<!--quoteo(post=3501106:date=Mar 7 2011, 12:11 AM:name=ShadauxCat)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ShadauxCat @ Mar 7 2011, 12:11 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=3501106"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec--><b>Update - CATSFC 1.1</b>
I've just released a new version, CATSFC 1.1, that enables touchscreen support for the in-game menu and corrects some of the poor English (such as "CPU Frequence" being corrected to "CPU Frequency"), and corrects the previously improper display of the language setting (i.e., when you are using the English display, it will now show "English") The game will also now remember your recent games even if you power off without hitting "exit."
That said, I'll address some other posts that came in while I was working on that...
<!--quoteo(post=3499876:date=Mar 6 2011, 07:26 AM:name=Killermech)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Killermech @ Mar 6 2011, 07:26 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=3499876"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->I gave this a testdrive mainly with games that suffered alot of slowdown before
C = CATSFC
B = BAGSFC
<u><b>Super Mario RPG</b></u> (About 1 hour playing)
C = HUGE improvement. Although it still suffers from slowdowns, mainly when a dialogue or a cutscene is active. Some minor/medium slowdowns when walking around areas, which improves if you enable
fast forward during those times. Some minor slowdowns in battles as well, but since it's mainly turnbased, it's still fully <b><!--coloro:#2E8B57--><span style="color:#2E8B57"><!--/coloro-->Playable<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--></b> as it seems for now if you don't mind the slowdowns.
B = Alot of slowdowns, can slightly be improved by disabling sound and enabling fast forward after the castle part. But Imo still very <!--coloro:#FF0000--><span style="color:#FF0000"><!--/coloro--><b>Unplayable</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->.
<u><b>Super Mario Kart</b></u>
C = Has alot of slowdown but you can actually play it. Although I wouldn't recommend it. <!--coloro:#FF0000--><span style="color:#FF0000"><!--/coloro--><b>Unplayable</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
B = Lag spikes all over the place along with huge slowdowns, <!--coloro:#FF0000--><span style="color:#FF0000"><!--/coloro--><b>Unplayable</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
<u><b>StarFox</b></u>
C = The improvements blew my mind in this one. Although it has alot of slowdowns, it's actually playable as in you can aim, steer etc. Like it's running at 5-10 FPS. Although it's still in a <!--coloro:#FF0000--><span style="color:#FF0000"><!--/coloro--><b>Unplayable</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--> state.
B = Once you get ingame, it runs at like 0.1-1 FPS. <!--coloro:#FF0000--><span style="color:#FF0000"><!--/coloro--><b>Unplayable</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
<u><b>Axelay</b></u>
C = Very <b><!--coloro:#2E8B57--><span style="color:#2E8B57"><!--/coloro-->Playable<!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc--></b> with some slowdowns. This is a very action packed game, so I still wouldn't recommend playing it, but if you don't mind the extra difficulty level the slowdowns brings, then it is playable.
B = Major slowdowns, although it is playable as you can steer your ship and shoot etc. But considering the slowdowns would bring the game to some kind of an impossible difficulty mode, I wouldn't recommend it. <!--coloro:#FF0000--><span style="color:#FF0000"><!--/coloro--><b>Unplayable</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
<u><b>Super Star Wars</b></u> (So I decided to try out a game that worked near perfect before to compare if there was any difference) <!--coloro:#2E8B57--><span style="color:#2E8B57"><!--/coloro--><b>Playable</b><!--colorc--></span><!--/colorc-->
C = At first it seemed just fine. But after trying it again after trying it with BAGSFC, I noticed there was a tiny tiny lag in the game. As it were running at frameskip 1.
B = Runs perfectly smooth. Just some minor slowdowns if there are alot of enemies on screen, same for both versions.
After discovering that tiny lag in Super Star Wars, I noticed there was a tiny lag in general in all games. As if the emulator is running at frameskip 1 now.
So basically my conclusion after the tests is:
- All games that ran poorly with alot of slowdown, were improved GREATLY to an almost very enjoyable playable state.
- All games that ran (near) perfect before, suffers from a tiny tiny lag now.
Anyways, very amazing work ShadauxCat! Just wondering if you still have any tricks up your sleeve to make this even better? Again, very good work!<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I already addressed this one, but I'm coming back to it: I didn't notice this problem. I played Super Star Wars and it ran flawlessly for me even at CPU Frequency 2. I don't know what's different between us, since we are theoretically running on identical hardware in nearly identical running environments, but I simply didn't have this issue. THAT SAID, however, I'm going to be doing as much as I can to improve performance across the board and hopefully eventually get games like Mario Kart and SMRPG to a fully playable level through some hard core code optimization. I can't guarantee I'll accomplish that, but that is my goal.
<!--quoteo(post=3500348:date=Mar 6 2011, 12:15 PM:name=Freezer6)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Freezer6 @ Mar 6 2011, 12:15 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=3500348"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Thx for your smooth work! Playing Super Mario RPG is cool!
Everything worked great, so far no bugs appeared.
Question: Is it possible to enabled Touchscreen for choosing options in the menu?
and
Remebering the last game played were cool,too!?
Both options in GBA EMU,too=Awesome!
Greetz and many thx<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Answer: Yes. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="

" border="0" alt="smile.gif" /> See above.
Fixing the GBA emulator, however, isn't really possible, as I have no source code for it. I'm tossing around the idea of coding a new GBA emulator from scratch after I finish tweaking CATSFC, but if I do, expect it to be a long time before anything playable comes out of it.
<!--quoteo(post=3500449:date=Mar 6 2011, 01:00 PM:name=RPG Hacker)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(RPG Hacker @ Mar 6 2011, 01:00 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=3500449"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec--><!--quoteo(post=3500132:date=Mar 6 2011, 04:37 PM:name=ShadauxCat)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ShadauxCat @ Mar 6 2011, 04:37 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=3500132"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec--><!--quoteo(post=3499556:date=Mar 6 2011, 03:24 AM:name=RPG Hacker)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(RPG Hacker @ Mar 6 2011, 03:24 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=3499556"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Great news!
I didn't have time to test it yet, will do so once I get home today. Just one question: Does it support BG Mode 5 (I think it was 5, may also be 4)? That's a mode used in a very few games, like for example for menus in Secret of Mana and Seiken Densetsu 3. What it does is basically giving screens double the width. In the previous versions of the SC2DS Emulators it wasn't emulated well, causing every second letter in those menus to be cut out. Is it emulated yet? If it isn't I could help you by giving more information.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
My answer to this is: I don't really know, as I didn't write the emulator from scratch and I haven't tested that. But I do know that the emulator was built from the source code of snes9x, so maybe? If the original supercard NDSSFC didn't support it, then the answer is no, I haven't explicitly added support for that; I'll look it up and see what I can find out.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The letters were indeed cut out in the old version. I didn't want to make it sound like an assumption, sorry. There reasons for this is that in most BG Modes on the SNES, a tile is 8 pixels width. In mode 5, however, tiles are always 16 pixels width (height can either be 8 or 16 pixels). This makes it possible to have a screen of double the width without needing more tilemap space in VRAM. The games I mentioned used this mode to put more text on the screen. What I think the emulator does right now is still treating the tiles as tiles of 8 pixels width, therefore skipping a few tiles. Well, what am I telling you this, anyways? I have screenshots somewhere. Look at this:
<img src="http://img176.imageshack.us/img176/1783/glitch1.png" border="0" class="linked-image" /> <img src="http://img256.imageshack.us/img256/1310/glitch2a.png" border="0" class="linked-image" />
So basically the solution would be to emulate the width of 16 pixels and then scale the screen width to half, to make it fix on the screen again.
In case you want to look into this problem: I reported the bug (along with a few other bugs and more details) here:
<a href="http://forum.supercard.sc/viewthread.php?tid=6320&page=19&extra=#pid48036" target="_blank">http://forum.supercard.sc/viewthread.php?t...extra=#pid48036</a>
<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
This is going to be a lot harder than it sounds, at least to make it playable. Shrinking a 16x16 tile to an 8x8 tile will effectively mean cutting out every other pixel both horizontally and vertically. I can't imagine any text will be readable after that, but I will certainly see what I can make happen. That said, though, there are other things I want to get done first because they apply to more games and will take less effort to get going to an acceptable level.
<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Sure, take your time. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/smile.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid="

" border="0" alt="smile.gif" />
It would be awesome, if you could fix it somehow sometime. (that's what I was talking about btw)