¤ archaic ruins ¤

. an archaic crossroads site .
founded April, 1996

accesses since March 1, 1998

Contained here is our 'morgue', so to speak, of past updates. Some links may work, some may not. The purpose of providing you with this history of releases is purely for your entertainment (and so that you can bet your friends money that certain emulators are really that old).

. return to news page .

1999 . january . february . march . april . may .
1998 . january . february . march . april . may . june . july . august . september . october . november . december .

1997 . november . december .

JANUARY 30, 1999

Bulletin

¤ Stepping Back
I would like to announce that I am going to step back on maintainence of Archaic Ruins for a short period, both to give the maintainence staff some room and to work on a super-secret project (known only to Roni) to impact Archaic Ruins soon. I have promoted Roni to the position of Senior Maintainer, mainly to set him apart from the newbies coming in. We have already added two staff memebers to Archaic Ruins, and we will be adding about 5-6 more in the near future (as soon as they respond to their accpetance notes). In the meantime, I will not be dissapearing from Archaic Ruins, but I will be doing much less in the public eye and more work with Roni and his staff and also on the secret project. You'll see more of me again when the secret project is completed.

JANUARY 29, 1999

Game Boy: ¤ DBOY v0.40a released! (MS-DOS) - Download
Um... Here you are, a new version of dboy for you all. I even took the liberty of making it into a real zip archive so even the lamers can unzip it. Just remember I can't read whatever language this is (Japanese?) so don't expect a listing of whats new unless you want me to post what I see on my screen. Which isn't very helpful.
News: ¤ UltraHLE canceled!!
Well, I'm sure you all of know about this already (but just in case your a lamer :), UltraHLE the N64 emulator has been canceled, the homepage has dissappeared and I suppose Nintendo is not very happy either. But honestly, I don't care, I'm just bored and wasting time right now.
What may have been the biggest step in emulation has become what some say to be "The beginning of the end" for emulation as we know it. I'd just like to say a few things since it seems every other site also had to have their say. In the sort of "cult" status that emulation is, I do not feel that it is worth our time to worry about whether this program will ruin emulation or not. I do this for fun believe it or not and I feel that lots of us do this for fun also. So what if our only chance to play N64 games is gone already. I haven't even used the emu because I'm already sick of seeing and hearing of those games. I don't even play my shiny gold Zelda cartridge, why the hell would I waste my time emulating it? I wouldn't. I think the people who have become involved in this scene are not the same kind of people who were here in the beginning. If I was one of the programmers of UltraHLE I would be laughing right now with all the attention I would be getting over a program I was never going to make a penny off of. It's not like they tried to take your money or something, like the future Bleem program will do, (they too will be under legal problems and you better hope you do not pay for that program because it will be discontinued before you can press the send button with your credit card information ready to go). Emulation is a fun hobby no matter if your a warez kiddie or a fan of classic games. Let's not ruin what we have here by constantly pushing ourselves in the limelight and crying like babies when our new toy is taken away from us, but acting in the spirit of all hobbiests: "We don't do this to win, we do this because we enjoy it." Simply meaning, we don't need to win a fight with Nintendo or Sega or NEC or anyone. If we don't overstep our boundries like what is constantly being done, we can have our fun and they will leave us alone. So all you programmers out there, maybe you should think twice about making a Dreamcast emulator next, because these games aren't classics, they are modern games which in ten years, the emulation enthuiasts of tomorrow will consider them classic games. Do you want to ruin what could be an on-going hobby for generations?
P.S. This is my view and if you feel I have said something wrong here or just feel like arguing, do not hesitate to e-mail me. I will be more than happy to prove my point in greater detail to everyone who disagrees with my opinions here.

JANUARY 28, 1999

Nintendo 64

¤ UltraHLE released! (Win9x) - Download - Homepage
A Nintendo 64 emulator that will play commerical games--for the first time ever! UltraHLE is a Win9x emulator which needs a P2-233 and a Voodoo-class 3Dfx card (P2-300 and Voodoo² reccomended). I didn't make an AR page for this one because I'm a bit lazy, I'm tired. There will be one soon enough. For now, I put a link to the homepage to compensate.

JANUARY 26, 1999

Nintendo

¤ GrayBox v0.27 released! (MacOS) - Download
Added game speed regulation (pretty crude) ranging from 25 to 300% of actual speed.
Use F13-F15 to change it, see the Keyboard shortcuts section below.
Added ability to link the music pitch to the game speed, it amplifies the experience.
Closed project, opened source, other developers may build upon GrayBox.

JANUARY 24, 1999

Game Boy

¤ DBOY v0.40 English released! (MS-DOS) - Download
Support Super Gameboy! (thanks to zw4!)
dboy -sgb cart.gb
Add 2P Mode in Super Gameboy (2P is joystick)
dboy -2p -sgb cart.gb
Made the center have a screen.

Nintendo

¤ DarcNES v01/24/99 released! (Linux) - Download
Fixed the SMB3 status bar (this is the first fix I have tried that passed my complete regression test suite).
Fixed a problem with the (previously unused) blit_4_8_czt family of blitters in blitters.c.
Fixed the right-side scrolling problem on the SMS/GG.
Changed the SMS/GG to use the newer blitters for the sprites.
Changed the documentation somewhat.
Changed the memory allocation in cal.c to use calloc() instead of malloc() (hopefully this fixed the DOS runtime problems).

JANUARY 23, 1999

Bulletin

¤ Problems..
OK, well it seems that my site is down for a bit. Last I heard from my provider is that they were switching connection lines and companies or something. So if you have sent me mail I have some temporary suggestions for getting a reply. Send mail to j-loco@oco.net. That's my real e-mail address, so don't send me junk or I'll get pissed off. Or contact me on ICQ (#15322128) or AOL Instant Messanger as RONIv1x. Sorry if this has caused problems for anyone, I know it has caused problems for me. I will start with my normal updates again tomorrow night. I'm going to bed now.
Just for clarification on the last two sentences, this bulletin was posted at 2:00 AM. =)

¤ Explanation:
Just so the record is straight, the reason for the lack of updates here is not laziness on my or Roni's part. It is simply the lack of anything to update since we don't carry MAME or Danji.

Game Boy

¤ Boycott v0.45 released! (MS-DOS) - Download
MBC3 support (now Pokemon Blue is playable, thanks Shirley)
MBC5 support (COLOR GAMEBOY GAMES work ! ...but without any color... :)
Improve general MBC1/2/3/5 support

Master System / Game Gear

¤ BrSMS v1.16 released! (MS-DOS) - Download
Fixed the SRAM emulation. Now SMS "Phantasy Star" has 100% correct graphics, and SMS "Ys" is fully playable. GG "Shining Force 2/3" now works, but they still have some graphics bugs.
Optimized the sprite renderer (the line-by-line engine can be up to 10% faster).
Now the "-listrom" switch display a small compatibility list. If you find any error on the list, please contact me.
Support to sprite collision detection (this fixes SMS "Cheese Cat-astrophe" and GG "Green Dog").
BrSMS will always try to autodetect when it should use the new sprite collision engine. However, you can force the new engine with the option "-sprcol". You can also disable the engine with the option "-nosprcol" (this is very useful for playing SMS "Impossible Mission").
Improved the IRQ engine again, this fixes almost all the SG1000 games and also SMS "Fantasy Zone" and GG "Fantasy Zone Gear". SMS "Alex Kidd in the Lost Stars" is better than before, but isn't playable yet.
Now the SG1000 emulation uses the same TMS9928 engine from BrMSX, this means the emulation is faster (25% speed increase, 100% with MMX), and also much more accurate (all four documented video modes and lots of undocumented ones). SG1000 "Champion Golf" is now playable. You can force the SG1000 emulation with the new switch "-sg1000" (use it for games not listed under "-listrom").
Added a new option "-lpt" to select which LPT port is connected to the SNES joypad.
Increased the clock to 3.57MHz again. This clock was verified in two different brazilian Master Systems. Thanks to Flavio Morsoletto for the tests.
Fake support to I/O port 01h, now GG "Primal Rage" works. Thanks to Rami Man for the report.
In addition to all this, this release is available to the public right off instead of being withheld a week for unregistered users.

Nintendo

¤ DarcNES update released! (Linux) - Download
Startd work towards adding PC-Engine emulation
Fixed some compile errors when disabling sound in nes_psg.c
Undid the changes of 19990110 to mapper 4
Added SVGALib support
SVGALib version also has gzipped ROM support and an additional set of keys (ctrl, alt, tab, enter)
Started cleaning up some of the NES PPU stuff

TurboGrafx 16

¤ Hu6280 v1.89 released! (MS-DOS) - Download
Fixed a bug in video_status emulation, 'Davis Cup Tennis' now runs perfectly
Fixed a bug in dma emulation, this fixes explosion sprites on 'alices dream'
Added code to detect if screen resolution was changed, fixes dirty left behind graphics on 'final blaster', 'outrun' etc.

JANUARY 20, 1999
SNES '9x v1.16a

Bulletin

¤ Update lag...
Sorry I've been gone for the last few days; I've been trying to focus a lot of time on my other site and was not able to get to Archaic Ruins. Today and tomorrow I'll add all of the updates for the past four days (lucky for me, there aren't many...). Sorry about the update lag. Also, as far as the staff requests, I want to say that I am at fault for the long wait. Roni has reviewed all of them, but I have only been able to get to half of them, and this is why they are taking so long. I will get to them by this Friday. Sorry about both these waits.

Nintendo 64

¤ NSFE cancelled!
"NSFE has been put to rest. As of 1/18/99 project has been canseled.
Gordon has been working on a nother n64 emulator ( yet to be named ) that is currently in the adavanst stages."

¤ TrueReality v01/18/99 released! (Linux) - Download
I've began to implement the first RDP command (SetScissor).
I removed the complicated DEBUG_XXX stuff in the makefiles and anywhere else. Now you just can choose to compile a version with debugger or without.
Figured out VMRG.
Implemented VMRG. Could not find out what VCH, VCL and VCR do :(
Cleaned audio stuff. Audio is now choosable via command line if compiled in. The quality (sample freq) and a downsample value cannot be chosen via command line right now. For all who have ported the audio stuff (Gil Pedersen?) please have a look and send me comments.
Fixed bug in LTV.
Figured out/Implemented SRV, SPV, SUV, SHV, SFV, STV.
Figured out/Implemented LWV, SWV.
Fixed MFC2 (sign problem).
Figured out how SBV, SSV, SLV, SDV, SQV work. Have implemented them.
Fixed/implemented clean LQV.
Implemented VSUB, VABS.
first 3 always do a bit shift (>>1) in some way. Too complicated to explain here.
LTV loads one element to 8? vectors.
Implemented LUV, LHV, LFV, LTV.
Implemented VMOV (it took me just 1 minute :-) ).
LWT seems to be powerful and complicated (loads 16x16byte?).
But maybe it is not stranger than LQV (as I thought yesterday).
Fixed bug in the floating point registers (thanx to: Guenther Sohler!) (64/32 bit stuff)
Added few RDP stuff (does not work yet).
Fixed bugs in LxV and SxV instructions.

I used wrong opocode field.
The offset is signed!

Figured out what various RSP flags mean (I'm not sure about everything).
Fixed element list.
Fixed VADD instruction.
Added some dependencies in Makefile.deps.
Figured out how VEQ, VNE, VGE, VLT work.
Fixed VEQ. The COMP FLAGS (bits 7-0 of flag[0]) were reversed!
Changed RSP general purpose registers from 64bit to 32bit. It seems that there are no instructions which use the 64bit registers.
So I assume that the registers are 32bit wide.
Fixed VNE, VGE, VLT.
Removed all useless exception stuff from the RSP core.
Fixed ADD, ADDI, ADDUI, ADDU, SUB.
Fixed VAND, VNAND, VOR, VNOR, VXOR, VXNOR.
Figured out how LBV, LSV, LLV, LDV, LRV, LPV work. Have implemented them. I could not figure out LQV comleatly.
There is sthg strange.
I implemented READLINE/HISTORY support for Linux. I don't know if that works on other operating systems. You need 'ncurses' and 'readline'.
Found bug in N64/memory.c: update_vi_reg() updated the mi memory instead of vi memory. Fixed!
New directory: sound_player This dir should include all external players for audio. Currently there is just linux.c. "make player" builds "play" in linux. "play" will be in the same directory as "TrueReality". On all other platforms a message is printed.
I've modified the play prg. Now you can choose a downsample rate (0, 2, 4, 8, ...) in the source. The prg plays the file until it's end then it loops the last x sec. x can be specified in the source too. TODO: All the parameter should be given via command line!
o I've figured out that the sound files are stereo. Implemented.
I've fixed the RSP "break" instruction again. It did not stop the RSP before. Hope that "break" is clean now.
Added primitive audio support for linux. Sounds as in PUR40A.
I've written a simple audio player. Now you can compile TR to write audio into a file. Look into the source (output/audio/linux.c).
I played the first level of TombRaiderIII (The Jungle). Wow, that was very difficult! I played about 2 hours and found just 2 secrets (of 6)! I need a new graphic card!
Fixed VRCPL opcode - it should work like in PUR.
Implemented ANSI color support for color consoles.
Implemented VRCPL/VRCPH opcodes.
Implemented the following RSP opcodes:

all R4000 related opcodes
MTC0 MFC0
MTC2 MFC2 CTC2 CFC2
LWC2 (LBV, LSV, LLV, LDV, LQV) SWC2 (SBV, SSV, SLV, SDV, SQV)
VADD VSUB ... do not clip to 0x8000/0x7fff
VLT VEQ VNEQ VGE
VAND VNAND VOR VNOR VXOR VNXOR
VNOOP :-)
VMADL VMADM VMADN VMADH
VMUDL VMUDM VMUDN VMUDH
The demos are waiting for VRCPL/VRCPH.

Implemented new version of MSDOS port from Diego Rozensztejn: Boca Juniors <boca_jrs@hotmail.com>
The MSDOS display now supports the FPS counter. Great work Diego!!! Such things are just possible with FREE software!
Corrected RSP load and store stuff. LW r1, 1(r0) should work now.
The LWC2 : r31, 2003(r00) problem is more difficult than I thought. LWC2 splits into 12 LxV (Load xxx Vector) opcodes.
Fixed the RSP break instruction.
Implemented all of the vector operations. That does not mean that I've coded all of them!
Implemented the vector registers and the accumulators.
I'm working on the LxV instructions. Unfortunately I don't know the complete opcode encoding. What do the RS RD RT SA Func fields in LxV mean????
I've implemented the RSP core. All instructions - except the vectorinstr. - are implemented.
COP1 of RSP is done.
I also have hacked out a RSP disasm which is in the 'N64/rcp' dir.
I've changed the debugging/mnemonic stuff in the rsp. That should be done in the cpu core too! All of that is based on suggestions of John Jannotti.
Guenther Sohler started Linux audio implementation.
Currently all demos (which use the RSP) do "LWC2 : r31, 2003(r00)" once. Hex 2003 is out of dmem!!!???
I've added joystick support for Linux-2.1.x kernels. I do not know if it works on Linux-2.0.x.
The DIRECTORY STRUCTURE has CHANGED again. Huhhh, that was hard work.
I've implemented some I386 ASSEMPLER stuff from Guenther. It does display rendering in x11. It can also be used with svgalib and ncurses.
I've implemented SVGALIB support from Guenther. Not tested!
I've implemented NCURSES support from Guenther (it uses svga keyboard). Not tested!
I've just implemented the MSDOS PORT and played pong for a while (with a precompiled binary from Diego) in the DOS box of Win95. Unfurtunately I've no msdos compiler and so I could not test if my implementation compiles properly.

Super Nintendo

¤ SNES '9x v1.16a (with GUI) released! (MS-DOS) - Download
Fixed up the SPC dumper so that it will increment file names.
Added Kreed's new SB code to increase the bass sound.
Fixed up the problem of mode10 instead of mode9.
Added the option to disable the 'dimming' of the SNES screen.
Changed some problems in the config file. Please delete your existing config file before running this program.

TurboGrafx 16

¤ Hu6280 v1.87 released! (MS-DOS) - Download
Fixed major bug in SATB DMA transfer emulation, this fixes the following games:

'Valkyrie' - this game now runs
'Dragons Curse' - sprites are fixed

Fixed bug in VBL emulation, this fixed 'Champions forever boxing' to actually run
Fixed bug in VScroll emulation, this fixes glitches in many games, I`ll name a few i noticed:

'Final Match Tennis' - sprites aren`t fucked anymore
'Jamanoid' - topline is visible :)
'burning angels' - top line is fixed
'ballistyx' - top line is fixed
'cadash' - RCR splits are fixed
'King of Casino' - sprites are on correct line
'darius' - top line fixed
'Columns' - sprites are on correct line
'World Court Tennis' - sprites are on correct line

Basically, this fix has fixed ALOT of the minor graphic glitches, its a KEWL fix.
Spedup filename 'alpha sort' routine, now doesn`t take ages :)
oh yeah, if any games ARE glitching, try using the -notiq option, it`ll fix them (eg paranoia).
Next release of HU6280 will include the following kewl things...

16 bit screen option (for the full pc-engine 512 colour effect)
'hu6280.cnf' file that will contain your options, keys etc.
fixed timer interrupts (I`m working on it dudes...)
improved audio (I`ve discovered a bug in the audio shit, i`m working on it)

Oh, BTW, incase you are interested, the only pc-e game that doesn`t seem to run on hu6280 now is 'Davis Cup Tennis', if you discover any others, drop me some email at jamsponge@hotmail.com, Finally, the emulator is nearing completion... I can feel it in my water ;)

JANUARY 17, 1999

E-mail Address Change: ¤Roni's New E-mail Information
OK, well over the last few days I have been changing my ISP. I am no longer part of the AOL lamer universe!! Now to deal with the less e-mail addresses I have, I changed all the links to my e-mail here at AR. Everything is now being sent to my site's address. I have put a subject line into it so I don't get confused with the emails. Please do NOT take off the subject line. You may add something to it but don't take off the AR part. So, if you send me mail make sure you send it to this address now. Thank you.

JANUARY 16, 1999

Virtual Boy

¤ VBEmu98 v0.6 Beta released! (Linux/MS-DOS) - Download Linux, MS-DOS
"I decided to go ahead and release the emu (V0.6) even though I have more to do, I can't make you wait forever! Expect a new release in a few weeks..."
Cleaned up the code a bit, made it truly C compliant (I took out some C++ shortcuts, so Its more portable)
Added True 3D support, need to clean up the code a bit still, and I need to finish cuting out the Allegro code. Also some serious profiling is in order...
Added in a new menu option 'display mode' that defines what type of 3D support the display has... Also began optimizing the display a bit (It needs a lot of work).
Need to Buffer the 14 BGMaps(done), Need to add BGMap Cashing (Flag sprite and BGMap writes to Invalidate cash) (done, mostly), and make sure the 'display interupt' is always firing evin if the display is not updating(done)...(is this a problem???) Also add in a 'brightness' function for i-glass support... (brta+brtb+brtc=brtc, brta=brta, brtb=brtb)
Lots of Improvments to the display routines, fixed the OBJ's and have an Idea how to fix the BGMap scrolling bug. Still need to add Sprite Scalling, Normalize the Brightness Functions and I think Mario Tennis is writing straight to the Video Display Memory??? (Check this out!!!)

JANUARY 15, 1999

Commodore 64

¤ VICE v0.16.1 released! (Linux/MS-DOS/Win9x)
Downloads are available from AR's VICE page (linked above)
Drive changes

The content of 1581 disk images is displayed correctly now.

Unix changes

New joystick driver is included.
Fixed AIX audio header problem.
The emulator does not crash with "X Error of failed request: BadColor (invalid Colormap parameter)" anymore when a bad or old `.vicerc' file is present.

MS-DOS changes

The filter of the attach dialog has been fixed to display D64, D71 D81, G64, G41 and X64 disk image names.
Cartridge attach and snapshot write dialogs could crash emulator on certain DOS extender. This bug has been fixed.
The name of currently attached tape images is displayed again.

MS-Windows changes

Disk images can be attached to drives 9..11 too now.

Miscellaneous changes

Some bugs in T64 handling have been fixed. The image lister now displays all files, the first file found is the first in the T64 archive (and not the second), detaching tapes works now and "LOAD ERROR" should be gone.

Game Boy

¤ Virtual Gameboy v1.4 released! (MacOS) - Download
John Stiles has updated the Macintosh version of VGB to correspond with Marat's updates to many of the other ports.

Master System

¤ BrSMS v1.14 released to the public! (MS-DOS) - Download
Added a new line-by-line, which is slower but more accurate. Some new games working in the new engine are SMS "Global Gladiators", SMS "Cool Spot", SMS "Speedball 2", SMS "Xenon 2", SMS "Quartet", SMS "Ghost House", SMS "Gauntlet", GG "Ristar", GG "Robocop 3", GG "Sonic Drift 2" and more!
BrSMS always try to autodetect which video engine it should use. However, you can use the new options "-line" to force the new line-by-line engine or "-block" to force the old block-based engine.
The Z80 clock was reduced from 3.57MHz to 3.32MHz (this seems to be the correct value). This make the Z80 emulation a bit faster.
Support to zoomed sprites, used in GG "X-Men: Gamesmaster's Legacy". Thanks to Rami Markus for the report.
Now the PC speaker is turned off when the emulator exits.
Tweaked a bit the border color, now GG "Fatal Fury Special" has less flicker.
Optimized the VESA 2 modes for MMX processors. Emulation in VESA 2 modes is now twice as fast when MMX is detected.
Now BrSMS display a list of known bugs for each game in the startup.
In addition to this, BrSMS v1.15 has been released to registered users. You can become a registered user for free by filling out the registration form included in the BrSMS download.

JANUARY 14, 1999

Master System

¤ DarcNES v01/12/99 released! (Linux)
DarcNES is a Nintendo emulator that also supports the SMS. This update is here as a note; see below for the update information, download link, page link, etc.

Nintendo

¤ DarcNES v01/12/99 released! (Linux) - Download
Added the Start button for GG support (it's ']', same as on the NES).
Fixed up some CPU cores that I had neglected to modify to suit the architectural changes I have been making.
Also fixed up some code that depended on the cores operating in the older way.

Super Nintendo

¤ SNES '9x v1.16b released! (Solaris/SunOS) - Download Solaris, SunOS
This update is another SNES '9x v1.16 update, with the same things changed as all the other million ports that have been released...

JANUARY 12, 1999

GameBoy

¤ Gameboy98 v0.05c released! (Win9x) - Download

Added CGB Emulation

¤ NO$GMB v2.0c released! (MS-DOS) - Download
Visit the NO$GMB page on AR for the optimized versions.

SGB: border color 0, another fix, hopefully it's really good now (pokeblue)
controls: keypad "+" (whoosh) shouldn't mess up frameskipping anymore
controls: disabeled ability to press up+down or left+right at the same time
CGB: increased intensity of real CGB colors
bugfix: division error when loading rom into two machines (prev_eintcount)
setup: highlighted default suggested console setting
GUS: supported both IRQs set to the same value
GUS: enabled line-in (might be useful to connect a 'slave' sound card to GUS)
a22i: added ".brk" directive for source code breaks (alias for "db 40h")
a22i: reduced max errmessages to 50 (more would suck with slow 640x480 text)
a22i: moved .sym generator to ext segment, a22i-ex now available on webpage
a22i-ex: added example source code skeleton and example 'make' batch file
a22i-ex: updated a22i.txt (instruction-set description about flags, timings)
a22i-ex: added DOS errorlevel output (01=assembly failure(s), 02=disk fail)

back2dos: restores previous DOS video mode as long as it it's VGA /80xNN

¤ Virtual GameBoy v1.4 released! - Download: (Linux)-(OSF/1)-(SunOS)

CGB CPU STOP opcode implemented correctly.
CGB double speed switch implemented.
CGB HFLIP tile attribute implemented.
CGB VFLIP tile attribute fixed.
CGB DMA mode fixed.
Added Pocket Printer emulation.
Added Hudson HuC1 mapper emulation.
Started adding Hudson HuC3 mapper emulation.
Minor changes in video controller emulation.
Fixed implementation for MBC3 realtime clock.
Minor changes in GameShark emulation.
Version number fixed in VGB-Unix.
Number of palette entries corrected in VGB-Unix.
Multiple fixes to VGB-Windows startup code.
"Size|Snapshot" option in VGB-Windows.
VGB-Windows now remembers window size/position.
Added miscellaneous keyboard controls to VGB-Windows.

News

¤ The rest of my story...
OK, I never had time last night to update, I had to get up early this morning and take my friend to school (another freak blizzard and she refused to walk in it, plus, I'm a sucker for cute girls). Anyway, on to the bad part of my life. Myself and a friend were planning on getting an apartment next month but as most things go, it didn't work out that way. He got kicked out of his house Sunday and we have to move now because he has no place to stay. So, sometime next week I have to pack up all of my stuff and head on over to our new apartment. I have no money for this, (I just paid off my credit card) and it is beginning to stress me out. Luckily, I'm on good terms with my parents or else this would be worse. Now my next paycheck has to be saved so I can put down a security deposit on an apartment. So, unless Luke is back by then, things may be slow here, as far as updates, next week. There is my little insight into my personal life, hope you enjoyed it.

JANUARY 11, 1999

News: ¤ What's going on...
Just letting everyone know before I head off to work today, that updates will be late tonight. I have lots of things going on right now and I'm moving out of my parents house next week (long story) but I will still be making all the updates, I just have less time to waste on them right now. But when the actuall moving process begins, I may need to take a few days off. The computer will not be the first thing I set up, I need a bed to sleep on more than I need the internet.
More on this later...

JANUARY 9, 1999

Atari 2600

¤ z26 v1.25 released! (MS-DOS) Download - Source

Fixes an obscure problem under Windows 98 that sometimes caused the system to become "unresponsive" if z26 was launched from a shortcut that had been dragged onto the taskbar and converted into a button.

An icon. (So you can drag a shortcut onto the taskbar...)

JANUARY 8, 1999

News

¤ New Vertigo NES Pack
If anyone can tell, by my personal web site or anything else I do on the internet, the NES is my favorite thing about emulation. So, that is why I'm posting here that Verigo 2099, the famous ROM pack releasers, have thrown together another NES Pack (#53). The ROMS were all dumped by imid and donated to them for release. If you know the link to their page then go get some new NES ROMS.

Atari 2600

¤ z26 v1.24 released! (MS-DOS) Download - Source

More fiddling with frame sync. At this point it works about as well under Win98 as it did under Win95. In fact in some ways it's a little better. I can play an audio CD in the background while playing z26 with very little frame-skipping. This wasn't possible before. I don't know if this is a Win98 thing or a z26 thing though.

GameBoy

¤ Boycott v0.44b released! (MS-DOS) Download

Full Game Genie support (either 6-digit or 9-digit codes)
Faster display when both frameskip and vsync are enabled
Speed up joystick detection (200%)
Two parameters added for CGB/SGB future support
Use 320x200 mode by default even without VESA 2.0
ROM analysis improved with MBC3/MBC5/GBCamera/HuC1/HuC3 autodetect
Autodetect Color Gameboy roms
Fixes ROM banks count
Bug fixes in RLCA/RRA/RLA instructions (may fix some games)
Bug fixes while debugging CB instructions
Fix english help messages ("or")
English or french messages (choose by a parameter)
Reset FPS when enter debug mode (FPS is more accurate now in debug mode)
Presentation improved
No video initialization until ROM not loaded (better now :)

Works either in debug mode or emulator mode (same executable with Debug parameter)

JANUARY 7, 1999

News: ¤ Staff Members
Luke will be unable to update for the next few days so I will be doing all the updating here. Luke also has to show Chris Colpitts how to do some things before he starts his job here. So for all of you who wonder about this site, now you know. Also, we are still reviewing applications so please wait patiently.
GameBoy: ¤ DBOY v0.38 released! (MS-DOS) Download
I don't read Japanese, and I bet you don't either!

JANUARY 5, 1999

GameBoy

¤ NO$GMB v2.0 released! (MS-DOS) Download
Here's the short list of what's new:
CGB, various details and fixes, sound, DMA3, GUS, @@a22i, etc, etc.

¤ Virtual GameBoy v1.4 released! Download: (FreeBSD)-(Solaris)
Win9x version also available for registered users.

Master System/Game Gear

¤ BrSMS v1.13 released! (MS-DOS) Download
video cache in blitting stage (speed gain up to 200%)
support to mirror port BD (GG "Sailor Moon S")
support to VDP[0] bit 3 (SMS "Ghouls'n'Ghosts")
improved speech support (GG "Sonic and Tails 2", GG "Sailor Moon S")
rewrote IRQ engine from scratch (fixed the PAUSE button and a lot of games)
SRAM emulation (SMS "Golden Axe Warrior", SMS "Miracle Warriors")
more games have custom optimizations
added "-snespad" to enable a SNES joypad connected on LPT1
added "-truevsync" for really smooth scroll in VESA2 modes
added "-speaker" to enable sound through the PC Speaker
added Fast Forward key in the NumLock
removed "-normal", "-fast" and "-turbo" (use the FF key instead)

¤ BrSMS v1.14 released to registered users!
Here's what you unregistered users can expect in a week:

reduced Z80 clock from 3.57MHz to 3.32MHz (this seems to be the correct)

new line by line engine (SMS "Global Gladiators", "Cool Spot", "Gauntlet")

added "-line" to force the line-by-line engine

added "-block" to force the block-based engine

support to zoomed sprites (GG "X-Men")

optimized the VESA 2 video modes for MMX processors (100% speed gain)

now the speaker is turned off when the emulator exits

tweaked the border color, now GG "Fatal Fury Special" has less flicker

now brsms display the known bugs of the game at startup

JANUARY 4, 1999

Nintendo

¤ CoolNESs v0.74 released! (AmigaOS) Download
Fixes to the Squarewave and sawtooth channels
Fixed the screenheight in the prefs

Nintendo 64

¤ Nemu64 v0.008 released! (Win9x) Download
Better PI Inturrupt (more demos work)
More RSP emulation

JANUARY 3, 1999

Arcade

¤ MAME v0.34 Final added!
Download:

MS-DOS: MAME-aMAME-pMAME

Unix: xMAME

MacOS: MacMAME

Mainly, it was just boredom which made me update the MAME archives today. That and the fact that there was a freak blizzard and I can't get out of my parking lot. I don't think anyone else here is going to update those dumb Public Beta versions so, I'm just putting up v0.34 as it comes out. The MAME section, unless it gets its very own maintainer, will then not be updated until v0.35. I'm not going to bother listing what's new because there is too much and I'm not THAT bored. I'm going to play NHL '99 now.

Super Nintendo

¤ ZD-SPC v1.71 released! (Win9x) - Download
ZD-SPC is a SPC player. It plays the SPC files that you can make with ZSNES (press F1 in ZSNES).
Added tool tips to all dialogs
Fixed crashing bugs in many cases (dragging a folder to ZD-spc, pressing play without a file loaded)
Changed F1 key in main program to load Preferences
ESC now minimizes ZD-spc
Added help to all other dialogs
Some other insignificant bugs

JANUARY 2, 1999

Gameboy

¤ DBOY v0.37 released! (MS-DOS) - Download
1999, The first release
Support part of Gameboy Camera (Only moves). I am attached because it had DBOY.GIF.
Sorry, The answer of the mail can not write because English is a weak point. If permitted to be broken English, I write an answer.

¤ SMYGB v0.2 released! (Win9x) - Download

Reimplement the kernel portion
Add CGB features
Fix some sound problems
Fix some SGB problems
Fix some CPU bugs
Fix ROM support problems
Add joystick support
Can adjust program priority
Support 24 bits and 32 bits screen modes

Nintendo

¤ DarcNES v01/02/99 released! (Linux) - Download
Added (working) mapper 32 (thanks to Kritz).
Added (working) mapper 23 support.
Added mapper 15 (thanks to Kritz).
fixed infinite loop in mapper 7 code.
Added Marat's Z80 core for SMS emulation.

Nintendo 64

¤ Nemu64 v0.007a released! (Win9x) - Download

Implemented an opcode to see the title of vnes
Speed increase

Support for VI_CURRENT_LINE_REG ==> Total CRAP #1 and #2 work better than in PUR (Project UnReality) now.
started rsp emulation, but you won't see anything working yet
some other things

TurboGrafx 16

¤ Hu6280 v1.85 released! (MS-DOS) - Download
Added -mouse command line option for emulating PC Engine mouse (try Jamanoid)
Updated CPU emulation, now handles SET opcode correctly !

¤ Jamanoid v0.63 released! - Download
Jamanoid is a homebrewn TG16 game written by the author of Hu6280.

Coded up proper bat collision routine :) ** Game is now actually fun! **
Extended play area vertically, to give player more gameplay space :)
Added a second bank of code, Yes! the code grew >8k ;)
Generally sorted code out, ready for the next big routine - POWERUPS!

JANUARY 1, 1999
Happy New Year!

Arcade

¤ System 16 v0.82 released! (MS-DOS) - Download
Sound states are kept in save-game files
Supports for Ensoniq PCI soundcards
Added MOVIE RECORDING/PLAYING supports. Use F9/F11 for recording/playing.
Fixed the PCM sounds out of sync bug for OUTRUN and Space Harrier
Fixed the command line option "-rdtsc"
Added "-noleds" command line option for systems cannot work properly with the keyboard led control routines
Fixed keyboard re-define routine for emulation control keys. All control keys can be correctly re-defined now
Changed the method in switching video mode at welcome title which had caused some systems to hang or reboot even without the title appearing
Added command line option for gamma correction "-gamma #"
Added command line option for thick scanline mode "-scanlines2"
Eliminated some display glitches in switching back from UI mode
Fixed display position in Eagle horizontal mode
Both Left and Right shift keys can be re-defined as game control keys now. This works great for Time Scanner
Upgraded Tatsuyuki Satoh FM core to 0.34D
The 400x300 X-Mode display mode for vertical display games is much more compatible than before
Added a new gcs file: Atomic Point
Fixed game description input in SAVE GAME selection screen
Sounds output are turned off before entering menu
Fixed random crash of QUARTET2 after loading a game state
Supports for MS SideWinder gamepad and LPT SNESPAD. Use "-joytype 8" for MS
SideWinder and "-joytype 10" for SNESPAD
Added a new gcs file: Riot City

Atari 5200

¤ Atari800 v0.9.8 released! (MS-DOS) - Download

Nintendo

¤ DarcNES v01/01/99 released! (Linux) - Download
Added (working) mapper 68
Started working on SMS emulation
Fixed mapper 4, Crystalis no longer dumps core on the name screen

¤ NES4PC v0.30 released! (Win9x) - Download

Interface: Made a playing mode which hides the debug stuff. This mode is much faster for just playing in since windows doesn't have to update the graphics for the rest of the window too. =)
Interface: Huge optimizations! Runs 30% faster now!
Graphics: Added a new brighter palette. The old one was the iNES one, and the new one is from Nesticle. I'll be looking for better palettes in the future.
Graphics: A few optimizations to the scanline engine
Sound: Fixed a lot of errors in the looping/fading code
Sound: Fixed a lot of the scratchiness
PPU: Added detection for more than 8 sprites on the scanline.
CPU: Fixed stupid mistakes in PHP/PLP
CPU: A few addressing mode fixes.
CPU: Made a difference between a reset and a hard boot, there was no diff before
CPU: Fixed a few irq bugs
CPU: Converted 16-bit Stack Pointer (used for optimizations before) to more accurate 8-bit stack pointer
CPU: Converted CCR from 7 booleans to the actual 8-bit register
Mappers: Fixed mapper 1 (MMC1, Again!)
Mappers: Fixed mapper 4 (MMC3)
Mappers: Added mappers 9/10 (MMC2/MMC4, Same thing basically)
Mappers: Added preliminary mapper 15 (100-in-1)
Mappers: Added mapper 24 (VRC6)
Mappers: Added mapper 230 (22-in-1)

The compatibility is hugely higher than v0.25 and it's a lot faster.

Playstation

¤ PSEmu Pro v1.0.20 released! (Win9x) - Download

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