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SNES Gradius III Hacked to be Faster

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    SNES Gradius III Hacked to be Faster

    A clever person has hacked/reprogammed Gradius III for the SNES to take advantage of the 'SA1' enhancement chip. So if you use the hacked version with an emulator or an Everdrive that supports the 'SA1' chip, you will get to experience the game with far less slowdown.

    The SA1 features a range of enhancements over the standard CPU:
    • 10.74 MHz clock speed, compared to the 5A22's maximum of 3.58 MHz
    • Faster RAM, including 2KBytes of internal RAM
    • Memory mapping capabilities
    • Limited data storage and compression
    • New DMA modes such as bitmap to bit plane transfer
    • Arithmetic functions (multiplication, division, and cumulative)
    • Hardware timer (either as a linear 18-bit timer, or synchronised with the PPU to generate an IRQ at a specific H/V scanline location)


    So you can appreciate how much of a boost in performance Gradius III now has.

    Go here for more details: https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/...s-gradius-iii/
    Last edited by Leon Retro; 02-08-2019, 15:39.

    #2
    good isnt it? hehe

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      #3
      Need to give this a try. That's some impressive work.

      Comment


        #4
        Originally posted by importaku View Post
        good isnt it? hehe
        It's most excellent.

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          #5
          All I kept seeing when this was put out there were clips of that bloody ice stage level that becomes about twenty times harder. I'm not sure I'd classify that as 'good', but it's definitely impressive work.

          Comment


            #6
            This also came out on Arcade, PS1, PSP and Wii. Do those versions suffer from slowdown or just the SNES?

            The HG101 guide to Konami Shooters says of Gradius III:


            "...notably the Gradius III & IV pack for the PlayStation 2, and the Gradius Collection for the PSP. Both of these are based on the arcade version, with the ability to turn off slowdown. The PS2 version also saves checkpoints, allowing you to resume a game you've quit, or restart at an earlier point in the level in case you need to power-up. There's also a bonus "Cube Attack" mode, allowing you to challenge the flying crystal blocks of the eighth stage. You can also unlock an Extra Edit mode if you beat the game, allowing you to pick some of the additional weapons found in the SNES version. The PSP port lacks these features. The SNES version is also on the Wii Virtual Console."

            Comment


              #7
              Originally posted by QualityChimp View Post
              This also came out on Arcade, PS1, PSP and Wii. Do those versions suffer from slowdown or just the SNES?
              The arcade version doesn't have slowdown anywhere near as severe as the SNES version. It's why the SA1 patch has done such a great job of speeding things up.

              Makes me think that's it's a shame that something like the SA1 wasn't embraced early on in the SNES's life, so more action games could have taken advantage of the huge boost in clock speed. 10.74 MHZ would have made most devs really happy to create shooters for the system. Might have been a completely different story -- loads of shooters instead of a few.

              Konami did use the 'SA1' in Jikkyo Oshaberi Parodius released in 1995. So they got there first with using the chip to enhance a shooter.
              Last edited by Leon Retro; 02-08-2019, 17:05.

              Comment


                #8
                Originally posted by QualityChimp View Post
                This also came out on Arcade, PS1, PSP and Wii. Do those versions suffer from slowdown or just the SNES?

                The HG101 guide to Konami Shooters says of Gradius III:


                "...notably the Gradius III & IV pack for the PlayStation 2, and the Gradius Collection for the PSP. Both of these are based on the arcade version, with the ability to turn off slowdown. The PS2 version also saves checkpoints, allowing you to resume a game you've quit, or restart at an earlier point in the level in case you need to power-up. There's also a bonus "Cube Attack" mode, allowing you to challenge the flying crystal blocks of the eighth stage. You can also unlock an Extra Edit mode if you beat the game, allowing you to pick some of the additional weapons found in the SNES version. The PSP port lacks these features. The SNES version is also on the Wii Virtual Console."
                And the ps2 version of III, boots in 240p

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                  #9
                  There are even SA1 enhancements out there for Super Mario World. That always slows down when it's doing anything remotely fancy.

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                    #10
                    Originally posted by dataDave View Post
                    There are even SA1 enhancements out there for Super Mario World. That always slows down when it's doing anything remotely fancy.
                    I didn't know about that. It's not a game with any serious slowdown problems, but I'll check out the enhanced version. It's cool how people are upgrading SNES games.

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                      #11
                      I love this tweaking to make them even better, only played on my pc so far I wonder if the SNES mini will play nicely with the hacked gradius III a weekend project me thinks.

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                        #12
                        Originally posted by importaku View Post
                        I wonder if the SNES mini will play nicely with the hacked gradius III a weekend project me thinks.
                        It plays the Parodius game that uses the SA1, so it should work fine. I'll bung it on the Mini sometime soon.

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                          #13
                          Originally posted by Leon Retro View Post
                          I didn't know about that. It's not a game with any serious slowdown problems, but I'll check out the enhanced version. It's cool how people are upgrading SNES games.
                          It slows down badly when Mario completes a level and it fades out.

                          Comment


                            #14
                            Well i tried it on the super fami mini, it works but it doesn't work. The game plays but the slowdown is still there, not like when i played it on zsnes guessing the canoe emulator on the mini doesn't quite know how to handle it.

                            Comment


                              #15
                              Originally posted by importaku View Post
                              Well i tried it on the super fami mini, it works but it doesn't work. The game plays but the slowdown is still there, not like when i played it on zsnes guessing the canoe emulator on the mini doesn't quite know how to handle it.
                              That's strange, because it runs the third Parodius game that uses the SA1. Maybe use it with a different SNES core?

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