Since IPS does not handle expansion of ROMs, just in-place replacement patching, the author needed something for users of his patches to easily expand Japanese ROM files before applying his patches when he needed to expand his games.

DvD had previously created a program that would expand specific games created by DvD Translations, King Mike Translations, Stardust Crusaders, and The Wolf’s Den called NES ROM Expander that they included with their translations.

Not wanting to constantly have to update this program and sensing that others might want to port this to other platforms, DvD decided to define a generic ROM patching standard and create an open source program that would implement this in the Windows environment. All romhackers need to do is make a simple text file which tells the program how to expand their game the way they want and include this text file in the zip with their IPS patch.

Features:

• Copy bytes with the option of replacing any bytes during the copy
• Fill bytes with the option of replacing any bytes during the fill
• Automatically modify, add or remove headers
• Confirm the proper size of the original ROM file
• Application is single file, no extra software, dlls, readme’s etc. needed
• Open source. Anyone who wants to port it, the VB6 source is available on our site, no questions asked
• Program is self contained with two help files, a simple one for users, and a detailed one for hackers who want to make new script files.
• New in version 11.11.29: Optional MD5 checksum let’s the user know if they are using the proper ROM file. It doesn’t care if the header is bad as it is designed to replace the header anyway.
• New features for version 12.8.12: ROM Expander Pro.txt file can be DOS, Mac, or Unix formatted colors and text added to HowTo section to more clearly show how the sample file works
• Also, two ports of REP now exist. These are especially useful for non DOS platforms such as Macs or Unix machines.