Hey All, So as I'm new to the site, but not new to gaming, I figured I'd introduce my collection as I've introduced myself! Any questions, feel free to ask
And here are some protos, mostly NES/Genesis. I've added Splatterhouse 2 and Vectorman 2 protos for Genesis since taking these.
Haha, that's actually a Wheaties box of Pedro Martinez. I bought it after he left the Sox in 2005 because I was sad and wanted to see him in the right uniform. Believe it or not, the Wheaties are still in there, if you're interested...
Thanks! It's actually a 0.1 build straight from a Nintendo employee who worked on the US version. It's dated about 4 months prior to the release. I'll be getting a CopyNES system sometime fairly soon so I can finally rip the rom and run a hexcompare. There are text differences from what I have been told. A careful hexcompare should find them... The DW proto is also straight from the same NES employee and is an earlier build. Looking forward to comparing that one as well. I will let you all know the results when I do get up to snuff on that. I just ran some hex compares yesterday on the protos I do have, finally getting around to learning a bit more about the process.
Are the Earthworm Jim 1 and 2 protos for Genesis anything interesting? I used to own an EWJ2 one that was pretty much an exact copy of the proto for SNES that exists out there, which shows how closely both platforms were developed on.
So the EJ 2 is actually MegaDrive. The issue I had comparing is that I have the Genesis final version, so I'm not sure how that impacts the coding. I was comparing EJ 2 mega to EJ 2 Genesis. Are there actually megadrive files I can download? Or should the coding be the same in theory? I need to look more into it. As for EJ 1, it's Genesis, and there were a number of differences later in the coding. It makes me think some of the later levels have some differences, but I would need to play them side by side, as I am more familiar with 2 than 1. I will maybe create a separate thread with some of this info this weekend. It may not have specific differences, but I can at least give a sense of the codings.
When you say coding I take it you mean you are doing hex comparisons between roms? If by Megadrive in this case you mean PAL, you can find the EU roms online easily. Though if they're not Genesis they probably can't be any different really since the US Genesis game was released first, so anything after that wouldn't have much of a chance for early content. Thanks for sharing. Hopefully in two months time I can afford stuff like this again without it breaking the bank
Yeah, hex comparison is what I was referencing. As to release dates, GameFAQ has Megadrive earlier, though it could be wrong. I thought the US generally got releases last? It also depends on the date of the build; an early proto could still predate an earlier release in another country. There could also be differences between final versions in the regions, so there could be interesting stuff in those areas. GameFAQ release data: http://www.gamefaqs.com/genesis/586156-earthworm-jim-2/data
EWJ2 definitely was a late 1995 release. I got it for Christmas that year along with Toy Story, so it definitely wasn't a '96 release over here. I dunno about the US generally getting releases last. Thought it was infamous that Europe would have to wait longer after both Japan and US got a lot of stuff back in the day. Anyway, yeah you never know with protos so I won't completely rule out anything.
Hey man, so I just found the mega drive E2 rom and ran a hex compare...it's dated the same month as the European release (October 1995), but get this...58,207 differences. They come all over at varying parts of the coding, as well, and the differences vary in terms of just having a few areas where coding is off a few spots which sets all the checksums off and other areas where the coding just appears quite different. There has to be some really interesting stuff in here! Apologies if my lingo is wrong regarding checksums...I am a coding newbie just getting used to reading and comparing. Oh, btw, you were right regarding the release date, at least as far as the Genesis coding is concerned. It's also dated October 1995 for Genesis
Just ran my EJ 1 Genesis proto, and had the same thing pop up! Dated the same month as final, but with over 125,000 coding differences, all over the map. Gotta be some differences here, as well.
Intriguing! Looking forward to hearing more about that. Great collection, too! Love the map wall. Miss the days when games came with beautiful full-color illustrations like that.
