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Joe Blade NTSC version?


Wilheim

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I made an attempt at NTSC-fixing and converting the original CAS to an XEX:

 

attachicon.gifjoe-blade-ntsc-fix.xex

 

Changes:

  • Move long immediate VBLANK routine into deferred routine
  • Insure proper initialization of DLIs when switching from bomb screen to main screen
  • Disable BASIC

Code:

 

attachicon.gifjoe-blade-ntsc-fix.zip

Thank you! I can see it works!

 

I have an issue. For some reason, in that XEX the foes stop walking when Joe jumps when running on NTSC, but they still walk on PAL. What's the reason of this?

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I made an attempt at NTSC-fixing and converting the original CAS to an XEX:

 

attachicon.gifjoe-blade-ntsc-fix.xex

 

Changes:

  • Move long immediate VBLANK routine into deferred routine
  • Insure proper initialization of DLIs when switching from bomb screen to main screen
  • Disable BASIC

Code:

 

attachicon.gifjoe-blade-ntsc-fix.zip

 

Nice!

 

Possible to apply a similar fix to Joe Blade II?

Looks like the issue may be the similar...

Edited by MrFish
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Does the countdown timer need slowing down?

 

The check seems odd even for PAL, which I would have thought would be $32 (50), so should NTSC be set to $3C (60)?

436C: 48                PHA
436D: 98                TYA
436E: 48                PHA
436F: 8A                TXA
4370: 48                PHA
4371: A5 14             LDA RTCLOK+2
4373: C9 34             CMP #$34
4375: D0 0F             BNE $4386
4377: A9 00             LDA #$00
4379: 85 14             STA RTCLOK+2
437B: AD 8E 2E          LDA $2E8E
437E: F0 0E             BEQ $438E
4380: CE 8E 2E          DEC $2E8E
4383: 20 61 43          JSR $4361
4386: 68        L4386   PLA
4387: AA                TAX
4388: 68                PLA
4389: A8                TAY
438A: 68                PLA
438B: 4C 5F E4          JMP SYSVBV
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I wished the "subgames" in Joe Blade and Joe Blade II were not there. In my opinion both games would play much better without them. But I am unsure if they can be easily removed or if the games are unplayable/unfinishable then (but if they can be removed and both games can still be finished, it would be great if someone would remove these subgames - all of them; or set a certain value somewhere, so the program thinks the subgames have been solved successfully)...

Edited by CharlieChaplin
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Revised some of the characters for the stencil font (mainly M, N, W) -- and fixed a few punctuation problems from the original stencil font.

 

Also included here is a version of the 3-bit font that's slightly shorter. This type of font generally looks better proportionally for NTSC because of the vertical stretching compared to PAL systems (your mileage may vary).

 

Joe Blade (NTSC, Font).xex

 

Joe Blade (NTSC, Font Short).xex

Edited by MrFish
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Thank you so much for all your effort! By my side, I finally found an NTSC version that was distributed in my country. For some reason, the game title was changed to "RAMBO" BLADE. Anyway, here's attached as a tiny contribution.

 

The speed of the enemies is faster in the first part of this version than in the original game (and Xuel's NTSC version). I'm not sure how the rest of the game compares, as I didn't play through much of this version yet.

Edited by MrFish
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The speed of the enemies is faster in the first part of this version than in the original game (and Xuel's NTSC version). I'm not sure how the rest of the game compares, as I didn't play through much of this version yet.

 

Yeah I noticed that too. The reason is that Rambo Blade replaces the LDA VCOUNT / BNE with LDA VCOUNT / BEQ which effectively gets rid of the frame syncing altogether. This means if you run on a 65816 at a higher frequency (e.g. 21MHz), then the enemies are super fast.

 

Other than that difference, it's interesting that Rambo Blade uses a similar NTSC-fixing strategy to the one I employed with Joe Blade II, i.e. just swap the immediate and deferred vertical blank routines instead of moving both into deferred as I did with Joe Blade.

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Yeah I noticed that too. The reason is that Rambo Blade replaces the LDA VCOUNT / BNE with LDA VCOUNT / BEQ which effectively gets rid of the frame syncing altogether. This means if you run on a 65816 at a higher frequency (e.g. 21MHz), then the enemies are super fast.

 

It doesn't seem to have any visible negative impacts that I've seen so far.

 

I wonder if the same could be done to help out Joe Blade II, because it's noticeably slower in comparison and could use a slight speedup.

Edited by MrFish
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  • 1 year later...

Tried Joe Blade 1 and 2 NTSC fixed tonight. Using a NTSC 600XL with 64k. First one works but as you get into the game there are glitches. Like doors or other objects on the wall are missing colors. Joe blade 2 wouldn’t even start. Original XEX runs but graphics glitch out of course.

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