Monthly Archives: October 2011

Honestly, I was hoping to find an excuse for a 1.1.1.1 version, and one has arrived!

I’m only including one change in this release, compliments of BryWI who both discovered and fixed this issue. The first code change from the 3DO community! A fitting landmark for the memorable version of 1.1.1.1. Thank you BryWI!

Bug fix:

1. When using a POV hat on a controller, the LEFT and UP combination was not working correctly. Previously, this was being processed as only LEFT.

Also, I had mentioned this once before, but I finally have received confirmation that the fourdo.com website will be changing hosts in the upcoming week. There will most likely be an outage of a few days, but don’t be alarmed!

If you want to try 4DO 1.1.1.1 beta, head to to the download page:
4DO Downloads

My main focus for this release was error logging. 4DO now logs all unhandled exceptions. Obviously, this will help in determining the root cause of crash reports.

I also found myself annoyed with the audio (such as the volume eclipsing everything else on my system, like Skype or music). So, I have modified the audio processing and provided the ability to control volume. I also happened to find a game with easily demonstrable stereo sound: Samurai Showdown. With that I was able to piece together how to hook into stereo sound!

Features:

1. Stereo sound – Sound was previously mono, and using the right channel’s audio only.
2. Volume control – Accessed through the new “Audio” menu.
3. Error logging – Logging gets dropped into a new “Temp” folder. This logging “archives” itself and will not exceed a certain size.

Fixes:

1. The void area pattern now will correctly show up if the emulator is stopped and the screen is entirely black.
2. Fixed a crash occasionally seen when saving or loading save states.

If you want to try 4DO 1.1.1.0 beta, head to to the download page:
4DO Downloads

I have finished the unique game identification system, so I have completed my last task that I was attempting to accomplish for a beta version of 4DO! 4DO now comes with a game database built-in, so it is able to identify any game loaded regardless of whether it’s in CD or ISO format.

Each official 3DO CD (that I’m aware of) is unique given the first 4k of data (sectors 0 and 1 on the CD). This includes any game and sampler and even the adult titles! CDs that are part of a multi-part game (like Daedalus Encounter) are still unique.

Here are some key points

• A game loaded by CD will no longer “share” save states with other games loaded by CD.
• A game loaded by CD will use the same save states as the same game loaded as an ISO.
• The “game database” is extensible. It is even extensible in the sense that 4DO should be able to augmented to handle games that aren’t unique in the first 4k of data (if necessary, though I doubt it).
• Save states filenames now have the following format:
  [GameId]_[GameName]_[SaveSlotNumber].4dosav
  Example: 2DDBB4AA_KillingTime.0.4dosav
  
• The game’s title now shows up in the 4DO window’s title bar.
• You can also view game information (Help -> Game Information). This isn’t particularly important for most folks, but it will help identify if there are certain games out there that are not properly “unique” and need to be explicitly added to the game database. Only two games with the same Sector 0+1 Checksum are really of concern.

These changes have also occurred since the last alpha release:

• Settings files have been moved to a Settings sub-folder.
• If you used an alpha version of 4DO and desperately want to keep your settings, move your FourDO.settings and JohnnyInputBindings.xml files into the Settings folder.
• NVRAM save data has been moved to a new Saves sub-folder.
• If you want to keep your old NVRAM save data from 4DO alpha, move your NVRAM_SaveData.ram file into the Saves folder.
• Save states have also been moved to the Saves sub-folder.

If you used 4DO alpha and want to preserve your save states, you’ll need to do those one-by-one:

1. First, find the old save state you’re interested in. If you played by CD, the old save state is the folder where 4DO.exe lives. If you played by ISO, the old save state is in the folder where the ISO lives.
2. Copy the old save state into the (4DO)Saves folder.
3. Start up 4DO.
4. Load the game you care about.
5. Save state
6. There will now be a new file with the appropriate name in the (4DO)Saves folder.
7. Rename your old save state to match the new name (and delete the new file, obviously).

It is quite possible that you are now angry, but I’ll quell your fears by assuring you that now that things are in beta I’m intending to never change formats in a non-backwards compatible way again. As I promised before, I intended for beta (and beyond) to be stable in this regard.

Also, the 4DO site will be moving soon. I’m not particularly experienced with this web space registration mumbo jumbo so I wouldn’t be surprised if this site is down for a few days while I figure out the transition. Some content may be lost, but I doubt that’s terribly devasting to anybody. The new location should allow me to add a few things like a wiki or a forum.

If you want to try 4DO 1.1.0.0 beta, head to to the download page:
4DO Downloads