MGS Essential Collection Swap-Magic issue?

[fallenangle]

Just received the MGS Essential Collection I bought recently through eBay.
All parts in really excellent condition and the discs very clean showing barely any indication of use.

The two original MGS PS CD game discs work fine using PS-X Change on my PSOne so no problem there although it may require a hot-swap at the disc change.

I bought the set primarily for MGS3: Subsistence so next I tried that with Swap-Magic/slide card on one of my fat PAL PS2s. That works fine too.

However when I tried the MGS2: Substance disc - no dice. I tried every Swap-Magic setting option and it just won't play. The screen just remains blank. I tried it all over again in my other PS2, a later model v.7 I think, and that also refused. But rather than a blank screen I received a "Not valid PS2 disc" message on the Swap-Magic launch screen.

The disc is scratch free and looks almost perfect so I'm a bit perplexed. If I try running the game on the PAL PS2 without Swap-Magic as you'd expect you get the standard PS2 swirling incompatibility screen but that does suggest the PS2 is actually reading the disc and running it properly. If it was a disc fault wouldn't I get a DRE message?

I've tried Googling for a Swap-Magic 3.6 PLus game compatibility list but there doesn't seem to be a definitive one. Does anyone here know if there is some issue with MGS2: Substance and Swap-Magic and suggest a solution that might get it running ie. another boot disc of some sort?

Thanks or any help.

[fallenangle]

Oh bum - with a little more searching I've found the answer at afterdawn.com. Apparently MGS2: Substance is one of those few DVD9 dual layer games and as such incompatible with Swap-Magic.

They mention being able to get it to work by ripping it to DVDS - can anyone tell me me what this means please?

[sj33]

It means using a guide or patch (both to be found online) to get the game to fix on a single layer DVDR. This will either involve splitting the game over 2 DVDRs, or removing content such as FMV (depending on what approach the guide or patch takes).

[fallenangle]

Thanks - I guessed it was something like that. I've got MGS2: Substance on XBox anyway however I thought it might be interesting to try and getting this version running but only if it wasn't too much hassle. I don't think I'll bother.

BTW does anyone know if the PAL PS2 version of MGS2: Substance had a 60Hz option?

[MrKirov]

nope, fully optimised 50hz though.

[fallenangle]

Thanks.