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v2.0.0
Changelog from v1.2.0
Improvements
A Virtual Boy frame lasts 19.9 ms (it shows about 50 frames a second), so a scene runs at full speed when every frame is ready within 19.9 ms. 18 ms is the safety margin we aim for, so heavier moments the bench didn't catch still fit. 21 of the 26 games (24 released, 2 unreleased prototypes) now run at full speed in every scene the speed benchmark times, on both a Wii and a Wii U in Wii mode (vWii): 3-D Tetris, Bound High!, Dragon Hopper, Golf, Innsmouth no Yakata, Jack Bros., Mario Clash, Mario's Tennis, Niko-chan Battle, SD Gundam - Dimension War, Space Invaders Virtual Collection, Space Squash, Teleroboxer, V-Tetris, Virtual Bowling, Virtual Boy Wario Land, Virtual Fishing, Virtual Lab, Virtual League Baseball, Waterworld, and Zero Racers. Full speed here means a scene's slowest stretch of 50 frames takes 18.0 ms a frame or less.
4 more games run at full speed, or close to it: Galactic Pinball, Nester's Funky Bowling, Panic Bomber, and Red Alarm. In these, some scenes have a slowest stretch between 18.1 and 19.9 ms. That is still fast enough for the Virtual Boy, with less room to spare. The one exception is a scene of Vertical Force, which Known Issues describes.
In v1.2.0, 58 of the 859 scenes the benchmark times had a stretch over 19.9 ms on a vWii. In this release one scene does. These are the games that had scenes over 19.9 ms on a vWii in v1.2.0:
| Game | Scenes over in v1.2.0 | Scenes over now |
|---|---|---|
| Vertical Force | 19 | 1 |
| Jack Bros. | 15 | 0 |
| Virtual Boy Wario Land | 5 | 0 |
| Panic Bomber | 5 | 0 |
| Galactic Pinball | 4 | 0 |
| Red Alarm | 4 | 0 |
| Teleroboxer | 2 | 0 |
| Dragon Hopper | 2 | 0 |
| Innsmouth no Yakata | 2 | 0 |
v1.2.0 said every room of Virtual Boy Wario Land ran at full speed, which came from timing Wario walking and jumping through each room. The benchmark's fuller test, which also breaks blocks and fights enemies, found the five scenes above.
Wii U version
This release adds a version for the Wii U itself, vbcgx-wiiu.wuhb, which runs under Aroma. Copy it to sd:/wiiu/apps/ on the SD card and start it from the Wii U Menu. Games go in vbcgx/roms/, the same folder the Wii version uses.
Tested on a Wii U so far: the menu, the GamePad, touch on the GamePad screen, and cover art all work, and games such as Virtual Boy Wario Land and Vertical Force run well.
The Wii U version has been timed too, on a real Wii U: 17 of the 26 games run at full speed there, 6 run at full speed or close to it, and Galactic Pinball, Panic Bomber and Vertical Force are slightly over in a few scenes. The speeds stated above are for the Wii version, timed on a Wii and on a Wii U in Wii mode (vWii). Reports from Wii U owners are welcome.
Controls
Stick directions can now be mapped in the button mapping screen, on the Wii and the Wii U. To map one, move the stick when the screen asks for a button. Each direction is shown by name, such as "LS UP" and "RS LEFT", and "C UP" for the GameCube controller's C-stick. By default the left stick is mapped to the left d-pad and the right stick to the right d-pad Mappings saved by older versions keep working and get the stick defaults added.
Pictures that changed slightly
A few speedups change what is drawn, and they are listed here. Every other scene the benchmark times draws the same pictures and plays the same sound as v1.2.0. A picture is 384 by 224 pixels.
- Innsmouth no Yakata: the house at the start of the intro (the mansion fading in, the fog drifting past it, and the fade out, about 20 seconds in all) is drawn every other frame, so it moves 25 times a second instead of 50. I couldn't see a difference visually, and it was the only way that I could get this scene to run at full speed.
- Vertical Force and Jack Bros., when a color pack is in use: the Virtual Boy's right-eye picture is never shown, so these two games no longer color it. A few colors on the screen are partly decided from it, so an enemy can briefly show another one of its colors. In the test scenes that happened in 406 of 83,800 frames (0.5%), never for more than 9 frames in a row (0.18 seconds), and never over more than 435 pixels. In Jack Bros. (Japan), the caption on the Fairy Forest area card also turns yellow 4 frames early. Save states made with v1.2.0 still load in both games.
- Red Alarm (USA and Japan): the app colors parts of the picture by how deep they sit, and for this game it now searches a narrower range of depths. In the test scenes 192 of 17,900 frames (USA) and 124 of 15,400 (Japan) change. A few lines or pieces of the display take a slightly different depth color for a frame or two. Half of those frames change 14 pixels or fewer, and the most is 1,305 pixels.
Menu
- The Wiimote Orientation setting is gone.
- The on-screen keyboard's keys no longer have stripes on their faces.
Bug Fixes
Loading a save state now colors the picture as it would be colored if the game were loaded with that state, no matter what was on screen before.
Known Issues
One scene is still over: in Vertical Force, the second base of stage 2 (the white towers, cannon pods, and the snowfield). Its slowest stretch takes 20.1 ms a frame on a vWii, which is just over the 19.9 ms the Virtual Boy needs, so on a vWii that stretch can run slightly slow. On a Wii it takes 19.5 ms, which is inside the limit. Every other scene of the 26 games takes 19.9 ms or less on both consoles.
Reports of other slow spots are very welcome.
How the speeds were measured
Each speed is a scene's slowest stretch of 50 frames, in milliseconds per frame. Every scene of the 26 games, 859 in all, was timed with 2.0.0 on both a Wii and a Wii U in Wii mode (vWii).
Every time is on the speed benchmark. The Wii U version's own timings are on its Wii U tab.
v1.2.0
Changelog from v1.1.0
Improvements
Virtual Boy Wario Land now runs at full speed in every room. In v1.1.0, many rooms after the first one slowed down.
Long play sessions no longer pause briefly now and then when the recompiler runs out of room for new code.
Menu
- The VBoy Color GX logo's highlight is lighter.
- The menu music is 20% louder.
Bug Fixes
A few rare cases where one frame showed wrong or missing colors are fixed. They could happen after a rewind or a state load, when a game drew straight into the picture, after a game reset its display partway through a frame, or after a color mode change at the wrong moment.
Known Issues
Two scenes outside gameplay can still slow down: Mario Clash's opening movie, slightly, and the house picture at the start of Innsmouth no Yakata. Reports of other slow spots are very welcome.
v1.1.0
Changelog from v1.0.1
New Feature: WiiFlow Plugin Integration
WiiFlow Lite can now launch Virtual Boy games straight into VBoy Color GX. Pick a game in WiiFlow's Virtual Boy view and it starts right away, with no menu first.
The release zip includes a plugin that finds your games in sd:/vbcgx/roms/. Copy the zip's wiiflow folder to your SD card, then turn on the "Virtual Boy" plugin in WiiFlow's settings.
Improvements
Two of the three scenes that slowed down in v1.0.1 are now much faster. Speeds are each scene's slowest stretch, in frames per second; the Virtual Boy runs at 50.27.
| Scene | Console | v1.0.1 | v1.1.0 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mario Clash's opening movie | Wii | 24 | 50 |
| Wii U (vWii) | 24 | 48 | |
| Zero Racers' title screen | Wii | 26 | full speed |
| Wii U (vWii) | 26 | full speed | |
| Innsmouth no Yakata's house | Wii U (vWii) | 23 | 28 |
Every game still draws exactly the same pictures and plays exactly the same sound as before.
Known Issues
Some spots in real play can still slow down, like parts of Virtual Boy Wario Land after the first room. Reports of other slow spots are very welcome.