On the trail of the Lonesome Bug

Block Buster PCB (Track side)

Well, a few steps forward, a few steps backward.

I've dismantled a BlockBuster and Vegas Slots cartridges and they are identical. So it's not a wiring issue.

I've also run the MESS Microvision Emulator. (MESS is a program which emulates virtually every computer and console ever made ....)

This , interestingly, has exactly the same problem with 'Vegas Slots' that I do, viz. the display is backwards - it behaves as if every nibble written to the LCD is backwards, other than that it works fine.

So it may not be just me, it might be the PLA for the O-Lines.

The MESS author derived his technical information from a different source from me, and implements his processor emulation differently, so it is odd that we have the exact same 'bug'. If it is a bug.

However, it does have the keyboard the right way up on Phaser Strike, which suggests that its an error on my part, which I will have to track down.

MESS works well, except for it tries to fit the 16x16 screen to the whole display, which makes the pixels very very big indeed.