Looking for a Kabuki Den savestate (for an HES rip)

[kingshriek]

Anyone here have a emulator save state (Magic Engine preferable) at the debug area in Kabuki Den (the place where you can listen to all the PSG music in the game). I'm currently in the process of ripping an HES of it, and the way the game's music is stored on the CD is annoying. There's got to be around 100 different music banks, with many duplicates in each. It will be really tedious to go through all of them - making sure I'm not missing anything or not duplicating anything.

Having easy access to all PSG in-game would make the process much easier (I could just rip the banks from a save state instead of the iso). Hopefully, someone can help me out. I don't really feel like playing through the game again at this time (though I will if I must).

Thanks in advance.

By the way, the driver used in Kabuki Den is also used in Ziria (have a basic rip of this sitting on my hd right now*) and the first Yuna game at least. I'll be looking out for more games that use this driver. Unfortunately, Manjimaru uses a different driver - one I haven't figured out yet. It looks like Ys 4 uses the same driver as Manjimaru as well.

* doesn't work in NEZPLUG though, but I think it's because NEZPLUG sucks, not that my rip is bad. For some bizarre reason, it seems to not let me write a value past #$0A to any MPR. I don't have that problem with other players - Audio Overload, MagicEngine, etc.

[Kaminari]

If you're not in a hurry, give me a couple weeks and I'll send you a save state. I was playing at it for some private debug sessions with David Michel, but I got sidetracked along the way with Gulliver Boy and Seiya Monogatari (and my PS2, but that's another story).

I see you've been on a ripping rampage lately, this is great! First new rips in four years, I was about to contact you and thank you for the hard work. Your Xanadu 2 rip made my day I'll get to you later about this.

I've had a number of problems with NEZplug, which were (AFAICT) resolved with NEZplug+. Have you tried this plugin? Your Ziria rip works correctly with it. And the audio emulation sounds noticeably better (except for the noise channel volume which is still too loud by default).

[ParanoiaDragon]

Where can I find these rips?

[kingshriek]

If you're not in a hurry, give me a couple weeks and I'll send you a save state. I was playing at it for some private debug sessions with David Michel, but I got sidetracked along the way with Gulliver Boy and Seiya Monogatari (and my PS2, but that's another story).

Thanks for the offer, but it looks like I am going to play through the game again - I don't really have anything better to do this weekend. I just wanted to check to see if someone had one on hand that I could use.

I've had a number of problems with NEZplug, which were (AFAICT) resolved with NEZplug+. Have you tried this plugin? Your Ziria rip works correctly with it. And the audio emulation sounds noticeably better (except for the noise channel volume which is still too loud by default).

I did manage to solve the problem I was having, though not by switching to NEZplug+ (which I did do). I stupidly forgot about the "data size" field in the HES header, which NEZplug strictly follows. So basically what was happening was NEZplug was only loading a portion of my rips - no wonder I couldn't bankswitch past a certain value. I don't really see a need for such an entry in the header - wastes four perfectly good bytes when EOF could be used for the same purpose.

Where can I find these rips?

www.snesmusic.org/hoot/kingshriek

Also, if anyone can provide savestates for games while PSG music is playing (Snatcher and Gulliver Boy would be great for instance), that would be excellent. I've just about exhasted my supply of CD titles that can be ripped with relative ease. With the save state, I would be able to see if the rip is feasible. If it is, I'll find some way to get a hold of the game and rip it.

And if the game has an easily accessible sound test (like Snatcher), the rip could be made from a collection of save states (one from each track).

And just for reference - games that I'm looking into right now (these I have, no need for any savestates):

Emerald Dragon, Galaxy Fraulein Yuna 2, Puyo Puyo CD, Tengai Makyou II, Ys Book I & II, Ys IV

[ParanoiaDragon]

These rips are awesome!  I might mention, that personally, I'm looking for rips of GB Genjin 2 aka Bonk's Revenge & GB Genjin Chikun (something or other, I forget the full name).  Is there any kind of tool that someone like me can use to make them myself, or is it pretty difficult?

[Kaminari]

I could happily help you with Snatcher (my playlist has been waiting for a rip for four years!). If I understood correctly, you need a save state (memory dump) for every tune while it's playing?

[kingshriek]

These rips are awesome!  I might mention, that personally, I'm looking for rips of GB Genjin 2 aka Bonk's Revenge & GB Genjin Chikun (something or other, I forget the full name).  Is there any kind of tool that someone like me can use to make them myself, or is it pretty difficult?

Music drivers and formats vary widely from game to game, so there isn't a tool that does everything for you. What you need to know is the assembly language for the system's CPU, how to interface with the sound registers, how memory is organized, bankswitching, interrupt handling, and of course the rip format you will be going to use.

As for helpful tools, nothing beats an emulator with an integrated debugger. I use FCEUXDSP for NSF rips and BGB for GBS rips. I don't know of any PC-Engine emulator with debugging features, so in this case, a disassembler is your best friend (though a debugger would make things so much easier). Also, you'll want a hex editor to put everything together.

In conclusion, the barrier of entry is very high if you aren't used to low-level programming. As for the two games you mentioned, I'll look into them when I need to take a break from Kabuki Den.

EDIT: Okay, got around to those GB Genjin rips much sooner than I thought. I have updated my page with the rips.

I could happily help you with Snatcher (my playlist has been waiting for a rip for four years!). If I understood correctly, you need a save state (memory dump) for every tune while it's playing?

Actually, now that I think about, one should probably be enough. If all the PSG music is accessible from a sound test, assuming no loading time when accessing different tracks, then all of the music should be in the save state.

[Bonknuts]

NecO emu is a PCE debugger (there's also a DOS based PCE debugger floating around). It's not as advanced as no$gba debugger and it has a few emulation bugs, but I've found it helpful a few times.

NecO's site:
http://www.miracleworld.net/neco/

[Kaminari]

Actually, now that I think about, one should probably be enough. If all the PSG music is accessible from a sound test, assuming no loading time when accessing different tracks, then all of the music should be in the save state.

Here you go. This is a Magic Engine savestate for the Snatcher debug mode. I could try making one for Yame if you prefer, but accessing the debug mode involves using a second pad which, for some reason, I can't setup in this emulator.

If you need a complete set of savestates instead, I'll be happy to serve.

[kingshriek]

Mission complete.

Snatcher HES

Much easier than I expected. All PSG routines were located in a jump table, making things nice and convenient. The only tricky part was the timer-driven PCM.

[Kaminari]

This is official, you're my new best friend! Really, this is a great day. Thanks a lot Kingshriek.

The playlist is complete, I just need to fine-tune some loops. I'll send it to you in a couple hours.