I'm super tired right now but just wanted to let you know that we have the first successful result! Star Fox does indeed run at a better frame rate with that new footer, so that value was indeed for the FX clock speed and it's one of the values that actually works.
I've been super busy today with work so was only able to run some of the tests this late. Here are the results so far:
Dungeon Master boots with the first footer but has severe graphical glitches once you get past the intro, like you said. Doesn't boot with the second footer.
Secret of Mana we already knew launches with the usual footer and yes, the hi-res menus look weird, as expected (I think me and 18Phoenix mentioned this before? Maybe not). The second footer doesn't boot. I noticed a bit late to run another test that the Preset ID on the second footer was 4A 12. Is that the Super Family Tennis footer? I think someone mentioned earlier on the thread that taking SFT from the Japanese app and putting it on the Western one didn't work (if this is true it would confirm even further that a Preset ID from a game not included officially cannot be used, even across regions) and that using a different footer made the menu graphics glitchy beyond the usual high resolution "blurriness". SFT is one the games I'm planning to try next so I'll see for myself and try some stuff out like using a different Preset ID with the rest of the footer intact. I of course tried Secret of Mana just like youtold me to but I'll try with BD 10 as well later.
There were no changes to the volume of Super Mario World or the second controller in Super Mario Kart. As you know, the volume is controlled on the NES and and now the SNES Switch apps by the lclassics file. There's an entry there for number of players but I'm pretty much 100% sure that's just for the details screen and doesn't really change how the game behaves since that's how it was on the NES app where I kept forgetting to change it in games like Contra or TMNT and they could still be played my 2 players no problem anyway. Maybe these values are just a left over from previous incarnations of the emulators? Or was left there for future proofing in case they decide to go back to the previous method later? Or maybe someone is lazy?
Like I said, Star Fox runs noticeably faster, enough to make the make the intro sequence end before the music can catch up and it's the same with the Corneria intro sequence (poor dude can barely get "Prepare for launch" before the arwings blast off). During the actual game it's a bit harder to notice, of course, but it's enough to throw off my muscle memory from knowing this game by heart and miss some timing and queues. The Switch's built in video recording is great for doing comparisons between the overclocked and standard versions, by the way. The credits sequence will probably run a hell of a lot faster and end way before the music does, the complete opposite of what happened in some emulators where the music would end up and there would still be half the development team left to mention! I'll probably end up adding this and the faster Gradius 3 to my final selection of games as something similar to the SP Versions of some games the NES app has (maybe 18Phoenix will do the same to his packs?). Stunt Race could also benefit from this, right?
I tried Yoshi as well but didn't really notice any difference even though I played the official version immediately after to compare. I'll have to play more though as I didn't spend much time with it now and in the first two stages there's nothing that should require the extra clock speed, only a few rotating sprites. Maybe I'll notice something once I get to a castle that has those 3D slabs dropping on Yoshi or one of the huge rotating boss sprites. If there's really a change in clock speed, that will surely trigger noticeable issues. I'll at least beat a couple of worlds and I'm picky about how this game runs, I hated how it played on the otherwise good snes9x version for Wii when everyone else was saying it ran perfectly fine, so I'm sure I'll find something if there's something to be found.
Tested a few versions of Tales of Phantasia (clean, no translation) and they all booted to a black screen, just like the expanded Trials of Mana rom does (and some other expanded rom that I mentioned before too, I should start taking notes). Same as Secret of Mana before, the Preset ID you used is BE 10. I figure that was probably intentional since it did load even if it didn't work (a "wrong" Preset IDs means the game doesn't boot, from what I've seen).
I still have to test Super Tennis (but the roms are ready) and the new SFA2 patches. I had to finish some work today and didn't have time for anything else and testing Super Tennis will take a bit of time since I don't really know that game that much so I'll just play a few matches with my brother.
So that's it for this report! Throw more stuff at me if you think of anything, I'm finished with work for now. I'll also finish testing what's still pending and report back later.
I haven't been particularly holding back, just focused. SFA2 was a good test for now because it has the most telling binary result. Work, or doesn't. It also allows me to know if I'm properly grasping the footer format when I'm having to create new data entries and adjust their values. And personally... I got started on the whole .sfrom thing with SNESC thanks to SFA2, and more specifically Star Ocean. From the very beginning it was my goal to get Star Ocean running on SNESC canoe, and I knew the path to that was through SFA2. But that quest, everything I figured out, preset ids, patches, header bytes, etc, all came about as a result to the point that I eventually had to make use of all that regardless of SO/SFA2.
It's kind of a goal now for switch, but mostly I just want to follow through with my previous finding and get the switch format figured out asap. When I worked on the SNESC stuff, I quickly realized that 99% of it could have been figured out MANY years earlier with WiiU/3DS. But no one did, and as a result the injection modding stuff is not as effective as it should be.
Oh, man, I was gonna mention in the post you were replying to that one great possible off-shoot of getting SFA2 working is getting Star Ocean to work as well! It's a game I'd also love to see working. I've said it before and I'll say it again, it's a real shame that you can't do these test yourself. I'm sure you'd get there much faster without having to rely on our inexperienced help. In any case though, count on me to try my best to help as long as you're willing!
I could come up with ideas for other tests. But testing them will be less conclusive. I'd imagine many times the game will boot, regardless of the settings. There will just be small differences at unknown points in the game. For example, most games boot on the SNESC using preset id 0x0000. Even if they have an official one. But that doesn't mean they run perfectly. More specific examples would be like SoM. On SNESC it will boot with 0x0000, but it wont work optimally because the menus will be blurry due to not using higher resolution mode. If you use the proper ID and VC patch though, it will boot and look crisp.
If I was to test anything else right now, it would be to the goal of understanding what can/cant be changed in a stock footer. What makes the emulator say this footer is valid, and this footer is not. The fact that 63 01 can be changed and has an effect still puzzles me.
My best guess is that stock game footers are considered valid and identified as such by the emu based on their preset id. Doesn't seem like the preset id is doing much else right now, if its not even controlling if a special chip is used or not.
As mentioned, games are known to "boot" regardless of preset id (the main component of the footer). Generally though, special chip games are an exception as the enabling of that games special chip is part of the games preset id. You could only use a special chip game with another ID if you used the special chip byte manually. And even then, ids from other special chip games were an exception as you would be trying to use 2 chips at the same time i guess.
The fact that special chip games boot with other ids at all, without the special chip byte set... is odd. There's some measure of auto detection in the emu code now. But the preset ids likely still exist for a reason. If changing the 63 01 instruction has an effect, it seems that the footers arent completely ignored. We just have to figure out what we can and cant change, and deduce why...
Yes! That's what I think as well and have been trying to tell you. For one, you can't boot a game without using the ID of an already included game, so using 0x0000 like you say works on SNESC would definitely not work here. Also, games, even the more complex ones with special chips, work correctly even with the wrong Preset ID (would Star Fox 2 even boot with the Preset ID of Mario Kart on the SNESC? I've got the SA-1 version of Gradius 3 running with Mario Kart's footer without slow down even on the crazy stupid bubble stage). So knowing that, it's probable that something else changed as well. Hell, it's possible that they exist now only because NERD already had the roms organized like that in folders and were too lazy to change their storage system and footers are only a label now.
In fact, here are 2 more tests build off that idea. They both use Joe & Mac 2's footer/ID, but with a modification. I changed the use of instruction 50 to 44, and the value to the appropriate pointer. I chose this games footer to modify as it seemed closest to what should be a valid custom SFA2 footer. No need to change the length or anything. It's also only 1 of 2 with a > 2 byte instruction and of those 2 the instruction+value length matches at a total of 8 bytes.
SFA2 Test 7
SFA2 Test 8
The differences between the 2 patches are just where the footer is located. Middle or end of file.
Ah crap, I forgot about these two patches when preparing the roms for the other tests. I'll definitely try them later.
Also, remember that unlike with the SNESC, this app will be updated with more games (possibly as soon as next month) so there's bound to be something new to learn with each update. Hopefully they add a game that can teach us something about how this whole thing works. Sadly, the really useful ones like SFA2, Secret of Mana (for the hi-res thing, although Super Family Tennis is already out), etc are likely to never come because Capcom and Square Enix have their own collections with these games on Switch. The SFA2 on Street Fighter Collection is not the SNES version, but it's still a slim chance. But Act Raiser (and Soul Blazer too, I think?) was on Virtual Console so maybe that will come in an update and we can fix the audio for the other Quintet games.
Edit:
thanks i was able to fix the game by adding this to the super mario world footer
new Footer: 12106803740670020C
Wait, did that fix the hi-res mode looking wrong too or just the glitchy looking stuff?
