Waku Waku 7: could be improved?

[Kirrap]

Sorry for starting a topic like this, I'm new to the forum and even more so at hacking games, so I'm asking the wizards who have done so much for our Saturn if it's possible to improve the poor version of Waku Waku 7; eliminating the slowdowns and changing the scenarios to full resolution, which I think using the extra ram of the Saroo cartridge could be possible, right?
As everyone knows, Saturn is the only console that has the Sunsoft fighting game trilogy; Galaxy Fight, Waku Waku 7 and Astra Superstars, which with the exception of the aforementioned all are perfect arcade ports, giving it a point in favor, the Saturn version has an improved soundtrack, if not remastered from the MVS version.

Hope could answer me if it’s possible or if it’s easy tell me if I could make it with some tools, that within my ignorance I assume it would be easier to attack the issue of slowdowns (if so I will also do it with the game In the Hunt).

Thanks in advance and thanks for all you made it for the video game history

 

[Kirrap]

Well looks like no body are interested in this port … but someone could send me a tutorial or something?
I fell like it’s possible eliminate the slowdowns using the memory or the extra ram from the Saroo cardtridge

 

[TrekkiesUnite118]

If you're going to use more RAM then use the official 4MB cart. That would still give you 4x the memory as the original only used the 1MB cart. As a result the patch will be usable to far more people as there's more people with official 4MB carts or 4MB compatible carts than Saroos. It also would be future proof as it would be built around the official specs as opposed to Saroo's janky implementation that could change on a whim.

The slowdown issue most likely wont be fixed by just adding more RAM, if anything it could add more slowdown if the interactions with the cartridge are handled poorly. Addressing the background scaling problems would probably be a better place to start.

 

[Kirrap]

Thanks for your kind reply. From my limited knowledge, I see the use of Saroo cartridges as a positive, since I understand they have memory that can be used to store the frames causing slowdowns (as I believe YBZ has done with other games). I know these cuts were made in other games because the data transfer speed of a CD-ROM is much slower than that of a cartridge where everything is already stored, which I believe is how the various Capcom ports and the KOF '95 cartridge work, right? They load the information that the CD-ROM can't process as quickly at the beginning, thus helping to achieve a near-perfect port. The potential I see in WW7 is that, unlike other Neo Geo ports, the characters here are the same size as in the arcade, and I don't see any cut of frames, only as we know in the stages and some super moves that look more pixelated, but it's minimal.
Going back to your answer, is there any tool that can help me with this? I've never done anything like this before, so I'm completely lost. I was asking for your help because, given everything you've done for this beautiful console, I think you're the only experts.

Thanks in advance

 

[TrekkiesUnite118]

Thanks for your kind reply. From my limited knowledge, I see the use of Saroo cartridges as a positive, since I understand they have memory that can be used to store the frames causing slowdowns (as I believe YBZ has done with other games). I know these cuts were made in other games because the data transfer speed of a CD-ROM is much slower than that of a cartridge where everything is already stored, which I believe is how the various Capcom ports and the KOF '95 cartridge work, right? They load the information that the CD-ROM can't process as quickly at the beginning, thus helping to achieve a near-perfect port. The potential I see in WW7 is that, unlike other Neo Geo ports, the characters here are the same size as in the arcade, and I don't see any cut of frames, only as we know in the stages and some super moves that look more pixelated, but it's minimal.
Going back to your answer, is there any tool that can help me with this? I've never done anything like this before, so I'm completely lost. I was asking for your help because, given everything you've done for this beautiful console, I think you're the only experts.

Thanks in advance

Extra RAM wont help with slowdown issues. All it does is provide more memory to load data into. If anything it can cause more slowdown as trying to coordinate transfers from the RAM cart can be tricky if you don't handle them properly.

All Saroo has done is speed up the load times, so for games that try to stream frames of animation from the disc during gameplay (Mortal Kombat II, Fatal Fury 3, etc.) you'll see an improvement. Nothing was done with those games to use the extra RAM in the Saroo cartridge. Waku Waku 7 as far as I'm aware isn't trying to stream data off the disc. If it was you'd see an improvement just playing it on an ODE or Emulator that speeds up load times.

The point I'm making with using the official 4MB cart over Saroo is that Saroo doesn't follow the official spec of the official RAM carts. It doesn't operate at the correct speeds and requires games to be patched in order to work with it. The official carts don't have that problem. So it would be more worthwhile to follow the official RAM cart specs so it works with more devices rather than tying it down to Saroo. It already uses the 1MB cart, so you could patch it to use the 4MB cart and cache more data there if it actually needs that (Maybe this would allow the full resolution background art?). Throwing more RAM though most likely wont address slowdown issues. You'll need to look into what is actually causing that problem in the first place.

As for tools, you're best bet is to boot the game up in an emulator and see what it's doing using the debugger. If you don't have any knowledge about low level programming, memory editing, etc. then I'd suggest you start learning that first.