Nordic Power

Action, Atomic and Nordic Power Screenshots
Technical Info
ROM	32 kbyte
RAM	8 kbyte
Hardware features	1 Button Freeze 1 Button Reset
Manual	PDF: 19 pages Nordic Power german TXT: german from iDOC.txt
CRT ID	9
Programming	See Tech Section

Nordic Power and Action Power are Action Replay clones which apparently were available in german speaking countries only.

Power Series

Atomic Power 1.1 is a 100% copy of the Nordic Power 1.0 translated to english with name and color changes. No signs of the commercial availability of Atomic Power were found and the "Frank&Joe" copyright hints for a custom text hack on the eprom. There is no ROM available for the Action Gear yet but the current Power line of products likely looks like this:

• Nordic Power v1.0 (c)Copyright 1989, D&E,Venlo
• Atomic Power v1.1 (c)Copyright 1990, Frank&Joe - 100% clone of the v1.0, english translation applied
• Nordic Power v2.1 (c)Copyright 1989, D&E,Venlo - This 64'er review screenshots the 2.1
• Nordic Power v7.2 (c)1989,1991 Gameworks, Ltd.
• Action Power v8.1 (c)1989-1994 A.S.I. Ltd., UK
• Action Gear (german review)

Thanks to Bugjam for the Nordic Power 2.1 and Graham for the Action Power 8.1 ROM dumps!

Nordic Power Advert

Nordic Power Manual Cover

ROM Description

Nordic Power is likely based on the 4.x series of the Action Replay with quite a few changes which could only be done with the source code available. The jump from 2.1 to 7.2 sure was due to marketing reasons and making up a number higher than the 6 the Action Replay was going by at the time. The Nordic Power 7.2 ROM was changed to some extent but on many things appeared more to be moving code around and fixing a couple of small glitches. Investigations here are pending, but no new options were found so far. The update to Action Power 8.1 introduced a feature on the freezer named Timerstop. Investigations on this one are also still pending. :)

There are two slightly different Nordic Power 1.0 ROMs on the net. The change does not affect workability or fix bad emulation though and can be dismissed.

All versions replace spr/spr and spr/bkg with "LDA/X/Y #$00 ; NOP ($EA)" when running the sprite collision killer on the freezer. Thats just fine, but the amount of occurences told to the user often is doubled for some weird reason. There is no Pokefinder on these cartridges but an option to enter Pokes.

Important Notice would be that Nordic Power hardware can be used with standard 4.1 and later Action Replay ROMs including v5.0, v6.0 and hacked versions. The hardware allows a 16kb ROM banking mode which could even be used to play games using that configuration, but they would require patching and possibly even more attention. This 16kb mode is not available on Action Replay hardware. The original hardware also carries a Datel writing and differs only slightly from AR v5 hardware.

Notes

• Extensions for Action Replay should work. If we run across incompatibilities it will be stated there.

Tech

The following is shamelessly ripped from atomicpower.c from the VICE emulator. Text was written by Groepaz:

    - the hardware is very similar to Action Replay 5, with one exception

    32K rom, 4*8k pages
    8K ram
 
    io1 (writes)
 
    7    extra ROM bank selector (A15) (unused)
    6    1 = resets FREEZE-mode (turns back to normal mode)
    5    1 = enable RAM at ROML ($8000-$9FFF) &
             I/O2 ($DF00-$DFFF = $9F00-$9FFF)
    4    ROM bank selector high (A14)
    3    ROM bank selector low  (A13)
    2    1 = disable cartridge (turn off $DE00)
    1    1 = /EXROM high
    0    1 = /GAME low
  
    different to original AR:
   
     if bit 5 (RAM enable) is 1,
        bit 0,1 (exrom/game) is == 2 (cart off),
        bit 2,6,7 (cart disable, freeze clear) are 0,
   
       then Cart ROM (Bank 0..3) is mapped at 8000-9fff,
        and Cart RAM (Bank 0) is mapped at A000-bfff
        and Cart RAM (Bank 0) is is enabled in io2 area
        using 16K Game config
   
     io2 (r/w)
           cart RAM (if enabled) or cart ROM

Missing

• Action Gear ROM dump
• Expansion disk images
• Manual scans
• Box fotos

Binaries

Nordic_Power_binaries_rr.c64.org_2021-04.rar contains just the C64 binaries:

• Nordic Power v1.0 1989.bin and .crt (german)
• Atomic Power v1.1 1990.bin and .crt (english)
• Nordic Power v2.1 1991.bin and .crt (german)
• Nordic Power v7.2 1991.bin and .crt (german)
• Action Power v8.1 1994.bin and .crt (german)
  • Action Power v8.1 hacked_Transcom_eng_yugoslavian_1993.bin and .crt - Transcom text hack (mostly english, partly yugoslavian - minor version and year are likely fake)

Nordic_Power_all_rr.c64.org_2021-04.rar contains:

• all of the above
• PDF: 19 pages Nordic Power Manual german
• TXT: Nordic Power Manual (german) iDOC.txt

Trivia

• The command CBM hints for 5.x Action Replay series
• Nova Load file transfer hints for pre 5.x Action Replay
• Loader saving crashes - asks for enhancement disk before - but loader seems in ROM?

Weblinks

• German CBMHardware page has some stuff. Ok ok - the linked MK.gif (same file) indeed shows the Nordic Power schematics as hardware knowing people tell. The contents of the used 82S129 makes the difference here.
• CSDb has a release of a hacked Nordic Power 7.2 at hxxps://csdb.dk/release/?id=187122 - the changes are debatable and therefore no direct link.