INES Mapper 218: Difference between revisions

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(documenting uses)
(we should not describe fantastical AxROM header configurations, this sentence is a wild goose chase. revising to be about subset compatibility instead)
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Note: 1K CHR-RAM allows to use as much as 64 tiles of 2bpp (or, with suitable color attributes, 128 monochrome tiles of 1bpp).
Note: 1K CHR-RAM allows to use as much as 64 tiles of 2bpp (or, with suitable color attributes, 128 monochrome tiles of 1bpp).


Also note that the PPU.A13 variant can be adequately emulated as [[AxROM]] provided the program never writes to $8000-$FFFF and is marked as having 1024 bytes of CHR RAM in [[NES 2.0]].
Also not that with if reads/writes to mirrored addresses are avoided, software for this mapper can also be made compatible with [[AxROM]] ($A9), [[BxROM]] ($A0-A1) or [[NROM]] + CHR-RAM, or other suitable mappers. ''Magic Floor'' itself is well behaved enough to be emulated as AxROM or NROM + CHR-RAM with vertical mirroring.
''Magic Floor'' itself is well behaved enough to be emulated as AxROM or NROM with vertical mirroring.


It has been used in two games, and one test ROM:
It has been used in two games, and one test ROM:

Revision as of 23:13, 22 February 2023

iNES Mapper 218 is used by the homebrew Magic Floor game. The cartridge contains only one single PRG-ROM chip (and a CIC, if required).

There's no CHR-ROM or CHR-RAM. Instead, the console's internal 2Kbyte Name Table RAM is mapped as CHR-RAM. The 2K RAM is permanently selected (/VCS wired to GND), and can be used in four modes by wiring VA10 to one of the PPU.A10..A13 address lines:

VA10 connection Effect on nametables iNES Flags 6 UNIF "MIRR" bit 7-0
PPU.A10 Two-Screen, Vertical Mirroring $A1 (0001) $01
PPU.A11 Two-Screen, Horizontal Mirroring $A0 (0000) $00
PPU.A12 One-Screen, BLK0 $A8 (1000) $02
PPU.A13 One-Screen, BLK1 $A9 (1001) $03

Note: Bit 3 in Byte 6 of iNES header would be usually Four-Screen flag, but, for this mapper it is used as One-Screen flag.

The VA10 connection does, of course, also affect the CHR-RAM mapping at 0000h-1FFFh. BLK1 would be the most common case (1K NT plus 1K CHR-RAM). BLK0 would allow to swap CHR RAM via Port 2000h.Bit3-4. Two-Screen would allow to use two NTs (and to squeeze CHR data into unused NT areas). Two-Screen would also allow to use 2K OBJ tiles (when leaving BG unused).

Note: 1K CHR-RAM allows to use as much as 64 tiles of 2bpp (or, with suitable color attributes, 128 monochrome tiles of 1bpp).

Also not that with if reads/writes to mirrored addresses are avoided, software for this mapper can also be made compatible with AxROM ($A9), BxROM ($A0-A1) or NROM + CHR-RAM, or other suitable mappers. Magic Floor itself is well behaved enough to be emulated as AxROM or NROM + CHR-RAM with vertical mirroring.

It has been used in two games, and one test ROM:

References