68300

Brian,

  In general I agree with other posts that choosing a tool is 
important, but your email suggests to me that you are not yet 
comfortable with a C/C++ development environment, and would rather 
develop with Assembly.

  I would suggest to use a 68xx family processor, instead of 68xxx, 
because of hardware and software "learning curves" will be much 
shorter, and because a 68xxx is very likely overkill.

  If true that coin application is not overly complex (less than 4K 
of assembly), then basically any 68xx micro will do just fine 
(68HC08, 68HC11, etc).
  Once you learn to design with them, you can easily "upgrade" your 
knowledge to 68xxx processors.
  Assemblers are very inexpensive, some of them even free, but 
depending on your budget you may want to spend some money to make 
sure you get quality product and support.

  Regards,

Jose Rodriguez