Another beta version of the Amiga emulator WinUAE has been released.

Beta 24: (this never ends..)

 

- real PCMCIA SRAM card removal should really really work now

- real harddisk (or memory card or usb stick) disk change message could have been sent to wrong device unit if multiple harddisk devices were configured (including hardfiles)

- direct3d and opengl fullscreen fixed

- direct3d/oglPicasso96 switching fixed (instant switch not possible)

- NTSC vblank end vpos fixed (top of display was cut in overscan modes)

»» Download / Information

Sorry for the delay on this. I was waiting for a certain someone to post it himself. Oh well.

There was an FBA Alpha WIP (work in progress) update today for games on Ninja Gaiden hardware.

Here's a driver for games on Ninja Gaiden hardware.

 

The supported games are:

Dragon Bowl

Ninja Gaiden (US)

Ninja Ryukenden (Japan, set 1)

Ninja Ryukenden (Japan, set 2)

Raiga - Strato Fighter (Japan)

Raiga - Strato Fighter (US)

Shadow Warriors (World, set 1)

Shadow Warriors (World, set 2)

Tecmo Knight

Wild Fang / Tecmo Knight

 

All of the normal FBA features are supported.

 

»» Download / More Information and Screenshots

A new test version of the N64 emulator Mupen64Plus has been released.

Mupen64Plus v1.4 - June 14, 2008

 

* New feature: graphical debugger for R4300 core

* New feature: On Screen Display

* New feature: KDE4 GUI (experimental)

* New feature: cheat system with Gameshark codes

* New feature: search/filter box in GTK GUI

* New feature: single frame advance

* New feature: adjust emulator playback speed up or down in 5% increments

* New feature: Rumble Pak support with force feedback

* New feature: Map emulator functions (fullscreen, stop emulation, etc) to joystick buttons or axis movements.

* New feature: Volume up/down

* Blight Input: Individually configure each direction of X and Y axis, which allows inverting the axis

* JTTL_Audio: libsamplerate support for high quality audio resampling

* GTK GUI: Removed second status bar which was not used

* GTK GUI: Implemented accelerator keys

* GTK GUI: Replaced custom directory browser with GTK file chooser

* GTK GUI: numerous small changes and fixes

* Added Mupen64Plus ´man´ (manual) page

* Removed mupen64_audio plugin, as it was unnecessary and mostly broken

* Added NoMemoryExpansion parameter to emulate 4MB console; fixes some games

* Overhaul of rom handling functions; numerous small fixes

* Bugfix: Removed NoAudioDelay core option to resolve issue #48

* Bugfix: check for stopped state in dynarec jump function, to fix unresponsive emulator when game gets stuck in loop

* Bugfix: GTK GUI: #6 - if a ROM is selected in the ROM browser and ´play´ is pressed, emulation will start

* Bugfix: GTK GUI: #62 - ROM browser column sorting works

* Bugfix: Rice Video: Support hi-res textures with different scale factors for X and Y

* Bugfix: Blight Input: don´t use 100% CPU in configuration dialog

»» Download / Information

Thanks to our affiliate, AEP-Emulation, for the news!

News (6/14)

 

Racin' Force I've been running some tests on Racin' Force, a Konami System GX game that uses voxels to generate a 3D playfield. It's an interesting combination of new and old hardware, the PSAC2 chip from earlier games generates a 2D ROZ layer which selects data from a color map and height map. This is used by the PSAC4 chip to render voxels to a framebuffer. An additional list of per-scanline camera data is provided as the PSAC4 knows nothing about the rotation parameters the PSAC2 applied to the color map and height map. Priority is specified for each voxel drawn so sprites can move in front of and behind specific parts of the landscape.

 

A limitation of this setup is that dropped pixels in the PSAC2 output result in missing voxel columns which makes landscape structures look flickery. However at 60 frames per second the results are extremely impressive. Consider how few custom ICs were needed to do this compared to the 3D hardware some arcade games used in 1993. For games with simple terrain such as Racin' Force and Konami's Open Golf Championship, the decision to use voxel graphics was well suited to their graphical needs and a cost-effective choice.

 

I made a low-quality video of the game in action. No controls are wired up, so the car is out of control after the attract sequence.

• Racin' Force footage
  

Of particular interest are the sloped curves on the racetrack, and the tunnel which has both a floor and ceiling made out of voxels. The PSAC4 chip has a lot of different drawing settings which have to get figured out. I've documented the PSAC2 registers and will tackle the PSAC4 next.

»» More Information