Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

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koitsu
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Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by koitsu »

https://twitter.com/gdri/status/995503617258946561
http://hp.vector.co.jp/authors/VA005758/
パソファミ関連サービスの終了のお知らせ

パソファミ開発者 安藤信明の次男の弘治です。

父・信明は昨年8月に胃がんと診断されて以来、闘病生活を続けておりましたが、5月5日夜に病状が急変し、2018年5月6日に永眠しました。
...
故人は自身でまだまだ開発やサポートを続けるつもりだったようで、周囲には最低限の情報しか伝えられていないため、何かと不手際があるかと思いますが、ご理解よろしくお願いいたします。

2018年5月11日 安藤 弘治
The message was written by one of Nobuaki's sons. It says his father had been struggling with stomach cancer for some time, and unexpectedly passed away on May 6th. It also states that his father, best to his knowledge, was still actively developing and supporting Pasofami. Google Translate does an OK job for this, but I'll have something more accurate/eloquent provided later tonight when I see my neighbour who can translate it accurately. Edits/exclusions above are my own.

This emulator and story may not mean much to folks who weren't around during the emulation heyday in the late 90s (Pasofami was originally released sometime between February and August 1996) but for those who were, it should hold some weight. Pasofami was a commercial emulator for Windows and was known for being quite fast/efficient for its time. It (or possibly Super Pasofami (SNES/SFC emulator) done by the same author) gained some notoriety outside of Japan, since it was known to contain copy protection that when triggered (and apparently sometimes erroneously) would recursively delete C:\WINDOWS. Regardless, Mr. ANDOU will always be considered one of the original NES/Famicom emulation pioneers.
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B00daW
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by B00daW »

Wow. What a blast from the past. Yeah; I remember Pasofami pretty well. Back in the day when ROMs were rare and you had to juggle among iNES, Pasofami, Nesticle, and fwNES.

Pour one out for a homey. :beer:
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by koitsu »

Sorry this took me a bit of time, work has been swamped and I hadn't a chance to see my neighbour until this evening. As promised:

Original Japanese:
パソファミ関連サービスの終了のお知らせ

パソファミ開発者 安藤信明の次男の弘治です。

父・信明は昨年8月に胃がんと診断されて以来、闘病生活を続けておりましたが、5月5日夜に病状が急変し、2018年5月6日に永眠しました。

パソファミ関連サービスにつきましては、故人の遺志により以下の形で対応させていただきます。

(1) 製作代行サービスは終了します
すでに入金していただいており製作物のご提供ができていない方へは、さきほど返金の手続きについてメールを送らせていただきました。もしメールを受け取られていない方がいらっしゃいましたら、ご連絡をお願いします。

(2) パソファミのユーザ登録は不要となります
マシンIDからユーザIDを取得するツール GETUSRID.EXE を公開しますので、こちらを使用してユーザIDを取得してください。パソファミ製品版作成には、ユーザ登録時に通知される変換キーワードが必要となりますが、こちらは「45-36-43-BE-00-01」を指定してください。
ユーザ登録料の入金が完了していてユーザIDをまだ受け取っていない方へは、登録料を返金する形で対応させていただきたいのですが、残念ながらユーザ登録依頼のメールが残っていないようで、連絡先がわからない状態です。振込記録は参照できますので、お手数ですが、振り込みいただいた時の名義人、返金の振り込み先(または現金書留の送り先住所)をご連絡ください。

このページにつきましても、最低限のページのみを残して削除するように言われておりますので、サーバ等の契約状況を確認後、コンテンツを整理させていただきます。

連絡先のメールアドレス pasofami@mb.infoweb.ne.jp については返金などの手続きが一段落するまで残しておきますが、こちらにつきましても削除予定です。それ以降の連絡先につきましては、コンテンツを整理した際に記載させていただきます。

故人は自身でまだまだ開発やサポートを続けるつもりだったようで、周囲には最低限の情報しか伝えられていないため、何かと不手際があるかと思いますが、ご理解よろしくお願いいたします。

2018年5月11日 安藤 弘治

2018年5月13日 追記: オールドゲーム ROM研究のBAB様より追悼のメッセージをいただきました
English translation:
The ending of Pasofami-related services

This is Kouji ANDOU, 2nd son of Nobuaki ANDOU, author of Pasofami.

My father was diagnosed with stomach cancer in August of last year and had been struggling with the illness since being diagnosed. On the night of May 5th the illness took a turn for the worse, and he passed away on May 6th.

The below describes my father's wishes with regards to Pasofami support and services:

1. Any in-progress development and support of Pasofami and related services/development will be terminated/cancelled. For anyone who has already sent payment but has not received what has been contracted for, we have sent a mail regarding this matter. Please contact me if you haven't received such a mail.

2. Pasofami user registration will no longer be necessary. The program GETUSRID.EXE will be released to the public. User this to get your user ID. For Pasofami product creation[1], upon registration there will be a keyword that is sent; use the keyword 45-36-43-BE-00-01 for this purpose.
For people who have submitted registration payment but have not yet received a user ID, we'd like to refund the registration fee. However, we do not have access to the original registration request Emails, therefore we don't have contact information for these individuals. We do however have a record of bank transactions. We apologise for the inconvenience, but for anyone in this situation, please provide your name and where to remit payment to, or the (mailing?) address to which to send the reimbursement.

With regards to the Pasofami website: only a minimum amount of the site will remain; all other content will be deleted. After confirming the status of the hosting service, something will be done with the site content.[2]

The Email address pasofami@mb.infoweb.ne.jp will continue to function until reimbursements reach a point where the address is no longer needed, after which we plan to delete it. When the contents of the organization/sorting out[2] have completed, we will provide a contract address.[3]

It seems it was my father's intention to continue development and support of Pasofami, but there was a limited amount of information pass on to me, and I want to apologise if this situation/fact inconveniences anyone.

May 11th -- Kouji ANDOU

May 13th -- P.S. -- "Old Game ROM" Research BAB wrote a commemorative message.
[1]: The term 製品版製作 (seihinbang seisaku) is used here, which can refer to several different things.
[2]: The description given here in Japanese is intentionally vague, so it's hard to discern what exactly is meant by this.
[3]: The term 連絡先 (renrakusaki) is used here, which is somewhat vague in this context; may mean "contact information" as well.

I apologise for any inaccuracies, especially with regards to GETUSRID.EXE. I personally have never used Pasofami so I'm not familiar with what's being described; maybe it's a verification key, for example. I simply don't know. Superscripted items are from my own notes during discussion with the translator.
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Drew Sebastino
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by Drew Sebastino »

Weird... Was this software you had to pay for? I don't really see the point when there are so many viable NES emulators for free. :?
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by Dwedit »

Because when this came out, the free emulators did not even exist yet.
Here come the fortune cookies! Here come the fortune cookies! They're wearing paper hats!
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by zeroone »

Dwedit wrote:Because when this came out, the free emulators did not even exist yet.
But, why didn't he change his business model long long ago?

Also, what does "paso" mean?
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by Drew Sebastino »

I think emulators have just about been declared completely legal, but asking money for one still feels... I don't know... grimey maybe? I'm sure it was a whole other landscape back then though, so I shouldn't really be commenting...

Really sucks for this person's son. It sounds like they don't quite know what to do, but at least they're trying to fix everything up rather than taking the money and running.
Also, what does "paso" mean?
"Paso" on this because there are tons of other emulators for free. :lol:
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by naruko »

Personal Computer -> パーソナルコンピュータ → パソコン -> パソ -> Paso
Famicom -> ファミコン -> ファミ -> Fami
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by tepples »

Espozo wrote:I think emulators have just about been declared completely legal
For example, in USA, Sony's loss to Connectix in the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit sealed that. I don't know about any analogous case law in Japan, but Atlus, Jaleco, and Konami did use an NES emulator originating from the GBA homebrew scene for rereleases of their NES games.
Espozo wrote:
Also, what does "paso" mean?
"Paso" on this because there are tons of other emulators for free. :lol:
I remember Pasofami ROMs coming as three files: PRG ROM, CHR ROM (optional) and a board description. Was the format of the last of these ever documented?
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by NewRisingSun »

Marat Fayzullin's NESLIST is named by ucon64's source code as the documentation of PasoFami's .PRM file. It seems that most of the bytes signal emulator hacks and do not describe the cartridge hardware. At some point, Pasofami started supporting the iNES format, so I assume that most mappers cannot be represented in .PRM at all.
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by koitsu »

Dwedit wrote:Because when this came out, the free emulators did not even exist yet.
At this rate, I'm going to have to start keeping a list of all of Espozo's posts that demonstrate failures in the generational gap. *chuckle* ;-) I knew this type of thing would happen (speaking generally, not about Espozo), because for whatever reason, the younger gens really don't seem to care about learning about the history of how things got to where they are now (this is especially the fields of retro console dev, emulation, and romhacking).

It's pretty simple really: when talking about (or asking questions about) something that relates to "a thing that began {in the past, before I was born, before I was old enough to get interested in it}", the thought at the forefront of your mind every single time should be: "how things are today are probably not how things were then". This in turn should make you ask questions to learn, not make ignorant statements like "you had to pay for it?! but there are so many free NES emulators!" The state of emulation and emulators today is absolutely nothing like what it was in 1996.

And as I said, Mr. ANDOU was certainly a NES/FC emulation pioneer -- one of the first. If you weren't around during that time, or if you were but weren't part of nesdev or emulation communities, then yes, a lot of this is going to be eye-opening. It's actually quite sad how so many of the original pioneers have been ignored; the giants upon whose shoulders today's emulator authors stand have been forgotten. When I met with JoeGtake2 for his The New 8-Bit Heroes documentary (the footage of which was not used), most of what I talked about with him was exactly that. I was sure to mention many names of the original nesdev/RE/homebrew and emulation participants, names which now only seem to exist in what might as well be considered the Dead Sea Scrolls -- because all of those folks deserve mention.

Anyway... Two other things I wanted to mention (one relates to Espozo's comment sort of, while the other doesn't):

1. What isn't exactly made clear in the Japanese text written by Mr. ANDOU's son: there are certain words and phrasing used (mainly in Item 1) that imply Mr. ANDOU may have been hired or doing some sort of general emulation work for clients. This is completely speculative, but it may indicate that people were hiring him or buying parts of PasoFami's core to use in other products (likely commercial). I do not want this paragraph to cause a bunch of grassy-knoll-shooter type theories. But this is a good example of what happens when someone (esp. with children) passes away without the details of things being passed (to family, a family attorney who handles such matters, etc.): those unaware are left confused about the nature of what the deceased was doing, and there is an uncomfortable nebulous feeling to it all, often occurring alongside the grieving process. It's difficult to explain, and even more difficult to go through (hopefully none of you do). As such, I think some of the vague wording is understandable.

2. I'm aware of Japanese cultural aspects (both personal and social) regarding death and the passing of someone, and did my best to have a decent translation done while respecting those. Sometimes depending on the nature of the situation, it can be a walk-on-eggshells type of thing, so I always approach it with respect.

Thanks.
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by Sour »

koitsu wrote:1. What isn't exactly made clear in the Japanese text written by Mr. ANDOU's son: there are certain words and phrasing used (mainly in Item 1) that imply Mr. ANDOU may have been hired or doing some sort of general emulation work for clients.
Personally (going from the Japanese text), I'm mostly assuming this to be about "registering" the software to get the full version. It says the .exe file is about generating a "user ID" based on a "machine ID", and taking a look at the pasofami website, there's a section explaining how to get your machine ID from Pasofami (and that you need to enter this in the registration form when you buy a copy of it). The part with the code appears to be a "machine ID", the machine ID I get on my computer in pasofami is formatted the same (6x hex digits). I'm assuming the machine ID that is given in the post might be a special value that allows the program to work on any computer, even if the machine ID doesn't match? Can't really say for sure, though.

Also, the part about "something will be done with the site content", the original text says that he "has been told to remove everything but the bare minimum from the website", and that this will be done after confirming the current state of the hosting contract, etc. (and later on he says he will update the contact e-mail with the new one at the same time). It doesn't actually say who told him to do this to the website, though (I'm assuming it's something that someone in the family has decided).
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by rainwarrior »

Sad to hear about that.
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by Drew Sebastino »

koitsu wrote:for whatever reason, the younger gens really don't seem to care about learning about the history of how things got to where they are now (this is especially the fields of retro console dev, emulation, and romhacking).
I agree that younger people can be more educated on recent history, but regardless of age, very few people care about retro console dev, emulation, and romhacking, and that's coming from someone who is. I get the notion that you find this to be a failure somewhere in society, but you can't expect people to care about something as niche as this. I hear classic car fans complain about the same thing, and that's far less obscure. Maybe I'm misinterpreting your criticism.
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Re: Pasofami emulator author Nobuaki ANDOU has passed away

Post by koitsu »

Espozo wrote:I agree that younger people can be more educated on recent history, but regardless of age, very few people care about retro console dev, emulation, and romhacking, and that's coming from someone who is. I get the notion that you find this to be a failure somewhere in society, but you can't expect people to care about something as niche as this. I hear classic car fans complain about the same thing, and that's far less obscure. Maybe I'm misinterpreting your criticism.
Fair points, but in actuality, it's not society I'm necessarily expecting it from -- it's you, as someone who is part of the niche. :-) Society and I have never seen eye-to-eye.
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