5/30/98
Emulator Release: Hu6280 0.00092
22:21:  A new release of Hu6280 is now available. Here's what's new in 0.00092, and 0.00091 which was also released today:

- Fixed sprites bug on marchen-maze
- Buryem now works
- Added Load and Save STATE features

You can download Hu6280 0.00092 from the TurboGrafx 16 page.

Emulator News: Retrocade nearing beta release.
21:44:  Retrocade's webpage says that Retrocade the multiple arcade emulator is about to enter beta stages. This beta will be released sometime on Monday June 1st, and will feature 82 games. Take a look at the webpage. Retrocade Arcade Emulator

Frontend News: SPC Launcher
08:43:  Here comes another SPCPlay frontend. All the SPC frontends available right now has much the same features so this one is as recommended as all others. However, if you want speed, you should use SPCPlay Now!.
Since this is the initial release nothing is new.

You can get it from the SNES Frontends page.

5/29/98
Emulator News: KGen, Reality64 and ZD, oh my!
21:50:  KGen is still being worked on. According to an update at the official KGen homepage, we can expect a new version of KGen to be released sometime in the near future. What new surprises await in the next version of KGen? Time will reveal all.

Reality64 has recently been resumed after the author discontinued it due to legal problems. It seems that the legal troubles have been worked out. Read the message, courtesy of Emu News Service.

As for Zophar's Domain, expect some new emulator sections...for UNIX people!

Emulator Release: Hu6280 0.00090
21:45:  A new release of Hu6280 is now up for download at Zophar's Domain. Here's the list of changes in 0.00090:

- JamSponge gets busy with some serious debugging!
- Improved irq emulation (cybercore now works)
- Now detecting shady start addresses and doing a bit swizzle for US roms...(RTYPE US now works)...
- Modded some techy interal emulation stuff that most of you would probably not have a clue about ;)

You can download Hu6280 0.00090 from the TurboGrafx 16 page.

Utility News: GameGear 2 MegaDrive Convertor
17:09:  As if the name isn't self-explanatory enough, GameGear 2 MegaDrive Convertor converts GameGear ROMs into MegaDrive/Genesis format so that you can play your GameGear ROMs on a Genesis/MegaDrive emulator. GG2MD can be downloaded by clicking here or by going to the Genesis section of the Utilities area.

Utility News: FF3 SoundFont Update
14:23:  I unintentionally forgot to link the FF3 SoundFont to it's homepage when I added it earlier. The page can be reached from the link on the SNES Utilities page or by clicking here. The page contains some useful information concerning the SoundFont & also has some midi's especially designed for use with it.

Utility News: AGE 0.6.3
11:47:  Arcade Game Editor allows the graphics inside the ROMs for certain arcade games to be edited, allowing you to modify or add completely new graphics to the game. There is support for editing text strings, maps, and attributes of some games as well. Over 70 games are currently supported & the source code is public as well, so even more games are bound to be included in future updates. Download AGE here or get it at the new Arcade Utilities section.

Utility News: Arcade Utility Section Added
11:35:  An Arcade Utility Section has been added to the Utilities Area. It will feature general utilities for the various Arcade Emulators and possibly utilities for specific emus. As with all the other utilities sections, make sure to inform me if you come across a utility that you think should be featured on ZD and go check out the Arcade Utilities section.

Frontend News: URL 0.97
10:34:  A new version of the totally universal frontend URL has been released, this is just a minor release, but as usual it's an improvement!
Here's the news:

- Added counters in the .ROM manager.
- Now read Sega System 16 game names (in the GCS file).
- Fixed a very annoying bug when deleting an emulator.
- Reduced memory usage by a few kilobytes (again).

You can get it from the Universal frontends page.

Utility News: Final Fantasy 3 SoundFont
10:19:  ST has created a Final Fantasy 3 soundfont. It works with Awe 32/64 soundcards and only requires 512k of DRAM. Though it doesn't include every single sound in FF3, it comes close & also works with other games' midis as well. The soundfont can be downloaded on the SNES Utilities area.

Utility News: Mo'Slo 1.2
09:25:  Mo'Slo is a utility that allows you to slow down the speed of your computer from 1% to 90%. This allows owners of high speed computers to slow down their systems for emulators that were designed to run on slower computers. It's also useful for people wanting to play games designed for 286's on a 486/Pentium. You can download Mo'Slo at the recently created Comp Systems Utilities area.

5/28/98
Frontend News: NeoRAGE FrontPad 1.0
17:15:  A new version of the swedish made, but in english language, NeoRAGE frontend NeoRAGE FrontPad. This frontend has actually undergone many version changes, but I've never had the time to update. Sorry David.
Here's the news:

This is only a bug release, I and many other discovered a bug when you should load a ZIP program!

You can get it from the Arcade frontends page.

Utility News: New Comp. Systems Utility Area
12:07:  Another new area has been added to the Utility section, this time covering utilities related to various Computer System emulators. You can read about the first utility added to this section in the update below. If anyone knows of any other utilities that are appropriate for this section, be sure to inform us so we can make them available as well. Check out the Comp. System Utils section here and also keep your eye out for a possible MAME area in the future.

Utility News: AmigaTRANS 2.05.95
11:53:  AmigaTRANS is a utility that allows you to transfer files from an Amiga to a Win95 system via a standard serial cable. The file can be downloaded from the new Comp. Systems Utilities section of ZD and more information can be found on the AmigaTRANS Homepage.

Utility News: PSXVideoFAQ v.3
11:44:  The PSXVideo FAQ has once again been updated by Brian "TheFreak" Balsam. The updated version contains more info on framerate and compression options. For those of you that don't know, PSXVideo allows you to convert video files from PSX CDs into a format playable on a PC. PSXVideo & it's corresponding FAQ can both be found on the Playstation section of the Utilities area.

Frontend News: Z-GUI 0.45
01:49:  A new release of Z-GUI, the ZSNES frontend, has hit the emulation streets, and it's a really BIG update!

Check it out:
* Added the ability to choose a "SaveGame Directory" which would help with
keeping your saved games, especially when using zipped ROM's, because they are saved to the Windows\Temp dir right now.
* Progress indicator added at startup to show progress of loading your configuration
* Also added a check box to support the New Graphics engine that is supported in ZSNES, under 256 colors.
* Ability to choose Player 1 and Player 2 input devices
* Added a "Next" button to play the next file in a playlist
* Now saves your settings before launching ZSNES, in earlier versions, you probably lost the settings
* The ability to register the various spc files so that you can click one and have it automatically bring up Z-GUI, and start playing the file.
* This works with both the individual music files, and the playlists created in the playlist editor in Z-GUI.
* Click on the Z-GUI logo on the program window, and it will load up your web browser and take you to my web site.
* Made a lot of little changes to the program itself, too many to list
* (still trying to figure out how to close that damned DOS box perfectly).
* Have to work on only allowing one instance of Z-GUI

You can get it from the SNES frontends page.

Frontend News: NeoGeoFE 1.10
01:44:  Say hello to another NeoRAGE frontend. I think that the number of NeoRAGE frontends are beginning to beat the number of ZSNES frontends soon, heh...

Here's what's new:
- Zip Support
- Auto Rename and Convert for Gekko

You can get it from the Arcade frontends page.

5/27/98
Emulator Release: A800DOS 0.9.6
23:24:  A new version of A800 for DOS has been released. Here's what's new in Version 0.9.6 of this Atari 8 bit computer emulator:

- DOS: keyboard and joystick handling changed a lot. Joysticks emulated on keyboard can now be freely defined to (nearly) any key combinations using comfortable JOYCFG.EXE tool. Besides, there are two modes of keyboard: Joystick mode and Normal mode. In Joystick mode the keypresses to joystick predefined keys are not passed to emulated environment. You can switch between Joystick and Normal mode on-the-fly by pressing the F7 key. (Golda)
- Falcon: NOVA graphics extended: 336x240 or 672x480 (double size)
- UI: the too fast autorepeat was fixed - by disabling the repeat altogether.
- SIO: serious bug in CopyToMem fixed. No more rewritten ROM OS. (Jindrich)
- ANTIC patch: no player DMA without missile DMA. (Perry)
- SIO: missing 'else' in DIR routines. (Perry)
- Allegro VGA: updated Makefile and fixed ShutdownVGA(). (Perry, Golda)
- VCOUNT patch
- PIA_Initialise() should initialise PORTA to 0.
- PIA registers are mirrored not only in Atari800, but in XL/XE models as well (thus addr&=0xff03). Bounty Bob runs now?
- DOS: VESA2 mode support (about three times faster than X-mode). VESA2 also preserves the refresh rate. You can disable VESA2 modes by switch -novesa. Also colour pallete initialisation is faster now. (Golda)
- DOS: Atari_Set_LED function (use -DSET_LED to enable that).
- UI: the last ESC keypress is not passed to the emulated program anymore. (Golda)
- Monitor: pressing [Return/Enter] can be used for single stepping as well. (Golda)
- new routine for saving of screenshot in 336x240 size as PCX. So far used in DOS and Falcon ports (press F10 to save current screen into a file). (Golda)
- the Atari keyboard should now react quickly enough. DOS port contains keyboard buffer for last two keys. (Golda)
- fix for initialisation of PORTA (David Firth)
- DOS port: better joystick autodetection (Michael Beck)
- several fixes for more ANSI like C code (various people)
- ANTIC: fix for DLIST counter. (Thor, Perry)
- ANTIC: several more hardware registers are unreadable. (Perry)

Download A800 DOS 0.9.6 from the Atari 8 bit/5200 page.

Emulator News: NLKE English documentation
14:47:  The documentation has been translated to English for NLKE...sort of. I think people will have better luck reading the spanish version then trying to understand the 'translated' english versions, which, sorry to say, sound horrible.

NLKE Page

Emulator Release: Hu6280 0.00070
14:43:  A new release of Hu6280 blahblahblah...anyway here's the new stuff in 0.00070:

- Now alpha sorting filenames in gui :)
- Sped up gfx emulation
- Removed some debugging shit that was slowing this sucker down

Download Hu6280 0.00070 from the TurboGrafx 16 page.

Frontend News: StarLaunch 2.2X and SPCPlayPlugin 1.77X
11:59:  A new version of both StarLaunch and SPCPlayPlugin has been released! StarLaunch is a multi-emulator frontend and SPCPlayPlugin is both a SPCPlay frontend, and can be used as a plugin for StarLaunch for easy use.
Here's what's new:
- fwNES support.
- Zsnes 0.400 and Snemul 0.7 options supported.
- Mosaic’s changed to run faster and look better.
- Support for BioNes and NlkE planned for the next release.

Go get SPCPlayPlugin from the SNES frontends page.
And go get StarLaunch from the Universal frontends page.

Frontend News: TechNeo 0.1
08:08:  A new NeoRAGE frontend has been born! This one is called TechNeo and as of yet it has no homepage. But email Etrange, the author, and maybe he'll put one up.

It has support for all command line options of NeoRAGE 0.00005 and this is the initial release, so nothing is new.

You can get it from the Arcade frontends page.

5/26/98
Emulator Release: NLKE 0.01b
13:15:  Yes! It's true! The 2 emulators have merged into one! NLKSNES and ESNES have joined forces to incorporate the sound and compatibility of ESNES with the speed of NLKSNES to form NLKE! NLKE 0.01b has now been released, and although transparencies have not been implemented yet, they shall be. You can download NLKE 0.01b from the SNES page.

Emulator News: ESNES & NLKSNES discontinued; ESNES shrine removed
13:14:  What?! Can it be? It's now official: ESNES and NLKSNES have been discontinued! Why? Well, look at the news article above this to see why... :) Also, the ESNES shrine is being removed...expect to see a ZSNES shrine soon.

Emulator Release: Hu6280 0.00060
08:13:  Yesterday, 2 new versions of Hu6280 were released in the same day. So here's what's new in both 0.00053 and 0.00060:

- Fixed sprite masking on dwduck (check out the magnifying glass section)!
- Moved sat-b sprite transfer to line 239, seems nicer
- Fixed games fading out problems (lots of games)
- Added command line ROM option (e.g. try hu6280 galaga.pce, to avoid the gui)

You can download Hu6280 0.00060 from the TurboGrafx 16 page.

Emulator Release: Project UnReality 0.4a(-1)
08:08:  A new release of the only true N64 emulator, Project UnReality, is now available. Unfrotunately, the built in debugger has been removed, and BreakPoint has announced that there won't be updates as frequently and as stable as they are now due to a variety of reasons. Anyway, here's what's new in 0.4a (minus one):

- Decent RSP emulation.
- Preliminary RDP emulation (only sprites right now).
- Beginnings of TLB emulation.
- Completely new interrupt system.
- New audio core (using DeltaPlayer) for near-perfect audio emulation.
- Many new COP1 opcodes added.
- Z64 filename support.

You can download PUR 0.4a(-1) from the Nintendo 64 page.

5/25/98
Emulator Release: CAGE 1.06
20:47:  A new release of the multi arcade emulator CAGE is now available. Here's what's new in CAGE 1.06:

- Rewrote all sprite and character draw routines in assembler. This does not add much to overall gameplay speed, but it certainly doesn't hurt. See my download page for the source code.
- Added support for Jr. PacMan (credit goes to the MAME team for the ROM decryption info).
- Improved sound on Super PacMan, Mappy and DigDug 2.
- Fixed bonus point levels on Mappy dipswitch options.
- Rewrote the Z80 emulator in assembler. Fast is not a strong enough word to describe its incredible speed.
- Optimized character and sprite routines in Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man. These games now run at incredible speed and should work on a slow 486 machine. Try turning off throttling to see how zippy it runs. On my P233 it goes at hundreds of frames per second.

You can download CAGE 1.06 from the Multi Arcade page.

Emulator Release: System 16 Arcade Emulator 0.78 Followup
20:44:  A followup release to S16AE 0.78 has been issued. This release fixes some crashing problems on some computers by removing some Pentium optimizations, and fixing some other issues. You can download S16AE 0.78 from the Multi Arcade page.

Frontend News: ZSNES RearEnd news
16:50:  I've just received the latest news about the ZSNES frontend ZSNES RearEnd from Zero-X of #zsnes. And this looks like the frontend is mainly finished and only maintenance releases will occour.
Here's the news:

"I would like to say that the Windows VB version of ZRE is not going into anymore major production. It will have small updates, keeping up with Zsnes, and thats it if any. Instead, i am going to be making one in either C++ or VC++. Note that the C++ version will not be out for awhile, but i hope it to be out in about a month or two. Also, i am currently redoing the Windows version before i stall down on it. It will look much more nicer and easier to use like"

I should also add that a Windows version will probably be out in a few days too.

Misc. News: A few errors corrected...
13:54:  Whoops, I managed to get a few errors into yesterdays update. First of all I managed to type that the Odyssey 2 was a computer, it's a console. Then I linked URL wrong. But that has now been fixed.

Frontend News: Z-GUI 0.4
13:52:  A new version of the ZSNES frontend Z-GUI has been released, the big news in this version is zip support.
Here's what's new:

- can handle long filenames in both the name of the zip file, and file that is compressed the name of the ROM file, can differ from the name of the zip file.
- right now, only the actual ROM file can be in the zip file.
- requires the unzip32.dll, found on my downloads page.

You can download it from the SNES Frontends page.

5/24/98
Misc. News: I feel that an explanation is needed.
17:17:  I really hope that people won't stop mailing me with frontend news just because I was gone for three days, I mean, a maintainer can't alwaysbe there. We have lives too. Anyway. I just want you to know that now I'm back in full force again.

Frontend News: URL 0.96
17:15:  A new version of URL, the right now ultimate universal frontend has been released! This new version has some good highlights, and here they are:

- Various bugs fixed.
- Completely rewrote some parts of the program to reduce memory usage by a few kilobytes, so you can store more and more roms informations (but who have 6000 roms ?).
- Allow command lines with more than 128 characters. (Useful when using command lines statements
- Fixed a bug which caused command lines to be shrinked when using backslashs after the executable name.
- Fixed some bad uses of colors.

You can get it off the Universal Frontends page.

Frontend News: Neo-RAGE Frontpad 0.03
17:12:  The swedes are just a bunch of programmers it seems :) Here's a new NeoRAGE frontend programmed by a guy from sweden. If the looks of a frontend are important to you, then use this one. It looks absolutely great.
Here's what's new:

- Rewritten the program for the new version.

You can get it off the Arcade Frontends page.

Frontend News: Neo-YUNE 0.3
17:10:  Neo-YUNE is a new frontend for NeoRAGE, the NEO GEO emulator. Since I've been away for a while, this frontend has been updated three times during my absence, but I'll just list what's new in the newest version here. More detailed information can be found in the readme file.
Here's what's new:

- Complete NEORage V 0.00005;) switch support.
- Precise directory finding.
- Has a Semi-GUI. Nice pseudo-fade too.
- Has an ini file
- Mouse operation. disabled for now
- Lists up to 28 games.
- Debugged and stainless code.
- It works.

You can get it off the Arcade Frontends page.

Frontend News: Oxygen 0.65.2
17:07:  Now this is a thing you don't see every day. A computer emulator frontend. This frontend is called Oxygen, and it's used with the Odyssey 2 emulator O2EM. It's definitely worth to try if you have trouble with the command line options of O2EM.
Here's what's new:

- Fixed indexing bug
- Added game counter
- Added double-click on game menu (now starts game when double-clicked)

You can get it off the Odyssey 2 Frontends page.

Frontend News: ZFront 0.150
17:05:  New ZSNES frontends seem to be added every week here on Zophars Domain, and here's another one of them. ZFront is a good frontend that's definitely worth to try.
Here's the new stuff:

- Added support for ZSNES v0.400
- Added "Favorites" list
- Improved "ZFront" icon
- Added simple "ROM title" reading routine (still buggy, only for LoROMs), available in the "Favorites" dialog
- Added ALL ZSNES command line switches (except the ones available through ZSNES.CFG)
- Removed a bug in the key configuration dialog that occurred when pushing buttons not supported by ZSNES (F11, F12, and the "<" key). Thanks to DaxMan!
- Added minor improvements on the look (new icons).
- Fixed a bug that occurs when selecting a long filename (ZSNES doesn't support them). Now ZFront converts the long filenames into short ones before launching them.

You can get it off the SNES Frontends page.

Frontend News: UZI 0.70
17:00:  A new version of the ZSNES frontend UZI has been released! This is just a minor update, adding these things:

- Support for ZSNES 0.400
- Zipfile cacheing.
- More Quickrom buttons with less memory use.

You can get it off the SNES Frontends page.

Emulator Release: BioNES 0.1a
13:49:  A new NES emulator has been released, known as BioNES. It features full sound emulation, over 30 mappers, correct sprite priorities, and it's MMX optimized. However, without a high end Pentium and MMX technology, it is quite slow. Be sure to check out the official homepage for more information. You can download BioNES 0.1a from the NES page.

Emulator Release: Hu6280 0.0004f
13:38:  Yet another release of the TurboGrafx 16 emulator for DOS, Hu6280. Here's what's new:

- Optimized gfx char-redraw loops (nice speed hit on some games)
- Took advantage of xscroll==0 :) faster on some games
- Changed VSync to OFF as default... (not enuf people reading the docs)
- Removed some more debugging code

You can download Hu6280 0.0004f from the TurboGrafx 16 page.

Misc. News: Uhm, sorry for my absence...
11:40:  I haven't made any updates for the last three days, that's because I've been on a trip with my class in school. But later tonight, swedish time, I'll be back with a BIG update.

5/23/98
Emulator Release: TOSBOX 1.04
23:20:  The Atari ST emulator, TOSBOX, has been updated to 1.04. Here are the updates in this minor release:

- The 'Home' key can now be used as the intuitive counterpart of the 'End' key. See Techical Notes: Keyboard for details.
- Three GEMDOS emulation bugs have been fixed.
- Two CPU emulation bugs have been fixed.
- A 'slow cpu' option has been added to the init file, to help track down certain kinds of CPU bugs.

Download TOSBOX 1.04 from the Atari ST page.

Site News: ZD does *NOT* carry emulators for the MAC
22:59:  OK people, I know most of you already know this, but since some of you haven't quite caught on yet...Zophar's Domain does NOT carry emulators for the Macintosh platform. Although we soon will be carrying emulators for Linux and FreeBSD, we will *never* carry them for MACs. Go to Emulation.net if you are interested in the new Snes9x for MAC(of which I got 14 e-mails about).

You may return to Poison Ivy 3.

Emulator Release: System 16 Arcade Emulator 0.78
22:55:  After over 4 months, a new release of System 16 Arcade emulator (which is incidentally the first arcade emulator I ever tried; it was known as Shinobi Emulator then) is now available. Here's the huge list of changes since 0.76 (8 new games supported!):

- Added support for original version of Strategic Defense Initiative.
- Added mouse support. (needed by SDI)
- Replaced the previous Z80 emulator by a new one from Neil Bradley.
- Added an alternative YM2151 emulator from Tatsuyuki Satoh (faster!).
- Added bootleg versions of the following games :E-Swat, Dynamïte Dux, Wonderboy III : In Monster Lair, Passing Shot (2 players version), Tough Turf, Moonwalker
- Added support for original version of Heavyweight Champ but it's not playable yet, i need someone to decode the value from the right and left handle (see the input test mode).
- Added zipped roms support.
- New improved gfx engine, it's now faster. The sprites scaling is also more accurate now (see Space Harrier).
- Added EAGLE graphics from Dirk Stevens.
- Added scanlines support. (only if linear 320x480 or 640x480 are available)
- Added Z80/YM2151 emulation to Out run and bootleg Super Hang-On.
- System16.GCS not longer needed, replaced by System16.INI
- *.CFG files not longer needed, replaced by System16.INI
- Emulator and games configurations are now saved in System16.INI
- Game selection screen added if no game specified on command line.
- Added original arcade lamps emulation via the keyboard LEDs.

You can download System 16 Arcade emulator 0.78 from the Multi arcade page.

Emulator Release: WinUAE 0.7.5b
22:46:  A few minor updates have been issued to WinUAE. Here's the list of fixes and changes in 0.7.5b:

- Synchronized with Bernd's latest source-tree. No significant changes which affect WinUAE.
- No longer have seperate archives for documentation, main program, etc.
- Include the necessary Amiga utilities in the archive: transdisk, transrom
- Default to 70Hz refresh-rate for full-screen display modes, not 75Hz.
- Eliminated the "Cyrix or 486 CPU" option in the Advanced panel of the GUI.
- Web page updated (new Frequently Asked Questions section, donation count updated, Picasso96 1.39 link, new mirrors, etc.)

You can download WinUAE 0.7.5b from the Amiga page.

5/22/98
Site News: ROMs added to Zophar's Domain?!?!
23:08:  Well, sort of. Zophar's Domain will now carry *public domain/freeware" game images. What this means is you will probably never see The Legend of Zelda or Sonic the Hedgehog here. However, with companies like Technopop, who recently released Zero Tolerance and its unfinished sequel ROMs to the public, more and more ROMs will appear. Remember, only ROMs that I have a legal right to place here will be placed here!

Chip-8 ROMs Page, Genesis ROMs Page, NES ROMs Page.

Remember, these are all accessible from the menu bar to the left.

Emulator Release: Hu6280 0.00044
22:19:  A new release of Hu6280. Whoo. (It also has a homepage now.) Newisms:

- Fixed bug that stopped galaga working.
- Went back to old gui (users prefered it).
- Now updating sprite sat-b table on line 220! this fixed sprite lagging on 99% of games!!
- Coded 2 versions of gfx emulation routines, 1 for masking, 1 for nonmasking, now I cleverly work out which lines of the screen require a mask, much faster gfx emulation).
- Now detects if no pce files are present and exits.

Downloadicus fromicus: TurboGrafx 16 pageicus

Emulator Release: NeoRAGE 0.00005
16:43:  A new release of NeoRAGE is now available. Here's the list of bugfixes in this Neo Geo emulator for DOS:

- Keyboard redefinition(TAB)
- Bug fixes that makes more games playable. EX. Ninja Commando, Sengoku2 and no strange title screen in Fatal Fury and more.
- Support for roms with different rom size as Blues Journey
- Much easier to start games just write neorage and the name of the subdirectory.

You can download NeoRAGE 0.00005 from the Neo Geo page.

5/21/98
Emulator Release: EX68 1.00 update translated
22:49:  The update.txt to EX68 1.00 has been translated, Here are the changes:

- Fixes about Interrupt(IOCS $FO)
- BIOS ROM Image Format is changed
- Fixes some FPU bugs
- Fixes about YM2151 Emulation
- Changes sound emulation to X68SOUND.DLL
- Fixes some bugs about DirectDraw

NOTE:
BIOS and IPL ROM images is changed for leagal reason. You can make a new image file by "readipl.x" on a REAL X68000. And you must install it. It is enabled for 5 days.

Thanks to Yutaka Tanida for once again offering his translation skills.

Emulator Release: Hu6280 0.0003f
18:33:  A new release of Hu6280 is now available. Here's what's new in version 0.0003f:

- Messed with palette emulation (nothing to do with sprite bug)
- Fixed HUGE bug in sprite emulation (see chan+chan, xevious etc.)
- Fixed Fps counter removal (when switching it off)

You can download Hu6280 0.0003f from the TurboGrafx 16 page.

Emulator Release: Gemulator 3.80
12:45:  Although it was released a month ago, I never added Gemulator 3.80 to Zophar's Domain. It's on here now, and included in the zip are the needed files to run it that were not included in the 3.60 release. You can download it from the Atari ST page.

Misc. News: Technopop releases unreleased Zero Tolerance sequel
01:31:  This news is a ZD exclusive story (whoo). Technopop, creators of Zero Tolerance, which is a shooting game for the Sega Genesis, has released the ROM of the unfinished sequel, Beyond Zero Tolerance, to the public. They have released other games they have created to the public as well. A very special thanks to Matt for e-mailing me about the special piece of news. Perhaps more companies will release their games to the public as well! Eat it up: Beyond Zero Tolerance. Remember, you heard it at ZD first!

Site News: New Poll
00:10:  Thanks for participating in our last poll. Seventy-five percent of you don't use midis with ZD, therefore we are going to remove them from the site permanently this weekend. To those of you who liked the midis on ZD, don't fret, for we will be offering a .zip file available for download which will have all of ZD's midis in it.

The new poll asks if you believe emulation should go mainstream. I think this is an interesting question to gage opinion with. What are you waiting for? Vote away...

5/20/98
Frontend News: Z-GUI 0.32
18:07:  Another good ZSNES frontend has today been released, supporting all the new options of ZSNES 0.400.
Here's what's new:

- Support for all the new functions in ZSNES v0.4.
- Playlist support nearly completed.
- Can now play the entire playlist, (more than one song).
- Fully supports LONG filenames, in both game names, spc files, and paths.
- Stopping of music is nearly 99% effective, with the included .pif file for SPCLAY.exe.

You can get it from the SNES frontends page.

Frontend News: Nitrolic 2.3
17:44:  A new version of the ZSNES frontend Nitrolic, programmed by Nitro the maintainer of the FAQ here on ZD has been released. The main new things in this version are these:

- Remade much of the program's internals.
- Added screenshot support
- Added a Romlist
- Added all the options of zSNES .400
- Fixed some bugs
- Added Gamma setting
- Added rom info (thanx Starfox)
- Made an option to disable sounds in Nitrolic
- Made a cool pulldown menu (thanx to me)
- Have future plans for Minimizing taskbar.
- Added a Minimize button.
- Fixed titlebar when minimized.
- ADDED ZIP SUPPORT!!!!! finally.
- Made easier to use..
- Disabled Controller config for this version.
- Added my info for Zophar's Domain.
- Taken out .hlp file for major re-doing.

You can get it from the SNES frontends page.

Frontend News: NEOFront 0.00001
17:41:  Here it comes: A frontend for NEORage! So, you think it's boring to write those command line options each time you run it, or make several .bat files with different configurations? That is no more needed. Here is the first frontend for NEORage. Use it and enjoy.

You can get it from the Arcade frontends page.

Frontend News: fwFRONT 0.20b
17:38:  A brand new fwNES frontend has been released! This is a worthy competitor to fwNES Express and it also has the advantage for people that need to exit to DOS to get their soundcard working.
Here's the news:

- Total rewrite,
- Added Advanced options
- Made it similar to fwNESexpress, a win95 frontend... just for DOS :)
- Keyboard mapping isn't implemented yet...not sure if it will be or not, but space is left in the program for it.

You can get fwFront 0.20b from the NES frontends page.

Frontend News: RMenu 0.1 DOS and 3.8 Win95
17:34:  A new universal frontend has been added to Zophars Domain. This one has native support for a number of emulators, RAGE and MAME being two of them. It also has easy to add new emulator support through the use of Models. The Windows 95 version has all the features of the DOS version except Rom deletion.
Here's what's new:

- RAGE now supported
- LHA/LZH compression support added
- Rom File Deletion (thanks again Jim!)
- Rom List Creation
- Colour Change :)
- Scroll Bar on file list
- A few minor bug fixes
- I'm runnin' out of ideas! HELP!!


You can get RMENU from the Universal frontends page.

Emulator Release: Hu6280 0.00031
16:19:  Another new release of the newest TurboGrafx 16 emulator around, Hu6280, has oozed its way to ZD (I'm running out of new ways to announce releases of emulators!). Here's the changelist:

- Modded memory fetches to use mmu_ptrs instead of indexing via mmu_regs
- Put in a framesync on/off toggle (Use F1) - default , ON
- Changed screen dump for speed
- Seperated irq code from line update :)
- Tided up sprite masking code again (neat again)

Receive this offering of Hu6280 0.00031 from the TurboGrafx 16 page.

Emulator Release: EX68 1.00
16:00:  Version 1.00 of EX68 has been released. Although it looks like there's a lot new in this version, I, as usual, am not able to tell you what's new, since the update.txt is in japanese. Therefore, anyone wishing to translate the EX68 update.txt for 1.00, please e-mail me, and i'll post the translation here. You can download EX68 1.00 from the X68000 page.

Emulator Release: VGen 0.18
15:14:  Jason Meehan has released his second version of VGen, the Virtual Genesis emulator. And straight from the readme, here is what's new:

- Slightly better rom compatibility
- A little faster
- Roms can be loaded from the command line
- Screen and sprite priorities are correct now
- Background color added
- Window plane added
- Controller 2 emulation added
- Joystick support
- Version select added
- Screen mode select added
- Gui improved
- Save and restore state
- Save ram emulated

Pick up Vgen 0.18 at the Genesis Page.

Emulator Release: ZSNES 0.400
15:05:  After over a month without any new versions, a major release of ZSNES is now available. The 2 main features of this release are new video routines in 8bit mode, which speeds things up by 100% or more (it's possible to get 60 FPS in Mario on a P166, or even a lower computer), and Super FX emulation. Here's the full list of changes and new stuff:

- Fixed a dual windowing bug in mode 7 in 65536 color mode
- Re-added FPU Copy due to a demand
- Implemented MMX Copy. Use -om to enable. Thanks to Angels Holocaust for this info!
- Fixed a bug when writing to .bmp files
- Added (buggy) SuperFX support (9.5MB memory required) Special thanks to the snes9x team for all the info and help!
- Fixed up sprite windowing. Should hopefully be correct now
- Added a commandline to show all file extensions through the GUI Use -sa to enable
- Added Noise to the Sound DSP
- Added a Fast Forward key. Use the Tilde Key (~) located at the top-left of your keyboard.
- Added Sprite Priority Correction
- Fixed a tile caching bug that caused some tile corruption
- Fixed a 65816 bug in XCE on the x flag. Thanks to ]SiMKiN[ for this!
- Implemented Interleaved format and a simple auto detection. In case autodetect fails, use -i. Thanks to feenix65 for this info!
- Improved header detection. Should now work better with demos and games with weird filesizes
- Added a new graphics engine in 256 color mode. It should be much faster in areas that don't use mode 7, but lacks a lot of features
such as windowing, mosaic, and sprite priorities so it is disabled
by default. It can be enabled by pressing 8 during gameplay. (~40-100% faster)
- Optimised Mode 7 in 256 color mode
- Implemented dual windowing to color window clipping
- Fixed several color window clipping bugs
- Added full resolution screenshot capture in 640x480x65536 mode To activate while in that mode, hold backspace and press F1
- Fixed several transparency bugs
- Added NewGfx to zsnes.cfg which determines if the new graphics engine is enabled at start
- Added CopyMethod to zsnes.cfg which can default the copy method as either fpu copy or mmx copy
- Allowed systems with 5.5MB of RAM free to load 2mbit roms
- Fixed sidewinder support when sound is set at a high sampling rate. Thanks to Marius Fodor for the help!

You can download ZSNES 0.400 from the ZSNES mirror or the SNES page. Don't forget to check out the ZSNES Message Board for any bug reports, or comments/questions/praise.

Misc. News: Malicia problems
14:58:  For some reason, Malicia was down for the greater part of yesterday, and some of today. We'll be doing all the updates (like zsnes .400) today, that should have been done yesterday.

As a side note, thanks to all who mailed in their birthday wishes (I got 84 e-mails in all!)

5/18/98
Emulator News: Project Unreality
23:45:  Project Unreality in a very short while has made another breakthrough... Not only do some of the graphics of WaveRace© and Mortal Kombat Trilogy© come up, but now some graphics of VNES (JL_Picard's POM'98 entry). And not just the graphics show up, but it's playable. Check out the page:Project Unreality

Misc. News: CaBBe leaves RomList
23:27:  CaBBe, the person responsible for bringing you many Neo Geo and Arcade game ROMs. has stopped dumping them. Although the reason he gave, which was he was not thanked or acknowledged by most people, is rather silly (if you read emulator readme's such as Callus and others, you'll see he's thanked numerous times), it is his choice. Good luck in the future, CaBBe.

RomList

Emulator Release: Hu6280 0.0002f
21:29:  Another release of Hu6280, the newest TurboGrafx 16 emulator around. Gnu:

- Fixed yet another masking bug (must have cropped in when i tided up the code ;)
- Modded internal emulation screen resulting in a speed hit
- Tied up sprite clipping to new internal emulation screen size :)
- Added something nice to gui ;) see if you can spot it ... :)

Download from: TurboGrafx 16 page

Emulator Release: BrSMS 1.7
20:38:  A new release of BrSMS, stressing bugfixes. Here's the list of newisms:

- Fixed a bug on Sound Blasters configured to IRQs greater than 7
- Fixed two graphic bugs related to the CPU Graph
- Fixed a sprite bug (score of "Golvellius" in top-view stages)
- Now BrSMS can open read-only files (ie files on CD-ROMs)
- Support for PAUSE key (press "P" on keyboard)
- Option to adjust joystick sensivity ("-joysens")
- Optimized the sprite renderer

You can download BrSMS 1.7 from the Sega Master System/GameGear page.

Frontend News: RAGEFront 0.4
18:44:  A new version of RAGEFront, the RAGE frontend by mrgsoft has been released.
Here's what's new:

- Universal Command line
- Native support for the rotated feature of Image Fight

You can get it from the Arcade frontends page.

Frontend News: RAINEFront 0.4
18:42:  mrgsoft has released a new version of their RAINE frontend. This version will probably be the final version of the frontend.
Here's what's new:

- Universal Command line
- Support for RAINE 0.10

You can get it from the Arcade frontends page.

Frontend News: xDRAGONFront 0.2.1
18:40:  A new version of mrgsofts xDRAGON frontend has been released. This is, by my knowledge, the only xDRAGON frontend available. Do you have trouble keeping track of all the command line options? Use this.
Here's what's new:

- Universal Command line
- Joystick calibration
- Test mode dipswitches
- Demo mode
- Help

You can get it from the Arcade frontends page.

Misc. News: Zophar's 18th Birthday
07:20:  Yes people, it's my 18th birthday! Today, May 18th, 1998, I've turned eighteen. I like that number. I think I'll say it again. "18". OK. So, feel free to e-mail me your birthday wishes. I don't know how much updating of ZD I'll be doing today... :)

5/17/98
Emulator Release: No$GMB 1.5a
21:54:  A new release of No$GMB, the fastest GameBoy emulator in the world, is now available. Here's the list of changes:

- true sprite priority order (garqoyles quest, mk3, bighurt baseball, etc)
- split sprite size (super hunchback 2)
- timing optimization (bomberman 3)
- added mousespots to toggle between setup screens and for save setup
- f10 status screen: re-fix for IE/IF flag display
- 4 button setup fix, this time really fixed completely

You can download No$GMB 1.5a from the GameBoy page.

Emulator Release: SNEmul Followup
21:38:  A minor update has been issued to SNEmul 0.7:

- added a 'Fast Sound' option.It decreases the sound update rate and set the sound frequency to 22050 Hz.

As usual, you can download it from the SNES page.

Emulator Release: Hu6280 0.0002e
15:49:  The second release of Hu6280 in one day! Here's the list of newisms:

- Fixed some cycle timings in cpucore
- Optimized character draw engine / masking code
- Added a 5 minute GUI... hahaha

You can download Hu6280 0.0002e from the TurboGrafx 16 page.

Emulator Release: SNEmul 0.7
12:18:  After weeks of anticipation, the highly awaited new version of SNEmul is now available, with transparencies in 16 bit mode being the biggest new feature! Yes, what ZSNES users have had for half a year, now SNEmul users can now experience. Here's the full list of new stuff:

- added NTSC/PAL detection
- speeded up a bit tiles decoding functions
- implemented 16 bits resolution VESA 2.0 is not required with all modes but it is stronly recommended. Scanlines are also recommended for high resolutions(speed reason)
- added support of palette alteration between scanlines
- implemented FIXED color add/sub (light/shade effects)
- implemented SUBSCREEN add/sub (transparency effects)
- speeded up a bit graphic engine
- fixed a bug in SPC700
- added another sound engine(worse than SEAL one, but may work with cards which are uncompatible with SEAL)
- improved resolution and debug dialog
- fixed some bugs in the GUI and SNEmul

You can download SNEmul 0.7 from the SNES page.

Emulator Release: Hu6280 0.0002d
11:58:  Hu6280, the newest Tg-16 emulator out there, has had its first update since its initial release yesterday afternoon. Here's the list of fixes to 0.0002d:

- Removed sprite to sprite masking code, now draw them in reverse order for speed...
- Fixed sprite bug that caused rtype to die
- Fixed sprite masking bugs (gradius,jj&jeff etc.)

As usual, you can download it from the TurboGrafx 16 page.

Site News: Neo Geo section
11:40:  A Neo Geo emulator section has been added to Zophar's Domain. Currently, all Neo Geo emulators that are available are on the page (Gekko and Neo RAGE currently). To use these emulators, remember to download the Neo Geo BIOS ROM, because without it, the emulators won't run.

Neo Geo emulator section

5/16/98
Frontend News: fwNES Express 2.1
17:19:  A new version of the really good fwNES frontend fwNES Express has been released. This new version is only a minor update over version 2.0 so I'll include the news for both updates here:

v2.1
-Added support for remapping keyboard(See Using fwNES Express below). A whole new KeyMapping tab.
v2.0
-Added support for fwNES98 v.20b. Version number is raised to 2.0 to differentiate it from 1.x which supports fwNES98 v.15b.The two versions(1.x & 2.x) can coexist on one computer(see below Using fwNES express). Support for keyboard remapping isn't in yet because fwNES98 v.20b has just been released yesterday. Hopefully, I'll implement it
in the next release.
-Added UnFNXPS.EXE, it can remove fwNES Express settings from registry.

You can get fwNES Express 2.1 from the NES Frontends page.

Site News: FAQ page added to ZD & a new ZD Staff member
16:15:  Hello, I am Nitro, the new faq Maintainer for ZD. I will be responsible for updating the ZD's FAQ page, please feel free to mail me at Gypsies@uswest.net. If you have any suggestions or comments. Visit the FAQ Page.

Emulator Release: Hu6280 0.0002c
16:04:  A new TG-16 emulator has just been released, right here on Zophar's Domain! It's called Hu6280, and is currently in Alpha stages. Although it's rather slow on a P166, it's in early stages, so give it a chance. The author wishes to remain anonymous, so mail all bug reports to the e-mail address in the readme.txt. Note that you must rename the game you wish you play to "cart.pce". You can download it from the TG-16 page.

Emulator News: Rolling Thunder Emulator
15:36:  An emulator is currently in progress for the arcade game, Rolling Thunder. Some screenshots have been posted of the emulator running Rolling Thunder. Be sure to check out Sys2064.

5/15/98
Emulator Release: GBE 0.21
23:41:  GBE, a GameBoy emulator for DOS coded by the same author who coded PC-NES, has received its first update since the initial release. Here's the list of changes in 0.21:

- Fixed a bug in bankswitching scheme (Donkey Kong Land III). This was causing graphical and musical bugs in several other games.
- Rewrote Gameboy interrupt handling
- Rewrote display timing code
- Fixed code for the Gameboy's internal timer (Mario Land)
- Fixed swap opcode emulation (Wario Land II). I forgot to add code to affect the flag register.
- Cleaned up sound code

You can download GBE 0.21 from the GameBoy page.

Emulator Release: O2EM 0.65
23:32:  After over half a year of inactivity, the world's only Odyssey 2 emulator has now gained a noteworthy feature: sound support! Here's the full list of the changes in O2EM 0.65:

- Added sound support
- Improved speed limiter
- Couple bug fixes in 8039 emulation (thanks to Mirko Buffoni for this)
- X and Y position registers now implemented correctly
- Grid collision handling fixed (Basketball)
- Changed keys for stick 2 to a more comfortable setting and enable it by default
- Fixed a bug in screen update routine that was causing crashes in some games
- Compiled with -mpentium which should improve speed on Intel Pentiums

You can download O2EM 0.65 from the Odyssey 2 page.

Frontend News: SPC 1.5b
18:31:  A small bugfix release of SPC, the SPCPlay frontend has been made.
These are the bugfixes:

- Clock fixed (sorry)
- English labels/messages rewritten
- Forgot to clear some variables when the switch SPC<->ZS? was changed
- Fixed bugs in the rolling bar and filebox
- Filenames centralization is fixed
- Default frequence changed to 22100Hz
- Added MenuItem "DOS Prompt" into the right click menu
- key access right button menu
- Mouse cursor is hidden when you give a right click
- Soft "adjusts" in the graphic interface

You can get SPC 1.5b on the SNES frontends page.

Frontend News: UFE 3.70
18:27:  These news are actually very late, but better late than never (I hope). Here is: The all new improved version of UFE, a multi emulator frontend definitely worth trying. It has loads of features that can be read about on the Universal/Multi Emulator frontends page.
Anyway, here's what's new:

- Documentation improvements
-> beautified
-> index added
-> UFE.FAQ added
- Bug fixes while copying files
- File creation added (may be useful) for DOS
-> with LONG FILE NAMES for Win95/WinNT
- Disable Long File Names in archives until I fix it
- Many bug fixes for launch emulators (MAME...)
- Add default support for
WB_MLAND (now 100% compatible with WBMLEMU)
GBE
JAS 1.1
MGDOS/BRSMS
SPCPLAY
SWC FILES (SNES)
STONX1/STONX2/STONX2B (now 100% compatible with STONXDOS)
- Fix default support for NEZULATOR (NEZ36 better than NEZ)
- Little bug fixes when displaying copying state
- Bug fixes when copying directories without LONG FILE NAMES
- Great bug fixes (at last !) with browsing errors
-> automatically restart browsing with default UFE path root
- AUTOPATH 1.2 (AUTOdetect PATHs for your emulators (c) 1998 EMU5EVER)
-> beautified
-> many bug fixes
-> add support for CALL dos feature for .BAT files
-> automatically add CALL to .BAT programs
-> smaller executable file size
-> PLEASE ALWAYS USE THIS ABSOLUTELY NEEDED AND USEFUL PROGRAM
- A new release (thanks to my girlfriend for motivation)

You can get UFE 3.70 from the Universal/Multi Emulator frontends page.

Emulator News: Project Unreality News
16:28:  Project Unreality, the only *real* N64 emulator project, has made a breakthrough. Currently, the development version of PUR is now able to display some opening screens from Mortal Kombat Trilogy. Check out the screenshots on the PUR Homepage.

Emulator Release: Z26 1.03
16:22:  A new version of Z26, an Atari 2600 emulator for DOS, is now available. Here's the list of changes for Version 1.03:

- Fixed crash if you don't have a Sound Blaster. This problem was introduced in version 1.02. (How DO these things happen???)
- Slightly faster sound interrupt handler and sound generation.
- Joystick controls can be swapped between players. This allows the joystick to be used on games like raiders.bin which use the *wrong* joystick. Keyboard controls are swapped too. Specify the -j2 command line switch.

You can download Z26 1.03 from the Atari 2600 page.

Emulator Release: Mame32 0.31.1
11:59:  The Windows port of MAME has been updated to v.31.1. The following improvements have been made:

- Fixed crash when attempting to detect MMX support on Cyrix CPUs.
- Added visible area support in fullscreen and DirectDraw windowed mode.
- 16 bit support for the DirectSound option. Fixed samples being cut off.
- Added support for up to four joysticks.
- Updated Wingman Warrior support.
- Added an audit feature. This checks all your existing ROM sets for missing and incorrect ROMs, and for missing samples.
- Added YM3812 FM synthesis for Sound Blaster compatibles under Windows 95.

Mame can be download on the Multi-Arcade Emulator section.

5/13/98
Frontend News: SPC 1.5
17:16:  The multi-language SPC frontend SPC has again been updated. This time it's to version 1.5, but no playlist is added yet.
Here's the new features:

- New graphic interface, with "perfect" translation
- Source code was optimized a bit
- Default MOUSE-timing changed to "Fast" and removed adjusts
- Startup checking (mouse, SPC and ZS? files, and SPCPlay file)
- Filenames are centralized and without extension (except ZS? files)
- Initial frequence is 8000Hz (it was as 11025Hz, bug fixed)
- Rolling bar resized and with new engines
- Now, eight (8) files to select in filebox
- Added ZS? ("saved states") support
- Added SPC <-> ZS? switch
- Added a nice clock at right corner of screen
- Added octal (< 48 files) and hexa (> 47 files) algorithm to filebox engine
- SHROOM use doesn't scroll the screen to up (see below)
- Lightbar, not "highlighted bar" ! ;-)
- Too many bugs was fixed
- Sorry, playlist system was not possible for this release... :-(

You can get SPC 1.5 from the SNES Frontends page.

Frontend News: Nitrolic 2.2
17:13:  A new version of Nitrolic, the frequently updated ZSNES frontend. has been released!
Sadly, the zip support has been disabled for this release.
Here's what's new:

- Made Nitrolic "Tabbed" only version.
- Added a Rom List
- Fixed Right menu click delete for SPC Playlist.
- Added 2 other rom lists "Header, Full pathname, Full win95 name"
- Added an SNES romname Reader (thanx StarFox)
- Fixed up the Tab Change module
- Made Frontend all the same size.
- Fixed SPCPlay Timer a bit.
- Cut Program size in Half.
- Using new version of VB40032.dll, Tabctl32.ocx, comctl32.ocx "Get off webpage"
- Fixed % bar "never noticed that little loading bug before"
- Added a delete menu to RomList box.
- Disabled zip support for this version.
- Deleted useless lines in Loading routine "should load faster now"

You can get Nitrolic 2.2 on the SNES Frontends page.

Emulator Release: WinUAE 0.7.2 Release 2
12:32:  The second release of the Windows95 version of the Ubiquitous Amiga Emulator 0.7.2 has been released. The following issues have been resolved:

- Fixed the freeze when running WinUAE in a window on your Win95 desktop.
- Fixed the CD-ROM mounting problems.
- Hard-files DO WORK - if you're having problems with an old one, try adjusting the parameters.

You can download WinUAE on the Amiga Emulators section.

5/12/98
Translation News: Translation Pages Update
20:32:  Here are some changes that have been made to the Translation and Utilities pages...

- FF Facelift v.70 patch was released by the FFx Team.
- Bahamuts Lagoon v0.04 patch was released by StarSoft Translations.
- OffCourse Translation Dq5 removed ( Terminated Project ).
- FF3j by Disklexic Translations removed ( Dormant Project )
- Hex Exposure v2.15 added to the utilities page.

I have been getting many requests about the status of the Secret Of Mana 2 Translation. The project was halted for awhile however, there are a few individuals who have been working hard to complete this project.

Utility News: PSXVideo FAQ updated
17:49:  Brian "TheFreak" Balsan has updated his walkthrough of PSXVideo to include a list of compressors and the picture quality/size of each. PSXVideo & it's unofficial FAQ can be found in the Playstation area of the Utilities section.

Emulator Release: Boycott .39
17:31:  Boycott .39 has been released and several improvements have been made, including:

- Add a fix for Alfred Chicken (thanks to J.Geffre)
- Add a fix for Frank Thomas BB
- Smaller snapshots with different sizes according to GB cartridges
* 25100 bytes for a 32Ko ROM
* 49164 bytes for other ROMS
* Does not exist with GB97 or GBE !!!
- I define constants for keys in source code
* Maybe one can soon change keys definition *
- Fix F2/F5/F6 keys (occur only one time)
- Halt key added (useful to go back to debugger)
- Debugger improved
* Can display BG, screen again
* Exit fixes with quit command
- Pause Key fixes (with *UGLY* and *STRANGE* printfs)
- Z80 engine improved
* Speeded up a little
* Source code smaller and easier to debug
* Debugging/optimizing of ADD SP,xXX
* Debugging/optimizing of LD HL,SPxXX
- Crashing bug fixes when loading a 512 bytes battery (.SAV)
- Bug fixes when saving a 512 bytes battery (.SAV)
- Ignores now wrong opcodes (may fixes some games)

You can download Boycott .39 on the Gameboy Page.

Misc. News: The Arsenal
12:17:  The Arsenal is a multi-faceted group dedicated to the advancement of the emulation scene, specifically with regard to NES related projects. For information on The Arsenal & how you can make a donation to the cause and receive a free CD containing over 1000 NES ROMs as a result, visit their webpage at members.xoom.com/the_arsenal

Utility News: GenEdit 2.01 fixed
11:32:  The .zip file for GenEdit 2.01 has been fixed. My apologies to anyone that downloaded the corrupted version that was uploaded yesterday.

Utility News: Massacre .35
11:25:  The first utility has been added to the Master System section of the utilities section. Massacre 0.35 is an editor for Master System ROMs and also includes a palette editor. It's a bit slow due to it's Q-BASIC coding but the author, Johannes Holmberg has stated his intentions to recode it in the future so give the program a try and let him know if you like it.

Site News: Master System Added To Utilities Section
11:02:  In light of the recent slew of updates to BrSMS, the fastest Sega Master System emulator available & the location of the first SMS utility, a Master System section has been added to the utilities section. Hopefully we'll be seeing more utilities for this great system in the future.

Emulator Release: BrSMS 1.6
03:33:  This release of BrSMS, the fastest Sega Master System emulator around, is just a minor release:

- bugfix: now the load state is working again.

You can download BrSMS 1.6 from the Sega Master System/GameGear page.

Emulator Release: Boycott 0.38
03:18:  Although this is VERY old news, I somehow managed to miss the release of Boycott 0.38. Since it's such old news, I'm not even going to bother posting what's new. You can download it from the GameBoy page.

5/11/98
Misc. News: New website on Links
21:29:  There is a new website which hosts the Offical Vertigo 2099 and fwNES message board, this site has been setup by ROmBO of Vertigo 2099. The title of the site is Advert City.

Advert City

Emulator Release: fwNES .20 Released!
15:26:  Yes that's right, fwNES98 has been updated again. As with all updates of fwNES this release is chock full of all new goodies. Such as:

- A Simple GUI is added
- Build in a simple debugger !!
- Full Sound Channel (DPCM included)!!
- N6502 is removed!( buggy and unefficient)!!
- More Background/Sprite Prority !!
- Fixed Dimmy Read!!
- No More Zelda V-Scrolling bugs!!
- No More Flick Status Bar !!
- No More Konami Game sprite walk into Background !!
- Mapper #1 MMC 1 fixed ..AD&D Hillsfar , CosmosWar Work !!
- Mapper #4 MMC 3 fixed .More games work and work better. SD -4 ,SD -5 ...etc !!
- Mapper #5 MMC 5 fixed .More games works CV3, MetalSladerGlory-JustBread/SDF..etc!
- (Koei games still buggy) !!
- Mapper #19 Namco fixed .
- Mapper #23 VRC2/4 fixed .
- Mapper #24 VRC6 fixed .
- Mapper #25 VRC2/4 fixed .
- Mapper #26 VRC6/V Added . Madara ,EsperDream
- Mapper #68 SunSoft-4 Fixed .NatteBaseball work!
- Mapper #76 Namco 109 Added MegamiTenshi 1 Work!
- Mapper #78 Fixed HolyDriver work well !
- Mapper #79 fix a bit (still buggy)
- Mapper #80 H/V/PG fixed
- Mapper #85 Konami VRC7 fixed ..Lagrange Point work better (not perfect yet)
- Mapper #86 MoeProBaseBall Added .
- Mapper #87 HyperSportMT mapper Added !
- Mapper #88 Namco 118 Added DevilMan work better !
- Mapper #89 74161/32 Added MitoKoumon work!
- Mapper #90 Tekken 2 Added !
- Mapper #91 StreetFighter3 Added !

As usual, you can pick up this new release at the NES Page.

Utility News: GenEdit 2.01
15:08:  GenEdit 2.01 has been added to the Genesis area of the Utilities section. The documentation doesn't mention new features, but GenEdit 2.01 now allows you to edit savegames for KGen and GenEm as well as the S-RAM for Genecyst & Magic Engine.

Utility News: Unofficial PSX Video FAQ
14:41:  Brian "TheFreak" Balsan has written an unofficial PSXVideo FAQ which does a good job of explaining how to use PSXVideo 1.07. For anyone that has questions concening PSXVideo & can't read Chinese, this is your best bet. The PSXVideo FAQ can be found in the PSX area of the Utilities section or by clicking here.

Misc. News: More of emulation in the news
01:19:  I came across an article today (well actually, Jeremy Chadwick did) in which more negative light is being thrown on emulation. In this article, the IDSA is mentioned, and employees of Sega and Hasbro also make statements regarding emulation.

The Article

5/10/98
Frontend News: StarLaunch 2.1x Beta preview release
17:49:  A brand new feature cluttered multiple emulator supporting frontend has been released. It has a lot of new features and here they all are, nicely arranged in a list:

Snes Cheat Code Scanner! (From the options list)
Snes9XWin support (Full support, including screen res)
Project Unreality support (as well as N64 roms)
BrSMS support
News and Info Updater
Plugin support - for settings, you’ll have to go to setup and check ‘switch plugin behaviour’ for now.
Favorites and History
Gameboy and N64 header info windows
Includes key redefinition for Sneese (player 2), and Snes9xWin
Better snes cheat code support
New Interface
Mosaic can be disabled from Setup
Default emulators can be chosen
Much better file mask handling
Implemented Mk4 Rom reading, but it’s buggy, and crashes sometimes

You can download StarLaunch 2.1x from the Universal frontends page.

5/10/98
Frontend News: StarLaunch 2.1x Beta preview release
17:49:  A brand new feature cluttered multiple emulator supporting frontend has been released. It has a lot of new features and here they all are, nicely arranged in a list:

Snes Cheat Code Scanner! (From the options list)
Snes9XWin support (Full support, including screen res)
Project Unreality support (as well as N64 roms)
BrSMS support
News and Info Updater
Plugin support - for settings, you’ll have to go to setup and check ‘switch plugin behaviour’ for now.
Favorites and History
Gameboy and N64 header info windows
Includes key redefinition for Sneese (player 2), and Snes9xWin
Better snes cheat code support
New Interface
Mosaic can be disabled from Setup
Default emulators can be chosen
Much better file mask handling
Implemented Mk4 Rom reading, but it’s buggy, and crashes sometimes

You can download StarLaunch 2.1x from the Universal frontends page.

5/9/98
Site News: Some things
22:36:  Well, here we are again with our usual status report every 2 weeks or so. So here we go.

First of all, the last 2 weeks have been very productive. As you know, we recently welcome two more people to the ZD staff, Bjorn Astrom and Chris Draven. I promised you all frontends pages since ZD started in 1996, and now, one and a half years later, we finally have them. Talk about procrastination.

Second, I am STILL receiving e-mails asking for commercial ROMs, even after my repeated warnings NOT to do this. Maybe if I spell it out in black and white for you. *IT IS ILLEGAL*. I can't send you them. I just can't. OK? Sheesh.

Lastly, I'm having some problems in regards to adding Unix emulators to ZD. I don't really know enough about emulators for unix and I'm having problems with the commentaries for these, so when I do add them, it will probably only be the popular ones (ie, Snes9x, Stella, UAE, MAME...).

That's all. Have a nice weekend. Buy your mother dead flowers for Mother's Day. I know i will.

Frontend News: SPC Status report
16:56:  I've received a status report of SPC, the SPCPlay frontend from Fabiano Lopes. The biggest new addition is a completely new GUI. All that's missing now is a playlist feature.

Frontend News: Nitrolic 2.01
16:52:  A new version of Nitrolic, the lately updated many times ZSNES frontend has now been delivered in a new version!

Here's what's new:

- Re-wrote ENTIRE program. (ouch!!)
- Fixed soo many bugs... I will just tell you the good stuff :D
- Fixed timer BIG TIME!! now it doesn't run a second SPCplay. heh.
- Fixed up the loading script.
- Allowed long-file-names on roms
- Made 2 lists for the SPCPlay playlist.
- Allowed option between Path and filename as list, or just the filename.
- re-made about box... (you have to see this) :D "right click to see"
- Fixed up the Stop button. (wasn't stopping correctly sometimes.
- Sped up the loading sequence. (for all you 486 users)
- Made a bit smaller. (next version will be even smaller)
- Fixed up the right click delete button on the playlist.
- Made GUI check box work right.
- Fixed a retarted Timing bug (preventing you from running other programs)

You can download Nitrolic 2.01 on the SNES frontends page.

Site News: Links Page Updated
03:04:  There has been yet another links page update, there are now nearly sixty sites reviewed and rated. Please keep your site submissions coming in!

Links Page

5/8/98
Emulator Release: WinUAE 0.7.2 Release 1
22:04:  WinUAE 0.7.2 Release 1 is now available. This Amiga emulator is the best available for Windows95. Here's the list of updates:

- Fixes BlitPattern() bug on Picasso96 screens
- Fixes some bugs in the custom-chip emulation
- Hard-drive Files work.
- Added support in GUI for "slow" memory emulation (some games require this).
- Sound-code now based on WinUAE 0.6.9r12
- Implemented DirectSound for fun.
- Joystick settings can be changed while the emulation is running.
- Using F12 (or the "menu" key beside the right-Windows key) will bring up the GUI, and NOT crash/guru the "Amiga".
- 24-bit, 32-bit desktops are supported again.
- "Julian"-mode renamed, and saved with configurations.
- Added LED status to WinUAE when running in a window on your desktop.
- Now using assembly-code for planar-to-chunky conversion.
- GUI problems cleaned up.
- Added new check for Cyrix
- Quitting WinUAE when running in a window would occasionally leave a piece behind in memory which kept further copies of WinUAE from running.

Download WinUAE 0.7.2 Release 1 from the Amiga page.

Emulator Release: BrSMS 1.5
21:48:  A new release of BrSMS, one of the fastest Sega Master System emulators available, is now available. Here's what's new in 1.5:

- fixed a bug on voice emulation ("Afterburner", "Alex Kidd Lost Stars")
- now there is one save state for each game (no more BRSMS.STA)
- options to select nationalization ("-eng" and "-jap")
- did a little speed up in the background renderer

Download BrSMS 1.5 from the Sega Master System/GameGear page.

5/7/98
Emulator Release: No$GMB 1.5
16:53:  No$GMB 1.5 has been released. Here's what's new in this...wait a minute. Before I go into the usual what's new, I have to make a statement on No$GMB, cash, and hypocrisy. First off, for those of you who didn't know, No$GMB is now free for users of 386s, 486s, ATs and XTs. But not for users of Pentiums. For an emulator called 'No Cash', wouldn't you say they are being hypocrites for making it shareware for Pentium owners? Well anyway, that's just my $0.02. Here's what's new:

- 8 megabit ROM cartridges supported (make sure that you have installed EMS (EMM386) in your CONFIG.SYS!)
- 32 kbyte external RAM supported
- help text moved to temporary memory
- strange IO attempts supported
- fixed WIN priority and optimized BG priority
- smoother WX emulation
- 100% true lcd-stat interrupt model
- separate oam/hblank interrupt emulation (instead of both the same)
- true 59.7275Hz real video refresh rate (rather than dirty 60Hz)
- true 70224 clocks per vblank (rather than 699xx)
- interrupt enable behavior
- display disable
- fixed timer
- startup logo-cls, out_lcdc, startup BG colors
- multiple two player links repaired (if more than two machines)
- joystick disable option fixed
- pause in multi split screens
- disable debugger option (no numbers): bugfix for cart not found
- accepts carts with "read only" attribute
- accepts [d:][path]filename instead plain filename on commandline and files.lst
- recognizes all installed HDDs, CD-ROMs, etc.
- joystick button setup (swap buttons, four-button sticks, etc)
- handles split/scrolled screens during emu pause (debug graphix, GIFs)
- black display border
- XT version supports old PC keyboards

Download No$GMB 1.5 from the GameBoy page.

Frontend News: SPCPlay NOW!
16:47:  A mysterious SPCPlay frontend has appeared, claiming to be faster than all the Windows frontends(When running in pure DOS). It has no real documentation at the moment so you'll have to try it out yourself.

You can download SPCPlay NOW! on the SNES Frontends page.

Emulator Release: Z26 1.02
16:28:  Z26, an Atari 2600 emulator for DOS, has been updated to version 1.02. Here's the 2 changes in this minor release:

- Fixed a problem that caused sound to be distorted on some systems when z26 was launched from a Windows 95 DOS box. Thanks to Brad Thomas for working with me on this!
- Pausing game turns off sound (again).

Download Z26 1.02 from the Atari 2600 page.

Frontend News: Nitrolic 1.8
16:27:  A new version of Nitrolic, the ZSNES and SPCPlay frontend, has been delivered to your emulation door, and as usual quite a few things are new:

- Added some sounds :D
- Fixed up timing bug in SPCplay Playlist routine.
- Fixed bug that didn't allow the user to do anything else.
- Fixed other bugs.
- Added a loop button!!!
- Fixed weird shell bug
- Made just a 'bit' bigger.. but it's still pretty small
- Re-designed web page!! heheh.. now it looks kewl.

You can download Nitrolic 1.8 on the SNES frontends page.

Emulator Release: xDragon 0.30
03:09:  A new release of xDragon, a multi arcade game emulator, is now available. Here are the changes in xDragon 0.30:

- VSync
- Autoframeskip
- Choose the correct video mode
- Double Buffer added
- Parallax scrolling
- xDragon save the joystick's calibration part
- Rotary Controller supported
- Added Sly Spy
- Added Midnight Resistance

You can download xDragon 0.30 from the Multi Arcade emulator page.

5/6/98
Misc. News: Cabal Information Request
16:38:  Rudy Smith is looking for any technical information on the arcade game "Cabal", released in the late 1980s. He's interested in coding an emulator for it. Please e-mail him if you can offer any help.

Utility News: Two PSX Utilities Added
12:23:  Two new utilities have been added to the Playstation section of the utilities area. PSXVideo 1.07 allows you to convert PSX videos into AVI format.WOTIZPSX 1.00 gives you basic info on standard PSX files. As I don't own a Playstation, I can't test these, but if anyone gives them a try, let me know how they work so I can post a more thorough review.

Frontend News: Genesis Launchtool 1.4 added
03:58:  A great Genecyst, KGEN and Genem(new version) frontend with zip support and loads of other neato features like editing header information and other stuff.

You can download Genesis Launchtool 1.4 on the Genesis frontends page.

Frontend News: SPC 1.4d English and Portugese
03:52:  SPC 1.4d has been updated again! This time an english version has also been porduced, so I can now tell you what's new:

- Added "Wrap" to right click menu highlighted bar (press UP to see!).
- Fixed a bug in rolling bar.

You can get SPC 1.4d on the SNES frontends page.

5/5/98
Misc. News: Ripper 101
19:28:  Another site ripping Zophar's Domain has been found. This time, it's a "KeWl WaREz pAgE" with 'l33t r0mz'. The emulator sections are ripped right off of mine, the only thing he changed was the color. The emulator page is here, and the main page is here. Be sure to e-mail him and let him know how you feel about this.

Frontend News: URL 0.95
17:15:  URL, the ultimate universal frontend has been updated! This frontend just keeps getting better and better!
Here's what's new:

- Various bugs fixed.
- Added a .ROM manager, where you can delete, sort, find duplicates, import or export entrys of the database.
- Fixed some bad use of colors and added a new theme.

You can download URL 0.95 on the Universal frontends page.

Frontend News: SPCPlayPlugin 1.6x
16:56:  A new version of the SPCPlay frontend SPCPlayPlugin has been released. Sadly, the readme doesn't say what's new, and the info on the homepage is severely outdated so I can't tell you what's new.

You can download SPCPlayPlugin 1.6x on the SNES frontends page.

Site News: New Utilities Maintainer
11:23:  For those of you that don't know...which is 95% of you, my name is InVerse and I'm the new utilities maintainer here at ZD. I'm taking over the position from [NOAM] who's now the graphic designer and maintainer of the IRC Quotes page. All new and updated utilities should be directed to me via the e-mail address located at the bottom of the page. A few minor updates have been done so far and I'll be adding new utils as soon as I receive them.

Emulator Release: A6502 Source released
10:33:  Larry Bank, author of the multi arcade emulator CAGE, has released the source code to his 6502 emulator, which is used in CAGE. You can download the source (coded in assembly) from the 6502 page.

Emulator Release: TMNT Emulator 0.7
09:06:  A new version of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles emulator has been released. Here's what's new in TMNT Emulator 0.7:

- Now 3 different flavors, DOS, Windows using GDI and Windows using DirectX
- Joystick support for DOS
- Sprite vs Background Priority fixed
- More video resolutions added
- Made it faster
- Sticky keys fixed
- Sprite glitches all fixed
- New config program
- Default keys changed

You can download TMNT Emulator 0.7 from the Single Arcade Emulator page.

Frontend News: SPC 1.4b
05:08:  SPC, the Portugese SPCPlay frontend has been updated with a new version.
Sadly, I can't tell what's new since I don't know Portugese.

You can download SPC 1.4b on the SNES frontends page.

Frontend News: Z-GUI 0.21
05:06:  Say hello to a minor update of Z-GUI, the ZSNES frontend. This is really a minor update, since only one thing is new.

- Stop button for SPCPlay

You can download Z-GUI 0.21 on the SNES frontendspage.

Frontend News: UZI 0.60
05:00:  UZI, the Ultimate ZSNES Frontend, has been updated! If you have a previous version of UZI you can just download the upgrade patch to version 0.60.
Here's what's new:

- Individual ROM configurations
- ROM Information Display
- Checksum verification
- Changed GUI (resizable)
- Context menu for special keys

You can download UZI 0.60 on the SNES Frontends page.

Emulator Release: Raine 0.10
02:59:  Raine 0.10 has been released, after much anticipation. Here are the new features of Raine:

- Added a little gui for Game Select/Key Select/Screen Select etc...
- Zipped roms support.
- Added detection and skipping for idle 68000 cycles in: WrestleFest, Rainbow Islands and Rastan (all have speed increase).

Here are the new games supported:

- Bonze Adventure (c-chip, so not playable)
- Cadash (playable)
- Final Blow (playable)
- Master of Weapons (messy sprites)
- Mega Blast (playable)
- Ninja Kids (playable but messy sprites)
- Ninja Gaiden (playable)
- Operation Thunderbolt (playable)
- Super Space Invaders'91 (playable)
- Zero Zone (playable)

You can download Raine 0.10 from the Multi Arcade emulator page.

5/4/98
Frontend News: Nitrolic 1.7
17:39:  Wow! 3 releases in 3 days. This promises to be one good frontend for ZSNES.

Here's the highlights for this new version:

- Made program bigger due to a Picture
- Redesigned the SPC GUI part.... looks cool.
- Fixed some timing bugs.
- Got bored.
- Fixed Message box bug... (thanx goes to Dale McDaniel for noticing) :D

You can download it on the SNES Frontends page

Frontend News: ZSNES RearEnd 0.301
17:37:  This new release of ZSNES RearEnd, the ZSNES frontend is just a minor release to 0.3.
Here's what's new:

- Fixed a nasty bug using the center screen options
- Added a color background changer ( Now your not STUCK with the black )
- Um............ I think something else... Oh ya! Added a logo!

You can get ZSNES RearEnd 0.301 on the SNES Frontends page.

Emulator Release: BRSMS 1.4
16:10:  A new release of the fastest Sega Master System emulator, BRSMS, has been released. Here are the additions to Version 1.4:

- support to VRAM reads (intro of "Sonic 1", "Aztec Adventure")
- support to VDP register 0, bit 5 (this fix the bug on left side of screen)
- support to VDP register 0, bit 6 (score of "Double Dragon" & "Golvellius")
- support to VDP register 0, bit 7 (score of "Golvellius" in vertical stages)
- support to sprite/background priorities (intro of "Sonic 2")
- support to second player on keyboard
- support to joystick (as player 1 or player 2)
- RESET button
- multiplayer game through a serial cable
- TV emulation, with scanlines (require VESA 2 and a very fast computer)
- save and load state at any time
- save PCX snapshots

You can download BRSMS 1.4 from the Sega Master System/GameGear section.

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