MEKA 0.58
posted in Emulator Release by outsider on Jul 29th, 2001
MEKA is a Multi-Machine emulator for DOS. The following machines are supported by MEKA: Sega Game 1000 (SG-1000), Sega Computer 3000 (SC-3000), Sega Mark III (+ FM Unit), Sega Master System (SMS), Sega Game Gear (GG), Colecovision and Othello Multivision. Here's the changes:
Added PSG sound logging to WAV files, accessible from the Sound menu.
Rewrote messaging system, added localization support. Moved all messages to an external file, MEKA.MSG. You can now change 95% of the texts used in Meka, and translate it to the language of your choice. I am however NOT YET sure about how accents will work, since it depends on the font used. This feature required a pass on all existing code and so took plenty of time to do (10+ hours), I might have screwed a few messages during the change, so be sure to send me an e-mail if you notice anything unusual.
Implemented a VDP quirk found in Master System 2 but not Master System 1 or Game Gear, discovered by Charles Mac Donald (thanks Charles!). This one fixes Cosmic Spacehead *BUT* might screws up few other games. I did a bit of testing but couldn't do them all again, so please report if you notice anything unusual with another game.
Improved hardware sprite collision accuracy, fixed a bug in some cases where it was previously framerate dependant, and rewrote the whole code in assembly.
Changed initializations messages and some other messages.
Fixed an incorrect numbers of TV lines in PAL/SECAM TV emulation (due to a typo - thanks goes to cgfm2 for pointing me this stupid error!), allowing removal of a few custom MEKA.NAM parameters (Daffy Duck in Hollywood..).
Fixed the annoying bug that caused crashes on startup under DOS when sound was enabled.
Fixed a minor bug in Codemaster mapper emulation, that affected the checksum check of 'Drop Zone' (although the game worked).
Fixed crash when using a patch defined in MEKA.PAT that write outside of any existing data.
Added (very) quick and (very) dirty frame-per-frame advance by pressing ALT-F12. In fact, it will unpause the game then pause it back next frame.
Updated Colecovision compatibility list and added some product IDs, thanks to Tincho DJ. The current state with Colecovision games is: a mess :( Someone will lots of Colecovision knowledge would be very helpful to help sorting out all bad dumps, testing games and redumping others.
Get it from the Sega Master System & Game Gear page.
