FamicomBox: A game revision made specifically for it

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hex_usr
Posts: 92
Joined: Sat May 09, 2015 7:21 pm

FamicomBox: A game revision made specifically for it

Post by hex_usr »

I'm not sure if this is the correct forum for this topic. It concerns an undumped cartridge and has nothing to do with homebrew and little to do with emulation. If this is the wrong forum, feel free to move it.

The FamicomBox is a hotel unit in Japan that played Famicom games, just like the Super Famicom Box. And also like the Super Famicom Box, it had cartridges made specifically for it, but each cartridge only held a single game and was shaped just like the NES cartridges used in America and Europe. But the CIC was connected to different pins, so NES games would not work on a FamicomBox, although FamicomBox games will work on an NES-101 top-loader (not the NES-001 front-loader). i64X made a video review of it on YouTube.

Most of the time, though, FamicomBox cartridges had identical ROM content to the regular Famicom cartridges, so they rarely get dumped because the ROM dumps would be redundant. They don't even have instruction and security ROMs like PlayChoice-10 games do.

However! A few weeks ago, I determined that a game revision that was only ever available for the FamicomBox exists! And currently, that game revision has never been preserved.

The game is Pro Wrestling, or プロレス for short. This was a Famicom Disk System game in Japan, and it was released as a cartridge in America and Europe. It also has a PlayChoice-10 version. But no cartridge release of Pro Wrestling was ever available in Japan, at least not for the regular Famicom; only on the FamicomBox does a Japanese cartridge release exist, complete with the Disk System version's unique title screen.

Image

And, as of 2017-02-17, this unique game revision has never been dumped. It is not available online, anywhere at all. No-Intro does not have it registered. And it certainly is not in the GoodNES set.

As far as I know, Pro Wrestling is the only FamicomBox game with this situation. Even Senjou no Ookami (戦場の狼, Commando), the only Famicom game to use the unique HVC-UN1ROM board, has an identical FamicomBox version, so there is no need to dump a Senjou no Ookami cartridge if you have one. This was verified by actually running the game on an emulated FamicomBox, which compares the checksum with its internal database, and that game has no internal footer like some FamicomBox games, so the database is the only way to verify that game. Pro Wrestling, on the other hand, is not in the database, so it will have an internal footer.

Does anyone with a FamicomBox and a Pro Wrestling cartridge want to preserve it by dumping its ROM and registering it with No-Intro? If you are reluctant to do so because you think that will devalue the cartridge, I will understand, but this is not some obscure competition or test software; all it is is a Japanese cartridge release of a game that is already available on the Famicom Disk System and NES.

This post should not be interpreted as a ROM request. If anyone actually does dump it and post it online, please do not link to it here.
bsnes-mcfly: the bsnes v073 and bsnes-classic killer (GitLab repository)
Great Hierophant
Posts: 780
Joined: Tue Nov 23, 2004 9:35 pm

Re: FamicomBox: A game revision made specifically for it

Post by Great Hierophant »

This forum is probably about as good as any for this topic. I have two questions, hopefully you can help with the answers :

1. This Japanese cartridge version of Pro Wrestling, does it use a UNROM board or another board? The FDS version only came on one side of the disk, which would require 64KB and therefore some kind of memory mapping hardware. I am not aware of any Nintendo Mapper 2 game that uses less than 128KB. The NES version required 128KB and uses a UNROM board. With that extra storage space, the NES version shows portraits of the wrestlers in the menu screens while the FDS version shows the regular full-body sprites for the wrestlers.

2. For Senjou no Ookami, does the cartridge have a NES-UN1ROM or a HVC-UN1ROM? In other words, is the PCB a true 72-pin board or did Nintendo use its 60-to-72 pin converter (called NES-JOINT).
lidnariq
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Re: FamicomBox: A game revision made specifically for it

Post by lidnariq »

Great Hierophant wrote:The FDS version only came on one side of the disk, which would require 64KB and therefore some kind of memory mapping hardware.
That usually indicates an NROM-class game, not UNROM. Looking inside this game ... it'd probably have been ported to either CNROM or NROM, depending on whether the the "ID" files are important:

Code: Select all

$ FDSList Puroresu\ -\ FamiCom\ Wrestling\ Association\ \(J\)\ #\ FDS.FDS 
   Disk is in FWNES Header Format
DISK 'PRO '  Side A  Files 9  Maker $01  Version $00
-----------------------------------------------------
000 $00 'KYODAKU-' $2800-$28DF (  224) [PICTURE]
001 $01 'ID PROG ' $6000-$7938 ( 6457) [CODE]
002 $02 'PROG CHR' $D2D2-$DFFF ( 3374) [CODE]
003 $03 'ID CHR  ' $0470-$1ADF ( 5744) [TILES]
004 $10 'MAIN CHR' $0000-$1D9F ( 7584) [TILES]
005 $11 'MAINPROG' $6D9D-$D298 (25852) [CODE]
006 $20 'PUMA CHR' $1D20-$1FBF (  672) [TILES]
007 $21 'JOY DATA' $CB4C-$D26D ( 1826) [CODE]
008 $30 'TOLOFEE ' $8000-$880E ( 2063) [CODE]
-----------------------------------------------------
|  53998 Bytes Used,  11428 Bytes Free,   82% Full  |
-----------------------------------------------------
For [the Famicombox version of] Senjou no Ookami, does the cartridge have a NES-UN1ROM or a HVC-UN1ROM? In other words, is the PCB a true 72-pin board or did Nintendo use its 60-to-72 pin converter (called NES-JOINT).
I was initially confused, and have removed my comment about the US release.

However: given that ordinary Famicombox games already had custom PCBs made, it seems more likely to me that there's an SSS-UN1EPROM instead of an SSS-JOINT. (Four of the expansion port pins are used to tell the 3198 CIC which slot it's in; thus the NES-JOINT would not be suitable for this)
Great Hierophant
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Re: FamicomBox: A game revision made specifically for it

Post by Great Hierophant »

Given the storage requirements for a disk, I think the game could be shoehorned into a CNROM cart, but NROM is too small. Alternatively, it was simply the NES version with the title screen replaced.
lidnariq
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Re: FamicomBox: A game revision made specifically for it

Post by lidnariq »

To hex_usr's original question: The person who runs famicombox.jp has a picture with 38 cartridges, and claims there were 39 cartridges made for the FamicomBox. It's possible he might have it.

Given cultural differences, asking politely is definitely required, and may not be sufficient.

Just searching for it in general in Japanese ("famicombox" "プロレス") insinuates it's not terribly rarer than the famicombox itself... (e.g.)
hex_usr
Posts: 92
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Re: FamicomBox: A game revision made specifically for it

Post by hex_usr »

Sorry about my 2-day absence; I was reinstalling Funtoo Linux, which takes that long to do.
Great Hierophant wrote:1. This Japanese cartridge version of Pro Wrestling, does it use a UNROM board or another board? The FDS version only came on one side of the disk, which would require 64KB and therefore some kind of memory mapping hardware. I am not aware of any Nintendo Mapper 2 game that uses less than 128KB. The NES version required 128KB and uses a UNROM board. With that extra storage space, the NES version shows portraits of the wrestlers in the menu screens while the FDS version shows the regular full-body sprites for the wrestlers.
I can't answer this question. I don't have the cartridge. If I did, I would have bought some dumping hardware, dumped it myself, registered for the No-Intro forums, and looked up the proper channels for getting it registered in their database instead of asking here.
Great Hierophant wrote:2. For Senjou no Ookami, does the cartridge have a NES-UN1ROM or a HVC-UN1ROM? In other words, is the PCB a true 72-pin board or did Nintendo use its 60-to-72 pin converter (called NES-JOINT).
I don't know this, either. All I know is that the ROM is very likely identical between the Famicom and FamicomBox releases because its checksum matches the BIOS's database, and it has no FamicomBox footer. If it had one, I wouldn't have been able to figure this out.
lidnariq wrote:Given cultural differences, asking politely is definitely required, and may not be sufficient.

Just searching for it in general in Japanese ("famicombox" "プロレス") insinuates it's not terribly rarer than the famicombox itself...
Yeah, sorry, I can't speak Japanese (can't even read it without the proper font pack right now). I am aware of the politeness requirements, but I think speaking English would be inherently rude, if that person can even understand it well enough. Someone who can speak the language with enough fluency would have to ask about it in my place. If not, I would prefer that it be bought online and dumped that way.
bsnes-mcfly: the bsnes v073 and bsnes-classic killer (GitLab repository)
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B00daW
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Re: FamicomBox: A game revision made specifically for it

Post by B00daW »

A long while ago I believe kevtris was given a FamicomBox and a bunch of cartridges. Maybe touch base with him if that was one of the carts that he came across and what was found of it? Maybe poke around his website and the classic portions of it?
joey4
Posts: 1
Joined: Sat Mar 25, 2017 7:03 pm

Re: FamicomBox: A game revision made specifically for it

Post by joey4 »

I was surprised to see that this game has never been dumped and was excited to get my famicombox out of storage. No major changes in gameplay except the intro and wrestler stats. I uploaded it to the no-intro forums for anyone interested.

SSS-PW-0
http://i.imgur.com/yTFO0vA.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/M8G4Qy2.jpg

From my understanding earlier FamicomBox games were on EPROMs and later in its lifespan (possibly for the FamicomStation) they switched to mask ROMs. Has to be one of the rarer Nintendo mask ROMs out there.

As a side note this game is unique as it's one of the few NES games with a correct internal checksum in the header (or footer) which allows it to be accepted by the FamicomBox.

PRG INTERNAL CHECKSUM: 5904
GENERATED PRG CHECKSUM: 0x1325904

In this case since its an unrom to calculate the checksum it would be the sum of all the bytes minus the internal checksums sum

if you're interested in reading more about this check out: http://problemkaputt.de/everynes.htm#fa ... deratffe0h

As a bonus heres my FamicomBox running retail NES carts:
https://youtu.be/8nAeAD5HSWY
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Myask
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Re: FamicomBox: A game revision made specifically for it

Post by Myask »

joey4 wrote:I was surprised to see that this game has never been dumped and was excited to get my famicombox out of storage. No major changes in gameplay except the intro and wrestler stats. I uploaded it to the no-intro forums for anyone interested.
Could you see your way to submitting it to Bootgod's database?
kazblox
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Joined: Thu Feb 23, 2017 2:27 pm

Re: FamicomBox: A game revision made specifically for it

Post by kazblox »

I just saw a video of this specific FamicomBox revision on YouTube. The USA release of Pro Wrestling appears to be based on this version of the codebase, according to the minor graphical revisions present in both this revision and the former that I just mentioned.

Also, joey4: I can't find your post on the No-Intro forums anywhere. Mind giving a link?
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