Questions I've Always Wondered About

[Mamba Tabac]

There was this real GREAT swap trick with the original release of The Revenge of Shinobi, which turned it in to Super Shinobi. I seen it and wow what an upgrade!!

Really? I've got the Super Shinobi and except for the obvious, ahem 'unlicenced characters' I can't really tell any difference between this and Revenge of Shinobi

[NeoVamp]

There was this real GREAT swap trick with the original release of The Revenge of Shinobi, which turned it in to Super Shinobi. I seen it and wow what an upgrade!!

A region switch is safer, because thats probably the only thing that happened when you saw the cart get yanked out,
it just defaulted to Japanese setting.

And the unlicensed characters won't suddenly appear if you have a cartridge without them,
its not like they just made them Japan exclusive and hid them from US/EU gamers.

so other then probably a small sprite change here and there and a different
title screen i don't understand the "WOW WHAT AN UPGRADE" comment.

[17daysolderthannes]

funny, i once accidentally pulled a game out of a genesis without turning it off first and it was fine afterward. all it did was freeze the screen image.

[The Sports Guy]

Some games on Xbox will run for a bit when you take them out. Not for long though.

I know for a fact that NCAA Football 09 for PS2 will run completely fine without voices for a while before it locks up.

[saxman]

funny, i once accidentally pulled a game out of a genesis without turning it off first and it was fine afterward. all it did was freeze the screen image.

That's what I always hear people say, and I've done it a few times too. But that first time we did it when we first got our Sega Genesis, it stopped working after that. Now I've read in this topic that it would likely fry the cart before it fries the system, but that wasn't the case in my situation -- my cart still works to this day, but the system needed to be repaired. But that to me is at least proof of the claim by Sega and many others that it's not considered safe to do that. I doubt it's coincidence that it stopped working like that.

Very interesting answers though. So the cart pull creates a voltage spike that could be harmful, and the connections between the Genesis and addons can be sensitive and lose contact easily? Yeah I remember quite clearly Knuckles' Chaotix and DOOM both loving to freeze without warning, but they seem to play without any problems in an emulator. And Sega CD, well pretty much any game that I've played on that has the risk of freezing.

That reminds me, and this is maybe slightly off topic, but somewhat related -- anyone play AX-101 in a Sega CD? We had two brand new copies back in 1994 or sometime around there, and both of them would constantly advance frame - freeze - advance frame - freeze, just randomly through cinematic sequences. Sometimes it'd hold a frame for several minutes before advancing a couple frames and freezing again. BOTH copies did this. It rendered the game virtually unplayable because we only actually made it into the first level a couple times before finally returning the game. Anyone even heard of this game?

[GameUser-16-32-128]

I've actually tried the Super Shinobi trick many times on my original Model 1 HD Genesis back then. Basically it just changed the Revenge Of Shinobi title screen to the Super Shinobi and the endings had the credits instead of just a "The End". After I played the hell out of the game for months, my Genesis played just fine on the new games I acquired.

The Genesis CDX for some reason has a problem with freezing while playing Road Avenger and Cobra Command. I've tried wiping the game discs clean with a soft cloth for any dust, but get the same result each time. Both of these game discs are in mint condition. It could be because the Genesis CDX CD-ROM is too slow to keep up with FMV. They're just too jawsum!

[celticsfan]

I know for a fact that NCAA Football 09 for PS2 will run completely fine without voices for a while before it locks up.

Maybe I should do that if it means getting rid of Lee Corso

[17daysolderthannes]

That's what I always hear people say, and I've done it a few times too. But that first time we did it when we first got our Sega Genesis, it stopped working after that. Now I've read in this topic that it would likely fry the cart before it fries the system, but that wasn't the case in my situation -- my cart still works to this day, but the system needed to be repaired. But that to me is at least proof of the claim by Sega and many others that it's not considered safe to do that. I doubt it's coincidence that it stopped working like that.

Very interesting answers though. So the cart pull creates a voltage spike that could be harmful, and the connections between the Genesis and addons can be sensitive and lose contact easily? Yeah I remember quite clearly Knuckles' Chaotix and DOOM both loving to freeze without warning, but they seem to play without any problems in an emulator. And Sega CD, well pretty much any game that I've played on that has the risk of freezing.

That reminds me, and this is maybe slightly off topic, but somewhat related -- anyone play AX-101 in a Sega CD? We had two brand new copies back in 1994 or sometime around there, and both of them would constantly advance frame - freeze - advance frame - freeze, just randomly through cinematic sequences. Sometimes it'd hold a frame for several minutes before advancing a couple frames and freezing again. BOTH copies did this. It rendered the game virtually unplayable because we only actually made it into the first level a couple times before finally returning the game. Anyone even heard of this game?

It sounds like you may just be too rough with your systems. All of those problems sound like common symptoms of damaged/loose/dirty pin connectors. Perhaps when you pulled the cartridge out of your Genesis (first video game system? first time using it? were you a kid?) you actually just pulled it at such a steep angle that you permanently bent the pins and kept it from connecting with the game.

Some games on Xbox will run for a bit when you take them out. Not for long though.

I know for a fact that NCAA Football 09 for PS2 will run completely fine without voices for a while before it locks up.

Tony Hawk ?3? runs with the DVD ejected sans music indefinitely I believe. I just wasn't paying attention and ejected the disc one time and I was like "huh, it still works..."

Maybe I should do that if it means getting rid of Lee Corso

or you could just turn down the announcer volume...

[celticsfan]

or you could just turn down the announcer volume...

Just a joke...don't actually own the game

[Devil N]

Tony Hawk ?3? runs with the DVD ejected sans music indefinitely I believe. I just wasn't paying attention and ejected the disc one time and I was like "huh, it still works..."

The greatest example of this was the original Ridge Racer for the PS1. That game loaded itself entirely into memory at startup, after which you could remove the disc and the game continued running just fine. You could even replace the disc with an audio CD of your choice, to get a different soundtrack while racing.

[Diosoth]

My copy of Knuckles Chaotix has random freezes. As all the Genesis games work fine, it's got to be a dirty cartridge that's resisted all my cleaning efforts so far.

[VinnyT]

The greatest example of this was the original Ridge Racer for the PS1. That game loaded itself entirely into memory at startup, after which you could remove the disc and the game continued running just fine. You could even replace the disc with an audio CD of your choice, to get a different soundtrack while racing.

There were a few games that did that. I use to do it with Twisted Metal, but I had to be careful when I had a CD in there and suddenly the level would end and sometimes it'd just freeze up since they were gonna get the data for the last level from Aerosmith.

Now I wanna play Twisted Metal again.

[Youngie]

Twisted Metal SUCKS (listening acdc?)

[17daysolderthannes]

My copy of Knuckles Chaotix has random freezes. As all the Genesis games work fine, it's got to be a dirty cartridge that's resisted all my cleaning efforts so far.

Knuckles Chaotix is just a picky bastard. I bought a second 32X because I thought something was wrong with the first one, and the fucker still won't play it, it freezes in the same damn spot. Its not my game because I tested it on a friend's setup and it works fine. I think its my model 2 since it apparently had a rough life with the reset broken and the pins being a little stretched and all (some games have to be reinserted a few times for them to work). As much as I like the lineup and the idea of the 32X, god dammit it is a pain to get it working.

[AD2101]

Knuckles Chaotix can be quite picky. I tried my old copy on both of my 32X's... Still froze at the same screen, which was whatever happens after you initially press start. I'm pretty sure its the only cartridge on any system I could not get to work