Ok, I need to know something.

What is the difference between pal and ntsc? How do I know which one to use?

I am almost done making the most awesome set ever for this game but I could not get the timing of my tracks to work right on the cutscenes. Then I figured out I patched my European.sfc rom with the ntsc patch makes my game run 10% - 11% faster than it is suppose to. I actually timed myself sailing across the world on a pal version patch, a ntsc patch, and a fresh clean rom that had no patch on it. The pal and fresh rom matched times and the nstc was almost 11% faster. However, the music still plays at it's regular speed for all three tests I did. Then I figured out why my music was not matching the cut scene, cutscene was playing faster than the music.

So now I am using the Pal patch, but I want to ask, how do you know if your rom is a nstc or a pal? Also, do you think that it is possible that patching the wrong patch to the wrong rom in other games would cause speed up as well? because if so, I might want to check the cutscenes for those games too in the sets that I have made

Terranigma was never released in USA, only Europe. If you try to run it on a NTSC system you get an error screen (not intented for NTSC).

So I added a crack to the rom (you can find it in the asm):

Code:

; NTSC crack
org $c0FFD9
db $01
org $c797ce
db $80

Side effect is that pal games run ALWAYS on 50 fps, and ntsc at 60 fps, that is exactly the 10% speed you experience.
If the game is set to pal or ntsc is written in the ingame header, country information, above crack code sets $0cffd9 to 01 which is US (ntsc).

Luckily it is often negligible whether you run at 50 or 60 fps, but for some games this is crucial (e.g., if you run bszelda english dub at pal it wouldn't match as well).
You can see the fps in bsnes (pal:50, ntsc: 60) in the lower right corner in bsnes:



If the cutscreen must match the time, I'd suggest to make a duplicate theme calling it pcm-x_pal.pcm and advice the people to rename it and delete the standard -x.pcm or something like this.

okay, but the screen is mario 2? Or only for explanation with 50 fps?

So all American released games run faster than europe games? Is Japan released games pal versions or just Europe?

I have known pal and ntsc are things based on regions but i never knew what they were or that there was little differences. So which regions release games as pal or ntsc? So far what i read online is america/japan do ntsc and europe does pal, is that correct? Does the music also run 10% faster or slower on basic fresh roms (not patched)based on beinfg pal or ntsc but msu1 music will always play the same speed due to uploading music somewhere else? Why do we have two different versions on games? Sorry i am so many uneducated questions, i have never tried to.learn this stuff before

Also, if i understand right, nstc patch for this game was made so it can be played on sd2snes right? Because i cant imagine a version difference mattering if we are all using emulators, or am i wrong?

JUD6MENT wrote:Also, if i understand right, nstc patch for this game was made so it can be played on sd2snes right? Because i cant imagine a version difference mattering if we are all using emulators, or am i wrong?

Most developers back then created their games using the NTSC/60Hz standard because a lot of them were Japanese or American companies, so those games are how they should be played, on NTSC/60Hz systems. Most PAL/50Hz conversions, or regionalisations of those games were lazy and weren't optimised for the change in speed. So yes, the original game music can be slower as a result of this because the developers didn't change the speed of the original audio to compensate.

Here's a demonstration with Mega Man II: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ooe3eZl5R5U

MSU1 audio will always play at the same speed. The games region has no bearing over external files, but if there is an FMV sequence with matching audio or a timed effect inserted in to an audio track, for a 60Hz game, to match what's going on on-screen... If someone is playing that game on a 50Hz console the effect or whatever you're seeing in the FMV, the audio will be out of sync due to the timing issues.

Relikk wrote:

JUD6MENT wrote:Also, if i understand right, nstc patch for this game was made so it can be played on sd2snes right? Because i cant imagine a version difference mattering if we are all using emulators, or am i wrong?

Most developers back then created their games using the NTSC/60Hz standard because a lot of them were Japanese or American companies, so those games are how they should be played, on NTSC/60Hz systems. Most PAL/50Hz conversions, or regionalisations of those games were lazy and weren't optimised for the change in speed. So yes, the original game music can be slower as a result of this because the developers didn't change the speed of the original audio to compensate.

Here's a demonstration with Mega Man II: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ooe3eZl5R5U

MSU1 audio will always play at the same speed. The games region has no bearing over external files, but if there is an FMV sequence with matching audio or a timed effect inserted in to an audio track, for a 60Hz game, to match what's going on on-screen... If someone is playing that game on a 50Hz console the effect or whatever you're seeing in the FMV, the audio will be out of sync due to the timing issues.

So what you are saying is that the music may or may not have a tempo change depending on how they are ported to pal, because megaman 2 music is slower but some games getting ported to pal versions can have the music have a tempo change to compensate the slower gameplay?

Also, is most these msu-1 patches based in ntsc then? I would assume that since I live in America I have naturally been patching ntsc to each of these roms and this is the first time I am noticing a change because I am using a pal rom as Conn described

JUD6MENT wrote:So what you are saying is that the music may or may not have a tempo change depending on how they are ported to pal, because megaman 2 music is slower but some games getting ported to pal versions can have the music have a tempo change to compensate the slower gameplay?

Yeah, games can be "PAL optimised" to run at the same, or similar speeds as their original 60Hz counterparts. Nintendo were good at this for example, whereas developers like Capcom almost never bothered.

JUD6MENT wrote:Also, is most these msu-1 patches based in ntsc then? I would assume that since I live in America I have naturally been patching ntsc to each of these roms and this is the first time I am noticing a change because I am using a pal rom as Conn described

Pretty much, yeah.

@red, yes I am tinkering on pal SMW2-Yoshi's Island currently, so that's why I had this rom on my hd and gave it as example to show where the fps can be seen.

it is a technical standard, like some countries have different AC feequencies. Europe TV runs on 50 fps, therefore videogames also neeeded to adapt to that. In that context, comparing pal and ntsc speedruns don't make sense.

For most games it doesn't really matter, like taking a normal level in Super mario world. The music is looping, that's it. If Mario is a bit faster, who cares?
If the music however must be synced correctly (like in voice dubs (bszelda)), you will notice that delay after a short time and the pcm:s need to be adjusted. From the coding side... well I could make all pal roms run at 60 fps, but this isn't intented by the original programmers, so better stick on tinkering the pcm:s where it is necessary.

Thanks for answering questions. It is great to learn this stuff

I noticed that track PCM-57, the end credits theme, is not on loop and needs to be looped. Is that an easy fix? If not, I can just extend my track until it finishes the end credit scene but the first PCM set will not work unless you are using the NSCT patch. That one speeds the end credits enough to barely finish the credits but the pal version has a cut off before the end.

JUD6MENT wrote:I noticed that track PCM-57, the end credits theme, is not on loop and needs to be looped. Is that an easy fix? If not, I can just extend my track until it finishes the end credit scene but the first PCM set will not work unless you are using the NSCT patch. That one speeds the end credits enough to barely finish the credits but the pal version has a cut off before the end.

You could edit the loop table in the ASM, apply it to a fresh ROM and then make a patch out of that and include it in your PCM pack. The value highlighted in blue below is track 57 (hexadecimal 39). Change it from $01 to $03. I've done it for a couple of games, although I'm not sure how kindly the original authors of the patches look at that kind of practice. Or ask Conn to find that loop value in the patched ROM for a simple hex edit rather than creating another patch. In my opinion the patch is more end-user friendly, but as easy as hex editing is it can seem a little daunting to some.



Or you can time the ending and extend it to match.

I set this track $39 to loop,
http://bszelda.zeldalegends.net/stuff/Con/Terranigma_msu1.zip

(refresh browser history if the patch date isn't 20th October 2020 )

If the main patch has that track looped now then the other PCM packs might need an update for that track, if the author chooses to.

The track indeed should loop:
https://youtu.be/TPe7NFns0g4

But the track in red's package has a length of 5:40, longer than the credits are displayed, so there's nothing to do

Cool, if it definitely should loop then that's the end of that.

Oh I just re-calculated the ending credits and it takes longer than those 5:40 of Red's pcm. Ah well, it simply starts anew then. Kurrono packs never loop as well and no one really ever complained.

Conn wrote:The track indeed should loop:
https://youtu.be/TPe7NFns0g4

But the track in red's package has a length of 5:40, longer than the credits are displayed, so there's nothing to do

His track is already looped so it is ready to go. If you are using the NSTC patch the track will get cutoff before the ending anyway because of the gameplay speedup, but if you are using the pal patch, you will need it to loop to reach the end (which is how I figured out it is not looping).

Thanks for the quick fix Conn. I should have my PCM pack and youtube preview up tomorrow.

Ok, it is ready!

Terranigma Orchestral Set presented by JUD6MENT:
https://mega.nz/file/KrZjUSqD#Kj0Db2VgH0O-Cmur7H3dfyrbJftdklvRDF6ztY4TFlM

Youtube Preview:
https://youtu.be/c7aKITkAoXA

Wow this project was long and fun to do. It had fantastic music and I hope you all get a chance to play it. Enjoy! I will add timestamps to this hour long video later today. I also made a few different tracks to adjust the 10% music increase with the NTSC patch to help the music cutscenes to be sure to read the "READ ME" file with the download.

If someone can move the download link and Youtube preview to the fist post that would be great. Thank You.

Updated first post, thanks a lot

RedScorpion wrote:Sounds nice!

Thanks, I just got timestamps into the video. It was a long preview so it took a bit.

JUD6MENT wrote:Ok, it is ready!

Terranigma Orchestral Set presented by JUD6MENT:
https://mega.nz/file/KrZjUSqD#Kj0Db2VgH0O-Cmur7H3dfyrbJftdklvRDF6ztY4TFlM

Youtube Preview:
https://youtu.be/c7aKITkAoXA

Wow this project was long and fun to do. It had fantastic music and I hope you all get a chance to play it. Enjoy! I will add timestamps to this hour long video later today. I also made a few different tracks to adjust the 10% music increase with the NTSC patch to help the music cutscenes to be sure to read the "READ ME" file with the download.

If someone can move the download link and Youtube preview to the fist post that would be great. Thank You.

Boy, how beautiful is this PCM,
thank you very much for your dedication, hard work,
the ending was also wonderful for theme 57,
wow: super, super wonderful, thank you so much !!!

Thanks vvv18,
out of curiosity, which ending credit track are you referring to? The one with lyrics or without?

JUD6MENT wrote:Thanks vvv18,
out of curiosity, which ending credit track are you referring to? The one with lyrics or without?

Hi...
I loved the final two tracks, but the letter one I liked even more, perfect !!!

Roman Heuser made a new Terranigma track, here is a downlaod of my single track updated:

Single Track Update - Laboratory PCM 21:
https://mega.nz/file/y6xQjIxA#1Y_nDDR9lGb2ArY91xHmwIj3FsoUHPRCNjAh1Dt__Gs

Give me a little time and I will have a YouTube Preview and a new main PCM album update link. Here is Roman Heuser's new track if you want to hear it.