Where do ROMs come from, daddy?

This is a serious question, which I hope to get a few serious answers to before things descend into chaos. Hopefully things stay cool.


Where do ROMs really come from?


I know that for GBA games, it's simply a case of popping the cartridge into the USB dumpers most of us have and then dumping the cart. Soon after these ROMs make their way onto the internet.


But what about SNES games? They're from an era prior to the internet. And also from an era where PC emulators I'm guessing didn't exist (when did the first SNES emu come out?). I know of the large chunky SNES dumping devices with funny names, the kind that would save games onto floppy disks, sometimes more than one. But I know little else about this. When did SNES dumping first start occuring? Who made the hardware? Tell me about these devices that used floppy disks.

How did all those SNES games eventually come to reside in the massive ROM archives most of us have visited? Did one guy sit down and re-dump everything? Were there communities that already had most of them archived and were simply waiting for the 'net age to develop? On some SNES games, I've seen splash screens with music, giving credit to what looks like dozens of "dumping colleagues", often finishing off with an address in Holland or other places.

I know this happened with the C64 crackers, but I don't know how far it goes with consoles.

What about Megadrive ROMs? What NES/Famicom ROMs? How did they extract the games in order to put them on bootleg HK cartridges? Where does one acquire NES dumping equipment? Do you guys have underground contacts for such things? Since new NES discoveries are still getting dumped. Same with the Master System.

Are those individuals who blazed trails still active?

What about Atari2600? When did dumping those games first start? Some were from the 70s! Is there a small group of people who live in a giant warehouse somewhere, who dedicated a few years of their life to dumping every known Atari 2600 cartridge?

How does one even begin to start working out ways of extracting the data from cartridges?

Also, how the heck does someone dump an arcade board?

And again, how is that complete ROM archives mysteriously started to turn up in some areas? Was it simply a few people collecting odds and ends from various places, then putting them all together?

I've heard about "cracking legends" who lived in various parts of the world (Spain), and would stop at nothing to overcome difficulties in dumping some games. What difficulties? What games?

The questions I could ask about this far ranging subject, are literally infinite.

Hell, feel free to answer questions I haven't even asked here!


I know some might frown on such discussion, but from a historical point of view, I am curious to know about the individual people, the groups, the communities, and the technical methods involved.

It's a fascinating "scene", or part of gaming's "history", but due to its taboo nature, no one seems to rationally discuss the origins of these things, and no one seems to openly give concrete answers.


For the record, I'm NOT doing an article on this, I'm just geniunely curious.

 

all your answers for the console roms from 16 bit upwards can be answered by looking up a few words - BUNG - SUPER WILD CARD - SUPER GAME DOCTOR - FRONT FAR EAST - CHINA COACH LTD - SUPER UFO - SUPER PRO FIGHTER and many more. basically these are the names of "back up units" for consoles such as the SFC/SNES, Mega Drive, PC Engine, N64 and so on. There was even a Neo Geo one I believe.

I owned quite a few for the Super Famicom. The first was a 16Meg pro fighter with separate disc drive. This was the 2nd generation of back upunits since it could play "hi-rom" games. Then games got bigger and so did back up units. next I got a 24 Meg Pro Fighter that was stolen after a few months. After that I got some strange crazy thing that I can't remember the name of and NOT ONE place on the net has it's name or image of it.!!!! I wish I still had that unit. Needless to say it was crap but it did come with a DPS cartridge to play Mario Kart :icon_bigg Next was the 32Meg Wild Card which now belongs to Importaku and also a 32 Meg Wildcard DX, the sex of copies, err back up units for the Super Famicom :110:

The older systems such as NES, Master System, Game Boy etc have there data dumped via custom made dumping tools. There are one or two guys here at ASSEMbler who dump roms for the community (classic stuff not recent). I won't say who just in case they don't want to be named. Ah, this is also how Arcade roms are dumped.

Yakumo

 

ooh, thank you for the key words. A search is in order!

Otherwise, fascinating stuff as always Mr Yakumo. I assume your dabbling with the SFC/SNES back-up units was purely for personal use, as opposed to you being part of some historical society who archiving them for future generations? What year was this btw, those early units?

I'm just trying to build an image in my head of how things developed in an era, where mass fast digital communication like the internet of today didn't quite exist in the same capacity.

 

Hmm, the SFC scene was great in it's day. I must have been in my late teens when it all started around 1990 or maybe 1989. I owned many original games of course but also more 3.5 inch discs that I care to mention. The amazing thing is that I checked a few of them last year and they still worked !!

Yakumo

 

Wow, beautifully written, and precisely the kind of "different world era" I was thinking about. I like your line about the "gentleman pirate's choice". It's a fascinating glimpse into a way of doing things that will never exist again (and could even be forgotten about), and also one that is seldom really spoken about openly.

Gaming has certainly changed over the years.

Anyway, I do realise most of this is probably already somewhere on the net, and I've been using Google (shudder) to dig up more information on certain key words, but I rather do like it when people relate their own personal experiences. Makes things much richer.

 

Assembler, my hat off to you, your description could not have been better

Ryan

 

I remember when they butchered the Ranama 1/2 fighting game for Snes in the western release(cant even recall the western name anymore). Thats when I started looking into the copiers, but I could never get enough cash together (I was like 13).

Back then you didnt really have web pages and chat boards, just some shady BBS info. Was hard to justify sending $300 and not really knowing if or when you'd get the hardware. If it backfired who would you turn to in order to get your money back?

I didnt really understand how the device would work so my buddie drew me a picture as to how he thought it would look/work. No pictures existed of those things in the wild per say.

Ah the good ole days.

 

really well said ASSEMbler :clap:

I actualy have a Korean(?) manga book with an ad for the Super Wildcard

 

I agree well said Assembler, I remember the glorious days of 8bit-16bit, MSX, the Mega-CD, the SFC, the PCE...

It's not so exciting nowadays... I guess I'm grateful to have experienced the period 85-95.

I always feel sorry when Mrs brothers are so excited by Xbox360, nice machine but no frill for me...

Sabre

 

Any chance of getting it scanned for us to see?

 

don't have a scanner.. but I can take a photo when I come home (in 2-3 hours)

 

This is pretty much the reason I collect games mostly from around 85-96. That and, as ASSEMBler said, the EGMs with hundreds of pages with import reviews and previews. I wasn't born with a silver spoon in my mouth, so I was always left wanting except for the occasional cheap MD game that made its way around the used game stores. As soon as I moved out on my own and got a good paying job, I started collecting every one of those titles, that as a kid, kept me up at night wondering what those Japanese titles were like.

Man, those were the golden days. And then I snap back to the present and realize that, shit, I'm only 28.

 

I got into the ROM scene (d/ling them and playing them on an emulator) back in 2000, and my friends put them on the schools computers. Those were fun times. We set up a few networked gundam battle games using SNES9X. Thos were some good times.

 

As much as I'm fundamentally against console piracy, there is something to be said for the old backup units. Maybe it's because you still played the game on the original console, or maybe it is because back then, getting your hands on a ROM image was a lot more difficult - and required a lot more brains, not to mention communication skills - than finding a torrent site or waltzing onto a message board and saying "WILL SOME1 HLP M3 COPY PSX GAMEZ & GIVE M3 ISOZ!!!111 PLZKTHXLOLZ"

 

photoed and uploaded... and in crap quality!
http://www.student.bth.se/~joaf03/asm/copy_ad.jpg

and btw. I rememberd wrong.. it wasn't a Super Wildcard but a Game Partner

 

Adding to the original question of WHO spread ROMs around, I believe it started up parallel to the pirated PC and Amiga games scene. Amiga games especially had a big network of BBSes where a cracker somewhere would buy or obtain a new game, train it, remove copy protection, and then release it first for the glory of being the fastest.

Similarly, I imagine, some of the folks in the cracking groups were also game freaks who imported Japanese systems and eventually HK copiers. Dumping a SNES ROM is generally easy, but some crackers went the extra mile to remove country lockout, copy protection in some games, and add a trainer/front end. Some groups like Anthrox and Fairlight seemed pretty active across several consoles.

As far as who got the original games, I've heard stories of folks working in game shops who had easy access to new cartridges; they could dump the game, seal up the box again, and nobody would be the wiser. Anybody want to confirm it?

 

Also your book is Chinese, most likely from Taiwan. Game Partners are Game Doctor SFIIIs rebranded by TopGame (for Taiwan.)

 

I actualy have a mag published in the states with an advertisement for the Super Wildcard. Ill check and see if it's still lying around if anyone cares.