Patching Rom Probs...

[EC-Kill]

Hey guys! Sorry to bother you all! I tend to lurk and just watch whats going on as most of what is usually flys over my head, :retard: .

Anywho, I've tried using patches provided here and from Aeon Genesis as well as trying a few of the IPS patchers provided here such as lunar and ipswin etc. So far the only patch that truly worked was the one I used for Tactics Ogre from Aeon Genesis, excellent that, with the lips101 patcher. I have however tried to use others from Aeon Genesis as well as from here at here at Zophar's including half a dozen FF6 patches like the eternalcrystals. Although every time I attempt to patch the various patchers say that it was successful they simply will not load into my emulators of which I have tried zsnesw151 but prefer the newer snesgt.

Again, I have had success with Tactics Ogre, but nothing else-so I figure there must be something simple but frustratingly out of my grasp at the moment...any ideas? What could/should I try? Anything would be appreciated, though I am no hacker I'm open to ideas, :help: .

Thanks for your time, :bigthumbup: .

[Reaper man]

Did you read the readme?

Did said readme mention headers?

[EC-Kill]

Yessir! I did try that, at least half the time-not all of them require you to change the name- I simply did this(copied from a readme) "If using ZSNES, make sure that the patch has the same name as your ROM.
In other words, if your ROM is called "mysticark.smc" make sure the patch
is "mysticark.ips" okay? ".

That was simply enough for me to catch, but thanks for the quick reply man! LoL, literally five minutes later!

Any more quick ideas to double check? I readily admit I am still very new to patching, ;'/


-When loaded into the emulator all I get is a flashing red screen or just a black/blank one.

[EC-Kill]

Dang, here I got all excited after seeing the number of views jump up to 12 but without anymore replies....

MAYbe if someone can say exactly what they did and used to patch and emulate FF6 patch/roms successfully that would help? I tried different emulators/patches/roms already, ;'). Maybe one using the FF6 eternalcrystals patch mayhaps?

Just an idea, which is about all I got, ;')

[The 9th Sage]

Well, what he's saying when he says "did it mention headers?" is that some SNES ROMs you might encounter will have a header. Some patches were made using a game that has a header, some aren't. If you try to apply a patch that is expecting the game to have a header and it doesn't, it's not going to work. Same with the reverse.

It sounds like maybe your ROM has this problem (either that, or it's a bad ROM...the following tool can help you either way). Go grab NSRT from here (http://www.zophar.net/utilities/snesaud/nsrt.html). Once you unzip it, the quickest thing to do would be to put your ROM into the folder where you put NSRT. Start up nf.exe. If you stuck the ROM into the folder with it, you should see your rom listed to the left. Right click it and choose to "Scan Selected".

You'll see a whole bunch of info on the pane on the right there. Look down to where it says Database. If it tells you what game it is, then the ROM should be an ok copy of it (also, the checksum probably ought to be listed as OK). If your ROM is bad, you'll just have to find another copy of it. You can try right clicking it and choosing to "Fix" the ROM, but that only works on a few specific problem ROMs.

Next, scroll up to where it says header. It'll either say No or something else.

Of course, "No" means it has no header, and anything else probably indicates it has a header. If the ROM was good, and it has no header (and the patch didn't work) go ahead and right click the ROM and choose "Add Header". Then try the patch again and see if it works. You can of course try the reverse if it has a header and the patch isn't working (that is, choosing "Remove Header").

If this is confusing, feel free to post a question or two.

[EC-Kill]

I took "If using ZSNES, make sure that the patch has the same name as your ROM.
In other words, if your ROM is called "mysticark.smc" make sure the patch
is "mysticark.ips" okay? ". from under headers in a readme, my apologies if that was off-I checked and it didnt matter AFTER I used your NSRT file to scan the roms- found the header options under options in edit and scanned-twice as it read it having changed the header after its been changed in the previous scan I assume- and realized that what I thought was just dumb.

I obviously did not understand what reaper man meant, thank you reaper man, but thank you 9th stage, for explaining it to me-I would have no idea how to change the header without using that NSRT tool! Honestly, the readme's didnt lead me to expect much more than just changing the file name like I said it mentioned above nor of course how to do it, so thanks again.

As it turns out I may have to do both- 'Dark Law-Meaning of Death' patch from Aeon Genesis runs great with no header while apparently the FF6 rom with the eternalcrystals patch will only run with an empty header- if you or anyone can explain that to me you can have a psychedelic cookie on me, ;'). [EDIT: Oh...I guess you already explained that in your first paragraph as headers depend on the patch having one, lol, have a cookie, ;')]


Once again, thanks guys, that was great! It looks like everything should work one way or another now, lol, luckily all my roms seem to be good as the checksum, name/origin and database checked out and did so with the patched roms as well except for the database. Although the unadjusting headers on roms that were patched were completely scrambled-checksum, name and database all, which figures as trying to load them gave me Nintendo flashbacks of trying to blow in my game cartridges and pray that this time it'll work, heh, so thanks again, I'm on my way!

[The 9th Sage]

Well, the explanation is sometimes the people hacking these games will be using a ROM with a header, sometimes they won't. The reason say a patch expecting a header won't work on a ROM without one is that an IPS patch (IIRC) is pretty much a list of addresses in the ROM that should be changed and what they should be changed to. Remove the header, and those addresses will change accordingly (because the header isn't there taking up space at the start of the file). That means the IPS patch would end up patching the wrong things because the things it was actually trying to patch are now in different spots in the file.

Also, you're welcome. ;)