Thursday 29 November 2012

Battle Garegga : 8ing/Raizing 1996

バトルガレッガ : Battle Garegga

Instruction details.


Various images of the PCB.



Thanks to MarkedKiller for the loan of the PCB. ^_^

Saturday 24 November 2012

V-V : Toaplan 1993

ヴィ・ファイヴ : V-V : V Five


Warzard Arts : CPS3 : Capcom 1996

 ウォーザード : Warzard

 

Wednesday 7 November 2012

DoDonPachi SaiDaiOuJou Marquee : Cave 2012

怒首領蜂最大往生完 : DoDonPachi SaiDaiOuJou

Marquee scan.

Move strip.

Friday 2 November 2012

Demon Front : IGS 2002

Demon Front : 魔域戰線

Cart label scan courtesy of Paulie @ ArcadeOtaku.


And a move strip

Wednesday 10 October 2012

Fixeight PCB - Toaplan - 1992

FixEight :フイグゼイト


Friday 24 August 2012

DoDonPachi Resurrection on an Asus Nexus 7

Installing/playing DoDonPachi Resurrection on an Asus Nexus 7 


Installing this on an iOS is simple, not so for the Android counterpart. Not only is it region locked, it's device locked. If your device isn't on the supported games list it will refuse to run, even if it's more than capable.

This was installed on a fresh Nexus 7. If your machine has had an account on it previously it may not work without removing/disabling that first. It's probably possible to get this shit working with far less hassle but this worked for me.

Step involved; (at your own risk, etc.)

On a computer create a Japanese Gmail account (location must be in Japan)
Navigate to Google Wallet
Add your credit card details to the account
Set a shipping address to somewhere in Japan
Set the billing address as appears on your cc bill
Root the Nexus 7
Add the Japanese Google account
Download ROM Toolbox Lite from the Google Play
Open > performance tab > build.prop editor
Edit the following lines in the build.prop (probably best to back it up first. ;) )

ro.product.model=SO-01C
ro.product.brand=docomo
ro.build.fingerprint=docomo/X10_1233-7397/SonyEricssonSO-01C/es209ra:1.6/R1EA018/1266719038:user/rel-keys

Exit ROM Toolbox Lite.

Download & Install Market Unlocker 3.3.0
Set the market to Japanese DoCoMo
Set to use a proxy
Proxy details, IP 49.212.161.19 port 3128
Enable proxy
Reboot

Launch Google Play (check Market Unlocker and proxy are running)

Navigate to 怒首領蜂大復活
Click purchase, spend 700Yen
Download & install (this should take seconds as it only downloads a launcher)
Click the launcher tile in your applications
357MB of additional data should now be downloaded (proxy not required for this afaik)
Wait.
Play.


So that's it, pretty drawn out and tedious to play a game that ain't even all that great. Still, it's better than fuck all. Adding regular Google accounts doesn't seem to have any effect on being able to play the game either, not tried removing the Japanese account yet, it may come in handy.

Thanks to Risike & Matskat on the shmups forum for info.

Friday 17 August 2012

Ketsui Save Hack

Ketsui Save Hack.

Another hack courtesy of austere. This is the V3 revision of the ROM patched to save high scores in the NVRAM.

Instructions. (At your own risk, etc)

Download the archive 
Extract the file ketsui_v100.u38
Write to a 27C160 EPROM
Place in the U38 socket on the Ketsui PCB
Good to go.

When powered up you should be greeted with a screen like the one below.


Note. If the game hangs after the region warning reboot in to the test menu, factory reset [9. DEFAULT] set to coin play, reboot again, enter a few coins and hit the start button a few times whilst still on the region warning screen. Scores may appear garbled first boot due to spurious data in the NVRAM, these will go as the table fills up with legitimate scores.

Also note;  if the PCB is powered off whilst the game is saving the NVRAM contenets may get corrupted. If this occurs follow the steps above. Inserting a V1 Ketsui ROM and factory resetting is also a option if that fails.

Thanks to austere for the hack and Shady994/idc for the decryption tools.

Wednesday 4 July 2012

Windy II Instruction Space : Konami 1996

コナミ ウィンディ II : Konami Windy II 

Instruction Space

Tuesday 19 June 2012

Thunder Force AC : SEGA System C-2 : Technosoft 1990

サンダーフォースAC : Thunder Force AC

Flyer. 



Flyer stolen from Gamengai, it was the only image of this game I could find on the Internet. ^_^

Various images of the PCB.



Monday 21 May 2012

DoDonPachi DOJ Black Label Save hack


DoDonPachi DOJ Black Label Save hack : Add save functionality to your DOJ WL PCB with this simple ROM swap. Do not use on an original DOJ BL PCB. It might work, but it will stop the original EPROM from booting.

There are a couple of known issues with this ROM. Obviosly it will not save without the battery. Also, if the  NVRAM contains data that that the high score table does not understand it will crash. The brown switch on the PCB should not be used. Whilst it should clear the NVRAM, the 'clear' state cannot be verified and my leave spurious data which will crash the PCB. Factory resetting the PCB from within the test menu *may* return the NVRAM to a usable state but cannot be guaranteed.

Note;  If the PCB is powered off whilst the game is saving the NVRAM contenets may get corrupted.

If the NVRAM does get corrupted the modified DOJ BL EPROMs or original WL EPROMs will still work without issue.


Download, extract, burn to a 27C160 EPROM and mount in position U36. If the game boots to a garbled or black screen enter the test menu, factory reset [9. DEFAULT] and try again.

If the game hangs with strings of text down the left hand side then the NVRAM is unsuitable for the hack. A factory rest is unlikely to help but probably worth a go. Inserting coins and hammering the start button on the country warning screen may also help but it's not guaranteed.

All credit for this hack goes to austere.

Monday 26 March 2012

Ambo Cabinet : Japanese Universe co. Ltd.199?

Ambo Cabinet : Tidy SNK lookalike.

Pics stolen from Wurstkopp @ ArcadeOtaku. 2L12B variant here.