Sony PlayStation

[sinful thicket]

I’m having this exact issue with my DualShock controllers, SNAX64, adapters, and Analog IO Pro board all from MisterAddons.

I start getting phantom inputs after a while too, with DualShocks.

Did something change in the core? How difficult is it to roll back?

I may go hook up my second, several months outdated MiSTer, just to see if I can reproduce the behavior.

Have not tried my GunCon in a while but now I am curious as well.

@marsh star have you posted about this over on the MisterAddons discord at all? I have, in both Product Support and SNAX64 channels, but haven’t gotten many responses yet.

Thank you for validating that I am not crazy.

[clear rock]

Make sure your DualShock is not haunted

[ivory verge]

@still palm do you have any idea what might be causing these problems with snax and dualshock? Nothing has been changed in the core for years.

[serene nebula]

I’d be interested to know if anyone else is running into that issue

[lusty coral]

@marsh star @sinful thicket

Whilst I don't have a solution, if it's an issue that doesn't take long to reproduce. I wonder if it's possible to try and older PSX core

Just in case if something recent knocked something out of balance.

[ivory verge]

The snac module was not touched at all.

[still palm]

https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/PSX_MiSTer/tree/main/releases there is the old releases if you want to try those but I don't think that's it.

[ivory verge]

@shut escarp checked with latest stable core and everything works fine for him.

[north oracle]

i used to have this problem, but i mounted a virtual memory card in slot 2 at all times and it doesnt occur for me anymore with snax64

my issue was a bit different tho, my inputs on my ps1 controller would autofire instead of completley stop working

[still palm]

I wouldn't test with Final Fantasy 8 since it known to have something weird going on, that I can correct if I have both memcards mounted or setting to real MCs

https://github.com/ShendoXT/padtest I'd try this to see if the problem shows there

[serene nebula]

Maybe the cable has an issue?

[shut escarp]

Worth noting I have a SNAX (2p) not a SNAX64 (4p but only for n64). Don’t THINK it should affect PSX but just clarifying

[still palm]

A really long extension cable, or maybe alot of other things plugged in could do something

[still palm]

yeah maybe a bad connection in the cable or a broken solder joint somewhere but I think they said they tried multiple things.

we may need to see a pic from @sinful thicket to see if they're doing anything weird

[sinful thicket]

@still palm

I don’t see any obvious signs of cable strain. I have it mounted via Velcro specifically to reduce the cable strain, since it’s a thick cable and the I/O port is mounted rather high.

[lusty coral]

(nice case)

[sinful thicket]

I guess if that is enough to have broken the cable somehow, I have a support issue to open with MisterAddons.

[still palm]

no psx extension cables right?

Do you have the sega gensis snax adapter? it uses all the pins and I think you would see something weird there if you had something wrong with the snax itself.

And did you have more than 1 psx snax cable adapter? just to rule that one out

[still palm]

On second thought if the problem was the regulator on snax that knocks the 5v down to 3v3 that the psx uses, sega adapter wouldn't catch it but the n64 one might. the Sega one would verify no problems with the io though

[sinful thicket]

I’ll give that all a shot this weekend and report back; thanks. No extensions. Multiple controllers, multiple adapters (2) tested.

[ivory verge]

I tried to fix something that doesn't work on real hardware anyway @lyric pagoda. Donald Duck Going Quackers works the same on a real PSX when two controllers are connected. The intro is skipped. When you disconnect the second DualShock, the intro plays correctly. When you turn the second controller off in Core and the first one is set to DualShock, the game works correctly. It works the same way.

I'll come back to Crash Bandicoot 3 topic later, but there's no error in the core of the Donald Duck game, it's 1:1 to the real PSX.

[serene nebula]

Ahahahaha that’s crazy, @ivory verge you’re a badass for finding that!

[dense wharf]

Donald Duck on ps1 isnt good

it's

great!

[ivory verge]

pal version

For me, the matter is closed. In core, all you need to do is disable pad no. 2. (it's enough to set it to digital)

This is a lesson for me to “get off my butt and pull out the PS1” instead of wasting hours looking for something that doesn't exist 🙃

[mortal oracle]

…so what you’re really saying is…

MiSTer wins again!!!

[cedar thistle]

Using an Xbox Series controller in DS mode last night to play Wipeout 3 SE, I ran into a problem with the controller losing the connection while wired. I haven’t really experimented to see if the controller has the same problem with other games or even cores, but I’m curious if this is something anyone else has seen.

[lost summit]

the issue could be closed as real behavior 🙂

[serene nebula]

Yesssss!!!!

[sinful thicket]

So, no issues with N64 via SNAX64 that I can tell. I played a few games, including Sin & Punishment. Maybe I'll try using a rumble pack as well!

Genesis, however, was completely different. In Xeno Crisis in 6 button mode, my retro-bit 6 button clone acts as if X and Y are both being pressed all of the time. I reseated the controller and everything, no luck.

I also confirmed that said Genesis controller does not exhibit the same issue, in the same game, on my Analogue Mega Sg.

[still palm]

Xeno crisis isn't a good test, it's a homebrew I think there was some problem with it.

[sinful thicket]

Hmm, in that case can you recommend another game? Is there some difference between 6 and 3 button modes and support?

[still palm]

street fighter 2 would test all of the six buttons of the controller. but even the 3 button controller uses all 7 io. so any game really, just not xeno crisis

we were talking about retrobit controller over in Help

[clear rock]

I coulden't get my Genesis SNAC adapter to work 🙁

[still palm]

what behavior?

[sand minnow]

Newer retro bit and other clone clone controllers have issues with Forgotten Worlds, which works fine on an actual 6 button with mode held. (forcing 3 button is recommended). Ms. Pac-Man needs mode to be held all the way to the splash screen to force 3 button mode, but it even works with problematic controllers when that is done.

I need to try Xenocrisis with snac, don't remember having issues on real hardware.

[minor spruce]

or be like me and find out you need to buy another hardware revision to debug an error because throwing in the dark is getting no where...

god that one pissed me off because i didnt need a 5th unit....

[abstract drift]

retrobits genesis repros don't work on snac afaik

no-ones quite sure why, something to do with the cable length

[serene nebula]

The Retrobit Saturn controller didn’t work on SNAC for me too. That’s weird lol.

[abstract drift]

i wonder if any of the magic blue1 did for the psx cores snac support ccould help with this

[restive plover]

if you have an older io board for mister, you might have same issue, i did on my OLD one where there was 1? less pin connected in it, you can do a minor bodge wire to fix if so

id have to dig out old board so see what all i had to bodge

[serene nebula]

Honestly that worked out for the best for me, I had @humble thorn’s REFLEX Saturn board and installed it in the Retrobit shell so now I have a super badass controller.

[sinful thicket]

Any luck testing with an OEM Genesis/MD pad? I guess my Retro-bit isn’t a good test case.

FYI I can use my N64 controller with a rumble pak and SNAC without issue.

[spark ermine]

Any one have any issues with the Army Men games not getting in game anymore? All of them seem to be getting stuck on loading screens for me except Army Men 3D, Army Men Air Attack 1 and Army Men Air Attack 2. Tested a couple of the ones not working on a core from July 10th 2025 and they get in game fine there

[spark ermine]

Newest core^

July 10th core ^

[chilly kraken]

I see it too. I can get sarge's heroes 1 to load, but not 2

where is kuba's test core. let me look at that

happens on Kuba's 12/26 test core too

Ok, it works on the 12/04 core

so it's something after that

doesn't work on 12/24 either

@ivory verge

[clear rock]

My SNAC adapter had some weirdness where ir refused to be controller 1 for some reason, I think it also only partially even functioned as controller 2

All my other snac adapters work fine

Oops, nevermind, I thought this was the Genesis channel

[ivory verge]

@spark ermine @chilly kraken thanks for checking!

The only change after 12/04 was for Trasher/Dave Mirra. I tested nearly 200 games, but it's impossible to test them all. Army Men - these games must do something unique. I'll check it out. If I can't fix it, we can always add it as an additional option for Dave Mirra, not globally.

[abstract drift]

army men doing something weird rings a bell

cant really find anything, but maybe it was on PSIO

[cosmic tulip]

maybe this is something we can implement a PS1 database.txt for

have these fixes apply per game

[manic citrus]

this is not the case of 'you need this thing turned on for the game to work' this is a 'you turned on something clearly labeled as unsafe and now a game doesn't work'

[tropic stratus]

Auto overclocking option left the chat

[mortal oracle]

Can someone @ me when MiSTer wins again plz?

I won’t be able to sleep at night until this is shown to be true

[abstract drift]

the original reporter hasn't said if they were using increased disc speeds - hopefully not

[spark ermine]

Don't think so

Could have but shouldn't have

Me the original reporter

[chilly kraken]

It's in the name

I have no choice but to believe them

[ivory verge]

I'll try to solve this problem; these games really require a different approach. I can't do it right away. If I can't fix it, we'll decide whether to permanently revert the change or add an additional option for Dave Mirra (it actually works with most games without any issues). We'll see.

I'll add Army Men to the test games when changes are made 🙂

This repair wasn't easy for Dave Mirra, I knew there might be some edge cases

[chilly kraken]

sorry to rain on your parade, kuba

[lost summit]

No 3DO 😂

[livid pecan]

i havent emulated PSX in like a million years, so i am a bit out of touch!
is there a compatiblity list like for N64? or does everything just work nowadays for PSX?

any reason the hblank/vblank setting is not always enabled, what are the downsides of enabling that?

[proven seal]

fixed hblank/vblank mostly just helps with keeping the image synced. i don't think it's necessary to fudge with it unless you're noticing dropouts or other problems in your video signal

as for compatibility, assume it's just as good as real hardware minus whatever issues are listed in the github repository https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/PSX_MiSTer/issues

[abstract drift]

hblank/vblank is off by default for crt reasons iirc

wipeout2097 is good for testing it, screen shakes when you hit mines (which can cause hdmi to drop out)

enjoy the core, it's one of the best!

[tropic stratus]

fixed blanks off(default): will have sync drops for few games that rumble the screen
fixed blanks on: no sync drops, but black bars around the whole image for many games

[clear rock]

Sync drops for hdmi? analog? both?

[tropic stratus]

HDMI for digital out. Don't know how DirectVideo analog will react.

VGA out is not influenced by this setting at all

[abstract drift]

yeah on analog the screen will shake just like it would with the original psx

[livid pecan]

cool, thank you guys! 🙂

[silent bridge]

I think it was fixed but maybe the GitHub wasn’t updated.

https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/PSX_MiSTer/issues/270

Was MGS fixed?

[cosmic tulip]

i believe @ivory verge fixed that yeah

[silent bridge]

That sounds right 😎

Maybe there are other issues on the GitHub page that need to be closed too then

[ivory verge]

Yes, I attempted to fix it, but I only uploaded the core here for testing; I never made a PR. I need to come back to it sometime and do it properly in the code.

[stone ore]

Guys
On superstation one, I’m confused how the SNAC ps1 ports/controllers will/do work?
Can you use the ps1 controller in menu and in psx core? Ie on my mister I use a usb controller then switch psx core to SNAC.
But I would like a superstation, but want to use it just like a console and ideally not have two controllers to get into core then play - is this possible?

[chilly kraken]

The way that snac works is that it speaks directly to the core, and since the core doesn't know about the menu, it can't send commands to it

[stone ore]

Hmm
Makes sense but contradicts what I think I’ve seen in clips

[chilly kraken]

Yeah, Taki is working on a forked core/main (we aren't sure) that allows for snac to control the menu, but you would need to ask him more about that as it's not part of the official mister project at the moment

[digital zinc]

certainly very non-standard

[stone ore]

Ah gotcha
So forgive my ignorance but people who have received their devices are simply using SNAC like we do as mister users
Keyboard / usb / Bluetooth device for menu then using the SNAC toggle to play psx via SNAC

[abstract drift]

yeah no-one really knows how that works yet

[stone ore]

Seems like little value to the super if that’s the case
Unless you can tell the super to cold boot into psx core only and therefore the SNAC controller works (but then no game selection would be possible 🤔)

[chilly kraken]

No apology necessary - I wish taki had prepared new folks better for this stuff.

Yeah, if you want to use PSX controllers, they will only work with the PSX core, and you will need something else (usb keyboard/controller/remote/etc) to control the menu.

In all other cores, you will need to use a usb controller/keyboard

[abstract drift]

though we've seen clips from takki of the psx controller doing menu stuff too now so

[chilly kraken]

yeah, he said it was a forked core (or main?)

[dark mountain]

Possibly that will probably going to change on some forked cores too, to have the PS1 SNAC working on some other cores, like the GB, GBA...

[chilly kraken]

yeah, that also was in the video I think

as @proven seal said, he has reinvented LLAPI

[stone ore]

So the hardware ps1 controller port is referred to a ps1 SNAC yeah?

[chilly kraken]

yes, exactly

[dark mountain]

We don't know how it is going to work, and won't until it's out.

Let's wait.

[chilly kraken]

and in a vanilla mister set up, that only works with PSX and only with games, not the menu

[chilly kraken]

super stations are out. !N! has one

[dark mountain]

Lucky one.

[abstract drift]

software seems way behind hardware here

[chilly kraken]

I just wish taki would ship something. seems wild that a product that is not marketed as a mister at all just ships as a mister in a nice shell

[digital zinc]

This is the way

[stone ore]

This

I have mister so get it but genuinely the product must confuse a lot of people

[chilly kraken]

yeah, it was marketed as a PSX clone that also happens to be a MiSTer

[stone ore]

I assumed using Robert’s mister core BUT skinned into a ps1 (with the option to side load cores etc as it’s basically a mister)

[chilly kraken]

It will be cool if he gets the snac stuff working. It will be a nightmare to keep updated for folks who care about that. But I suspect a lot of the folks who bought super stations are new to mister and looking for an analogue-type device

which, again, wild that it's just a mister

[abstract drift]

from what i've seen its just the usual mister software with psx set as default core

[chilly kraken]

N can confirm, but I think it literally just boots into the mister menu with standard options

[stone ore]

Yeah exactly
They’re obviously very transparent by giving more
But maybe isolating the psx core should have been the default

[abstract drift]

oh its not even defaulting into psx? lol

[stone ore]

Mister menu

[proven seal]

this is the most baffling part to me. having the front controller ports be SNAC but booting into the mister menu is rather poor foresight, in my opinion

[abstract drift]

i mean, you'd be equally stuck unable to pick a cd-image even if it did

[chilly kraken]

Yeah, I feel bad because they obvbiously needed to get the hardware out the door because people had become restless (and they were already late)

[stone ore]

But there’s a console mode coming that hopefully will fix some of these things

[chilly kraken]

but man, not having the software ready seems wiiiiild

[abstract drift]

yeah i kinda get the impression this is stunt shipping just to say they did it in 2025

[dark mountain]

The hardware was finished before the software, but it's not like there are 1000 SuperStation in the wild so far.

[abstract drift]

i dont get why they couldn't of sorted the software side out ages ago though they shouldn't need final hardware to do that or anything

[chilly kraken]

@stone ore Sorry that you get all the early adopter benefits. I know you have a mister but if you need help with stuff, we can totally help with anything that is part of the mister project. Things get a little sticky when it comes to stuff outside of that

[stone ore]

I realised I didn’t correct anyone
I do not have my superstation yet
It defo does boot into mister however currently

[chilly kraken]

ahh ok

there are some out in the wild

but yeah, doesn't seem like a lot

[abstract drift]

i ordered one too, hopefully they sort things out before too long

[stone ore]

I love mister but genuinely would just love the superstation to basically be an analogue type product that supports the mister community if that makes sense
I hope they make an option to lock it down into a console mode for example

[stone ore]

Did you go for Grey?
Looks like blue are being shipped

And did you go for the dock for cd loading

[clear rock]

Or standard operating procedure for modern consoles these days...

[chilly kraken]

yeah, its obvious that it's not the experience he wanted to give folks

but you live long enough to become the villain etc etc

[clear rock]

https://tenor.com/view/insane-joker-the-killing-joke-laugh-gif-15307608

[stone ore]

Genuinely, if the mass public receive theirs and can’t open the psx core it’ll be a bad look
Hopefully there’s a software fix before then

[clear rock]

The mister already supports auto-booting to a core on poweron right?

It's just a setting you would do in an ini file?

[stone ore]

If it does I didn’t know this

[clear rock]

Or at the very least, to a game (and thus the core too)? Could just auto-boot that attract screen then

"mister-boot.chd" I mean

Not sure if there's any copyright issues with that one

[golden ginkgo]

put bootcore=PSX in the mister ini

[stone ore]

Ah that’s cool
So… I’d still need more than just my SNAC ps1 controller tho to load the game right?

[chilly kraken]

yeah

but if you put a disk in the dock

in theory that should be enough

[clear rock]

I can see a modification to get PSX SNAC to work in the OSD... problem is if anyone uses the SNAC for anything else...

I am assuming there would be no way to detect if it's not a PSX controller and disable the SNAC OSD feature

No buttons on the console itself ot navigate the menu like the M64?

[chilly kraken]

🤷 #fpga-platforms message

[clear rock]

How would that work if you used the dock to connect some other SNAC device though

Could it cause damage?

[chilly kraken]

we don't know. you know as much as we know

[clear rock]

I do? I assure you I likely know a lot less

[chilly kraken]

that tweet is the only thing we have seen. we dunno how he is doing it, so we don't know how it affects anything else.

So you really do know as much as we do 🙂

[desert otter]

I don't like the fact that the snac port is paywalled behind buying the CD drive. That annoys me. Could've just made the front USB port a SNAC port but no, apparently that's feature creep but by all means, let's put an NFC reader in it for tap to cuz so many more people use that than they do SNAC 🙄

And on top of that, you can't get the attachment drive/dock whatever in clear blue. Just solidv grey or black. So if you were someone who wanted to buy one, but have the blue console, it's not a cohesive and matching design

(unless there is a clear blue dock and I missed that somehow)

[dark mountain]

The Dock will be the same color as the console.

The black version shown is just for final mold testing.

[desert otter]

It looks like there is an option for clear blue now. I didn't see one back when I pre ordered the SS

So at least there's that

[dark mountain]

Taki was clear on that multiple times on social medias.

[golden ginkgo]

it was always to color match the main unit you ordered

[chilly kraken]

yeah, it's part of the preorder page IIRC

[desert otter]

I can't keep up with anything posted on Twitter because I don't see an option to filter by newest post on that platform

[golden ginkgo]

people feel strongly about this device 🙂

[desert otter]

I just feel strongly about the main unit not having SNAC that's all. But that's because I want to use my existing snac adapters and controls for things like N64.

[golden ginkgo]

I would bet if you tested users, way more preference for usb in the front for generic usb controller input than a snac port (not the psx one, but the one you mention)

[desert otter]

Stuff I already paid money for

I don't need anything other than so it's put someone like me into a frustrating position of, do I spend another $45 plus tax and shipping just for the port, or do I take my chances with cheap USB adapters

[stone ore]

I view the unit a little differently perhaps
It has snac for the console it’s built for / around
Fully hear your opinion but surely if you care a lot about other cores you really want a mister etc
Just my thoughts

[chilly kraken]

yeah, I think this really is supposed to be a PSX FPGA. The MiSTer side is less of the focus

we know it's a mister, but I really don't think it's being sold as that

[stone ore]

I didn’t know it was using mister at first just thought it used the psx core that is on the mister if that makes sense

[chilly kraken]

yeah, for sure. I thought it was going to boot into the PSX core by default. then I thought it was going to boot into console mode by default.

[stone ore]

Yeah agree
The value to me is that is will basically be a psx that I can plug and play
Love to get away from the more tech side of the mister
So if they can make it boot like a psx then throw a disc in! Perfect

[clear rock]

Yeah, I can understand extra USB ports and the M.2 port being in the dock, but the SNAC port is odd. Would have been better to have the NFC in the dock and SNAC port in the main unit

Oh by the way, is there a built in level shifter for the SNAC in the dock? IIRC, you don't need a level shifter for PSX SNAC right?

[desert otter]

I wouldn't know.

it is what it is at the end of the day. I'll figure things out for myself when the time comes. I'll most likely end up just getting a Mayflash N64 to USB adapter for my controllers on eBay for cheap and calling it a day.

[proven seal]

after being dissatisfied for years with all of the available mister case designs, i should really buckle down and learn to create my own

[desert otter]

by all means, if you have the 3D printer necessary to do it yourself. If I had a 3D printer that's what I would've done already

[proven seal]

i don't currently own one but it's something i intend to buy once i move. perhaps until then i could brainstorm ideas for a case

[desert otter]

Well, you end up being limited somewhat by is inherent shape as a stack, but if you want to go the route of getting connectors that'll let you spread the stack out but still connect everything, you can open up your design options by a lot

[clear rock]

There are places you can order something 3d printed for yourself, in some cases even local libraries have 3d printing services provided what you want to print won't take too long

[stone ore]

Hi mate
This doesn’t seem to work, the mister is overwriting what I’m changing when I re insert the sd back into the mister
🤯

[dark mountain]

Remove the first ; symbol on the same line.

[stone ore]

This could be embarrassing - I’ll try now 😊

[dark mountain]

And you have a 20 secs timeout before autobooting the core, on the next options - at bootcore_timeout.

If you need to, you can reduce it.

[stone ore]

Thank you
Does this look better

It doesn’t auto boot on these settings unfortunately

It just re wrote my saved changes too

[dark mountain]

I don't know if you can use some values <10 for the timeout.

[golden ginkgo]

sorry, there was a bug fixed for bootcore but not sure if released in stable yet

[stone ore]

Sorry, what does the timeout do? Hold the mister in the main menu for that period of time?

[golden ginkgo]

if not, if you put the whole filename it'll work (while fix isn't stable): bootcore=PSX_20251204.rbf

[stone ore]

Awesome I’ll do it now

[golden ginkgo]

I'll let you with Zet-sensei who is the expert here, just helping on this as I looked into the bug. Going offline for 2h now

[stone ore]

Thank you Nelson

[golden ginkgo]

It worked? Not sure what core version you have

[stone ore]

No it didn’t work
I used my core version title and saved it but auto boot not activating

I’m running update all
Then will change the core auto boot to the latest rbf on the off chance that fixes things

[golden ginkgo]

What’s the full name and location of this ini file?

[stone ore]

It’s in my mister at present so will feedback soon
But it’s on the root and Mister.ini
I’ve checked that my mister isn’t set to mister_alt for example

[golden ginkgo]

Vaguely remember someone with issues with bootcore_timeout, I’d try commenting/removing it.

[stone ore]

Cool
I’ll delete that block of txt thank you

Would it make sense tho that my changes are no longer showing when I re insert the sd card back into my pc? It’s like the mister is re writing the ini info on boot up

Yep defo won’t work
And it reset my ini file too

Just deleted the ini
Let mister re create it on the sd card
Edited it again and nothing changed
Still doesn’t auto boot etc

[abstract drift]

edits to your ini file are not sticking?

[golden ginkgo]

this is odd, not sure if it's the mister, never heard of this behaviour. are you taking the SD card back and forth from the Mister to a PC or something to make file edits?

And you're unmounting the SD card after saving the file and before removing it? I'd run some tests on that SD card maybe

btw the easiest way to interact with the mister filesystem, is either via ssh or mounting the SD card via samba https://mister-devel.github.io/MkDocs_MiSTer/setup/games/?h=samba#transfer-roms-over-the-network-with-sambasmb

[stone ore]

Yes I’m removing the sd itself
I have two sd cards for mister and they’re both performing the same way

This highlighted file is the config file I’m amending and it’s then auto changing when in the mister

[golden ginkgo]

Moved it here in case the smart folks there can help #help message

[stone ore]

Hi
Issue is seemingly my side
I can save the ini changes
But when the sd is removed from pc then re inserted the changes haven’t actually saved

Tried on my MacBook and when I try and save the ini changes it tells me it cannot save!

Happening on both SD cards too
I can add / delete and amend games etc fine 🤯
I’m done lol

[serene nebula]

What is the name of the ini file you’re changing

And try just changing the ini file on the mister itself

There’s a script for it

[stone ore]

It’s this
Can I type to change the Ini on the mister? I thought just toggle options

[serene nebula]

Yeah, there’s a script called ini_settings

[stone ore]

Cool
I just thought it would only toggle resolutions etc not allow me to add auto boot cores etc
I’ll give it a whirl

[serene nebula]

I think the advanced option is what you want for text entry

[silent bridge]

If you still have that test core, I’ll test it out this weekend 😁

[sand minnow]

It's because they made a modification to the board wiring (my suspicion is that it was done to prevent it from working with Genesis to USB adapters, but I'm not sure on this).

[serene nebula]

Seems like one should avoid buying any repro controllers from Retrobit

[proven seal]

they were never that great anyway imo

[serene nebula]

I didn’t know! I bought a Saturn one and it didn’t work with SNAC and surprise surprise, that controller had issues working with real hardware too lol

The saving grace was being able to use @humble thorn Reflex CTRL board in it and it’s a pretty badass USB controller now imo

[minor spruce]

The reflex adapt is really versatile

[sand minnow]

The Saturn controllers had issues with the pad breaking or buttons getting stuck too. On the retro-bit wireless Saturn pad, directions on the d-pad just stopped working. Reading Amazon reviews, it seemed to be a common issue.

[desert otter]

It's almost like the cheap ali Express controllers somehow do it better for a fraction of the price

[sand minnow]

8bitdo M30 Genesis works with SNAC

[mystic flare]

i think 8bitdo have really done themselves proud over the years. now they make licensed controllers that no one questions the quality of, and are discussed as upgrades to the console stock controller.

[serene nebula]

oops, I meant Reflex CTRL. My bad.

[trim gull]

IIRC the issues with the Retro-Bit 2.4g Saturn controllers has been resolved in their second revision

[sand minnow]

The issues were the pad breaking where with the wired, though I had buttons sticking on both wired and 2.4G. With the BT controllers, only the Saturn ones had the pad issue. The Switch compatible Genesis USB pads added a home short cut that interferes with controller operation. The Genesis 9 pin controller compatibility issues were actually introduced in later batches.

[summer night]

Originally there was no snac on the dock either, some of us were studying the possibility of making custom converter for the ps1 ports. They underestimated the snac need from the community and did not design for it.

Because enough of us complained about snac it was eventually added to the dock.
Of course it would be better to have on the console, but I don't feel like I'm being paywalled considering all the other extra features from the dock and the console itself compared to the prices of adding them to a normal mister stack where any extra accessory/cable is expensive as well.

• they're working on making ps1 snac compatible with all cores.

[proven seal]

they could've easily consolidated all of the features on the main console and the dock into one unit, and their custom SNAC cores are essentially a different flavor of the LLAPI cores that we've had for years now

[clear rock]

... Why would you want your repro of a decades old controller to intentionally not work with USB adapters?

[trim gull]

because they want to sell their 2.4g version which comes with a usb dongle for PC

and they also might sell a USB wired version

[marsh hamlet]

Hi. do we know if the COP0 is supported by the core?
https://gbatemp.net/threads/i-tricked-the-ps1-hardware-to-ignore-spyro-3s-uncrackable-security.678736/

[tender tartan]

COP0 is there of course, but maybe/probably not implemented to extent explored by this hack

[tropic stratus]

That was quite a bit of drama in that story.
From what I see it is a simple instruction breakpoint triggering some interrupt.
It's fully described here: https://psx-spx.consoledev.net/cpuspecifications/#cop0r7-dcic-debug-and-cache-invalidate-control-rw
The core does currently not implement it.
In general I didn't implement anything where haven't found any example use, because I almost certainly do some mistake and cannot test.
Could certainly be added. If someone is interested in it, I can give some hints on where it most likely needs to be done.

[serene nebula]

What does that do and why is it important?

[clear rock]

Would it take up a considerable amount of space of the FPGA to add?

[sand minnow]

So people would buy their USB repro instead.

[clear rock]

They made both? As seperate controllers? I see, thats annoying

[stone ore]

Any obvious reason that mister doesn’t fill my vga connected crt monitor? Thank you

I don’t want to ruin the image by trying to stretch it using the monitor settings etc

[chilly kraken]

I think you need fixed h blanks

[tender tartan]

You don’t ruin the image that way, that sort of scaling on a CRT will just alter the waveforms controlling the beam; no image processing is performed

[tender tartan]

Mostly interrupt/exception control, and some debug related control registers that the hack in question uses

[serene nebula]

Thanks for answering my question!

The first part of your explanation sounds important but not the second part. Obviously the goal is to always fully replicate hardware so I’m just trying to identify what’s mission critical for the general public.

[cosmic tulip]

Has anyone figured out the regression with the 3DO games yet

or do I need to go back to an older core

[ivory verge]

army men ?

• Added CD Backward seek filter option (U) to the misc. section,
  fix for Dave Mirra / Trasher games is now optional

[cosmic tulip]

yep that's the one

thank you

[dreamy sierra]

snac to control the menu would be a serious game changer for me

[shut escarp]

Does having a 2nd controller or mini keyboard in arms reach really mess up your misters feng shui that much? I see that complaint a lot and it’s never really been a problem for me and I use SNAC a lot

[proven seal]

unironically yes lol, at least for me. being able to control everything with a single pad goes a long way to keeping things feel organized and "console-like"

[shut escarp]

Then use a DS4 and be done with it unless you’re playing something that warrants SNAC like a light gun/steering wheel/n64 game is how I look at it

Or m30 or whatever your insert-catch-all controller of preference is

[proven seal]

that's what puts me in an odd position though; i prefer to use original controllers where applicable. i don't even own any modern controllers, actually

for now, i just use USB adapters for everything, which is mostly fine enough. i would love the lower latency offered by SNAC, but i can't justify investing into it when it can't navigate the menus

[shut escarp]

the difference between SNAC and a quality USB adapter is on the order of 1-1.5ms, It's completely not worth worrying about

[proven seal]

yeah, that's why i'm not super torn up over lacking a SNAC setup. been using the bliss-box adapters for about a year now and they've been great, 1ms of latency i believe

[clear rock]

You could also use mister remote to control it

That even lets you load a game directly instead of loading the core first then the game

[tropic stratus]

No, it's just some additional trigger for the exception and one additional target.
In worst case it would make the 2x core a little harder to build.
The main purpose of this was to use some external debugger, but as we have no way to even add it, it's pretty pointless besides such hacks.
By the way: our cheat engine could very likely do the same, but they have chosen to do it that way so that it also works on original hardware.

[clear rock]

I am guessing the Duckstation code posted at the end is not just a simple Gameshark style code or compatible with the mister cheat engine?

[tropic stratus]

It's not described, but it likely is.
However, instead of overwriting the required values in RAM directly, it instead implements a routine in RAM that is triggered using a CPU breakpoint to jump into it.
This second part is not available in the mister core.
You could very likely make a much shorter cheat code to just overwrite the value in RAM directly without the routine.
It would work in Duckstation or Mister, but not on real hardware.
However, this code also doesn't work on hardware, it would require a patched CD image.

[clear rock]

Just simply changing the RAM values on mister would not trigger the copy protection?

Wait, wasn't the copy protection only on the PAL version now that I think about it?

[tropic stratus]

From what i understand it only happens when you modify the "normal code" outside of breakpoint exception.
The game cannot observe the whole ram and usually you wouldn't be able to modify ram on the real ps1 without modifying the code.

[sinful thicket]

Do certain cores, including PSX, not support VGA scan-doubler (ie, 31khz PC CRTs)?

Or do I just have something grossly misconfigured

[proven seal]

PS1, saturn and N64 don't support the scandoubler. you'll have to come up with some custom modelines unfortunately

[mortal oracle]

Did anyone ever figure out what was causing Driver 2 to be slow?

[mortal oracle]

(Destruction Derby can lag a fair bit too on cactus creek, but I suspect that’s probably the same on actual hardware)

[serene nebula]

I own both those games, I can check against real hardware

[mortal oracle]

Destruction Derby I’m almost certain is accurate to original hardware

I played it a tonne as a kid. I don’t remember slowdown but I’m also not surprised. They pushed the boat out with 20 cars in a race

Driver 2 I think @ivory verge confirmed is slower

Third mission specifically or something like that

[serene nebula]

why did you add an extra n and e

[mortal oracle]

🇬🇧

[serene nebula]

I like your fancy words

[mortal oracle]

Actually I think this one is French

Like about half of our words 😅

(The fancy ones)

[ivory verge]

Yes, I checked it on old and new cores. There are drops in some places to 9 fps. The only improvement is with 2x CPU + turbo high.

[mortal oracle]

Thank you

It would be interesting to know why that is - because I guess it’s not the only game that suffers

[ivory verge]

the only game with such drops is Re-Volt

[tropic stratus]

If you are sure it runs to slow at a specific point compared to real hardware, please upload a savestate and I can analyze what the bottleneck is

[abstract drift]

i think they said it was just the start of the very first level

[crisp ether]

the place they mentioned is the beginning of mission 2 or 3 (i can look up which one specifically) under the L train in Chicago where you have to slalom between some dirt piles at the beginning

it is the very beginning of a level, but not the first level

i did confirm along with kuba-j that it is indeed much slower than hardware there

[abstract drift]

ah yeah i just found it "It's immediately noticeable on the 3rd mission where you have to keep up with an elevated train. Right at the beginning of the mission, you have to slalom around a few piles of dirt, and go through some small pieces of trash on the street. The slowdown is extreme."

[crisp ether]

that is where it is very noticeably divergent from hardware. it seems to maybe run slow relative to hw in general on MiSTer overall though, that part just gets extreme

would definitely be a good spot to see what is going on

[abstract drift]

have you got a save at mission 3?

[crisp ether]

no, but there might be one around somewhere, or a cheat. i have to go to bed due to work tomorrow at the moment

looks like there are complete saves on gamefaqs, i bet you could load into the mission directly from one of those but i haven't checked

[ivory verge]

This can be reproduced in every mission; there are points where the game slows down significantly. You can easily notice this in the first mission just by driving through the city.

[mortal oracle]

If nobody beats me to it, I can try to create a savestate at that point later today

[serene nebula]

Ah wow, just like real Chicago

[stone ore]

For light gun games
Will my setup accept a light gun?
VGA connected monitor and this adapter

[dense wharf]

try it out

[stone ore]

I don’t have the gun
But wanna buy one like this

[dense wharf]

what kind of monitor is it?

[stone ore]

VGA crt

[dense wharf]

it might work

[stone ore]

I don’t know if the yellow composite video cable will need to be connected to a composite input on a crt tv?

I think it will?

[dense wharf]

the yellow cable from the guncon goes into the one on the snac adapter

[stone ore]

Yep, then the other end is female, so I’m wondering if I then need to feed to a crt tv (not monitor)

[dense wharf]

no

it just has to go into the snac

guncon on a snac works on my VGA monitor, but it doesnt work for everyone

[dense wharf]

you dont use that

its irrelevant to the mister

[stone ore]

Hmm strange
But good thank you
Hopefully it doesn’t need that video cable
I always assumed they included the female for people who don’t have scart etc
I used to have the light gun and can’t recall ever using composite cables

[shut escarp]

I dont believe that will work with a guncon, That is a 480p monitor and guncon only works with 240p

[stone ore]

Ah okay
Any way to scale it back to 240p

[shut escarp]

I don't -think- so but some VGA monitors have wacky settings / features.

Generally, you'll need a regular 480i/240p consumer television (or PVM monitor) for light gun stuff and they wont play nice with PC CRTs which are 480p minimum

[stone ore]

This is the reported resolution on time crisis if it means anything

[shut escarp]

Hmmmm, That's more promising then

[stone ore]

Just got a gun to try
If I set the psx core setting to snac the trigger does make a sound but nothing on the crt
If I set to guncon in the core then I get nothing
Any ideas incase its user error

[still palm]

jumper needs set on analog io board v6.1,it's next to user port (set it to io6) or the yellow plug won't work and you'd need to hook it up elsewhere

or it's just the monitor anf GC not seeing the flashes

[serene nebula]

pins updated, also link to latest mister main in pin

[mortal oracle]

Kuba strikes again!

Will try and find some time to fire up Driver 2 now and get a save state for the slowdown

Let's hope the tutorial isn't as brutal as in the first game 😄

[digital zinc]

There is no tutorial

[ivory verge]

I wanted all the games that came out for the PlayStation launch in Japan (1994) to be fully playable 😄

A. IV Evolution
Crime Crackers
Gokujō Parodius Da! Deluxe Pack
Mahjong Goku Sky: Atsushi
Mahjong Station Mazin
Nekketsu Oyako
Ridge Racer
TAMA

all are now working correctly

[mortal oracle]

Amazing, thank you!

[ivory verge]

what problem ? 🙂

yeah , it's the launch list 😄

only Parodius and Crime Crackers had a problem

i don't see any slowdowns , but yes there are bug with screen adjust

but it's nothing serious

[mortal oracle]

@tropic stratus , @ivory verge – Here's a save state just before the slowdown in Driver 2. (There's also a regular save that should be at the start of the mission, in case I did the save state too late to get the problem).

[ivory verge]

thanks!

[mortal oracle]

Lemme know if it's borked in any way and I can redo it 🙂

(I remember that mission well 😅)

[stone ore]

This is how it’s currently set - looks okay?

[still palm]

yes looks correct.

[stone ore]

Thanks
Then in core set the core to snac
The side a and b buttons work to progress the intro in point blank but then the calibration doesn’t work in terms or the cursor - trigger button work or makes a sound tho

[still palm]

if trigger works and screen flashes or it makes a sound you'll probably have to try it on a crt and not that pc monitor (if you have one)

[stone ore]

Oh sad times
I assume it’s a monitor issue then
Screen does flash and gun shot sounds but it doesn’t show the cursor on calibration screen which I THINK it does on og hardware at the calibration screen

Thanks for the input tho @still palm

[sinful thicket]

I was able to get PSX working pretty well on my NEC FE700 using this custom modeline:

forced_scandoubler=1
vga_scaler=1
video_mode=640,16,96,48,480,10,2,33,25175,-hsync,-vsync```

This works well on the N64 and Saturn cores for me as well

[tacit fox]

@ivory verge THANK YOU for what you're doing with this core! ❤️

[proven seal]

PSX core is definitely one of the top 5 mister cores imo, and it's really awesome to see kuba come in and button up a lot of the longstanding issues. this is shaping up to be a perfect core

[mortal oracle]

Definitely my favourite core

Followed by the N64 core

[chilly kraken]

JT says that the NGPC is getting saving either this week or next...

🎶 🎶 🎶 So you're about to change your tune 🎶 🎶 🎶

[manic citrus]

this song sucks

[serene nebula]

Can he take it out of beta plz

[mortal oracle]

When it’s finished….

[serene nebula]

Fine

[chilly kraken]

I have been guilting him on his server. don't worry, I got u

[mortal oracle]

Doesn’t it still have some major issues?

[chilly kraken]

yeah

[sand minnow]

Currently, it can't play Pac-Man

even though it was on a list of working games early on

[clear rock]

Core is getting renamed to Neo Geo Pocket Color Forever

[tropic stratus]

Thank you!
the game will slow down starting at around timer 1:57:5x and run fast again at around 1:56:00.
This has nothing to do with where you are in the world or where you are looking at. Instead it's because of the CD loading.
You can easily see this with the LBA overlay in the debug menu: the game only runs slow while the CD is reading.
If I remove the CD completly and then load the savestate, the game will slow down forever after 1:57:xx
If i "open the lid" then load the savestate, the game will freeze at the same spot it would slow down and continue when the lid is closed again.
If I use fast seek and 8x CD speed, the slowdown is even worse.
Turbo has no effect on low and medium, but doubled the speed on high, which means that CPU speedup alone doesn't help, but DMA and GTE speedup helps.

Looked into my emulator and what happens:

• game sets new position on the CD to read
• reads it
• issues pause (causing a long wait time)
• setmode (drive speed set to same value, so has no effect?)

There is an interesting comment about pause in the code:
"todo: should this be swapped between single speed and double speed? DuckStation has double speed longer and psx spx doc has single speed being longer"

Duckstation however swapped this end of 2024:
from

const TickCount pause_time = IsReadingOrPlaying() ? (s_state.mode.double_speed ? 2000000 : 1000000) : 7000;

to

const TickCount min_ticks = (s_state.mode.double_speed ? 1000000 : 2000000);

New build with that change: gameplay now drops from ~20fps to ~14 instead of ~9 fps before while the CD reading is going on.
Not sure what the framerate on a ps1 is, but I would be very surprised if that wasn't the root cause.

[mortal oracle]

Wow, thank you for looking into this, fixing it so quickly, and providing a detailed explanation on the cause of the issue. Can’t wait to test the new core!

Is there any other game you think that might be affected positively/negatively so that we can focus our testing to be most helpful?

[manic dirge]

I'm not sure if this can be of any use to Robert or not for the PSX core, but found it very interesting, and a good read about Spyro 3's anti-tamper mechanisms.

https://gbatemp.net/threads/i-tricked-the-ps1-hardware-to-ignore-spyro-3s-uncrackable-security.678736/

[tropic stratus]

we discussed about it the last days already, tldr: it's nothing new PSX documenation tells everything about it

[lusty coral]

#1046940919607345272 message

[tropic stratus]

a whole lot of games, if not all could be influenced. It's a quite common command, however most of the time the game would not busy-wait for it to finish.
I would like to wait for someone to compare against ps1 if framerate more or less match now.

[mortal oracle]

Thank you. Agree, that would be great to know

[somber steppe]

Oh no, I missed all the driver 2 action.

[mortal oracle]

Good news! Now you have another excuse to play it! 😉

[dull ledge]

Hey guys, is there a hot key to turn guncon on or off? I think I hit I pushed into the trackpad on my dualsense and it said something like guncon off and then on. Could this be the issue people are having? Kind of like how you can change from digital to analog mode in game but with guncon on/off instead? I couldn’t get guncon to work for weeks until I changed some setting and just worked as intended

[somber steppe]

It's a great version of a great game! Better than driver 3 for sure.

[shut escarp]

when you push the trackpad it says Analog on and off not guncon

[clear rock]

This talk about a dormant debug command reminds me, I might have misunderstood but I think I recall hearing that the PSX has basically a terminal for debug/dev purposes that is still running internally even though it's not really hooked up to anything? And that many retail games still output to this since it's not like they needed to remove it if the user would never see it. Is that true or did I misunderstand?

It's actively sending it through the serial port? What about games that had link support?

Also by "comms link" do you mean those ISA cards with the parallel port that were meant to connect to those action replays from the '90s?

Nice, I have one of those parallel cards still in my Pentium 3 computer, I used to use it to back up my Saturn saves

Is there a way to view this terminal output on the core or is it not implemented?

AFAIK it dosen't, I meant if there is a way to view that data somehow or if the core dosen't process it

[stone ore]

Hey
I hope there is a simple fix but not looking hopeful for me
I don’t really understand why the cursor / tracking doesn’t work
Did you have to config the guncon somehow?
Naturally I’ve just set it to snac and hoped it would work

[shut escarp]

It does just work when set to snac and used with a 240p TV instead of a 480p monitor

[dull ledge]

I was having issues for a while as well. I even tried a reflex adapt and installed updated mapping config and did update all again. Then I decided to try the SNAC adapter again and just started working so unsure how o can help

[shut escarp]

Didn’t you have the composite sync plugged in to the wrong place initially?

[stone ore]

Mines connected just here
I’m sure it’s the issue on vga monitor and not crt tv disappointingly

[chilly kraken]

Just a reminder that if we can get some eyes on this, maybe Kuba and Robert can coordinate a new release #1046940919607345272 message

[mortal oracle]

I don’t know if Robert’s build contains Kuba’s changes too, or if it’s a different branch?

So it might be good to get them both in one build at some point. Though we can still test independently

[chilly kraken]

yeah, I think after both are verified as good, we can merge them. Might be better to have them separate for now in the event that there is a regression in one of them

[ivory verge]

I have prepared a draft PR, but I am waiting to see if anyone finds any problems. There shouldn't be any, but you never know.

[little frost]

I have noticed that if you are touching (not pressing) the trackpad on a DS4 or Dualsense at all while pressing the Menu button it will switch to “Lightgun mode” @shut escarp

[shut escarp]

ahhh lets you use the touchpad as a mouse for lightgun stuff

gotcha

[little frost]

for the longest time i thought there was a bug or something that was turning on Lightgun mode when pressing Menu and then I finally realized that I was just baaaarely grazing the touchpad when I pressed it

[dull ledge]

Oh I see. That’s what happened to me. Ok. Good to know.

[mortal oracle]

Tested Robert’s latest build - seems much better on Driver 2 generally

Not seeing as much random slowdown - now the slowdown seems to correspond to things actually happening on the screen, which makes sense

Before it seemed to occasionally randomly slow

Which makes sense given his message

But that scene in particular is still bad - and I suspect it was on real hardware. Just a bit of a perfect storm - very slow scene combined with the additional slowdown from the CD stuff

Also tried a few other games and nothing seems broken or worse

[ivory verge]

I will check Driver 2 on real hardware this weekend

[mortal oracle]

It’s a great game

Yep. I used to play it loads back in the day

Driving around and being able to get out of the car was mind blowing back in the day

Then GTA3 came out

I never managed to link two consoles up 😭

Oh, I did with the Xbox 🤔

[shut escarp]

oh neat i didnt know R4 had 4 player mode like that

ive done a bunch of split screen R4 with jogcon and negcon

[little frost]

it’s so cool that some of these longstanding issues are still getting fixed…amazing!

[opal carbon]

Omg this makes me so happy. I beat Driver 1 last year on MiSTer and was bummed that Driver 2 wasn’t working. Thank you for looking into this issue!

[mystic flare]

the Bushido Blade system link was very cool to experience

i modded 2x ps1 with the Xstation and imported the cable

[somber steppe]

I'm thinking about selling mine.

[mystic flare]

market was flooded with xstation modded consoles

i was quite tired of ebayers trying to knock my price down to the competition despite my listings having a full re-cap, region free bios and other QoL treatments

[serene nebula]

Dude with both players in first person? It was so awesome.

[clear rock]

Dosen't the xstation take care of regions anyway?

[mortal oracle]

Is that your collection?

Also those cases are ugly compared with the ones in Europe 😅

[serene nebula]

I think the European ones are ugly so there!!!!!!!!

The people are beautiful though

[mortal oracle]

😠

[serene nebula]

But not the PS1 cases!!!!!

I’m kidding, they’re probably better lol

[mortal oracle]

You really don’t like them? 🥺

[serene nebula]

I dunno, I just assume it’s nicer

I forgot how they looked like

[mortal oracle]

Our Dreamcast cases were nice too, but flimsy as hell so they all broke

[clear rock]

What about the old style PS1 cases?

[mortal oracle]

Ours were fatter and had a wider edge - they looked unique

Although tbf that one probably isn’t original because I think they all said “PlayStation” on the black edge

[mortal oracle]

Were they everywhere, or just in US/NTSC?

[clear rock]

I think they were just in the US, and only around the launch era, they switched to steandard Jewel cases pretty quickly

same with saturn, I have a few games with those long style cases like that

I think my copy of NiGHTS is the long case version, like this

[mortal oracle]

That’s pretty cool

[clear rock]

Saturn took longer I think to switch to standard cases

[mortal oracle]

Although the Tekken one kinda sucks since the artwork is empty at the bottom 😅

[serene nebula]

Yeah those are great

[clear rock]

Actually, wait, did Saturn even switch? I think they mght have stuck with it in US

And just used standard cases in Japan

[serene nebula]

I have the one PS1 game with a purple spine, THE ONLY GAME

bkueish purle

Like Mario’s Sky

[clear rock]

It generally allowed for a bigger manual, but they had to put in a piece of foam to protect the CD:

IIRC, some of the PS1 long cases were also all a brittle black plastic, no clear parts

[mortal oracle]

Manuals… thems was the days

https://tenor.com/view/jpsigh-rapunzel-disney-gif-7569593

[clear rock]

Here's an example:

[serene nebula]

Yeah I have a collection of longboxes

[clear rock]

The middle and right one are the older style of the tall boxes, that were all opaque black plastic instead of having a clear part

[mortal oracle]

Oh, the edge was ridged originally

It was the fake printed one that I hated

[clear rock]

Must.. Not.. Make.. Obvious.. Joke...

[mortal oracle]

[mortal oracle]

^

[serene nebula]

it was a big day for him

What can I say

[mortal oracle]

What was the plot?

[serene nebula]

made by Mastiff too lol

Well

[mortal oracle]

Was it like Conker’s bad fur day?

[serene nebula]

No it’s like some collection of really shitty jigsaw puzzles for kids

[mortal oracle]

That doesn’t sound very big

Wouldn’t make a good YouTube video

[manic citrus]

https://tenor.com/view/anime-eyebrows-hey-gif-10311326

[mortal oracle]

That’s really wholesome

I feel bad now

Very egg-citing

[serene nebula]

Yeah you’ve got read ridges and fake ridges

[mortal oracle]

Fake ridges smh

[serene nebula]

But then you got racing ridges

All types of ridges

[abstract drift]

i've only got one longbox - doom

[serene nebula]

lol early Namco manual art

[serene nebula]

Hell yeah

[mortal oracle]

Custom PlayStation edition 😎

aka without the awesome music

[abstract drift]

you mean with right?

[serene nebula]

The only problem is the D ain’t ridged

No ridged D for thee

[ivory verge]

King's Field

[serene nebula]

yah game is cool

I got the second one too

[ivory verge]

it's slow , it;s ugly but i love it 😄

[mortal oracle]

Devs will never make it big

[serene nebula]

what the fuk is this game

Why do I have it LOOOL

[abstract drift]

D?

[mortal oracle]

Quiz dreams, eh, Roberto?

[serene nebula]

LOL WTF

I have so many weird ass Japanese games

[abstract drift]

i'm just going to assume its about helping that blue lady find her lost clothes

[mortal oracle]

That would be my assumption

[empty yacht]

does not sound like a pleasurable experience then

[serene nebula]

The hell is this

LOL

[mortal oracle]

Looks like it might be good tbh

Atlus, sick name

[mortal oracle]

That’s looks awesome

[serene nebula]

That looks way cooler than my bullshit

[mortal oracle]

You guys should make a list of your hidden gems

[abstract drift]

can you stop making me want to go unbox my physical games and get shelves for them again

i just packed them all away

[mortal oracle]

Googled it and that game looks unplayable unless you know Japanese, sadly 🙁

Unless there’s a patch out there

[abstract drift]

you can get a lot done pointing your phone at games to translate these days

[mortal oracle]

Yeah but that’s a painful experience imo

For a whole game anyway

[abstract drift]

yeah depending how reading heavy it is

[mortal oracle]

Maybe with the DE-32.5 Maxi we can use AI to translate everything

[mortal oracle]

Looks like a hybrid game with some RPG-ish elements

So might be quite reading heavy imo

[serene nebula]

Want to play an FMV game where you work with Adam West (original Batman) to find who stole the Chaos Chip, a microchip capable of advanced problem-solving from your ex-girlfriend?

[mortal oracle]

@serene nebula do you have a list/catalogue of all your games?

[mortal oracle]

Of course

[serene nebula]

That’s the game

[mortal oracle]

[serene nebula]

Hope you’re good at poker and other casino games.

[mortal oracle]

Sadly I don’t know the rules of poker

[abstract drift]

my collection is too small (thankfully tbh) to need a database for it or anything

[mortal oracle]

It’s way too confusing for me

[serene nebula]

doesn’t matter, Adam West helps you

[abstract drift]

only my absolute favorites

[serene nebula]

Yeah I went buck wild unfortunately

now I have mister and don’t touch those games lol

[mortal oracle]

All my old games are in my parents’ attic 😅

Left them there when I moved out for uni. Think they’re still there…

[abstract drift]

quite alot of my collection is actually loose discs too so it fits in a cd folder

[mortal oracle]

But no core can be perfect. Why don’t you play on original hardware?

[serene nebula]

honestly? Laziness lol

[mortal oracle]

Do you want to test Driver 2 for us and compare to Robert’s new core?

[abstract drift]

you're way more likely to get issues from your real PSX's aging laser than from the cores remaining issues

[mortal oracle]

I was just trolling him based on an argument we had earlier 😄

But we kissed and made up, and then he showed me his ridgeless D

[abstract drift]

i've got a real PSX with xstation and hdmi mod and i still use the core 9/10 times

[mortal oracle]

Yeah, I have no reason to use original hardware for any of the cores MiSTer supports

I won’t sell the consoles/games, but I probably should because they’ll just stay in storage until I die

[abstract drift]

yeah mines just for verifying bugs at this point heh

[mortal oracle]

Sadly I’m a PAL gamer soooo

[abstract drift]

we get pal bugs too

[mortal oracle]

As if any of you ever play those games

[abstract drift]

pal is less of an afterthought on roberts cores than others

as he likes to play in german

[ivory verge]

Most of my PSX game collection on MiSTer is PAL

[mortal oracle]

For real? Nice

There’s the odd game that I’m tempted to go back to the PAL version. The accurate speed NTSC ones are much faster than I remember 😅

Like the WWF Smackdown games

I feel like 95% of my PS1 game playing time was spent playing the 5 WWF games I had 😅

[ivory verge]

Ever since the first PSX test cores appeared, I've been testing PAL versions, not many people wanted to do that 🙂

[abstract drift]

i prefer PAL wipeout - it was made in europe

[mortal oracle]

I have a few PAL games where I heard those versions were better. Wipeout and Colin McRae are the ones that come to mind

[ivory verge]

I don't know, it's also a matter of sentiment. That's how I remember those games, that's how they worked and that's how they looked to me. I don't have that with any other system, and PS1 is the most important console ever for me

[mortal oracle]

I can relate to that

Most of the NTSC versions seem the same to me, just with the exception of the Smackdown games that are too fast, and a couple of others that have different names (rapid racer)

Oh, and Gran Turismo PAL had a much better soundtrack iirc

[ivory verge]

#help message

Do you remember? 😄

[mortal oracle]

Way before my time 😭

I was still using a stinky raspberry pi back then

[lusty coral]

Only thing I do not like about PAL is the pal covers for Resident Evil

Resident Evil 2 looks grim

But the Japanese covers, pure gold

[frail storm]

Edward Scissorhands Tag Tournament

[mortal oracle]

I think RE1 had the same cover as in Japan

So it was basically as Miyamoto intended

Nope, I am wrong. Sorry

[lusty coral]

They look so good

[mortal oracle]

Playing Driver 1 to test out the recent core builds. Really enjoying it

Forgot how good it was

[clear rock]

https://tenor.com/view/shocked-worf-star-trek-the-next-generation-huh-gif-23507451

[clear rock]

I know I have a Darkstalkers longbox, I think that's my only one

[clear rock]

I think some softwar emulators alrady can do that, never tried it so no idea how well it works

[mortal oracle]

It’s pretty easy to do on a PC tbh

[mystic flare]

they were some quirks and edge cases.
i also preferred certain bios screens to other and removal of any trace of PAL50

[mortal oracle]

Just compared the smackdown games and they seem to be the same speed across PAL and NTSC. Just seem faster than I remember now I’m old

[mortal oracle]

Oh, I might have found a bug, but it’s a bit tricky to figure out…

WWF War Zone PAL seems to freeze on the intro FMV (video freezes, sound keeps playing). It seems like it’s fine 9/10 times on the latest stable core (2025-12-04), but on the two recent test builds (pause Swap and 2026-01-13) it seems to freeze more often than not. I thought it was a bug introduced between the stable and recent test builds, but if I take a save state and reload it, occasionally the stable build will freeze too.
It might be that I made the save state “too late” on a potentially "bad" core (i.e. one with an error) which causes something to mess up occasionally even on the stable core - but it’s interesting… NTSC version seems completely fine though

bin/cue redump images running from a usb ssd (never had any problems before)

It's in the opening FMV, so should be easy enough to reproduce in case someone wants to try – but here's a savestate as well

I'll dig in again tomorrow to see if I can figure out any consistent conditions. It's definitely much less frequent on the stable core – unless I'm just imagining things

[ivory verge]

i tried your save state , it's totaly random, even with old cores it could be happen

[ivory verge]

hangs on second run, on core 20250825

test bulid 20260113 , sixth run hangs

The problem exists, but it is completely random regardless of the core version.

[mortal oracle]

Thanks for looking into it ❤️

Maybe it also happens on original hardware. I don’t have my PS1 nearby so I can’t test to confirm 🙁

[tropic stratus]

strange that it happens randomly. There is not much randomness in the PSX core other than VRAM (due to being in DDR3) and slightly async Video clock.

I understand if it's in a game, but during boot time is really strange

[ivory verge]

only happens during FMV

it's not always even the same point

And honestly, if you start the game and watch the intro once, you'll probably never even encounter a moment where it freezes. I didn't.

[tropic stratus]

can you skip it?

[ivory verge]

yes

[tropic stratus]

ok, so at least some very easy workaround

[ivory verge]

When I test games, I often leave them to play FMV/gamplay continuously.

but WWF games are not my favorite 😄

[clear rock]

If it's random could that be an issue with memory timings of the FPGA competing with the CPU for the DDR3?

[tropic stratus]

Without these random timings of DDR3, the only other randomness is the video clock, but that level of randomness is minimal. So it's very likely the DDR3 as source of this

Some very old core had synchronous video out, but it's probably too old to be worth testing.

it's not completly removed, but requires a new build: https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/PSX_MiSTer/blob/main/PSX.sv#L262-L263C6

But to be honest, I wouldn't spend the time unless you really love that intro

[mortal oracle]

(It pretty constantly froze for me - not freezing was rare)

[mortal oracle]

If you really love the intro you can see it on the NTSC version. That one didn’t seem to crash for me

[ivory verge]

It never freezes for me on first playback on any core

[mortal oracle]

And it was always at the same point for me

Feels like we might be getting some different behaviour 😅

[clear rock]

I wonder if the release of the SuperStation One is going to make these bug reports even murkier, since it uses an open bios

[mortal oracle]

I mean, I don’t care and it’s not important. I was just sharing in case it was useful/relevant for development

[ivory verge]

I'm glad you reported it!

thanks bro 🙂

[mortal oracle]

If I can stomach the process of cold rebooting and reproducing, I might try and record some stats - just because it’s interesting that we see something different 😄

[clear rock]

I had a weird issue like that with a saturn game, if I left the intro running it eventually freezes, nobody else could replicate it

[ivory verge]

only difference is that i use micro sd card

timings ?

i don't know

[mortal oracle]

In the grand scheme of things it’s not important

[ivory verge]

I will check the core with the video sync out option enabled

[mortal oracle]

It’s only one of the greatest games of all time 😭

(It’s not)

Maybe the game itself is broken 😄

[clear rock]

NiGHTS? 😛

[mortal oracle]

Me too, but I don’t recall watching the FMV too much 😅

I don’t remember an issue though, so it’s provably a core thing

Probably*

I suspect Kuba would have noticed by now 😅

Or Robert

[ivory verge]

I mainly test PAL versions, I have no problems with FMV in my set of games

so it's definitely not a common occurrence

Personally, I don't want to spend too much time looking for the cause of this wwf bug.

its very minor

[tropic stratus]

FF8+9 both have very long FMVs and i completed both without any crashes with the german version.

[somber steppe]

When testing FMVs the fear effect games gotta be some of the best games to test, they run FMVs in the background a lot of the time.

[ivory verge]

Yes, I played Fear Effect, it works fine

[clear rock]

I thought my PSX core was bugged the other day because of IQ's weird soundtrack 🤣

It completely does not fit the game and I thought it had somehow cached the tracklist from a previous image I had loaded that session before I switched to IQ

[frail storm]

That's maybe my favorite OST on the system. For PSX, I don't think there's a single OST with so high production values, except maybe Heart of Darkness.
Man, how I love both of those games, in part because of their music...

[clear rock]

It feels like I am exploring a forest or the world map in a JRPG

Not... doing cube-based puzzles in a dark void

[frail storm]

What the game is trying to "tell" is an sci-fi tale, akin to the original TRON film.
The delicate classical/symphonic music fits the 70's/80's notion of high culture and reflexive sci-fi, as opposed to today's only "fi" based around mindless action with no philosophical themes.

IMHO, sci-fi became dangerous for capitalism, so it was swapped for stupid StarWars-like stuff so people don't dream about utopias, as that would hurdle the enslaving process we're in

[clear rock]

I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not

[manic citrus]

it's also hilarious given what Lucas has said about Star Wars

[frail storm]

IQ's music is not very different from, let's say, Robert Wise's Star Trek 1979 film or Star Trek:TNG, but these are huge marxist utopias so current terminal capitalism sci-fi has moved away from the themes and the culture on those on purpose

[frail storm]

Not at all. I am very serious. But I will leave it here.

[clear rock]

You mean that Jar Jar is the key to all of it?

[frail storm]

Jar Jar is a stupid character in a stupid saga that was fun in the 70s and 80s, nothing more

[clear rock]

Jar Jar is from like 00

Also that was an actual quote from Lucas IIRC

That many have memed to hell

[frail storm]

But as I said, I will leave it here. Too many conditioned people around I don't want to offend.
Simply understand that, at a time, actual good music like the one in IQ was to be expected on a videogame with an sci-fi setting, because that was how culture worked when there was such thing as culture.

[clear rock]

I am saying the music simply dosen't fit the tone of the game

Not that it's bad

[frail storm]

And I explained why you feel like that about the music in that game.
For me, it fits the game perfectly. And I wish videogames had evolved in that line, instead of the insufferable POS they are today.

[clear rock]

Please don't try to tell me why I believe the things I do, that's pretty rude

[mortal oracle]

You’re not cultured enough to appreciate it

[clear rock]

.... how do you not see that as being rude?

[mortal oracle]

I’m kidding

[frail storm]

ok, ok, just ignore everything I said, sorry I made you feel like that! 🙂

[clear rock]

This is literally a "You need a high IQ to appreciate Rick and Morty" moment

🙄

[manic citrus]

open your third eye

[frail storm]

No need to complicate our lives with such discussions. You are perfectly fine!

[frail storm]

Ah no, I stay away from spiritual junk, so no 😄

[clear rock]

I can't, it has Astigmatism

[mortal oracle]

You’re not cultured enough to appreciate it

[frail storm]

If you mean retro-cultured enough as people in some parts of the world where religion is on a high revival, yes, then I am proudly uncultured 😄

[clear rock]

Well, hopefully you become cultured enough some day to realize how silly you're being 😛

[frail storm]

Oh, direct insult. No better arguments huh?
I will let time and history make it's job, there's nothing I can change.
Have a nice day! (And don't take it personal!)

[digital zinc]

[clear rock]

Anyway, of the games I was trying out I finally managed to put a decent amount of time into Vagrant Story, I game I remember seeing commercials for all the time and thuoght it looked neat but never had the chance to play. Was very impressed by it, felt more like one of Square's PS2 era cinematic RPGs than a PS1 era RPG

Though I miss getting EXP from fights

[abstract drift]

does vagrant story ever move to a setting other than brown caves/dungeons?

i've bounced off it so many times in the first hour

[clear rock]

I only played for about 4 hours, but I was underground that whole time

... plenty of non-underground settings in cutscenes though, and technically the intro fight is in a castle/cathedrial

[scenic ledge]

Sidney was so cool. It was just pure luck that I didn't end up with his tattoo

[tender tartan]

There’s some variation to the environments. You’re on the village streets for a while. But mostly dungeons, yep.

[cosmic tulip]

Yes

There's also the forest

[dull wedge]

@tropic stratus Question, I made someone do a test for me on the PS1 core to see if cop0 is fully implemented, it is often neglected in emulation. So I had high hopes for MiSTer since it should be accurate to the real deal. Sadly, according to the test for my specific use case, it didn't work. So perhaps it can be improved. I helped debug it for Duckstation as it also didn't properly implement it. Unlike what is commonly believed, it does actually get used, for Legacy of kain for example using it as secret storage for libcrypt keys. What I did with it however is completely different, I used it to change EPC in real time to bypass Spyro 3's security without leaving a footprint. I did this on retail hardware by re-enabling the debug exception vector at 80000040. So far only 3 emulators support it + the real Playstation. I can offer a patch/mod for Spyro 3 that re-enables the double jump from Spyro 2 to prove this, only when it succesfully triggers, cop0 should be properly implemented

Question being, was cop0 taken into account for the core?

[abstract drift]

#1046940919607345272 message

[dull wedge]

Lol that is my article (dramatic by design I might add to also entertain the non technical reader)

So the case is already known

It is indeed using execution breakpoints, the use for them are re-enabled at boot in my mod. As the exception vector for it is nopped out by Sony. But some games still use it as hidden storage

[clear rock]

Was it only used as storage for libcrypt keys, or did any games use it for anything else?

[fluid raft]

@ivory verge
Hello, how are you?
Could you please let me know if you plan to release a build including the c-blend option for the most recent updated versions of the PSX and N64 cores?
Thank you very much for your attention and for all the great work you’ve been doing

[dull wedge]

Don't think it was used for much else. It gets set up at boot, you can see it when stepping through at the bios startup. Probably as an init value. So besides lybcript, I think Sony told all the devs to not touch the debug exception vector, unless a debug unit was being used. So a debug unit bios probably has it enabled by default, on retail ps1 the vector is nopped out, but it is usable, just gotta redirect it

Either way, it works on a real retail PS1. Which to me is always the golden standard

[abstract drift]

a test rom for it would certainly be helpful

[clear rock]

I agree that 100% parity with the original hrdware should be the gold standard, but just a few years ago just about nobody thought PS1 would even be possible on MiSTer, including the person who wrote the PS1 core. I would love it to be 100% but I don't think it's possible on the DE-10.

[abstract drift]

rob already said this is possible

its just not in since we didn;t know how to test it

[dull wedge]

Well whomever I need to send the rom to, let me know @abstract drift if an explanation is needed on how to do a double jump that is fine too, or a noob friendly version that just adds a life when jumping

[abstract drift]

ideally the testrom isn't a whole game, it can take hours to simulate a game up to gameplay

[dull wedge]

I just make simple tests since I don't own debugging hardware, the games are my debuggers along with 3 emulators. I know how to program it in ASM and know the expect outcome, that's how I get away with it

[clear rock]

I said I don't think it's possible to make the core 100%, not specifically this feature. Also IIRC didn't Robert say that basically the more you add the more it makes stuff like the turbo core less viable?

But yeah, if there is a test rom that can help see if the feature works as intended when added. I wonder if this would impact libcrypt games though

The current implementation of them I mean

[abstract drift]

i'm kind of curious how legacy of kain even works on the core

if it really needs that

[clear rock]

Don't libcrypt games had subchannel files to get past the copy protection? Also IIRC it's only PAL region games that ever used it

[abstract drift]

yeah we've got the subchannel stuff

[clear rock]

Was the infamous Spyro 3 DRM only in the PAL version too?

[abstract drift]

it doesn't bypass libcrypt though it kinda just makes it work naturally

[dull wedge]

The method I use with the BPC/BPCM/DCIC allows one execution breakpoint at a time, but I cycle them and know the naturally flow and path the game takes. Spyro 3 for example will stop you at boot on a shitty chipped system, but that can be bypassed invisible by changing the corresponding conditional jumps to always take the branch by trapping it, then changing the EPC, then in the exception vector you use K0 and K1 to do the compares to the EPC, knowing on which branch it happened. Thus defeating the AP/AT while all integrity checks pass. Did the same thing for my double jump

[clear rock]

That initial stop you are talking about, that's for non-stealth modchips right? Surprised it had that, games started to remove that check since it goes off regardless if your copy is legit or not, and just a simple gameshark can bypass it

[dull wedge]

Yeah exactly, but those gameshark codes can not target assembly when it comes to Spyro 3, normally, it'll trigger AP later on. Spyro is extremely aggressive. A ram code that checks the 14 loops works, but the one that is out there is redundant being 28 lines, it could have been 2

But the method I now use can do assembly changes, without being spotted. So, Sony left us a really nice tool

This is also how some anti-cheat can be bypassed on more modern systems, simmilar concept

[dull wedge]

It's full on assembly, the first line reads when the jmp to the game becomes active, but goes to 8000B0BC instead where it installs all custom exception handlers before it boots into the actual game. 90 (4 byte) code types can be split up into the gameshark 80 (2 byte) style except for the first line, it's a 4 byte conditional IF equal. I helped conjure up most of the ideas for the Duckstation code types, I'm one of their in-house cheat code providers

[clear rock]

I know the game shark would not have been able to get past Spyro 3's DRM, I meant the first one that's just the modchip check that other games had too

[tropic stratus]

Legacy of cain works, as storing data in COP0 works perfectly, it's just the breakpoint exception that doesn't trigger as so far no one needed it and I had no way to test it even works without writing tests myself.
If you have a test, feel free to just post it here, tests should be small enough.
In theory this should be pretty simple. The main question for such things is always in which cycle to trigger, so it throws the exection at the correct program counter.
This is more complex than in duckstation, as the core replicates the full 5 stage CPU pipeline.
But if your test does check for the saved PC in the exception handler, it should be straight forward.
(for your code it might not matter if the exception and return point is really exact, but to be exact it makes a huge difference)

[somber steppe]

Speaking of legacy of kain, is there a way to speed up the loading time when opening the menu on mister? Great game but those loading times are really a bit much.

[ivory verge]

maybe try changing the CD speed to 4/6/8x

[somber steppe]

Afaik it's something with data not being stored where it's supposed to, with the devs having to rush the port on psx.

[mortal oracle]

Or just play the game as Miyamoto intended

[dull wedge]

My testing so far is game-driven, real hardware first. I step through the flow in a debugger, then validate on a retail PS1 by reflecting state in-game (for example, mapping a value like EPC after a debug exception to something visible such as score/lives), so it is not a synthetic “test ROM” yet.
If that level of evidence is useful for MiSTer, I can help, 100%.

Two key points from what I have observed:

The debug exception must trigger at the exact address. DuckStation initially fired it 4 bytes early, and that difference mattered, because it would cause conditional branches to fail, that got fixed. In other words, if the breakpoint is set for instruction at X, the exception needs to be taken at X, not X-4.

EPC behavior: the general rule is EPC is effectively read-only in the sense that writing back to the EPC register itself does not behave like writing to normal state. It is commonly treated as “you don’t patch EPC by storing to it”. In my tests I did it anyway, as it does no harm.

I still want to verify edge cases, but the consensus is that “write EPC back” does nothing. What does matter is what the CPU loads into EPC on exception, and what you return to.

Fastest reproducible test I can offer is Spyro-based: I have a very simple pass/fail signal.
If COP0 debug exception behavior matches real hardware, a jump adds a life (or similar visible flag).
If it does not, the game either crashes or the life never increments.

If you want something cleaner than a full game dependency, I can do a minimal asm-only test too, but it will take more time.

If you are fine with “modify anything for the test case”, then I can adapt the Spyro test quickly and provide exact expected behavior, addresses, and what constitutes pass/fail.

And yes, my test does check the PC/EPC and uses it for a conditional branch. That's how I've done my testing, so it is exact

[austere otter]

Wow, thanks @dull wedge for the extensive research into this! Glad to see more people getting involved in improving the core. 👍

[dull wedge]

It benefits everyone, and I'm a huge PS1 enthusiast.

Eventhough I don't own a MiSTer FPGA system yet, it'd be cool when I do perhaps get the SuperStationOne, that I can rely on it to be as accurate as possible and retire my poor Playstation haha

[austere otter]

PS1 is for sure a very important system on MiSTer for a lot of people. The game library is arguably the best of all systems on it.
I still keep my PSX with Xstation too, but to be honest havent found reasons to boot it up haveing the current MiSTer core. Though I used it for comparisons early on in the core development. I was the one checking Misadventures of Tron Bonne for every new core release until it got fixed 😊 . Those were the times!
Anyway we appreciate your help

[tropic stratus]

unfortunatly Spyro doesn't work well:

• it doesn't show me the status of registers after the exception and I cannot validate against PS1 (or duckstation if that is accurate enough)
• simulation of a game takes ages

Not sure if you have some framework already, but if not you might look into this repo: https://github.com/RobertPeip/PSX
I already added a lot of tests there. Those are easy compiled, easy executed and can provide simple text outputs without much effort.
If you add something there that captures the state after the debug exception and prints it to the screen, I would be very willing to implement it.
Any other test environment is of course also fine.

[dull wedge]

Ill see what I can do when I have some spare time, I'm sure we'll be able to figure something out 😁

[rare gyro]

The SuperStationOne looks so cool, but not sure I could click fast enough to get one 😄

[river otter]

wdym? You can click add to cart right now?

[rare gyro]

really??

[river otter]

https://retroremake.co/products/superstation-one

[glass isle]

Hi, it is possible to support MemcardPro over snac? @tropic stratus

The card works but the game ID is not currently being detected

[somber steppe]

I know this doesn't answer the question but it's very easy to export/import the memory card data between mister and mcp. I migrated all my memory cards by changing the file extension and copying it.

(Rest of the file name also has to be what the mister/mcp expecte, obviously)

[glass isle]

Yes, indeed it's not the same or as convenient as simply inserting the same memcardpro ​​I use on PSX or PS2 into Mister via SNAC and playing the same saved games I already have seamlessly from one place to another.

[tropic stratus]

i have not tried it, but there seems to be a solution: #1046940919607345272 message

[clear rock]

IIRC there is no way for a stock PSX to send that information to the memcard port, you would need some kind of modification such as a PS-IO, xStation, or a modded BIOS, so not surprising that the MiSTer core does not support that without a modified bios either

(From what I understand the PS2 does, but only for PS2 games)

[dull wedge]

So, I did some work today, will do some more work later. Made an executable that will turn red on wrong EPC behaviour, Blue on correct EPC behaviour. Since I've not made an executable like this before, it's been a nice little experiment. So later I'll set up the dcic at boot, and have the normal exception vector re-arm it

Should be plug an play after that

Actually, might maybe only need to set it once, so no need to trigger an additional exception

[tropic stratus]

It's always a question of how far you want to go.
I can imagine all kind of weird things one could test:

• breakpoint exception at some instruction that would throw an exception
• breakpoint exception when interrupt happens
• breakpoint exception at branch instruction
• breakpoint exception in branch delay slot
  But maybe let's keep it simple first and just put it somewhere safe and check for COP0 registers to be correct after it triggered 😅

[glass isle]

Yes, it worked, only in card slot1, but works

[dull wedge]

Yeah, lets keep it simple, build from there. I've built a small list of possible dcic values for execution breakpoint, reading from an address, value change I believe. There's a lot that can be done, I'm probably just scratching the surface. I already figured out ways it could be use for anti-cheat. But that's besides the point for testing purposes, just a cool side effect of the findings

There's a dcic value as well to only catch branches. Could be cool for a trace function when logged to easily find no clips and other stuff. I have something like that for Duckstation (Pugsy made it for me, he does a lot for Mame)

[opal carbon]

Curious what SNAC adapter you’re using. I’m only able to make it work with the Crown Arcade adapter.

But it works reliably and I use my MCP2 with my PSX. Haven’t tried slot 2 but it’s reliable in slot 1 with the hacked BIOS

[clear rock]

Do we still just have the same old choices for PSX SNAC adapters? Only ones they were able to find that did everything I wanted were like $80 or more

[still palm]

retrocastle one might do everything, but let someone that has one confirm

[clear rock]

That's the closest, but the memorycards are a bit of a mess in their placement. Also it was designed to work with their mister stack and while it works with others, it's a bit of a mess to use it with others

[still palm]

there might be different versions of MCP2, I'm not sure of the differences though

[clear rock]

The MCP1 had differences, earliest versions had a FPGA in them, but this apparently made them have all sorts of compatibility issues

Newer versions just have the EMP32 and work a lot better

[still palm]

oh maybe you're right and that's what it was, my memory is a little fuzzy on that

[clear rock]

There is also the SD2PSX

basially an open source MCP

[dull wedge]

Debug exception setup for 0x80010064 & bootup starts at 0x8000B100, then jmps to 80010000

When 0x80010064 is trapped, it brings us the debug exception handler at 0x80000040

0x80000040 has a jmp straight to 0x8000B184, here the DCIC gets de-armed, the epc gets increased by 24

This brings us at 80010088 where we turn the color blue

scenario 1, If non of this ever happens, the screen should turn red.
scenario 2, debug exception never happens so EPC never gets changed, should turn screen red.
scenario 3, a good ol crash (Unlikely)
scenario 4, blue screen but not re-arming or looping back to 8000B100

It eventually all loops back to 8000B100 & starts it all over

My tv, or rather my cheapass upscaler for some reason does not like this shit, so it just shows no input (actually might need to add vblank, else my code is too fast, still fine for a test though).

Maybe for that use case scenario I should try a one shot instead

[dull wedge]

If I disable the cop0 emulation in the debugger on pcsx-redux it will turn red 🙂

Full cop0 emulation only gets emulated on pcsx-redux when the debugging is enabled, so this is a great test

@tropic stratus So, I tried and I did notice that pcsx-redux does allow writing to the EPC, on the PS1 it does no harm either

Might ask Nicolas Noble about that

[tropic stratus]

any chance to compile this into an exe?
With CD, i have to go through the BIOS, which makes simulation impractical. Same effort as debugging with Spyro.

If not, maybe I can create a savestate shortly before the breakpoint...

[dull wedge]

It was an exe before I made it bin/cue, so yes

[dull wedge]

@tropic stratus

If it doesn't display at all, I might need to add a vblank later. Having some people over to fix the heating, so if so it'll be later today

[ivory verge]

Has anyone had the opportunity to test this core #test-builds message for longer? I haven't found any bugs.

[mortal oracle]

No issues that I’ve found, but I’ve been dividing my time between your core and Robert’s pause swap

[ivory verge]

I have merged core with pause changes

[mortal oracle]

Happy to test that also 🙂

[ivory verge]

And thanks for testing @mortal oracle !!!❤️

[mortal oracle]

Thanks. Will copy that over and continue playing games testing

[ivory verge]

It's included my changes from PR + Robert's pause change

[mortal oracle]

So that’s basically everything to now?

Aside from anything you’re currently cooking

[ivory verge]

Yes

[mortal oracle]

@serene nebula pin request please 🙂

[spark ermine]

I'd been jumping between the two cores too and I haven't noticed anything either

[ivory verge]

Thank You ❤️

[mortal oracle]

Freezing intro FMV in WWF War Zone (PAL) update: following @ivory verge’s suggestion, it seems like Turbo low is sufficient to prevent the freezing 🙂

(Thanks kuba)

[tropic stratus]

tried to run it in my emulator.
As it doesn't output anything, I can't tell what is going on.
I zipped an export of the first million CPU instructions executed, maybe you can give me a hint what is going on and what to look at.
I can find the 0x8000B100 entry point, but it never gets to 0x80010000

[dull wedge]

Like, never?

After the routine at 8000B100 there is a straight jump to 80001000

When I get back ill check the log

[tropic stratus]

I just see that when it jumps to 8000b100, there is just no data at this point, so NOP is executed until it hits 8000b940 where some weird data is, causing an exception, going to 80000080

looked at the exe header:

• initial PC is 0x8000b100[offset 0x10]
• load address is 0x80010000[offset 0x18]
• file size is 0x200
  So it copies 512 words from the exe to 0x80010000, but starts executing from 0x8000b100

when i look at other .exe i have, they typically have both initial PC and load address set to 0x80010000

[dull wedge]

Ok, I suppose it is the bios, as an exception should not occur otherwise

[dull wedge]

Yes, but it isn't neccesary. My Spyro 3 patch works the same way. However, I am curious so I will check the log when I am back home.

8000B100 should have data there, if the BIOS is correct (SCPH1001) hle or modded bios could probably set it around 8000A1000, which is wrong. I could potentially isolate it to the 80010000 range completely so BIOS version wouldn't matter as much, as the exception for debug will always happen at 80000040 anyway.

[tropic stratus]

Don't know, I used the exe handler code duckstation had in 2021 for my emulator and the core.

Well, lets say I reimplemented it, so I could have made mistakes back then or it was changed in the meanwhile

[dull wedge]

Duckstation was updated to properly emulate cop0 now

Else it'd just break

I helped Stenzek debug it

I run the scph1001 bios, which alligns with allowing to boot at 8000B100

But I guess as an universal ALL bios, 80010000 could be the new start

[marsh hamlet]

do it worth a gun con 3 for about 60€ for this core? Including sensors

I really want to play point black

[mystic flare]

you could save money and get a wiimote

if you want a high end lightgun experience pay a little more for a gun4ir/openfire

[dull wedge]

This should disregard any bios version

[chilly kraken]

it's weird that I have to put in my social security number to get it to run but whatever

[dull wedge]

?

[chilly kraken]

sorry, just a joke 🙂

[dull wedge]

No, no it's ok

You can give me your social security number

🙂

[chilly kraken]

finally, someone will keep it safe for me

I certainly shouldn't be trusted with it

[dull wedge]

Foh sho homie, foh shooo

[dull wedge]

Might need to add a dummy file for the disc version to satisfy the PS1, gonna test that right quick

[zinc helm]

started with a guncon3. just finished building out a gun4ir with a guncon1. it's night and day. guncon3 felt like a laser pointer presentation because you spent more time looking at the onscreen cross hair. gun4ir felt like what I remembered playing on a CRT aiming down the sights, but on a 65" LCD

[tropic stratus]

ok, now I get red screen, cop0_BPC and cop0_DCIC get loaded, but exception does not yet trigger. Can probably start with that.
There is some issue you might want to look into: there are endless writes to GP0 which overflow the GPU Fifo.

[rare gyro]

Neat that the emulator is still useful at this point

[mild forge]

Is there a way to enable rumble when using a Dualsense? Or is that not supported?

[ionic beacon]

Any recommended snac ps1 adapter to buy in EU? I have a JogCon etc i wanna try

[forest trench]

It should work, you can test in the main menu by holding L and pushing X or Y

[dull wedge]

I am aware, it also goes in a constant loop but at least it serves its purpose for now. I never made an exe like this before, so anything graphical is new to me. I usually do things under the hood, invisible. Never had to setup the GPU for anything before. So aside from the COP0 assembly routine, you're witnessing a new experiment from my side haha

But I'll further work on it. It's a great test. Tried it on a bunch of emulators just to see which ones can be trusted. It's a very small list

[mild forge]

On a keyboard?

[forest trench]

No sorry, the x and y button positions, so Square and Triangle on the actual Dualsense controller

while holding L1 trigger

[mild forge]

Thanks I’ll try this when I get back home.

[mild forge]

By the main menu do you mean the start menu of the mister or the pause menu within the core?

[little frost]

pause menu (OSD) in the core

[forest trench]

the startup menu

lol

[mild forge]

Ooo conflicting stories

[forest trench]

i know it works for sure in the main startup menu, never tried in-core

[mild forge]

Got it. Thanks guys

[little frost]

oh does it only work from the startup screen? I don’t really use autofire, but it seems odd that it wouldn’t just work using the OSD in general

[forest trench]

not autofire, rumble

[little frost]

ohhh

[mild forge]

Ok so startup menu for sure

[little frost]

ok maybe listen to @forest trench 😆

[forest trench]

that's where I always test

[mild forge]

New auto fire feature is awesome btw

[little frost]

I’ve only done that rumble test a couple times a long time ago and can’t remember where I did it

[mild forge]

Can finally use a proper controller for ps1 shmups

[marsh hamlet]

I'm going to look into this then. thank you

[marsh hamlet]

guncon1 or guncon2? I have never had one, so not sure what is better to look into my local marketplaces

[shut escarp]

Guncon1 with SNAC is -flawless- with a CRT on PS1 core

Guncon2 over USB is -very so so- with a CRT but works on all cores and doesnt need any extra adapters

oh but you're talking about scrapping a controller to gun4ir it, rip

[zinc helm]

I used a guncon1 that was sold as not working. I did a basic install, nothing fancy like a solenoid or rumble motor. it's not bad if you have basic soldering skills

[dull wedge]

@tropic stratus So, I've further improved the program. I gotta do some more testing later. Would be cool to eventually have it as a standard for emulators, console copies etc as test rom

[dull wedge]

Here we go, confirmed to work on real console and all the accurate emulators! @tropic stratus

It's a one shot process, so start the break at 80010000 for the whole thing or 800100D4 one step before the custom exception handler should kick in, if behaviour is accurate

[tropic stratus]

Will take a look the next days to implement it. Thank you

[marsh hamlet]

exactly

[dull wedge]

You're welcome, glad to be able to provide some form of help

[marsh hamlet]

CRT it's out of discussion

and I'm used to play on wii, so shoild be ok

[ivory verge]

Fixed

The worst case for me

I think I need a drink🤣

https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/PSX_MiSTer/issues/319

It was my worst nightmare; you have no idea how many times I returned to this topic.

[dark mountain]

Incredible!

Nice work, as always @ivory verge

This one is particularly tricky.

[ivory verge]

The other mirumiru demos also work correctly now, without freezing during movie playback.

[dark mountain]

I remember that MiruMiru demo when I was helping Stenzek on DS.

But never found a solution before I left back then.

[dull wedge]

Anyone in here actually already owns a Super Station One?

[dark mountain]

Here.

I received it like yesterday.

[dull wedge]

So, how is it?

[dark mountain]

Great so far - a Mister PI with a better form factor.

It just lacks some new menus - for new comers.

[dull wedge]

You got the fan upgrade as well? I heard it ran a little hot, not sure if that is truly the case

[dark mountain]

No fan.

34C constant since yesterday on the side of the case.

[dull wedge]

That doesn't seem too bad

[minor spruce]

just excited for when mine eventually arrives...

[dark mountain]

I brought it to a classic gaming association earlier, they were enthusiast.

My major criticism is the lack of a SNAC bypass without the Dock.

[minor spruce]

That's fair

Kinda agree the snac bypass probably should have been on the front USB

[mild forge]

Doesn’t seem to be working for me on my Dualsense

Oh wait, it’s not working on my Dualsense edge but it is working on my regular Dualsense

Maybe the edge was never given rumble support on mister?

[forest trench]

The problem is that the controller recognition stuff is tied to Linux updates on MiSTer
Because MiSTer Linux updates happen infrequently, support formore recent controllers tends to lag by many months

There is a way to force it by SSHing into the MiSTer and adding a rule for the controller VID:PID

[mild forge]

Ah gotcha. Sorry I should have been more specific that I was using the Edge the whole time. I figured the 2 controllers were interchangeable from a connectivity standpoint but I guess not

[forest trench]

the model id (PID) would differ between the 2, so even if they function the same it's just a matter of not recognizing it

[mild forge]

I appreciate the help!

Is it worth submitting a ticket to someone to request edge support or is that just a waiting thing?

Edge rumble support I should say. The controller works fine otherwise

[forest trench]

It's most likely already added, just waiting for the next MiSTer linux update

[dark mountain]

I only checked MIruMiru 1 & 2 completely, no issue at all found with the test core from today.

[spark ermine]

I just finished spider man on core from yesterday, gonna update to today's core and play spider man 2 now. Not expecting to find any issues but just in case

Or maybe not lol, I thought I saw new core posted here today

[abstract drift]

are you sure? the edge has already been out for years

[forest trench]

@mild forge Ok I just checked, and hid_playstation.c hasn't been touched in 5 years
So before the Dualsense Edge was released
It's possible the VID:PID mapping for Sony controllers is done somewhere else, but in any case if the Edge is not being recognized as a Dualsense it may warrant an issue to be raised.

@manic citrus had updated the xpad driver some months back and added a bunch of new xinput controllers, which is what I was thinking of.

Dualsense VID:054C PID:0CE6
Dualsense Edge VID:054C PID:0DF2

[golden ginkgo]

interesting, you can see how it got added here https://github.com/torvalds/linux/commit/b8a968efab301743fd659b5649c5d7d3e30e63a6

[forest trench]

yeah, our hid_ids and hid_playstation don't contain those changes for the Edge

[sinful bloom]

Can't check right now due to energy crisis, but I just wanna know

Does the core support this dual analog flight stick as a control method mappable to a modern pad (ds4, dualsense)?

[abstract drift]

afaik thats functionally the same as the dual-analog (not dualshock)

so yes

[sinful bloom]

So they repurposed these into dual analog gamepads (pre-dualshocks)?

So you can play Descent on these?

[abstract drift]

yeah they have 2 modes, green light is like the sticks, red light is (more like) a dualshock

[serene nebula]

I have that, it’s awesome

[serene nebula]

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