Taito G-Net games

Machtroid

I'm trying to understand how Taito G-Net games work. Taito G-Net games include the following:

http://adb.arcadeitalia.net/lista_mame.php?game_biosof=coh3002t&arcade_only=0&current_version=0

lr-mame2016 can run these games, however the problem I encounter is that the BIOS will flash every time I launch the game. And in some cases the BIOS will flash over and over in a loop. In cases when the BIOS flashes over and over I can sometimes get the game to launch if I reset the game using the MAME menu right after the flash is complete - Ray Crisis would be an example of this.

I know there are other arcade games where the BIOS has to flash the first time you launch it, but then on every subsequent launch it will boot right to the game. Do Taito G-Net games have to flash every time you launch them? I also notice in the MAME menu I can choose between the v1 and v2 BIOS, but the result seems to be the same. I'm just trying to better understand these games, and if there is any possible way to circumvent the 3+ minute BIOS flash every time they boot up.

Thanks,

sleve_mcdichael

Do save states work? Can you save a state after the BIOS loads, and then load that state in a later session to bypass the BIOS loading? If that works, perhaps you could use savestate_auto_load = "true" in a custom config for each game where it's required so this "just happens" on these games without any action from the user.

(This might prevent high scores from persisting, as it re-loads the "clean" version each time, from before the score was achieved. Maybe you could savestate_auto_save = "true" too so it's saved again at the end of each session.)

sleve_mcdichael

DISCLAIMER: I am using mame2010-version CHDs; I couldn't find 2016 versions, however the ZIPs are identical between the two versions so the CHDs might be too, maybe? It does "work" in both versions, at the very least.

md5sum:

5cfb39450dd9549ad34005709c4f6816  spuzbobl.chd

(Also they do run a lot faster in 2010. 2016 runs them like slow-motion on my RPi4. Again I am using a CHD labeled mame2010, and while the ZIPs are identical for the two versions, I do not know for sure that the same is true of the CHD, but it does run.)

I can't replicate this. Both raycris.zip and spuzbobl.zip did the long "loading" only on the first launch. On subsequent launches they still do the second, shorter "prepares the start" load but not the long first one.

After first launch, I have approx. 8.6MB saved to $romdir/arcade/mame2016/nvram/spuzbobl/* and if I delete this, the long first load is repeated on next launch. Do you have this nvram content in your roms folder?

Machtroid

@sleve_mcdichael I was wondering about that, nothing was being saved for these games in their respective nvram folders. I will try loading them in 2010 to see if they save the nvram after the bios flashes. I use a combination of mame 2010 and 2016, not sure exactly why I was using 2016 for these particular games. I think I have most CHD games default to 2016, but I have to use 2010 for certain games such as coh3002c bios games (Rival Schools, Strider 2).

Thanks for taking a look at this, I'll give it another shot here shortly and let you know what happens.

Machtroid

@sleve_mcdichael OK it took me a little extra time, I had to rebuild my mame2010 romset and acquire 2010 friendly CHD's but I got the Taito G-Net games working much better as you described! I still can't see that it creates the nvram anywhere in my roms directory, however it won't get stuck in the bios flashing loop, and on subsequent game launch it boots right up! The only thing I can notice on games such as Ray Crisis and Shikigami no Shiro is that there is no music, but I'm guessing this is to help the games run a bit smoother. They are indeed much more playable than they were in 2016. Thanks for the help on getting these to run!

sleve_mcdichael

@Machtroid said in Taito G-Net games:

I still can't see that it creates the nvram anywhere in my roms directory, however it won't get stuck in the bios flashing loop, and on subsequent game launch it boots right up!

It must be creating it somewhere, then, since without it, it does have to reload each time. It's loading the CHD into memory. If you diff the ZIP files, you'll find that they are identical (at least, the two I have, are.) The whole "game" is in the CHD, so that has to be loaded before it can run.

In 2010 the NVRAM is saved as a single file (nvram/raycris.nv) instead of several individual files in nvram/raycris/* as seen in 2016. You could see where with find:

pi@retropie:~ $ find ~/RetroPie/roms/ -name "raycris*"
/home/pi/RetroPie/roms/arcade/mame2010/nvram/raycris.nv
/home/pi/RetroPie/roms/arcade/mame2010/diff/raycris.dif
/home/pi/RetroPie/roms/arcade/mame2010/cfg/raycris.cfg
/home/pi/RetroPie/roms/arcade/raycris
/home/pi/RetroPie/roms/arcade/raycris/raycris.chd
/home/pi/RetroPie/roms/arcade/raycris.zip

The only thing I can notice on games such as Ray Crisis and Shikigami no Shiro is that there is no music, but I'm guessing this is to help the games run a bit smoother.

I also get no music in either of raycris or spuzbobl; I am not previously familiar with these titles but on YouTube, they do both seem to have music, so I don't know what's up with that...

Machtroid

@sleve_mcdichael Regarding non G-Net games, I was also trying to get Guardian Force (grdforce) and Soukyugurentai / Terra Diver (sokyugrt) to work in MAME 2010. I had poor results in 2016, and according to the following compatibility list 2010 should be able to run them at some capacity:

https://buildbot.libretro.com/compatibility_lists/cores/mame2010/mame2010.html

However when I try to load these games in 2010 the emulator freezes. These are stvbios games which seem to have mixed results in MAME. Yet some, such as Shienryu, will even run in MAME 2003-Plus. Just curious if anybody had success with those particular two.