Barcode Battler

The Barcode Battler is a handheld electronic game released by Epoch Co. which uses a barcode scanner to generate ingame characters and items. A successor called the Barcode Battler II would later be released in Japan with an output port to interface with video game consoles such as the Famicom and Super Famicom. (This is the version released internationally as the Barcode Battler)

A Famicom expansion port cable was bundled with the game Barcode World in order to interface with the device, which is what this page will describe.

7  bit  0
---- ----
xxxx xDxx
      |
      +---- Serial data

The transmission format appears to be level-shifted RS232 serial at 1200 baud:

• 1 Start bit (must be 1=LOW)
• 8 Data bits (LSB first, 1=LOW=Zero, 0=HIGH=One)
• 1 Stop bit (must be 0=HIGH)

The data format is a 20-byte ASCII string consisting of:

• A 13-byte barcode formatted as:
  • EAN-13
  • EAN-8 (leading space padding)
  • UPC-A? (unknown padding)
  • UPC-E? (unknown padding)
  • ERROR (trailing space padding, denotes scanning error)
• A 7-byte ID:
  • EPOCH\r\n - sent by hardware
  • SUNSOFT - alternate string accepted by Barcode World

• nocash’s documentation (covers FC & SFC protocols)

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