Quite a few Arcade releases use IC cards to save player data and unlockables. However due to the nature of these cards, they only have a limited lifespan based on the amount of read/writes before it loses it's magnetic charge. So I was curious if any talented individuals found a way to mimic these cards and\or feed the system with digital IC-cards on a USB-stick for example.
I know with Initial D 1-3 (on Naomi 2) and Wangan Midnight Maximum Tune on Chihiro a user on Arcade-Projects forums made a python script that allows you to simulate the card reader by connecting a cable from the arcade system to a serial port or to a usb to serial port adapter. I have personally used it with Initial D Arcade Stage 3 and it worked really well. It was cool to be able to upgrade the card like I never could before. Other then that I know of no other projects to simulate card readers.
@wombat there not that few games uses IC or magnetic card readers - InitialD 1-3, ClubKart, Derby Owners, Virtua Fighter 4, Wangan Midnight, Virtua Tennis 3, InitialD 4-6, Atomiswave iirc KOF Neowave and few others, a lot of Konami bemani games, etc the problem is - each of mentioned games uses unique IC or magnetic cards and unique readers with it's own protocols, so research / reverse engineering required for each of games and it's readers. another problem - there quite few (if any) people who own real hardware interested in such researches and can/will take serial logs during 'talking' game systems to reader units.
@Gamemaster14XIV, wow that sounds really cool and practical. I'm going to lookup this project, curious to all it's details @MetalliC, ah I see, that's quite a hurdle, I expected that at least the SEGA games would have used the same protocols and such. I'm saving up to get a Lindbergh, card reader and Virtua Tennis 3. Perhaps once I reached my goal I can help in this process to take logs and such. Would be awesome to see more games being being compatible with solutions like the one @Gamemaster14XIV mentioned.
If you ever are doing anything with Lindbergh, let me know as I have a Lindbergh Yellow with multi kit and would be more then happy to help in any way possible. It would be really cool if a Card simulator could be made for Initial D 4 and 5. I now have in my position a Namco System 256 system with Tekken 5 Dark Resurrection and all the hardware needed to run the card readers, along with a bunch of cards. I have already experimented with the card system to see what can be done ingame. If someone wanted to give a try to figure out how to simulate this System 256 card system, I would be more then happy to help in any way I could. The system uses Sega Card readers and these small boards called SConv which go between the readers and the EXCard board installed in the 256 itself. If you take a look at the topic I have in Articles and News, I did an in-depth video on how this is all hooked up.
In the meanwhile I bought a bunch of Virtua Tennis 3 IC-cards, just to be safe Also I read at Arcade-Projects that @Jackalus actually worked on emulating the Lindbergh card reader, but stopped due to time constraints, I quote:
