I've come into possession of one of these http://www.sitesnes.com/photo/img_acc/SNES%20Universal%20Adapter.html and have been fooling around with it for a little while. On simply booting the SNES, this adapter would appear to run like any standard pass through converter and struggles to get by titles that implement the 50hz-60z check (Mario All-Stars, Super Metroid etc). To bypass this, holding select when turning the system on brings up a menu similar to that of the Pro Action Replay 2, where the player can toggle which region the cartridge is from before playing: What interests me though, are those spaces for "Access Codes", supposedly codes can be entered to allow play of real troublesome games (I have no idea what), does anybody know of any sites that list access codes for games, or which titles would use them ?
All that appears to be to me is a Game Genie type patch system. Basically the "ACCESS CODE" for each import game will be different. You need to input the address of code which checks if your system is NTSC or PAL and change the correct byte of code to make the check pass so you can play the game. So it looks to me like it saves a few codes on the cartridge for you I imagine so that you could get a code and write down or just remember which access code is for which game. I imagine the device is just a cheaper scaled down Action Replay type device aimed at playing imports but you could probably input a code for cheating if you wanted. If you need codes you can take the ROM file and use UCON64 to do a NTSC/PAL lockout check to patch any checks and then use a hex editor to compare the files to get the needed addresses and value to change.
Thanks for the response :thumbsup:! May investigate with UCON64 then, I wonder if I could get SMRPG to work? I think that may very well be the case (both are Datel after all), there's even a hole on the cartridge where the switch on an Action Replay would go.
Super Mario RPG has an additional lockout mechanism as it has the SA-1 coprocessor chip. Basically if your console doesn't have a working region matching lockout chip, it won't run. So the only way you might run a NTSC SMRPG on a PAL system would be if you modded your system to have a NTSC and PAL lockout chip selection as well as the mod to change between PAL and NTSC video modes. Basically you're better off getting a NTSC system to play NTSC SA-1 games. But regular games you can certainly make or find codes for. Infact some people may have even published game genie codes for doing exactly what you want or perhaps PAR codes and you could just decode the GG codes or use the AR codes directly.
Programmable Universal Adapter This device is basically a barebones PAR2 2.x BIOS. It allows only 7 codes instead of 100, no switch to toggle cheats, and no trainer/cheat finder. The codes should be standard PAR format (SNES addresses) However, it's possible they also removed the ability to use 7E/7F RAM addresses as they aren't required for region codes and it would further discourage using the cart as a cheap PAR. It works with Terranigma to my knowledge, no access codes needed, and if it can handle that it probably works with 90%+ of games. That would explain why no access codes were ever published. SMRPG and other SA-1 are exceptions as those aren't standard software checks.
It is also possible to mod the SMRPG cartridge to play it on 50hz. You have to lift one or two pins on the SA1 as far as i remember. The Member D4s should be able to tell how it works.
I believe the Action Replay 3 does enable SMRPG to work NTSC on PAL actually. Only version 3 though, which is harder to find as not many were made.
Interesting as I have the AR MK3 for SNES. I bought it on ebay sometime in the past. I really just bought it to try playing chip games (like Star Fox and Mega Man X2) on my Super Famicom so I wouldn't have to keep my US SNES handy.
Ah, really? I hadn't ever considered that the game cartridge would check the SNES lockout chip, usually it's the other way around (?). That is an interesting tidbit however, as I believe it highlights a difference between the 3 differing versions of the game. V.1.1 works happily with a standard pass-through adaptor. (link) V.1.2 works with a 50/60hz switch or by way of switch off/on trick. (link) V.1.3 (which I believe I have) I'm guessing uses the method you've just outlined and..well..won't run on anything as far as I can see. Haha, yes indeed :nod:. I've heard that as well (which would make sense, given that PAR 2 v.2T & v.2P are said to work and this is similar to those), it appears capable of circumventing 50/60hz chekcs which Terranigma is said to do. Quite correct!Lift up pin 127 on the SA-1 and leave it floating, if it doesn't work after that then the floating pin must be connected to a 5v source I think. I've been contemplating trying this for a little while although I don't have a 3.8mm gamebit screwdriver atm. Still, I do have a deceased motherboard I can practice on in the meantime :dance:. I'm not certain the PAR 3 is that different from PAR 2 v.2x, if my wild earlier speculation is accurate, I would expect it to work with v.1.1 and v.1.2 of SMRPG only. Still, it would be good to experiment! yet those PAR 3s as you say, are difficultt o come by...there's a couple doing the rounds on ebay.de most of the time, but pricey..and surely the etxt would be in German.
Well the way I see it, SMRPG with the SA-1 won't run with the typical adapter or lockout mods because the cartridge must be connected to a functioning lockout chip. However with a different design your PAR or Import Adapter could connect the cartridge to a working lockout chip circuit fooling it into thinking the SNES system is the right region. I don't believe you are correct about multiple versions of SMRPG unless you for a fact have several and some work and some don't. There are many versions of PAR and probably some different versions of that Import Adapter. I would speculate they do something similar to what I listed above to make SA-1 games work. But older versions wouldn't do this because they were made before SA-1 and SA-1 is the only chip I'm aware of that attempted this form of lockout. The reason they are rare is probably because of the drop in sales due to the decline of the 16 bit era by the time games with chips like SA-1 came along. But that's ujst what I think. Like I said before I have a PAR MK3 though the label is missing off of it. It wasn't terribly expensive when I bought it. Can't remember exactly but I seriously doubt I'd have paid over $50 total.
The reasons why I think there are numerous iterations of the cartridge are many, the figure 3 comes from (I've heard) there being 3 different versions of the SMRPG ROM floating around cyberspace: -Looking in the descriptor for this film, the user writes: -On top of that, I have that same adaptor and a functioning cartridge and they do not work together. -It works on the fc3plus (a famiclone) in this film, however my cart does not function in my friend's fc3plus nor does his. -Again on the famiclone front, Digitpress has a specific warning on their Retro Duo compatability list (Here): Now it does clearly refer to "alleged" versions however, in the thread there are reports of users having working & non-working units!
I doubt that it's actually SMRPG that has different versions and more likely the SA-1 chip itself. One way to test would be to play a later SA-1 game than SMRPG. I think Kirby's Dreamland 3 would be one of the later ones.
