nesdev.com

There is an emulator able to replace graphics in NES games. It's called "MyNES" ( http://sourceforge.net/projects/mynes/files/ )
I wanted to use this "HiRes" feature desperately but it was too hard to me and I never tried again...

There are pictures of some experiments with a 'Dragon Ball Z' game:







And there's even a video on http://youtu.be/haGHtKWmj5M

The latest versions of My NES no longer supports it unfortunately, and may never come back!

There should be a better way than doing it in a double-pixeled bitmap mode anyways.

_________________
AKA SmilyMZX/AtariHacker.

Oh, sad news
I had never heard about HiSMS until reading this topic.
I'm enjoying a lot to change Sega Master System graphics - so I'd love to see something similar (and as easy to use) done to my beloved NES someday.

By the way this is my modification test with "Alex Kidd in Miracle World":



Original screen:

Very good work! Did you draw the sprites yourself?
I tried HiSMS, but I believe the interface could be better.

Thank you!
Yes, I'm drawing everything. The logo was heavily inspired from "Complete Album" cover ( http://www.jap-sai.com/Games/Alex_Kidd_ ... m_CD_A.jpg ) but I'm tracing / drawing / retouching every element on screen.

You should try this emulator again. It's very simple to use and it runs my modified game as fast as the original Alex Kidd.
There are a lot of features to be added or fixed (it's version 0.1 after all) but it's still an incredible software in my opinion.

Do you know how HiSMS works in palette changes? Do we need to make a HD version of the same sprite when it changes colors?

Apparently yes.
I'm already facing this problem (Alex Kidd logo starts to blink after a few seconds -- and it suddenly goes back to the original 8-bit form when it happens).

It means that a version of MegaMan in a emulator that works like HiSMS would be a little bit boring to make...
Every single animation frame would have to be done a dozen times or more.
How dows HiSMS work when the sprite is partially hidden (like when Alex is behind bushes, for example)?

Yep. But I still would do it if someone releases something like a "HiNES".



I'm not there yet but it's explained here: http://hisms.orgfree.com/tutorial/index.html

There are two ways to handle this:

1. Have the emulator always use a constant palette that includes light, medium, and dark versions of all three colors in a particular sprite palette, as well as black, gray, and white.
2. Use the palette changes as an opportunity to add unique detailing to Mega Man's sprite for each state.

I imagine that most games just use the tiles' priority bits. (The SMS does it backward compared to the NES. On the SMS, priority is assigned to tiles, not sprites.) Games that perform occlusion in software using CHR RAM updates, like Solstice for NES, would have a bigger problem.

I still think the best possible approach is game-specific, as then the emulator can utilize the specifics of the game state in order to generate the appropriate graphics independently from the original tile-based approach. This would also allow the approach of using a completely different method of rendering, such as the 2.5D idea I mentioned. I'm not even sure how much more work it would be to do something like this as opposed to a generic "high-res tile" approach, although the latter would be easier for non-programmers to implement (but also more limited). For example, I'd love to see a SMB emulator that renders the graphics in the style of NSMB, but running the original game logic so all the known bugs would still be present (hat stomp, mushroom jump, wall anti-ejection, world 36). This would also present an interesting situation where existing TAS movies could be replayed on such an emulator to present a new and fresh look to something that is already very entertaining from a gameplay perspective.

_________________
Read my blog! The Incoherent Ramblings of a Lowly Geek

I am trying to talk to Quietust (author of Nintendulator), at first he said that doubling the pixels directly in ROM and PPU (as we want to do) would not be feasible in Nintendulator because of the low level emulation of the PPU that Nintendulator uses.
Do any of you guys know what version of Visual Studio must I use to edit and run the source code of Nintendulator? I am using Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate, but I get errors when opening the project.
I was thinking in using a tecnique similar to the one used in HiSMS (sprite replacement), but instead of looking for specific colors, consider the sprite as it is (with four "indications" of color, 00, 01, 10 and 11). At the moment when the new sprite would be redraw, it would be done using the palette of the game. If it works, we will be able to avoid the palette changing issue.

Works here with VS2010. You'll need the DirectX SDK for dxguid.lib.

_________________
Download STREEMERZ for NES from fauxgame.com! — Some other stuff I've done: kkfos.aspekt.fi

I'm still praying for a "HiNES".
Meanwhile the first stage of my Alex Kidd HD prject is finally done: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScyB69dwRA0
I *REALLY* would enjoy to recreate some NES classics to 720p.

All this talk reminds me of Pacifi3D.