Double Dragon boot problem!

[Gomess]

Hi folks, I better preface this debut post with an apology, 'cos I've seen that almost the exact same question has been asked before. But the answers to that question used terminology that I don't at all understand, and I didn't want to hijack a previous topic, so...

 

Much like the other poster who was greeted by a neverending cycle of "crosshatch screen, coloured squares, sound test, set clock, crosshatch screen..." upon booting SvC Chaos, I'm unable to play Double Dragon for the exact same reason (except I'm on Windows, rather than a Mac). It recognises that the rom is there, I guess, and it's the only one of my many NG roms that doesn't work! So I'm pretty stumped.

 

And like I said, I'm afraid I have no idea what "bios" or "kawaks" or "mame" are, but I'm willing to learn.

[The-Ice-Man]

What program are you using to run the game? Kawaks and MAME are just two of the programs that you can use to play NeoGeo roms. I use MAMEUI, which I've never had any problems running that game.

[Agozer]

Regarding SvC, the the problems you describe suggest that the romset you have is not the "right" romset for the emulator that you use. If you are using the NeoRAGEx emulator, you are most likely trying to run a romset of SvC that hasn't been properly stripped of its protection mechanisms and hacked to run on NRX.

 

What exactly happens when Double Dragon refuses to boot?

[The-Ice-Man]

My MAMEUI wasn't up to date so I just updated it to see if there was an issue with Double Dragon in the new version or something, but confirmed that Double Dragon boots and runs fine on v1.36.2.

[Gomess]

I'm using NeoRAGEx, sorry should've mentioned that.

 

It detects that the Double Dragon rom is there, but upon loading it just displays a grid pattern. Pressing Start causes it to change to a display of primary coloured squares. Pressing Start again causes it to change to what appears to be a sound test (I can highlight scrambled words, and hear character voices), again gives me a "clock set" screen (which instantly resets if I try to set it), and then back to the grid with another push of Start.

 

It almost seems like I'm trapped in some sort of "debug" mode, you know what I mean?

 

If the files I have are somehow wrong, well... Is it against forum rules to link directly to roms? :/ I'd just appreciate any help you guys can give, hope I answered your questions right. Feel free to bash me if I didn't.

[The-Ice-Man]

You know what, now that I think about it this is something that used to happen every so often to me in FBA-XXX Pro on the Xbox. You're stuck in the NeoGeo test mode. It would happen sometimes in FBA-XXX Pro if you reset using the control pad shortcuts. I think all you need to do is locate the dipswitch settings and disable the test mode. I don't use NeoRage so I can't tell you where to look, but once you find dipswitches and such, you should be able to work it out and get the game to load properly. The other option is to delete the game's nvram file, which should revert the game to default dip settings.

[Gomess]

Sorry, this is where the language barrier comes up. Dipswitch settings? NeoRAGEx has a menu called Machine Settings, under which are Language, System (Arcade / Console), MVS Settings, and Freeplay.

 

Turning MVS Settings on before loading a game takes me to an arcade-owner-style debug menu where I can alter the game speed, difficulty, number of credits per quarter, and the like. Are those the dipswitches? :/

 

Yes, I am what is known as a noob.

 

Otherwise, I opened up the game's folder, but couldn't find anything like an "nvram file". Is that a file ending in .nvram, or somesuch...?

 

Cheers again folks, especially for your patience!

[The-Ice-Man]

Yes, the MVS Settings where you change the difficulty and so on are the dipswitches. They're called that coz in older arcade machines, the difficulty and so on had to be set by altering actual switches. Newer machines like NeoGeo and CPS2 used a software menu. The MVS machines had hard switches too I believe but that's not important.

 

I'm gonna go and run Double Dragon myself with MAMEUI and see if I can remember how to get into the test screen on purpose, then I can hopefully tell you what you need to do to get out of it.

 

If I fail at that then we'll try the nvram file. If NeoRage works anything like MAME in how it handles game memory you'll be looking for a file called doubledr.nv. Like I said I don't use NeoRage so if it's different I'm sorry, Agozer will have to help. He knows about every emulator in the world.

 

Edit: Ok so getting into the test mode is easy. Getting out not so. Getting into it you just select Hardware Test on the Bios menu. But once you're in you're stuck there until you reset the game. Under normal circumstances reseting the game would make it boot like normal. Unless you had the hard dip set to Test on, in which case it would take you straight into the Bios. You're apparanlty being taken straight into the Hardware test though which is the problem.

Edited February 8, 2010 by The-Ice-Man

[Gomess]

Cheers Mr. Drake, you've helped a bunch already! I tried to get into the dipswitches, but again it gives me the same grid. Seems you have to actually run a rom before you can alter its dispswitches, and obviously I can't run it...

 

...Should I get a different emulator?

[The-Ice-Man]

Not so fast. When you get the grid, you are running the rom. When you get the sound test menu, the sounds you can play are from the game. So you know that the rom is running, and working fine. It's just that you're for some reason stuck in the Hardware test. Once you've launched a game in NeoRage, is there a soft reset option? If so, use it, and see if it takes you back into the hardware test. You'll know you've done a soft reset if you see the green screen followed by the NeoGeo logo.

[Agozer]

If NeoRAGEx goes directly to the crosshatch/hardware tests after the initial boot (and doesn't get out of that no matter what), no amount of dipswitch fiddling or soft-resetting will fix that. Yes, the game is "basically" running, but is stuck because the romset is incompatible with NRX for whatever reason.

 

I'm pretty sure that NRX saves the Test Menu options along with game-specific hiscores in its HISCORES directory, in .brmc files.

 

 

 

 

If I'm misundertanding the situation, then I'll apologize and exit from the back promptly.

[Gomess]

I can't find any kind of reset, soft or hard, on NRX, so that one's out, unless I'm missing something. I shall look for the readme, it'll have all the info on stuff like that...

 

I don't think Agozer's misunderstood the situation, and you're right, there are .brmc files in the HISCORES directory, but... What exactly should I do with them?

 

As it's only Double Dragon which has this problem, it's occurred to me to just download the rom from elsewhere, but I've not yet found one that works. This is probably a coincidence though, as I generally use the same couple sites; they probably all share the same broken roms...

 

Sorry if I'm not giving enough details or something, feel free to ask me to be more specific and I'll try with my limited computerspeak. >_>

[The-Ice-Man]

Well, if you've found memory related files for Double Dragon, delete them. Basically get rid of anything with doubledr in it's filename, except for the rom itself of course. That would in theory reset the game to it's factory settings for the next time you run it. If that doesn't work then it's the rom I suppose. It just seems to be an odd error for an incompatible rom. Usually they just won't run when the rom doesn't match what the emulator wants.

[Agozer]

IIRC, F10 or F11 is what'll soft-reset the machine or then just pushing F1 to enter the Test menu and come back. Of course, the only way to get rid of dipswitch settings is to delete the Hiscore file. Presumably anyway. It's been so long since I've used NRX, so that the specifics start to be a blur. As general advice, you should really start moving on from NRX and switch to something more current. FBA and Kawaks are the easiest to work with, but the downside is that most (if not all) romsets that worked in NRX do not work "as is" in these newer emulators. As expected, most romsets designed to work for these newer emulators also won't boot and run in NeoRAGEx either.

 

All Neo-Geo games released in 1999 and later, starting with Garou, need non-decrypted romsets and have to be patched/hacked in order to run on NRX.

 

 

Post the contents you your Double Dragon romset, if only just for kicks.

[Gomess]

Yeah, I'd never been concerned about "keeping up to date" with emulations of defunct consoles. Guess I assumed there weren't any improvements to make! D'oh. *Going to start topic: Are My Emulators Out of Date?*

 

Anyhow, the Double Dragon romset contains:

ddrag_c1.rom

ddrag_c2.rom

ddrag_c3.rom

ddrag_c4.rom

ddrag_c5.rom

ddrag_c6.rom

ddrag_c7.rom

ddrag_c8.rom

ddrag_m1.rom

ddrag_p1.rom

ddrag_s1.rom

ddrag_v1.rom

ddrag_v2.rom

 

So yeah, F1 is soft reset, and it just takes me back to the crosshatch screen. I know I'd have to download all new roms if I got a new emulator, but it's worth it, right? I mean, presumably these other ones can run everything NRX can and more.

 

...Come to think of it, Garou and even Fatal Fury 3 did always freeze at the character endings, but I just rolled with it... :/