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#1 2016-11-07 05:23:53

TheButtonsStuck
Member
Registered: 2016-11-07
Posts: 4

TGM DS flashes visuals text briefly before going to black screen

I'm trying to get this homebrew title to run.  I am using rom loading -> Load entirely to RAM.  The game boots and flashes text briefly before the screen goes black.  I can still select things as I hear the sound effects if I press the A button, eventually I can get to the game screen but I only see the background for the tetris arena and nothing else. 

If I try to run the game by changing Slot 2 (GBA) from auto to MPCF Flash Card Device and select an empty folder for FAT image (not sure if i'm doing that right...) I get this error:
"Searching NDS_TGM_20080815.nds ...
Cannot use NitroFS in this environment."

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#2 2016-11-07 17:41:28

zeromus
Radical Ninja
Registered: 2009-01-05
Posts: 6,168

Re: TGM DS flashes visuals text briefly before going to black screen

Beats me. Doesnt work in nocash. Does it even work on hardware? It just looks enormously buggy. The link to the source code is gone.

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#3 2016-11-07 21:06:41

TheButtonsStuck
Member
Registered: 2016-11-07
Posts: 4

Re: TGM DS flashes visuals text briefly before going to black screen

At some point it seems like it did work.  While I was trying to come across a fix I found this youtube video.  https://youtu.be/cpSDLC1lnx8  So at some point this game did work.  Here is a link to the homebrew release if you'd like to test yourself.  http://gamebrew.org/wiki/Tetris:_The_Grand_Master_3_DS

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#4 2016-11-08 00:14:12

zeromus
Radical Ninja
Registered: 2009-01-05
Posts: 6,168

Re: TGM DS flashes visuals text briefly before going to black screen

looks like 0.9.8 can run it using MPCF in slot-2. The title screen is on main BG3 and sub BG0. The game doesnt use 3D.
When the game boots correctly, it outputs debug text slowly to the bottom screen while booting, chiefly
Found ... "/NDS_TGM_20080815.nds"
The rom must be named NDS_TGM_20080815.nds precisely and placed in the root of the SD filesystem (not unusual for older homebrews)

The main problem seems to be that the palettes aren't written.
Only the 255th entry of each palette is written. It seems the palette is probably being written in reverse accidentally. This seems eerily familiar. For some reason I remember debugging a game that was doing this previously.

The game seems to write only palette entries 05000000, 05000002, and 050001FE, and then copy them from 05000000 completely to... (a backup cache?)

0.9.9 works as well, which does include the JIT. So too does 0.9.10 and 0.9.11

I need to debug this in an older version

When it's working correctly, around frame 225, "/nitrotracker-legit/" will show up. That takes longer on the latest SVN version. Most likely the nitroFS isn't being read correctly

I bisected it to find the fault commit r5438. No surprise, it's in the SD filesystem scanning/loading code. I'll analyze it further tomorrow

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#5 2016-11-08 09:25:03

TheButtonsStuck
Member
Registered: 2016-11-07
Posts: 4

Re: TGM DS flashes visuals text briefly before going to black screen

Thanks I've got it working now, as far as the problems you've described its beyond me.  The game was never properly finished so that would explain why it's buggy.

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#6 2016-11-11 02:36:10

zeromus
Radical Ninja
Registered: 2009-01-05
Posts: 6,168

Re: TGM DS flashes visuals text briefly before going to black screen

fixed in r5575. Problem has nothing to do with tetris. filesystem scanning was broken by r5438. large roms or directories full of dozens of MBs of files would break.

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