Handheld Cores

[hard sinew]

That explains it. I live in the dark now.

I remember adjusting the angle to the light though. Like a plant.

[rotund flume]

GBA is amazing in the sunlight

I played Boktai that way lol

[hard sinew]

I'm a millenial. We don't crave the sun. We crave the dark.

[hot sparrow]

i was suprised how much better the og gba is vs the gba sp with the front light turned off

you really need that front light turned on nearly always

[little tulip]

I don't think the GBA would have the reputation of having the dark screen if the screen would've worked similarly to the game boy color

[rotund flume]

There’s also a third screen type, the AGS-101, which is an actual backlit screen.

[hot sparrow]

yea, i don't know if they ever sold those here

the photos i've seen on them look really oversaturated so i'm not sure it's much loss

[hard sinew]

Afaik those were only in the us and in japan.

[rotund flume]

The screens are very nice, I didn’t really think much of saturation values as a kid, I just went “holy shit I can see!” lol

And now I play GBA games on my HDTV like a heathen

[hard sinew]

I play gba on mister and on my modded gba. Someday I'll get an indigo anal pocket so I can play in partner look with shannon.

I also have a gameboy player but I don't use that anymore since mister.

[fathom trail]

Ah so a secret kojima fan

[hard sinew]

How do you recognize a kojima fan?

[fathom trail]

I dunno, how?

[hard sinew]

Don't worry, they'll tell you. 🤣

I freakin' love kojimas games as well btw.

[rotund flume]

LOL truuuue

I ran a Kojima fan club at id which was just me and the lead concept artist reading Kojima’s tweets and laughing

||But secretly also wanting to work with him||

[hard sinew]

||to learn, right? Pls don't mess up his games||

[rotund flume]

I actually got scared away from even applying. He’s an extreme control freak and not nice to work with.

Or so I’ve been told by friends.

Maybe he’s like Ken Levine where he spends more time at comic book shops than working? Or I guess with Kojima watching movies lol.

[rich mason]

kojima went full kojima years and years ago.

[hard sinew]

I read an article about an interview where he mentioned that he read 300 books while on the clock in the 80s to analyze stories and bring them to video games.

But I also enjoy my Robby games. Not every game needs to be a genius game that makes me contemplate life and improves me as a person.

[solar iron]

Was the sun in your hands?

[frank pasture]

Apply! Work on good games for once!

Or maybe they won’t be good games once you work on them 🤔

[little tulip]

The AGS-101 was never sold in Japan. Only the original GBA and Frontlit GBA SP sold there.
The backlit AGS-101 was sold outside of Japan though, like it was also available in Southeast Asia.
Do we know why it was never sold in Japan?
Was it because of the phat DS being available already?

[little tulip]

Well there's also the GBA micro which released as the same time as the AGS-101. Its weird though because the GBA Micro and the DS Phats' screens both have colors closer to the original GBA (correcting the oversaturation applied to GBA games) while the AGS-101 the DS lite have more "modern" colors.

DS Phat
Correction, the DS Phats' screen has more ghosting than the original GBA, but less than the AGS-101 or DS lite

Photos are from here
https://youtu.be/KM0w4USono0?t=5m14s

[rotund flume]

Yeah the Micro is cool. The perfect GBA device for me, even though I had to replace the battery.

[hard sinew]

Thank you for correcting me. All I know for sure is that we never got it in europe. Probably so we wouldn't get used to nice things to quickly because we were used too pal at the time.

[little tulip]

From what I've read, it was indeed released in Europe but only limited, way more limited than how it was released in the US.

[random gazelle]

My old gameboy still floats up into my mind whenever I see a big square of afternoon sun on the carpet.

[little tulip]

Does too much sunlight bork the screen of Nintendo handhelds.
I've seen way too much Gameboys with burned screens, especially DMG and Pockets

[little tulip]

https://x.com/MangaMoguraRE/status/1870314592942920036
e

Legacy of the Game Boy. Thank You Pokemon/Game Freak/Nintendo

Manga Mogura RE (Anime & Manga News) (@MangaMoguraRE) on X

"Yu-Gi-Oh! GX" 20th Anniversary REMASTER ANIME Officially Announced!

Air Date: April 2025

Image © Takahashi Kazuki, Studio Dice/Shueisha, TV Tokyo, NAS

Twitter · Dec 21, 2024, 3:45 AM

[hot sparrow]

i wasn't aware the micro was comparable to the og ds. i liked the og ds screen for gba but the button layout and smaller display size was a bit annoying. i guess the micro would be similar tho, being dinky and having a small display

[hard sinew]

Also don't forget that the micro can't play normal gameboy games.

[little tulip]

Tbh in my opinion, i don't think it's optimal to play gb or gbc games on any GBA system other than being convenient to have a singular system to play all game boy line of games

[rotund flume]

Sunlight doesn’t impact screens at all. Screen burn is caused by aging and too much heat which affects the polarizing film of the screen.

[thorny apex]

tell that the thousands of people who were unfortunate enough to let their vr headsets sit with the lenses open to sunlight

[hard sinew]

I don't think vr headset owners get much sunlight in their homes tbh.

[sterile quarry]

Found a (possibly?) interesting case for the GBA core "Spritelimit" option.
https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/GBA_MiSTer?tab=readme-ov-file#spritelimit
Saw a recent MiSTer video noting an error in Top Gear Rally where cars would still appear when they should be blocked by the road (as in the screenshot, forigve the blend being active too!).
Manually setting the "Spritelimit" on fixed it alright. Reading the GitHub page, should that feature enable automatically if the game needs it? Does Top Gear Rally need to be added to some list?

Is "Spritelimit = On" match to original hardware all the time?

[fresh oxide]

Yep, there’s a quirk enable for that. Gunstar Super Heroes is another game that needs it, and it’s on that list already.

[sterile quarry]

I guess I'll make a GitHub issue to note it needs to be added.

[primal lichen]

It's weird how that option isn't on by default.

[sterile quarry]

I guess this a case where the core could have Spritlimit on by default. I usually expect cores to be as original hardware by default, with opt-in for "turbo" features

[mild glen]

The reason is simple, it is not part of original hardware functionality

Same thing with some arcade cores. Some Konami arcades are by default Mono. User can change it to Stereo in the service menu

[primal lichen]

???

So is the sprite limit on the original hardware or not???

[sterile quarry]

Indeed. Same understanding here. I started with this issue after a YouTuber noted it, so can confirm after recording my GBA screen, this sprite limit effect is not an issue on GBA (or DS either). Gives the appearance Sprite limit On should be what hardware does...

[torn jay]

it should be on by default. The only reason it is not, is that it was introduced when the core was already out for a while and the potential risk of breaking games seemed too high

or better: it was not tested much. Also while not being accurate I thought at this point in time that people would prefer non flickering sprites anyway.
I would expect lots of false positive bugs if it was enabled per default now

More accuracy would also mean frameblending on per default and i would assume 95% don't want that additional lag and smeared image

[sterile quarry]

I guess that's me with the frameblending screenshot 😄
Depends on use case. Maybe one day some high level MiSTer setting that has some defaults for all cores like;

• Towards clean HDMI
• As original (warts and all!)
  Nice that this is a false positive at least. I can still add that GitHub if it helps? Or is it a minor thing to get it on the special list for the Spritelimit clause?

[torn jay]

it should be in the quirk list, yes

[sterile quarry]

PS1 has a similar feature come to think of it that fixed a Driver menu glitch I'd seen. Same as with GBA though, was introduced past the big set of testing. Maybe one day those could be set default.... Hard to get people to test I guess. Now that I know I've both set to original console version. I'll take the flickering sprites, I started on Master System so it's all normal to me!

[torn jay]

hopefully we get a new GBA core some day that has some things more accurate and people are motivated to test again. It was my first core on mister and while it plays nearly all games very well, there are some design choices i'm not happy with today

[hard sinew]

I was really suprised when I saw the world map in golden sun jitter like I did in some software emulators. Turns out it's heavily reliant on frame blending to look correctly.

[little tulip]

So I'm being told by my repairperson that the way to keep screenburn is to store it in a storage space away from sunlight, and turn it on at least once a week?
Is that sound?
There are so many DMGs and Pockets for sale near my area but most of em have screen burn isssues. I don't want that to happen to my unit lol

[rotund flume]

It’s the heat that destroys so you don’t want to keep it in an attic or in direct sunlight because both of those will heat your unit up.

Turning it on once a week isn’t necessary for the screen. Like I said, the aging process is the other killer for polarized screens which there is nothing you can do to prevent it. Just by keeping the unit in a cool and dry space you’ll prolong its eventual deterioration.

You can follow your repairperson’s advice and that won’t harm your unit at all. It’s just not exactly accurate advice but at the same time it’s not anything inherently wrong about it.

Storing it away from sunlight means no heat and turning it on at least once a week means you’ll play GameBoy weekly. Both are win/win.

[solar iron]

I was today years old when I discovered that Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3 has a hidden debug mode by pausing the game and then pressing select 16 times. How did I never know this!?

[primal lichen]

Oh yeah, that code makes it easy to get the best ending (maxed out coins + all treasures + beat all 40 courses) if you're too lazy to grind out the cash the legitimate way.

[torn jay]

to connect to my message above... seems I learned over the years.
Restructured my GBA software emulator to be fully cycle based (apart from PPU and Sound) and it now fulfills all timing tests of the mGBA testsuite
When I tried the same 5 years ago I struggled so much and now it seems to natural 🙂

(to be fair: I used knowledge of the gamepak prefetch implementation from Nanoboy Advance for some edge cases i couldn't figure out myself)

[mild glen]

Would love to see a gba core rework 🙂

[sterile quarry]

Always cool to see your work! Will await dreaming of GBA SNAC connecting like 5 CRTs for Zelda 4 swords 😄

[toxic cargo]

Does that mean that the GBA core will be adapted to this too? 😮

[inland whale]

Hi all, I am trying to gather data for the Metroid Zero Mission speedrunning community to add the FPGA core as a valid platform. Currently, only official releases and Bizhawk running the mGBA core are allowed.
What would be good metrics ?

Also, do you think it would be an accurate platform?

[wispy gate]

Good question @torn jay do you have thoughts?

[primal lichen]

If the accuracy was tightened more, then I would say yes.

[torn jay]

shouldn't be less accurate than mGBA

but it probably depends on what exactly you look at. E.g. there are some edge cases of cart flash speed that are not emulated with most emus and also the core

[torn jay]

it would be more or less a rewrite of the main modules. Let's see what the future brings 🙂

[primal lichen]

Sounds great!

[frank pasture]

My favourite thing about new cores is discovering the library as everyone goes into testing mode 🙂

[rotund flume]

Yeah, I end up reading a lot about a new system to figure out which games I should play. It’s super fun.

[leaden quail]

Folks, I recently bought this cheap $10 micro USB to USB A cable from Amazon to make my Gameboy Micro playable on the mister and it’s not registering

Any help?

Like in terms of the mister itself, there’s no green light indicator when it’s plugged in

If not the gameboy micro, what’s the best way to get a gameboy to be playable on the mister and what model should I get, Advance or SP?

[hot sparrow]

are you trying to use a gba as a controller for mister

[leaden quail]

yeah

[lost glen]

That's not a thing. The gbm doesn't output its buttons to the USB port. It's just a charging port.

[leaden quail]

damn

[open shuttle]

Same goes for all other gba models unless you use a flash cart to run a program on the gba that makes it present as a gc controller via link cable to a gc controller adapter

[lost glen]

Oh, neat - I didn't know that was a thing!

[hot sparrow]

what kind of loser would ever do that

(has done exactly that)

[leaden quail]

daaaaaaaang lol

What are your guys preferred controllers for the Gameboy/GBA core

I’m using the Switch wired GameCube one

[wispy gate]

I just use my 8bitdo SN30 that I use for most things

[strong sierra]

snes mini controller

[open shuttle]

Sn30 works great

[leaden quail]

Yeah I just bought a sn30 controller as well, looks dope

Late to the party lol

[north ice]

I use a PS4 controller, because I use it for everything. 🎮🤪

[heady gull]

I'm probably gonna try my basic arcade stick for a lot of 4-direction cores as well. Was just using a wired switch controller for everything before though

I also need to test out my old FC30 as well

[hot sparrow]

for GB a SNES classic controller via deamonbite adapter using the super game boy core

[torn jay]

we could do low latency serial cable to SNAC and transmit the buttons over it

then any GB/GBC/GBA could be used as controller

[hot sparrow]

without a flash cart?

[torn jay]

no, would need any reprogrammable/flash cart to run the control->serial program

it would basically be the same as your solution(which also delivers such a program but uses the cartridge bus to transmit the button states) but with low latency interface directly to mister

probably to much effort for such a niche case, so existing solution are good

[little tulip]

I'm just curious, do speed running communities for GBA games disallow playing on DS/3DS?

[little tulip]

I use a Wii NES controller for GB games. For GBA games, 8Bitdo Saturn controller, but I just pretend the B and C buttons are A and B

[primal lichen]

They're encouraged to run on DS, because technically the DS backwards compatibility runs games slightly faster than OG GBA hardware.

It's not by much, but if you play a game for hours, seconds can be shaved off by simply playing GBA titles on a DS.

[little tulip]

Wait, I thought GBA run games on DS run at about 0.12% slower than on GBA due to how the DS CPU is clocked on DS mode vs the OG GBA CPU?

GBA clock frequency is 16.77216MHz
DS on GBA mode is 16.756991MHz

[primal lichen]

Was it? I thought it was the opposite.

I distinctly remember seeing a video on GBAtemp showing off this by using F-Zero Climax as an example, and the DS would eventually pull ahead.

Am I just remembering wrong?

[little tulip]

https://youtu.be/KM0w4USono0?t=9m2s

[deep yarrow]

this is my favorite lately:
https://shop.insidegadgets.com/product/wireless-gameboy-controller/

[wispy gate]

That is cool but seems very odd lol

[sterile quarry]

I guess the GameBoy (non GBA), is the really unique fun one you can't get any other way? (Short of significant hardware mod/gutting a GB into a shell)

[deep yarrow]

they make one for GB/GBC aswell

if you've got an analog pocket you can use that with the GBA cart (thats what i do)

[sterile quarry]

That's one work around, using the analog pocket. Does that feel much like an old Gameboy?

[deep yarrow]

somewhere between a GBC and a DMG in terms of size yeah

[rotund flume]

I play using an SNES controller because that’s COOL and FUN

[deep yarrow]

snes pad is really good for this i find, thats what i was doing before that BT cart came out

[sterile quarry]

SNES does feel close enough I find. D-pad is that Nintendo style, A+B are nearly the same angle orientation....

GBA is nice too. I find it should be closer to GameBoy looking at it, but find the Start Select placement almost makes me think SNES "feels" more like an old Gameboy 😄

[torn jay]

i still prefer the n64 pad. Dpad is good, ergonomics are good and i like the position of the B button more

[deep yarrow]

its funny how much start/select placement can matter, they really bother me on DS4/DS5

[sterile quarry]

N64 is good too. Imagine if it had a little select button!

[wispy gate]

A dog bone controller would have the shitty anti angle of the buttons

[rotund flume]

PRAISE

N64 controller did nothing wrong, anyone hating on it means they have skill issues

[leaden quail]

hold up

Can’t you use the Anbernic RG34XX as a controller for the mister?

The GBA mockup clone handheld console?

[rotund flume]

does it have a controller mode where you can set the device to function like an x-input controller?

[leaden quail]

I’m not sure, haven’t looked into it.

It has the RetroArch core, that’s all I know

I wish Retrobit made a usb type GBA controller pad

Or something

but the GameCube switch controller will do for now

Tried using Retrobit’s older version of the N64 USB controller on the mister, doesn’t work properly unfortunately so it was kind of a waste of money

[little tulip]

I find the A and B button too far apart in the SNES controller. If i do use it, i usually set up Y as B and B as A, for full coverage of my thumb.

[deep yarrow]

i mean, GBA shells are comically available for super cheap

designing a pcb to sit inside and act as a controller should be pretty straightforward

[little tulip]

Aftermarket GBA shells are in abundance these days

[open shuttle]

Peak way to play pokemon on the gbc

[leaden quail]

The most disappointing thing was finding out you can’t really use a GBA/GBM as a controller either

ugh lol

I haven’t tried doing it through a Gameboy link cable and a GameCube snac (reflex) adapter

Not sure if that would work

[little tulip]

The N64 controller is comfy to use (for me), but it kinda bothers me how the placement of the A and B is different from the GB control schemes.

[deep yarrow]

it wont

actually it might but only if you run that rom on the GBA that makes it act as a gamecube controller

think you can get it out of the GBI repo

yeah its the .gba files in here:
https://files.extremscorner.org/gamecube/apps/gbi/latest-extra

[rotund flume]

Yeah, it's a bit funky

[sterile quarry]

Yeah, what Freddo noted. Can be done with the GameCube cable, plus any GameCube to USB adapter yeah.
Just also need to get the ROM onto a GBA. I just use a cheap repo cart I flash the ROM onto using a DSlite (far cheaper than GBA everdrive).
You might even get the ROM to transfer across from a Wii it is that small

[rotund flume]

Pretty neat how people have figured out how to get original portable hardware working as controllers

[gray grail]

Gameboy core with the 'sprite-fix' branch from @north ice
I'm just compiling for testing purposes.

https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/Gameboy_MiSTer/issues/255#issuecomment-2567150262

[hard sinew]

Gonna test it asap!

[gray grail]

Just test it for possible regressions.

SGB functions.

[hard sinew]

Agree to disagree. I just tested pokemon blue and still get the green flicker.

[gray grail]

They know, the issue is quite complex.
The core is just for testing if other games aren't regressing so far, but a proper fix hasn't been found for Pokémon Red & Green at the moment.

[hard sinew]

Gotcha. Thank you.

[raven arrow]

https://imgur.com/lvotzBV

what happened

the core reset itself?

[ashen bone]

no save states allowed

(idk)

[raven arrow]

I am starting to think they're causing weird stuff in the core

https://imgur.com/8iM1G2k

[torn jay]

loading a savestate could introduce strange effects if some important register was forgotten.
Saving the state however should never cause any issues, because you use "Pause when OSD open" anyway and saving does only need the pause. Maybe with some change over the last years it is broken somehow?

you could try to activate "Rewind Capture". It takes savestates all the time. If that causes issues, let know which game and I can reseach

if that works, please try savestates with Savestates to SDCard = off. If that also works fine -> your sdcard is broken

Because that is one hang i could imagine: the storing to sdcard never finishes

[raven arrow]

I'll play around a bit, sure

the game is Mega Man Xtreme 2 by the way, I only do these "beginning of boss battle" and "annoying section that kills me instantly" saves and playing through Extreme Mode I didn't have issues like these again

but also I will mess around with Shantae

[wispy gate]

Gameboy core has some bugs?

[wary fjord]

*had

[gray grail]

I've compiled a core with the last changes from paulb-nl from today on the HDMA.
And the last changes on the Sprite-fix branch from Maij.

So, Pokemon maybe work better on SGB mode and F1 Championship Season 2000 should work.

For TESTING purposes.

[hard sinew]

Pokemon still does the green flicker and also your pokemon now gets the color of the enemy pokemon. 😅

[sudden jasper]

Brownstoise

[hard sinew]

Blue charizard is actually kinda pretty.

[north ice]

Yeah... My commits are just a history of changes while I'm experimenting 😅. I have made some weird situations appear through some little tweaks but none that sensibly fix the problem. I understand the excitement but if I find a proper fix then I'll post it here. In all likelihood Paul will find a fix before me.

Glad you're having fun though. Maybe it's a feature, not a bug? 😂

[hard sinew]

Your work is still hugely appreciated, that green flicker bothers me more than it should. 😅 I'm happy to test any core for it, even if my pokemon must suffer.

[inland whale]

would it be doable to add a checksum of the GBA BIOS used in the core's OSD ?

again asking in the context of using the core for speedruns

[rotund flume]

Can’t speak for the core devs but that may require a change to main and not sure that’s something the project lead would want to do since it’s inconsistent feedback from every other core on MiSTer.

Doesn’t hurt to ask of course.

[raven arrow]

is there bios-related advantages I can do that I had no idea about

[north ice]

It is possible to perform a checksum in a core and use that to enable/disable features in the OSD menu. Equally I think you can make information text change (or at least grey it out). This doesn't require a change to main.

There's an example of this in the gameboy core, a checksum is used to allow 'GBA mode' when the original gameboy color bios is loaded.

So for speedruns maybe you could start the timer with the OSD open and an information tag displayed before a restart is pressed?

[inland whale]

thanks that's interesting. I indeed found the code you mentionned in the GameBoy core.I don't know any Verilog but I think it would be an interesting piece of info to have easily accessible in the OSD to have a quick way to check

in case of homebrew for ex.

I see ``define ORIGINAL_CGB_CHECKSUM 18'h2F3EA` in the GB core and I wonder how that number comes up

[north ice]

It's quite simple, as a bios is loaded from file it comes in 16 bits at a time. If you take those the top 8 bits and the bottom 8 bits and treat them both as integers you can just add them up, one by one, and keep a rolling sum. The value defined above is a pre-calculated value that corresponds to the original nintendo bios, summed over all of it's data. It's not perfect, you can create a different bios with an identical sum in this way, but for this purpose it's sufficient.

Here is the verilog code chunk that performs the sum as data is loaded in

[keen laurel]

// Calculate checksum for incoming cgb bootrom downloads

[lyric vine]

Hello all, I'm not sure which channel would be the best to ask in for help here, I have recently gotten a modretro chromatic device which uses the mister gameboy core. I am trying to enble the speedcontrol module and enable fast forward via a button combo like MENU + SEL. So far every attempt has led to me have a glitched out screen that eventually fades to fully white. Is there any GB core dev here that could give me a push in the right direction? The entire chromatic community would thank you, we all want our sped up pokemon lol

[solar iron]

I would try the off topic "#fpga-platforms" thread.

[lyric vine]

Thanks a ton! ill post there

[random gazelle]

https://atarilynxvault.com/pages/atari-lynx-pins

[random gazelle]

I was thinking maybe some mod could pin these pins in the pins section in case anyone goes in looking for pins and there's no real pins.

[rotund flume]

Did I do it right?

[random gazelle]

https://tenor.com/view/glasgowog-earth2-kissykissy-thisguy-gif-25596035

[raven arrow]

Just wondering out loud

These GBA consolizers wire up a SNES pad

What's the hurdle implementing SNES SNAC into the GBA core?

...or is it implemented?

I also wouldn't mind using actual GBA as a controller via SNAC

-# I just want to have more excuses to buy SNES pads

[torn jay]

SNES SNAC into GBA doesn't make much sense, why not N64 SNAC?
GBA SNAC would make sense, but then you either need a simple software within a flashcard or a complicated software that is transmitted via SNAC from the Mister

[deep yarrow]

GBA flashcarts are pretty cheap these days i don't think people would mind doing that neccesarily

nes/snes/n64 protocols are all quite similar iirc too? why not all 3

[raven arrow]

I assumed you related to the Wide Boy 64

But it uses GBA as a controller, so uh yeah

I wouldn't mind N64 as a GBA controller but SNES pad already has all the buttons

-# Plus two more for autofire

[little tulip]

placement of the A and B buttons

[hard sinew]

This is why I like the gamecube controllers from hori and oldschool for gb player.

[strong sierra]

for a SNES pad you really wont notice the difference compared to using a daemonbite or retrozord based usb adaptor (eg 4dapter / reflex) with 1000hz polling, and you get so much more flexibility

[wispy gate]

This this this this this this

[vast raven]

Anyone else get a crash when changing backgrounds on Apotris in the GBA core? Works fine on my everdrive

[rotund flume]

Ohhh interesting. If you don’t mind, could you backup your GBA core config then delete it to see if it still crashes with stock settings?

[vast raven]

Where is that again?

[rotund flume]

/media/fat/config/

It’s gba and I forgot the file format, I think CFG?

[vast raven]

Nope still crashes

[rotund flume]

Darn

Thanks for trying though

[vast raven]

Might be a save type issue, I'll try changing it

Nevermind that isn't an option

[fathom trail]

I wasn't familiar with this, looks pretty crazy https://akouzoukos.com/apotris

[vast raven]

It is. It's basically every major variant of Tetris in one package

[fathom trail]

I'll see if I can test it in a bit

[vast raven]

All seems good except settings -> background crashing

[rotund flume]

Wow that’s pretty cool.

[strong sierra]

Same here with apotris v4.0.2

[fathom trail]

Yeah, I'm hearing some garbage sound effects on the screen as well

I can still open the osd and stuff but the game is unresponsive and occasionally making noises

[strong sierra]

Yup

[vast raven]

Pretty horrid noises too

[strong sierra]

https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/GBA_MiSTer/issues/154

[deep yarrow]

sure it doesn't happen on real hardware? i can check if needed

[vast raven]

Works fine on my everdrive X5.

Although the game patch notes have updates to correct various issues with flash cards, so who knows what the game is doing in the background

[rotund flume]

Did that game ever ship on a cart?

[vast raven]

Yes actually, with rumble support as well

[rotund flume]

Damn that’s cool

[vast raven]

https://akouzoukos.itch.io/apotris/devlog/452358/apotris-v34-physical-release

[rotund flume]

Ok so great, confirmation that it works on real hardware. I mean the Everdrive confirms it but maybe it was doing something wacky to work on flash carts.

[deep yarrow]

havn't seen a new GBA core bug in years, amazing

[vast raven]

These are the settings my everdrive defaults to

Is the core defaulting to sram?

The fact that it's crashing when accessing a setting that's storing quite a few numbers makes me wonder if that's the issue

Also can confirm rumble works if you set it in in-game and the core settings

[torn jay]

the core has autodetect for the save type. Whatever is accessed first will be used

(unless some game has special copyprotection, then it needs to be added to the quirks list in the code)

[vast raven]

I figured so.

[solar iron]

Yes, we discussed it here a couple weeks ago. #1046941428758102086 message

I needed to change the background color on my Analogue Pocket first, and then copy that save file over to my MiSTer. Was the only way for me to change it.

[vast raven]

Drat. Has anyone tried contacting the Apotris dev about it?

[torn jay]

we should at least see where it happens before doing that

could be it's just waiting for some sram response or so

[deep yarrow]

it's not too big for the core is it? i forget if there's a max cart size

32MB - sounded kinda high

[torn jay]

yes it's max for GBA, everything above would need a mapper

[deep yarrow]

ah

[raven arrow]

The big fat mapper for Sega CD-quality Shrek 2

[viscid whale]

how do you download cheats for GBC?

I got the GBA and GB cheats just fine, but GBC codes arent there

[raven arrow]

Doesn't update_all.sh cover that?

[viscid whale]

no

it downloads them as normal GB codes

[solar iron]

It is interesting that it doesn't occur on the Analogue Pocket core. Only on MiSTer. I wonder what it is exactly that's causing it.

[vast raven]

We just need MSU-1 support for the ultimate experience

[torn jay]

the official gba core of the pocket or the mister core ported to pocket recently?

[solar iron]

I assume the MiSTer core, since it's the "openFPGA" core.

[torn jay]

then it's very weird as it should be nearly the same

[solar iron]

Yeah, when I encountered the issue on my MiSTer last month, the first thing I did was check it on my Analogue Pocket to see if it happened there. But it was fine. I even made the change there, and transfered the save file to my MiSTer just to get the background color changed.

[torn jay]

as you seem to have both, maybe you can compare if both cores create the same save file if you have none at start

if not, this would be some indication it's related to save type

Also one of the only things that is handled at top level and could be different

[solar iron]

So back up my current saves. Remove them from each SD card, and start a new save on each. Would it just be the file extention for me to check? Or should I just upload them to here?

[torn jay]

best would be to upload both or you can compare them yourself

size and content is interesting

feel free to upload here and i try if i see something

i guess you have to delete the old saves, do the same steps until ingame or so, then save? not sure when this game does save, but it would be good if about the same happened with both

[solar iron]

The game saves as soon as you enter the title screen, so both saves should be from the exact same "setup scenario".

[deep yarrow]

did someone really port the mister gba core to pocket ? thats awesome

[frank pasture]

The openFPGA GBA core is spiritualized, iirc

https://github.com/spiritualized1997/openFPGA-GBA

[wary fjord]

Yeah, I don't think Kevtris Spiritualized ported the mister core to OpenFPGA. I believe that is what Budude2 is doing now

the people yearn for RTC

[frank pasture]

Yeah, that’s the major thing that’s missing

[wary fjord]

pokemans

[frank pasture]

Exactly

[hard sinew]

Pokemans is like the most important thing on a handheld.

I've spent my entire spare time today doing pokemon training so I can play proper pokemon later.

[frank pasture]

I was going to @ you as soon as Pokemans were mentioned

But like Betelgeuse, I knew you’d appear anyway

[wraith magnet]

The Spiritualised core is the official Analog one, not Robert's MiSTer one. The tell is that it can play 64MB cars (i.e. Shrek) which the MiSTer core doesn't support.

What is the file size of this rom that plays on Pocket but not MiSTer?

[deep yarrow]

only 32M

[frank pasture]

Which is how I watch Shrek on every train journey

[wraith magnet]

The way the filmmakers intended.

[frank pasture]

The filmmakers and Miyamoto

[wary fjord]

were they "official"? I was under the impression that all the spiritualized cores appeared magically when openfpga dropped

I mean, they are kevtris cores, but I guess I thought that that was a open secret

[wraith magnet]

It is the same one baked into the Pocket that plays carts

[frank pasture]

I think the point is that it’s supposed rather than confirmed ^

But it certainly seems likely

[wary fjord]

oh is it? that's interesting

[wraith magnet]

It's the same deal with the jailbreak cores on the previous Analog consoles, it's the same ones that play the carts that Kevtris made but you can load roms on them

[rotund flume]

Symlink your GB cheats folder as GBC

Or copy them over, or just load your GBC games on the GameBoy core

[viscid whale]

how one does that?

[rotund flume]

I use a program called WinSCP and it lets you create symbolic links. It’s basically the Linux version of a shortcut (I think).

I wrote a guide a long time ago I’ll try to find it.

[open shuttle]

Yeah it’s essentially a shortcut. If you have terminal or ssh access to the mister, you can do it via ln -s /path/to/gb/cheatfolder /path/to/gbc/cheatfolder (gbc cheatfolder must not exist for this to work)

[viscid whale]

sounds complicated

[open shuttle]

It’s the rest of the owl that’s complicated, creating a symlink is peanuts in comparison

[rotund flume]

If you use WinSCP to access your MiSTer you can create a Symlink by doing this:

• Right click the folder you want to Symlink to and select "File Name -> Copy to Clipboard (Include Paths)
• Right Click where you want to place the new Symlink, in this case the /media/fat/cheats folder, then select "New -> Link"
• In the new pop-up window you'll want to give it the "GBC" name in the top field
• In the bottom field you'll want to paste the path location to the "GameBoy" cheats folder location
• Make sure to delete the quotations if there are any
• Hit "OK" and you'll have your new Symlink!

[viscid whale]

so its like an FTP connection with the mister?

or do I just inserd the SD card onto the pc?

[rotund flume]

Oh yeah, sorry, I should of said that from the beginning lol

[rotund flume]

Nah you keep it in your MiSTer so you can FTP into it

[viscid whale]

is the file protocol to be set to FTP?

[rotund flume]

Uhhh yes I think, sorry not army PC

Username is “root”

Password is 1

Very secure, I know

[viscid whale]

what about host name?

is that the IP or I can just put whatever

[open shuttle]

Sftp, not ftp. I don’t think you can make symlinks over ftp

[open shuttle]

Yep ip

[viscid whale]

thank you very much got it to work

[vast raven]

Symbolic links are neat, because unlike a windows shortcut, for all intents and purposes Linux treats it like the original file/folder.

[open shuttle]

Most of the time, anyway. There are some caveats but you won’t run into them here

[torn jay]

thank you. The saves are the same, except for the later unused part which is different initialized by the pocket, but that should make no difference

[little tulip]

Dunno if this is exactly the right place to ask, but on unmodified GBCs and GBAs, any interlacing-like effect isn't supposed to be visible on the LCDs right?

https://youtu.be/M90C3BdTjIc?t=10m28s

[rotund flume]

No but you can see the pixel grid

[little tulip]

The GBC and GBA i bought got the interlacing effect. Adjusting the trim pot removed it. The video I posted above made me think that it was normal.

[digital pier]

When I opened the CD-i core topic, people laughed. Now, everyone seems incredibly happy with that core. I'm also hoping for a Nokia N-Gage core. I know most people see it as a meme phone, but I had both the original and the QD, and I loved them. I played so many games on it! From Sonic and The Sims to Pandemonium, and it even had exclusive games like Pocket Kingdom: Own the World (by SEGA and the spiritual sequel to Dragon Force, which was for the Sega Saturn).

From a gamer’s perspective, it was a well-put-together phone/console hybrid. I’d love to see a topic for N-Gage, or even Symbian OS in general. Unfortunately, I don’t have the rights to create one myself anymore. Would anyone else be willing to start it?

[fiery vault]

Yes the N-Gage even had an exclusive Elder Scrolls and Call of Duty which is pretty crazy considering how big those franchises are now

[hard sinew]

An N-Gage core would be really interesting. I think there have been a lot of interesting games on phones I'd like to see on mister. Like before crisis.

[wary fjord]

I seem to remember someone saying that the ngage probably wouldn’t fit on the de10 because of how it was engineered?

I can’t remember if it was because you needed the cellular chip on the fpga too or something like that

Only that it would be a tight squeeze

[rotund flume]

Honestly, its easy to laugh when you don't understand it. Look at me, I was a doofus who didn't see "value" in a CD-i core, or rather didn't have much interest in it. Now I play it nearly every day and there's an endless treasure trove of genuinely cool shit on that core to explore.

So yeah, huge lesson learned from me, and I should know better! Thanks for bringing attention to these oft forgotten consoles, we're all better off because of it.

[rotund flume]

Yeah I saw that and was like "wut"

There's a lot of really suspicious sounding titles on that platform lol

[wraith magnet]

https://discord.com/channels/647909397477195803/1330621848420880454

[wispy gate]

You and I are the only two that want this lol

And I've literally never played or owned one

Kinda why I want the core honestly

[tawdry walrus]

Ngage runs at 104 Mhz. So a core is unlikely.

[full blaze]

A core that plays java phone games would be pretty awesome

[vast raven]

A brew core would get us zeebo and the definitive version of doom RPG

[digital pier]

Compared to cores like the PSX or Sega Saturn, which involve multiple processors, co-processors, and highly parallel systems, the ARM9 is straightforward. It is a RISC processor with a basic 5-stage pipeline and no out-of-order execution.

MiSTer already supports ARM7TDMI (used in the Game Boy Advance core), which is a direct predecessor to ARM9, indicating feasibility. FPGA cores don’t need to match the original clock frequency exactly. Instead, they replicate the behavior by breaking the tasks into smaller, faster cycles. This allows an ARM9 running at 104 MHz in real hardware to be faithfully emulated even if the FPGA design doesn’t match the exact clock frequency.

[wraith magnet]

Hmm, seems something probably only Robert could weigh in on with authority on if this would be possible on MiSTer and how hard it would be to build the ARM7 up to being an ARM9

[hard sinew]

As the saying goes: Lieber ARM dran als ARM ab. Robert will understand.

[torn jay]

I already build a ARM9 about 5 years ago

But it was only made to reach 33mhz

ARM design is more difficult to reach higher clock speed compared to MIPS, so i doubt 104 mhz are reasonable on Mister for it, but maybe as overclocked version with timing only reached at 60-70mhz

[wraith magnet]

Ah, something doable on a more powerful board?

What did you build your ARM9 to be used in?

[fading scroll]

Wasn't there some exploration at one point around a DS core? That would've needed an ARM9 and ARM7

Don't know if it was for that or if the DS was written off on paper first

[torn jay]

yes was for DS. Made it for the Nexys Video board, Artix 7. About 50% faster than our Cyclone 5, but 33mhz ARM9 would be doable even on the de10-nano

[wraith magnet]

Oh, interesting, how many MHz do you think you could stably get it up to on your Nexys board?

GP32 looks like it went even higher than N-Gage incidentally

[fading scroll]

133Mhz IIRC? I used to have one back in the day

[torn jay]

not sure, my design back in 2020 was....mediocre at best. Even the PS1 cpu is stuck at ~66mhz timing closure, while N64 design can do 80mhz even with FPU, TLB and 64bit commands.
Depends a lot on how hard you really try. 133mhz seems to much even for the Artix 7. But with todays FPGAs (e.g. Ultrascale+) 200mhz should be possible

Can really only guess here, don't pin me down on the exact numbers

[wraith magnet]

Appreciate the insight, many thanks 🙂

[hard sinew]

I just googled ps2 cpu speed only to find out even 200mhz are still not enough. 🥲

[frank pasture]

PS2 on MiSTer 4

[rotund flume]

How’s the Neo Geo Pocket core coming along?

[wide violet]

I wish someone else would take over that core. :/

Not that its current author is bad, they are great, but someone with a passion for the handheld should be doing it.

[rotund flume]

Or someone else should make their own NGPC core imo.

But I’ll keep waiting for my beloved NGPC

[wide violet]

I think that’s what may end up happening.

[frank pasture]

The intersection of skilled devs with free time and a passion for the NGP must be pretty tiny 😅

[wide violet]

A skilled dev did express interest but passed when they discovered it was ‘claimed’

[frank pasture]

Who was that?

[wide violet]

I’ll dm

[frank pasture]

You can DM if you’d rather not “out” them

[rotund flume]

I appreciate the claimed respect. I think it genuinely is a nice gesture. But that shouldn’t stop anyone from doing their own if they have passion for it. This is all open source after all.

Thank goodness no one felt they couldn’t do an SNES or a PS1 core even though they were being worked on by someone else.

I’ll stop whining, beggars can’t be choosers after all lol.

[frank pasture]

Bets on a finished 3DO core before the NGP is “finished”? 😅

[wraith magnet]

It would have been better if he had just opened up his code and let others take over and finish it, and he could have gone back to working on what he actually enjoys and is good at. I can't imagine any of his patrons would have been annoyed by that. Would have been win-win for everyone.

[frank pasture]

Do his cores only become open source once they go public?

(I presume so otherwise the beta key thing would be trivial to overcome)

[wraith magnet]

Yeah, it is after they are considered fully done

It would presumably take his biggest patrons to push him to just open the code and hand it over to the community

[solar iron]

Yeah, I do wish that would happen. I love me some NGPC. Just gotta play the waiting game at this point.

At least there are some nice versions of some of its best games on Switch. I was super addicted to Card Fighters Clash a couple years ago.

[arctic solstice]

I bought NGPC games becuase of the pocket adapter and liked them so much I ended up buying the actual NGP and NGPC. I like how the system is identical between regions and all system have the option to set the language to English.

Also, most of the NGP games aren't worth bothering with because they have near identical NGPC versions, but KoF R1 is worth picking up. I like it better than R2. The JP only NGP Puzzle Link can link with the NGPC version (even the US version, oddly enough).

and Baseball Stars Color actually has a better "palette" on the NGP than the original b/w version. The Color one seems to be more polished. Tennis is an odd one. Color version change the look of most characters and overhauled the menus, but has worse AI (which wasn't great in the original either) and is super easy.

[rotund flume]

Yeah, NGP is kind of a waste of time considering the overlap.

[gray grail]

Is it relevant to test the GB/C core with some test suites and adding failed tests to the issue log on GitHub ? Even for the Super GameBoy core ?

I'm thinking about the Mooneye tests, SameSuite and such.

EDIT : I've just saw some references on the issue tracker, so it's already done.

[novel kindle]

the GB/C core is pretty solid now.

[gray grail]

I've seen some failed tests today, that's why I was curious about that.

Yeah, the core is pretty solid, just some failed tests, like 10 on the 1500 passed already on my side.

[novel kindle]

regression ? or failed before ?

[gray grail]

Failed before, when I check the issue tracker.

paulb-nl already knows them since at least 2021.

I should have checked before launching "all the horses".

[novel kindle]

if some tests are not referenced it could be great to add

[gray grail]

I will check the failed ones on the real hardware (and the latest SameBoy version too) and report if necessary.

[novel kindle]

Thank you

[gray grail]

I've dismissed some tests as they are failing also on my real hardware and on SameBoy.

[radiant eagle]

need to make a bug report on Nintendo’s github for GB/GBC

[wraith magnet]

Seems odd there would be tests that fail on real HW, wonder what the point of those are

[gray grail]

Different CPU HW revisions.

Failed tests were some OAM bugs.

[open shuttle]

yeah there were a half dozen cpu revisions that fixed various bugs

[gray grail]

Issue opened with the tests used.
https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/Gameboy_MiSTer/issues/263

I need to go for the rest of the day.

[frank pasture]

Zet 🫡

I appreciate all the work you do testing the cores and logging issues

[unique radish]

In regards to the Gameboy Link Snac, would I need a level shifter?

[primal lichen]

I knew the GBA core was inaccurate, but I never assumed the Game Boy also had inaccuracies too.

Must be a bunch of minor issues.

[gray grail]

Mostly minor, just 2-3 recent homebrew games have some strange effects.

Like on Pocket Penguin DX.

When you are hit by an enemy, the screen goes crazy for a second.
I don't have that on my OG system and an Everdrive.

[whole topaz]

I can't seem to save my game with the GBA core

I have the most recent one as of a week and a half ago

I know I could use savestates but the lack of ability to use regular saves is throwing me off

maybe I'm doing save data wrongly

[gray grail]

Could you check on your core menu if Autosave is at ON ?

[whole topaz]

it is not

[gray grail]

You must check it as ON for the core to save on the SD card.

[whole topaz]

ah

[frank pasture]

Yep, turn on autosave and then open the OSD after saving (or just before closing the game/core/turning off the MiSTer)

[gray grail]

Oherwise it will not save your progress.

[whole topaz]

gotcha!

let me give that a try

[frank pasture]

You need to open the OSD to “commit” to the SD ^

[whole topaz]

right I remember reading that

based on my previous reading, I thought autosave meant it would save to the SD card too much

so that's why I didn't have it turned on

[frank pasture]

That’s why it’s off by default, but I’d say leave it on and just backup somewhat regularly

[whole topaz]

uh

how do I save my game without having it on

[frank pasture]

Otherwise you run the risk of forgetting to manually hit save and then losing your progress 😉

[whole topaz]

I did hit save

manually

[frank pasture]

Save in the OSD

Not save in the game

[whole topaz]

yes, I did

hm

[frank pasture]

[whole topaz]

let me try the auto save I guess

or rely on savestates

savestates are probably okay for the most part?

[frank pasture]

Autosave works fine for me

[whole topaz]

hm

so doesn't it do a ton of SD card writes

[frank pasture]

Not really no

[whole topaz]

oh

then I'll just use it haha

[frank pasture]

Only when you’ve saved and open the OSD

[gray grail]

I use the same SD card on doing tests on the core since 4 years.

[whole topaz]

oh!

[gray grail]

Without breaking my Sandisk card.

And I'm REALLY a heavy user.

[whole topaz]

ah

[frank pasture]

Sorg had it off by default because he’s somewhat paranoid about SD writes, but really I think most would agree it’s better to just have it turned on

[gray grail]

Just backuping my card every 6-8 months with my current saves on a PC.

[whole topaz]

I could probably set up a cron job on the Linux system

[frank pasture]

Just don’t use some random cheap Chinese unnamed SD and you’ll be fine 😅

[gray grail]

Just to be sure for games I like and/or I need to retest later on a certain point of save.

[whole topaz]

that's what my laptop does

uses a cron job and backs itself up every night

[frank pasture]

But it’s trivial to write a single line rsync script and put that in the scripts directory

[whole topaz]

yeah

[frank pasture]

(Assuming rsync is installed on the MiSTer, I never checked)

[whole topaz]

that's what I was getting at

something like rsync

[deep yarrow]

the only reason to turn autosave off is if you don't want your save overwritten for some reason

its kinda weird it's even allowed to be off honestly though given how unlikely it is you'd want that

[vast raven]

Decided to revisit the Yu-Gi-Oh GBA games again with the collection coming up. Hopefully they include the Turbo cheat for Eternal Duelist Soul. Game is mega slow without it.

[whole topaz]

I have a question: how do I enable CRT filtering?

[solar iron]

I'll never understand why auto save isn't on by default. Unless you're opening your OSD like every few seconds in a game that saves constantly, it's just a non issue.

[frank pasture]

Yeah, I don’t really get it either

Quick search suggests that Sorg seems now open to it being on by default, but it seems it’s up to the core developer to set it as they see fit
(#psx-chat message)

[vast raven]

For systems that use memory cards, I hope we later see it more automated. I get the hesitation for cartridges that save constantly, but PlayStation literally tells you when it's saving.

[torn jay]

i actually do open the OSD often, because of the pause functionality. That's why i have autosave off. Also for development reasons. But i agree, default on would be better.

[little tulip]

Is there an actual risk with leaving it on, or nah?

[open shuttle]

It can vastly increase sd card wear (relative to only manual saving). It’s still tiny, probably not worth worrying about for the average person.

[vast raven]

You'd have to set the osd button to turbo on a game that triggers "saving" constantly to see any real wear.

I think if the mister was a more like a computer with proper shutting down process rather than flicking a switch to turn off power immediately, the osd saving likely wouldn't be a thing.

[hard sinew]

Yeah. From what I understood the mister writes a tiny save file (mostly just kb for consoles) when opening the osd, which a normal person does... like maybe every 30 minutes at most? I just can't see that making a substantial difference in longevity for a 250gb+ sd card.

[little crystal]

The manual saving is done in part to minimize SD wear

Without manual saving, for consoles that can arbitrarily write save data whenever they want, one bit at a time, you'd be constantly checking it and rewriting it to storage

[vast raven]

Yeah, it's not the end of the world to do it this way, but it is a weird user experience quirk of the platform that I hope gets reevaluated on a case by case basis later down the line.

Just having a dedicated shutdown feature in perhaps a new hardware revision would be nice

[hard sinew]

I'm so used to opening the osd by now tbh... I think a "standby core" that mostly shuts everything down would already solve a lot of issues people have. Double points of it could be used to wake the mister up again with a controller.

[frank pasture]

Please no shutdown feature

I don’t shutdown my coffee machine

The appliance-like nature of MiSTer is one of its biggest appeals to me

[hard sinew]

How would you like a point in the menu that let's you put the mister into "sleep" or something and later wake it up again without having to actually go there?

[frank pasture]

I just flick the switch. That works well enough for me 😅

But I guess you mean the restart?

I think without save states on most cores it wouldn’t be that useful

[hard sinew]

My thinking is that people don't like the osd to save thing because they see no reason to open the osd when shutting it off, thereby forgetting to do it and not liking it when their save didn't count.

So if you were to give them a way to shut down the mister (or at least make it as sleepy as possible) via osd they'd probably prefer that over walking to their mister to turn it off, and thereby also save their game automatically.

[frank pasture]

Opening the OSD is kind of ingrained in me. I’m sure they can learn it too. I just think of opening the OSD as being akin to a shutdown sequence of sorts

But I get what you’re saying, including an extra step would force an action so could be useful for people who forget

Maybe I’ll turn my eventual BasketSnake core into a shutdown core then😅

[hard sinew]

If there was a remote sleep and wake up core I'd probably use that instead of the hardware switch tbh. 😅

[fallen harbor]

I definitely forget to open the osd

[vast raven]

It's a mistake everyone makes at least once

[hard sinew]

I remember my first play session with mister. I played breath of fire for like 2-3 hours. Didn't save. 🥲

[vast raven]

But I think you're onto something with a low power core. What if pressing one of the buttons on the io board triggered an osd like save, then brought you to a low power core which doesn't send video output out. To turn your mister back on you could press the menu or the same button on the io board. Could also double as a reset

Sleep mode basically

[little crystal]

The ARM core would still be running the MiSTer process at 100% in that case

[vast raven]

Couldn't the Linux side be sent into a sleep mode?

[deep yarrow]

you could get main to fall asleep whenever that cores up

and just run a really lazy loop polling the menu button

idk how much power you'd really be saving though, it'd still be running all the linux

[frank pasture]

I doubt you’d save much at all - but also, the MiSTer isn’t very power hungry anyway

If you want to save power, just turn it off 😅

“How low can I make the power draw of a low powered device that can turn on/off instantly?” definitely feels like trying to optimise away a problem that isn’t there

[raven arrow]

Whatever MiSTer is doing can't be any worse and stressful than me doing shenanigans on my Steam Deck

[torn jay]

any automatic that doesn't need user action inside would cause horrible issues over time.
E.g. you would turn off while a partially written file is automatically saved, destroying your save completly.
There are games e.g. on gameboy that use the save ram as normal ram for the CPU, so it's really written nonstop all the time

[tawdry walrus]

Creating atomic actions is a known thing.

For instance, you could save as a second file, then mark the file as newer, then delete the old save.

[vast raven]

I would only have a save trigger when going into the sleep mode. On wake id just have it restart the mister like a console does.

But if sleep mode is impossible then it's pretty moot

[little tulip]

https://pokefan531.tumblr.com/post/766008194709454848/handheld-lcd-shader-projects

Are these shaders available for Mister?

[raven arrow]

There are numerous color tints, ranging from GBA/SP to NDS built in the core

Also an LCD grid among scaling shaders

[little tulip]

The "modify color" option? (Gba 2.2, Gba 1.6, NDS 1.6 etc)

[raven arrow]

Yes

[hard sinew]

You can also set the colors from raw to corrected.

[little tulip]

Isn't this for the gbc core?

[regal holly]

Retroarch's shader is better at getting the AGB-001 colours correct which is the model I like to replicate. MiSTer doestn't get the blues and greens quite right.

[little tulip]

I See. The link i forwarded are shaders that supposedly emulates the colors of the GBA screen more accurately. The options in the core/in mister are of course fine, and even on real hardware colors can change depending on the light source.

[little tulip]

What options do you use in Mister?

[regal holly]

I don't becuase nothing looks quite right. I only use MiSter if something looks ok with no colour correction.

[little tulip]

I feel that using the GBA 1.6 in the core options + loading Gamma 1.8 in the video options looks right. Not exact to the GBAs i have, but good enough for me.

[regal holly]

The Gameboy shader is also better than MiSTers filter which can't put the bright lines between darker pixels.

[little tulip]

Colors can vary depending on placement of light, and the model of the GBA (AGB w/ Sharp LCD, AGB with Panasonic LCD, AGS-001 early revision, AGS-001 later revision)

[limber lagoon]

Hi, Posted this in settings workshop, but it's probably more appropriate here. I'm having issues with both the gameboy & gameboy color core, when using Vscale_mode=5 on my LG C3.

My Ini settings are 1080p @60hz, Vscale_mode=5 (normally Vscale_mode=1), Vsync_adjust=2, Vrr_mode=1. When using the gb core with Vscale_mode=1 everything is fine, but with mode 5, I seem to get a refresh rate mismatch, and some weird lines on the bottom of the screen. Any idea why this happens?

[little tulip]

btw, do you have like specific examples?

[regal holly]

Yeah, one example is to take a look at Metroid Fusion's demo loop. Green shades on real hardware look more blue on MiSTer with GBA 1.6 being the closest you can get. The Retroarch GBA shader look much closer to the real thing. Real hardware seems to have more of a push towards yellow, not displaying a perfect white that the MISTer core has. This footage of a AGB-001 looks extremely close to what I see on my hardware, should be easy to see the difference. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDAZh7kDtTk&list=PLmns9yRfAA-KoKOMhpjviiDmOb3zoGmHH&index=16&themeRefresh=1

[little tulip]

This person's GBA is not calibrated properly. It has horizontal lines/interlacing -like artifacts, which usually happens when the LCD is replaced or through age.
This person has got to calibrate the LCD potentiometer.

[little crystal]

While the interlacing artifacts can be improved by calibrating the pot, I'm pretty sure they're always at least slightly visible on an AGB-001

or at least I couldn't get rid of them by calibrating the pot!

[little tulip]

They're most visible under sunlight when the batteries are about to go out.

[little crystal]

Or when the screen is flashing colors every frame - such as on the map in F-Zero, or on the black shadow in Mario Kart's character-select screen

[little tulip]

That's where the AGS aging cart rom is useful for since it has the LCD flicker adjustment pattern

[wispy gate]

It's under something like video processing in the OSD, start with presets then go from there

[whole topaz]

I got it working, thanks!

[little tulip]

The GBA on the video compared to my GBA.
I think the GBA in the video is one of the earlier 40-pin sharp manufactured one.

My AGS-001 GBA SP is a later model one, which apparently has a different LCD and colors from the early AGS-001s

Image I found online, from the open_agb_firm developer.
Newer AGS-001 on the left, older one on the right.

[regal holly]

Mine is an earlier model. Your picture looks incredibly blue for the majority of tones, MiSTers colour options look even further away from
that then the original screen. Think I will stick with Retroarch for this one...

[little tulip]

I'll take an outdoor photo as I took my photo indoors nighttime under a fluorescent -lit room

[wispy gate]

https://www.reddit.com/r/AnaloguePocket/comments/1ifctkd/i_made_a_free_web_app_to_export_and_edit_gameboy/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

[frosty kindle]

I noticed an issue with Joust on the Atari Lynx where there are black bars in the lower left portion of the screen that shouldn't be there. I've seen this on my own MiSTER as well as when Pixel Cherry Ninja streamed the game on the Lynx core a while back

Also, here's a video of the game being played on the real thing for further reference. Granted the video quality isn't great, but it's still clear that there's some ground missing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCPEbVlVTfA

[torn jay]

you can enter a bug in github if you like for it

to be honest, I have no idea what the source could be. Doesn't look like a pure render bug

[tacit mural]

https://tenor.com/view/anime-last-stand-als-anime-last-stand-update-anime-last-stand-upd-als-update-gif-2055114662060648899

[torn jay]

thankfully the lynx core is now 4 years old and only has 4 open github issues with 2 of them being feature requests and 1 being framework related, so I guess I can take another one without being sad 🙂

(or maybe it just shows how unpopular lynx is)

[mild glen]

Robert, if you need some well needed break from your game (that we are excited about), please consider Neo geo pocket core

Current core is unfortunately….lacking in some aspects

[unique radish]

One day we might be discussing the amazing Game Com core.

[vast raven]

I like forward to the low pixel refresh rate filter

[tacit mural]

I'd like to request a cookie clicker core

[wraith magnet]

Has anyone made the case to JT to just open up his code and see if others can get it over the line? He is clearly not enjoying working on this.

[mild glen]

The code is open source

https://github.com/jotego/jtcores/tree/master/cores/ngpc

https://github.com/jotego/jtcores/tree/master/cores/ngp

[wary fjord]

But it uses jtframe, no? I didn’t think that was open source.

[wraith magnet]

Ideally it would be ported over to official MiSTer FW

[mild glen]

Jtframe is open source

[wraith magnet]

So is absolutely everything open now, all the NGPC stuff as well?

[mild glen]

Ngp core is open source

Everything is open

Jotegos Framework is platform agnostic

The only thing that is not open is the analogue pocket part, but this is outside of the ngp/ngpc. And that is irrelevant for MiSTer

And I’m 100% sure that Jotego wouldn’t mind if there is a mister developed one. He would probably be happy. Maybe it is good to check with him though

[wraith magnet]

Yeah, I imagine at this point it is like a ball and chain around his leg he just wants free of

[mild glen]

Yes

Code is there at least

[wary fjord]

I’d love for someone to finish that core

[primal lichen]

Having a better optimized GBA core and a new Neo Geo Pocket core would both be nice.

[hard sinew]

What's wrong with the gba core?

[primal lichen]

Mixture of inaccuracies and strange design choices. Even FPGAzumSpass is aware of the problems and would like to fix it at some point.

[torn jay]

you will probably not notice in many cases, but yes, the accuracy lacks compared to the other cores I worked on.
Thankfully the GBA games are often very forgiving. Regardless, it could be better and with the large and good library would deserve it

[hard sinew]

How long do you think such a rework would take you Robert? Just out of curiosity.

[ashen bone]

would love to see a gba core rework. it’s already one of my favorite cores so more accuracy would be the cherry on top

[wraith magnet]

A ground up rework to play Shrek? Commitment. 😉

[hard sinew]

I would love to convert lord of the rings extended to gba cartridge quality and watch it on the core tbh.

[wraith magnet]

You could probably do that now, but it would have to be 32MB (64MB video cart mapper not supported). I assume there are tools to do this? It would look and sound awful though.

[hard sinew]

I know someone converted Christopher Noles movie "Tenet" to a bunch of cartridges when he complained that the movie shouldn't be streamed but watched on the big screen during lockdown. So there has to be a way.

[wraith magnet]

As much as I enjoy Tenet, watching it on a GBA would be a form of torture.

[cinder peak]

technically not open source btw

The cpu core is closed source

the repo is private

so without rewriting the main CPU from scratch, no one can port it to any other platform they want currently

oh nvm, my recurse didn't work, i hate submodules

looks like it might be open but it doesn't allow public key?

some permissions issue

[mild glen]

https://github.com/jotego/jt900h/tree/master

Is it closed?

[cinder peak]

it's not closed, but the stupid submodule bullshit is annoying to deal with is all

git recursive wasn't working on it

this usually happens for the ones he has which are closed

i've cloned his jtcores before and the pocket framework is all closed and gives the same error

i get why people use submodules, but it can be annoying for stuff like this lol

[mild glen]

In the sense of ngp, the code should be open as that was announced by Jotego a while back.

[cinder peak]

ngpc as well?

[cinder peak]

jtframe is open source, the pocket framework version is not

jtframe is partially the mister framework, so it has to remain open source

[wary fjord]

Ahh, ok. thanks for that clarification, duder. I thought it was all closed

[cinder peak]

yeah, most of it is the mister framework, at least for the mister target https://github.com/jotego/jtcores/tree/master/modules/jtframe/target/mister/hdl/sys

the other stuff is his own ddr and sdram controllers which he generalizes out to all the cores, it's for his flow to be simpler

[mild glen]

Yes

#1046941428758102086 message

[cinder peak]

yup seeing it now, coolio

thank you sir

[rotund flume]

Wait I am a silly man, NGPC works?

[wary fjord]

“works”

[frank pasture]

I don’t think there have been any significant changes for a couple of months, if that’s what you’re asking

But I may be wrong

[wary fjord]

nah, not since the first round of bug fixes

[mild glen]

Works but has issues

[rotund flume]

Omg omg so excited

[fathom trail]

Don't we all

[solar iron]

NGPC is still not public too right? I know NGP is public at least.

[wary fjord]

it is not

even NGP requires some fiddling to make work

and both cores do not like direct video

[solar iron]

Oh yeah, I've tried the NGP core, and it is very weird to get it working.

[rotund flume]

Oh damn I thought it was

[candid kernel]

my head hurts i give up and need help

im trying to use gb2p to load 2 different pokemon games and trade pokemons among them

but i cant get the saves to load on the games in the gb2p core

[rotund flume]

Are they named the same as the game and in a save folder named after the core?

[candid kernel]

uh

i guess so?

[rotund flume]

Double check it just in-case.

[candid kernel]

so in normal gb core each game has its save loading np

[rotund flume]

I dunno if it pulls saves from the GB save folder

It might

Try loading a game that saves pretty early on, like Donkey Kong, and see where it places the save.

[candid kernel]

let me see where it saves it one sec

rebooted mister after saving on mister

lets see what ftp sees

saved donkey kong on gb2p folder

[rotund flume]

Ok cool, make sure your Pokemon saves are also in that folder and it should work fine. There’s something you need to do for the player two save hold up

[candid kernel]

so i copied both saves to the gb2p save folder now this is what happens

if i load both games the same then it lets me load the proper save

the moment i load the 2nd rom for p2 it treats the save for the 2nd rom as if its the only rom available for the p1 game

ie load yellow on both then yellow save is what shows, load red on p2 then yellow shows reds save and red side only shows new game option

[rotund flume]

Saves can be copied from singleplayer, but only player 1 will have a savegame then. "Dupe Save to GB 2" option can be used to load singleplayer savegames for both players.

[candid kernel]

vice-versa if i do it other way around load red first then yellow and its yellows save that shows as continue for red and red shows no save

hmmmm

lets see now

[rotund flume]

https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/Gameboy_MiSTer/tree/Gameboy2P

[candid kernel]

with that option on

[rotund flume]

Sorry it took a while, my cats got into the pantry and all my pets were going nuts

[candid kernel]

no worries lol

[solar iron]

Sounds like the purrrfect excuse.

[candid kernel]

iight now explain that github in a dumber down way cus from what im gathering is i cant load each save for each independant pokemon game

says its either one or the other and when i save it saves them both as 1 file

which wont help what im trying to do

maybe i should spend money and buy that gb link snac adapter (-_-) but i dont want to spend more money and wait on shipping to evolve my kadabra to alakhazam... y pokemon gotta make me jump through hoops

nvm it worked

miracle!

[rotund flume]

Yeah I guess so? Sorry not familiar, thought you could easily load two different save files

[candid kernel]

alright i feel kind of proud of myself

will i be able to replicate it? idk

but i just hope there arent more pokemon that require being traded to evolve

so this is what i did

made save in like 4 different ways with rom gb2 on/off and dupe save on/off just incase then i loaded single player core to see if it loaded correctly and not corrupted

[strong sierra]

'Saves created contain savegames for both players.
For compatibility, all saves are 256Kbyte in size, 128 KByte for each player.'

Sounds like you need to join/split the SP saves, padded to 128kbyte each

[candid kernel]

once i saw it worked i transfer that to my pc and used https://savefileconverter.com/ to convert the mister save back to a 32kb sav and then put that back in the mister to see if it loaded correctly still

and it did

so now to turn on my n64 and load this save back into my pokemon yellow cart

let me google if theres any other pokemon that require trading to evolve so i can just give up on those

rip

machoke graveler slowpoke and haunter...

even back in the 90's i didnt have friends to trade with who nintendo think we were popular?

anywho thanks for help robby

Success

[mild glen]

It is public

[torn jay]

depends on how many hours per day. on the current GBA core i worked around 6 months, but often way longer than was healthy into the night.
As it would be a full redesign due to the current design running at 6 times the original clock to "make things easy", I would guess 12 month until all games work fine again and all tests are fulfilled

[torn jay]

the shrek-mapper can be done completly core-external. Requires zero knowledge of the core or GBA in general.
So no, a new core would not support shrek unless someone works on it.

[hard sinew]

Sounds like a lot of work for something that has a working solution already. Maybe pin some posters of your favorite gba games to your wall while working on it, to keep you motivated. 😅

[solar iron]

Yeah, that's why I tried it!

[mild glen]

I was supposed to comment this

[solar iron]

Oh, that's a surprise. When did the NGPC core go public? It's never showed up on my end in update_all, even with Jotego's cores set to download.

[frosty kindle]

I'll put in a report in Github just to document it better. To be fair, the only other issue I've seen from the core so far is a small visual glitch between stages in Robotron, which coincidentally is from the save dev as the Joust port.

[little tulip]

I obtained another SP.
Seems like the early model. The colors are definitely warmer

Here's my two SPs. Older model is left, newer model is right

[muted ginkgo]

GameBoy Advance 24.04.10 doesn't start on my de-10 with sdram mister. It is stuck on a white screen. I tried toggling a lot of settings. There is a boot.rom, boot1.rom and mister-boot.gba in its games folder. They came preinstalled on the sdcard (ordered from ultimate mister fpga)

GBA 2P shows a Normmatt logo for 2 seconds before briefly flashing white. It then loops

Loading a GBA shows the progress bar (in the OSD). The screen remains white

[remote carbon]

Use update-all with bios download enabled?

[solar iron]

And maybe delete the bios files that are currently in the folder before running update all?

[hard sinew]

I transferred a Pikachu from yellow to stadium and taught it surf, transferred it back to yellow, transferred it to stadium2 and then transferred it to crystal. Who even needs a time capsule? 😎

[little crystal]

It's a shame they never made an official way to bridge gens 2 and 3

though as usual, fans pick up where the pokemon company leaves off https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inMbtwmVlKQ

[hard sinew]

Pokemon romhacks are the way to go imo.

Don't "gotta catch 'em all" me unless you put them all in the game.

[candid moth]

There's a new non-mister FPGA core for GB but it's in Chisel/Scala: https://github.com/elipsitz/gamebub

[toxic cargo]

That's probably my favorite GBA game. It was my first GBA game and looks and sounds very special to me.

[rotund flume]

I never played it when it came out but it's a really cool game that I grew to appreciate later. Scratchy soundtrack tho lol

[toxic cargo]

That OST scratchyness is almost intentional! It's pure art, every sample is taken in a VERY lo-fi fashion (sound mixing on the GBA is done by the CPU) from somewhere. And there are hundreds of them.
That crazy and creative sound design is, in fact, one of the more appreciated features of the game.

[rotund flume]

Maaaaan you sure? I just thought it was issues with the GBA sound hardware?

[toxic cargo]

Watch the video and read the comments if you're interested:
https://www.reddit.com/r/nintendo/comments/zrr9m0/the_bizarre_music_and_sound_design_of_wario_land_4/

[toxic cargo]

Yes and no: the "limitation" is that mixing is made with the ARM CPU, samples take up ROM space, etc... But what you hear in Wario 4 is half-intentional: it uses the limitations of the technique to it's advantage.

Wario 4 is not only a game, but also a piece of art. And it's recognized as such.

Also, GBA can sound very good eh. Look at the Golden Sun OST, or Mario & Luigi sound design, etc. But you know, ROM costs, etc.

I must admit however that I have a softspot for lo-fi PCM music since I come from Amiga 🙂

[rotund flume]

Well that’s pretty cool. I had no idea!

Thanks for explaining it.

[toxic cargo]

No prob, those facts are what I enjoy more about games.
That's why the creativity peak was during the 80's and 90's... Technical and economical imposed limitations, sometimes artificial because of commercial viability, made the games my absolutely favorite form of art.

[little tulip]

I love the OG Gameboy sound chip sounds used on GBA games like Ace Attorney or Sonic Advance 2 or Rockman Exe https://youtu.be/ZocM0ZCnH5Q

[deep yarrow]

@steady wasp there's a new opensource* GBA core that has full linkcable support: https://github.com/elipsitz/gamebub?tab=readme-ov-file

[wraith magnet]

Oh, that's interesting. I wonder if it is possible to port that over. Are there any other unique features? Does it have the 64MB video cart mapper (i.e. Shrek mapper)?

[ashen bone]

asking the real questions

[wraith magnet]

Hmm, I am not a developer but I see it is written in chisel, and whenever anyone mentions that it is generally followed by "chisel code is horrible and auto generated"

[fallen harbor]

Chisel code is horrible and auto generated

With all the effort spent trying to justify higher level fpga languages, someone could just learn verilog damn it!

[hard sinew]

If the core works, it works.

[little crystal]

https://github.com/maltanar/fpga-tidbits/blob/master/src/main/scala/fpgatidbits/math/Counter.scala this was one of the first examples of Chisel code I could find, and

why

https://www.reddit.com/r/FPGA/comments/wnnhb8/so_whats_the_deal_with_chisel_and_why_is_it_so/

[wraith magnet]

Is a neat project if you want to build your own GBA/GBC clone. Read through his blog post and readme, no mention of mapper support anywhere which is a bit odd, so not sure on level of compatibility. No idea if it does support the 64MB video carts, maybe someone digging into the core will be able to see.

[steady wasp]

might be able to learn something from it, it would be better if it wasn't chisel though

[wraith magnet]

Is anyone planning to build one of these?

[solar iron]

Hmm, it's not working on my end. I'm using my PS4 controller, but no rumble when I play it after patching it. Games like Drill Dozer rumble fine with it though, so no idea what I'm doing wrong.

[rotund flume]

I might be wrong, it was an earlier version of the patch that worked for me

[north ice]

@vanfanel I played Wario land 4 a lot (100%ing it multiple times when I was young) but I always found the style... Disturbing / off-putting. I always felt WL3 was the pinnacle in terms of style and joy (for me).

I never played through the non-land named games though. WarioWare threw me off the wagon. 🙃

[solar iron]

You should play Warioware! That game is incredible!

[torn jay]

thankfully the mGBA suite now has tests for the link port registers and timing, so it should be much easier to build that. You wouldn't have to compare real GBA vs the core all the time

[solar iron]

Got it working! There's a second patch that you need to apply to it for it to work on MiSTer. It said that the second patch was only for "openFPGA" users, so I thought it was only for Analogue Pocket. But it seems that second patch is also needed for MiSTer.

[rose vine]

For GB, I support MBC1, 2, 3, 5, 7 (with RTC, rumble, accelerometer, as relevant). For GBA, I only stuck 32MB of ram on there so I can’t support the 64MB video cartridge anyway

[rose vine]

I do know verilog! And I hate it. I agree that chisel generated verilog is garbage— but I don’t care, as long as the synthesis tools can ingest it. There’s the occasional thing where I had to dig in and realize that it was generating verilog that Vivado was implementing suboptimally. But in general, I got a lot of benefits from using Chisel for this project. When I first started, I was using Verilog and ran out of steam due to how… unpleasant it was. I switched to Chisel and that gave me the will to keep going 😛

[deep yarrow]

oh hello, i take it you are the creator? i very much enjoyed reading your write-up thankyou

[rose vine]

Yep, I am. Thanks!

[north ice]

Aside from reading the code and comparing, I would be interested to see what Chisel helped you to do more easily.

[novel kindle]

https://fxtwitter.com/cbrzeszczot/status/1810741402898461151

[verbal heath]

Hey all. Noticed that none of the Gamegear X-Men games are loading for me on MiSter. I’ve tried the Gamegear and Mastersystem cores. Using analog output. Wanted to know if anyone else has tried to play them, before I start looking into troubleshooting

[fast dove]

Has anyone made a SNAC adapter for Game Boy Advance link cables specifically?

[sterile quarry]

Game Boy Advance cables would fit and work with the existing cables already, so there is no need for a GBA specific one at all

[cinder peak]

have you tried any other game gear games on the core?

does the earthworm jim game gear game work for you?

[gray grail]

Test build with some CH1 frequency changes (from paulb-nl).

https://github.com/paulb-nl/GBA_MiSTer/tree/sound

[deep yarrow]

neat! any clues whaat might sound different?

[verbal heath]

I’ve tried other gamegear games and they’ve ran, but haven’t tested a huge amount of them. Will check Earthworm Jim next time I turn it on.

[gray grail]

I've not checked completely at the moment, I'm just reinstalling my MiSTer setup and my compiling environment right now.

The X-Men games should work on the SMS/GG core, I could at least launch them (on a Digital board though).

Same for Earthworm Jim.

[verbal heath]

Earthworm Jim works; X-Men does not.

Fixed the problem though.

I had Z80 Speed saved as Turbo by accident

Turning it to Normal made the game boot normally.

[rotund flume]

Nice, glad you figured it out

[torn jay]

Gen3 Pokemon games, see the original issue: https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/GBA_MiSTer/issues/142

[deep yarrow]

oh nice the example they posted is really clear

[sudden jasper]

I wonder if that fixes or goes towards fixing any of the other audio issues that user has reported

[torn jay]

there is currently no other sound bug in the github

if you know of any, please test it

[rotund flume]

And please report it on GitHub. Posting here is great but this is a chat room and not an issue repository so searching for bugs places an untenable onus on the core developer.

If you find a bug and want it fixed then put in effort.

[ashen bone]

i get a lot of audio popping in the GBA core but i'm unsure if it's the core or some weirdness with the 9.2 i/o

[torn jay]

if at all it is the GBA. (GBA sound hardware is relativly weak, especially for the software mixed 8 bit PCM channels)
If it was the core, there would have been plenty of reports over the last 5 years.
If it's I/O is easy to test: use HDMI/digital audio to rule it out

[sudden jasper]

Oh I was thinking of these or am I looking at the wrong thing?

https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/GBA_MiSTer/issues/155
https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/GBA_MiSTer/issues/143

I don't have my GBAHD hooked up ATM to compare with real hardware

I got the MiSTer as a nice convenient way to not have so much stuff hooked up

[torn jay]

the music balance was an issue since the very first day, but not really a bug in the sound channel itself.
It's not known why this happens and the methods to get around it in software emulators have been very hacky. Not sure if anything changed in regard to that the last years.
The DBZ bug is somehow also sound, you are right. I missed it when I looked through the list. However, it's very unlikely fixed by it as it is a sound DMA bug(GBA sound HW, not GB sound HW) that I have no clue where it comes from.

[sudden jasper]

Damn GBA, why are you so weird.

[torn jay]

To be honest: i would really like to debug some of these issues that came in the last years, but first the core really has to be made more accurate in general.

I will reveal more the next days 🙂

[sudden jasper]

Oooo that's exciting. In all fairness, I've not really noticed any issues personally. I probably wouldn't have even been aware of this if I hadn't browsed the GitHub while I was bored on a train

[torn jay]

Totally fair. Overall the amount of bugs have been found in the last years isn't really something to worry about, but still, knowledge of the GBA is so much better these days, the core deserves to be better.

[sudden jasper]

I still think the work that everyone does in this community is amazing

[wary fjord]

Oh no…we have awoken Robert from his slumber…

https://tenor.com/ftbudKDG8DP.gif

[novel kindle]

Thank you 😊

[novel kindle]

https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/GBA_MiSTer/pull/158

[little tulip]

Sweet.
Coincidentally, I've been on a GBA mode these days

[gray grail]

I'm removing the build, as paulb-nl is doing another update that will fix Apotris too.

[novel kindle]

and quake proto alos

also

[torn jay]

where do you have this info from?

[novel kindle]

PR's

[gray grail]

https://github.com/MiSTer-devel/GBA_MiSTer/pull/159

[torn jay]

completly missed the second one

amazing to see that Paul always finds such things burried deep in a core

[gray grail]

I've tested Iridion 3D and Apotris.
I'm updating the corresponding issue tickets as fixed.

[novel kindle]

@gray grail could please share your build ? Latest autobuild of GBA unstable have graphical issues

[gray grail]

Gimme 5 mins.

I'm trying dual/triple building remotely.

[novel kindle]

thanks 🙂

[solar iron]

Oh nice, Apotris fix! 🎉

[sudden jasper]

I love the GBA

Good memories of not being able to see Tony Hawks Pro Skater 2

[rotund flume]

Maaaaaan, I remember buying that game because IGN recommended it and I loved the shit out of it.

But like, when the sun was hitting the GBA screen perfectly, lol

[deep yarrow]

golden sun was always my favorite

though recently FF tactics on GBA is taking up a lot of my time

[sudden jasper]

Yeah I had to sit in a certain part of my house to get the light in just the right spot

[rotund flume]

Golden Sun is SOOO GOOOOD

I mean it's not good

it's amazing!!!!

[deep yarrow]

did anyone else have an afterburner mod back then? it was a backlight mod for the original GBAs

[rotund flume]

My good friend did

he bought it just for the video out

[deep yarrow]

absolutely wrecked batteries lol

[rotund flume]

or was that another mod

[deep yarrow]

i think video out was later

[rotund flume]

ohhh ok

[deep yarrow]

but the mods were like integrated with each other iirc

[rotund flume]

Wait that's right, he got the Afterburner first and then got the video out thing later

[deep yarrow]

ah

[rotund flume]

He was a Castlevania mega fan and bought a GBA + Circle of the Moon

[sudden jasper]

I tried one of the front light mods a few years ago but I removed it as it looked like shit. I did have an EZFlash Advance though!

[rotund flume]

and he couldn't play it

straight up was like "this is unplayable"

then he got the afterburner kit and we had great fun playing GBA on his TV

[deep yarrow]

sadly sold that GBA years ago, with a modern li-ion battery it might be quite viable

[rotund flume]

I could be wrong here but the new kits are superior, right?

[deep yarrow]

oh for sure

but they replace the screen entirely

afterburner kept your original screen and added lighting

[sudden jasper]

You haven't properly played a GBA if you've been able to see the screen

[deep yarrow]

gamecube gameboy player was the best way to play tbh

until the core anyway

[rotund flume]

Yeah, that's how I played a bunch of games

[deep yarrow]

i probably played more gameboy player than gamecube come to think of it

[sudden jasper]

Yeah same!

In fact, for a long time my GameCube was just a big fat GBA with a TV connected to it

[deep yarrow]

crystal chronicles and zelda 4 swords were awesome too if you had enough friends wiith GBAs

if anyone else made that i'd be hubris but nintendo... yeah it wasn't that hard to find 3 friends with a gba heh

[rotund flume]

I played and beat Four Swords with my wife (GF at the time) and her neice and nephew. Was a ton of fun!

[open shuttle]

Played so much smash, animal crossing, and gbc/gba games on my GameCube.

[hollow rock]

I played Tony hawk on GBC

I think I played downhill jam on GBA though

[vast raven]

I used a Gameboy Advance Nintendo power to help beat THPS2 on PS1. The GBA port is surprisingly faithful. Did the same thing with Rayman.

It's a shame how dim the backlight is for original Gameboy Advance sps.

[torn jay]

First results from the rebuild, now cycle accurate GBA core.
Right picture is current firmware of pocket using ez flash cart. Jailbreak version fulfills test as well, no idea why the "cart-version" is not fully accurate.
Old GBA core has only 442/936.

[rotund flume]

Holy shit dude, that's amazing! CONGRATS!!! 🥳

[torn jay]

It doesn't play games yet, so please give me some time. Will tell more when it's ready.

[wary fjord]

take your time, duder. thank you 🙂

[torn jay]

Due to the large amount of changes, I fear a lot of testing is required again to make it stable, but I really hope the new accurate design is worth the effort 🙂

[hard sinew]

🥳 🎉

[fathom trail]

What is the list of currently cycle accurate cores?

[wary fjord]

1. You
2. Me
3. Dupree

[wary fjord]

https://tenor.com/boWpt.gif

[mild glen]

This is an announcement! Congrats Robert. Keep up the good work 🙂

[novel kindle]

@torn jay do you have the same issue with everdrive if you have it ?

[torn jay]

don't have any other GBA flash cart, but you can try if you have

[torn jay]

most cores are. GBA was not for various reasons. It brings some downsides with it, e.g. that the core will not work with only DDR3 anymore

[novel kindle]

I don't have analogue pocket to test but will test on my GBA SP to see

[rotund flume]

🎶 Guess who's back, back again? Robert's back, core wen? 🎶

[torn jay]

ez flash with normal GBA has 936/936, so it's only on pocket

this test is running from internal ram anyway, so flash cart shouldn't make any difference.
I guess the cart-core is different from the rom-core

[primal lichen]

Might be a revision quirk

[torn jay]

hard to say with a closed source project and I don't really care why. I just wanted to show we can play in the same league or better 🙂

[primal lichen]

Looking forward to try out the improved GBA core. I want to play Gunstar Super Heroes and Astro Boy: Omega Factor in particular.

[wary fjord]

yeah but does shrek work

[mild glen]

I have pocket if you want me to test anything

No flash cart though

[primal lichen]

Can't wait for people to report on false flags because of the core being a lot more accurate to original hardware.

[vast raven]

Will it be a second core like Genesis or will it be a complete drop in replacement?

[hollow rock]

It won't be a replacement because it's not building on the existing core and for the sake of preservation nothing of the current core and it's source code will be deleted

Unless I'm mistaken about the whole complete remake from the ground up thing

[vast raven]

I meant how it'll eventually be presented in the downloader and menu

[deft jay]

OMG Robert! Congratulations to this feat 🙂 I´m up for some ROM testing with the new core when its ready. Gotta loop that FF6 intro again lol!

[torn jay]

Not sure how it will be handled later. There will be things the new core cannot do due to ressources required to keep it accurate (run from DDR3, 2 player core, possibly other extra features), so there will still be value in the original one.

[deft jay]

Got it. does save states go also?

[torn jay]

save states will stay

not sure if they will be 100% compatible between both cores

[deft jay]

Cycle accurate and savestates very exciting. I guess the two player core will have its place along sided this one

[torn jay]

one big change is that the 256kbyte "external ram" is now inside the FPGA instead of sdram/ddr3 to allow for the required latency when it's accessed while ROM prefetch is running.
This fills up a large part of the FPGA memory and will not allow to run 2 GBA cores in one DE10-Nano.
The Analogue pocket has a seperate SRAM for that.

[primal lichen]

What about the turbo features? Will that get scrapped?

[torn jay]

I would like to keep fastforward and turbo as options, but it's not yet clear if there will be enough headroom for them in terms of timing.

[deft jay]

the 256kbyte external ram handling in the FPGA, what does that give us? If its only a function used wile loading a rom i dont understand the benefit

[rotund flume]

Turbo > FFW imo of course

because Turbo makes Kurohige no Golf Shiyouyo playable which is totally a real game and not something I just made up

[torn jay]

the GBA has internal and external RAM that the games can use. Internal RAM is only 32 Kbyte and can be accessed in 1 clock cycle. External RAM is 256 Kbyte and needs 3 cycles.

[primal lichen]

Fast forward is a pretty nice feature for the RPGs. I personally like to use it for the Pokémon games whenever I need to do a little bit of grinding.

[deft jay]

oh, got it.

[left breach]

@torn jay awesome, thanks. Happy to do test streams.

N64 was so much fun.

[rotund flume]

that makes too much sense, I don't like it

[torn jay]

basically the current core runs everything at 6 times clock speed, which on average it's about 2.5x speed.
However, there are situations where busses can be used in parallel and the core can be slower than the original GBA.
The core will catch up, but these situations lead to timing inaccuracies that are visible in some games and for sure in a good bunch of tests.
I build it like this 5 years ago because I didn't found a solution for keeping it cycle accurate due to the sdram access delays.
Over the years I learned enough to understand it is indeed possible.

[rotund flume]

[wary fjord]

Will the new core need dual ram? Or is single ram still gonna be enough?

[torn jay]

single

the RAM will behave like a cart module, holding exactly the rom and cart save data, nothing else

[wary fjord]

Niiice

[unique radish]

Would it support GBA link cable? Via a Snac adapter

[wary fjord]

man this is exciting

[torn jay]

yes, SNAC will be much easier, due to the timing being reliable

[unique radish]

Amazing!

[left breach]

So this is how we will play your rogue like GBA game 😀

[unique radish]

(I still need to buy that Snac adapter at some point)

[vast raven]

So you could snac two misters together GameCube style

What's the current landscape of mister fpga handhelds these days?

[unique radish]

I didn't even think of it like that TBF. That's an idea

I was thinking of like trading Pokémon from the mister to a GBA.

[torn jay]

handheld mister with link port for GB and GBA sounds good 🙂

[vast raven]

I'd love that.

Also was e-reader ever functional?

If not, could be cool to implement it with tapto

[mighty isle]

Haha you just couldn’t quit us @torn jay

[vast raven]

Well he needed his homebrew to be testable on an accurate core

[deep yarrow]

very exciting news

[timber wraith]

And here I thought the GBA core was already great

[hot sparrow]

https://tenor.com/view/cat-annoyed-eyeing-cat-meme-cat-funny-gif-14867130448325066479

[little tulip]

Can this be implemented in the core?
Shaders that have colors more accurate to an actual GBA
https://pokefan531.tumblr.com/

[ashen bone]

isn’t this already available via the color modify option

[gray grail]

We already had that discussion during the end of January.

[primal lichen]

Personally I would like an option to modify the colors so it matches the NSO GBA gamma levels.

[ashen bone]

i won’t lie, even if they are “accurate” to a real gba screen, they’ve always looked too washed out to me

[primal lichen]

That is why in addition to the modified colors, I also add extra gamma to help compensate for the dulled colors. The right settings can create some good results.

[flat violet]

I highly prefer the original look myself, would be great to have the option for accurate colors if possible.

[little tulip]

@vast raven Yeah same I personallly use a combination of one of the in-core color option and a gamma shader.

[gleaming heath]

MiSTer to MiSTer, MiSTer to GameCube, MiSTer to Analogue Pocket, etc etc. I think Link Cable support would open so many opportunities.

Imagine this with, replacing the GBAs with MiSTers attached to iPad screens. Nirvana.

...I'm gonna need to buy a 4th MiSTer and dust off my early model Wii

[sudden jasper]

I try not to worry too much about the colour correction; something "close" is good enough. Some earlier games took the screen into consideration whereas some later games didn't. It's a bit of a crapshoot.

Mine goes into a RetroTINK 4K and I'm currently using the "Game Boy Interface" colour correction which tones down the saturation but doesn't wash it out as much as the more authentic one does.

[rotund flume]

The GBA filter might be a good close enough solution. I compared it against my SP while making it

[sudden jasper]

This looks fine to my eyeballs

I never liked that colour scheme on Samus though. It's like a hawaiian shirt but in power suit form.

[rotund flume]

LOL that’s so on the nose 😂

[ashen bone]

i most often prefer the raw rgb colors. for the games that overcompensated for the gba's dim screen with overly-bright colors, you can usually find color restoration hacks that make them look great on a big display

[solar iron]

Fusion suit Samus has always been the ugliest Samus!

[primal lichen]

Every Samus is spectacular

[rotund flume]

I didn’t like Fusion when it came out but I did beat it

Then Other M released and you know what, Fusion is alright

[fathom trail]

Who in charge thought that Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3 was an OK name?

[primal lichen]

Super Mario Advance 4: Super Mario Bros. 3 is worse.

[sterile quarry]

There's always the option to make new GBA filters. Not sure if those are user accessible or baked into the core. GB/GBC are really easy to make
(helps when it's like 4 colours!)

[rotund flume]

I hate to say it but it makes sense

[primal lichen]

It's funny how Nintendo pulled the same trick of introducing a Mario spin-off and framing it as a sequel twice.

Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island is the other example.

[fathom trail]

Why isn't the sequel Wario Land 2: Super Mario Land 4?

[ashen bone]

i don't even think it was called smw2 in japan was it? it was just yoshi's island lol

[rotund flume]

Sales probably gave them the confidence they didn’t need to use the Mario land name crutch anymore

[primal lichen]

It was called Super Mario: Yossy's Island in Japanese.

Not as egregious, but they still tried to frame it as another Super Mario game.

Also yes, it's "Yossy". Nintendo kind of flip-flopped on whether it was "Yoshi" or "Yossy" for a while.

[solar iron]

I'm one of those crazy people who likes Other M.

[ashen bone]

ah i see. i at least agree with that more than i do "super mario world 2" lol

yossy is funny though

[hollow rock]

What about dread on switch?

[rotund flume]

I think that game is wonderful but it didn’t stick with me. My good friend was the Director on it though so I am biased