Nine Over Ten 9/10

While Mario Kart DS delivered a racing experience rivalling its console counterparts and Speed Racer: The Video Game brought about movie visuals to life on the DS, there’s one racing game that would really give you a “whacked” out experience, just like what its title implies.

Those of you who have played Warioware: Twisted or Warioware: Touched! would know how crazy those mini games can get, and what happens when you take those mini games and apply them in a racing game? You’ll get Wacky Races: Crash & Dash.

Touching is Good

Now I’ve played Wacky Races before, the GameBoy Color version on the DS via emulation, and it wasn’t really brilliant, but Wacky Races: Crash & Dash is a totally different kettle of fish. First thing first, the game sports the stylus and touchscreen as the means to control the car during a race, and not the D-Pad. The car will move based on where you touch ahead of the car!

Depending on whether you are a right or left hander, the D-Pad and the XYAB buttons perform the same function of activating power ups. The game features a myriad of characters and vehicles, taken from the Wacky Races cartoon series, and each vehicle has its own set of “Wacky Powers”, e.g. flight, firing what appears to be cannon balls at opponents, hopping(!), etc, etc.

I personally prefer to use Peter Perfect as his vehicle, The Turbo Terrific is geared for speed (but at the same time, a handful to control). The Ant Hill Mob is not bad too, with really funny animations when their Wacky Power of Getaway Power is activated.

Muttleyyyyy!!!!

Each race is divided into smaller segments. During each segment, you get collect and activate power-ups (Wacky Powers), try to get ahead of your opponents and avoid getting damaged. Some power ups allow you to target opponents by simply tapping the opponent with your stylus. Remember the thing I said about mini games earlier one? Well get damaged too much and you’ll be forced to play a mini-game to “re-assemble” your Wacky Racer vehicle.

That’s not the last you’ll see of mini games as each segment ends with a small cut scene featuring Dick Dastardly and Mutley and one of their nefarious traps. You will find yourself using the stylus to dodge boulders, draw lines to form structures, trace a path, and clear the way of bombs, amongst other things.

This is a pretty cool concept and the whacked out feeling is ever present even at the end of the race where you’ll have to blow into the microphone (or rub vigorously with your stylus on the touch screen) to enable a mad dash to the finish line!

Misc

Gameplay is divided into several modes, the first one being the Wacky Rally, where you compete in a set of races in order to unlock the next set of races. There’s also a Single Race mode and the Trap Challenge mode. The Trap Chllenge challenges the player to complete as many trap mini-games as possible.

The visuals for the game is presented beautifully with cel-shaded art the order of the day. What’s more deserving of praise is the audio. I believe this is the first time I’m hearing running commentary in a racing game on the Nintendo DS, or even any racing game on any platform for that matter; it’s like watching the cartoon again.

Summary

Overall, Wacky Races: Crash & Dash is definitely a keeper. The concept, design and the execution of the game’s design all indicate that some thought and a lot of effort have been put in to make it a great game.

Come to think of it, I noticed that Eidos has been getting its hands dirty on Warner Bros IP for games on the Nintendo DS. Wacky Races does justice to the source material and more than redeems Eidos over the horrible game known as Looney Tunes: Cartoon Conductor.

Wacky Races: Crash & Dash is available on sale from the 23rd of June on Play-Asia. Click here for further details. Can’t wait, or you are living in America? Get the game at Amazon (click here for details)

As the title mentions, there is a problem when it comes to running Sega Genesis/Mega Drive games on the Nintendo DS: the emulators have not found a way to produce sound!

It’s a rather quiet experience playing Sonic the Hedgehog but even though the lack of sound is a shame, the game runs really fast on a particular emulator: jEnesisDS 0.5.

I’ve tested two Genesis/Mega Drive emulators, PicoDS and jEnesisDS 0.5. Both have their similarities but only one had the larger set of advantages. Both emulators run without sound and while both CAN run whatever I’ve thrown at them, jEnesisDS is faster,smoother and has a way nicer user interface.

Kind of like comparing a European supermodel to one of those local race queens and the supermodel has some brains to boot.

I’ll be writting a more in-depth review in the future but for the moment, get jEnesisDS 0.5 at DCEmu. Registration is required, but free.

Issue 48 of the excellent (but expensive, at least over here in Malaysia) Retro Gamer magazine did a spread on the Spectrum 128. It got me curious because you can hardly find one over here, and mentioning Spectrum will more likely conjure up colours of the rainbow than the thought of a computer.

Despite the scarcity, Google search results seem to indicate a large and dedicated Spectrum fanbase. There are even entire archives (legal!) of games available online. As the icing on a already yummy cake, there are also a couple of pretty impressive looking Spectrum emulators for the Nintendo DS, but each with its own caveats.

Lets look at the one that I got up and running (and playing games with): SpeccyDS.

Prerequisites

Getting Spectrum games to run on the Nintendo DS is a pretty easy and straightforward affair. There are just several prerequisites:

1. Download the SpeccyDS ROM from http://speccyds.wordpress.com/. The latest version is currently v.0.3
2. Download a bunch of Spectrum ROMs, from http://www.worldofspectrum.org or somewhere else. Do keep in mind that SpeccyDS doesn’t support tape images, only memory snapshot files for the ZX Spectrum 48K.
3. A flashcart (I’m using a Slot-1 R4DS) and a Nintendo DS.

Lock and Load

For good housekeeping, create a Spectrum folder in the root directory of the memory card that comes with your flashcart. This will be the location to store your Spectrum ROMs.

Copy over the SpeccyDS file (SpeccyDS.nds) into the root directory of the memory card and you are all set to go.

Limitations

SpeccyDS only runs games for the ZX Spectrum 48K and not the 128, Not only that, it only supports .z80 and .sna file formats… so work that Google search box :). At least I got Thundercats (The video is not up yet, since Youtube is pretty slow today)

Alternatives

There is an alternative, and it’s another piece of homebrew software called DSpec. I can get it to run on the R4 but other than that, it can’t detect the ROMS in the system, despite me following the file structure provided by the developer. Maybe it’s because the DSpec.nds file is resistant to DLDI patching.

Other type of flashcart users might have a better time using DSpec, so do check it out at: http://dspec.eighttwelve.co.uk/download.php

The idea for the 10th Edition of The ROM Report came to me when I was talking to a couple of my colleagues about 80s cartoon series. I remember being glued to the tube and being fed a diet of Thundercats, Transformers, Centurions, and Spiral Zone.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was also a favourite series of mine. I wouldn’t really call them turtles, they are more like tortoises but like blondes, turtles seem to be more fun. The cartoon came out in 1987 and the NES game was release in 1989.

It’s pretty fun to play, as you can see in the video I’ve taken earlier of the game.

On the otherhand, I didn’t really watch Beetlejuice on TV. However, the video game, released for the NES is a little tough and presents a challenge. See for yourselves:

Now, if you think difficulty levels are over-rated, you have not seen Transformers: Convoy No Nazo. Yup, it’s based on the Transformers cartoon series and stars Ultra Magnus.

The game is so tough that I can’t even get pass the first level. Here’s a video of my attempt:

All 80s inspired games featured in this article can be run on the Nintendo DS with the use of nesDS. Check out the rest of The ROM Report for more information on how to run older generation games on the Nintendo DS.

NES gamers would probably remember Taito’s classic The Legend of Kage which was released in 1987 for the North American NES.

The game was a 2D platformer and even though I’ve played it as a kid, I remembered distinctively that the hero was a ninja that could jump really high, and one of the enemy types wore a hat and shot flames, and was a tough bastard at that.

Anyways, I got the game to run on the Nintendo DS with the help of the nesDS emulator. You might want to check that out, but before that here’s a video of the game running on the DS.

Since the theme of this edition of The ROM Report is “the old and the new”, lets talk about the sequel to The Legend of Kage. Yup, Kage Densetsu: The Legend of Kage 2 was released in early March 2008 for the Nintendo DS.

The graphics have become much prettier, and along with it, more forgiving gameplay and a rather nice soundtrack as well. The hero, Kage, can still jump really high and comes with a new special power that allows him to duplicate himself.

I’ll let the movie do the talking:

Kage Densetsu: The Legend of Kage 2, is available at Play-Asia at a cheaper price than what other imported Japanese games are sold for. Click here for purchase details.

A big shout out to Pizza Pasta (The New New Era) for a very helpful tip on getting Earthbound Zero to run on the nesDS. I’m quoting his comment verbatim:

You might know this by now but Earthbound Zero is totally playable in NESDS, you just have to mess with it a little on your computer.

All you have to do is open Earthbound Zero in a NES emulator on your computer (I used Nestopia) and get to a point where you can save a file. After you save, transfer the Earthbound Zero SAV file into your NESDS roms folder and you should be able to resume your game in NESDS. Hope this helps.

Yups, it helps! Thanks man. And yeah, portable Mother/Earthbound Zero FTW!!

In this Fifth edition of The Rom Report, we’ll look at running something special on the Nintendo DS, with an exceptionally good looking piece of homebrew software and a bunch of ROMs as well.

According to Wikipedia, MAME, which stands for Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator, is an emulator application designed to recreate the hardware of arcade game systems in software.

In plain English it would mean that old arcade games can be played on MAME emulator running on a PC!

All you need to do is to supply the ROM image of the arcade game, by which downloading them is a legal gray area, yadda, yadda, yadda.

Legalities aside, the same thing (running arcade games using a MAME emulator) can be done with the Nintendo DS! The piece of software that I’m about to introduce may just support a paltry sum of 75 games, but it really is a piece of work.

For starters, MarcaDS looks like a piece of commercial software, with the nice intro screen and all. It even apparently supports the use of the Rumble Pak, but the best part is yet to come. It uses BOTH DS screens to display a game! It’s something like playing games from this year’s Konami Classics Series: Arcade Hits for the Nintendo DS.

Running MarcaDS is pretty easy. Just copy the MarcaDS.nds file to the root directory of your Flash Cart’s Trans Flash memory card (Most of the time, it’s a MicroSD card). If your Flash Cart’s firmware doesn’t support auto DLDI patching, it would be a good thing to apply the DLDI patch to the MarcaDS.nds file before attempting to run it.

I’ve always recommended creating a folder (let’s call it MAME) in the Trans Flash memory card, to store games of a specific type. It’s a much better way of organizing than just dumping everything in the root directory. Arcade ROMS are stored as ZIP files and you’ll have to make sure that the zip file names match the ones listed in the compatibility list.

Here’s the entire compatibility list taken from the MarcaDS site. The rest of the site is in French, but you can visit it here.

+———————————-+——-+————–+——————————-+
| | | ZipFile | |
| Game Name | Sound | Name | Problems |
+———————————-+——-+————–+——————————-+
| 1942 (Set 1) | Yes | 1942.zip | |
| Amidars | No | amidars.zip | |
| Anteater | No | anteater.zip | |
| Arkanoid | Yes | arkatayt.zip | |
| Bagman | Yes | bagman.zip | Partial sound : no voice |
| Bank Panic | Yes | bankp.zip | |
| Battle of Atlantis (set 1) | No | atlantis.zip | |
| Bomb Jack (set 1) | Yes | bombjack.zip | |
| Botanic | Yes | botanic.zip | |
| Calipso | No calipso.zip | |
| Caterpillar Pacman Hack | Yes | ctrpllrp.zip | |
| Cosmic Avenger | Yes | cavenger.zip | |
| Crush Roller (bootleg?) | Yes | crush.zip | |
| Dig Dug (rev 1) | Yes | digdugb.zip | |
| Donkey Kong (US set 1) | No | dkong.zip | |
| Donkey Kong 3 (US) | No | dkong3.zip | |
| Donkey Kong Junior (US) | No | dkongjr.zip | |
| Eyes (Digitrex Techstar) | Yes | eyes.zip | |
| Frogger | Yes | frogger.zip | |
| Galaga (Namco rev. B) | Yes | galaga.zip | No score print |
| Galaxian (Namco set 1) | No | galaxian.zip | No background |
| Galaxian Part 4 | No | galap4.zip | No background |
| Galaxian Part X | No | galapx.zip | No background |
| Galaxy Wars (Universal set 1) | No | galxwars.zip | |
| Green Beret | Yes | gberet.zip | |
| Hangly-Man (set 1) | Yes | hangly.zip | |
| Hexa | Yes | hexa.zip | |
| Invader’s Revenge | No | invrvnge.zip | |
| Invader’s Revenge (Dutchford) | No | invrvnga.zip | |
| Jr Pacman | Yes | jrpacman.zip | |
| Joyman | Yes | joyman.zip | |
| Jump Shot | Yes | jumpshot.zip | |
| Lady Bug | Yes | ladybug.zip | |
| Le Bagnard (set 1) | Yes | bagnard.zip | Partial sound : no voice |
| Lizard Wizard | Yes | lizwiz.zip | |
| Lost Tomb (easy) | No | losttomb.zip | |
| Lunar Rescue | No | lrescue.zip | |
| Masao (bootleg) | No | masao.zip | |
| Mr. Do! | Yes | mrdo.zip | |
| Mr. Do! (bugfixed) | Yes | mrdofix.zip | |
| Mr Goemon | Yes | mrgoemon.zip | |
| Mr. TNT | Yes | mrtnt.zip | |
| Ms. Pac-Man (bootleg) | Yes | mspacmab.zip | |
| Pac-Man (Midway) | Yes | pacman.zip | |
| Pac-Man (Midway, harder) | Yes | pacmod.zip | |
| Pac-Man Plus | Yes | pacplus.zip | |
| Pengo (set 2 not encrypted) | Yes | pengo2u.zip | |
| Penguin Kun Wars | Yes | pkunwar.zip | Some tiles are missing ? |
| Phoenix (Amstar) | No | phoenix.zip | |
| Pickin | Yes | pickin.zip | |
| Pinball Action (set 1) | No | pbaction.zip | |
| Ping Pong | Yes | pingpong.zip | |
| Piranah (hack) | Yes | piranhah.zip | |
| Ponpoko | Yes | ponpoko.zip | |
| Pooyan | Yes | pooyan.zip | |
| PuckMan (Japan set 1) | Yes | puckman.zip | |
| Rush Attack | Yes | rushatck.zip | |
| Scramble | No | scramble.zip | No background |
| Snap Jack | No | snapjack.zip | |
| Solomon’s Key | Yes | solomon.zip | |
| Space Invaders | No | invaders.zip | |
| Space Invaders (Logitec) | No | invaderl.zip | |
| Space Invaders (Model Racing) | No | invadrmr.zip | |
| Space Invaders II | No | invad2ct.zip | |
| Space Invaders Deluxe | No | invaddlx.zip | |
| Space Invaders Part II | No | invadpt2.zip | |
| Space Invaders Part Four | No | invader4.zip | |
| Space Invaders Galactica | No | galap1.zip | |
| Super Bagman | Yes | sbagman.zip | Partial sound : no voice |
| Super Cobra | No | scobra.zip | |
| Super Galaxians | No | superg.zip | |
| Time Pilot | Yes | timeplt.zip | Not playable |
| Video Hustler | Yes | hustler.zip | |
| Vulgus (Set 1) | No | vulgus.zip | |
| Zig Zag (Galaxian hardware set 1)| Yes | zigzag.zip | |
+———————————-+——-+————–+——————————-+

In order to download MarcaDS, scroll right down to the bottom of the page, with the latest version being the first on the list of files. Click here for a direct download, but it’s best to check back with the previous link provided, for latest updates.

I seem to have more fun playing retro games on the Nintendo DS than my bunch of DS games. The Encyclopedia of Game.Machines has been a great read, full of retro stuff (Play-Asia, USD 29.90)

Normally when it comes to running Gameboy and Gameboy Color on the Nintendo DS, the homebrew programs of choice to run those ROMs would be Goomba and Goomba Color.

However, those progams utilise a .gba extension that would require a Slot-2 solution such as a Supercard to run.

I’ve found a great way for playing GameBoy Color games on the R4DS, or practically any Slot-1 solution such as the M3 and it’s called Lameboy. Downloadable via GBATemp, Lameboy is currently in version 0.9 and it’s pretty easy to run.

Provided that your R4’s firmware is the latest, you would not need to manually apply the DLDI patch on to the Lameboy ROM before running it. The latest R4 firmware will perform an automatic DLDI patch.

So, here are the games that I tried:

• Super Mario Bros. DX: Runs like a charm, with very minimal slowdowns. All Mario goodness in 56 colours.
• Street Fighter Alpha: With just two fire buttons, fighthing is made easier. Just nice for 2D fighthing n00bs like me.
• The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening: Runs pretty fine.
• Metal Gear Solid: Like Link’s Awakening, it runs fine too.
• Wacky Races: Framerate problems abound, not recommended unless you have a wish for epilepsy

Here’s a tip while running GBC games on Lameboy, press the “Y” button to expand the game’s display to almost the entire top screen of the Nintendo DS.

For previous editions of The ROM report:

• The ROM Report Part 1 - SNES Games on the DS
• The ROM Report Part 2 - NES Games on the DS
• The ROM Report Part 3 - More SNES Games on the DS

Welcome to the third installment of The Rom Report! Today we’ll look at several SNES games that I’ve tried to run on the Nintendo DS using SNEmulDS.

Without further a do, here’s what really works, what works somewhat and what doesn’t work at all.

• The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past -This is a classic on the SNES, and even though it plays well on the SNEmulDS, the sound is totally skewed, with loud static being the order of the day. Recommended but play it with the volume turned off.
• Metal Warriors - A platformer from LucasArts and Konami featuring mechs, this game is prone to hang at the options screen and actual gameplay lags with a number of graphical glitches. Gamer beware.
• Prince of Persia - This Broderbund classic looks pretty, but you’ll need to adjust the emulator’s GFX settings constantly to let the game look the part. There are Minor but manageable graphical glitches both at the title screen and in-game. A difficult game to play notwithstanding, it’s hard not to like an old classic like PoP.
• Prince of Persia 2 - Graphical glitches are somewhat worse compared to its predecessor and the lack of sound makes it a flop on the DS.
• Samurai Shodown - A personal favourite of mine, this 2D brawler is in the vein of Street Fighter, but with weapons. The graphics are sharp and a marvel to look at despite playing the game on the small DS screen. There’s a minor glitch whereby the life bar doesn’t seem to show a decrease when hit. No worries though, it starts flashing when you or your opponent is near K.O. Recommended.
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles IV: Turtles in Time - Another personal favourite of mine, this time it’s from Konami. Control one of the four Ninja Turtles through 2D platform levels full of enemy ninjas and a boss at every end. Recommended.
• X-Men: Mutant Apocalypse - This is a rather tough game in terms of difficulty, or maybe it’s because of the controls that lag abit. I faced no problems running this game.
• Zombies Ate My Neighbours - Graphical glitches abound on the main menu but once past that, you’ll find the game not hard to love, as it is with the campy title. It’s recommended that you set the emulator speed to normal, instead of the default “Fast” to cope with the frantic gameplay.

Side notes: SNEmulDS doesn’t really like running .fig files and I wonder why. I’ve two games, Mechwarrior and Yoshi’s Island in .fig format and both don’t run properly (no graphics, sound only).

For previous editions of The Rom Report, here’s Part 1 and Part 2.

As promised, this is Part 2 of the Rom Report, this time featuring NES games run on the Nintendo DS with the help of a Slot-1 Flashcart and a piece of homebrew software called nesDS.

Before I begin, I’ll need to clarify that running SNES and NES games on the Nintendo DS are two separate things.

You’ll require two different homebrew emulator software, SNemulDS for SNES games and nesDS for NES games. The first part of the Rom Report has got the SNES part covered and if you interested in running SNES games, please refer to my guide here.

The NES games I’ve tried so far are:

• Mappy - This is a really fun game from Namco, where you run about a house as a rat named Mappy, avoiding, if possible, a gang of thieving cats. Don’t know who Mappy is? Well I’ve a 8-bit Dots puzzle depicting him right here.
• Ice Climber - This really is a classic in my book. I used to play this game on my cousin’s Micro Genius (a NES clone). On the emulator running on the Nintendo DS, the game is smooth and fast, retaining the sense of excitement and challenge as you try to get your eskimo up the ice mountain.
• Super Mario Bros 3 - If you don’t like the SNES make over of Super Mario Bros 3 in Super Mario All-Stars, this is the game for you. The game runs smooth on the emulator but there’s just a slight quirkiness with the buttons. I still don’t know how progress is saved though, and the emulator (nesDS) lacks a save state function.
• Metroid - Despite having played one of the more recent Metroid games, I can’t seem to put a finger on the original Metroid. It is a little boring. But if you were to ask me whether it runs fine, the answer is a definite yes.

Overall, the fun factor is there when it comes to these old school games. The only problem is while the emulator, nesDS, can adequately run the games, it is not up to scratch feature wise, lacking the ability to save and load states. Those features are not missing from SNemulDS when it come to running SNES games.