48 replies to this topic

[jaycee900]

Still can't get this to run, gets to the rom selector and pick a game and it just returns to minimenu with zipped and unzipped roms, I haven't even had hotfix 3 installed yet so can't be that, used all scaling settings and still no luck...

[SteveM]

Still can't get this to run, gets to the rom selector and pick a game and it just returns to minimenu with zipped and unzipped roms, I haven't even had hotfix 3 installed yet so can't be that, used all scaling settings and still no luck...

I suspect this has something to do with spaces in file names. The Dega package handles spaces fine, but the op_runfbapp utility handles its arguments differently since HF3, so if you have spaces in the name (or the directories in the path) it may not work. I haven't found a practical way to cater for both situations in one PND.

Easiest thing would be to install HF3. Otherwise try removing the spaces in the ROM's file name and path. If it still won't work, have a look in /tmp/pndrundega.out for clues.

[notaz]

I suspect this has something to do with spaces in file names. The Dega package handles spaces fine, but the op_runfbapp utility handles its arguments differently since HF3, so if you have spaces in the name (or the directories in the path) it may not work. I haven't found a practical way to cater for both situations in one PND.

I recommend including op_runfbapp from HF3 in the pnd itself and running it from there, it's just ~6KB anyway.

[jaycee900]

Still can't get this to run, gets to the rom selector and pick a game and it just returns to minimenu with zipped and unzipped roms, I haven't even had hotfix 3 installed yet so can't be that, used all scaling settings and still no luck...

I suspect this has something to do with spaces in file names. The Dega package handles spaces fine, but the op_runfbapp utility handles its arguments differently since HF3, so if you have spaces in the name (or the directories in the path) it may not work. I haven't found a practical way to cater for both situations in one PND.

Easiest thing would be to install HF3. Otherwise try removing the spaces in the ROM's file name and path. If it still won't work, have a look in /tmp/pndrundega.out for clues.

Hi, thanks installed HF3 and works like a charm!

[Jourdy288]

left trigger to quit, dude
piece of cake

Sonic reference FTW!

?_?

-God Ginrai

Piece of Cake...

[God Ginrai]

left trigger to quit, dude
piece of cake

Sonic reference FTW!

?_?

-God Ginrai

Piece of Cake...

That is a very common phrase, I don't see how you could call that a Sonic reference.

-God Ginrai

[Alerino]

yeah, actually i didn't have Sonic in mind... in fact this is news to me

[SteveM]

Short story: New version uploaded which is able to run Castle of Illusion for the Game Gear.

Long story: It would appear that there are several Game Gear games weren't really Game Gear ports, but repackaged Master System games. The Game Gear is able to play Master System games by means of emulation (which is how the Master Gear adapter worked) but this behaviour is hard-wired into the cartridge and therefore not possible to detect from the ROM image alone. Thankfully, the list of games which used this technique it isn't all that long:

• Castle Of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse(USA, Europe)
  
• Excellent Dizzy Collection (Europe)
  
• Fantastic Dizzy (Europe)
  
• Mickey Mouse no Castle Illusion (Japan)
  
• Olympic Gold (Europe) (En,Fr,De,Es,It,Nl,Pt,Sv) (v1.1)
  
• Olympic Gold (Japan, USA) (En,Fr,De,Es,It,Nl,Pt,Sv)
  
• Out Run Europa (USA, Europe)
  
• Predator 2 (USA, Europe)
  
• Prince of Persia (USA, Europe) (Beta)
  
• Prince of Persia (USA, Europe)
  
• R.C. Grand Prix (USA, Europe)
  
• Rastan Saga (Japan)
  
• Super Kick Off (Japan)
  
• Taito Chase H.Q. (Japan)
  
• WWF Wrestlemania Steel Cage Challenge (Europe)

What I've done is add a bit of code which reads a list of MD5 checksums from a file and forces the emulator into SMS mode if any of the entries match the current game. At the moment, however, the file only contains three MD5s for the different versions of Caste of Illustion I had lying around. If you have one of these games and want to add it to the list, issue the following command in a terminal:

md5sum rom_file_name.gg >> /media/YOUR_SD_LABEL/pandora/appdata/ggsms

Note that this must be done with an unzipped ROM as the MD5 is checked after unzipping so that the inevitable differences between zip archives created with different software are ignored. The ROM can be zipped up again after taking its MD5. If it works, please post the relevant line of the ggsms file so it can be added to the default list supplied in the PND.

Even longer story: I completely forgot about the op_runfbapp problem which I intended to fix in this release. If anyone has old (i.e. pre-HF3) firmware, I'd appreciate an MD5 of /usr/bin/op_runfbapp so I can check for this at runtime and support both old and new versions.

[NickLoTurco]

I know for a fact that games on this run faster than they used to, on mine anyway. I can tell from the in-game music! Does anybody else have this problem?

[SteveM]

It's not just the difference between 50 and 60Hz?

[TitanUranus]

I know for a fact that games on this run faster than they used to, on mine anyway. I can tell from the in-game music! Does anybody else have this problem?

Try downloading and running the european version of the rom.

[Prometheus]

Wasn't the Master System region-free, though? I know that running European Master System games on a Game Gear (of any region, but in my case British ) resulted in them running at 60Hz, so I'm not too sure there are many (if any) Europe-specific Master System ROMs...

[SteveM]

Try downloading and running the european version of the rom.

You could, but I'm pretty sure it's still run at 60 FPS.

I could add a 50 Hz option, but is that really what anyone wants? The games were intended to run at 60 FPS; us poor unfortunate folks in PAL territories had to make do with 50 FPS and the squashed image that came with it.

Wasn't the Master System region-free, though? I know that running European Master System games on a Game Gear (of any region, but in my case British ) resulted in them running at 60Hz, so I'm not too sure there are many (if any) Europe-specific Master System ROMs...

Yeah, there's no region protection and AFAIK there weren't any PAL-specific games like they had for the C64. The Game Gear was of course not subject to the constraints of a 50Hz TV system and could play everything at full whack.

[TitanUranus]

Try downloading and running the european version of the rom.

You could, but I'm pretty sure it's still run at 60 FPS.

I could add a 50 Hz option, but is that really what anyone wants? The games were intended to run at 60 FPS; us poor unfortunate folks in PAL territories had to make do with 50 FPS and the squashed image that came with it.

Wasn't the Master System region-free, though? I know that running European Master System games on a Game Gear (of any region, but in my case British ) resulted in them running at 60Hz, so I'm not too sure there are many (if any) Europe-specific Master System ROMs...

Yeah, there's no region protection and AFAIK there weren't any PAL-specific games like they had for the C64. The Game Gear was of course not subject to the constraints of a 50Hz TV system and could play everything at full whack.

I've never really thought about this before (still havent thought much about it!) - and I'm about to go off at a tangent here, but I have the PAL gamegear TV converter. Surely it must be running at 50Hz to show UK TV, and I doubt they changed the CPU frequency just for that, so wasn't the UK GG actually just set to run at 50Hz anyway?

[Prometheus]

I don't know about the TV Tuner, but the PAL Game Gear was definitely not 50Hz. They were the same wherever you were, as far as I know.