FPGA Based Videogame System

[AtariNerd]

Thanks so much, I'll give that a try when I get home. Pretty sure that's one of the arrangements I tried. Looks like I might have some game roms. issue. (EDIT: Yep, Fixed.)

 

Always willing to ask the obvious questions, others fear to ask.

 

EDIT: And I thank you again,

Edited April 7, 2019 by AtariNerd

[vanfanel]

How do you get Colecovision SGM games to work on Mega Sg jailbreak?

 

edit: Select Cores, Colecovision, press Start button, Core Options, click Use SGM.

Have you tried Penguin Adventure conversion to Colecovision SGM? Does it work for you?

[killersquirel]

 

I dunno man. Here's what I played. Maybe try it out and see if any difference.

 

This version works on both the Mega SG jailbreak and Mega Everdrive X7. It's odd that the rom that I had refused to work on those systems, but worked on the MiSTer. I didn't try this rom on the MiSTer yet, but it should work there too. Thanks for posting it.

[+grips03]

Have you tried Penguin Adventure conversion to Colecovision SGM? Does it work for you?

I don't own that game. In general CV SGM games work fine.

[copy]

I spent some time trying to dial in perfectly centered 1080p 4x settings (5x for Game Gear). Here are my results. I would be interested if anyone has arrived at the same or different numbers:

Genesis

 

x320 Width: 1360 (square pixels)
x256 Width: 1243 (true 4:3) [Mega Sg 4:3 preset is incorrect]
Horizontal Position: 21 *
Height: 960 (4.0x)
Vertical Position: 50
Disable H Interpolation 320x: checked
Disable H Interpolation 256x: unchecked
Disable V Interpolation: checked

* The horizontal position setting is shared between the 320 and 256 modes and produces different results in each. 21 does not perfectly center either mode, but it is a compromise setting that brings both fairly close.

(Would it be possible to add separate horizontal position settings for each mode to the firmware?)

Master System and ColecoVision

Width: 1170 (4:3)
Horizontal Position: 19
Height: 960 (4.0x)
Vertical Position: 54
Disable H Interpolation: unchecked
Disable V Interpolation: checked

Game Gear

 

Width: 960 (true 4:3) [Mega Sg 4:3 preset is incorrect]
Horizontal Position: 6
Height: 720 (5.0x)
Vertical Position: 45
Disable H Interpolation: checked
Disable V Interpolation: checked

Edited April 7, 2019 by copy

[bikerspade]

So I have a few things to report. First, I got my new SMS adapter today and it is working as it should, so we can put that issue to bed. However, I'm seeing odd behavior with Wonder Boy III FM. First, I'll start by saying that the hack in the Smokemonster pack works fine played through the jailbreak. Finally! I still cannot get the same ROM to work in any configuration on my Nt Mini though, so I'm stumped as to what the issue there is. Has anyone been able to get FM sound to work for Wonder Boy III on the Mini?

 

With that said, I then tried to get it to work with my cart, but no matter what I do I can't get it to work with the cartridge. I tried all 4 of the BIOS files that I transferred over from my Nt Mini pack, but none work. In fact, I don't see any difference at all. When you load the different BIOS files on the Mini the startup behavior changes for some of them. Can anyone else confirm this behavior? Lastly, maybe I just have this whole thing wrong (since I had spent a lot of time and had a few different modders look at the FM mod on my SMS which wouldn't work for Wonder Boy III either), but is it not possible to get FM sound from a US Wonder Boy III cart? From what I remember reading it is, but I can't get it to work on my modded SMS, nor can I get it to work on the Mega Sg. All that said though, I was finally able to find a way to get it (ROM hack through the Mega Sg jailbreak), but it seems odd to me and I'd still like to get it working on my actual SMS at some point.

I was never able to get the FM sound to work for that game on the NT Mini jailbreak. I tried all sorts of permutations of enabling/disabling FM sound, Export, etc. If you ever get it working, please let me know.

[+grips03]

If you plug in the M30 controller dongle why does the Mega Sg reboot?

[mario64]

Has anyone had luck getting Pier Solar (the genuine cartridge) to run when connected to a Sega CD model 1? I know enhanced CD soundtrack won't work but I can't even get the game to load. It briefly shows the "ignore Sega license" message then the screen goes solid red and just sits there. If I disconnect the Sega CD it will load correctly. Why would simply having SCD connected break the game? Any ideas?

[CZroe]

Has anyone had luck getting Pier Solar (the genuine cartridge) to run when connected to a Sega CD model 1? I know enhanced CD soundtrack won't work but I can't even get the game to load. It briefly shows the "ignore Sega license" message then the screen goes solid red and just sits there. If I disconnect the Sega CD it will load correctly. Why would simply having SCD connected break the game? Any ideas?

Have you tried cleaning the “piano contacts” with an eraser? Both Sega CD manuals tell you to do that. Heck, my Sega CD 2 manual tells you in no less than three different places! They also had a secondary cap over the contacts on the Genesis. You wouldn’t expect a covered and often disused connector to have that much of a problem. Never the less, it seems that this was a real issue if you didn’t clean it and it must be a bigger issue these days. Edited April 8, 2019 by CZroe

[mario64]

Have you tried cleaning the “piano contacts” with an eraser? Both Sega CD manuals tells you to do that. Heck, my Sega CD 2 manual tells you in no less than three different places! They also had a secondary cap over the contacts on the Genesis. You wouldn’t expect a covered and often disused connector to have that much of a problem. Never the less, it seems that this was a real issue if you didn’t clean it and it must be a bigger issue these days.

Thanks for the suggestion. The Sega CD works fine with other games so I don’t think dirty contacts would be the culprit. It’s just Pier Solar that is giving me issues - only when the SCD is connected

[Andromeda Stardust]

IIRC, most games run at about 17% slower on the PAL 50Hz video standard. Just watch a playthrough of Sonic on a PAL Mega Drive and it will look like it's running in a slow motion mode, complete with slow music too.

 

There were some games which took this slowdown into consideration and adjusted the original game for PAL 50Hz, so that it would match the speed of the NTSC counterpart. Codemasters did this with Micro Machines, so if you play the PAL-optimized version on an NTSC system then it's going to be 17% faster than it should run.

 

There may be more to it than this. I'm just going off of memory here from when I used to download MD roms from a German BBS in the early 90's.

what about psycho pinball? That's also a PAL exclusive cart I own. Plays great on my model 1 @60hz.

[spoonman]

what about psycho pinball? That's also a PAL exclusive cart I own. Plays great on my model 1 @60hz.

Right, only some of the PAL relesees were optimized for 50Hz. Most run slow on PAL and regular speed on NTSC.

There may be a list of PAL optimized games somewhere.

[Andromeda Stardust]

Right, only some of the PAL relesees were optimized for 50Hz. Most run slow on PAL and regular speed on NTSC.

There may be a list of PAL optimized games somewhere.

Some games just play fine either way too. Psycho Pinball might be one of them.

 

For instance, Mario Bros "Classic Serie", the obscure 1993 Scandinavian enhanced rerelease of Mario Bros. I have played it on my AVS at both 60Hz and 50Hz. Pitch is slightly sharp at 60Hz, but the game runs at a speed that is comfortable either way.

 

Now the PAL 3-in-1 Super Mario Bros / Tetris / World Cup feels like Mario on steroids at 60Hz. Physics are sped up just enough to screw with my muscle memory. A lot of pirate multicarts randomly include the PAL variant of Super Mario for whatever reason.

[Cosmic Owl]

 

There were definitely some audio fixes in 4.3, but I haven't heard of any additional audio fixes that are coming soon:

https://support.analogue.co/hc/en-us/articles/360024836892-Mega-Sg-Firmware-Update-v4-3

 

SmokeMonster mentioned in a stream about revamped audio settings coming in a future update, but unfortunately I don't remember exactly which stream it was or I would try to find you a link. I'm not sure where he got his information from though and it is very possible that the update he was referring to was the 4.3 update.

[Guspaz]

Wouldn't the simple solution to having the CD audio input be enabled by default be an "auto" option that has a threshold that's just above the noise floor? Enable passthrough on a per-sample basis if the signal goes above the noise floor, have some hysteresis to keep it enabled long enough to not shut off while anything else is playing.

[Kaide]

Wouldn't the simple solution to having the CD audio input be enabled by default be an "auto" option that has a threshold that's just above the noise floor? Enable passthrough on a per-sample basis if the signal goes above the noise floor, have some hysteresis to keep it enabled long enough to not shut off while anything else is playing.

 

 

The idea is generally sound. I've yet to find a good implementation of it, but most of them are done in the analog domain. Doing it after the ADC might be more reliable, but in general I think the question is: how reliable is the noise floor, in practice? And is it possible to reliably detect the signal without introducing a delay before it "clicks" on? Generally the places I've seen it used fall down on the latter more than the former.

Edited April 8, 2019 by Kaide

[Nigoli]

SmokeMonster mentioned in a stream about revamped audio settings coming in a future update, but unfortunately I don't remember exactly which stream it was or I would try to find you a link. I'm not sure where he got his information from though and it is very possible that the update he was referring to was the 4.3 update.

That was what I was referring to. His stream was when the Mega Sg released which was before 4.3 and the jb released.

 

 

I still think the audio is going to be tweaked either way for the next firmware. Revamp or not. I'm glad I mentioned about Greatest Heavyheights if that one was a problem with the audio. It's only with that one part of the music too. The rest of the game doesn't have any other BGM that's like that.

[derFunkenstein]

 

Sorry to keep bringing this up but can someone else please test this on their own Mega Sg to see if this appears to be an issue?

So I was half-listening to the My Life in Gaming stream they had with Kevtris last night over the course of this morning and he said towards the end that hybrid scanlines are on his list. The way they work at 720p is how they're supposed to work across the board. I'll be interested in seeing an update for 1080p

 

Regarding 4.3 audio, I feel like I was able to tweak 4.3 to get really close to a good model 1. My settings are in the video and to me they're pretty darn similar.

Edited April 8, 2019 by derFunkenstein

[Andromeda Stardust]

 

The idea is generally sound. I've yet to find a good implementation of it, but most of them are done in the analog domain. Doing it after the ADC might be more reliable, but in general I think the question is: how reliable is the noise floor, in practice? And is it possible to reliably detect the signal without introducing a delay before it "clicks" on? Generally the places I've seen it used fall down on the latter more than the former.

I had a speaker system once that was full volume all the time (adjust sound with the pc volume instead of independant controls) and I wanted to listen quietly enough that I could sleep to it. Well the audio output from the soundcard wad below the standby threshold so it cut off automatically.

 

I've also seen stndby chips malfunction. My fince's sound system cuts off after 30 minutes of inactivity. Somehow the sensor malfunctioned an it will shut off after 30 minutes weather music is playing or not. Workaround, disable the standby cutoff.

[SegaSnatcher]

So I was half-listening to the My Life in Gaming stream they had with Kevtris last night over the course of this morning and he said towards the end that hybrid scanlines are on his list. The way they work at 720p is how they're supposed to work across the board. I'll be interested in seeing an update for 1080p

 

Regarding 4.3 audio, I feel like I was able to tweak 4.3 to get really close to a good model 1. My settings are in the video and to me they're pretty darn similar.

 

Oh thats you? I'm the guy who told you about the other settings in the comment section. I still think your LPF roll off is way too strong. The amount of high end that is getting filtered by your roll off setting of 20 is pretty obvious when you compare it to your VA6 Model 1. If your goal was to match your VA6 much more accurately than you should at least start from 10 and work your way down. 3400 cutoff with 6 roll off is gonna get you closer. You should do a video with my settings I posted in your other video and see how close it gets.

 

 

Edited April 9, 2019 by SegaSnatcher

[Atariboy]

Was reading some old posts of mine just now as I was looking for something, and came across this gem from several years ago.

 

"FPGA's place in the classic gaming world probably won't go past hobbyist and homebrewers."

 

Not one of my better predictions.

[StrangerInUsAll]

Does this on the Super Nt too. Looks like they both share the same simulated scanlines and it’s broken on both.

It's fixed as soon as you set height to 719 instead of 720 (in 720p), scanlines then look very good, BVM-style! The same bug is in both the SuperNT and MegaSG firmware.

[derFunkenstein]

Oh thats you? I'm the guy who told you about the other settings in the comment section. I still think your LPF roll off is way too strong. The amount of high end that is getting filtered by your roll off setting of 20 is pretty obvious when you compare it to your VA6 Model 1. If your goal was to match your VA6 much more accurately than you should at least start from 10 and work your way down. 3400 cutoff with 6 roll off is gonna get you closer. You should do a video with my settings I posted in your other video and see how close it gets.

 

 

Well what you posted made a big difference. Im to the point where my ears cant hear any subtleties between the two. Im sure its not exact yet but I got to where I didnt feel the need to keep fiddling. So for that I thank you!

[Enragedwhale]

Oh thats you? I'm the guy who told you about the other settings in the comment section. I still think your LPF roll off is way too strong. The amount of high end that is getting filtered by your roll off setting of 20 is pretty obvious when you compare it to your VA6 Model 1. If your goal was to match your VA6 much more accurately than you should at least start from 10 and work your way down. 3400 cutoff with 6 roll off is gonna get you closer. You should do a video with my settings I posted in your other video and see how close it gets.

 

 

Mind posting up your settings SegaSnatcher?

 

Couldnt find them in the comments of either video.

 

Cheers!

[derFunkenstein]

Mind posting up your settings SegaSnatcher?

 

Couldnt find them in the comments of either video.

 

Cheers!

That's my fault, I took down the videos from firmware 4.2 where he posted them.

 

I'm sure that there are differences between what I have and what my VA6 does, but I've got 20 years of live music on my ears, so I've probably got some hearing loss.