Mark of the Wolves Boot Problems

Hi guys, I just recently have run into a problem with my copy of Garou, it is crashing whenever I try to play it. It recently started, I was playing the game last week without a problem. I tried it today and it starts up but whenever I press start on either side, the screen turns red then the NeoGeo reboots. I tried it in all the slots and I also pulled the cart and cleaned it really well, still no dice. All my other games are working great. Any ideas? I do remember that when I bought the game I was having problems with the controls, I was told to try doing something with the dip switches which fixed the problem. Anyway, i you guys have any ideas, that would be great. Thanks in advance.

What does the 5 volt rail measure at the jamma/mvs edge connect, if on the low side it can lead to these sort of probs. Seems to effect some carts gameplay more than others.

Wow, I really wouldn't know what is going on there. Anything else I could take a look at?

Try it with no other carts in the board..


Clear the Back Up Ram ..That may solve the problem..
Check page 15-of 22
http://www.hardmvs.com/manuals/MV2F-MV4FServiceManual.pdf

i was having a similar issue till i did a ram test and everything was ok.

just turn the mobo on with all the dips on for a min or so, and then try it.

chris1: Yeah, I tries that as well, I put it into every slot, by itself and no dice. I tried all my other games and they were all okay.

NOT SONIC: Okay I will try that. Just switch all the dips to on, turn it on for a minute then turn it off off and set them back and try it again?
also what is the mobo??? (sorry)

Are you sure this cart is legit,not a boot?

Yeah it is absolutely not a boot. I will have to try that ram check thing and see where that goes. Typically though, how often should that ram corruption happen? This would be my second time in a year. I will try after work and see if this can get it to play correctly.

SNK-Jorge said:

Yeah it is absolutely not a boot. I will have to try that ram check thing and see where that goes. Typically though, how often should that ram corruption happen? This would be my second time in a year. I will try after work and see if this can get it to play correctly.

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Look at it this way... Remember when you would put a cart in an NES and the graphics would come up all scrambled when you turned it on, so you had to keep trying until the game started correctly? The same is true with a Neo cart, but when the game is screwed up, it can also load crap data into the system's backup RAM as well. The worse your games work, the more often it can happen.

Neo Alec said:

Look at it this way... Remember when you would put a cart in an NES and the graphics would come up all scrambled when you turned it on, so you had to keep trying until the game started correctly? The same is true with a Neo cart, but when the game is screwed up, it can also load crap data into the system's backup RAM as well. The worse your games work, the more often it can happen.

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i remember KOF 2k had severe probs if the dip switches were changed at ALL from default. garou only came out 8 months or so earlier, so could that mayhap be it?

Today after work I went ahead and ran the ram test on it and it now works fine. no problems. Thanks a bunch guys, I was worried for a while there.

On another note. I have 4 games in the cab, MOTW, Shock Troopers, Realbout 2, and Matrimelee. When I turn on the cab it automatically skips MOTW (first slot and plays MAtrimelee (slot 2) Then when I switch games it resets and goes to slot 3, THEN i can switch the games normally. ANy ideas as to why this happens with some games and not others?

SNK-Jorge said:

Today after work I went ahead and ran the ram test on it and it now works fine. no problems. Thanks a bunch guys, I was worried for a while there.

On another note. I have 4 games in the cab, MOTW, Shock Troopers, Realbout 2, and Matrimelee. When I turn on the cab it automatically skips MOTW (first slot and plays MAtrimelee (slot 2) Then when I switch games it resets and goes to slot 3, THEN i can switch the games normally. ANy ideas as to why this happens with some games and not others?

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Rearrange the games in the slots in the order that they are starting up..see if that helps..

note; Some games just don't like to work well with others..I don't know why,someone told me once but I forget.
I've had a lot of experience with games not working well with others=me having to change 1 or two carts out of the line-up...sometimes determining that it's one cart causing the problems.
Coincidentally MOTW gives me a lot of problems working with other games,one reason I usually only put it in one of my 2 slot cabs instead of my 4s..

Some of the newer games that have the "Giga Power" screen like to function weirdly in multi-slot systems. It's a mild nuisance, but is a little more annoying the more slots your board has.

Yeah, it seems to only happen when MOTW is in. That is cool. Thanks a lot for all the information guys.

I have an issue with my copy of Matrimelee not wanting to be first in line on my 4-slot.

Also, my Matrimelee is VERY picky about how it is seated in its slot, regarldess of which slot it is. Sometimes when I select through the games, when I get to Matrimelee, I'm presented with a black screen and am forced to restart my cab.

Def not a boot, verified that, and it's clean as hell too (practically new) - I think it's just finicky.

I guess thats the nature of the beast?

I find it sometimes that the boards in the cart are too tight in the shell..I make them wobble-loose inside the shell so that they slide into the motherboard easy..this seems to make a lot of my problematic games work better-if problematic..
If the cart feels too tight or binding when inserted into the motherboard then I loosen the carts boards*by shaving small parts in the shell to give the boards a slight wobble or play.
I've had carts boards with warping due to the shell being to tight on them...that I had to fix as they weren't going into the mobo right.

If a carts boards are too tight in the shell the connections on one side may not be so good..when I make the carts have more play in the shell it seats in the mobo better thus equaling out on both sides of the pin in the motherboard.
I've been doing that for like 5-6 years now.

I don't think I've ever had to physically modify a game to make it work reliably. The only games I have that aren't reliable are generally really old or a little dirty. I know what you mean about the fit not being too tight, having the right "wobbliness," but actually modifying them sounds a little extreme to me.

Neo Alec said:

I don't think I've ever had to physically modify a game to make it work reliably. The only games I have that aren't reliable are generally really old or a little dirty. I know what you mean about the fit not being too tight, having the right "wobbliness," but actually modifying them sounds a little extreme to me.

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I had that problem with RBFF2 (a Yaton cart...who'd have thought, lol) Too tight..loosened it up and it worked fine.

As for Jorge's prob...yeah, definitely mess with the order of your carts. I had that issue with 1945 + (last mvs cart I bought) and it kept registering 3 games...so I moved the games around until it worked...and it did.

Neo Alec said:

I don't think I've ever had to physically modify a game to make it work reliably. The only games I have that aren't reliable are generally really old or a little dirty. I know what you mean about the fit not being too tight, having the right "wobbliness," but actually modifying them sounds a little extreme to me.

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But why,no one ever said they were made perfect..(I do what I have to do to get carts working)
..I've never come accross a cart that was really old.. Maybe Yaton carts but IMO they are more dirty then old.
....and that they didn't work right without a cleaning,less or if it had a case problem causing a connection issue.

My MS5 new kit cart was so F-ed up in the shell that it would not even slide in mobos right nor would it work....It felt way too tight even after cleaning it..
I modded the inner case,got the 'slight" wobble I wanted and it worked flawlessly.

MS4 new kit was messed up too..the case itself was made too fat to fit in my smaller version 4 slot mobo..it would not slide into the top without forcing it in due to the inside of the cart(towers) just not being made right.
I shaved them down a bit,got the case to "close" better and it fixed the problem
You could clearly see the space it had on the sides of the case.



I am that extreme. ..I'm not lazy,I will do what I have to do make a cart work right.I'd not say for just anyone to do..
....I don't give up easy..I've made carts work that were sworn to be messed up....I'm a perfectionist and I know exactly how to modify the carts to make them work right.I've been messing with mvs carts for a long time.

It's really not much you have to do,it really isn't..little shaving here and there,fit the cart..
.... after cleaning the carts and having it not work in 4 clean mobos something else is wong... If I find it to be too tight boards..after doing the modification they work flawlessly..I've had 100%success with doing that.

I don't doubt there are carts like this, but maybe your system is also picky.

Neo Alec said:

I don't doubt there are carts like this, but maybe your system is also picky.

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Well I thought the board might be picky..I go through all aspects to find the problem..

So I tried another board and another.

..testing the carts in:

.I have 4 MVS mobos hooked up in 4 cabs out of a........... 7 total MVS mobos that I used to use to play games...switched them around in other cabs.(sold three loose mobos/still have 4 that came in the MVS cabs)


Still if a cart doesn't slide in a mobo smoothly-too tight I know the boards aren't loose enough or lined up in the shell right.

Yaton carts have a habit of this since he throws boards in misc MVS cases..I've got some real banged up stuff from him,,I've got carts cheap from him where screws were missing because he could not get the cart closed right..

I bought a cart from a member here like 5 years ago that had a shell issue with the boards.(he told me about it beforehand)..it was missing two screws and would not close right..The case was pressing on the boards in places that needed to be cut to get it to close...

For some reason the boards would not fit in the shell right...the shell had been replaced from another game though..after I did some shaving here and there it finally would close.

I sold it later so someones got it sill.(it was a Neo Bomberman cart)

I had a few threads here with pics on the subject..

Replacement shells usually have problems fitting right. With all my real carts, my 2-slot is not picky.