ZEROIGAR RELEASE!

[Dicer]

Well, shit...Mednafen doesn't want to run on windows 10...

Good thing I've got an SSD with Linux Mint, where it runs flawlessly, so ha ha indeed...

[EvilEvoIX]

Man I need a PCFX now.

[NightWolve]

So I used TurboRip last night and it extracted everything fine, then manually ran the patches on the ISO and it seems good.  I couldn't figure out Mednafan so I need to unbox my PC-FX to try it on legit hardware, hopefully I should have some time soon.  Unfortunately NightWolve I don't have a guest account on the machine due to domain policy. 

Cool! And that was the same computer where ImgBurn would hang on track-mode analysis ?

I think the codebase is pretty solid now and it could probably even run on Windows 95 - I'll probably test the EXE some time on my first PC, a Pentium MMX 200Mhz which I still keep around. Still have a few little tweaks to do though before I attempt a real track analysis with the Q Subcode/subchannel data stuff.

http://perfectrip.cdfreaks.com/ - This app was something I wanted to learn from, especially when I go forward to design a GUI version, but it's broken as shit on my Windows Vista. It gets stuck in an infinite message box error crash about "NTDLL.dll," etc. And when I got to the drive selection screen, it couldn't detect my CD/DVD drives. They have the right idea, but they stopped development long time ago - it's been abandoned.


And how about this, Ryphecha's last Mednafen release addressed a bug for Zeroigar!

http://mednafen.fobby.net/

PC-FX: Fixed a bug causing a graphical glitch in "Sakuraigar Mode" in "Tyoushin Heiki Zeroigar".

Was that coincidence, elmer ?? Or you asked her to look into it ??

Well, shit...Mednafen doesn't want to run on windows 10...

Try the MAGIC-ENGINE FX emulator, just to see. I think the "F1 save, F5 load" trick works when your 5 minute timer is about to run out since it's payware - that's a tip David Michel himself mentions to reset the timer and keep playing when in demo-mode.

http://www.magicengine.com/uk_download_main.html
http://www.magicengine.com/files/mefx111-demo.zip

[elmer]

I couldn't figure out Mednafan so I need to unbox my PC-FX to try it on legit hardware, hopefully I should have some time soon.

The big thing for Mednafen is that you need to put a copy of the PC-FX BIOS in your Mednafen directory as "pcfx.rom".

It should be 1MB when you uncompress it (1,048,576 bytes).

There are 2 versions that I've seen floating out there ...

"NEC PC-FX BIOS (1994)(NEC)(JP).7z"     726.38 KB
"NEC PC-FX BIOS (1994)(NEC)(JP)[a].7z"  738.13 KB

You need to get the "NEC PC-FX BIOS (1994)(NEC)(JP)[a].7z" one, the other one doesn't work with Mednafen.

After that, it's as simple as running "mednafen zeroigar.cue" from the command line ... or dragging the .cue file onto the mednafen.exe file in Windows Explorer.

If I can get a solid rip figured out and tested I'm happy to share a link with others.

I just mounted zeroigar.cue with Deamon Tools Lite and then used ImgBurn to rip a .bin/.cue image from the virtual CD.

FYI, the new zeroigar-english.bin that I just ripped is 645,393,504 bytes.

!!!Warning!!! ... If you do install Deamon Tools Lite, it also uses OpenCandy, just like ImgBurn, and so you've got to be careful to deselect the junk adware that it offers you by using the "Custom Install (advanced)" option.

If the patches complete successfully on the track 2 BIN I am assuming all is fine?

Yep ... both zero-mix and zero-patch do at least some checking on the original file as they patch the other copy of it.

They're just checking for accidental mistakes, not malicious acts, so they can be tricked if you really want to create a non-working CD!

zeroigar02.iso should be 377,487,360 bytes long, with MD5 0f8de09a7067a7edd725631351620b98

[elmer]

And how about this, Ryphecha's last Mednafen release addressed a bug for Zeroigar!

http://mednafen.fobby.net/

PC-FX: Fixed a bug causing a graphical glitch in "Sakuraigar Mode" in "Tyoushin Heiki Zeroigar".

Was that coincidence, elmer ?? Or you asked her to look into it ??

No coincidence at all! 

That's the missing "filmstrip" background in the Sakuraigar story slideshows that I reported to Rypheca, and that she kindly diagnosed and identified what the problem was.

Zeroigar is setting one of the background screens to an illegal size that real hardware is correcting, but Mednafen was rejecting and failing to display.

I fixed Zeroigar in the patch to set the proper values, and Rypheca fixed Mednafen to "correct" the value (just like the real hardware does).

That way , the patched game will work on old versions of Mednafen, and the original unpatched game will work on the new version of Mednafen. 

Try the MAGIC-ENGINE FX emulator, just to see. I think the "F1 save, F5 load" trick works when your 5 minute timer is about to run out since it's payware - that's a tip David Michel himself mentions to reset the timer and keep playing when in demo-mode.

The problem with that is that Magic-Engine FX doesn't actually emulate the PC-FX accurately enough to play Zeroigar 100% correctly.

Only Mednafen gets all the graphics and sounds correct. 

I really can't recommend Magic-Engine FX for playing this translation, especially since David is asking you to pay money for it ... and it doesn't fully work, and Mednafen is free ... and it does.

[NightWolve]

No coincidence at all! 

That's the missing "filmstrip" background in the Sakuraigar story slideshows that I reported to Rypheca, and that she kindly diagnosed and identified what the problem was.

Zeroigar is setting one of the background screens to an illegal size that real hardware is correcting, but Mednafen was rejecting and failing to display.

I fixed Zeroigar in the patch to set the proper values, and Rypheca fixed Mednafen to "correct" the value (just like the real hardware does).

That way , the patched game will work on old versions of Mednafen, and the original unpatched game with work on the new version of Mednafen. 

Oh, that's interesting. So there was a more proper way to treat an error and more correctly emulate how real NEC hardware responds to it. Gotcha!

Try the MAGIC-ENGINE FX emulator, just to see. I think the "F1 save, F5 load" trick works when your 5 minute timer is about to run out since it's payware - that's a tip David Michel himself mentions to reset the timer and keep playing when in demo-mode.

The problem with that is that Magic-Engine FX doesn't actually emulate the PC-FX accurately enough to play Zeroigar 100% correctly.

Only Mednafen gets all the graphics and sounds correct. 

I really can't recommend Magic-Engine FX for playing this translation, especially since David is asking you to pay money for it ... and it doesn't fully work, and Mednafen is free ... and it does.

Oh, well, it's what I have/use, but I didn't know it has issues with the game. 1st level looked fine to me when I played it. I guess I'll try to get it running with Mednafen if I can on my PC. But to be honest, I kinda hate command-line software and never liked Mednafen being the non-GUI oddball emulator! Hahaha! I know, I made TurboRip, but it's just cause it was easier to let Windows provide you with a DOS-emulated window than designing and controlling your own window/GUI.

I don't have a problem with someone deciding on payware though, but as Dicer can't get Mednafen to work at all, it's the only other alternative emulator I know of and he might as well try it. And yeah, there's a bypass to Michel's 5 minute timer in demo mode that he himself revealed in his forums so you can play all games fully without buying it.

He's a good guy, he helped me when I started working on TurboRip and fan translations with hardware/coding info and so forth. He has been harassed/heckled by people (as I have myself) with the free-for-me entitlement complex that believe they deserve such software for free, so I kind of sympathize.

[elmer]

No coincidence at all! 
Only Mednafen gets all the graphics and sounds correct. 

I really can't recommend Magic-Engine FX for playing this translation, especially since David is asking you to pay money for it ... and it doesn't fully work, and Mednafen is free ... and it does.

Oh, well, it's what I have/use, but I didn't know it has issues with the game. 1st level looked fine to me when I played it. I guess I'll try to get it running with Mednafen if I can on my PC. But to be honest, I kinda hate command-line software and never liked Mednafen being the non-GUI oddball emulator!

You can just drag a .cue file onto mednafen.exe in Windows Explorer ... not the friendliest of interfaces, but it avoids the command line. 

[I don't have a problem with someone deciding on payware though, but as Dicer can't get Mednafen to work at all, it's the only other alternative emulator I know of and he might as well try it. And yeah, there's a bypass to Michel's 5 minute timer in demo mode that he himself revealed in his forums so you can play all games fully without buying it.

He's a good guy, he helped me when I started working on TurboRip and fan translations with hardware/coding info and so forth. He has been harassed/heckled by people (as I have myself) with the free-for-me entitlement complex that believe they deserve such software for free, so I kind of sympathize.

The really, really, hard work done by David Michel, David Shadoff, Charles MacDonald, and a few other pioneers are how we can all get to enjoy the PCE/PC-FX emulators, translations and homebrew that are available today! 

It probably wouldn't ever have been done without them.

David Michel's generosity in providing the algorithms for his PC-FX's FMV emulation to Rypheca for use in Mednafen was incredible (you can see the credit to him in Rypheca's source code).   

I have absolutely no problem with David, or any other developer, asking for money as compensation for all their hard work.

The only problem that I have with Magic Engine FX, is that he stopped developing it years ago, even though there are some significant problems in it's emulation.

It's like he's (quite understandably) just lost interest in the PC-FX platform.

Anyway, I'll try to update my Mednafen patches to the latest 0.9.38.5 release of Mednafen today and make a new build, then perhaps Dicer can try that and see if it works on his Windows 10.

[esadajr]

I'm surprised no one mentioned MedGUI, the Mednafen frontend. At least for Zeroigar it gets the job done.

The whole emulator enchilada (x64) https://goo.gl/F9G6NE

[elmer]

Anyway, I'll try to update my Mednafen patches to the latest 0.9.38.5 release of Mednafen today and make a new build, then perhaps Dicer can try that and see if it works on his Windows 10.

OK Dicer, if you want to give Mednafen another try, I've uploaded a new build of my modified Mednafen and put the links in the original development thread ...

https://www.pcenginefx.com/forums/index.php?topic=18654.msg418740#msg418740

I'm surprised no one mentioned MedGUI, the Mednafen frontend. At least for Zeroigar it gets the job done.

Hahaha ... I'm a crusty enough old curmudgeon to object to the idea that a simple front end takes over 8MB of files, plus the entire .NET framework in order to work! 

But I guess that it's a good recommendation for those people who are more interested in actually running games, rather than in complaining about modern software development practices. 

[Aggie Tsubi]

TANGENT:

Forgive me, but I don't remember if you ever wrote about Miraculum PC-FX....

If you have played the game, what did you think of it?


BACK ON TOPIC:
When you do play Zeroigar, you have to tell us what you thought of it. I always enjoy reading your posts.

I think it is safe to say that your quality to crap ratio is unparalleled: a few excellent posts every year.

Thanks for the very kind words! You know, I'm such a lazy ass that I bought Miraculum nearly two years ago and it's still sitting at the bottom of a pile of unplayed games, whoops. Boy, it would suck if it ended up not working, haha. It's definitely on my to-play-soon list along with patched Zeroigar. And then they'll transition to the to-ramble-on-about list, haha.

I actually have played Zeroigar some before (in Japanese), but not extensively. Like others, the level-up system went completely over my head (kanji are my mortal enemies). Really liked what I've played so far, both in terms of gameplay and the cool retro-for-even-back-then cutscenes. It's gonna be awesome to understand every bit of it with the patch.

[esadajr]

I finally got a chance to play/test this last night on a Wii. While it doesn't run like a dream, I say it is playable and looks awesome via component on the CRT. The slow down is more notorious during the video playback and even there it doesn't sound that bad. The music is a bit slow, but the controls are fine even when the screen accelerates.

[Necromancer]

The problem with that is that Magic-Engine FX doesn't actually emulate the PC-FX accurately enough to play Zeroigar 100% correctly.

Unless it's since been fixed, MEFX wouldn't let me play the two minute score thingy back when we had a high score challenge thread going here.  Selecting it from the title screen just got me a blank screen.

[SamIAm]

The chief problem with MEFX is that it doesn't emulate any of the rotation effects properly. That means the second boss, the fourth boss, and the stage six mid-boss aren't drawn as they should be, and you will literally be taking hits and not be able to see what it hitting you. It's only playable if you're a maniac like me who has completely memorized the boss patterns already.

[Black Tiger]

This project motivated me to finally get a PC-FX again. I don't know how much free time I'll have to play the game, but I'll try it out as soon as my new system arrives.

[NightWolve]

I've been using ImgBurn for years, and after thinking about this today, I finally felt shamed enough to donate.

Ya know what, I said f--k it, and just donated as well! He's a great coder and I've been using it for years since switching over from Ahead Nero that I got for free when I bought a new budget DVD drive at MicroCenter. Nero is interesting, has lots of features, and it helped keep TurboRip working on Windows Vista/7/8 with their Nero ASPI DLL layer till I finally released the updated 1.40 version with this project which uses the native Microsoft SPTI layer instead (like ImgBurn!), but anyway, I grew to like the ease of ImgBurn and I feel I've always had successful burns with it.