Project Status

Project status

Last consolidated: 2026-09-20.

Production pipeline

System	Status	Evidence and limit
Clean-ROM validation and separate output	Production	Implementation/CI-confirmed; exact USA Rev. 0 hash only
Header checksum update	Production	Implementation/CI-confirmed
Compact eight-stage selector	Production	Runtime-confirmed A-button route; compact index maps to native 0,1,2,3,4,5,8,9
1 KiB arena reservation and native payload	Production	Runtime-confirmed load/execute; guarded bounds and tests
Ordinary-pickup persistence	Production beta	All eight stages runtime-confirmed at representative locations; all 84 are statically cataloged, not individually exhausted
Stage-local pickup randomization	Production beta	All 84 implemented and tested over 250 seeds; seed TEST153 first Fire location predicted/rendered/awarded Shield; full run pending
Pickup-driven XP progression	Production beta	Diagnostic B runtime-confirmed V2 allocation, XP restore, 85/258 rewards, Temple -> Wind transition and title -> Fire retention; nine-reward/full-tier run pending
Four inventory boxes	Production beta	Runtime-confirmed switching, transition preservation, stage-key masking; Game Over/reset edge still pending
BOX n OF 4 HUD text	Production	Runtime-confirmed native text path
Boot branding and seed phrase	Production	Guarded and CI-confirmed; phrase uses a dedicated deterministic namespace
Logo and selector-save bypasses	Production	Runtime-confirmed, legal screen and later/manual saves preserved
Outfit recoloring	Production	Runtime-confirmed palette modes; static TLUT source transform
Browser/CLI shared patch core	Production beta	CI builds/tests; release UX continues to mature

Confirmed proofs, not product features

Proof	Result	Remaining work
Same-stage pickup substitution	Full identity tuple changes award and art	Generalized in current stage-local mode
Fire foreign Prison-key import	Relocated/expanded resource file plus dedicated callback works	Production resource planner, allocation policy, compatibility matrix
Prison extension-selector Potion coexistence	Out-of-stock-range selector resolves appended Water Potion bundle while vanilla Herbs remain resident and functional	Generalize into guarded production planner
Health urn external-to-embedded conversion	Runtime-confirmed: Proof H converted 0x28F..0x292 to self-contained native type-4 blocks; imported Urn of Vitality rendered/awarded correctly in Prison while vanilla Herbs remained correct	Generalized in the pure resource planner; production pipeline integration still gated
Fire ordinary enemy 0x0A -> 0x09	Spawns and plays normally	Production policy and broader coverage
Temple monk imported into Fire	Model loads, enemy moves/fights/dies	Death/despawn presentation missing; arbitrary rosters unresolved
Temple XP progression proof	Three proof pickups plus one vanilla Herbs control established no-combat-XP and pickup-driven tiers	Generalized into the production Diagnostic B architecture; full nine-tier coverage and final art remain
Reverse Elbow host/action proof + genuine MKT import branch	v6 established repeatable scheduler/action stability; v08/A1.7 runtime-confirmed genuine SCCOMBO10; Sektor direct replacements through Jump Kick / Flip Kick / Flip Punch are runtime-confirmed; v20 remains the accumulated raw-resource failure boundary	Forward Flip, Back Flip, and High Hit are runtime-confirmed in v34; Low Hit remains pending because the tested enemy route did not provide a practical crouching-hit setup. v35 runtime-confirms Sweep Fall + Sweep Getup. v36 runtime-confirms Knockdown and v37 runtime-confirms normal Getup. Continue with Stumble and the remaining direct-core states, keeping bundles inside a previously proven working file-0x87 size band. Proof ROMs from v25 onward include the confirmed post-legal logo skip for faster iteration; full-character composition still needs a storage solution

Latest runtime findings

The Temple XP proof is confirmed: combat does not award XP; collecting the proof rewards sets XP to 85 and then 258; the second threshold activates the next tier; nothing is added to inventory; ordinary pickups and progression rewards coexist. The proof model appears pale blue-grey and Herbs-like. The desired final presentation is a bright-blue body with a bronze handle.

A first production-layout attempt was Rejected / failed on 2026-09-20: Temple reached the Mission Objective screen and loaded stage music, then hung just before gameplay appeared. Production was rolled back to runtime V1.

Follow-up Diagnostic A is Runtime-confirmed: with the progression stage-entry restore helper bypassed, the same V2 allocation and generated progression callbacks loaded Temple normally. XP 85 and 258 rewards worked, special-move tiers unlocked, combo EXPERIENCE stayed suppressed, combat awarded no XP, and normal/progression Herbs coexisted with identical Herbs graphics.

Diagnostic B then removed only the early tier-evaluator call from the restore helper. It is Runtime-confirmed through Temple completion, Temple -> Wind with XP 258/two moves retained, and title-menu -> Fire with the same XP/moves retained. The original hang is therefore attributed to calling the native tier evaluator too early during stage initialization. Production now uses Diagnostic B behavior: restore XP at stage entry, but evaluate tiers only when a progression pickup is collected.

The behavioral Reverse Elbow branch is now historical host-action evidence rather than the intended final implementation. Later v8.1-v8.3 tests established usable high-speed directional motion and a proof-only forced crossover, but also exposed collision/jitter and freeze/strike mismatches inherent to recreating donor behavior with native approximations. The project has pivoted to a genuine MKT→MKMSZ compatibility layer. The single-frame import branch then resolved descriptor endianness/order, palette isolation/opacity, raw-wrapper type, and CI row-stride conversion. v08/A1.7 is runtime-confirmed: Back → Forward + Low Kick renders the genuine MKT Rev. 2 SCCOMBO10 Reptile/male-ninja frame coherently inside MKMSZ, with the true 42x95 geometry, donor palette, 44-byte aligned row stride, and clean restoration of stock Sub-Zero. This establishes genuine foreign fighter-sprite transplantation for this MKT resource family.

1.0 required scope

The 1.0 randomizer is not considered complete with stage-local shuffling alone. Required before 1.0:

1. Global cross-stage item randomization. Items must be able to appear in other main stages, requiring a production resource-import/materialization planner rather than copying stage-local resource selectors verbatim.
2. Global deterministic shuffling. Keep the current stable seeded Fisher-Yates approach, but apply it to the global logical item pool rather than eight independent stage pools.
3. Whole-run solvability validation. Reject seeds whose progression graph cannot reach the required end-state. Use current stage/location requirements as source of truth; the legacy Lua fixed-point solver is a useful design reference but its location rules are stale/incomplete. Rejected attempts must be derived deterministically from the original seed plus an explicit attempt index, so regenerating the same seed always produces the same accepted layout even when several attempts are required.
4. Randomizer HUD/UI. At minimum expose the run information needed to play the seed: check progress, required Power Upgrades/current progression status, inventory-box/page state, and useful pickup feedback. The legacy Lua overlay is a reference for semantics, not a native renderer implementation.
5. Run-resource lifecycle. Determine and preserve HP, lives, and continues correctly across stage transitions and direct selector routes; define intended Game Over/new-run resets.
6. Difficulty hard-lock. Very Hard must be enforced as a run invariant rather than only selected as a startup default.
7. Final runtime coverage. Complete a representative full global seed, including all nine progression tiers and the major lifecycle boundaries.

Open Temple Map work: the legacy Lua global pool included the scripted Map as an 85th check. For 1.0, investigate separating the Map inventory reward from the Temple elevator/exit trigger so the elevator can still be raised correctly even when the Map item itself is shuffled elsewhere. Also prevent the Map item from being removed on the Temple -> Wind transition, which is stock behavior today.

Pending priorities

1. Finish composed runtime validation of the pipeline-disconnected cross-stage resource planner: Prison is confirmed with five distinct simultaneous imports plus vanilla Herbs; Fortress in the same stress ROM is still pending. Then add destination-safe key/crystal award wrappers and run a guarded disposable integration proof before enabling global materialization in browser/CLI.
2. Replace stage-local generation with a global deterministic shuffle plus whole-run solver, including deterministic retry attempts and a deterministic per-seed required-Power-Upgrades target.
3. Build the native randomizer HUD around the finalized global-run state.
4. Resolve Temple Map trigger/item separation and cross-stage persistence; then HP/lives/continues persistence, Game Over/new-run reset, and Very Hard enforcement.
5. Run full-seed 1.0 validation.
6. Post-1.0: enemy randomization/resource compatibility, imported-enemy death/despawn, and Reverse Elbow.

Explicit exclusions

Bosses and scripted encounters are not ordinary-enemy entries. The Temple Map is not an ordinary pickup and needs an explicit 1.0 inclusion decision if it is to become a global check. Zero resource slots are logical selectors, not free physical storage. PS1 addresses are not N64 addresses. Proof ROM patches and archive handoffs are not silently part of the product pipeline. Enemy randomization and Reverse Elbow are not 1.0 blockers.