Quick Side Question: Is ROM the same thing as the Archive?

Ah ok. I kind of understand, I think.

Unfortunately, not all calcs are equal when it comes to RAM. The 83+ has only 32KB, while the 83+SE and older 84+(SE) have 128KB. Regrettably, TI cut this down so that a newer 84+(SE) has only 48KB of RAM. But anyway, yes, paging makes things more difficult. Your running code is in the area $8000-$BFFF (more specifically from $9D95 to where the program ends), and the calculator's hardware is such that attempting to run code on page $80 ($40 for 83+), which is normally in the $C000-$FFFF area, causes a reset.
Btw, as for RPG's, I think I've seen ones over 16KB in size. I can't remember which ones, but, given that they require their components to be archived, yeah. What I don't know that I've seen are RPG's over one sector (64KB) in size.

has anyone managed to create a substring routine? this has been bothering me

EDIT: made a crude one. only will work for same length substrings for now, because that's all i need for now.

L is the length of your substring. in this example, it would be 4.
"YOURTEXTHERE->Str1
" ->Str2          // one space
For(Z,0,2
conj(L*Z+Str1,Str2,L
det(16-L)
Disp Str2,i
End


For people who wants to get the current RAM:

{e9828}r-{e9824}r
Source of information: BrandonW, Calc84maniac and Iambian in the following IRC logs:

[00:09:04] <@OmnomIRC> <calc84maniac> you could manually do the Free Ram check in Axe by subtracting two values in memory
[00:09:29] <+Iambian> calc84maniac: The calc has those two values specified?
[00:09:36] <+BrandonW> Free RAM is actually quite easy to calculate, the subtraction of the values at two RAM pointers.
[00:09:44] <+BrandonW> ...and calc84maniac beat me to it.
[00:09:48] <@DJ_Omni> really?
[00:09:52] <@DJ_Omni> that would be nice to know
[00:09:55] <+Iambian> I knew it involved two pointers.
[00:09:57] <@OmnomIRC> <calc84maniac> what was it, (OPS) and (FPS)?
[00:10:10] <+BrandonW> Can't remember exactly.
[00:10:14] <+BrandonW> One moment.
[00:10:16] <+Iambian> Oh. I was thinking about the long way around it.
[00:10:16] <+SpyBot45> New post by Magic Banana in Hey Guys! http://ourl.ca/6026/94063
[00:10:41] <+Iambian> But I know it's the end of the floating point stack and the end of the operator stack.
[00:10:47] <@DJ_Omni> so we had magic mushrooms
[00:10:48] <+BrandonW> Yes, (OPS)-(FPS).
[00:10:52] <@DJ_Omni> now we have magic bananas!
[00:10:58] <@DJ_Omni> mhmm
[00:11:00] <@rcfreak0> oO
[00:11:03] <@CoolioJaz> @Iambian i think so, yeah....
[00:11:10] <@DJ_Omni> are those located at specific memory addresses?
[00:11:20] <+Iambian> They are, since they're labeled.
[00:11:21] <@DJ_Omni> If they are, then Axe should be able to easily access them
[00:11:21] <+BrandonW> Yes, (9828h)-(9824h).
[00:11:27] <@DJ_Omni> aah ok thanks
[00:11:31] <@OmnomIRC> <calc84maniac> so in Axe, that would be
[00:11:57] <@OmnomIRC> <calc84maniac> {e9828}r-{e9824}r
[00:12:15] <@OmnomIRC> <calc84maniac> where "e" is the exponential one
[00:12:34] <@OmnomIRC> <calc84maniac> I guess I should call it "ee"?
[00:12:49] <+Iambian> So that's how you're gonna check for free RAM without resorting to hex codes
[00:13:19] <+Iambian> Nifty workaround.

^++

Agreed and seconded.

That's really nice to know!  Thanks DJ, Calc84, Iambian, and BrandonW!