Way cool: Mario World code injection w/ SNES controller

[SlitheryDee]

no, I get it, but who cares..

the end result is what matters... yay, pong or snake.. show me something cool. What they did was not cool.

So it's not enough that the bear dances?

 

[BoberFett]

no, I get it, but who cares..

the end result is what matters... yay, pong or snake.. show me something cool. What they did was not cool.

What they did WAS cool, for anybody with an IQ higher than that of a turnip.

 

[KeithTalent]

Very cool, though I'm still not entirely sure I understand exactly how they did it. :hmm:

KT

 

[slayer202]

Very cool, though I'm still not entirely sure I understand exactly how they did it. :hmm:

KT

 

[TallBill]

no, I get it, but who cares..

the end result is what matters... yay, pong or snake.. show me something cool. What they did was not cool.

You're entitled to your wrong opinion.

 

[Ichinisan]

x2

yay, you can play pong or snake.. that's... umm.. boring.

They loaded Super Mario Bros also.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHlGY40XU_o#t=7m7s
(jump to 7m7s)

At the presentation, the graphics were a little glitchy (they never saw it do that before). They also had to wrap-up the presentation because there wasn't much time.

From what I understand, it's supposed to be a pixel-accurate version of SMB with perfect play control and the wanted to have an SMB speed-runner play it.

 

[88keys]

How the hell did these guys even come up with this? I mean, how did they know that glitching the graphics would open up these tables allowing them to program within the game?

Lack of sex can drive men to accomplish amazing yet pointless feats.

 

[CZroe]

didn't gameshark actually end up being the "winner" of those devices? i remember them being around a lot longer. i remember having one for psx that owned too. it plugged into the expansion port on the rear of hte console.

Interact GameShark = Datel Action Replay. Their website always said something like "The Action Replay is a different device from another company called Datel" in response to questions about them being the same but you can take it apart and look at the PCB.

 

[slayer202]

8 controllers is 100% possible with 2 multitaps.

didn't know there were legit multitaps for snes :hmm: well ok then

 

[Jeff7]

How the hell did these guys even come up with this? I mean, how did they know that glitching the graphics would open up these tables allowing them to program within the game?

Lack of sex can drive men to accomplish amazing yet pointless feats.

Meanwhile, similar obsession with or devotion to a sport would be regarded far more favorably.



"So the idea here is to use a special stick to hit a ball into a tiny hole that's far away. But we can make the game slightly more interesting by making the ball fly better. Let's use advanced fluid dynamics simulations to figure out how to do that."
= Divots in a golf ball.

 

[zinfamous]

What they did WAS cool, for anybody with an IQ higher than that of a turnip.

I know I have a higher IQ than a turnip, but I also know that this will never be considered cool by anyone that is actually cool.


ever.

 

[BoberFett]

I know I have a higher IQ than a turnip, but I also know that this will never be considered cool by anyone that is actually cool.


ever.

You're a bro, aren't you?

 

[zinfamous]

You're a bro, aren't you?

haha, no. Did I say that I didn't think it was cool?

My point stands.

 

[Jeff7]

Sup, brah?

 

[mrjminer]

Very cool, though I'm still not entirely sure I understand exactly how they did it. :hmm:

KT

They didn't explain it very well in the video. From what I could gather, the movements and actions of Mario was actually gathering the textures and/or sending commands into some sort of underlying game compiler or parser used by the game, and they did this to

Spoiler

create their pong and snake games (possibly the 'The End' screen, too?)

. I think that's why they said it looks like what Mario is doing is not ideal, but intentional. Only watched it once though, so I may have misunderstood.

 

[Ichinisan]

They didn't explain it very well in the video. From what I could gather, the movements and actions of Mario was actually gathering the textures and/or sending commands into some sort of underlying game compiler or parser used by the game, and they did this to

Spoiler

create their pong and snake games (possibly the 'The End' screen, too?)

. I think that's why they said it looks like what Mario is doing is not ideal, but intentional. Only watched it once though, so I may have misunderstood.

Yeah. Most of that gameplay glitching was loading the code into the OAM table. Ultimately, that code would just direct the system to read bits from the controller ports. Once they triggered the glitch to execute code from the corrupted OAM table, it copied the new programs directly from the controller registers by reading bits representing the on/off state of each button. At that point, they simulated 2 multi taps (8 controllers) for maximum bandwidth to push the new program code.

 

[Genx87]

Rusty was a genius ahead of his time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3mvQ8V6evY

 

[IHateMyJob2004]

Cliff's: Bunch of nerds have some elite hacking skills and too much time on their hand. All impressive but if you came to my company and this was the only thing on your resume, we'd probably pass on you.

 

[TheVrolok]

I really want to be impressed by this.. but it's kinda meh to me. Everyone needs a hobby, I suppose, even one's as niche as this.

 

[HeXen]

x2

yay, you can play pong or snake.. that's... umm.. boring.

x3.
They could have spent that time making a fan made mario game home-brew or something. I actually want a modernized Zelda 2 on home-brew on Neo Geo hardware, but then smart people go and do this stupid crap instead.

 

[CZroe]

I don't think people realize the ramifications of an exploit like this on a modern console. It's similar to when Phantasy Star Online was exploited on the GameCube to run homebrew through the Broadband Adapter (BBA) and people used that homebrew to write a backup loader to the memory card that you could invoke without Phantasy Star Online or BBA (Action Replay with Samson's loader). With the right homebrew it loaded homebrew and backups from discs without a mod chip (Viper chip's software was extracted and released by a rival group). There are also similar exploits for the PS2 including Freedom, Memor32, and FMCB, but they require a mod chip or previous exploit to propagate.

Now, it's freakin' awesome that they did it with controller input alone: no intercept server/BBA or copying from a previous exploit.

x3.
They could have spent that time making a fan made mario game home-brew or something. I actually want a modernized Zelda 2 on home-brew on Neo Geo hardware, but then smart people go and do this stupid crap instead.

LOL! I was actually kind of annoyed until I realized that this was a joke making fun of these stupid expectations.

Anyway, I'm not sure people understand what is possible here. This isn't a modern console with gobs of RAM intended for loading entire levels off a storage medium. The RAM is far more limited than it looks because all the resource data (sprites, images, samples, etc) are mapped to memory directly from ROM (sprites, images, etc) or offloaded into another processor's memory (SPC700 sound samples). Though it's all "in memory" because the ROM is part of the memory map there isn't enough room in actual Random Access memory to load your own equivalent stuff there. Games created this way either have to be really simple like NES games or they have to use ROM resources from the game they exploited like the snake and pong games.

 

[ImpulsE69]

What they did WAS cool, for anybody with an IQ higher than that of a turnip.

Yes, it was cool. Although, I think what is cooler is how they are able to do it live while 'playing' the game. That takes some precision and memory. He must have done that hundreds of times to just pull it off at will like that. Is position on the map part of it, or are they simply entering keystrokes in order and not concerned about anything else?

 

[Ichinisan]

Yes, it was cool. Although, I think what is cooler is how they are able to do it live while 'playing' the game. That takes some precision and memory. He must have done that hundreds of times to just pull it off at will like that. Is position on the map part of it, or are they simply entering keystrokes in order and not concerned about anything else?

Their bot is playing the game. Timing has to be absolutely precise. Most of that initial stuff was loading objects into the OAM table, specifically for their X/Y coordinates to be interpreted later as code.

 

[ImpulsE69]

Their bot is playing the game. Timing has to be absolutely precise. Most of that initial stuff was loading objects into the OAM table, specifically for their X/Y coordinates to be interpreted later as code.

Aww, that makes it a bit less cool then. Still cool though Lol.

 

[CZroe]

Aww, that makes it a bit less cool then. Still cool though Lol.

There are people who have "played" the same injection exploit to glitch to the end of the game in a legit speedrun, but that only takes a relatively tiny bit to make a pointer in memory (not kilobytes and kilobytes of kilobytes of code that has to be precisely played in).