Hexing the Utopia boot disc take two

by dopefish 7/24/00

After three people proved to me that the Sega Katana Dev kit + libraries have been leaked for a long time, I decided to redo this whole page. Also, AltRN8 reminded me that the UTOPIA1.TXT was still scrambled. Duh, I feel like an idiot. That's why on the old page everything was so fragmented. Descrambling the BIN makes it a lot more readable. When a 1ST_READ.BIN-type file is put on a CD/GD it is scrambled in order to be loaded properly by the DC. Here's how to descrable it:

1. Get Marcus' 1ST_READ.BIN scrambler from his software page and compile it.
2. Run it on the UTOPIA1.TXT. The usage is: scramble -d <file to unscramble> <new unscrambled file to create>

The -d flag is to "descramble." I bet you figured that out anyway :). If you have one that you want to scramble, just don't include the -d flag. I WILL NOT help you with compiling. It's an easy thing to do so don't even think about emailing me about it :P.

Since I'm too lazy to do another big table (I HATE making them), I just took a bunch of screenshots. Don't dispair modem users, they're teeny tiny GIFs that only add up to about 60K in total. All of these pictures were taken in Hackman 4.04. On with the images:

Here are the two new locations of the reset calls after being descramled.

One of the many areas where "Lib Handle" is mentioned. I don't want to show them all -- one sufices.

Different files mentioned here. Maybe this is the search order for what file to load first?

Sega's Shinobi Dev Library



Sega's Ninja Dev Library





Whew! That's the really long NEC copyright section.

Since I have seen proof that the Dev Kit/Libraries are leaked, then most likely Utopia did not copy any boot disc of Sega's. They coded their own, but used Sega development tools which would still make Sega mad.

The reset codes are of course still there. So if someone is good with asm, they should try to find the code for them. We have some SH4 docs in our Tools section and for others visit Jules' site.

One of the images I saw of the Dev Kit showed some of the demo programs. One (I forget it's name) was an NEC demo "showing a rotating PowerVR logo with spectacular highlights." Kinda sounds like Utopia's rotating moose, only instead with a PowerVR logo. Perhaps they might have used that code as a base to code the moose?

Email me with any thoughts about this new hex document.

-dopefish