Any hobby dev group or pirates "do request" commission games for Famicom ???

[L___E___T]

Hey man, I was surprised to find out that even 'ports' require whole new code sometimes.  Take a game on 360 and a game on PS3, it's very different unless you use an existing engine like the unreal engine.  The same can be said for the NES and the same game appearing on the PC engine, all ports do is take the game 'rules' and recipe and rewrite them in a different language.  I don't know all that much about assembly code, but that's how it was explained to me if it helps.


As to your request, there's a couple of hack threads on this forum - I'd take it straight to those guys (I mean run over to the hack site forums) and offer up the possibility.  I think for a very decent hack you may have to pay someone a couple hundred bucks if they're not gonna do it for free - it's quite alot of work just to do a graphics hack let alone redo the enemy attack patterns etc.

I think you could go on those forums and have some luck - let us know!

[Agent X]

Hey man, I was surprised to find out that even 'ports' require whole new code sometimes.  Take a game on 360 and a game on PS3, it's very different unless you use an existing engine like the unreal engine.  The same can be said for the NES and the same game appearing on the PC engine, all ports do is take the game 'rules' and recipe and rewrite them in a different language.  I don't know all that much about assembly code, but that's how it was explained to me if it helps.


As to your request, there's a couple of hack threads on this forum - I'd take it straight to those guys (I mean run over to the hack site forums) and offer up the possibility.  I think for a very decent hack you may have to pay someone a couple hundred bucks if they're not gonna do it for free - it's quite alot of work just to do a graphics hack let alone redo the enemy attack patterns etc.

I think you could go on those forums and have some luck - let us know!

#1) Your elaborated explanation helps indeed sir.  Just glad I'm not the only one who "assumes" stuff when it comes to game programming and what not.  Times like this I wish I had the knowledge of a thousand computer nerds, but alas it's not my path.  I am but a man with ideas and no way (gamewise) to execute them. 


#2) I'm confused now.  There's *Hack* threads on Famicom World covering something along these lines already (certain people who could do it), or do you mean there is some Hacker's Forum on the Internet I must pilgrimage to in some Bruce Leroy fashion to seek the master who can do such things?  I'm not being facetious either, I really am a bit confused on this part, maybe it's how you worded it.  I'm all for at least articulating further with the right people, these ideas of mine.  If it is on this forum, perhaps you could lead the way?  I've got my  mind on 15 different things right now as it is, but posting here and chatting with ya'll is good therapy too.  If this Hack Forum is separate from FW.COM, then what is the URL so I can Warp there?

[L___E___T]

Oh no worries mate, I can sometimes sound like a bit of an ass but it's not intentional. 

I meant there's a hack thread on here in the other gaming section I think, with links within to good sites that host hacks,  Those sites have their own forum and I would try asking to see if anyone's willing.  I personally think the Bruce Leroy approach is a great one!

Zophar's domaon has some good tools :
http://www.zophar.net/hacks/nes.html

But the rom hack database is where it's at - they have a couple hacked NES shooters already:
http://www.romhacking.net/?genre=16&platform=1&game=&category=&perpage=20&page=hacks&hacksearch=Go&title=&author=

That's a good place to start, but I reckon someone on either of those forums will be willing to help or at least explain things better than we can.  Good luck, it'd be great to hear if you get it started and how you get on.

[UglyJoe]

But the rom hack database is where it's at - they have a couple hacked NES shooters already:
http://www.romhacking.net/?genre=16&platform=1&game=&category=&perpage=20&page=hacks&hacksearch=Go&title=&author=

Be aware of RHDN's rules, especially:

16.) It is NEVER allowed to request someone else do work for you. That includes asking for someone to make a utility, do a translation, write a document etc.

I know you'd be offering money, but still expect to hear some noise from the moderators.  People have requested hacks/translations for money before and the threads weren't locked, but I don't think anything constructive ever came from them.

[L___E___T]

Dammit, well, I guess you could always PM a suitable candidate?  I wonder why they ahve taht policy?  Perhaps they just got inundated with requests, poor fellows.

[UglyJoe]

Yeah, every day there's a new user who's like "who can hack this for me" or "why hasn't this game been hacked yet".  The best ones are the ones who have an "idea" for a rom hack and are looking to head up a "team" of rom hackers.  In other words, "I have no skills and am not willing to learn, so I'm making it sound like I'm not just asking you to make a hack for me because we're on a team." 

That's really the biggest gripe over there: new users generally aren't willing to learn how to hack.  If Agent X decides to request a hack, he'll probably get flamed for not being willing to do it himself.  The prospect of paid compensation changes things around a bit, but, even then, getting paid to hack is very much frowned upon.

This is because rom hacking is a legal gray area, since we're messing with other companies' intellectual property.  The general belief is that as long as rom hackers keep things to a hobby level and don't do anything to interfere with the companies' sales/whatever, then we should be ignored.  If a hacker is getting paid to do a hack, then that means they are directly making money off of someone else's IP, which puts things square into the illegal realm.  If this seems petty, expect it anyway.  There's a lot of drama in the rom hacking scene (although they're trying to get better!).

[Agent X]

Yeah, every day there's a new user who's like "who can hack this for me" or "why hasn't this game been hacked yet".  The best ones are the ones who have an "idea" for a rom hack and are looking to head up a "team" of rom hackers.  In other words, "I have no skills and am not willing to learn, so I'm making it sound like I'm not just asking you to make a hack for me because we're on a team." 

That's really the biggest gripe over there: new users generally aren't willing to learn how to hack.  If Agent X decides to request a hack, he'll probably get flamed for not being willing to do it himself.  The prospect of paid compensation changes things around a bit, but, even then, getting paid to hack is very much frowned upon.

This is because rom hacking is a legal gray area, since we're messing with other companies' intellectual property.  The general belief is that as long as rom hackers keep things to a hobby level and don't do anything to interfere with the companies' sales/whatever, then we should be ignored.  If a hacker is getting paid to do a hack, then that means they are directly making money off of someone else's IP, which puts things square into the illegal realm.  If this seems petty, expect it anyway.  There's a lot of drama in the rom hacking scene (although they're trying to get better!).

#1) Well there goes my "Glow" all Last Dragon style for having a possible alternative.  I can see where tech savvy blokes might get annoyed with such requests and people who lack Teh Skillz though.  I've been the same way with people who want to shoot semi-auto assault rifles and other MilSpec weapons from my personal arsenal, or hang back with me and others in the tactical combat shooting communities, but then won't listen to firearms safety and instruction overall to ensure a safe/fun and overall educative experience.  They just want to play RAMBO for the afternoon and waste lots of ammo, and that's cool for all of like 10minutes, then it's like:  "Does so & so have a personality?"  "Are they worth giving instruction to?"  Guess it's the same thing really. 


#2) Sucks for me though, because it's not like I wouldn't be willing to learn how to do the ROM hacks and what not, but I've got faaaaaaaar too many things on my plate at age 30 going on 31.  Two kids (one 3 years, the other 2 months), having to work crazy hours, then having as little as 15 a week for weeks at a time, + I'm writing three different action/drama hard-boiled crime novels, while I either shop for an appropriate publisher or will have to decide to go the DIY and self publish and distribute/promote... shooting for book #1 to be out by the end of 2009... and being super dad is a job onto itself.  ***Well, there just isn't time to learn something more complicated than HTML or late 90s Basic VRML, and that undertaking proved to be worthless as the format got discontinued.

I've been on the Internet of one capacity or another for 12 years now, and helped form  (in some cases destroyed ---long story) various communities, ran 4 semi successful websites (2 for celebrities), and I can honestly say... I'm too old to be dealing with people FLAMING ME over nonsense.  While they'd have merit behind the annoyance, someone who's willing to plunk down moola and isn't hiding the fact it's a commission job that's likely a one shot deal (if not in a small batch), there's no sense in being an asshole about it either.  I think I've had enough drama on the web to last me the rest of my life.  I'd rather not even head over there and ask if that's likely how you think they'd react.  And that makes me a sad panda indeed. Guess it'll just exist in my mind and likely have to just purchase another SFC and buy AREA 88 that way, but that was never the point.  It just blows my mind that no one ever wanted to see an 8-BIT port to the FC system? 

#3) Yeah, the whole IP thing.  It's indeed a slippery slope.  Seen this kind of thing within the Neo:Geo community before concerning NGF and their odd business practices in the past, up to and including their  "cease & desist" letter from SNK Playmore back in 2003 or 2004, don't remember which year now though.  I just can't help but often feel like yelling WTF? though, when we're talking about companies who likely done jack with their older IPs, buried under time and recollections, and a small batch of games isn't going to make anyone rich from a professional hobbyist development project.  But it is their IPs and well... I can see the point of both the IP holders as well as ROM Hackers not wanting to have their door kicked in by a federal SWAT Team and sent to pound them in the ass prison.  ---That grey area sure is a mofo indeed.

At any rate, the thread did generate a good conversation none the less, and ultimately proved to be more insightful as well as helpful than anything of the sorts I've posted at other places.  Thank you sir, along with everyone else who responded to this topic of well intent, but ultimately will probably produce nada.  Oh well, guess you could say the shit hit the...


***The more things change***

Thanks Again Folks

[L___E___T]

I think you still stand some chnace with a choice PM, I'd certainly try. 

Failing that, you could make a hack half decently yourself, it's not as hard as it looks on a basic level. 

Also, the game maker / multimedia fusuion level is well easy and quick too - just won't appear on a real cart

I wouldn't give up yet, nothing ventured nothing gained and the internet is just the internet, you can never really take it seriously as a friend told me, which makes alot of sense.

I'd still ask ina  dressed up thread like'how easy would it be to make this hack?'

[Agent X]

Well that's certainly an idea there L___E___T and maybe I shouldn't just give up the ghost on this, but I know me as well.  After practically having grown up from my late teens into adulthood and maturing (well, mostly anyhow, still a kid at heart) in Cyberspace... well, I'm just not about the drama anymore.  Probably the #1 reason why Famicom World (for some reason I keep wanting to type the URL as "Famicom Land.Com") is the only place I now bother to have community with others, is simply because I'm able to have civil discussion with others, some who apparently are as young as 12, and there's no BS.  Having to find the secret warp zone pipes, warp to a new world, then moonwalk like Michael Jackson into some hacker's community only to be like a pleading waah waah, then to get punted like a football that bounces off the side of a Vic Viper and turns into the old geezer with a Banjo sitting on the porch of the SNES Phalanx box cover... well, that's just too much drama for what my aims are.  It be seriously easier for me to just bite the bullet and get back into Super Famicom again, though I've owned and sold that system 9 times before from '94 until about a year ago.  It just suck having to start from zero.

That said, the DIY route might still be doable if it's not too hard.  But I just don't know where I'd seriously find the time to devote (myself) to said project.  This other program you speak of... why can't the finished product simply be flashed to an EPROM and put on a cartridge to play on the physical system?  I mean, if it's a FC/NES program you'd think that be the easiest route to go?  Like I said, my skillz computer and programming wise are functionary at best, my forte and specialties are in Tactical Combat Shooting, Outdoors stuff in general, book writing, and hard riding BMX.

[L___E___T]

The 'other program' I use is multimedia fusion - which is written in a completely different language and works just like klik n play if you ever saw that.  It basically has the rules for things preprogrammed so you just set conditions for a game.  I'll try and summarise:

- If a nes game uses code to say make an enemy look like 'this' on screen, you need to have a graphics table that works like a library and then a piece of code that knows which piece of that library to take and use at any specific moment.  Kind of like a graph and then a list of instructions saying 'hey, use tile A1 for that bit'.

- In multimedia fusion you just draw the image yourself, literally draw it in the program or import an image and say 'use this image' so it's alot simpler.  Though the point has to be made that you really can't convert these into a famicom file, it just doesn't work like that