[Coco] [Color Computer] Japanese PC Game in CoCo Style?

[James Diffendaffer]

response to the postings on the mailing list
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The game is definitely an NEC PC-6001 (aka NEC TREK in the US and
commonly called the P6 or Papicom in Japan) game.  It may be a windows
executable but don't be surprised if it's just an emulator
pre-packaged with a ROM or snapshot of the game.  
http://papicom.net/
http://www.pc-6001.net/p6/index.shtml

I own two TREKs (one boxed) and it's version of the expansion
interface.  It's one of the best built PCs in my 8 bit collection.  It
was very popular in Japan but not in the US.  Sadly that means almost
none of the expansion devices are available here.  The US version does
have a better keyboard. 

As far as CoCo 1/2 VS TREK... I think the TREK had some additional
graphics capabilities by switching color mode with hardware on the fly
so you could get more colors on screen at once but I've never been
able to find docs about it.  It would use more RAM and steal more
memory cycles from the CPU to implement even if the mode does exist.

The Z80 is a pretty powerful chip but it does require a very debated 2
to 4 times the clock rate of a 6502 for the same results so expect an
even higher clock to match the 6809.  Given the long cycle times for
instructions there is more likely to be added wait states caused by
the graphics refresh.  The speeds would be close with an optimally
written programs on each but I know at least one coco programmer that
might debate that since he worked on a game (<cough>Mega Bug<cough>)
for both.  

The TREK had an Extended BASIC, RAM expanders, a voice synthesizer and
the expansion interface included the floppy interface.  The floppy
interface was a parallel controller so the drives probably had a built
in drive chip and the parallel chip was just to communicate with the
external box. 

There is also a MKII and other follow up machine that were more
powerful than the original including better graphics.

The NEC PC-6001 really was the CoCo of the Z80 world.  The Dick Smith
VZ200/300 and equivalents were also pretty close.  They actually had a
copy of the Model 1 ROM with some features disabled.  They just didn't
have all graphics modes wired.