Star Fox 64 on Wii VC has crackling audio

[bignutishere]

Hi, I'm discovering the joys of owning a Wii in the year of 2026. Better late than never.

Been playing the NTSC Virtual Console version of Star Fox 64 a bunch, and there's this annoying audio distortion that's hard to ignore throughout the game, like the audio is crackling.
It's most noticable in the end credits. This video I found on youtube shows it off as well, so I know the issue isn't just on my end: (45:56 in case the timestamp doesn't work)

I was surprised how nobody online seems to have discussed this over the years. Has anyone else noticed this or similar issues on other n64 VC releases? Is the cause known? Out of curiosity, I did try the PAL Lylat Wars release, and the audio was perfectly fine in that one.

 

[Disorarara]

Now that is a crazy discovery! It's like when people first discovered there was a flicker filter applied to all Wii software, necessitating deflicker codes

I would say it's even worth investigating if other Wii N64 VC games have this issue or if it's just Star Fox 64 on NTSC systems, that it's missing from the PAL version must mean they were aware of the bug but never decided to update or patch it in any way for NTSC regions.

 

[bignutishere]

As someone who has absolutely 0 technical knowledge on the wii, n64 or emulation, I figured the issue would either be in the rom, or the emulator/WAD the rom is packed in. So I did a little experiment out of curiosity.

FIrst, I unpacked the n64 rom from the NTSC virtual console wad, and played it on project64. No audio issues present
Then, I used FriishProduce to pack an SF64 rom (dumped from an n64 cart, not the one extracted form the wad previously) into the Lylat Wars VC WAD, audio issues still remain.

It's interesting that the same virtual console emulator would have these audio problems for the NTSC rom, but not the PAL one. Perhaps the different framerates also play a part in it? This affects both the 1.0 and 1.3 VC releases btw, and is reproducible in Dolphin as well, not just real hardware.

I guess because it's most apparent in the credits (I'd say the 2nd most noticeable scenario is the music you hear when you beat a level), and might be less noticeable if you're using speakers and not headphones like me, maybe it hasn't bothered too many people. And of course we have so many ways to play these games now, doing it on the wii is kind of a novelty at this point

 

[Disorarara]

As someone who has absolutely 0 technical knowledge on the wii, n64 or emulation, I figured the issue would either be in the rom, or the emulator/WAD the rom is packed in. So I did a little experiment out of curiosity.

FIrst, I unpacked the n64 rom from the NTSC virtual console wad, and played it on project64. No audio issues present
Then, I used FriishProduce to pack an SF64 rom (dumped from an n64 cart, not the one extracted form the wad previously) into the Lylat Wars VC WAD, audio issues still remain.

It's interesting that the same virtual console emulator would have these audio problems for the NTSC rom, but not the PAL one. Perhaps the different framerates also play a part in it? This affects both the 1.0 and 1.3 VC releases btw, and is reproducible in Dolphin as well, not just real hardware.

I guess because it's most apparent in the credits (I'd say the 2nd most noticeable scenario is the music you hear when you beat a level), and might be less noticeable if you're using speakers and not headphones like me, maybe it hasn't bothered too many people. And of course we have so many ways to play these games now, doing it on the wii is kind of a novelty at this point

Have you tried putting the NTSC star fox 64 rom into another VC game? like Sin and Punishment or F-Zero X? To see if the issues still remain. Honestly this is one of those things I would have never noticed myself cause I always prefer to emulate using Wii64 or Not64 when I can and Star Fox 64 happens to be one of those games that works perfectly but this has piqued my interest.

 

[bignutishere]

LOL clearly I had nothing better to do all day today. Because I just tested it out on a majority of the VC titles


So the rom I used was Star Fox 64 (USA) (Rev A), and all the WADs were NTSC-U as well. Spoiler alert, results were the same or worse. But since I've taken some notes for each, might as well post them here for future reference.

To be fair, I used Dolphin and not real hardware. But since I couldn't see a difference between the vanilla SF64 VC release running on the Wii or emulated, I figure these should be fairly accurate.

Last thing, I used a 100% save file, which unlocks the sound test. The audio sounds perfectly fine on the unmodified Star Fox 64 WAD there, so the crackling is only during gameplay. Seems like a performance issue. Might even explain why the PAL release is fine, as it runs at a lower frame rate. I'll have to check out Wii64 and Not64, thanks for that rec!

WAD	Notes
Super Mario 64	Screen is darker than usual N64 framerate drops are fixed Start button gets pressed automatically on title screen Missing fog effects in Corneria
Mario Kart 64	Start button gets pressed automatically on title screen N64 framerate drops are fixed
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time	Start button gets pressed automatically on title screen N64 framerate drops are fixed
F-Zero X	Seemingly same as vanilla Star Fox 64 WAD
Paper Mario	Worse lag and audio stuttering on map screen In Dolphin, after a while, throws 'Invalid read' warning and sound cuts out
Wave Race 64	Same as Paper Mario
Yoshi's Story	Runs at a constant 15fps and half speed when entering Corneria city
Pokémon Snap	Worse lag and audio stuttering on map screen Runs at a constant 15fps and half speed when entering Corneria city
1080° Snowboarding	Freezes on 'You will need the Classic Controller' screen
Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards	Audio crackling and sligthly pitched up on title screen
Cruis'n USA	Same as Kirby
Pokémon Puzzle League	Audio crackling and sligthly pitched up on title screen In Dolphin, after a while, throws 'Invalid read' warning and sound cuts out
Mario Golf	Softlocks on the '1997 Nintendo PRESENTS' screen
The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask	Freeze on the '1997 Nintendo PRESENTS' screen
Super Smash Bros.	Main menu buttons don't have a background Softlocks when selecting Single Player or Training mode
Ogre Battle 64: Person of Lordly Caliber	Briefly shows the spinning n64 logo on boot No audio Main menu buttons don't have a background No fog in Corneria
Mario Tennis	Freezes on 'You will need the Classic Controller' screen
Mario Party 2	Briefly shows the spinning n64 logo on boot Audio crackling and sligthly pitched up on title screen Main menu buttons don't have a background
Bomberman Hero	Shows the spinning n64 logo on boot for several seconds No audio Screen is darker than usual Main menu buttons don't have a background