[therourke]

These patches are wonderful because that way people can play the games with the native SNES Classic emulator (Canoe) instead of depending on Retroarch, which uses up space and also has input lag.

Yes. The dream is not needing to have SNES9x on the Classic at all.

There were tests done on input lag of Canoe versus other software:

https://forums.libretro.com/t/an-input-lag-investigation/4407/583

A SNES Classic running games through Canoe was *almost* as fast as a high end PC running SNES 9x. As close as you can get to a 'true' Nintendo experience on Nintendo hardware without buying the carts themselves.

[pimpinelephant]

http://s000.tinyupload.com/index.php?file_id=05020137751809963657

Not perfect. But should work as a cursor. Gaia. Passable given Canoe atm.



Gun Hazard. Going to run trace logs on what a soft reset does differently. But. I muffed my saves on purpose and GH still thinks they can be read (detected). And then returns to title screen when fails to load.

Could Canoe not be loading the sram save.. because of file name oddity?
"Front Mission Series - Gun Hazard (Japan).sfc" ==> "Gun Hazard (Japan).sfc"
"Kirby's Dream Land 3 (USA).sfc" ==> "Dream Land 3 (USA).sfc"
(Forgot what Japan name is, suppose saves are borked there too)



Slayers = huh. Trips snes9x crash. Woot? Considering they didn't fix this yet, joke on me? (Looking to be some evil spc timing issue)



update1:
So 1st guess as to loud pops is either very fast adsr changes, not clipping correctly overflows, or looping sound problems. Maybe sound cache being used. Not enjoying audio debugging for now but will have to build up practice.

Daffy Duck = flickers anytime? title? just in-game?

 

I just checked the SRAM file that is created when using the in-game saves, and the first 16 bytes (offsets 0x0 to 0xF) are:

2D 2D 20 47 55 4E 20 48 41 5A 41 52 44 20 2D 2D | -- GUN HAZARD --

I went ahead and checked a couple of other games' SRAM files, and the couple of games that I checked did not have the name of the game anywhere within the SRAM file. I decided to then change those first 16 bytes to [00] to see what would happen. I loaded the game up on Higan and the SRAM file was not loaded, exactly like in Canoe.

Here's the interesting part though, the SRAM file is always edited upon game boot-up. The first 16 bytes are always changed to the above mentioned values when booting up the game, whether or not you load or play any file (I only checked the Continue option and then shut down Higan). Despite the SRAM file being edited to contain the name of the game every time the game boots up, the game continued to act exactly as it does in Canoe. The game would not recognize the SRAM file until you made a new save file.

Here's where it gets really interesting though. I searched for another game that contained the name of the game within the SRAM file. Turns out that Slayers SRAM files contain just that, albeit at a different location! The values at offsets 0xD0 to 0xD7 are:

53 4C 41 59 45 52 53 A2 | SLAYERS¢

I went ahead and did the same thing with the Slayers SRAM file that I did with Front Mission - Gun Hazard, replacing those 8 bytes with [00]. As expected, the SRAM file was edited at game boot-up, as I mentioned earlier, to the hex values mentioned above. But unlike Front Mission - Gun Hazard, the game recognized and loaded the SRAM file as it normally would.

This might possibly solve why, in Canoe, the game loads the SRAM on soft resets but not on shutdown/boot-up. The game should be loading the SRAM similarly to Slayers, where even if you edit the SRAM file, booting-up the game will revert it to what it should be and therefore be able to be loaded. Unfortunately, Front Mission - Gun Hazard does not do this, it will continue to revert the SRAM to what it should be, but it will not load the SRAM, at least until you make a new in-game save.

It almost appears as if that process of editing the SRAM file upon game boot-up is what is causing the issue in Canoe, although who knows (certainly not me).
Canoe creates the SRAM file -> shutdown/boot-up game -> the game edits the SRAM file -> the game refuses to load the SRAM

I think in most cases this process is fine, as Slayers demonstrates, but in the case of Front Mission - Gun Hazard, the game will refuse to load the SRAM upon SRAM edit.

EDIT:

Alright, I did some more testing with Front Mission - Gun Hazard and its SRAM. I've been able to reproduce the Canoe soft-reset vs shutdown/boot-up issue in Higan.
I booted up the game with an in-game save file present. After booting up the game, I deleted the SRAM file from the Higan library directory. The game would simply just re-create the same SRAM file once selecting the "Continue" option or by soft resetting. I'm assuming this is the case due to the data already having been loaded and stored within the RAM(?).

I then did the same steps once again, but I instead deleted the SRAM file and completely shut down the game. A re-created SRAM was never created due to not selecting the "Continue" option. I then booted up the game, and there were no in-game save files present. This is obviously to be expected, but I wanted to make sure that it would behave exactly like in Canoe.

Now, the SRAM file is obviously not being deleted in the Classic, but at the very least, I was able to achieve the same behavior in regards to soft-resets and shutdown/boot-ups.

I'm not sure what exactly could be causing the issue, but it's possible that it might be linked to what I discussed earlier about Front Mission - Gun Hazard and Slayers. I have no clue though, so take my words with a grain of salt.

EDIT 2:

As for Kirby's Dream Land 3, the issue is a bit different. In the case of Front Mission, the SRAM isn't loaded in any circumstance, while for Dream Land 3, the SRAM is loaded normally with other preset IDs, just not with its official preset ID. I believe the general consensus with regards to Dream Land 3 is that it's a Canoe issue. It would appear that the developers (whether intentionally or not) simply disabled the SRAM feature for that specific preset ID.
DarkAkuma explains here: https://www.romhacking.net/forum/index.php?topic=25789.msg352623#msg352623

[sluffy]

Always have to check for "hidden" posts. Missed the Lemmings video.


https://www.sendspace.com/file/q4o236
Krusty's Fun House (rev0 - ue, rev1 - uej)

Game dmas past bank boundary. Wraps. Then starts probing ppu 2100+ registers. Supposed to return open bus? Actually reading goofs cgram register and points to incorrect spot. Bug gone.


Adventures of Yogi Bear, An American Tail, misc ones posted as broken or not working, more details on how far game gets on Canoe? Too generic to figure out which hotspot to start pulling apart. I can think of lots of things without specific "splash logo1, splash logo2, hangs" or "gets to title screen". Or just black.

Gun Hazard research. That's thorough method. Actually insinuates there's .. a cpu bug. But I'd have to check later.

Dream Land 3 - is there a temp file like bwram, wram, some non-sram file? SA-1 also has battery-backed ram so curious with Canoe.


Argh. Thinking. What else.


Illusion of Gaia - how far does Canoe boot this without the slowrom fix? To title screen? Enix logo? Nothing? I can't trigger this protection so madly curious what you guys are experincing.

Super Final Match Tennis - being a Human game, if you use Clock Tower or Super Fire Pro Wrestling X ids, does it get past the spu sync block?

Rock N Roll Racing - damn. That's weird. Not even sprite logo on Canoe? That's 8-bpp title background.

Rendering Ranger R2 - assume it shows splash or two then dies? Or is it just nothing?

Uniracers xpos results are .. somewhat surprising actually. Going to play with this in debugger sometime again.

Mohawk - very likely Alien 3 sprite limit problem. Screen is all sprites.
Outlander - same.

Pirates Dark Water - must check.

Soul Blazer - still no idea. Yet.
Eye of Beholder - weird as heck. Missing so many sprite tiles on Canoe pic.

ActRaiser 2 - must be some mode7 border trick. Or Canoe was too lazy to shoehorn normal method in.

Little Magic - I think someone said it has no background graphics?

Alien vs Predator - keep thinking it's some timing error with signaling. Hard to track this down.


Mmm. Must get fresh docs sheet again. Still so much to try and whittle down. But these games are abusing the hardware in odd ways. Or dancing around the waterfall edge and not dying.

[therourke]

Yup. The long wait for posts to be un "hidden" / okayed is super tedious. Confusing. Unnecessary. Hi admin

[sluffy]

Lemmings is a strange one. Fact that map has ghost flicker. Leaning towards timing issue. Freaky cursor is something new to me. Can't explain that one at all.

Daffy Duck -- think I do need a video for this. Not sure where/when it's happening.


Robin64 will come to the rescue with visual aids. Because looks like I'm stuck with harder ones now.

[FormerTree]

Krusty's Super Fun House (Rev A) tested and works. Since I apparently missed checking anything other than the main menu when I tested Illusion of Gaia yesterday, I was more thorough here...

Here's the spot from the previous screenshot:


Original ROM: CRC32 0xAC5116D9
Patch: krusty__rev1__usa-europe-japan.ips
Output ROM: CRC32 0xC7174F2D

Played through first 6 levels of first world, no palette corruption in the affected screen and no side effects.

To anyone reading, if you accidentally apply the wrong patch to the ROM, the game will not boot and you'll see a grid of off-yellow pixels on the screen. If this happens, get a clean ROM and use the correct patch.


Here's another unusual one. Final Fantasy Mystic Quest (Mystic Quest Legend in Europe) -- this game works perfectly, I've played about 45 minutes with no issues... except that the top line or two of pixels keeps flashing on and off. You don't need to move or scroll the screen, just sitting perfectly still will trigger this behaviour. It is not very noticable in the first area (the mountain area from the introduction) but it's noticable in every area after the first. It makes the game pretty difficult to play because it's really visually overwhelming.

Here's an animated GIF -- ignore that the people on the screen have moved around and just concentrate on the flicker at the top (also Robin64 you can add this to your issue list document if you want). In this GIF I've stayed perfectly still and you can see the screen flicker on the top few lines.

[reyvgm]

Lemmings is a strange one. Fact that map has ghost flicker. Leaning towards timing issue. Freaky cursor is something new to me. Can't explain that one at all.

Daffy Duck -- think I do need a video for this. Not sure where/when it's happening.


Robin64 will come to the rescue with visual aids. Because looks like I'm stuck with harder ones now.

I relayed your questions on resetera. People will answer them soon enough I assume.

Would it be within your range of abilities to make a patch to allow Super Scope games to be played with a controller? For example, titles like Battleclash and Yoshi's Safari boot, but can't be played because you need a Super Scope. Someone made a patch to be able to play Mario Paint without the mouse, so I assume a similar one could be made to play without the Super Scope.

Here's another unusual one. Final Fantasy Mystic Quest (Mystic Quest Legend in Europe) -- this game works perfectly, I've played about 45 minutes with no issues... except that the top line or two of pixels keeps flashing on and off. You don't need to move or scroll the screen, just sitting perfectly still will trigger this behaviour. It is not very noticable in the first area (the mountain area from the introduction) but it's noticable in every area after the first. It makes the game pretty difficult to play because it's really visually overwhelming.

This has been documented on the DOC for weeks now. Same issue happens in Final Fantasy 5 when you battle enemies in any desert background, and in Marvel Super Heroes in some stages. And yep, it's very annoying.

It's not an overscan issue either because otherwise it would be visible on other emulators too, but the issue never happens. Could you make a similar gif for Marvel Super Heroes and FF5 so that Sluffy can see it?

Your name is Ay-ay-ron?

[sluffy]

Thanks for requesting help.


https://www.sendspace.com/file/5ismbt
WWF WrestleMania - The Arcade Game (USA) only. Do other regions later.

Should make ring normal. Puts everything to mode1 + sprite layer adjustment. Why the heck they use mode2 (offset-per-tile) is beyond me. Feels more like a mistake and then hacking around it. Bsnes shows no gain other than more pain.

Yoshi's Island (fuzzy dizzy) and Tetris Attack are known to use opt better than this.



FFMQ sounds like IRQ. Maybe early HDMA. Or too long NMI <-- this is "common" fiend. Thanks for that gif - clearly shows the symptom.

Krusty down. And NHL + Madden are doing funny stuff (doc).


At one time, thought about adding a joypad/mouse cursor to .. Metal Combat? But it's so sprite heavy not sure it'd work. Canoe would freak out with its further sprite limits.

[reyvgm]

Thanks for requesting help.


https://www.sendspace.com/file/5ismbt
WWF WrestleMania - The Arcade Game (USA) only. Do other regions later.

Should make ring normal. Puts everything to mode1 + sprite layer adjustment. Why the heck they use mode2 (offset-per-tile) is beyond me. Feels more like a mistake and then hacking around it. Bsnes shows no gain other than more pain.

Yoshi's Island (fuzzy dizzy) and Tetris Attack are known to use opt better than this.



FFMQ sounds like IRQ. Maybe early HDMA. Or too long NMI <-- this is "common" fiend. Thanks for that gif - clearly shows the symptom.

Krusty down. And NHL + Madden are doing funny stuff (doc).


At one time, thought about adding a joypad/mouse cursor to .. Metal Combat? But it's so sprite heavy not sure it'd work. Canoe would freak out with its further sprite limits.

You don't really need to add a cursor. As long as you manage to get the Super Score to instead work with a controller that should be fine. I mean, emulators let you use your Mouse as a Super Scope. I assumed a 'hack' like that could be made for a controller.

[rhester72]

You don't really need to add a cursor. As long as you manage to get the Super Score to instead work with a controller that should be fine. I mean, emulators let you use your Mouse as a Super Scope. I assumed a 'hack' like that could be made for a controller.

Probably not, as other emulators handle that at the emulator level and feed the game the "light gun" events the game is expecting...the game itself is unmodified.  Doing it from within the game code itself would seem rather problematic.

[sluffy]

DBZHD and RR2 both suffer from spu sync issues. Would need spu rewrites. These can be messy or easy.

FFMQ on deck next.



update1:
https://www.sendspace.com/file/35qfb3

unsure if works for ffmq usa rev1/a. Very likely irq timing nuttiness. 1st try, easy method.

[pimpinelephant]

Alright, I have to retract most of what I said in my previous post. I did some more, actual thorough, testing. Basically, I'm a dumb person, and I should have done more testing instead of spouting off the first thing I saw. I have edited my previous post to reflect my idiocy.

First, in regards to the Front Mission - Gun Hazard SRAM being able to load with the use of Save States.
This one has a very simple explanation, one that I would have been able to see if I had just done some simple investigation. I extracted the Save State file(s) (Canoe creates multiple files due to it's "Rewind" feature) from the Classic and took a look at them to see if I could find anything of note. Well, I did. The Save State file contained a 8192-byte block that was, you guessed it, identical to the SRAM file. The SRAM was able to be loaded with the use of Save States simply because the SRAM data was all already contained within the Save State file.

Second, in regards to Kirby's Dream Land 3's SRAM issue.
I had never actually tested this game on Canoe, I simply just took everybody else's word for it. Well, I just tested the game on Canoe, and the SRAM saved and loaded as it normally would with no issues, at least none that I found. I shutdown/restarted the Classic to make sure, and Kirby's Dream Land 3's SRAM still continued to load without issue. The SFROM was created with DarkAkuma's SFROM Tool, and the Preset ID that the tool automatically gave to it was 10A4 (E-PAL Preset ID). It should be noted that I have not tested the game with its Preset ID set to 10A2 (E-NTSC Preset ID).
DarkAkuma explains here: https://www.romhacking.net/forum/index.php?topic=25789.msg352623#msg352623

Anyways, I did some more testing with Front Mission - Gun Hazard's SRAM. There appears to be only one difference between SRAMs created by Higan and SRAMs created by Canoe. For both, I loaded the game up, got to the splash screen, and then shut down the game without saving. I wanted to see what, if any, differences were present between both SRAM files. The answer is none. I compared both files with a hex editor, and the data matched exactly... Except for one thing.

When Canoe creates an SRAM file (for any game), it appends a 20-byte value to the end of it. I believe it's a hash value. The SRAM file, naturally, increases from 8192 bytes to 8212 bytes. It should be noted that Canoe also creates a second file. This second file is 20 bytes in size and only contains the aforementioned hash value. I'm not exactly sure what the purpose of this hash file is. Does Canoe load SRAMs based off the hash value contained within the hash file? After all, the SRAM is edited to contain the hash value (placed at the end of the SRAM file).
ROM asks to load SRAM -> Canoe loads the hash file -> hash file points to the SRAM file -> Canoe loads the SRAM file (?)

I wanted to see if this 20-byte value being added to the SRAM file would cause the game to refuse to load the SRAM, so I placed the SRAM file into my Higan library. I made the SRAM file Read-Only so that Higan wouldn't overwrite the SRAM file upon game boot-up (8212-bytes into 8192-bytes). I loaded the game, made sure the SRAM file was not changed or edited, and then selected the "Continue" option. The game still loaded the SRAM normally, even with the SRAM file containing a 20-byte value at the end of it.

This leads me to believe that the issue might be occurring during that process of "hash file -> hash value -> SRAM" that Canoe executes when loading SRAMs, if that even is the process that Canoe executes because I'm just all guesswork.
Why this conflicts with only Front Mission - Gun Hazard, I have zero clue. It could possibly have something to do with Front Mission refusing to load the SRAM if it has been edited, as I mentioned in my previous post. Or it could just be that the hash file is being loaded but the SRAM file is not. But again, this is all my own guesswork, and I am very dumb, so take everything I say with a very big grain of salt.

EDIT:

I do know that Front Mission - Gun Hazard does in-fact have a form of copy-protection. I'm not exactly sure if it's an SRAM size-check though. Could the game be checking for an SRAM size of 8192-bytes but returns an SRAM size of 8212-bytes?

[reyvgm]

Lemmings is a strange one. Fact that map has ghost flicker. Leaning towards timing issue. Freaky cursor is something new to me. Can't explain that one at all.

Daffy Duck -- think I do need a video for this. Not sure where/when it's happening.


Robin64 will come to the rescue with visual aids. Because looks like I'm stuck with harder ones now.

From resetera:

-Dennis the Menace hangs/crashes just after the first legal credits screen before the Ocean logo is supposed to show up.
-Daffy Duck The Marvin Missions has the screen flickering when you jump.
-Top Gear 2 freezes to a black screen as soon as you select 2Player game and select "Start Game" at the main menu. It does the same if you enter a password on the password screen.

[sluffy]

better tester for mystic quest. saves more time for wai. usa rev1 only.
https://www.sendspace.com/file/kzbwx6

[Robin64]

Well my capture hardware turned up, so what perfect timing, I shall throw the Mystic Quest patch at it. (Make sure to view in 720p60fps)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCHp9VMrvrU

As you can see, the top line of flicker is almost gone. It only happens a few times.

And here's Daffy Duck: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Blv2oFbvnoA

[reyvgm]

Well my capture hardware turned up, so what perfect timing, I shall throw the Mystic Quest patch at it. (Make sure to view in 720p60fps)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCHp9VMrvrU

As you can see, the top line of flicker is almost gone. It only happens a few times.

And here's Daffy Duck: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Blv2oFbvnoA

February 22, 2018, 04:20:04 pm - (Auto Merged - Double Posts are not allowed before 7 days.)Just tested Final Fantasy 5 on Higan and apparently the top-line flickering during desert battles happens there too. So I guess it's not a canoe or a translation issue, but something native to the game.

[sluffy]

Big thanks for clean and pristine videos.


https://www.sendspace.com/file/7uxq0e
Let's try this for Mystic Quest. Do irq execution myself.

[etiel]

More info on some games:

Super Final Match Tennis: Did not work with Clock Tower/Super Fire Pro Wrestling X preset ids, still black screen after Human logo. Also tried a different rom (Super Final Match Tennis (J) [f1]) and didn't work either.

Illusion of Gaia: without the slowrom fix you can see the Enix logo and the title screen and then it goes black after you press start.

Daffy Duck: as you can see in the video posted above, the screen flickers frequently (randomly?) and not only when jumping. It happens on every level.

Smash Tennis/Super Family Tennis: title, game/player/court/sets selection screens don't scale correctly. The cursor (racquet) is also misplaced.
https://i.imgur.com/62zpW85.png

[sluffy]

Right. Thanks for reminding me. Didn't notice the racquet being off-position. ^^

Eh. Most Human games rely on good spu timing. Tossed to that lower priority list.



If previous mystic quest still flickers, then this should finish it off
https://www.sendspace.com/file/qvq33n

Canoe might not be punctual about when it starts irq, reports h-blank, or in this case h-dma interference. Because 99.999% emus ignore turning screen on/off mid-scanline, I'm going to abuse it as final backup.



update1:
And tester for Marvel Super Heroes USA
https://www.sendspace.com/file/wpas1o

Similar concept to Mystic Quest. Wait for h-blank and try to turn screen on in-time before next scanline begins.



update2:
And for those who missed the ninja edit by pimpinelephant, please re-read above posts.

Kirby's Dream Land 3 sram is working. DarkAkuma's tool gives 10A4 (E-PAL Preset ID). 10A2 (E-NTSC Preset ID). Docs as of 2018-02-21 mention it doesn't work. So update please.

Gun Hazard. Very nice detective work! From what I've seen, game doesn't do sram size check. Just expects data to already be there. Didn't know it had copy protection so will look it up.
(looks like region watchdog)


update3:
Super Family Tennis = 512x448. Hi-res menu. Mmm mm.

[matt!]

Super Family Tennis (PAL) racquet is in the correct position. The top half of the hi res screen is stretched to fill the whole screen.

Super Final Match Tennis (NTSC-J)
breaks when saving options. won't boot after options have been saved. Delete save to play again.

Masters: Harukanaru Augusta 2 (NTSC-J)
Masters New: Harukanaru Augusta 3 (NTSC-J)
both have corrupt graphics in game. snes9x2005 is the only thing I can use to play these two.

World Class Rugby (PAL to NTSC patched)
Pitch colour is corrupted, white rather than green

World Class Rugby 2: Kokunai Gekitou Hen '93
OK, doesn't have the above problem. same game only with fewer, Japanese teams