MSX Game Reader library

Source: MSX Forum

Vincent van Dam, developer of fMSX-SDL has released a library and Win32 binary which accesses the drivers that are delivered with the Sunrise or ASCII Game Reader. With these sources, the doors have opened for other emulators to support the Game Reader as well. The release comes in the middle of a discussion whether or not formal approval of MSX Association via Bazix is needed to support the Game Reader in emulators other than the MSXPLAYer that is delivered with it.

Relevant link: Vincent van Dam's website

Comments (3)

By dvik

Prophet (2200)

09-09-2006, 22:51

Great news

Imo, the most important MSX news in the 21st century, after the news about the Game Reader itself of course.

With the sources it shouldn't be hard to get support in other emulators but what I'm looking forward to even more is all the tools that can be made to make MSXing easier and more fun.

By mth

Champion (507)

10-09-2006, 18:29

Whether or not formal approval is needed from MSX Association is a matter of the law. As far as I know, reverse engineering for the purpose of interoperability is allowed. Since Vincent does not distribute the DLL itself, he is not breaking any copyrights either. So the way I see it, there is nothing to discuss here.

What the discussion should be about, is whether MSX Association wants to open the protocol to access the Game Reader over USB. If that protocol is opened, it will be possible to communicate with the Game Reader without the DLL, allowing Game Reader support on operating systems other than Windows. I am interested in implementing support for the Game Reader in openMSX, but the protocol would have to be fully open (no NDA or other strings attached) and there would have to be sufficient documentation.

By snout

Ascended (15187)

10-09-2006, 18:55

The goal of the re-opened discussion with Bazix/MSXA is to see if we can achieve exactly that.

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