Digmac
Leona's Therapist
- Joined
- Feb 10, 2016
- Posts
- 1,966
So I popped my Sonic Wings 3 cart into my AES to practice on some of the stages. I enabled debug dips for the level select to practice, and played as usual. I didn't realise that I had A, B, C and D held down as the game over screen came up, and then what I found blew my mind... A full developer menu used to debug everything in the game.
I was in disbelief what I had stumbled across. I knew this had to be fully documented and preserved for others to see and use. Once I checked and documented everything for the Sonic Wings 3 menu, I went and popped in my Sonic Wings 2 cart to see if the menu was present there as well. To my surprise again, the debug menu is present in Sonic Wings 2 as well. To my knowledge this has never been documented before, anywhere. Yagamikun checked around for me and found a thread from 2007 on it, in which no one believed the OP when he talked about it since he never posted any proof or how it was done. The thread can be viewed here: http://www.neo-geo.com/forums/showthread.php?160586
Well, after 13 years since that thread, I can confirm that the debug menu exists. Here is a full write up, documenting everything about the debug menu in both games. Since I found the Sonic Wings 3 menu first, we'll talk about that, and then the Sonic Wings 2 menu, and what's different between the two.
To access the debug menu in both games, enable debug dips in your unibios before the character select. You do not have to turn any of the dips on, just enable them. Start a game, pick any difficulty or any pilot, it doesn't matter. Then, lose on purpose. When the "Game Over" screen appears, hold down A, B, C, and D. You will then access the debug menu. Joystick Up/Down scrolls through the options. Press A to access a check. Press A+B to go back to the menu.
Sonic Wings 3 debug menu functions:
Sprite Dump & Fix Dump
Sound Check
Object Check
Fixed Check
Fighter Check
Enemy Check
Map Check
Time Scadule Check
Color Check
System Return
Game
I was in disbelief what I had stumbled across. I knew this had to be fully documented and preserved for others to see and use. Once I checked and documented everything for the Sonic Wings 3 menu, I went and popped in my Sonic Wings 2 cart to see if the menu was present there as well. To my surprise again, the debug menu is present in Sonic Wings 2 as well. To my knowledge this has never been documented before, anywhere. Yagamikun checked around for me and found a thread from 2007 on it, in which no one believed the OP when he talked about it since he never posted any proof or how it was done. The thread can be viewed here: http://www.neo-geo.com/forums/showthread.php?160586
Well, after 13 years since that thread, I can confirm that the debug menu exists. Here is a full write up, documenting everything about the debug menu in both games. Since I found the Sonic Wings 3 menu first, we'll talk about that, and then the Sonic Wings 2 menu, and what's different between the two.
To access the debug menu in both games, enable debug dips in your unibios before the character select. You do not have to turn any of the dips on, just enable them. Start a game, pick any difficulty or any pilot, it doesn't matter. Then, lose on purpose. When the "Game Over" screen appears, hold down A, B, C, and D. You will then access the debug menu. Joystick Up/Down scrolls through the options. Press A to access a check. Press A+B to go back to the menu.
Sonic Wings 3 debug menu functions:
Sprite Dump & Fix Dump
Spoiler:
Both view raw sprite data and can change palettes of the sprites being viewed. Joystick Up/Down scrolls, joystick L/R changes palette.
Sound Check
Spoiler:
This is self explanatory. You can change the memory address to listen to all of the music and sound effects in the game. Joystick L/R to change track. Press A to listen to the selected track. Music starts around 20.
Object Check
Spoiler:
This views sprites/objects, most with animation, some static. Joystick Up/Down changes the object being viewed. Joystick L/R changes the frame of animation/scrolls through the animation. Hold A and move the joystick to move the object. Hold C and move the joystick to control the bottom options, and press A while holding C to toggle them.
Fixed Check
Spoiler:
This is similar to Object Check, and uses the same controls, however it only views static sprites with no animation.
Fighter Check
Spoiler:
You can test each plane using this menu. Joystick L/R selects the plane. Press A to deploy it. You can then use the joystick to move the plane as if you're playing, and you can shoot with A and test the bomb with B. While the plane is deployed, press C to change the shot power level. Press D to select another plane.
Enemy Check
Spoiler:
Views the same objects as the Object Check, however if you select an object that is an enemy with the A button, it will preview the selected enemy's fire pattern. Once the pattern is over it will display "DEAD" on the screen. Press A again to select another object. Pressing C brings up a menu, but I can't seem to get it to do anything other than display unique enemy HP data.
Map Check
Spoiler:
This allows you to scroll through every background in the game. Joystick L/R selects the background. Joystick Up/Down scrolls the background.
Time Scadule Check
Spoiler:
I believe they misspelt "Schedule" with this one, lol. This seems to have been used to check everything in the game. You can watch each stage play out with all the enemies as if you were playing the game. You can watch all endings for all characters in English and Japanese. You can also watch the attract mode loops, end credits and opening. Joystick Up/Down selects the ID to view. Press A to view it. Press A again to go back and select another ID to watch.
Color Check
Spoiler:
This displays color bars like the MVS hardware test. Nothing too interesting.
System Return
Spoiler:
This exits back to the game normally.
Game
Spoiler:
This exits back to the game as well, however, if you press start you can freeze the game at any point. I believe this is how they got screenshots for magazines, ads, and the game artwork.