vbSMS+ ("olafsms") Released!

[olaf]

I've officially released the first public version of vbSMS+ (it was named "olafsms", but some people had some problems with that, which is okay). Here's a little about vbSMS+ (taken from its new homepage)...

 

vbsms+ is an enhanced unofficial continuation of the vbsms project (as of version 0.2) by john casey (which emulates the sega mark iii, master system, and game gear). the majority of source code in vbsms+ was not written by me, therefore, i take no credit for the appropriate portions. however, all additions/alterations to the source code of vbsms are entirely by me (unless stated otherwise) in vbsms+.

Below are the changes done to the original vbSMS project.

 

- added a menu system

- added a "load rom" dialog

- added closing of ROM/stopping execution

- added pausing w/blitting while paused

- added resetting

- added a program icon (schamp.ico from mamu_'s mameicons)

- added support for the sega game gear's start button

- added an "about" dialog

- added display size changing/blitter stretching

- added border masking for sega game gear mode

- added support for player #2 controller

- added full screen support (with resolution changing/enable on rom load)

- added state saving/loading

- added movie recording/playing

- added layer disabling

- added saving of screenshots

- added support for pc gamepad input

- changed palettes to be hardcoded/switchable

- changed the black and white palette to be more accurate

- changed keyboard input to be configurable and added a configuration window

- removed drag and drop support

- removed error dialogs (allows more games to be played)

You can visit the official vbSMS+ homepage here or download it here (version 0.1.0).

Edited October 20, 2006 by olaf

[olaf]

In related news, I finally heard from the original author of vbSMS today...

 

It's nice to see someone carrying on my/our work... The reason I didnt develop it anymore was because I got obsessed with making the emulator run 100% of the roms (try Spider-Man - Return of the Sinister Six) - before I advanced with any further development (such as sound, directx) etc.

 

I'm very interested to see how far you can take this project, I was hoping someone would pick it up; I don't currently have the time to pogram as I work away from home and have no computer access.

 

I'll keep note of your website, and when I do manage to buy myself a laptop - I'll carry on with it.

 

If you'd like to ask me anything I can be contacted at j.casey (at) msn.com

[Robert]

Moved to News.

 

Well done Olaf!

 

I will try this out shortly.

[ken_cinder]

Takes a good 10 seconds just to start up for me, and takes the same to resize the display (I actually thought it locked up the first time around). Have we UPX'd this? (It's pretty tiny at a mere 42kb)

 

Timing seems to be a bit off on the CPU as well, I only tried a few SMS games......and they seemed a bit fast. I would imagine this isn't your doing, but it could probably use fixing.

 

Also, is there a V blank at specific intervals? I keep seeing a black frame every 5 seconds or so.

 

Gamepad works great, but I think you should make a single config screen instead of a keyboard one and a gamepad one. I couldn't figure out at first why my pad wouldn't work, until I noticed the checkbox for "Use gamepad" on the keyboard screen. A simple dropdown box with a selection of keyboard or gamepad would be better.

 

Nice work though

[Robert]

OK I got around to trying it. Firstly it wouldn't start, needed COMDLG32.OCX which I found on the net. When I went to check the configuration of the keyboard, it died again because TABCTL32.OCX was missing, which was fixed the same way.

 

The keyboard config shows numbers instead of key letters, so i decided to not change anything. I don't have an alternate input device.

 

I tried out changing screen sizes, 2x, 3x works although it disappears for a couple of secs while doing so. 4x just causes the emulator to vanish and never comes back. I assume that because the size would be larger than my screen some sort of exception occurred (although it never said anything).

 

EDIT: I found an hour later that it was in the task manager, consuming 15% cpu time, and killed it off. Must have got stuck in a loop.

 

I tried 2 games, the first was a daffy duck game, the second being lemmings. They both ran as expected, although no sound, and seemed to be rather slow. There's no frame counter so I couldn't be sure.

 

I tried dragging the rom onto the executable but this gives a black screen. I also tried dragging the rom onto the open window, but again, it didn't start.

 

Incidently, the daffy duck game has an inbuilt music and sound test option which could come in handy later.

 

The settings are remembered, but it took a little while to find where they are stored. It's in the registry, at HKCU\Software\VB and VBA Program Settings\olafsms - in case you want to reset back to default.

 

If a game is running, you need to click the X twice to close.

 

For a first release, and only 42kb in size, this is a remarkable effort. Go Olaf!

 

To answer IJTF_Cinder, I had no delay when opening the emulator, although there is a few seconds delay between opening a rom and the game starting. I didn't get any black frames although when closing the emulator the whole screen flashed black. It doesn't appear to be UPX'd or compressed at first glance.

[olaf]

The emulator is UPX compressed. The blinking every 5 seconds or so is not my doing (and it's later than that on my PC). I removed drag and dropping of ROM files. Using over 2x zoom size on my PC causes slowness (1.9ghz/1gig RAM) -- I just use full screen at 320x240 or 640x480. I'll see what's going on with the 4x zoom. The overall slowness is because of video stretching. I'll make sure to put an OCX/DLL package up on the site or include them.

[Robert]

Noticed you've added the OCX/DLL package.

[Mooney]

I just tried this, has kinda low compatibility among the roms I tried, but the ones that worked worked well! Good job!