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News Archive: July 2002

Tuesday, July 30, 2002

KallistiOS 1.1.8 Posted by CyRUS64 @ 10:57
Info from Dan (via kos mailing list):
"I've split this version into several archives:
kos-1.1.8-dc-bin library binaries, Makefile templates, headers
kos-1.1.8-examples-dc-bin example sources and compiled ELF files
kos-1.1.8-examples example sources
kos-1.1.8-manual documentation in PDF, HTML, and TeX
kos-1.1.8-src library sources and headers

All of these except the docs are still over 1MB and the docs are 500k!

The two dc-bin archives extract to kos-1.1.8-dc-bin, i.e., you can just extract both in the same place and be fine. The other three extract to kos-1.1.8.

There are two release-related changes here as well, both for dc-bin users:

1) I've included the utils tree, so you don't need to download that and compile it separately. Just run make inside there and it'll build genromfs for your platform.

2) I tested compiling the examples using only the dc-bin tree to make
sure it works. I actually found a couple of issues in my packaging
scripts which have been fixed.

That's all... thanks, everyone! On to 1.1.9..."

Major changes in this version include: bug fixes, OggVorbis updated to 1.0Final, new public maple API, non-square PNG loading, dcload-ip support while using lwIP, more generic queueing sound driver, Trilinear's KGL Z-Clipper, Japanese support for bios fonts, paletted texture support, working CDDA support, conio serial-console support, and the removal of several deprecated functions (see release notes).

Links:
Release notes / changelog
Downloads

Dream Engine Posted by CyRUS64 @ 2:25
Hollywood Hasney posted on the forums about a new Turbo Grafx Engine emulator 'preview version' that Bill Nagel has released. Currently he is working on converting the core of the emulator, called Dream Engine, to sh4 assembly but in the meanwhile you can grab the preview here.

Kos/CA Posted by CyRUS64 @ 2:16
Dan has recently been heavily updating the KallistiOS documentation and html/pdf formats of the current version can be found here.
Also, a seperate Cryptic Allusion games site has been launched by the team.

Monday, July 22, 2002

Atari800 0.71 Posted by CyRUS64 @ 11:16
Christian Groessler emailed to say that he has made available a new version of the dreamcast port of the atari800 emulator. Here's a list of changes:

  • Uses Atari800 1.2.3 code base
  • Support for status saving/restoring on vmu. The status will be saved on the first VMU found, unless the configuration file contains an entry for STATE_DIR which is not empty and not ".".
  • Changing video mode of emulated Atari (PAL/NTSC) now changes the video refresh rate of the DC (50 for PAL/60 for NTSC). Since the timing of atari800dc now depends on the video refresh rate, the PAL/NTSC differences are better emulated.
  • Support for the Arcade Stick.
  • Implemented double buffered screen update with the possibility to switch at runtime between normal screen update and double buffered version.

    You can get source and binaries (no CD images, since there are
    copyrighted BIOS ROMs and games/programs needed to make a CD) here.

    Sunday, July 21, 2002

    Sam's Unnamed 3d engine Posted by CyRUS64 @ 21:41
    Sam Steele has released 'a demo of the 3d engine used in DCBlap. This demo will load up converted WorldCraft files and run several scripted objects using a modified dialect of ZZT-OOP.'
    Dreamcast, Windows, and Linux versions are available at his site.

    Rotozoomer 256b Posted by CyRUS64 @ 10:13
    Another 256b from quarn/outbreak (it's the second ever dc 256b ;p ) - this time it's a rotozoomer.
    Grab it here.

    Friday, July 19, 2002

    Quake II Posted by CyRUS64 @ 12:57
    Bero has notified me that he has released a preview version of his Quake II port to the dreamcast!

    He has also released source diffs for Quake,Quake II,Hexen II, and the source to libGL, which is a mostly rewritten version of kgl.

    Currently only the binary bootfile of Quake II is available for download, and he's looking for a host for the 44mb (ouch) nero image of this which includes the id demo datafiles.

    Visit Bero's site for the downloads and more. Take note that a mouse is required to play the game and it currently runs at 30fps in 320x240 resolution.

    First dreamcast 256b intro :) Posted by CyRUS64 @ 12:24
    Here's the details from .quarn/Outbreak

    "Last time we gave you the first dreamcast 4k ever. Today, it is time for me to give you the first ever dreamcast 256b intro! wiiiiieeeee! :)

    and it's also the first 256b ever done by me... wiiiieee!

    have fun! (and this sucks btw ;))"

    You can download this here.

    Congrats to .quarn/Outbreak for another recording breaking feat =), surpassing his earlier 4k success.

    Thursday, July 18, 2002

    KOS Patches Posted by CyRUS64 @ 13:27
    Dan has added the following patches to the KallistiOS CVS:

  • Missing "break" statements in pvr_texture.c added which caused everything to be treated as 16bpp. (Mike Z)
  • Palette selection support. PVR_TXRFMT_8BPP_PAL and PVR_TXRFMT_4BPP_PAL) (Mike Z)
  • CDDA volume/panning fix. (Fredrik Ehnbom)
  • Fixed dirent_t to also be "struct dirent". (Christian Groessler)
  • Added "volatile" to the counters in maple.h (Christian Groessler)
  • Improved randnum() function in libdcutils. (Jim Ursetto)
  • Added FASTSOUNDLIB to the Makefile flags for libmodplug. (Jim Ursetto)
  • INIT_OCRAM flag to enable OCRAM at startup instead of full cache (Jason Fritcher)
  • irq_enable_exc() to allow exceptions during G2 operations. Otherwise if you, say, write to an invalid address while loading sound RAM, the DC just reboots. (Dan Potter)
  • arch_get_ret_addr() to grab the return address from the current
    function. Useful in tracking down bugs. (Dan Potter)
  • CDDA audio should be working now. (there's still some weird panning stuff that doesn't seem to work). (Dan Potter)
  • CDDA example (basic_cdda)
    Also, be sure to check out Dan's latest screenshot of Feet of Fury and its progress at Cryptic Allusion.

    Monday, July 15, 2002

    AICA adpcm Posted by CyRUS64 @ 0:46
    Bero has had some success with the until-now unknown ADPCM format of the aica chip. After testing the various Yamaha formats, his conclusions are that the AICA ADPCM seems to be the same as YMZ-280.
    He has posted a wav-to-adpcm convertor and test program at his site.
    Also there you'll find a recent Joliet patch for kos' iso9660 filesystem code.

    Wednesday, July 10, 2002

    Maple bus info Posted by CyRUS64 @ 13:11
    Regisma posted a link on the forums to some patent documents he found which may be of much interest to certain peripheral hackers. They are of course v.technical, but do provide a great insight into how the actual Maple Bus works as a piece of hardware, in contrast to Marcus' reversed maple notes/docs which provide a starting basis for using the system via software without really being able to understand how it actually works. (Take note of Sega's clever lack of usage of the words 'Sega' or 'Dreamcast', and they entitle it an 'M-Bus' :) )
    From further browsing, the patents also include full maple command references and seemingly even have useful info on such unreversed peripherals as the microphone... feel free to provide feedback or collated information that you might garner from the patents.
    Credit to Regisma for some neat detective work!

    Links:
    Local copy
    M-bus patent

    Monday, July 8, 2002

    VMUBloat! Posted by CyRUS64 @ 0:43
    Hollywood Hasney posted about a 'VMU capacity increasor' by Dirtysanchez, called VMUBloat!, on this thread in our forums, so for those desperate to cram some extra space out of their vmu... if you happen to have a Nexus memcard then I've also posted a link to an import site that has downloads already available for this which perform the same function.

    Update: Dirtysanchez emailed to say that he has 'discovered some possible issues with VMUBloat and has removed it from [his] site.' He apologises for the inconvenience, and will hopefully fix these issues in the near future.

    Quake 1/2 + Hexen Posted by CyRUS64 @ 0:13
    Bero emailed me regarding some wip screenshots and information he has posted on his ports of Quake 1, Quake 2, AND Hexen (!) to the dreamcast, and this time legal :) (as opposed to Titanium Studios' leaked version of Q1 using the m$ wince devkit)
    Although there is no mention of framerates, I understand that he is using a somewhat custom version of the KallistiGL api, so I expect speeds will be fairly low at this time. It is also interesting to see his notes regarding Quake2's memory exhaustion with sound enabled / map changing. The fact that he has gotten it running at all is a huge achievement, so congrats to Bero on some evidently nice porting...

    Links: Bero's DCDev

    Wednesday, July 3, 2002

    Iris (3d engine) Posted by CyRUS64 @ 20:00
    A new update to Iris has been made by Olivier...
    "Iris is now very stable. I added some sample code and a class reference for people who would like to play with it. I'm currently working on a little game to show some physics."
    This engine is particularly impressive and comes with some great documentation, so hopefully we will start to see some developers using it in the near future. If coders are not willing to use the direct pvr api, and would rather use a higher-level api such as KallistiGL, then this is an excellent alternative.

    Links: Epitech.net