King of Fighters 94: Team Edit hack

[city41]

Yeah it's really awesome. The patch should be totally safe. It's writing the same value to vram as before, just ever so slightly slower. At this point, I think the only possible downside is the game writes to vram somewhere else that was missed. But even that I think is unlikely.

The first version of the patch I put up had a slight conflict with kof94te. I don't think it causes any issues. But just to be safe I uploaded a new version which avoids the conflict.

 

[Neo Alec]

The NGCD version is like an official patch for the cartridge release. The added wait cycles (using the cart pin) were like a workaround for a programming issue. But SNK was forced to go back and fix it for the NGCD release. Their patch is basically another workaround to add wait cycles though, this time in code.

 

[city41]

Their patch is basically another workaround to add wait cycles though, this time in code

Writing to video ram always has this speed limitation. It's documented here in the access timing section

VRAM - NeoGeo Development Wiki

wiki.neogeodev.org

By slowing down only the video writes, the rest of the game no longer takes the wait cycle penalty.

My guess is they were really far along on kof94 when they realized these glitches were there. Turned on wait cycles, noticed it didn't impact the game much, and shipped it.

Vanilla KOF94 does have some very minor graphical glitching in places. One example is the first Rugal cutscene (when it starts there's a couple lines of noise at the top of the screen). I'll bet this patch fixes that too.

 

[Neo Alec]

The Neo Geo CD version has less slowdown then? (See charging on the Brazil stage.)

 

[city41]

The Neo Geo CD version has less slowdown then? (See charging on the Brazil stage.)

I just tested this, the CD version has no slow down during that. I didn't test Athena's super. But since the CD version doesn't use wait cycles, I think it should be just like the patched cart version.

Also confirmed the first cutscene has less graphical garbage than the normal cart with the patch. it's still there, but juuuust barely.

So far I've not found a single thing wrong with this patch.

 

[city41]

Oh and not all characters cause the slowdown when ABC charging in Brazil. Terry doesn't. Maybe cuz his charge animation has fewer frames? Wild guess.

 

[city41]

The slowdown/neosd/darksoft patch is now live at https://neorh.mattgreer.dev/kof94

Also a bad bug slipped into 1.4.0 if you turn on the rugal debug dip and choose him, it stops playing sound from there on out. So there will be another release. But I'm going to wait, probably about a week, so if any other bugs come up they can all be fixed together.

So no playing Rugal in 1.4.0. Sorry about that.

 

[city41]

1.4.1 is now out, fixing the Rugal debug dip bug.

https://neorh.mattgreer.dev/kof94

Really hoping this one's it

 

[city41]

oh and btw, it was determined this "exploding flag" is the leaves on Brazil stage when you knock someone down

 

[city41]

The hack is now in fightcade

fightcade-web

www.fightcade.com

We're hopefully going to figure out the things fightcade needs to make kof94 and kof94te a ranked game.

 

[NeoSeeD]

I got around to playing the hack today and it's fantastic! On a CRT, the 94 style icons fit in well with the rest of the game.

 

[city41]

Awesome, thanks, glad you like it.

 

[city41]

The hack, soldered onto a real KOF94 cart.

The hack still has one very minor case where wait cycles cause a lot of slow down: having p2 join in while p1 is on the character select screen. The HERE COMES CHALLENGER graphic stays up too long because of the slowdown. This part of the hack is identical on this real cart as it is on the mister. Makes me think the mister is probably emulating wait cycles accurately.

 

[city41]

Team Edit edition combined with the "Prevent color corruption when using Rugal" patch also added in, causes the wrong win quotes to be chosen on the win screen.

Either way, if you are playing kof94te with the Rugal fix, please rebuild your rom without the Rugal fix (or without team edit edition, that also works).

The website now prevents this combo: https://neorh.mattgreer.dev/kof94

If you want the Rugal fix, the only way to get it (for now), is to have it with vanilla KOF94.


EDIT: Combining TE with the Rugal fix patch will not cause the game to crash. It behaves as if the losing team is always Brazil. So for example, Clark always says "A perfect disguise!" no matter who actually lost.

 

[city41]

Version 1.4.2

https://neorh.mattgreer.dev/kof94

​

Fixes a character colors bug when losing to Rugal.

Changes​

• Bug fix: If you lost to Rugal in the boss fight, and you chose alternate colors for your character who lost, they would be shown in the falling sequence and on the continue screen with their main colors. This is now fixed. Thanks to Leonard and Goenitz for finding this.

Known Issues​

Graphical glitches can occur when playing on real hardware with a NeoSD or the Darksoft multi. This is due to limitations in these carts. The original KOF94 game played on these carts has the same graphical glitches.

This can now be fixed with this patch. Thanks to paulb-nl for the fix.

 

[city41]

I doubt anyone here will care, but the kof94te discord will shut down September 1st. If anyone wants to run it and keep it going, let me know.

 

[RBjakeSpecial]

The hack is now in fightcade

fightcade-web

www.fightcade.com

We're hopefully going to figure out the things fightcade needs to make kof94 and kof94te a ranked game.

In FightCade? Hell yeah! I'm going to have to try this out. Incredible work and I'm so glad you did it!

 

[city41]

I doubt anyone here will care, but the kof94te discord will shut down September 1st. If anyone wants to run it and keep it going, let me know.

A discord member took over ownership, so the discord server will live on

 

[city41]

There is a kof94te tournament on Sunday. I'm guessing these online tourneys are tiny and casual, but still might be fun to watch a bit.

fightcade-web

www.fightcade.com

 

[A_T_P]

Hey there @city41 , your hack is great so far from playing it in MAME! But I cannot seem to get it converted to a darksoft version for the MultiMVS to save my life, just get a crosshatch. Tried the discord link, but it's expired at this point.

I've followed the instructions on AP to convert from the MAME roms from your patcher to the darksoft format to the letter but no love. Would really like to play this on the cabinet, so if you've got any advice, or anyone just has a working set somewhere, I'd really appreciate it.

 

[Hazard_747]

It was my first AES cart all together. I played 95 first on the PlayStation though so that holds more memories for me, but having that first cart was still cool to me.

King of Fighters 95 on the PlayStation was also my first foray into this series. Reading your post brings back so many nostalgic memories from playing that game back in the early 2000s.

 

[Ralfakick]

King of Fighters 95 on the PlayStation was also my first foray into this series. Reading your post brings back so many nostalgic memories from playing that game back in the early 2000s.

Yep always remember the first time playing because that will always be the best. KOF 95 will always hold that nostalgia for me.

 

[Neo Alec]

For me it was KOF 95 on the NGCD.

 

[HornheaDD]

Yep always remember the first time playing because that will always be the best. KOF 95 will always hold that nostalgia for me.

I remember seeing 94 at an arcade and not really jiving with it. But i do remember putting many a quarter into 95 when I worked at Walmart. We had one in the vestibule and I'd go and play it on my breaks. Other than always wanting to play Terry, when I saw Iori in there I was like oooooh

 

[Ryokomaru]

Hi, this version is incredible. KOF 94 is also my favorite. Would this hack be possible on Neo Geo CD? With the SD card loader, it could be the definitive version with that music. Thank you so much for your time.