Family Basic Tapes and Misc

[ozidual]

Added Typed up Programs for the book Family Computer and Family Basic Perfect Guide to archive.org and linked it in the main post.  I have scans for it, just need to edit them down to something I can upload to archive.org.

After finishing that, I decided to type up the January programs from MicomBASIC for Family Basic.  I did 1986-1989 and hope to finish 90-94.  I'll be uploading those to archive.org and trying to find a way to group them so I can provide a link here to all of them at once.  Some really amazing ones like:

1987 -PEN PEN- (Binary Land clone): https://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm8091578
1988 Fisraduth: https://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm2353283
1989 The Spirit of Satan: https://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm7275541

It's interesting to see the evolution of the games and the code over the years.  More POKES/PEEKS and using DATA in the later games.  Also moving toward combining character sprites to make larger sprites and things like backgrounds that move or change multiple times.  You can see how people were always striving to push  Family Basic further.

[UglyJoe]

It's interesting to see the evolution of the games and the code over the years.  More POKES/PEEKS and using DATA in the later games.  Also moving toward combining character sprites to make larger sprites and things like backgrounds that move or change multiple times.  You can see how people were always striving to push  Family Basic further.

Looking forward to it! Will be interesting to analyze the lower-level code to see if there are some common techniques being used.

[ozidual]

First off, does anyone here have a copy of the Playbox BASIC manual?  I'm wondering if we can get simple scans or even photos of the pages.  I'm curious about what programs/music/etc. may have appeared in there for typing up that may have been removed or changed for the Family Basic V2.x release.

Today I added 2 more books and uploaded the programs for one (links in the main post).  I've scanned in quite a few books but aligning and cropping everything takes time.  I also have more in a stack to scan.  Overall I've collected 23/30 books with Family Basic material in them.  There could always be more, but I'm pretty sure I've ID'ed all of them.  Here are the other books (besides Playbox Basic) I am missing:

ファミリーベーシックおもしろゲーム大作戦 (Family Basic Funny Game Strategy) [Tape purchased, need guide]
一生懸命　ファミリーコンピュータ　ゲーム＋ベーシック入門 (Difficulty Starting Family Computer Games + Basic Introduction)
ファミリーベーシックジャンプ : ファミコン大作戦 (Family Basic Jump: Famicom Strategy)
ファミコンソフト集001 : ファミコン大作戦 (Famicom Software Collection 001: Famicom Strategy)
ファミコンソフト集003 : ファミコン大作戦 (Famicom Software Collection 003: Famicom Strategy)
ファミリーベーシックで歌おう (Lets Sing With Family Basic)
Those first two sometimes have cassettes but everything should be in the books included with the cassettes.  I have a listing of all books with the missing ones in bold here: https://ozidual.github.io/FamilyBasicTracking/Main.html

As for what I uploaded recently:

Family Computer Encyclopedia Part 8
Family Computer Game Strategy Secret Techniques
  - 3 very simple Family Basic games, 10 Lode Runner levels, and 4 Excitebike levels

There are only 1-2 Family Basic programs per Family Computer Encyclopedia so I may upload the books individually but upload the programs together.  The holidays can be tricky for free time, but I'll see if I can upload more in the near future.  I'm halfway through editing scans for Famicom Software Collection 002: Famicom Strategy right now.

EDIT: Small update on my project to type up every Family Basic program from January issues of MicomBasic.  I finished most of them.  I ordered the last 2 January issues (95 & 96) along with the 1st and last issues of MicomBasic with Family Basic programs from Japan.  I should get those in the next couple weeks.

EDIT: Got one of the books.

[P]

Fantastic work as usual!

Oh and if anybody has the Playbox BASIC manual to share I would be all over it, compare and translate anything new to English.

[ozidual]

Added the rest of the Family Computer Encyclopedia books that have Family Basic programs in them (2-8).  I have books 1 and 9, and checked indexes on a few others to be sure.  I also added Book 002 in the Famicom Daisakusen series (still need 001 and 003) and Learn With Pictures Famicom Basic.

There's still more to come.  I'm in the middle of scanning a collection of 25 Family Basic games and there are at least 2 more on my scan pile.  There are 2-3 more already scanned that I need to edit/upload, so look forward to all of those in the next couple months.

[ozidual]

Article about the Family Basic work I've been doing: https://www.gamingalexandria.com/wp/2022/02/nintendo-family-basic-type-in-games/ (The original tweet for it can be found here).  The article will be updated with more games regularly.  It currently holds quite a few of the games I worked on from typing up the Family Basic games in all the January issues of Micom Basic (mentioned in a previous post).

I updated the main post a few times since my last post with links to more scans and updated the missing books post with 1 more acquisition (another is on the way and I'll update the post when I receive it).

I'm currently working on recreating the tape that would have come with the Game Game 20 book in the Interesting 20 set.  I have about 16 out of 20 games typed up.  It's an earlier book but it's interesting to see them using PEEK to access the microphone so early on and in 3 games so far.

I also put together a morguefile.wiki about Family Basic with all the known Family Basic books, their dates, and links to archive.org if they've been uploaded.  You can find that here.

[ozidual]

I finally finished scanning/editing the last of the Family Basic books I have.  We now have full scans of Seibundo Shinkosa's double trilogy of Family Basic books:

- Hop, Step, and Jump which go in depth into programming Family Basic with low level details like RAM locations and high level planning such as how you would write an RPG with it.
- 001, 002, and 003 which each hold ~10 games including Mini Trek.

It looks like the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd books were each released together (e.g. Hop came out at the same time as 001).

The last 2 scans were Keibunsha Encyclopedia 222 and Nintendo Family Computer Family Basic Introduction to Our Famicom.  Both also teach you Family Basic in their own way (like most of the books I've uploaded).  The Keibunsha Encyclopedia includes a handful of programs and music while the Introduction book only has 1 or 2 programs.

I updated the main post, archive.org, and the Morguefile Wiki with these links and scans.

There are still 3 more Family Basic books/cassettes that I need to get ahold of:

ファミリーベーシックおもしろゲーム大作戦 (Family Basic Funny Game Strategy with cassette)
ファミリーベーシックで歌おう (Lets Sing With Family Basic with cassette)
一生懸命　ファミリーコンピュータ　ゲーム＋ベーシック入門 (Difficulty Starting Family Computer Games + Basic Introduction)

[ozidual]

I finally purchased Let's Sing With Family Basic.  I uploaded the programs in audio form here: https://archive.org/details/lets-sing-with-family-basic-cassette-tape-data-and-audio-ozidual

and added it to the main post.  I'll get around to scans of the box/book at some point too.

I also wanted to mention that Gaming Alexandria is pushing ahead with its Type-In Programs here: https://www.gamingalexandria.com/wp/type-in-programs/

It's for all Type-Ins, not just Family Basic.  Hubz has added his Type-Ins for PC6xx1 computers, and we're hoping to bring in other people's work as well.  I've typed up a couple more Family Basic programs and I'm working on adding in all the ones I've done in the past so they have a central location for others to find.  Currently I'm typing up what appears to be a password generator for Hydlide Special for the Famicom that was featured in an early Famitsu.  I hope to have that one up in the next few days.

[P]

Gotta save that to favorites. Too bad there are no MSX programs though, I do have an MSX2+.

[ozidual]

No MSX... yet   Activity is picking up a little bit on that channel of the Gaming Alexandria discord.

The magazines with the code are being collected and scanned in.  Login Magazine issues are being uploaded almost daily.  Micom Basic already has a good chunk scanned.  I hear word that more japanese magazines with code are on the way too.  It's just getting a solid base to type it in and upload it.  There's one person working on getting instructions together for emulators to make it easier for people to get started.  Another person is looking into OCR programs to help out.

[UglyJoe]

How many tape recordings do you have that need to have the programs typed up?

I am working on some software that reads in a WAV file of a Family Basic tape recording, extracts the data, and converts it to a program listing.  Once I have it working I could have it print out the listings for you.

[ozidual]

How many tape recordings do you have that need to have the programs typed up?

Just got one.  I'll see if I can send it to you.  Which is a good way to start this update.  I finally found Interesting 20 which is Game Game 20 in a box with a cassette that has all the games.  I saw it mentioned a couple times along with a few low res pictures, but there wasn't much out there.  Then a month or two ago it popped up on Mercari and I snagged it.  It's now uploaded here.  It's part of the 4 Let's Play With Family Basic books.

A month or so before that I got one of the last two Family Basic books - Hard Work: Family Computer Games+Basic Guide, which is now uploaded here.  There's only one left - a book/cassette set - but it is beyond my price range.

If you look through my archive.org uploads, I have also uploaded quite a few Micom Basic issues and a Beep issue.  We now have almost all Micom Basic issues that include Family Basic programs in them (1984 08 - 1996 04).  We're only missing a handful of 1995 issues.

I also finished scanning and uploading the Lets Sing with Family Basic set (one of the other 4 Lets Play With Family Basic sets).  This and the other links in this message have all been added to the original post. 

[ozidual]

I picked up the last missing Family Basic cassette which is part of the last book I needed.  I still do not have the book, but now the programs are preserved here.  The cassette was in great condition and Side B was a duplicate of Side A (all the data) so I was able to get pristine copies of all of the games/backgrounds.

One interesting thing is the last game in the list is in 3 parts AND it only runs in Family Basic v2.1.  I've seen quite a few later programs that required 2+ parts to play the game, but this is the first one I've seen for Family Basic v2.1.  The book/cassette came out sometime in 1986.

I'd would still like to get ahold of the book, and will keep an eye out for that.  Hopefully it is cheaper without the cassette.

[P]

Do you know why it doesn't work on any other version? AFAIK version 2.0 got some new command that version 1 is missing, but the differences between version 2.1 and version 2.0 is just some unknown bug fixes.
And does it not work on V3?

[ozidual]

Yeah, it wasn't working when I loaded it into Famibe v3.0.  The first thing it was getting hung up on was CLEAR &Hxxxx commands.  I'm not sure if that function doesn't work the same way in 3.0 as it does in 2.1 (i.e. that it can clear RAM addresses). 

I thought about it a bit but don't have a solution.  Here's a few of my thoughts:

1. I replaced it the CLEARs with a POKE 00, &Hxxxx or something similar in all 3 programs and while that worked, it would crash later in the programs. 
2. Since it is using POKEs regularly, I wonder if data is stored differently between v2.1 and v3.0.  So what is free space in 2.1 is not free space in 3.0
3. Similar to 2. maybe the DATA function stores data in a different location between v2.1 and v3.0.

I didn't spend too much time working on it though since I wanted to get it out there in its original form.  It's also been a while since I did much programming in FB and I am nowhere near proficient in it so it could very easily be something else.