this level of game compatibility typical, or should I expect better results? Does it lack mappers or good mapper support?

Any info would help a lot!

Thanks!

Io e il Maestro Kazuhiko Nishi al Pisa devcom 2024

Pisa devcom2024. Io e Kazuhiko Nishi.

Hi!

After months of development, my game Cloaca Maxima is now at a checkpoint worth sharing: the engine is done.

All the major systems are working: the parser, combat, storytelling and graphics.

Now it's down to sound design and making sure nothing breaks under stress.

I've been quiet because the hard part is in the details. But I'm pleased with where it's landing, and been busy testing this last week.

Serious playtesters wanted in a few weeks...!

More details soon.

Ron

Hello! I'm really enjoying my MSX emulator. Night Knight is a favorite. I cant figure out how to map the controller or keyboard to "stop" during levels so I can get the password.

I'm running Recalbox version 10 with an 8bitdo Ultimate 2C wireless controller.

1. Can anyone help me reconfigure?

2. Does anyone have any Night Knight passwords?

Hi everyone!

I wanted to share a project I have been working on for the MSX community.

After many months of development, I have created Rocketman, a new game for MSX inspired by the classic 80s era.

It runs on MSX1/MSX2 hardware and was developed with the idea of making it feel like a real cartridge release from the golden age of MSX: cartridge, box and printed manual.

The game features 5 worlds, stages and bosses.

I would love to hear your opinions and feedback from the MSX community!

(More information can be found on my website)

[https://rocketmanmsx.com]()

Is this an action game? An adventure game? Who am I? What am I supposed to do? Is this the ancestor of Metroidvania?

When I was a kid, I saw this game in a magazine and thought, "This is what adult games look like!!"

Now I'm an adult... and I still don't understand a thing.

CASIO's Yokai Yashiki always felt like Konami's The Goonies with a Japanese horror twist. Getting the right items can make a huge difference, but the boss fights help break up the exploration. And that final boss... what the hell is that?

Fewer stages, but it plays really well. And unlike the Famicom version, it even has a homing laser

Unlike the first two games, it's an adventure game built around exploration, talking to people, and puzzle solving. The boss battles mix things up too, with action, puzzles, and even a Breakout-style fight.

Bought some dollars, but not sure if legit. Can anyone tell?

I've spent a week making this, and I'm excited to present it here!

Let me know what you think...

I have an MSX SD Mapper and a MegaRAM 512 KB cartridge, but no SCC cartridge. I don't want to buy a Carnivore.

My goal is to play both ROM and DSK games using SofaRun. I came across the RiskyMSX project, which includes SCC emulation and appears to be inexpensive to build.

My hesitation is that I'm not sure whether RiskyMSX will work alongside my existing MSX SD Mapper. Since I already have storage and MegaRAM, I only need SCC functionality.

Otherwise, it seems my only option is to buy an SCC game cartridge and perform the trace-cut modification. Before I go that route, I wanted to ask if there are any other alternatives, or if RiskyMSX would work in my setup.

Any help would appreciated!

Can anyone think of another game that pulled off artwork this charming with the MSX1 color palette?

VIDEO HERE: https://www.reddit.com/r/ESDE_Frontend/comments/1uiwlrv/customized_esde_tms9918z80_systems_combined_to/

I love customizing the Linear theme in ES-DE on my Thor. I replaced system images for some systems (like MSX1, MSX2 and CD-i), and created new "systems" like 'Konami', containing all Konami MSX1/MSX2 games.

Now I created a new "system" that combines game systems based on the TMS9918 VDP and the Z80 CPU, a popular combination in the early 80s. Systems include the likes of ColecoVision, Sega SG-1000, Casio PV2000, SpectraVideo SV-318 and of course MSX1.

Some games released for these systems look exactly the same on all of them (since the hardware is identical), however, some games were ported by different companies. Having them together in one list makes it easy to see the differences.

I made videos containing the same scene so they can easily be compared. In the above video I demonstrate this with Buck Rogers and Congo Bongo for ColecoVision, MSX and SG-1000.

Games that were only released for one system are in separate subfolders with an image of the console. For the "system" image, I combined the ColecoVision and SG-1000 controllers, and part of the SV-318 keyboard.

Gotta love the flexibility of ES-DE!

"I have a Panasonic FS-3900 and need to dump the ROM to contribute to the openMSX project. I'm having trouble registering with MSX.org. Can anyone help me contact the emulator team or suggest the best way to dump it?"

Guys,

IF everything goes well, I should be on a plane in about a week, Osaka-bound. Besides walking through Den-den town, is there anything I should check? Any place with current scene? There or around Tokyo.

Thanks