https://youtu.be/fh4UXEiPZXM
https://www.dropbox.com/s/uqwisasu6a2f1j0/banked_demo.zip?dl=0
About this demo -
I stumbled upon some footage that I fell in love with. From that point forward the idea of importing that footage was born.
3 Banks - Totaling close to 300 images....
Finally got to use Jeff's SoundBuilder tool. Used v006 driver couldn't get the sample to play with the v011 driver.
The images are "grainy" but imagine if they were touched up for production?
Sorry about CRC's and SHA's wanted to get it out to you guys.
In summary this was an excellent experience!
Goes without saying thank you to the entire yaronet community especially NeoHomeBrew, blastar, freem and HPMAN!
Lots of cool stuff learned...
1. Newer versions of mame allow you to add drivers via the hash folder.
Tip: If hex numbers mess with you like they do me there are plenty of great driver examples you can piggy back off of in neogeo.xml
2. It is not necessary to convert your .bin files to the corresponding P and C files. Mame can run the bins!
So when you need to build a test on real hardware you can worry about converting your .bin files.
I saw a post a while back are you guys spear heading a movement to create some development boards? If so please count me in!
I currently use a "Saulabi Spirits 2" board that has sockets I didn't use receptacles so now it doesn't fit in the case
but it still works as a test board. I don't do real hardware tests often because you know the time it takes to do all the eprom burning etc...
*Fun fact I got "bang bang busters" to work on my dev board. I couldn't believe I pulled it off! I was over the moon for a long time I played that game on my board.
3. HPMAN's "banked_demo" code is invaluable! I could not have processed my frames without it and more importantly we have a solid example of banking!!!!
My understanding is basic - 4 banks - 1 p rom to rule them all.
The question is hypothetically is there a custom configuration that would allow for more banks? Virtually unlimited gfx data?
4. Image catalogs rock! Allow your images to be displayed in any order. The demo displays this - BANK2 images are displayed before BANK0 and BANK1.
5. blastar has identified some really cool techniques to better compress gfx! This would be the next level!!!!!!!!!
6. edit* - I can't believe I forgot this one... CLEAR_FIX is used in commercial games. It creates an 8x8 border around the 320 x 224 frame. This is a safe region.
My opinion on this is that I will continue to create my content at 320 * 224 because on flat panel displays the entire region is visible.
I will also make sure nothing important is happening within the imaginary 8*8 border.
7. edit* - I can't believe I forgot this one... 2 pal banks can used to get past the 180 pal per vertical blank issue...this would be so cool to see in action!
8. I was forced to make my first youtube channel, dropbox account and set up a website.
Now that those things are out of the way I was thinking in time Megashocked.com could be a place to feature cool code based tutorials and how to's on the Neo programming end....
EX: I could post a tutorial on how to quickly set up adobe after effects to output image sequences to be processed in DATimage.
EX: Formatting gfx for importing into DATLib
EX: could feature members like NeoHomebrew's attract sequence (great start structure for a game), Memory card!!!
EX: The list goes on HPMAN's Animator, Jeffs Sound Tool, blastars chunky mode (wish you could make a lib so we could brew chunky bosses etc and import them into game creations!)
EX: setting up your environment you name it.
I know alot of what I am into is pretty basic to you guys but...it might be nice to have a place to direct new comers to for some basics.
I know the wikia is the ultimate...I am more thinking about acknowledging people in the community and their work and providing some 'easy' practical examples.
It would be great to capture some of these posts and harness their raw energy into a summarized format as a reference point.
I might be getting ahead of myself just a thought here.
I am Mega Shocked because you guys keep shocking me! You all are the MegaShockers! People like you make it possible for all of us to do what we love!