Brainstorm Time
Hi! Thank you for everyone who provided feedback to me, either directly or though the comments on the last feedback thread. I've annotated the mentioned points, which I will later make a post pointing some of the valid concerns I received though the process.
Today I would like to hear from you what game are you the most interested to me eventually work on. Unlike other times where I added a poll with a list of games, this time I would like to every single patron make a comment with the game you're interested in getting an improvement (either SA-1, FastROM, widescreen, multi-player support, etc.) and optionally explain what's wrong, what's missing or what can be improved on said game.
Note that I didn't include Super FX because the first game which will receive an upgrade will be Star Fox, since I already started analyzing it and given it runs at 10.74 MHz, I believe it has the most potential to bring good results before going to a 21.5 MHz game.
That's all for now! Please feel free to use the comments section and in case you see a comment with a game that you're interested, make sure to like it so I'll know you're interested on it as well!
Comments (45)
Pocky and Rocky, Area 88, R-Types 3 for slowdown eliminate please.
U.N. Squadron, A Link to the Past, Final Fight.
All of these you mentioned are planned to be optimized :)
I would like zelda 3 in fast rom, the patch should be compatible with the official French translation. It would eliminate most of the slowdowns and should be easy to do.
There is a FastROM available for the USA version of Zelda 3. Although FastROM patches tend to be compatible with translations, the translation needs to be updated to use the FastROM benefits too; regardless, I have plans for an improved FastROM version of Zelda 3 for all regions :)
The Parodius games please, especially the first part.
It's a frequently asked game, I'm sure I will optimize them including the already existing SA-1 version! Probably they didn't optimize enough the game even with the 10 MHz chip
I’m also throwing my hat in for Sparkster, fired it up a couple nights ago and the end of the first level is just slowdown city
Sparkster is a pretty fast paced level. Already uses FastROM, so I think the only path is a SA-1 optimization. We'll see :)
Super V.G (Super Variable Geo) and Sparkster
Super V.G. is new for me, how does bad does it run in terms of speed?
Area 88, Magic Sword, and the Parodius trilogy please.
Area 88 and Parodius are game on my radar for the next months. How bad does Magic Sword runs, by the way?
F Zero I always thought should have been 2 player, that would be awesome
Sadly, 2 player F-Zero is not possible due of the Mode 7 limitations :( I think the only possibility of 2 player happening is either porting the game to Super FX (but I think it would ruin the gameplay due of buswidth issues) or modding the console to use 128 KB of VRAM and controlling the high VRAM bit via I/O port (it's a thing that bsnes_hd might be able to do just like widescreen games...but modding the main console might be a no-no for most people)
Widescreen for F-Zero, Mario Kart and other games based primarily on Mode 7 would be cool. Combining widescreen and HD Mode 7 would result in a nicely modernized version that's still true to it's roots. Also I hope that at least some racers are comparatively easy to mod for widescreen.
The mode 7 games has a very good chance of getting widescreen versions once SMW widescreen is out. They are not that complicate for full wide support...
My Top 3 games for eliminating slowdown: 1) R-Type 3 2) UN Squadron 3) Actraiser 2
All of these are on the radar :) UN Squadron has more chances of coming soon
I would love to see a patch for Harvest Moon. If you have more than a couple cows in your barn later in the game, it will slow to an agonizing crawl. I want to saw it drops to <5fps at its worst, which makes milking and feeding all of them a huge pain.
You know, I tried playing Harvest Moon, but I had difficulties due of language barrier, since I don't know the name of all vegetables, fruits, etc., in english and the text seemed a bit more complex to understand than the normal... I should give it an attempt again. I didn't know it had that much slowdown, do you have an example video about it? It might be an interesting game for a major experience improvement since it has 'hidden' slowdown
I'd love to see optimization and widescreen support for Flashback! Getting the cinematics and gameplay to run more smoothly would be amazing, and there are other ports out there to use for reference when making changes.
Woah, does it use the same rendering engine as Another World/Out of This World? The scenes are pretty interesting. I think optimizing the game would be a better goal, since the level screens are apparently designed to work on the standard size and expanding them would not display anything new unlike Super Mario World. But the cinematic scenes can be rendered on HD quality just like Mode 7 HD, that would be the next evolution step for bsnes_hd. I'll study the game further when I get the chance!
Personally the wide-screen support isn't something I would use as I'm mainly on CRTs and OG hardware but I would love to see turtles given the Sa1 treatment, or any games that run slow on SNES (that's most of them)
Ninja Turtles game series are planned for SA-1; although I'm currently working on SMW Widescreen, the main focus of my work will still be SA-1, so don't worry that there is a lot of cool things planned for the future :)
Multiplayer support in games that didn't originally feature it would absolutely be on top of my list. But I actually thought of something that I have no idea whether or not is even possible. Would it be possible to implement SA-1 support into the Super Game Boy to assist it will games that suffers from slowdowns? Or improve on some of the extra features of the device?
Sadly it's not possible to mix two enhancement chips together, that would require some really crazy modding. However, I think if one study the SGB hardware more deeply, I do think it might be possible to take advantage of the SGB CPU to process GB games more efficiently, but that's kind of unknown area for me. As for multiplayer support, I think TMNT is one of the most requests. I will probably try it on SMW first, since I know much more about the game and the chances of multiplayer happening (like NSMBW) being successful is much higher
I'm interested in Link to the Past getting FastROM support. It can suffer slowdown such as when firing silver arrows due to the sparkling animation particles it generates when fighting bosses like Lanmolas. It might even be something that the LttP randomizer community could benefit from. That extends to the Super Metroid + LttP combo randomizer, which uniquely incorporates both the SM and Lttp ROMs into a single ROM and changes between the two using ROM bank switching.
SM + LTTP combo is new for me, do you have any video about how it works? There's a Link to the Past FastROM patch available, but I have plans in eventually making my own version of the USA and Japan region games for the next months
TMNT IV - Turtles in Time - slowdown and flicker Also, create a real, physical SNES-CD add-on with SA-1, Super FX 2 and MSU1! I’m joking and dreaming at the same time. Parabéns pelo seu trabalho. Você é uma inspiração e espero que você brilhe cada vez mais!
Haha, valeu! TMNT está no radar. Agora SNES CD com SA-1, Super FX e MSU-1 acho que só o ikari_01 pra conseguir essa façanha
Donkey Kong Country (first game) widescreen would be amazing. Not sure how to handle the map, but I suppose not 100% of all assets would need to be widescreen?
I would need to study more about the game, but it's an interesting choice to take a look on the future!
My Top 3 to erase slowdowns: 1: Pocky and Rocky 2: UN Squadron 3: R-Type 3 kisses
UN Squadron and R-Type 3 is on the radar. For Pocky and Rocky, hmm how does it run? Do you have examples of videos containing slowdown? I never had a chance to play it before
Return of Double Dragon (Japanese Version) : Making the game go from 30fps to 60fps using FastROM or SA-1 would be great!! I think this would make wonders for this game and be an interesting and slightly different project. Thanks!!
I would like to try the entire series! Too bad normally you have to do the disassembly work of every single game in separate, but Return of Double Dragon will be my first pick for the future :)
F-Zero widescreen and multi-player support. Wide screen would really open up the tracks as I've experienced with bsnes-hd, but hopefully without the visual artifacts. Multi-player support is sorely lacking in this game and the ability to implement it would be a big deal.
Widescreen support is planned once SMW widescreen is out. Sadly, I think multiplayer support will only be possible on the widescreen version (no real hardware compatibility) or using the UltraNET, since you can't really have mode 7 split screen like Super Mario Kart due of the way F-Zero works internally
I'd like to see Donkey Kong Country 3 get the treatment. There's a couple spots with slowdown. Also, any game with widescreen support
DKC3 would be a great challenge for a SA-1 port. Would be amazing to see it on the future. I have added it to my to do list :)
You've already hit my big wants (i.e. Super R-Type, Gradius 3, Castlevania4, and Axelay). My next tier wants would be Final Fight (remove all slow down at a minimum, then try to increase the number of characters on screen and as a stretch goal, add 2 player and all 3 selectable characters in one game (a tall ask, I know)), Secret of Mana (remove all slow down), and Link to the Past (remove slow down). Another suggestion would be to look at 7th Saga. The game is more or less fine as it is, but the Mode 7 overworld to battle scaling/rotation effect is super choppy and getting that running like similar effects in Final Fantasy 4/6 and F-Zero would be pretty nice.
Do you have some video examples of 7th Saga for understanding how bad it runs? All other games you mentioned I have plans for doing them, but I got curious about 7th Saga since it's a game that I didn't have the opportunity to play it yet...
Panel De Pon (need more puzzle games getting speed hacks) - lots of frame drops in vs mode or whenever lots of bricks are on screen. Super Dr. Mario & Tetris - not much noticeable slowdown, but Dr Mario is the greatest game ever made after all.
A SA-1 version would allow Panel De Pon get up to 499X speed, haha! (Joking, actually I can get up to 999X!) Dr Mario is new for me, will take a look on how it plays when I get the chance