Welcome to the Windows 95 Phoenix Arcade Emulator by Chris Hardy ================================================================ (For best results read this text file with word pad, with View/Options/Text/Wrap to Window turned on) Quick Starter Requirements - Windows 95 - Direct X 2 or 3 installed - Phoenix and optionally Pleaids ROM images The ROMS should be called - Phoenix ROMS IC23,IC24,IC39,IC40,IC45,IC46,IC47,IC48,IC49,IC50,IC51,IC52 (These were the original ZIPed version from ftp.tant.com) or PHOENIX.23,PHOENIX.24,PHOENIX.39,PHOENIX.40,PHOENIX.45, PHOENIX.46,PHOENIX.47,PHOENIX.48,PHOENIX.49,PHOENIX.50, PHOENIX.51,PHOENIX.52 (This is the format Dave Spicer uses) Pleaids ROMS PLEAIDES.26,PLEAIDES.27,PLEAIDES.44,PLEAIDES.45,PLEAIDES.47 PLEAIDES.48,PLEAIDES.49,PLEAIDES.50,PLEAIDES.51,PLEAIDES.52 PLEAIDES.53,PLEAIDES.54 (NOTE : The number on the end of the names differ between Phoenix and Pleaids.) Instructions To run this emulator you will need to get the Phoenix and optionally Pleaids Arcade machine rom images. These can be obtained from ftp.tant.com or any of the popular Arcade ROM sites. I cannot and will not supply the copyrighted ROM's to people, so don't bother asking ;-) You will also need to have Windows 95 and DirectX 2 or 3 installed on your machine. DirectX can be obtained from Microsoft's web site (try www.microsoft.com/msdownload/directx3.htm ) or just pick up a magazine with a Windows Direct X game demo and install it. (You can un-install the game demo, DirectX should remain on your system). Note - If you download DirectX from www.microsoft.com you DONT need the full DirectX SDK (The 28meg file), you only need the WEBDIST.exe file (The 10 meg file). This contains all the runtime libraries necessary to use DirectX. Put the rom images into the same directory as the executable and start the emulator by running the phoenix.exe program. (If you only have the Pleaids rom's start the emulator with "phoenix pl". Keyboard Controls - Arrow Keys to move the ship - CTRL to fire missile - SHIFT or Down arrow key for shield (not used in Pleaids) - Usual Dave Spicer controls 1,2,3 "1" to start 1 player "2" to start 2 player "3" to insert coin Actually the SHIFT key does have a use in Pleaids, as Stuart Campbell pointed out to me in an email. Stuart Campbell says "The "shield" button IS in fact used in Pleiads - it was called "Warp" on the arcade machine, and it simply hyperspaces you to a random point on the bottom of the screen." I was wondering why, in the demo mode, the ship suddenly jumps across the screen. This explains why. Joystick Controls - Joypad/Joystick to move the ship - Button 1 to fire - Button 2 or Down on the joystick to enable shields - "Select" button to insert a coin. (Button10) - "Start" button to select a 1 player game. (Button9) - The 1,2,3 keys still work if the joystick is selected Screen Modes Phoenix supports all the screen modes which DirectDraw supports, (8,16,24,32 bit), but 256 colour modes are the fastest. The emulator will run faster in lower resolutions as this means that DirectDraw has more video memory for the graphics. Whats the number in the Window title The number in the window title is the Frames Per Second that the emulator is running at. This number should be approximagely 60fps. If the emulator is running at a lower frame rate change the Refresh rate in the "Refresh" menu item to something other than Every Frame. (Never means that the screen will never be re-drawn and the fps will be the fastest emulation possible on your machine). If I run the game in 256 colour mode, 640x480 and set the Refresh to Every 4th frame, my DX2-80 486 machine I have at home will run the game at 60fps. On a Pentium 133 it will run at full speed displaying Every frame in a 3x3 window. Problems "I installed DirectX and Windows won't startup" This problem sometimes occurs when a driver is installed but won't startup, (ie some Rendition 3D boards). Try copying the DirectX installation directory (normally called redist) to your harddrive, and boot in Safe mode. Then use the Display control panel to install and select your card (without rebooting). I can't be responsible for any problems you have installing DirectX on your machine. Contact Microsoft if you have problems. It's their program. "Hardware Device driver not available" If a message is displayed that say's that DirectDraw is reporting that there is not any hardware devices available, it means that your Windows video card driver is not fully DirectX compatible. This means that DirectDraw cannot utilise any of the hardware functions of the card, (ie image blitters, video memory, scalable windows), and therefore will be slower at emulation. Generally this means that you have either an unsupported card or you have installed older drivers over the DirectX drivers (ie the Diamond Stealth InControl program). Try re-installing the drivers that came on the Windows 95 CDROM and re-install DirectX. Thanks to Moose O'Mally for helping me sort out this problem. "I've got my Joystick plugged but Phoenix won't let me select it" You either haven't plugged in your joystick properly (or it is in the wrong port), or you haven't installed the windows joystick drivers. Start the control panel and there should be a joystick icon. If there isn't click on Add Hardware, say No to "do you want to detect new hardware" and click Next, Now pick "Sound, video and game controllers", and click Next, Select Microsoft for the manufacturer, and select Gameport Joystick. Click Next and you will be asked for your Windows CD/disks. After the driver has been installed you will need to reboot. When the machine has re-booted, open the control panel, and select the Joystick icon which has appeared. Using this select your joystick type, calibrate and test it. You should now be able to use your joystick in the emulator. "The emulator starts and then just exits" (Hey it always exists somewhere !!!!. Thanks Phil for correcting my spelling) An error exception has happening somewhere in the initialisation. Contact me as I have a debug version which gives more error messages. Bugs - The background scrolling layer is displayed one character line down. - There is a blank line of characters in the background which shouldn't be there. - There are a couple of palette bugs in Phoenix - FIXED (I hope) - I'm not sure if the palette for Pleaids is the same as Phoenix. I last saw the arcade machine when I was 15. Can anyone supply me with a photo or a scan of some of the arcade screens, or the actual palette? - The display window size is a few pixels out vertically. This is why the scrolling background skips lines when it scrolls down. (The arcade screen image is being stretched) - FIXED - The eagles don't change colour when they should. They are meant to be green and purple in the second wave. I just haven't gotten round to implementing the palette change bit in the video control register. - FIXED History and Thank You's This is my first emulator project, and only really got started because of the excellent Phoenix memory map which was written by Ralph Kimmlingen and ftp'ed to the wiretap FTP site. My thanks to Ralph for publically providing this information. The emulator is written completely in Visual C 4.0. The Phoenix/Pleaids emulator was written over a short period of about 1 1/2 months due to the use of an already existing Z80 emulator by Marat Fayzullin. Knowing that the processor code is correct allowed me to concentrate on the graphics code. Thanks to Peter Johnson, the D3D god, for the base DirectDraw code which got my windows code started. Thanks to Leo Skirenko for the Z80 knowledge. Thanks to Marat Fayzullin (fms@freeflight.com) for the Z80 emulator. I hope that he doesn't mind me using it. And finally, thanks to all the guys who have given me memory maps for future emulators and beta tested my first emulator, Moose O'Mally, Clive Bittlestone, Bruce Farmer and Gary Sheperdson. Enjoy and have great retro memories... may they be as good as you remember them being. Chris Hardy (chrish@kcbbs.gen.nz) 10/11/96 The latest version should be at Moose's Arcade Emulator page http://www.rocknet.net.au/~moose/ or at Phil's Arcade Page http://www.netcomuk.co.uk/~pmorrisb/index.html. Check both as one may have a newer version. Changes : 10/11/96 1.00 - First public release 16/11/96 1.01 - Fixed a bug where every keypress was used. Even when the windows was not active. - Added support for new Taito phoenix roms from ftp.tant.com. (called phoenix.XX instead of ICXX) and Dave Spicers names 18/11/96 1.02 - Fixed window size problem. Now it looks much better with no pixel stretching - After many requests from people added the Down key for shields. (see I do listen) 24/11/96 1.03 - Fixed some palette bugs - Added palette swap support. Now the eagles are the correct colours - Added Joystick support. That should keep a few people happy COPYRIGHT INFO The ROM's that this emulator requires are the copyright of the original owners. This emulator is Freeware, which means you can give it to your friends, (WITHOUT the roms), or anyone else. The emulator is still Copyright Chris Hardy 1996. The emulator is NOT to be included on any CDROM's without my permission. If you wish to include this emulator on a CDROM then email me for permission. (Which will probably be given if I can have a copy of the CDROM ;-) Disclaimer By using this program you are assuming complete responsibilty for your PC. This means I won't be responsible for any damage you do to your PC trying to install and run this emulator. More Legal stuff originally from Dave Spicer emulator readme, which I am applying to my emulator also. Anyone using this program does so at their own risk. The author does not accept any liability for loss or damage arising from its use. Permission is granted to upload the original zip file to any ftp or web site where it may be publicly acccessed, just so long as the zip is UNALTERED. Yes, 'unaltered' does mean not rezipping the directory with an extra text file saying 'downloaded from Fred Bloggs web page'. The idea is to remove the chance of viruses getting into the distribution. In particular, NO ROM IMAGES FROM THE SUPPORTED GAMES SHOULD BE INCLUDED WITH THE EMULATOR. Doing so annoys both the coin-op companies and me. The author will not be held responsible for any copyright violations by users of the emulator and actively discourages any such violations. All other forms of distribution are strictly prohibited. This restriction includes, but is not limited to, distribution in Internet compilation disks/cds, shareware libraries, magazine cover disks/cds and any other media. (with the exception noted in the previous paragraph)