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luigiblood · 9 months

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Some thoughts about Nintendo Switch Online retro games since last time

This is essentially going to be not much of a post but I guess I could talk about a few things about its future since with all the updates that we got since last time.

We'll talk about UI code, Pokémon, NES, Fire Emblem and N64.

UI code upgrade

Literally the next day since my last post about it, on March 16th, Nintendo added new NES, SNES and GB titles. Under the hood, they did do a massive change to the user interface programming, bringing pretty much every NSO app to the latest user interface codebase that GB and GBA NSO had.

That said it brings absolutely no visible changes, NERD has just made sure to bring everything up-to-date. This is just more stable and probably easier to program and manage UI code.

Pokémon Stadium 1 & 2

On April 12th, Nintendo released Pokémon Stadium to NSO + Expansion Pack, and with no Transfer Pak support.

Of course, what did I even expect since there's no old mainline Pokémon titles yet (if ever?).

My opinion about Pokémon on NSO is that it will get stuck to only spinoffs. My worst case realistic scenario (aside from no rerelease) is Pokémon Company selling the old gens at $15 piecemeal (yes, $5 more than on 3DS Virtual Console).

Personally I expect Pokémon Company to be very strict about Pokémon management, and those games are highly abusable with glitches, honestly and are kind of region locked, too to some extent especially between japanese and international players, but they still bothered to rerelease them and supporting them with a way to transfer your Pokémons out of the games. It's also abusable if you supported the Transfer Pak in Pokémon Stadium titles since they also work like extra boxes for your Pokémons and those support save states, which was explicitly removed out of the 3DS Virtual Console release...

They did also release Pokémon Stadium 2 this week, also without Transfer Pak support.

I did look at the emulator really quick and did find that they added new functions for Lua script hacking for the games, and it does kinda look like they rebuilt the entire thing from a new version at least.

I'll speak more about N64 emulation later.

Mystery Tower

Fast forwarding a bit, on June 6th, Nintendo added more NES, SNES and GB titles. One of them was Mystery Tower by Namco.

This bothered me, because I knew what this game was, but the title did absolutely not sound right. Turns out this title is actually brand new, they had this title in their collection, the original title was "BABEL" which is interesting since this means it is a first case of title change hacks on NSO. That said I did eventually find out that Japan also had a title change to "The Tower of Babel", which was also done in collections, but also the Wii U Virtual Console release!

Anyway please try this puzzle game, just keep in mind the direction and how you can turn around stuff based on how you face it.

Fire Emblem

On June 23rd, Nintendo released Fire Emblem for the GBA NSO app. But Japan also had Fire Emblem: The Binding Blade, the actual first GBA Fire Emblem title, as we only started to get these games since the second GBA title.

I'll refer to them as FE6 (The Binding Blade) and FE7 (Fire Emblem) from now on.

This update was interesting for a couple reasons.

It just so happens that the japanese version of FE7 can link to FE6's completed save files to unlock a couple things in the game.

So now, when you go into multiplayer, after the first player selects FE7, the second player is allowed to select either FE7, or FE6 for "Link Cleared Save Data" (official english text). Another player can simply share their save files to another player.

This also means that the GBA app now has the ability to load different games for each player depending on the choice of the first player who serves as the host.

(This screenshot is me messing around with the functionality.)

However this is not the only noteworthy thing to happen, because it wouldn't feel fair for a single player to not being able to transfer their own FE6 saves to FE7. Well, they did actually implement a hack for single player too!

They actually reimplemented the linking process inside the emulator just to avoid emulating a second GBA for it, and it would seamlessly transfer the save data just fine.

If you're wondering about what it unlocks, a quick read made me figure out that it skips Lyn's story, and add new scenes to the epilogue and other small additions as well. Those new epilogue scenes are available in the US version by default, but not in the EU versions for some reason. They can also be accessed in the JP version without a save transfer by finishing the game 9 to 11 times (what the heck).

This functionality working as it is really cool, honestly, and it makes a process less painful to do like it was back then, and it did make me feel confident in the transfer of data between games like with Golden Sun & Golden Sun: The Lost Age or the Zelda Oracle games... speaking of...

The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages/Seasons

Those two games ended up randomly coming at the end of July this year. They are known for being two parts of a fuller story if you link each of them from whatever order you start them with.

And that's where my disappointment came in to remind me of the terrible reality that is Nintendo Switch Online.

It is doable for two players to share their save files to each other through multiplayer, but if you wanna do the games yourself on your own in single player, you'll have to input the password you get from the other game.

That is kinda sad considering it's the first player who selects the save file from the other player, it could have been very easy to setup in a way that's easy to use without needing to implement any specific user interface, but that didn't quite happen.

I hope they'll bother for Golden Sun considering the tiers of password this game can have with Golden Sun: The Lost Age, but I am starting to think if the game does offer a way to transfer without needing any additional work, they wouldn't do it. In the case of Fire Emblem, this way of save transfer was the only way to do it.

I did not mention much about this, but Oracle of Ages/Seasons are also known for having exclusive content if you play those games on a Game Boy Advance. After looking into it though, it does not seem like we're missing much, but it's kinda sad that they're not really in their most definitive way to play them.

Pokémon Trading Card Game

Two weeks after those last two games, Pokémon Trading Card Game and Pokémon Stadium 2 were released.

The cool thing about this game, is that they emulated the infrared communications.

At least, Card Pop does work, for sure, which does require emulation of the IR communcation... or does it?

Upon a quick inspection of the emulator code, I found out that the emulator does indeed patch the game ROM's functions, and thanks to the disassembled Pokémon Trading Card Game offering me a lot of information, I found out that they absolutely don't emulate the IR communications at all and outright replace the IR functions to point to a invalid 0xDD opcode (opcodes are small commands that CPU executes)... which probably points to a function in the emulator to specifically manage this. Ain't that funny? In any case though, they do at least let all IR communications work just fine, and that's what matters.

(For the nerds who wants to look this up, the emulator keeps SHA1 hashes of the ROM you can easily search for, then points to a struct of 100 bytes original to compare, 100 bytes to patch, address, size, and something else I don't get.)

I ended up looking this up as someone pointed me to this video:

youtube

It turns out in the original game, one of the cards, the Phantom Venusaur, is impossible to obtain due to a mistake in the calculations of the odds, on which this video explains very well in detail.

This is the reason that motivated me to look at how the emulator might patch the game, and see if they fixed this issue: They did not fix this problem, I see no patch for any of the relevant code for this.

So, NERD, if you're reading this, look at 06:5D92, you can definitely fix this in one way or another.

N64 emulation

So... the Pokémon Stadium 2 release at least updated the emulator in some way, because they added new functions for the Lua scripting for N64 game hacks, and some of the UI engine stuff got shuffled around.

Then I tried some of the games, to see if some things got fixed:

F-Zero X did NOT get its framerate drop fixed.

Goldeneye's Dam level has texture tiling fixed. Interesting.

Since I noticed this last thing, it was pointed to Graslu00 who knows the game in and out and already compared the emulation of the game on NSO and Xbox... to a disappointing degree.

Here's his thread about the fixes... or rather the lack of: https://twitter.com/Graslu00/status/1688994099477528576

The update did also some additional fixes to Pokémon Stadium 1, though I don't really know much about it other than it relates to rendering and soft reset in some way.

Unfortunately the N64 emulator is still not up to snuff, but I think the most annoying thing is still the controls. The default controls suck, let us change them in the emulator, per game! Offer also better stick emulation!

It still pains me to rely on the Switch OS remap feature, it's not good for this, it messes too much with some of the macros, it sucks!

It annoys me when I see the text "Change Control Method" in the emulator files too, you guys clearly thought about it! Why isn't it a feature after months with nothing?

Future releases

There's still a couple N64 games left that were explicitly announced for 2023, such as 1080° Snowboarding, Excitebike 64 and Mario Party 3.

That said Japan also had plans for release of Harvest Moon 64 (which I see no reason why we can't get it now that Harvest Moon SNES got released since), but also Goldeneye 007, on which Japan has it on the highest age rating (CERO Z).

Considering how the plans are going and how lazy everything is (sorry devs, I'm sure you guys know already, but most of the results of this just don't impress me and don't fill me with confidence aside from GB/GBA somehow), I just think N64 NSO will randomly get a 18+ rating and put every N64 game under parental control bullshit out of nowhere with no warning for Japan.

Also, where's the alternate languages for NES and SNES games?

#nintendo switch online

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reaverzine · 10 months

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HOW GOOD IS YOUR MEMORY?

If you owned a memory card for your Nintendo 64 chances are you had a Performance, a sub-brand of InterAct Accessories, Memory Card, as seen above. These are one of the most common third party memory cards made for the n64.

InterAct Accessories made dozens of types and styles of memory cards for the Nintendo 64. Their 'tall' Performance Memory Card being the most common when it came to a Nintendo 64 owner needing a memory card, or Controller Pak as Nintendo marketed their own.

Performance n64 Memory Cards often boasted larger storage capacities than the official Nintendo Controller Paks, allowing players to store more game saves and data. Performance Memory Cards offered up to 1 megabit (128 kilobytes) or even 4 megabits (512 kilobytes) of storage and more, namely in their 'Plus', 'Mega', and 'Massive' branded memory cards.

In addition to increased storage capacity, some Performance Memory Cards included additional features like built-in cheats or the ability to transfer saves between different memory cards. These features offered convenience and expanded functionality to n64 players.

It's important to note that while Performance Memory Cards offered benefits such as increased storage and additional features, their compatibility with all n64 games was not guaranteed. Some games might not recognize or work properly with third-party memory cards, leading to potential compatibility issues. It was advisable for players to check the compatibility of Performance Memory Cards with specific games before purchasing or using them.

Performance Nintendo 64 Memory Cards were a popular choice among n64 players who desired more storage capacity or extra features beyond what the standard Nintendo Controller Paks offered.

#Nintendo #64 #Nintendo 64 #Retro Gaming #Games #Console #n64 #Performance #Memory Card #reaverzine

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flowergirlmiwa · 6 months

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games I wish I had when I was a kid!

Yu-Gi-Oh The Eternal Duelist Soul

This was one of the best selling games on the GBA, but I got Dark Duel Stories on GBC instead. Eventually I got 7 Trials to Glory, a mixed bag of a game I nonetheless hold dear to my heart, but I wish I had EDS as a kid. EDS is the perfect game to be the first YGO game on GBA. The spelltraps are massive blowouts, caveman Yu-Gi-Oh is in full effect, and the cardpool is both small and nostalgic. EDS (or the original Japanese release) was the first video game that actually tried to follow the rules of the real world OCG/TCG card game and it did a pretty good job along with a clean presentation, great music and flavorful decks to grind against. Plus the packs you pull from are mostly based on real Japanese card sets! Basically I admire a lot about what this game did in 2002 and in a potential world where I got it alongside my GBA SP in 2003 I would have been set for years. Instead I got... Dark Duel Stories in late 2003 around the time I got my GBA SP, and that game is .. not as worth investing time into. Oh yeah and it has a cute calendar system with weekly matches at the duel shop and oooo it's just such a cute game!

Goldeneye 007

I didn't have a lot of N64 games as a kid, but out of all my regrets on the console, I easily missed out the most not owning Goldeneye. Now I can appreciate it as basically the Super Mario 64 of first person shooters and imagine that, even though I only owned one controller, those levels would have kept me coming back again and again obsessively for hours. I can just imagine how I would have organically find the island on Dam by myself and wondered what was out there. I never had that chance

Super Smash Bros Melee

Throughout the early 00s I had various nostalgic experiences playing the original Super Smash Bros, and eventually I craved very dearly to play it's sequel. Literally all I could tell you is that it had (Scott the Woz voice) "a freaky STORY MODE! now that's cool!" and you could play as Bowser. It looked so damn cool but I didn't have a GameCube. I would have dreams about playing this game I knew very little about. I actually can guarantee I read about the Sonic and tails in melee rumor before I had seen more than an hours worth of gameplay in my life (all through playing demos in 2002).

When did I actually get a GameCube? 2007. I actually remember visiting Nintendo World NY in 2006 right before release of the Wii and playing Melee on one of their demo kiosks (and wind waker for the first time ever, notably). I got my hands on a GameCube in summer 2007 thanks to a friend of my dad's and pretty much the first thing I did was go to the still surviving Hollywood Video in The City and rent melee. Now considering I was 12 the first time I got to extensively play melee and really enjoy it, you could say I was still a child and that's true. I wish I somehow had a GameCube around 2004 and got to play it then though. Look, things felt different in my life then, it wasn't the same kind of feeling to me. By the time I got to play it I didn't really have that childish exuberance and excitement. Plus I got a Wii that same year for Christmas so my overall excitement for the GameCube was muted lol.

The Simpsons: Hit and Run

I would have gobbled this up as a kid even if not the biggest fan of the simps, if I had gotten this at release for PS2 I could imagine I would have spent many hours playing it

Pokemon Stadium 2

As a kid I desperately wished I had this game and rented it a bunch of times. When I discovered you could emulate N64 I spent most of my time doing so playing this game. I eventually got my own real copy around 2019 but considering I would leave the first game on for days on end I would have loved to have had stadium 2 as a kid. Plus it actually has single player content and provides plenty to people without use of a transfer pak too! I was fascinated by the updates as a kid renting the game

#my post #might do more someday if I think of more

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legiongamerrd · 1 month

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#Gamefemerides

Hace 23 años, se lanzó Pokémon Stadium 2. Es un juego de estrategia RPG por turnos publicado por Nintendo para el Nintendo 64, y desarrollado por Hal Labs. Contiene a todos los 251 Pokemon de las Generaciones I y II. En Occidente fue titulado así por el segundo Stadium en lanzarse fuera de Japón, el cual era el 3ro de la serie. Soporta Dolby Surround.

Como sus predecesores, es compatible con el Transfer Pak, permitiendo a los jugadores usar a sus Pokémon entrenados en los juegos de Game Boy y Game Boy Color.

#LegionGamerRD #ElGamingnosune #Videojuegos #Gaming #RetroGaming #RetroGamer #CulturaGaming #CulturaGamer #GamingHistory #HistoriaGaming #GamerDominicano #GamingPodcast #Podcast #HalLabs #PokemonStadium2 #Pokemon #PokemonGS #PokemonRBY #Nintendo #Nintendo64 #N64 #GameBoy #GBC #RPG #Multijugador

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#Instagram

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altcntrlmp · 4 months

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Classic N64 Controller

youtube

The Nintendo 64 controller is the standard game controller for the Nintendo 64 home video game console. Manufactured and released by Nintendo, it is the successor to the Super Nintendo controller and is designed in an "M" shape and features 10 buttons, one analog "Control Stick" and a directional pad. It had many extensions, such as a: Controller Pak, Rumble Pak, Jumper Pak, Expansion Pak and Transfer Pak.

#Youtube

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developermiral · 2 years

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Perfect dark gameboy color

#Perfect dark gameboy color full#

The reader can understand it without the "however". "Criticism, however, was levelled at the game's difficult gameplay due to the lack of health and ammunition, and distinct lack of strategy overall." - "however" is not needed and could be seen as going against WP:WORDS."At the time, Rare had the Game Boy team split into two, one for the Game Boy Color version of Donkey Kong Country and the other for Perfect Dark." - Might need to be ".Rare had its' 'Game Boy team split into two."."Objectives can range from rescuing hostages to exploring areas and recovering items, such as keycards, explosives or laptop computers which are useful to hack into electronic devices." might need to be cleaned up.Reviewer: Cptnono ( talk) 06:56, 23 March 2011 (UTC) Reply The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review. This review is transcluded from Talk:Perfect Dark (Game Boy Color)/GA1. Thank you.īetacommandBot ( talk) 14:49, 8 March 2008 (UTC) Reply When does it take place? If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to ensure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. If used in conjunction with the N64 Transfer Pak, the game could be used to unlock four cheat modes in N64 Perfect Dark - All Weapons, Claoking Device, Hurricane Fists and R-Tracker.Image:Perfect Dark GBC Box Art.jpg is being used on this article. The game made use of many of the features of the hardware. A two player deathmatch mode made use of the link cable, unlockable stickers could be printed using the Game Boy printer or traded with other players via the infra-red port and the cartridge had a built-in rumble feature. The game encouraged stealth over action in keeping with the N64 game. The game was played mostly from an isometric top-down perspective but included a variety of other game types such as a vertically scrolling driving section, a first-person sniping section and a number of different boss fight stages.

#Perfect dark gameboy color full#

Perfect Dark on the Game Boy Color was set in the year leading up to the start of the N64 game, covering her final test and graduation to full service as a Carrington Institute operative and her first mission. This game also has a built-in rumble feature. However, at certain points in the game you'll be placed in a through-the-eyes perspective as well. The game itself doesn't utilize a first-person perspective for the action - instead, Perfect Dark GBC features a pseudo-overhead viewpoint, much like what Konami did with Metal Gear: Ghost Babel and what Rebellion did with Mission: Impossible. The game features full motion video cutscenes that unfold the storyline for the gamer. These missions revolve around the destruction of illegal cyborg manufacturing facilities. In this edition, Agent Dark must complete seven huge missions that involve weapon play as well as puzzle solving. Like the Nintendo 64 game, Perfect Dark for Game Boy Color follows the exploits of secret agent Joanna Dark. OverviewPerfect Dark is a video game for the Game Boy Color developed by Rare and released in 2000.

#Perfect dark gameboy color

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jtgunner · 2 years

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Nintendo Direct Thoughts

I'm off work! I get to watch the Direct now! (Writing these live as I watch it.)

New Fire Emblem looks good. Still need to finish Three Houses lmao.

It Takes Two on Switch, huh? Neat! Wish I could play it, but I have no one to play with.

Xenoblade 3 DLC? I still need to finish Xenoblade 2!

Fitness Boxing Fist of the North Star? Lmao. That's unexpected!

Tunic on Switch? That's a game I'd like to play.

A Wonderful Life remake? I remember renting that game for GameCube!

Oh god, I have to get Splatoon 3…

Octopath Traveler II? I still need to finish the first one! (Notice a recurring theme, here?)

I hope the new Mario + Rabbids game is good like the original!

Wow! A bunch of N64 classics seem to be returning! I'm LMAOing at Mario Party 1 getting included, when that game was never included in the Wii or Wii U Virtual Console (supposedly because of the minigames that require rotating the control sticks.)

Also LOLing at the Pokemon Stadium games coming to NSO because of the little blurb at the bottom saying that the Pokemon can't be transferred. Like I know there's no way to do it, but the Transfer Pak compatibility was the key feature for those games!

Lmao! Goldeneye 64! The return of the console FPS king! See kids, before Halo and Call of Duty, this was the console FPS game you played with friends.

Pauline and Diddy Kong in Mario Strikers? I was hoping Pauline would appear in more Mario spinoffs!

Looking forward to that Mario Kart 8 DLC!

Oh wow, Pikmin 4! It's been years since I played Pikmin. I've only played the first game, though.

Wow, there's a lot of games with farming in this Direct.

Bayonetta 3!

Sifu on Switch? Neat! I still need to get this game… But not on Switch (it's looking a little rough on Switch.)

Radiant Silvergun reminded me of Ikaruga, so I looked it up. Apparently Ikaruga is a spiritual successor to Radiant Silvergun!

Tales of Symphonia is one game I've meant to play, so I'll have to check out the remastered version!

Ooh boy! Kirby's Return to Dream Land Deluxe! More Kirby games!

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom! So that's what BOTW2 is called! Can't wait!

Also no new Star Fox or F-Zero.

#Nintendo Direct

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