Homebrew Saving in Goomba Color

[ZenchiZennou]

I usually use Lameboy which is incredible, but some games only run correctly with Goomba Color. But I have a problem running the software correctly.

In-game saving doesn't seem to work for me. I'm not talking about savestates/real time save.

I tried using it on an M3 Lite and M3DS Real. Maybe I did something wrong or does it not save at all which I highly doubt. I'm probably just missing something. Do I need to use it in GBA mode?

I tried using Goomba Front but I'm not sure I used it correctly.

Any help is appreciated and thank you in advance! ^^

 

[DanTheManMS]

Try running it from the M3 Lite directly without using the M3 Real at all. You might need to patch with the Game Manager software for it to work. After that, it should be able to handle in-game saves fine. Just make sure if you're playing a game with a 32 KB save file that you press L+R after saving in-game to forcefully update the SRAM.

Beyond that point, I don't know how the M3 Lite handles saves, but it should function like any other standard GBA save file.

Have you ever been successful in getting the M3 Lite's "built-in" GBC emulator to work? If you did, we can easily upgrade the emulator core to the latest version of Goomba Color by replacing a single file.

 

[ZenchiZennou]

Thank you for your reply!

The built-in M3 emulator seems to work only with gb games. From what I've read online it has Goomba which runs only gb games. If I try to run gbc games I get the message to put goomba.gba in the root directory. Or when I convert the gbc files with the game manager (GM) to the .gba format I get the message that the game pack I'm trying to run is only for use with gameboy color.

So I put goomba.gba in the root directory and try running the game again. I finally got it to save my in-game progress, but the weird thing is that sometimes when I start the game again the saves are gone. Sometimes I can access the sram via the goomba color menu and sometimes not. There must be something I'm doing wrong.

Also I noticed even though I successfully saved my in-game progress there is no save file created on my SD card. Is this normal? Does it save directly in the rom?

This is the exact procedure I used:

1. I put the original goomba.gba file in the root directory of my SD card.
2. I put the original gbc file on the SD card. I tried both the root directory and other folders.
3. I start the game by choosing the gbc file in the menu.
4. I play the game and save in-game after which the sram seems to be accessible in the goomba color menu.
5. When I shut down and restart there is no auto backup that normally takes place after restarting the M3 but some other message appears. The only way to get this M3 save file is if I use the game manager to convert the game to gba but this is only for gameboy games as far as I understand. Or is it that I must convert the gbc file using the GM and use only the .dat save file that is created together whith the gbc rom?

I'll be trying some more things later.

Again thank you for your help! ^^

 

[DanTheManMS]

I wasn't even aware you could launch *.gbc files directly from the M3 Lite menu. I highly doubt that's going to function correctly.

Okay, so you can get it to save when using the Game Manager to convert the game to *.gba format? Excellent, now all we need to do is update the emulator core used for that to support GBC games as well. Download the latest version of Goomba Color from the dwedit.org main site, and have the goomba.gba file from that handy. From there, go to Game Manager's folder in Program Files and find the "INTRO_GB.BIN" file. This is the emulator core, so either delete or rename it and replace it with the goomba.gba file, renamed to INTRO_GB.BIN. Then try re-converting your games and hopefully it should work.

You may need to setup Windows Explorer to always show file extensions to do this properly. If so, go to Tools - Folder Options - View tab - uncheck "hide extensions for known file types" and hit Okay.

 

[ZenchiZennou]

I wasn't even aware you could launch *.gbc files directly from the M3 Lite menu. I highly doubt that's going to function correctly.
You're right it isn't stable, but I can assure you that you can run .gbc files if you put goomba.gba in the root directory . It works fine for a while, but after some time all games I tested crashed always.

All I have to say is DanTheManMS you are indeed THE MAN. Flawless victory! The games I had problems with work perfectly now and I don't have any more trouble saving as far as I know. Let us hope it stays that way. I could kiss you if you were a girl! ^^ Where did you find this particular solution or is this common knowledge for you? I searched on the net for a while, but I couldn't come up with a working solution.

I love this community so much! Thank you very much! I owe you! ^__^

QUOTETake my advice with a grain of salt. Or several, for that matter.

Have a little more confidence in yourself!

 

[DanTheManMS]

I don't have an M3 myself, so no it wasn't common knowledge. I gained this particular solution from Covarr's first post at http://www.pocketheaven.com/boards/viewtopic.php?t=5599

You could also use the Goomba Frontend to create a *.gba compilation with your GBC games, but as long as it works currently, it would probably be best not to change it. Basically, the M3 Game Manager does the same thing the Goomba Frontend does except it only adds the one game to the *.gba file rather than several at a time.

Glad you got it worked out.

 

[AiMsHiT]

can't you use real-time save for gb/gbc games now?

 

[DanTheManMS]

Goomba supports savestates, Goomba Color does not. I've never experimented with using a Supercard's or M3's on-board real-time save capability in either one.

 

[Shadow-Zero]

Goomba supports savestates, Goomba Color does not.

Is this still the case? (and why?)
Using Goomba Color with my M3 Perfect now and when I press L+R I'm not able to select Save or Load...
Should I use Goomba instead of Goomba Color then?


Related search results:
http://gbatemp.net/t...r-saving-issue/
http://gbatemp.net/t...color-problems/
http://gbatemp.net/t...-color-4212009/
http://gbatemp.net/t...ith-save-state/

EDIT:
Reading Pocketheaven I read:

Added 32k saves, Enter the menu with L+R to save the game's sram

Doesn't that mean we should be able to save with Goomba Color?

 

[Another World]

why did you bump a 4 yr old thread?

-another world

 

[DanTheManMS]

You can save with Goomba Color, just like you could with the actual cartridge, like opening the Start menu and pressing Save or something

Savestates are still only supported in regular Goomba and not Goomba Color

 

[Shadow-Zero]

Yeah I got that. Is that what the 32k saves are for?
Then again, still, the release notes say "Added 32k saves, Enter the menu with L+R to save the game's sram". So I guess I still don't get that part. If I do L+R in Goomba Color I can't do anything with Save/Load state nor Sram, so what does that line say?

 

[Lumstar]

32k saves are for Pokemon games and others that store large amounts of data.

Regular save files are your normal in game "save menu" type. Savestates are different, it's where your exact emulation state is remembered.

 

[Shadow-Zero]

Ok, so 32k saves are for the Pokemon games. And the "Enter the menu with L+R to save the game's sram" is specifically for that too?
So if I play a Pokemon game (never played them), press L+R then the Save state and/or sram functionality is available?
Or is it so that if you use the internal save of a game, THEN the Goomba Color Sram functionality comes available? (haven't tested that, will try that when I get home)

 

[jurassicplayer]

Regular saving consists of going to the in-game menu and saving there. This data is kept in the sram and is not actually saved to your microSD (supposedly). By saving the sram, you move your save data onto a more permanent place, or the microSD, thus the 32KB file. If you don't save the sram, and it is not automatically saved at some point (I have never used goomba color), then you shouldn't end up with any 32KB file as well as not having the save data available when you start the game after a hard reset.

This is in no way anything like a savestate, and saving the sram is more of just a requirement to perform if you wish to play the game as you would on a legitimate game cartridge and retaining the save data across play times.

-edit-
Btw, the sram is a temporary thing. It stays as long as there is energy to keep it there (battery power ftw). Hopefully this clarifies everything.

 

[DanTheManMS]

Dwedit's language is confusing. Just the mere act of pressing L+R to go to the menu "finalizes" the internal save file within Goomba Color. Again, we're talking about just normal in-game saves here. I don't know the technical details, but basically all you have to do is make sure that for those specific games, after using the in-game menu to save, just go into the Goomba Color menu at least once before turning off the GBA.

The "Save State" and "Load State" buttons do absolutely nothing in the Goomba Color menu. They are simply left over from when the project was forked from the regular black-and-white Goomba emulator. Pretend they never existed.

Goomba color takes care of getting the save game data from several emulated games into a single SRAM save for an entire compilation, and the M3 is responsible for getting that data onto the *.sav file on your SD card. Never having an M3, I don't know exactly how it does it, but I suspect it's automatic since the M3 Perfect was very advanced for its time.

 

[Shadow-Zero]

If you have AutoSave 'on' with the M3 Perfect it writes the data to the [gamename].dat file in the GAMESAVE folder when you reboot the GBA or when you go to the main menu via L+R+A+B. Manually you can dump the sram to any .dat file with SELECT when you're in the Game menu.
At least, that's how I understand it.