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Anapan
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Re: Rom hacks worth playing?

by Anapan Thu Feb 20, 2020 6:32 pm

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Anapan
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Re: Rom hacks worth playing?

by Anapan Thu Mar 26, 2020 6:23 pm

Some guys on SMSPower forums have been converting MSX roms into SMS games.
https://www.smspower.org/forums/16445-MSXToSMSHacks
I just added a library of great games to my Game Gear's flash cart.
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Re: Rom hacks worth playing?

by Ziggy587 Thu Mar 26, 2020 8:07 pm

Anapan wrote:Some guys on SMSPower forums have been converting MSX roms into SMS games.
https://www.smspower.org/forums/16445-MSXToSMSHacks
I just added a library of great games to my Game Gear's flash cart.


Oh, that is fucking awesome! I'll have to remember to check this out when I get a chance.
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Re: Rom hacks worth playing?

by Ziggy587 Mon May 11, 2020 3:39 pm

Someone translated the FDS version of Castlevania, which may seem unnecessary, but I totally love it!

https://www.romhacking.net/translations/5543/

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Re: Rom hacks worth playing?

by Ziggy587 Fri Jul 10, 2020 7:58 am

Kirby's Dream Land for the Gameboy has been colorized for the Gameboy Color!

http://www.romhacking.net/hacks/5213/

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Other Gameboy games have been ported to the Gameboy Color, such as...

Super Mario Land: http://www.romhacking.net/hacks/4477/

Super Mario Land 2: http://www.romhacking.net/hacks/145/
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Re: Rom hacks worth playing?

by opa Fri Jul 10, 2020 8:49 pm

Thanks for the heads up. I sent the Kirby rom hack to a big Kirby fan I know.
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Re: Rom hacks worth playing?

by Ziggy587 Tue Jul 21, 2020 12:19 pm

Anapan brought this to my attention in the flash cart thread, but I wanted to also post it here because I think it's awesome!

Donkey Kong Country Uncompressed Audio MSU-1 Hack: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6qsqUJuO4o

Download links in the YouTube video description (click to expand).

So the story goes, some awesome fella was somehow able to source the uncompressed audio files for DKC and restore them. Some other awesome fella then took these uncompressed audio files and created an MSU-1 hack for them. The difference isn't immediately noticeable in some tracks, but if you A/B it then you'll realize that every track is a lot more clear. Some tracks had instrument channels that were very quiet/muted in the original version that I never noticed before, and are loud and clear in this uncompressed version! For example, there's a percussion part I never heard before in the track when you're talking to Cranky Kong (same track when you go into DK's tree house). The YouTube video doesn't even do it justice, it sounds better in person.

For those that don't know, the MSU-1 is a theoretical enhancement chip made by byuu for the SNES. It is capable of streaming CD quality audio as well as FMV. So think of it as the CD add-on for the SNES that we never got. You can play MSU-1 hacked games in the bsnes or higan emulators, or on a real SNES/SFC using an FX Pak Pro (formally known as the Sd2snes).

I think that MSU-1 audio hacks are awesome, but I don't particularly care for a lot of them. If you're curious, just search YouTube to find plenty of examples. Turtles in Time, Link to the Past, Super Mario World, and Chrono Trigger are just a few examples (there are many, many more) of games you can find with MSU-1 hacks that have the music replaced with CD quality audio. I was just talking about this in the SNES/Genesis port comparison thread regarding Hook. The game Hook on the SNES has some awesome music using the SNES' sound chip. The Sega CD version of the game had CD music ripped straight from the movie's soundtrack. This sounds awesome, but doesn't fit the game IMO.

But THIS Donkey Kong Country hack, this is a horse of a different color. This isn't just another MSU-1 hack with remixed CD quality audio. This IS the originally chip tunes, just in a higher fidelity. So if you're like me and find the MSU-1 to be an awesome possibility but tend to prefer the original chip tune music, then this hack might be right up your alley! It's the best of both worlds!

The author of this DKC hack has also done the music for DKC2 and DKC3, for anyone that's interested. I have only patched the first game so far. I did listen to some samples of the second and third game on YouTube, I have to investigate them more before trying the patches for them. DKC1 is pretty straight forward, but 2 and 3 are more complicated games. For DKC2, I noticed in Hot Head Hop that the alligators don't have reverb on them so they sound really weird. The video did mention that it has since been updated, so maybe this was fixed. But this leads me to believe that there might be other minor issues, like I said I have to investigate them more. For DKC3, I read in a YouTube comment that there's a few issues. Like Wrinkly's Save Cave only plays the normal music, but doesn't play the Super Mario 64 tune when it's suppose to. And Brother Bear Blue has really slow tempo music until you give him a present then the tempo gets really fast, this doesn't work in the MSU-1 patch. Again, maybe these things have already been fixed.

Like I said, although I think it's awesome, I'm not a huge fan of playing remixed tunes in SNES games because to me they don't fit. But this is an awesome possibility. There's a few games I'd be really curious to hear what the uncompressed audio sounds like, but these files aren't easy to come by so I wont hold my breath. I did hear of other interesting possibilities though. For example, taking the audio from an arcade board and using that in the SNES game (Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, TMNT4, Final Fight, et cetera). That could be really cool.
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Re: Rom hacks worth playing?

by Anapan Wed Jul 22, 2020 4:49 am

I really am enjoying that Kirby DX hack, I tried it on several devices and damn-near beat it on the plane. My nephew even gave it his best on my Gameboy Player a few days ago,

Regarding the restored DKC soundtrack patch. I took a look at Jammin' Sam Miller's channel, and it really looks like he's taken the SPC rips from the rom, converted them into MIDI (in tracker view), taken samples from whichever (probably mostly Roland) midi hardware had the same samples, and is remastering the track using modern mastering software (well, I prefer Fruity-Loops too, tho my friends in bands scoff).
I see no pre-recorded tracks in his videos. This is laborious reconstruction from scratch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mc_kCZEtcgE
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Re: Rom hacks worth playing?

by Ziggy587 Wed Jul 22, 2020 8:01 am

Anapan wrote:Regarding the restored DKC soundtrack patch. I took a look at Jammin' Sam Miller's channel, and it really looks like he's taken the SPC rips from the rom, converted them into MIDI (in tracker view), taken samples from whichever (probably mostly Roland) midi hardware had the same samples, and is remastering the track using modern mastering software (well, I prefer Fruity-Loops too, tho my friends in bands scoff). I see no pre-recorded tracks in his videos. This is laborious reconstruction from scratch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mc_kCZEtcgE


Ah, OK. I've read in a few comments that he's tracking down this or that sample. So then Wise used samples from Midi hardware?

Ziggy587 wrote:Like I said, although I think it's awesome, I'm not a huge fan of playing remixed tunes in SNES games because to me they don't fit. But this is an awesome possibility. There's a few games I'd be really curious to hear what the uncompressed audio sounds like, but these files aren't easy to come by so I wont hold my breath. I did hear of other interesting possibilities though. For example, taking the audio from an arcade board and using that in the SNES game (Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, TMNT4, Final Fight, et cetera). That could be really cool.


So I did find a couple of cool MSU-1 hacks.

There is a Turtles in Time MSU-1 hack that has remixed music, but there also is one that has rips form the arcade hardware. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6zCAEM1cNI

Castlevania Dracula X with music from Rondo of Blood. I posted some time ago that I thought it'd be really cool with the MSU-1 to take Dracula X and insert the CD soundtrack and cutscenes from the PCE game into it. Well, this is half of it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYELybfpKQU . I think this is awesome, but I actually rather like the soundtrack in the SNES game, I think it sounds amazing for SNES hardware compared to the CD soundtrack. I like to play both versions of the game, so it's nice to have the difference there.

Final Fight with arcade soundtrack: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJQksPCPK5w

Street Fighter II Turbo with arcade soundtrack: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuHlNCjj0EY

Mortal Kombat II with arcade soundtrack: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98qRHeUJat0

Looks like there's also MK1 and UMK3.
I'm parting with some duplicate Blu-Ray and DVD movies. Check out this thread if interested.
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Re: Rom hacks worth playing?

by Anapan Mon Jan 18, 2021 7:00 am

Saw a video previewingSonic 2 Community's cut coming out in a few days. It looks really impressive. This rom has been completely modified to play in 16x9 while still being Genesis emulation. Aside from the 4x3 special stage which they report that they are working to modify for wide screen as well. Looks like it's pretty polished at this point and just being vetted for release by community veterans.
Previously, the best way to play Sonic 2 in widescreen was through the mobile ports built on a new engine called Star Engine (previously called the retro engine) which was later used to make Sonic Mania.

Edit: Another worthwhile hack - the 1.3 version of colorized Metroid II is much better than all previous ones.

Edit2: Just as I posted this, The mobile ports of Sonic the Hedgehog 1, 2 and CD have been decompiled and then recompiled to play natively on PC:
https://github.com/Rubberduckycooly/Sonic-1-2-2013-Decompilation
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