16 NES BASIC PROGRAMMING GUIDE
Appendices: codes, limits and edition history
Printable text follows ASCII where the font/editor support it: space 32, quotation mark 34, digits 48–57, uppercase letters 65–90. Keyboard source entry normalizes lowercase to uppercase. CHR$ can create all bytes 0–255, but unsupported or control glyphs are not promised visible. LEN counts bytes, not Unicode characters.
The relevant control bytes are Backspace 8, Enter 13, Escape 27 and the optional bridge's caret controls 28–31. Ctrl+C is byte 3 and always interrupts rather than becoming an ordinary queued text event. The reserved controller-event table is:
| Button | INKEY$ code | JOY bit |
|---|---|---|
| A | 128 | 1 |
| B | 129 | 2 |
| Select | 130 | 4 |
| Start | 131 | 8 |
| Up | 132 | 16 |
| Down | 133 | 32 |
| Left | 134 | 64 |
| Right | 135 | 128 |
| Resource | Limit |
|---|---|
| Numeric variables | 26, A–Z, signed 16-bit |
| String variables | 26, A$–Z$, independent |
| Stored/concatenated string | 63 bytes |
| Shared string pool | 256 bytes |
| String expression arena | 128 bytes |
| Physical input line | 95 characters |
| Program | 128 lines / 3072 tokenized bytes |
| Control frames | 8 shared FOR/GOSUB frames |
| Canvas | 128×64, one bit per pixel |
| Sprite slots | 64, eight per scanline |
| Editable art | 32 patterns, IDs 8–39, 8×8 |
| Project files | Six named slots |
Supported: integer math, typed strings, the reference's functions, native input and controller events, text I/O, line/branch/loop/subroutine control, one-bit canvas, hardware sprites/editor, asynchronous APU sound and explicit project storage. Unsupported: long variable names, arrays, floats, ELSE, DATA/READ, ON GOTO, arbitrary gamepad scan codes, Unicode source, arbitrary sprite palettes, composed-sprite editing or inter-ROM project transfer. Future features are not promised by this edition.
Edition 1.0 is the first bundled host programming book, dated 3 November 2026. It covers the completed BASIC language in app 0.7.1(30), with unchanged ROM bytes from completion build 0.7.0(29). The exact fingerprint appears at the front of this book and in the app's local guide metadata. The standalone ROM uses NES 2.0, mapper 1/submapper 0, 128 KiB PRG ROM, 8 KiB CHR RAM and 32 KiB PRG NVRAM, NTSC.
Physical NES/flashcart acceptance remains NOT VERIFIED. Windows/macOS PDF readers can open an exported copy of the book; that does not imply a separate native 8-Bit Impostor app exists on those platforms. The app's actual supported build is iOS/iPadOS 17 or later. iOS-app compatibility on Mac is not certified here.
See ABOUT → SOFTWARE NOTICES in the app for project/core/font licenses. No public product-support URL or email was confirmed for this edition; none is invented in this book. Original NDB software is independent of Nintendo. Use only ROMs you have rights to use. The guide's pixel artwork is original, and the embedded reading/code fonts retain their redistribution licenses with the build source.