Time Pilot '84 for MiSTer

[lroby74]

This release is not official? It's not present on core manager

[Zichio]

This release is not official? It's not present on core manager

No, it's not added to the official repo yet. If you look at the link in the first post, it points to Ace's github (the creator of the core).

It will be added to the official repo when it is ready.

[lroby74]

Thank you

[Ace]

I'm setting up to put the core on the official repo in the next 4 days. There have been problems with the watchdog timer triggering non-stop with the July 13 build of the core, so I made a new one earlier in the month that I haven't released yet which gives the option to toggle the watchdog on or off (the Time Pilot '84 PCB does this by means of a solder pad on the board that disables the watchdog when bridged). This build will be the one that gets posted to the main MiSTer GitHub.
This game has given me so many headaches between things randomly breaking during compiles to audio issues (couldn't get an SN76489 implementation that didn't exhibit audio errors and had to resort to tweaking the one from the Colecovision core to fix off-by-1 errors and its noise LFSR) to having a really hard time with the Konami 502 custom chip. It'll be good to officially get this core out and move on to the Sega System C-2 hardware. That said, I do still need to get my hands on a Time Pilot '84 PCB running Set 3 as this version has a completely different memory map to Set 1 and Set 2 on the primary CPU and I want to make a 1:1 model of this.
A note regarding future cores: I will always post them to my personal GitHub first as part of a public beta-testing period before bringing them over to the main MiSTer GitHub. Especially in a case like Time Pilot '84 where the game seems to exhibit unpredictable behavior on different MiSTers, it gives me a chance to iron out problems that I personally have never come across as I don't want to have something with my name on it that is experiencing major problems on the main MiSTer GitHub.

[TwinX]

Thank you for your work ace, appreciated. I have no konami 502 anymore. I do have a 503 if you like. Still waiting for track and field on mister.
I also have sn76489 chip somewhere. If any of that helps you let me know. Not sure if you know the guys from fpgaarcade? They have reversed engineered a lot.

[Ace]

I don't need any of the Konami custom chips or SN76489 (Arnim Laeuger's implementation is present in the Colecovision core but has off-by-1 errors in the tone generator and an incorrect LFSR which I've fixed for Time Pilot '84, and I brute-forced the Konami custom chips using those from an actual Time Pilot '84 PCB), but thanks for offering. All I need is a stable core that is consistent between different MiSTers and the currently unreleased build that adds a watchdog toggle is what will be posted to the MiSTer GitHub (it's dated August 2, but I didn't manage to get any time to post it).

[lupin3rd]

...That said, I do still need to get my hands on a Time Pilot '84 PCB running Set 3 as this version has a completely different memory map to Set 1 and Set 2 on the primary CPU and I want to make a 1:1 model of this.

Is there a simple visual way to identify a Time Pilot '84 Revision 3 board? I know where a working TP84 board is, but since it's in a friend's arcade at the moment, I can't just pull a ROM out to dump and check which revision it is. However, if there's a visual way to identify it, I could: a.) Find out if it would be useful, b.) Trace the address lines and help identify the differences in the memory map, or c.) Take a bunch of super highly detailed photos of the board.

Unfortunately, I wouldn't be able to send you the board, but I think between the both of us, we could identify the differences you are after.

[Ace]

Sets 1 and 2 use 4 ROMs on the primary CPU while Set 3 consolidates this down into two ROMs and may do the same with the sprite ROMs. There was one Time Pilot '84 board I had seen on eBay that I presume is Set 3 as it looks quite a bit different to the board I was loaned for the MiSTer core, which runs on Set 2. Some of the board layout has been reworked to include extra jumpers and the ROMs are soldered on top of being mask ROMs rather than EPROMs. That might be a clue as to whether or not a Time Pilot '84 PCB runs on Set 3. I don't exactly know what's different about Set 3 other than the completely revised memory map on the primary CPU (I know Set 1 has a different set of life counts to set via the DIP switches than Set 2, but am not quite sure what's different beyond that, though weirdly, Set 3 reverts to Set 1's life counts).

[lupin3rd]

I'll look into it and report back what I can find. I may take my EPROM burner to the arcade and dump the ROMs to see if mame identifies them. Are you using the ROM set names that mame uses? If so, that will help me determine if I have access to what you need.