THIS PACKAGE COMES WITH ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED, STATUTORY OR OTHERWISE. THE ENTIRE RISK AS TO USE, RESULTS AND
PERFORMANCE OF THE PACKAGE IS ASSUMED BY YOU AND IF THE PACKAGE SHOULD PROVE
TO BE DEFECTIVE, YOU ASSUME THE ENTIRE COST OF ALL NECESSARY SERVICING,
REPAIR OR OTHER REMEDIATION.
UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES, CAN THE AUTHOR BE HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGE
CAUSED IN ANY USUAL, SPECIAL, OR ACCIDENTAL WAY, ALSO IF THE OWNER OR A THIRD
PARTY HAS BEEN POINTED AT SUCH POSSIBILITIES OF DAMAGE.
This install applies to "Human Race: The Jurassic Levels" © 1993 Mirage.
Requirements:
-------------
This install requires WHDLoad and RawDIC to be in the path.
These programs can be found in the WHDLoad package.
To install from a different drive than DF0: select installation mode Expert.
The installed game requires 0.5 MB ChipMem (+2.3 MB for preload).
It can be quit by pressing F10 (key can be changed with Tooltype "QuitKey=").
Features:
---------
- Full load from HD (real files!)
- Protection removed (manual check, MFM)
- Stack frame error fixed
- Illegal code (Atari ST?) disabled
- DMA wait in replayers fixed (x4)
- Timing/DMA problem fixed
- Decruncher relocated to fast memory
- Supports german (SPS 510), english (SPS 1036) and french version
- ButtonWait tooltype supported for title picture
- Custom1 can be used to skip the intro
- Custom2 can be used to select the starting level (1-80)
- Source code included as usual
- NewIcon (created by me)
- Quit option that works on 68000 machines (default key is 'F10')
This was requested by Ungi a few days ago. After I released the patch
for Face-Off from Krisalis last week he wrote a mail to me and told
me that he has been waiting for a patch for this game for years.
Since I liked the original game (i.e. the predecessor to this game here)
a lot back then I just started to work on a patch 2 days ago and
today everything is finished.
Patching this game was a lot of fun, first I created the imager which
wasn't hard to do as the game uses an almost standard track format, only
the block headers have been changed. When I looked at the created
disk images I noticed that they all contained a file table.
I figured out the format easily and adapted the imager to save files
instead of disk images. The game uses a quite slow sector loader which
loads 1 track (11 sectors) at a time so using real files means much
faster loading!
Then I looked at the files and noticed that the binaries which contained
code all had a custom table with relocation info included.
I quickly coded a small tool which converted the relocation data to a
standard RELOC32 hunk and created a normal AmigaDOS exe. Doing this meant
that I could load the executable into ReSource for easy disassembling.
The code is quite nice, I especially like the interrupt handler, quite
nifty code indeed! The code only had one major problem and that was
a wrong stack frame on 68010+ CPU's. The coder built some kind of
low-level library which was used for loading/decrunching and stuff like
that. This library uses traps to call the different routines and the
coder took it for granted that the stack frame size is 6 bytes.
That, however, is only true for 68000 machines.
One of the trap routines called another trap, corrected the stack
assuming the size of the mentioned 6 bytes.
Because of this the game crashed on anything else than 68000 machines
even though the rest of the code is almost fully 680x0 compatible.
I also had to fix a bug which made the game freeze after the intro
animation on fast machines such as my A4060.
The other problem were the replay routines, they used the usual
empty dbf loops for the DMA wait. This has been fixed too of course.
I also detected and disabled some strange code in the loader that
looks like Atari ST code (move.b $ffff8609,d0 etc), it was called
after loading a track.
Manual protection was nothing special and has been completely removed.
I like how the coder didn't do a direct check of the answer though,
when a wrong answer was given the routine would just corrupt the stack
resulting in a nice crash.
If you want to skip the intro you can either press fire as soon
as the title picture appears or just use the Custom1=1 tooltype.
I also added a level selector, this way you don't have to enter any
level codes, just set the level you want to play with the Custom2
tooltype. You can use values from 1-80. For example, if you want to
play level 20 then use Custom2=20. The level codes still work too
of course.
I have not tried it but I'm almost sure that my imager is compatible
with the original game (The Humans) too. So if you want to play the
original levels with this patch just insert your "The Humans" disks
when the imager asks for disk2 and 3. As said I have not tested this
so you use this at your own risk.
Have fun with this quite addictive game from HD, it's much
improved now in my opinion, no disk swapping anymore and fast
loading.
Special greetings to Ungi, I hope you like this one.
Sting, 15-Jan-2012
Greetings to all in Scarab and Scoopex, the WHDLoad team, PMC,
Musashi5150, Skan, Slummy, Loaderror, Frequent, Wayne Kerr, Mr.Spiv
and all the other usual suspects. :)
Extra greetings to the usual suspects on #amigascne, see you all at
Revision 2012! :)
History:
--------
version 1.01 (15.01.12) done by StingRay:
- support for french version added, thanks to Denis Lechevalier
and Retroplay for disk images
version 1.00 (15.01.12) done by StingRay:
- initial release
- supports english and german version (SPS 510 / SPS 1036)
- source code included
Contact:
--------
If you have problems with this installation please try and get a newer
version of this package from the WHDLoad WWW-Page. If that doesn't help try
some Tooltypes like NOCACHE, NOAUTOVEC, EXPCHIP, NOMMU, PAL or NTSC. If
that also fails, please inform the author via the Bug-Report-Form which
can be accessed on the WHDLoad WWW-Page.
For the full WHDLoad package, other installs and updates refer to:
http://www.whdload.de/
or aminet:dev/misc/whdload#?
and aminet:game/patch/ |
