Video Storybook Manual
By: Richard C. Degler
April 3, 2008

I finished disassembling the Astrocade unreleased cartridge "Video Storybook"
as far as I'm going to take it.  There are still a lot of Variables and 
Routines that are left unidentified, but someone filled up an entire 8K ROM 
with some pretty twisted code, leaving only 132 bytes at the end.  Here's 
what's inside:


Sorry, no dancing monkeys (and those crawling things are turtles?) but some 
other pictures and a few primitive drawing tools.  Starting from the upper left 
key and assuming the standard keypad - unless someone wants to make an overlay 
for this:


'C' does a Soft Reset, but since the "Reset" button is disabled this doesn't do 
much.


Note: these Drawing routines all start and end with a press of the trigger ...

'Up' Arrow starts drawing a Dotted Trace, or just a Point if NOT in Multi-color 
mode.

'Down' Arrow starts drawing a Rubberband Line from trigger-press to trigger-
press.

'%' (Letter 'O' in MESS) does a poorly-coded Paint Bomb Fill (might crash the 
game!)

'mR' ('R' in MESS) draws a Hollow Circle from center then use Cursor up/down 
for size.

'mS' ('S' in MESS) draws a Filled Circle (see Multi-Color modes for colors 
available).

'cH' ('H' in MESS) draws a Hollow Rectangle from corner to corner (hard to see 
it!)

'/' (Keypad - check your Num Lock) draws a Filled Rectangle (see Multi-Color 
modes).


Here are the Multi-Color Modes which affect the Drawing modes, such as they are 
...

'7', '8', '9', and '*' are basically the same three foreground colors cycled 
through.

'4' the default setting - Solid Red (the other two colors are NOT usable as 
solids?)

'5' and '6' MORE multi-color modes, this time with Background color stripes 
mixed in.


Screen Flashing Modes *** EPILEPTIC WARNING * SEIZURE ALERT *** You've been 
warned ...

'-' (the one on the Keypad in MESS) Resets Colors to Red, Blue and Gold (or 
Yellow.)

'1' Stops the screen flashing at whatever color combination is currently 
displayed.

'2' Color Ramping cycles through the color wheel without changing the 
intensity.

'3' Intensity Cycling from dark to light (none of these affect the background 
color).


No provision was made to Select your own color preferences.  And next to them 
...

'+' (Keypad '+' in MESS) does a Hard Reset, and CLEARs the Screen like a Power 
ON


Drawing MAGIC Modes (also has support for FLOP as well as FLIP! but not hooked 
in) ...

'cE' ('E' in MESS) to PLOP write absolute, '0' to OR write, and '.' to XOR 
write.


Finally, call these WORD Shifts initiated by the '=' key (Keypad 'Enter' in 
MESS) ...

'=,C' for Fan Lines radiating to the Left of where the cursor was when trigger 
pulled.

'=,Up' for Fan Lines to the Right (?), '=,Down' for Up, and '=,%' ('=,O') for 
Down.


Here are the Animated PICTURES (You have to make up your own story about these) 
...

'=,mR' to Draw 2 Birds, a Tree, 2 Deer and a Turtle (use Trigger to pick one 
up)

'=,mS' to Draw 2 Houses and a Garden (watch the flowers bloom then wither 
away!)

'=,cH' to Draw a Cottage, 2 Trees and 2 Kangaroos (make them 'Roos hop in 
place!!)

'=,/' to Draw a Fire Station and a Fire Truck (or they came to put out the 
chimney!!)

plus '=,7' to Draw a Cottage, '=,8' to Draw 7 Turtles, and '=,9' to Draw a 
Kangaroo.

These Pictures can be moved around by pulling the trigger, which causes the 
bottom of
the screen to change from the background color.  Once that happens, the cursor 
will
pick up the first picture it comes into contact with.  It will place it where 
it is
when the trigger is pulled again, at which time the cursor appears where it was 
last.


Should have been mentioned up top - Defaults to using Knob 1 and Knob 3 to move 
...

'=,*' to use Knobs to move Cursor (Hey, who has a SPECTRE handle to try this 
out?)

'=,4', '=,5', and '=,6' affect the Knob control somehow, but no difference is 
seen??


and Lastly, what's been called Keyword "GOTO " using Word Shift on a BASIC 
overlay ...

'=,-' Use THIS every time to transfer Cursor control to the Player ONE 
Joystick!!1!


END OF DOCUMENT