K2_VIDEO Unit Exposed

My new best friend, NeoTurfMasta, over at NeoGeoFanClub.com recently released some pictures of the insides of his K2_VIDEO unit. This machine was used to allow Neo Geo Pocket developers (and perhaps reviewers) to play NGPC games on a TV or video capture device. Here's a direct link to his post about the SNK K2_VIDEO NGP to TV adapter.

What's more is that Turfmasta has been using this hardware to create some nice video captures of Neo Geo Pocket Color games. This is excellent, because it gives you an idea of how the stuff runs on actual hardware without having a video taken by a camera of someone playing a NGPC (like I would do). To me, though, it's much more than that. It excites me to know that hardware like this has made its way into the hands of regular (non-SNK) people. I really appreciate that Turfmasta has gone out of his way to share his collection through the pictures and videos that he's providing. I wish more collectors would follow his lead and show us some other cool NGPC development or prototype hardware/software.

I'm working with Turfmasta a bit to try to get the BIOS of the K2_VIDEO unit dumped. I don't really know if it will ultimately produce anything amazing, but I fell that it's important to share this sort of thing. If we can get it into the capable hands of people like Judge and Flubba, perhaps they can find some hidden gems in there. Otherwise, I still feel that it's important to archive such things for historical and nostalgia purposes.

Oh, did you want this post to be CFC2English related? Okay. There's a video clip Turfmasta made by video capturing CFC2English running on his K2_VIDEO unit. Thanks again to the NeoGeoFanClub guys: Turfmasta, NeoBomberman, and rarehero.

GP2X Wiz Emulation

The GP2X Wiz has arrived. You can check out my GP2X Wiz review over at Play-Asia-Rulez if you like. Basically, it's a smaller, lighter, cooler, and faster GP2X.

As you can see, I have been working on bringing the NGPC emulator to the Wiz. The video shows the Neo Geo Pocket Color emulator running on the GP2X Wiz. Of course, I had to play some SNK Vs. Capcom CFC2 on it. I still need to tweak some things (like stretching the screen size), but it really does work well. Check out the Wiz if you're looking for a new toy to run all kinds of emulators and homebrew games.

In other NGPC news Thor released a great new homebrew game called Gears Of Fate. I highly recommend that you try it, and, if you have a way to try it on the actual NGPC, do it. It's an amazing bit of technical achievement. If you can't run it on hardware, try NeoPop or check out this video of Gears Of Fate on the Neo Geo Pocket Color.

Nice Interview

This is just a brief note. There hasn't been anything noteworthy going on with the CFC2 translation lately, and I haven't been working on any other interesting projects. Real life is where it's at for the time being, I guess.

I did want to mention an article that I just read, though. It's an interview with Clyde Mandelin, AKA Tomato, who did the fan translation of Mother 3 (GBA). In it, he describes some of what goes into a translation, which is just like what I went through with this CFC2 translation. Give it a read. If you're here, I'd assume you'd find it interesting.

Gamasutra interview with, Mother 3 translator, Clyde Mandelin

Here's an excerpt.

"There are basically two major parts of a ROM translation, whether it's for the SNES or any other system: the hacking part and the translating part," he explains. "First, the hacker has to locate the game's font and produce what's called a table. Using this, the hacker can then start to locate the text data."

"Once it's been found and figured out, the hacker can then dump the Japanese text to a file. The translator then takes this file and translates it. The translator usually just types the translated text using something like Notepad, but for really big projects, the hacker might create a custom program to make it easier on the translator."

Have I Become A Real Blogger? Does Play-Asia Actually Rule?

Yeah, yeah, I know. This isn't really CFC2/NGPC related news. I'm not sure it's even news, but I thought that there's a chance that some of you might care.

Well, there it is. Apparently, Play-Asia Rulez. It's not so much a statement as it is a link to a new blog that posts about cool games/products (that in general happen to be available for purchase at Play-Asia). You might find tips/tricks, reviews, discussions, etc.

The reason that I'm posting about this here (and the reason that it is at all relevant to this blog) is that I am one of the contributors at http://play-asia-rulez.blogspot.com/. In fact, I have the distinction of being the author of the first post on the blog which is an article about the game "Delta Warp" for the NGPC. If you care, you can find that Delta Warp article here.

So, let me know (either as a comment to this post or one of my Play Asia Rulez posts) what you think about it. If you have any suggestions for future articles, let me know. I'm sure that there will be a Cardfighters post there sometime in the future.

Emulation News

This isn't strictly CFC2English-specific, but there is some news about new developments in NGPC emulation that I thought I should mention.

First of all, a guy called FluBBa has been working on a new NGPC emulator that runs on the GBA. That's right, Neo Geo Pocket on the GameBoy Advance. My hope is that he will use the same emulation engine and build a version for the Nintendo DS. Based on what I know about the design of his emulator, I think it has a good chance to run near full speed on the DS. FluBBa's site (with downloads of his emulators) can be found at http://www.ndsretro.com/.

During development of his emulator, FluBBa noticed that certain games check a (previously thought to be unused) bit in the input status byte. Basically, there's a byte (8 bits) in the NGPC that contains the status of all the inputs. On a normal NGPC, there are 7 inputs (up, down, left, right, A, B, and Option). That leaves one bit unused. It seems that it's not totally unused after all. This bit seems to be the "D" button for debugging. Perhaps it is included as an input on the development hardware.

I made a quick hack to RACE! so that I could test this find. I tested it with several games, but I only found 3 that seemed to respond when I hit the "D" button. These games are Card Fighters' Clash, Card Fighters' Clash 2, and Dokodemo Mahjong. So, this news does relate to CFC2English. At the right, you should see a screenshot of CFC2English running the debug menu (which pops up when the "D" button is pressed). http://www.insertcredit.com/ also has a post about this find which has a link to download screenshots of all 3 games' debug features.

Speaking of RACE!, there is a new version of RACE! for the PSP. A guy named Akop (AKA Uberjack) has continued the RACE! project. He is known for porting emulators to the PSP. Here is his blog post about the release. Here is the link to download RACE! PSP. This new version has a nicer menu system among other user interface improvements. I don't plan to compete with Uberjack for RACE! updates. My current feeling is that Uberjack's version of RACE! is the official PSP version. If things (like the "D" button) need to be added to RACE!, they should show up in his version. At this time, I don't plan to release new versions of RACE! on my own.

It's Been a While

Well, it's been a while since the release. I haven't heard much for complaints, which I assume is good. In my experience, if people are quiet that means there's nothing wrong. It could also mean that nobody cares, but in either case I don't have much else to do on the project.

I just got word that a guy called "drunkenmaster226" put up a YouTube video of CFC2 English. Thank you for that. It's nice because it shows the "old school style intro" and gives people a nice glimpse of what the game is like. It was obviously taken using an emulator because you can hear the audio slowing down in places, but it's still a nice introduction to the game. You can watch it here, or over at YouTube.

I'm not sure what else to discuss at this point. The interest seems to have fallen off quite a bit. Though, that's what I expected. I think most people that cared have already downloaded it. If you're enthusiastic about this release, though, maybe you ought to go spread the word around to other sites/forums/etc. where there might be other people that would enjoy it. There are probably a lot of people that played CFC on the NGPC that haven't even looked around for new NGPC news since they stopped playing their. They might not know about CFC2 English, and they might like to know that it's playable on the PSP and Nintendo DS. If they don't care, that's fine, but I assume there are people out there that would care if they knew to care.

As always, I enjoy the comments, so if you've got anything to say, leave a message.

Fame, Fortune, and a New Release

Well, the day has finally arrived. This project is finally getting the type of mainstream media attention it deserves. With that, I expect we'll be the recipients of all the fame and fortune that come with such attention. I'm pretty sure that from now on, I won't even be able to shop for groceries without being recognized as one of the guys that brought CFC2 for the NGPC to the English-speaking masses. Oh, and the fortune is sure to follow.

Of course, I'm talking about the recent article posted over at GameSetWatch.com. I was interviewed by Alistair Wallis for a weekly column that he does. Here's an excerpt.

"To celebrate what is a pretty mammoth effort, we talked with Flavor about all the goings-on regarding the project, and received some astoundingly in-depth answers about topics such as his Card Fighter’s Clash fandom, why it’s all taken so long, and why the Lost Church is now a Rooster Church."

Head over to http://www.gamesetwatch.com/2008/05/quiz_me_qwik_card_fighting_with_flavor.php to read the full article.

Oh, yeah, there was a third thing in the title, wasn't there. Yeah, there's a new release. The graphical menus have finally been translated. You can find it at the download link listed on the top-right of this blog. I actually already have a couple of bug fixes that need to be applied to the graphics, so there may be a new update to the files in a day or so. I will probably only post an update to this blog entry when I upload the updated version.

We love to hear the comments, so if you're playing the translation let us know! Have fun!

The Day Has Finaly Arrived! Game On!

This feels like a big relief for me. I hope there aren't much for bug reports. I need to get back to real life for a while. Enough about me, though, let's get to the good news.

SNK Vs. Capcom Card Fighters' Clash 2 English Edition is now available for download. It runs on PSP, Nintendo DS, NGPC, GP2X, PC, Mac, and wherever else NGPC ROMs can be played. Without further ado, I present to you the download link for CFC2English.

UPDATE: Okay, there was a bug in the CFC2English release. I have now fixed it (I hope). The download link at the top-right of this blog should now contain the proper files. I'm sorry for any confusion.

The CFC2English ZIP file contains an IPS patch. You will need to have the original Japanese ROM file of CFC2 (and some IPS patching software) to apply the patch. FYI, the SHA1 hash of the patched ROM should be 5CF9428A6864802D26F59C2364F476012896628A and the MD5 should be E324C1CEB54080AE5BE1065B91243331.

If you want to play it on the Nintendo DS, you will need CFC2English, CFC2EnglishDS, and the original Japanese CFC2 ROM (to apply the IPS patch to).

I know that the patching is a bit of a hassle, but that's the way I must do it. I will not release a full ROM. Though, I'm guessing that, by the time most of you read this, someone will have patched the ROM themselves and put it somewhere on the web.

Also, I have added the PSP version of the RACE emulator in that file drop. That should allow you PSP users to play any NGPC ROM. If you want to play it on other systems, I suggest looking for NeoPop or whatever other emulator is available for your favorite platform.

If you have any problems or questions, please leave a comment.

Oh, and if any of you happen to make any videos (like YouTube or whatever) of this stuff running, I'd love to see them.

Alright, it's obvious that you already know about this project, but there are others out there that don't. Some of them would love to play this game. If you are a member of any forums, mailing lists, or any other sort of medium that would discuss this sort of thing, please spread the word. I'd prefer that our hard work be appreciated by as many people as possible, so go out and spread the good news.

Testing, Release Imminent (I Hope)

There are some technical issues that I need to resolve, and I am waiting for some final files from one person. During this waiting period, testing has begun. I am hoping that the tests will go smooth and by the time I receive the files, CFC2 English will be ready for release.

I am planning to release this as an IPS patch which will require that you already have the original CFC2 ROM file. This is the typical approach for releasing translations, but please leave a comment if you have any issues with that or other suggestions.

Speaking of ROMs and what's going to happen when this is released, I know that there has been a fair ammount of interest in playing this game on an actual NGPC using a flash cart. Here is my suggestion. Go check out www.tototek.com. They guy that runs the show there has actually (years ago) made his own NGPC flash cart. As far as I understand, he never actually finished the project. He wanted it to be flashable via USB, but it never got that far. They have a forum there where they discuss new product ideas. Perhaps if they knew there was enough interest and that people would buy enough of the flash carts to offset the production costs they would actually sell them. It's just a thought.

I must let you know that I have been sidetracked lately with fixing up the PSP version of RACE!. It is now in a state that I think is ready for release. It seems to run all NGPC ROMs just fine, thought it does have a couple graphical and audio glitches with a select few ROMs. Hopefully, sometime in the next few days, I think you might find it in the usual PSP homebrew/emulator places.

Here's a little something that I think you might enjoy. I found this nice little CFC2 World Map when looking around the original NeoGeo site. If you click on a location in the picture, it will take you to a (Japanese) description of the location. It's kinda nifty, anyway.

CFC2 World Map

New Hardware and Emulation

Well, to be blunt, there hasn't been much progress on the translation side of things lately. There really isn't a lot left to do there, but I've been a bit distracted by other things lately. There are some real life situations that are causing my hobby time to get cut down a bit, but that's not the whole story.

I have recently acquired two new (to me) consoles. I found a cheap Dreamcast at a local shop, so I hope to get CFC2 running nicely on the DC. I did set up the development environment and build RACE for the Dreamcast. It runs CFC2, but it seems that it doesn't save the save-game progress properly. I'll have to look into that.

The other console I picked up, thanks to Craigslist, is a PSP. I traded some unused stuff for it, and I'm very pleased at how the deal turned out. I set up the psptoolchain and had only some minor issues getting RACE to run on it. You can see a video of it here. It has sound. It's hard to hear, because I didn't turn up the volume until close to the end. I don't know why someone didn't port RACE to the PSP sooner.

CFC2 English Running on PSP

I know that most of the votes (on the right) have been for Nintendo DS and Neo Geo Pocket Color. First, it will always be made to run on the NGPC, but that will require a NGPC flash cart. The other systems are just icing, but it seems that DS is probablly the most likely to be utilized.