The end of NeoDC is near.... Edited: working on demo collection

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mrneo240
Rank 9
Posts: 926

The end of NeoDC is near.... Edited: working on demo collection

Post#1 » Tue Oct 03, 2017 5:56 pm

Hello everyone,
People may or may not be familiar with the NeoDC team and that's ok. The end of this team is close because we are running out of work to do. If you want something let us know!


It started by releasing an 80min working release of roommania #203 and then continued on.
I believe the list is:
  • Roommania #203
  • Sengoku turb Fanfan double-entendre (all works, no rip)
  • Monaco Grand Prix rs2 online (for you guys!)
  • The next Tetris online (for you guys!)
  • Super RUNABOUT (Jap) someone here requested it
  • Planetweb 3.0 (has its own issues, not my fault)


Utilities:
  • Neodc_cdda_tool - rips game audio, optionally re-encodes to FLAC. Very tiny application built for one purpose but is being expanded as more requests are made or I need a tool and one doesn't exist. Size: 6kb (tiny!!!) and 48kb with FLAC support (still pretty tiny, way tinier than most FLAC encoders). Runs on win9x -> Windows 10 with no external dependencies.
  • Chao Generator for @Slurm: Generates a random Chao that can be downloaded by the DC. PHP, time:15 minutes ;)


Ongoing projects:
  • DC-Explorer - experiment in coding a full web browser in a WindowsCE environment
  • Untitled 3d game - experiment in coding a short/simple but complete game in a WindowsCE environment with directx
  • Sega rally 2 (Jap) - reverse engineering and fixing cdda issues after ripping to CDI
  • Monaco Grand Prix rs2 online - fix display issues for NTSC consoles using composite cables. Reverse engineering
  • Worms world party - haven't started but I believe the currently available release doesn't have cdda. Fixing that, may bleed into Sega rally 2 research.
  • 21 other games that are missing VGA support - ongoing but slow research and reverse engineering.


Thanks for the support everyone and for playing the releases that get made! If you would like to see a release made for a game let me know.
Release standards:
  • supposed to work on all consoles and all cable types
  • Will always be a standard CDI 80min image
  • Minimally ripped (only if needed), and padded out to the 79th minute
  • If CDDA audio then 2 versions will be made: full and an mp3 ripped version (quicker download)

For the people who I am working with on projects: Monaco mods, planetweb 2.6/3.0, DC-Explorer. Don't worry I'm not leaving.

EDIT:
Someone requested the demos so thats the new project:
Generator 1+2
Magazine Volume 2-11

PAL demos could be done but we have 3 dreamcasts and they are all ntsc so there is no way to easily test. if someone wants to volunteer that'd be cool.

My harddrive is weeping at storing all of this. going to need to grab some 2tb externals

Look for them soon!

EDIT: Demos are starting to get done.
Last edited by mrneo240 on Thu Oct 05, 2017 11:10 pm, edited 3 times in total.

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Bob Dobbs
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Posts: 4393
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Re: The end of NeoDC is near

Post#2 » Tue Oct 03, 2017 7:14 pm

I am sorry to hear you guys are disbanding. The team will be missed. You have been a valued member here at DC-Talk. It is unfortunate that there isn't anything we can do for you as your skills eclipse so many of us in this community.

As far as requests go, itsthinkingstill is working on enhancements to the DC PW 3.0 web browser. If there is anything you can do to help him finish, that would be great. I do understand that the DC itself would be a major undertaking to actually upgrade a browser to make it a more web friendly (adobe stuff like pdf, flash, java, etc...).
Regards,
Bob Dobbs

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Mechanic
Vagabond
Posts: 729

Re: The end of NeoDC is near

Post#3 » Tue Oct 03, 2017 7:58 pm

mrneo240
Thanks for Monaco. It's flawless
You do great work
Italian Stallion

mrneo240
Rank 9
Posts: 926

Re: The end of NeoDC is near

Post#4 » Tue Oct 03, 2017 10:04 pm

Bob Dobbs wrote:As far as requests go, itsthinkingstill is working on enhancements to the DC PW 3.0 web browser. If there is anything you can do to help him finish, that would be great.


Yep! That's still a priority, can't quit halfway through! Plus I have been promising and promising to release a tool to fix the CDI so it boots properly. I haven't made any progress but I can give instructions to the community so itsthinkingstill and others can remake the cdi themselves. Lengthy process though, but it's all I got.

mechanic wrote: Thanks for Monaco. It's flawless
happy to do it! If I catch notice another Dreamcast online game is resurrected I'll be back to release it! (Hint hint Sega rally 2)

Im going to be building some new toys for my dreamcast very soon: an SD card adapter and a USB coders cable. Hopefully with those 2 things development will be easier and quicker than either checking with emulators or burning a bunch of discs (roommania took sooo many discs before I nailed it)

I'll still be here and helping there will just be less game releases and daily updates.

I love the dreamcast and I love this place!
I think I'll be getting a dreampi soon too!

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VasiliyRS
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Re: The end of NeoDC is near

Post#5 » Tue Oct 03, 2017 10:46 pm

I believe the list is:

Where can i get those releases?

DC-Explorer - experiment in coding a full web browser in a WindowsCE environment
Untitled 3d game - experiment in coding a short/simple but complete game in a WindowsCE environment with directx

Good luck with WinCE! I believe it has huge potential for Dreamcast.

mrneo240
Rank 9
Posts: 926

Re: The end of NeoDC is near

Post#6 » Wed Oct 04, 2017 12:11 am

They are all release on isozone check user uploads for mrneo240

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itsthinkingstill
Vagabond
Posts: 787

Re: The end of NeoDC is near

Post#7 » Wed Oct 04, 2017 12:59 am

Thanks for all your hard work! you guys will always be appreciated. Maybe before you go you could make some of the Official dc magazine demos bookable or a working version of dreamkey? either way it would be interesting to see Sega rally 2 jap as that had an online mode, i would recommend if you guys could keep the browser intact that would be great for down the road and bringing back the website

mrneo240
Rank 9
Posts: 926

Re: The end of NeoDC is near

Post#8 » Wed Oct 04, 2017 1:04 am

Challenge accepted. Let me know which magazine discs. I'm not sure if there is a browser on it but maybe there is, I just verified the game works. Noticed though that the music which we took time editing wasn't played in the menus and then came the research and then the start of the reverse engineering project. Just when we had documentation and were getting used to debugging and reversing katana binaries this game comes along and is WinCE. Same assembly language but a whole different beast. The developers must have done something fucky because the SDK shows the"new" way and the"old" way to play CDDA and they chose to do it a completely different way.

mrneo240
Rank 9
Posts: 926

Re: The end of NeoDC is near

Post#9 » Wed Oct 04, 2017 1:09 am

As far as Sega rally I believe there are scene releases. Scratch that.

Ok I just checked and there is not a scene release for the Jap version, I'll upload tomorrow with a note saying it's unfinished. The game works great minus no CDDA. Single release though: probably just zero out the audio so it compresses well and then will already be dummied. If you want music play the original (for now!)

WingMantis
dark night
Posts: 58

Re: The end of NeoDC is near

Post#10 » Wed Oct 04, 2017 5:14 am

mrneo240 wrote:Hello everyone,
People may or may not be familiar with the NeoDC team and that's ok. The end of this team is close because we are running out of work to do. If you want something let us know!


Utilities:
  • Neodc_cdda_tool - rips game audio, optionally re-encodes to FLAC. Very tiny application built for one purpose but is being expanded as more requests are made or I need a tool and one doesn't exist. Size: 6kb (tiny!!!) and 48kb with FLAC support (still pretty tiny, way tinier than most FLAC encoders). Runs on win9x -> Windows 10 with no external dependencies.


Ongoing projects:
  • 21 other games that are missing VGA support - ongoing but slow research and reverse engineering.


Hold up, I only found NeoDC mentioned here and in the Monaco thread. And I came across 1 thread on assembler from a couple weeks ago (I've seen some of your mrNeo240 posts there though...)

As far as VGA support, I was wondering about some of the games like Plasma Sword and some others that are really only 320x240 and don't work right in VGA (don't have these myself).

Can you enable the scan doubling (for 31Khz, then is there one for outputting each line twice as well?) and the pixel doubling bits in the video register to force it into 640x480? Or maybe scanlines right in the frame buffer might be possible with hex editing of the game image (sort of how they are doing widescreen hex edits now).

Something to think about. Maybe it's been tried before?

EDIT: From what I've heard, Plasma Sword only renders in the top left quadrant. Not sure if anything was tried besides forcing VGA mode. So maybe the frame buffer sizes need hacked to 640x480 also

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