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Re: repaired games from bad tapes

Posted: Mon May 20, 2019 6:19 pm
by .mad.
robcfg wrote: Mon May 20, 2019 2:54 pm Screaming Abdabs comes to mind. It has some standard blocks and then it switches to a custom loader with no standard block structure. Does it load on Mame?
Yes, that custom loader works!.
even the old TOSEC version that is corrupt with a few random hex [54] instead of [55] works???

here's another one that failed to load in MAME or Xroar.
Gis a Job.

i think it has an intentional error on the tape which doesn't read in the CAS conversion.
or it is just a bad copy.
i removed the error, and fixed the gaps.
it works in MAME and Xroar now. :D

Re: repaired games from bad tapes

Posted: Wed May 22, 2019 4:26 pm
by .mad.
Hotel on Mayfair (Datacom + Preston)

fixed CAS to load Data file correctly.
and found the missing the 2-6 Player game mode (HOM2)

Re: repaired games from bad tapes

Posted: Mon May 27, 2019 3:57 pm
by .mad.
Johnny Reb - Working!

Both the WAV and CAS in the archive failed to load.
found an alternative WAV and converted it to CAS.

Re: repaired games from bad tapes

Posted: Thu May 30, 2019 12:10 pm
by .mad.
Larkspur Trilogy (Doublet) ;)

H Bullman & J Smallwood version is missing from the archive download.
I found a CAS version with a corrupt last block and fixed it.

The John Penn CAS version has different filenames and a few extra lines of BASIC.
i fixed the incorrect spacing between the blocks, so it now loads in half the time.

included are the restart save games (Side B) of the tapes.

Re: repaired games from bad tapes

Posted: Sat Jun 01, 2019 1:54 pm
by .mad.
Lucifer's Kingdom.
fixed and modified CAS for Dragon32.

The Original tape crashes on Dragon32 [resets], when loaded in Dragon64 the fire button doesn't work.

Joystick control in Xroar goes a bit funny (no auto centre).
so the ship floats diagonally up the screen.
if you select Keyboard for LEFT joystick the game control is more stable (cursors and / for fire).

control is very stable in MAME.

Re: repaired games from bad tapes

Posted: Sun Jun 02, 2019 2:05 pm
by .mad.
Match Maker (Orange)
tape is on the M.I.A. list, so i made this from the disk.

the CAS loader only shows the loading screen when the DDOS cart is inserted?.

Re: repaired games from bad tapes

Posted: Tue Jun 04, 2019 11:07 am
by .mad.
Morbid Mansion (Blaby)

Failed to load in MAME and Xroar with an error on the data read.

Re: repaired games from bad tapes

Posted: Sun Jun 09, 2019 1:42 pm
by .mad.
Cuthbert in the Mines
This is a weird one in emulators.

WAV has a corrupt loding screen an takes [3:42] to load.
converted CAS takes [8:29] to load.

when the CAS loader first block is padded with zero's to make it 256bytes.
the load time is reduced in MAME to [3:29]

so it's yet another MAME error.

Re: repaired games from bad tapes

Posted: Sun Jun 09, 2019 3:30 pm
by robcfg
Where does it take 8:29 to load?

I just tried on XRoar and the CAS file loads Ok (loading screen has no error), and it takes 3:50 to do so.

You seem to have shortened the sync bytes from 256 to 128 and you have at least one block that yields a crc error.

Re: repaired games from bad tapes

Posted: Mon Jun 10, 2019 3:36 pm
by .mad.
robcfg wrote: Sun Jun 09, 2019 3:30 pm Where does it take 8:29 to load?

I just tried on XRoar and the CAS file loads Ok (loading screen has no error), and it takes 3:50 to do so.

You seem to have shortened the sync bytes from 256 to 128 and you have at least one block that yields a crc error.
Hi Rob,

Thanks for the info. ;)
i have not noticed the CRC error. could be it is ignored by the emulator?.

The WAVE (not CAS) has a corrupt loading screen in Xroar and MAME.
when that CAS is loaded in MAME it takes about 8:19 for me.

i padded the loader in the fixed file above.
does it pass your CRC check.
only the first block is edited with zeros, all syncs are back to original 256bytes.

sorry.... i know you don't like these mods. ;)
it is only emulator compatability i am looking for.