Yesterday I created a video called "Loading and Saving Astrocade 'AstroBASIC' 'Tapes' using MAME Emulation." I uploaded it to various places today.

YouTube:

[video:youtube]
[/video]

Archive.org:

https://archive.org/details/LoadingandSavingAstroBASICTapesusingMAMEEmulation

BallyAlley.com:

http://www.ballyalley.com/astrocade...dSavingAstrocadeAstroBASICTapesUsingMAME

AtariAge.com:

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/26...-the-bally-astrocade/page-2#entry4265585

This tutorial explains how to load and save Bally BASIC programs in the Astrocade emulator in MAME. Specifically "AstroBASIC" programs are loaded on the emulated Bally Arcade/Astrocade console, a game system released in January of 1978. The steps required to get the MAME emulator up and running with the system ROMs are explained in a previous tutorial called "Setting up Astrocade Emulation Using MAME."

The main idea of this video is to get a user loading programs from "tape" (actually WAV files archived on BallyAlley.com) as quickly as possible. After the instructions in the tutorial have been followed, any user of a Windows system that has at least version 0.208 of the MAME emulator setup can load and save software to and from "tape."

Some short examples from the following type-in programs are provided here:

Loading:

1) 4D2 (Video Art, Machine Language)
2) Electronic Blanked (Video Art, BASIC)
3) M-III Plus (Video Art, BASIC)
4) The Pits (Game, BASIC)
5) Astro Zap 2000 (Game, BASIC)
6) MOD 2 (Graphic Demo, BASIC)

Saving:

1) THANKS.WAV - A short 2-line BASIC Program that's supposed to say "THANKS, 'JUST DESSERTS!,' but I noticed just before uploading this video that I misspelled DESSERTS as DESSETS. No program runs without an error, right?

Note: Occasionally during this video, the screen "flashes." This doesn't happen when using the software. This is a side effect of the Open Broadcaster Software that I used to make this recording. Rest assured, when you run MAME and follow these steps your screen will have none of the flashing.

Adam

Last edited by BallyAlley; 04/28/19 05:07 PM.