Unofficial CD32 conversions project

[earok]

Hi all,

I've been working with a couple of others to do a whole lot of unofficial CD32 conversions. We're doing a mix of standalone releases and small compilations of related games, all of them with DVD sized covers (similar in philosophy to the excellent RGCD releases). For the first month, we're going to release one a day through a blog, with the next iteration of my big compilation at the end of the month.

We've already pretty much sorted out what games we're going to release this month, but any feedback or future requests would be appreciated.

(Edit: gazj82 has provided A4 sized PDFs that will yield an accurate DVD sized cover when printed, they can be downloaded here - http://www.gmjelec.co.uk/files/cd32.zip and http://www.gmjelec.co.uk/files/cd32guest.zip)

One-a-day September releases!
Sep 1st: Flashback
Sep 2nd: Tearaway Thomas
Sep 3rd: Cannon Fodder (+ CDXL Intro)
Sep 4th: Rick Dangerous Collection
Sep 5th: Super Cars Collection
Sep 6th: Kick Off Collection
Sep 7th: The Great Giana Sisters
Sep 8th: Lemmings CD32 Collection
Sep 9th: Dune II
Sep 10th: Rally Championships
Sep 11th: 4D Sports Driving
Sep 12th: Flight of the Amazon Queen
Sep 13th: Alien Breed 3D II: The Killing Grounds (2mb)
Sep 14th: Flappy Bird
Sep 15th: Xtreme Racing
Sep 16th: Leading Lap MPV
Sep 17th: Slam Tilt
Sep 18th: Empire Soccer '94
Sep 19th: Nemac IV: The Director's Cut
Sep 20th: Lionheart
Sep 21th: Breathless
Sep 22th: Football Glory
Sep 23th: Bomberman CD32 Collection
Sep 24th: Cannon Fodder: The CD32 Collection
Sep 25th: Giana Sisters CD32 Collection
Sep 26th: James Pond CD32 Collection
Sep 27th: Sensible Soccer Anthology + SWOS 96'/97'
Sep 28th: Alien Breed Saga
Sep 29th: Worms Collection
Sep 30th: 160 games compilation

Encore series!
October 1st: Ruff N Tumble
October 2nd: Microprose Formula One Grand Prix
October 3rd: Stunt Car Racer
October 4th: Shadow of the Beast Trilogy

Guest releases!
October 14th by Cobe: Mortal Kombat I & Mortal Kombat II
October 27th by Scorpion: CD32 Compilation Volume 1
October 28th by Cobe: Virtual Karting 1+2
November 5th by Cobe: Tiny Troops
December 28th by Cobe: Wonderdog
February 15th by Cobe: Legend of Kyrandia

Specials!
December 25th: 2014 CD32 Amiga Community Compilation
January 16th: Earok's 2015 Birthday Mix

Other releases:
21st February: Inherit the Earth

Misc and tutorials:
Can't play CD-Rs in the CD32??

[Peter]

Great artwork for Flashback - nice project - CD32 owners will be really happy with this!

[Neil79]

Expect an article on IndieRetroNews soon, not now though it's nearly 1am

[SteveUK]

[turrican3]

earok,
how did you do the cd32 cdxl intro ?
which tools did you used to rip and to play the cdxl ?

[earok]

Peter and Neil79, thanks guys!

Turrican3, the process was a little messy but it went something like this:

- Estimated what frame rate / width / height I'd need for the video to play back at 2x CD speed
- Downloaded the video from youtube
- Used Switch Sound File Converter to extract the audio as an 8-bit 11025hz wav
- Resized and converted to individual PPM frames with FFMPEG

Then I switched to WinUAE and used the CDXL toolkit to do the rest

- Converted the individual PPM frames to HAM6 IFF's with PPM2ILBM (this step probably could have been done from Windows too - also I didn't use PPM2AGA because PPM2AGA doesn't guarantee the background colour will be black)
- Converted the audio file with Play16
- Finally, made the CDXL file using XLMake and XLAudio

Also for playing the video I just used the standard CDGSXL utility.


I might write a basic C# utility for Windows to automate the process.

[Cobe]

[earok]

[ali-b]

yup... I'm on the IRN coverage for Flashback and will have it written up shortly...

[s2325]

Great work on these covers

[ali-b]

It's up on Indie Retro News
http://www.indieretronews.com/2014/0...-to-amiga.html

[earok]

Thanks Ali-B, I appreciate it - any chance you can include a mention to Wepl and Psygore in the post for WHDLoad and the slave respectively? (And 'Stan' for the cover/level select screen). In truth, all I've done is package up the hard work others have done.

[Neil79]

Added

[tekopaa]

This is great!!!

gotta burn and print new games

[Amiga_CDTV]

Originally Posted by earok

I've been working with a couple of others to do a whole lot of unofficial CD32 conversions. We're doing a mix of standalone releases and small compilations of related games, all of them with DVD sized covers (similar in philosophy to the excellent RGCD releases). For the first month, we're going to release one a day through a blog, with the next iteration of my big compilation at the end of the month.

We've already pretty much sorted out what games we're going to release this month, but any feedback or future requests would be appreciated.

Wow, this looks absolutely great!

Are all of these going to be targeted to a stock, un-expanded CD32?

Would it be possible to do intro videos that would support the FMV module?!

As a suggestion for games, I'd love to see a compilation of some Taito coin-ops, like Bubble Bobble, Rainbow Islands, Parasol Stars etc. And/or a Lemmings collection! Especially a version that would use the CD32 controller better would be just awesome.

[earok]

Thanks all!

Originally Posted by Amiga_CDTV

Wow, this looks absolutely great!
Are all of these going to be targeted to a stock, un-expanded CD32?

Yep, absolutely. When and if a new Fast RAM expansion option for the CD32 comes out, we'll do a set of Fast RAM required releases to celebrate.

Edit: Having said that, a handful of the games we're doing would definitely be smoother if you've got an expanded CD32.

Originally Posted by Amiga_CDTV

Would it be possible to do intro videos that would support the FMV module?!

Possibly, but I wouldn't know how to do it. I don't have an FMV module myself, but I'd be keen to do FMV intros if a cheap substitute for the FMV module ever becomes available.

We're actually taking an existing CD32 game and substituting just the FMV module only intro with a CDXL one so that all CD32 owners can enjoy it

Originally Posted by Amiga_CDTV

As a suggestion for games, I'd love to see a compilation of some Taito coin-ops, like Bubble Bobble, Rainbow Islands, Parasol Stars etc. And/or a Lemmings collection! Especially a version that would use the CD32 controller better would be just awesome.

Steve and I actually had both ideas ourselves but we ended up only doing one of them. The other one may come in a future month. Check back on Monday

[Gzegzolka]

Great idea that is worth to approve those games should have cd32 editions long time ago

[ali-b]

Originally Posted by earok

Thanks Ali-B, I appreciate it - any chance you can include a mention to Wepl and Psygore in the post for WHDLoad and the slave respectively? (And 'Stan' for the cover/level select screen). In truth, all I've done is package up the hard work others have done.

Hi - yeah I only didn't put that in as I wanted to leave "something" on the linked page for people to find but yeah, Neil added it (he has the big red PUBLISH button )

[DDNI]

These look great!
If they use WHDLoad, is there the register nag screen? If so, how do I include my WHDLoad key?

[earok]

@ali-b Ah I see, thanks!

@DDNI - yes to WHDLoad but no nag screen as it's using the special CD32 only version that Wepl generously provided for projects such as these. So long as you've got a stock CD32 (no fastram) you won't have any issues.