| | Gradius 2 enhancement patch |
| | Tuesday, March 24, 2009 - 21:14 Submitted by: sd_snatcher Topic: Games & Demos | | The MSX-version of Gradius-2 (a.k.a. Nemesis 2) is a spin-off story of the Gradius series, developed specifically for the MSX and later ported to X68000 and PSP under the title "Nemesis 90 Kai". As with many other Konami megarom titles for MSX, it suffered from the bug in the timing routine that lets it run at twice its normal speed if the processor is fast enough. Also, the game is far too CPU-intensive for a standard 3.57MHz Z80A to sustain a full frame rate. As a result, the game drops frames constantly, running noticeably slower than its predecessor: Gradius (a.k.a. Nemesis).
This new patch is not just the same as previous ones. It will not only implement the DynamicVsync (for MSX1 & MSX2), many speed optimizations and some tricks: it also includes a much-desired feature: SmoothScroll for MSX2+ and MSX Turbo-R!
In addition, sd_snatcher released a new version of the Salamander DynamicVsync patch, that includes some new optimizations to get even better speed improvements on slower machines.
Relevant link: Gradius 2 enhancement patch |
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| By Huey on March 24 2009, 22:13 | Nice!
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| By Yukio on March 24 2009, 22:23 | Nice.
Now, I need to find a legal copy of the cartridge. I think that there is a tools for copy the cartridge somewhere on MSX.ORG. It should work with Konami cartridge too ...
Does anyone know if this game works with the Slot expander and the megaram + SCC cartridge? Maybe I should need the Ademir Slot Expander too!
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| By hap on March 24 2009, 22:29 | Thumbs up to the smooth scroll! and suddenly I suck at the game due to the higher speed. 
(tried it on a tR with mpazos megaflashromscc)
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| By Huey on March 24 2009, 22:30 | Ah shoot
Was going to try. But too much of a hassle with this XPC.....Sorry.
Why not provide an IPS file?????
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| By hap on March 24 2009, 22:42 | Maybe because it appends data to the ROM, I think IPS v2 supports that tough.
(you should be on IRC )
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| By ARTRAG on March 24 2009, 23:15 | xpc??
O_o
maybe i'm too dumb to make it work
release an ips, please!!!
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| By Gilneas2 on March 24 2009, 23:43 | I got it to work in openmsx, it plays reaaally well, thanks a lot!
What I did: You need MSX-DOS, execrom.com, gradius2.xpc, and nemesis2.rom on the same disk (directory).
The trick is, nemesis2.rom must have the right md5sum. The ones on msx archive have the wrong one! You can find the right nemesis 2 rom with google on page 4 or 5.
Then in openmsx you enable extension megaram. Boot up in msx dos, and run execrom /Pgradius2.xpm /S /B nemesis2.rom
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| By spl on March 24 2009, 23:49 | Yes, please, ips 
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| By manuel on March 25 2009, 00:12 | Feature request: if you have an MSX2 with a V9958, it doesn't do smooth scroll, please detect the VDP instead of relying on address 0x2D.
Otherwise, this ROCKS!
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| By Yukio on March 25 2009, 00:24 | "address 0x2D".
Is this the MSX generation "id"? The one that should tell if it is a MSX, MSX2, MSX2+ or a MSX Turbo R system?
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| By ARTRAG on March 25 2009, 00:31 | on bluemsx v2.8 it has glitches!
once each 8 frames the x offset is wrong....
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| By sd_snatcher on March 25 2009, 01:34 | There are two easy ways to use the XPC patch:
1) Easier: ExecROM. Just put the ROM and the XPC patch on the same directory (of a disk containing MSX-DOS, off course) with the same filename (ie: GRADIUS2.ROM and GRADIUS2.XPC). ExecROM will detect this and will autoload the patch. You'll need a MegaRAM. (OpenMSX do emulate the MegaRAM). To run the game just type ExecROM GRADIUS2 at the MSX-DOS prompt.
2) Apply the patch to the ROM. Goto ExecROM SourceForge page and download XPCtools. You can apply the patch just as you do with an IPS patcher.
The problem is: Most emulators require the game to have an exact size (multiple of the page size of the megarom in question) to execute a ROM. Otherwise it will not run the ROM correctly. You can fool such emulators by attaching an 8KB dummy file to the end of original ROM before patching.
So the steps to patch the file for an emulator would be:
1) Google for "dummy file creator", get one tool for that.
2) Create an 8KB filled dummy file filled with FFh
3) Open a shell on Windows, type: copy /b NEMESIS2.ROM + dummy8KB.rom GRAD2ENH.ROM
4) type: xpcapply GRAD2ENH.ROM GRADIUS2.XPC
Piece of cake.
Please don't blame "the process is hard" on the XPC file. It would be exactly the same if it was an IPS file.
And I can assure you that it was much much harder to create this patch than the minimal work someone needs to apply it.
Also, contact your preferred MSX emulator developer to add support for autoloading XPCs the same way ExecROM does. Because the IPS file is too clumsy for many MSX rom hacking needs, like:
1) Extending ROMs beyond their original size
2) Containing multiple different patches inside one file
3) Having patches that can be asked for the user if they're to be applied
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| By sd_snatcher on March 25 2009, 01:54 | Quote:
| Feature request: if you have an MSX2 with a V9958, it doesn't do smooth scroll, please detect the VDP instead of relying on address 0x2D.
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Hi Manuel!
Unfortunately this is not possible, because those machines don't have the VDP wait-signal circuitry, which is mandatory for a MSX2+ and is required by the smooth scroll routines because I'm using the high speed VRAM transfer by enabling the WTE bit of the register #25.
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| By nikodr on March 25 2009, 04:49 | Can you tell us in what place of the rom is the scroll routine?
As i have been trying to dissasemble konami roms it would be good to know specific places of the rom where various routines are located,that way we could learn a lot from the original routines of the game.
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| By Randam on March 25 2009, 07:08 | A great enhancement for a konami game yet again. Would it mean much work to make this patch (or a seperate one) work for the so-called nemesis 2 beta?
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| By Metalion on March 25 2009, 09:27 | Could someone explain to me the principle of dynamic vsync ?
I suppose that static vsync forces to update the frame on a given vsync interruption, while dynamic vsync waits for a certain event before updating the frame at the next vsync interruption, but I would like to know more ...
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| By ARTRAG on March 25 2009, 11:50 | As Metaion, I would like to have details on dynamic vsync
The answers I had are largely unsatisfactory
Please!
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| By konamiman on March 25 2009, 13:17 | I can't make it work on BlueMSX. I am emulating a Turbo-R with a MegaRAM on slot 1. I have a DSK with MSX-DOS 2, ExecROM, gradius2.rom (the MD5 sum matches), and gradius2.xpc. ExecROM runs and detects the emulated MegaRAM, but after that, it says:
Loading file GRADIUS2.ROM:
- Cartridge type: 128k, MegaROM
File not found
So what could I do? Please help me, i need to see this, in the same sense as in "I need to breathe".
Aside note: yes, "the process is hard", both for IPS and for XPC patches. I can't wait for the day in which we finally abandon that political correctness and start distributing directly the patched ROMs. Piracy? Uh, yeah, we will send Konami to bankrupcy by distributing ROMs for a system abandoned 15 years ago.
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| By konamiman on March 25 2009, 14:01 | Sorry for my previous somewhat agressive reaction. Of course I value the work done, even more considering that Nemesis 2 is my favourite MSX game. Maybe I should follow the advise of counting up to ten before sending something to Internet.
I finally managed to make it work by directly patching the ROM file. However it does not work quite well in BlueMSX. The scroll is smooth, but every time it is supposed to show a new tile column, the screen horribly glitches, making it impossible to play.
I guess it is simply too much for an emulator, so I will try it later on my real Turbo-R. Anyway if someone manages to run it correctly un BlueMSX, please tell.
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| By ARTRAG on March 25 2009, 14:09 | I already reported the very same problem few posts before
have you v2.8 of bluemsx?
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| By konamiman on March 25 2009, 14:25 | Yes, I use BlueMSX 2.8, the latest version available.
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| By ARTRAG on March 25 2009, 15:05 | same as me, it has to be an emulation problem in bluemsx....
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| By hap on March 25 2009, 15:29 | http://samor.nl/hap/crap/gra2m_ips.zip
This is an ips version of the scroll+turbo patch, works with BiFi's ips4msx too. Patch goodmsx "Gradius 2 (1987) (Konami) (J) [a1].rom" and it'll create a 256KB file with the end filled with $FF.
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| By spl on March 25 2009, 18:55 | After using the XPC patch, rom has 129 KB, so I am not able to load it with MGLOAD and it doesn't run from the MEGAFLASHROM.
IPS version works like a charm.
Regards,
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| By karloch on March 25 2009, 21:32 | Would the smooth scroll be possible with Salamander?
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| By msd on March 25 2009, 21:32 | Can you do that scrolling fix for all bad scrolling msx games
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| By muffie on March 25 2009, 23:21 | Quote:
| "Aside note: yes, "the process is hard", both for IPS and for XPC patches. I can't wait for the day in which we finally abandon that political correctness and start distributing directly the patched ROMs. Piracy? Uh, yeah, we will send Konami to bankrupcy by distributing ROMs for a system abandoned 15 years ago."
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The minute you do that, Konami will post on MRC one of those "Lack Of Respect" angry texts saying that they will abandon the MSX scene forever...
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| By wolf_ on March 25 2009, 23:36 | *yawn*
are you for real?
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| By sd_snatcher on March 25 2009, 23:47 | People, calm down. What kind of attitude is that?
I'm improving/bugfixing the games because I like a lot to play them, and decided to share those with the (I believed so) friends I made in the MSX community.
I was hoping to made the MSX community happy (just as it happened here), but the kind of reactions shown here is making me think if I did the right thing...
I decided not to use an ips patch because I feared the critics would raise their voices and shout "What?!? A 128KB patch just for that?!?!? The game doubled its size!!! Don't you know how to code properly?!? And it even don't work on my xyz ips 1.0 patcher! Make it work now!"
And fear is not quite the right thing to have in mind when developing this kind of project, or is it?
Also I do not post ROMs because MRC itself has a anti-warez policy in place. I'm not questioning this decision, but the case is: It would not be such a great news to have like "google somewhere in the Internet for the download link". Also, lawyers don't mind if a game or a mouse has a copyright of more than 50 years, right? So I want to avoid troubles with them. Both lawyers and mouses.
Changing the subject: My free time is falling like a rock, as RealLife (TM) is calling. I'll take some time to answer the good questions raised here, but some can require quite a lot of time if I was to answer it with deep details. Please have some patience until I can answer.
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| By sd_snatcher on March 26 2009, 00:28 | Ok, 1st the batch of the easier questions:
Quote:
| By Randam on March 25 2009, 03:08
A great enhancement for a konami game yet again. Would it mean much work to make this patch (or a seperate one) work for the so-called nemesis 2 beta?
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Thanks for the compliment! This can be done in some days, if enough people really want it. My plan was (if people really liked this enhancement) to proceed to Gofer no Yabō Episode II (aka Nemesis-3), that will require more time, off course. On a limited-time scenario, which one would you prefer?
Quote:
| konamiman
I finally managed to make it work by directly patching the ROM file. However it does not work quite well in BlueMSX. The scroll is smooth, but every time it is supposed to show a new tile column, the screen horribly glitches, making it impossible to play.
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Do the blueMSX team have something against my projects? It's the second time in a row their emulator refuses my releases!!!
There must be some kind of routine like that inside blueMSX:
if (FRS' code detected) then refuse_to_work
(blueMSX team: Just kidding, just kidding!)
Quote:
| By spl on March 25 2009, 14:55
After using the XPC patch, rom has 129 KB, so I am not able to load it with MGLOAD and it doesn't run from the MEGAFLASHROM.
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That's why I said you have to use a dummy file to enlarge the file to 256KB.
Quote:
| By karloch on March 25 2009, 17:32
Would the smooth scroll be possible with Salamander?
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*Theoretically*, yes. But the main problem would be the vertical scroll. A lot of work would be necessary to adjust the sprite routines, which are already somewhat sensitive and prone to collateral effects.
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| By hap on March 26 2009, 00:43 | Quote:
| My plan was (if people really liked this enhancement) to proceed to Gofer no Yabō Episode II (aka Nemesis-3), that will require more time, of course. On a limited-time scenario, which one would you prefer?
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parodius in my case =p
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| By wolf_ on March 26 2009, 01:25 | sd_snatcher: I'd say that (obviously) tile-enemies or other moving tile-objects can cause a problem when their scroll speed isn't the same as the level.
You mentioned Salamander above, but how about ripple lasers (which iirc move non-sync with the level) ? You'd get very odd movements I bet!
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| By Salamander2 on March 26 2009, 01:41 | best msx news of the year.
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| By Huey on March 26 2009, 07:37 | I've played the patched version of Gradius 2. It plays like a breeze (on Meisei).
So incredibly cool that a great game has been made even greater. Respect.
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| By konamiman on March 26 2009, 09:08 | I finally could made it to work, by using the IPS patch (I'll try the XPC patch + file enlargement, anyway). What can I say? It rocks to the point where nobody has rocked before (TM). You took a perfect game and made it even more perfect. I'm sooo happy! ^___^
As a collateral effect, as the game goes now faster (at least in Turbo-R), it is also noticeably harder. For example, in the original game I had no problem beating the stage 2 boss fast enough to get two additional weapons. In this version, I have a hard time just trying to survive! I love that!
Aiming now for Nemesis 3 is a great idea IMHO. And simply to bother you a little more, could it be possible to implement smooth scroll on MSX2, by using the "set adjust" technique as in Space Manbow?
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| By spl on March 26 2009, 09:25 | sd_snatcher: I think your work is great and I am enjoying it a lot. Don't worry
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| By st1mpy on March 26 2009, 09:55 | This was exactly what I was hoping someone would do. Thank you!
I too had problems with xps (probably because I didn't pad it), but ips works and the patched game is simply amazing. I always thought why Konami didn't do it themselves.
I am sure it is possible to contact Konami/D4E and get this distributed in some digital distribution form or as a new ROM if they want to, and you should be able to negotiate a deal to recoupe the patch dev cost. As long as the patched game is tested.
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| By Latok on March 26 2009, 10:30 | It was a real pain in the ass to download the IPS-patch, to find and download the ROM, to find and download an IPS-patcher, to transfer the data to my turboR, to patch the ROM, to load the ROM into MEGAFLASH, but..............It works and it's simply AMAZING  Thank you!!
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| By Imanok on March 26 2009, 12:13 | Great work, man!
Quote:
| Aiming now for Nemesis 3 is a great idea IMHO. And simply to bother you a little more, could it be possible to implement smooth scroll on MSX2, by using the "set adjust" technique as in Space Manbow?
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I suppose the main problem about trying that is the same as Salamander's vertical stages... all sprites should be relocated everytime the screen scrolls.
Quote:
| I am sure it is possible to contact Konami/D4E and get this distributed in some digital distribution form or as a new ROM if they want to, and you should be able to negotiate a deal to recoupe the patch dev cost. As long as the patched game is tested.
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It's already done... do you know MSX Gradius 2 for the PSP (included at the Salamander collection)??
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| By Yukio on March 26 2009, 12:18 | Actually the mouse is only 40 years old. But some stuff would cause controversial trouble for over 50 or 75 years ...
And some MSX compatible mouses are able to emulated the joystick to play games!!!
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| By Huey on March 26 2009, 12:44 | So? ????
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| By st1mpy on March 26 2009, 13:24 | Oh, are you saying Gradius (MSX ver) for PSP scrolls smoothly? I was thinking of getting that...
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| By sander on March 26 2009, 13:58 | Amazing work! I'm impressed Thank you! Next step would be screen 4 and adjusted MSX2 graphics, maybe even with SM style scroll. Maybe we could make some contest, with some gfx guys and programmers? I'll contribute. Heck, i'll even consider starting up Polka then ;P
On a side note: I'll understand that explaining how you did all this with example code would mean considerable work. Still, this would allow the rest of us to help do some more games like Parodius and Nemesis 2 Beta. Please consider this, also considering your RL duties.
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| By Imanok on March 26 2009, 14:16 | Quote:
| Oh, are you saying Gradius (MSX ver) for PSP scrolls smoothly? I was thinking of getting that...
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That's it (I'm talking about 'Gradius 2')
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| By wolf_ on March 26 2009, 14:36 | How about this for a next step in uplifting old games:
- Find out where the music/sfx player is, and where the tunes are
- hack 'em out
- insert a new player, new tunes, for new chips, and create a new ROM!
For instance, think about having SCCPSG music in Usas, Penguin Adventure, Vampire killer etc.!
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| By sander on March 26 2009, 14:42 | we have a long road before us..
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| By iamweasel2 on March 26 2009, 17:14 | Great work, man! I downloaded the IPS patch and it plays really nice, thanks for sharing it with us!
Would it be possible to do the same work with Nemesis 1?
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| By iamweasel2 on March 26 2009, 17:44 | Wolf: I think it is easier and it would have better results if you simply add cd audio songs to the game by replacing the music code. No need of new hardware or CPU time to unpack/play the song data.
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| By Randam on March 26 2009, 19:36 | I just now tried the rom combination patches. I noticed that if I apply all rom combinations neither of them works. Is that the same as when you would play nemesis 2 with a slotexpander and MOG, Q-bert and Penguin Adventure in it? Never tried that before...
@sd-snatcher: I only asked about nemesis 2 beta because I thought that it would have mostly similar routines and would probably be easier than another game. If you intend to pursue another game in due time that would be very cool as well. Two thumbs up for the great work. 
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| By sd_snatcher on March 27 2009, 03:33 | 2nd batch of the easier questions:
Quote:
| By hap on March 26 2009, 00:43
parodius in my case =p
|
I had a look at Parodius, and it really seems a best candidate for the next patch. Probably Nemesis-3 will have to wait a little: That stage-9 will probably give me quite some headache in two main points:
1) The 2nd conveyor belt that transports the gun turrets on the opposite direction of the scroll
2) The big robot that is the boss of that stage
Except for that the rest of the game seems to support my current smooth scroll routines quite well, as there are no vertical scroll. I do have a draft idea on how to deal with the robot, but I would like to hear your suggestions on how to deal with the gun turrets of the 2nd conveyor belt.
Quote:
| By konamiman on March 26 2009, 09:08
Aiming now for Nemesis 3 is a great idea IMHO. And simply to bother you a little more, could it be possible to implement smooth scroll on MSX2, by using the "set adjust" technique as in Space Manbow?
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Maybe one day, but currently the set-adjust has the same problem the vertical scroll has: it moves the sprites together with the scroll. The problem is: Konami sprite routines are quite sensitive and very prone to collateral effects... I don't know how to deal with this yet. Also, the sprite relocation will probably draw even more CPU power. Added to the fact that the routines that transfer data to the VRAM are slower for the V9938, it may result in a slower gaming for a 3.57MHz MSX2. Are you ok with this? I wonder: Does it worth the effort? There are so many MSXzers without an MSX2+ or Turbo-R nowadays? As time is a scarce resource, wouldn't be better to invest it to improve more games?
Quote:
| By Yukio on March 26 2009, 12:18
Actually the mouse is only 40 years old. But some stuff would cause controversial trouble for over 50 or 75 years ...
|
I was thinking of the other mouse. That one, with big round years, almost a hundred years old, and with an army of lawyers around him.
Quote:
| By iamweasel2 on March 26 2009, 17:14
Would it be possible to do the same work with Nemesis 1?
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Yes, it is. I already did it about 4 years ago, but used a more simple technique that only worked on turbo machines. I was not satisfied with the results, so Gradius-2 uses much better routines to achieve the very smooth results you see now. I can assure you, it's not that easy to implement smooth scroll on a MSX1 game. They just were not designed with that in mind.
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| By ro on March 27 2009, 08:35 | Great stuff, to start with!
I've patched the grad2 ROM file on 2 desktops, both running BlueMSX2.8. On one it runs, on the other the emulator hangs.. huh?
It's exactly the same, patched, ROM file. weir. Oh well, I'd be using OpenMSX for this
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| By ARTRAG on March 28 2009, 16:27 | Thanks to xpctools i had my rom, I had also to install TR roms in open msx (buemsx fails to run this patch),
and, finally, I enjoied this true miracle!
The closest thing to Space Mambow I've ever seen, closer than MB2
Great work!
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| By sd_snatcher on March 28 2009, 21:34 | And finally, the batch of the most technical questions:
Quote:
| By nikodr on March 25 2009, 00:49
Can you tell us in what place of the rom is the scroll routine?
As i have been trying to dissasemble konami roms it would be good to know specific places of the rom where various routines are located,that way we could learn a lot from the original routines of the game.
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There is no single "scroll routine". But I'll list below some of the routines that might interest you.
All offsets are relative to the file beginning.
4845h: Scrolls the background on RAM
497Ah: Starfield scroll
77F1h: Transfer the tiles (nametable) from RAM to the VRAM
Quote:
| By wolf_ on March 25 2009, 21:25
sd_snatcher: I'd say that (obviously) tile-enemies or other moving tile-objects can cause a problem when their scroll speed isn't the same as the level.
You mentioned Salamander above, but how about ripple lasers (which iirc move non-sync with the level) ? You'd get very odd movements I bet!
|
The effect is similar to the tile-objects of Space Manbow. The movement is fast enough to make it imperceptible. Gradius-2 has a temporary power-up similar to the ripple of the Salamander, which is the "Vector". Try playing Gradius-2 with the Vector on the 3rd stage and you'll see the movement is quite satisfactory.
Quote:
| By Metalion on March 25 2009, 05:27
Could someone explain to me the principle of dynamic vsync ?
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The principle is: The vsync is automatically disabled if the game begins to get too slow and also automatically re-enabled when the game is running at the correct speed.
I believe you wanted to ask about the algorithm, which is this:
Repeat
GameLoop(); /* runs 1 game interaction */
If ( NOT ( Am_I_too_slow() ) wait_for_vsync();
While ( 1 );
"Am_I_too_slow()" is a routine that answers if the game is running slower than expected.
Quite simple, isn't it?
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| By KNM on March 29 2009, 13:42 | Can anybody upload or put some link for download the rom properly patched for those who are integral idiots,like me? I´m getting mad with the dummy file and XPC ( cannot know how to enlarge it for match sizes ) and can´t make it work on BlueMSX v2.8.Please!
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| By karloch on March 29 2009, 15:49 | Last night I had a weird dream: I was about to patch the Gradius 2 ROM file when the XPC utility patched the Basic and Disk ROM instead... Since that my MSX showed at the BASIC bootup: "MSX International Basic 4.0" (the MSX was a NMS8245). I wonder what the dream could mean, maybe I should get a little rest from work
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| By sd_snatcher on March 29 2009, 17:25 | I discovered that ExecROM has a bug that only manifests itself on MSX-DOS1. This bug causes the patch to be applied incorrectly.
So, the easier way to use the XPC patch is to boot a MSX Turbo-R with MSX-DOS2 and a megaram.
I´ll try to fix the ExecROM bug on the next weeks.
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| By Yukio on March 29 2009, 18:08 | I trough that ExecROM only worked in MSX Turbo R when using MSX-DOS2 ...
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| By karloch on March 29 2009, 19:48 | Just tried the patch on my real TurboR, the results are awesome, not only the scroll, but the new palatte. Great work!
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| By KNM on March 29 2009, 21:02 | hap : Thanks for your usefull help! Now i get a working one on my ST and it ROCKS !!!!!
Sorry for "warez" request!It won´t happen again
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| By konamiman on March 29 2009, 22:31 | Confirmed: the XPC-patched version loads fine on a real MSX (I am using an ESE-SCC cartridge) when the patched file is expanded to 256K. By the way, here is how I expanded it by using Linux (assume GRA2.ROM is the original patched file and GRA2-P.ROM is the expanded file):
dd if=/dev/zero of=pad.dat bs=1 count=130385
cat GRA2.ROM pad.dat > GRA2-P.ROM
rm pad.dat
karloch: I want to have this kind of dreams!! How do you do it??
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| By ARTRAG on March 30 2009, 00:22 | hehe!
I have a better way to pad a 128Kb rom to 256Kb
in linux
cat gradius2.rom gradius2.rom > gradius2_padded.rom
and in dos
copy /B gradius2.rom+gradius2.rom gradius2_padded.rom
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| By karloch on March 30 2009, 01:35 | @konamiman: Like I knew it... Futhermore, that's not the weirdest MSX-dream I have had, but I think it's better to stay quiet about the other ones... xD
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| By iamweasel2 on March 30 2009, 02:36 | Checking the huge amount of replies this post (and KnightLore, Alien 8, Knightmare gold's posts as well) already got, we can see how popular enhancements to classic games are. I hope we can see more and more work like the ones mentioned here in the future
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| By konamiman on March 30 2009, 11:48 | Quote:
| cat gradius2.rom gradius2.rom > gradius2_padded.rom
|
OK if the file is exactly 128K long, but the problem here is that we have a 129K file. So you end up with a 258K file.
Anyway, for sure there must be a simpler way for padding files than the one I used.
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| By ARTRAG on March 30 2009, 12:02 | No!
You have to use the original ROM that is 128Kb
The result is 256Kb
Than you have to patch that file with XPC
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| By ARTRAG on March 30 2009, 12:06 | A terrible blasphemy : sd_snatcher what about a port of Parodius or Nemesis 2 to the P1 mode of the gfx9000?
:-)
Really, having disassembled all the I/O VRAM, why not going further ?
You should patch mainly this routine
77F1h: Transfer the tiles (nametable) from RAM to the VRAM
Moreover you could disable the code for sprite multiplexing to gain CPU
(well, you could disable it even now when on msx>=2)
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| By on March 30 2009, 12:10 | Great improvement! Congratulations for the uneasy task & Thanx for sharing!
To answer your questions above:
- I think priority should be given to patching MORE games (since time is scarce as you said)
- Still, I think a SetAdjust smooth scroll for MSX2 would fully make sense if time/motivation allows it, maybe when tackling the Salamander's upscroll issues? As for the time consuming question on MSX2s: true, but who cares when running Space Manbow?
I'm not that sure at last MSXers all invested in MSX2+/TR. Some even sticked to MSX1...
We are talking about thousands of users, no more, no less, judging from this site's numbers: MSX1s and plain MSX2s might remain, statistically speaking, commonly used compared to latest generations. It's indeed hard to figure out unless a poll clearly gives statistics on the actively used machines nowadays.
Whatever you do is good enough anyway!
Sin
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| By dvik on March 30 2009, 19:49 | Just an update to blueMSX users. I confirmed the bug and fixed it. If people are interested I can release a patch with the fix next couple of days or so.
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| By ARTRAG on March 30 2009, 21:21 | That would be nice!
have you seen also the bug in borders that appears in Space Mambow on msx=>2+ ?
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| By konamiman on March 30 2009, 21:58 | dvik: Please post the patch! We will devour it!
And just one more question about patching, this one could apply to all SCC games:
In Turbo-R, the SCC sounds a lot louder than PSG; actually PSG is almost silent, which results in (for example) drumless music.
Would it be possible to patch these games so, when pressing some key at boot time, the SCC volume is decreased (or the PSG volume increased)? I remember the "Masters SCC" by Martos doing something similar.
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| By dvik on March 30 2009, 23:18 | Quote:
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have you seen also the bug in borders that appears in Space Mambow on msx=>2+ ?
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Yeah, thats fixed too. It was a bug introduced in 2.8 but I reverted back to 2.7.1.
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| By ro on March 31 2009, 10:19 | cool dvik!
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| By karloch on March 31 2009, 19:45 | The Space Mambow MSX2+ bug in blueMSX was giving me some headache. Nice to know that it was a bug that is fixed
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| By dvik on March 31 2009, 20:23 | I'm looking at a couple of other minor bugs to see if I can fix them easily. Then I hope we can release 2.8.1 within a week or so. We've done other fixes too since last year that would be nice to finally release.
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| By hap on March 31 2009, 21:42 | Ohh, activity, I may do some minifixes too then.
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| By ARTRAG on April 01 2009, 00:14 | I finished the game in OpenMsx
but it is very nice to look at yor video.
BTW
I was wandering what prevents to slow down the speed of the background starfield....
Now that the level has fine scroll, it should be possible to use the old code to scroll
the star field in parallax with the foreground.
It could add deepth to the general look of the levels
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| By dvik on April 02 2009, 19:28 | Quote:
| Ohh, activity, I may do some minifixes too then.
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Yeah I've been doing some debugging last couple of nights. Lets coordinate and decide on a possible release date.
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| By karloch on April 05 2009, 01:18 | It looks like the patch also gives invulnerability to the Metalion. How can I disable that?
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| By spl on May 14 2009, 04:30 | Can somebody upload again the IPS patch?
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