Hi, I was @ retro usb site and looking the powerpak device for NES system. And they have a "Mapper Compatibility List". What does it mean ? And.. from the full library of NES games, how many will work on this cartridge ?
NES mappers are a way for the software to switch available data sets without the hardware being aware of it. The upshot is that the limitations of the NES can be worked around so that the tiny amounts of memory that the system can look at don't limit the games. Most NES games use a mapper of some kind, and there's an informal mapper numbering system, which is what you're looking at. The NES PowerPak supports the most important mappers. I don't know exactly what the compatibility rate is, but it's well into the 90% range. The caveat here is that unlicenced/pirate games often used very weird mappers so don't expect those to run - the majority of retail games should work without a hitch, though.
