Picodrive For Gp2x


notaz

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notaz.gp2x.de
Background
Picodrive is yet another Megadrive / Genesis emulator. It was originally written by Dave from finalburn.com (site seems to be dead now) for Pocket PC back in 2004. There were also some ports for other systems (Gigadrive/Genadrive) based on the same code, which were done also by Dave. They were not very accurate and didn't emulate sound. There was still a lot to do, but Dave abandomed his works, including unfinished Cyclone core. Fortunately Dave released the source, so then (as far as I understand) Reesy used it as a base of DrMD(x).
In the summer of 2005 I saw a port of PicoDrive on my mobile, but it was very inaccurate, had no sound and was unable to run any of my favourite games. DrMD's source was not available, so I took Dave's code and started fiddling with it. The project was slowly moving and reached the state it is in today.
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So why to make PicoDrive, when we already have DrMd(x)?
* it can handle mid-frame palette changes, because it does 16bit rendering (water in Sonic).
* it can do shadow/hilight modes also because of 16bit rendering (check Skitchin' menus, Toy Story intro images, ...)
* it can emulate window plane nearly properly (check GRIND Stormer, Mercs, ...)
* it can render interlace mode2 (Sonic2 and Combat Cars 2 player modes)
* it can emulate serial SRAM chips (Megaman - The Wily Wars, Wonder Boy in Monster World, NBA Jam, many other EA sports games, ...)
* it can emulate custom banking of 4-in-1 and 12-in-1 ROMs
* one of few emus which can run some protected unlicensed games like Super Bubble Bobble, King of Fighters '98.
* one of few emus which can boot Virtua Racing and run it's 2d stuff.
* open source

But of course it has it's weaknesses, default renderer seems to be slower than DrMd's. There are also some sound problems. The menu is very minimal (but that's the style I prefer). You can think about it as a tech-demo, which has a purpose to improve MD emulation quality. Reesy can use the code if he wants, but in that case I suggest him to release his source too.

Download
Source code
Edit: updated links to the new files because had to delete the old ones.
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Well folks, it's confirmed:

D&D Warriors of the Eternal Sun now displays the characters's stats & stuff on the left side of the screen .... and Truxton as well.

Thank you, thank you Thank YOU³!!! :D :D :D
 
Alright thats it!!!! :angry:

Even if it kills me (and I damn well mean it ) Ima ressurect my GP2x

Whats the speed like? If its almost playable that would be awesome

Isn't it possible for Reesy and you to merge your works that again would be....mhhh I appear to be at a lost for words


EDIT: In my haste I didn't read the full post
 
Hmm, just a quick note:

The shadows problem still hasn't gotten squashed; the shadows in Battletech & Puyo puyo2 are still light blue.

I wonder what's broken with them? I vaguely remember playing B.T. with correct shadows on either the GP32 or the '2X at some point .. I think ...

Don't mean to sound like I'm complaining ... I love it! Thanks again notaz :)

WOW! Another quick note:

Ecco Tides of Time sounds better than in DrMD :eek:
 
This is cool - the sound now works properly on Mickey Mouse Castle of Illusion. (On DrMD the jumping sound is often corrupted).

I know, I know it's not exactly a hardcore game but I like it! :p

And open source too! Thanks notaz - great job!
 
Very nice work Notaz. DrMD source code can be found here

http://reesy.gp32x.de/DrMDv5b7_source.zip

The source code is released under the "you can do whatever the fuck you want with it" license :). Feel free to take whatever you want from it but by the looks of it I doubt there will be anything of use to you. Keep up the good work though....now back to Road Rash with the correctly rendered Sky in lovely 16bit :)
 
Reesy posted on Sep 9 2006 at 03:19 AM said:
Keep up the good work though....now back to Road Rash with the correctly rendered Sky in lovely 16bit :)

We're all going to dieee... Reesy has dropped his project in favor of a completely different project! Oh woe is us and our DrMDx versions that we have! [/weird sarcasm]
 
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TelcoLou posted on Sep 9 2006 at 04:40 AM said:
The shadows problem still hasn't gotten squashed; the shadows in Battletech & Puyo puyo2 are still light blue.
Shadows need 16bit renderer. Make sure you disable "Fast renderer" mode. Switch between default/fast renderer is also mapped to Y by default.
 
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@notaz
Brilliant work! Very impressive! I also like the clear menu design.
Advanced Military Commander now works flawlessly.

@tmb_ayebe
Ah, I like Castle of Illusion. For me it is better than a lot of Mario jump and runs...
The music now sounds really good at 44100 Hz.

Regards,
Stephan
 
Twimfy posted on Sep 9 2006 at 10:15 AM said:
SRAM saving in Sonic 3...*cries with joy*

Cheers for this release...this is fantastic.
Thankyou thankyou thankyou!!! Seriously that is great news. :D

So does anyone see a new emu coming called DrPico? now that this and the DrMD source is released?
 
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Twimfy posted on Sep 9 2006 at 05:15 AM said:
SRAM saving in Sonic 3...*cries with joy*
Why do you need SRAM in Sonic 3 for?

- Alex
 
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AWESOME emulator! Herzog Zwei WORKS PROPERLY, at least for the few seconds I tried! :)

And it's a pretty fast emulator, too.. With overclocking to 272 mhz, I bet I can run it properly with fullspeed!

Thanks! :)
 
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