

                        ******* RiscCPS *******
                             version 1.25a

                           by David McEwen 
			      16/10/2001

Minor change
------------
   Frontend now correctly saves frameskip value


In this version
---------------
   Now comes with frontend that even a chimp can use
   Prelimary System 16 and 18 support
   Some tidy ups and minor speed improvemnts
   Addition of an FPS counter 

In last version
---------------
   Neo Geo support!!
   Now 71 romsets supported (see gamelist)
   Some generic speed improvements
   Internal tidy up

Coming Soon
-----------

 Priority support for CPS1
 Save/load states
 More supported games
 ...


Known Issues
------------

 CPS:
   
   Final Fight - can't continue once you die
   
   SF2 - I have had 1 report of a crash
   
 
 Neo Geo:

   Various - slight issues with scaled sprites in some cases (go blocky)

	                          
Introduction
------------

This is an emulator for the Capcom Play System, which is an arcade system made 
(funnily enough) by Capcom. It supports both CPS1 and CPS2. If you don't know who 
Capcom are you should go away and educate yourself about games then come back
and play with this emulator! 
Capcom are an amazing software company and have created some of the most stunning
games of all time. 1942, Strider, the Street Fighter series and in more recent 
times the genre defining Resident Evil, the excellent Dino Crisis 2 and Capcom v SNK.
They are one of the few companies still supporting the arcade and for this they
should also be applauded.
With this emulator you can play some of their older classics. Currently it runs
a bit slowly on an SA, but a decent number of games are playable. I really wouldn't
try it on a slower system...
The emulator now also emulates the brilliant Neo Geo system created by SNK. Like
Capcom they have set standards in 2d gaming and continue to support the arcades. 
However unlike Capcom they released a home version of their arcade system, which
unfortunately never took off (although a popular item these days on eBay). The main
reason for failiure was the prohibitive cost of games, which retailed at 100ukp or
more. This was due to the amount of ROM each game had... however the lucky few who
have a machine are treated to exact recreations of the arcade experiences as the
hardware is identical. 
Later on SNK released a CD version of the Neo Geo, strangely enough called the Neo 
Geo CD. This had the benefit that the games were much more affordable. However due
to the system using a single speed drive loading times could be painful. Also many
games were never transferred across to the CD platform. The single speed issue was
resolved with the release of the CDZ, which has a speedy double speed drive.
In many respects SNKs failiure to gain a foothold in the home market is disappointing
as it has meant that they are teetering oon the edge of disappearing forever. This 
would indeed be a sad loss as the company brought the gaming world some true classics
such as the Metal Slug series and the various King of Fighters incarnations. 
The platform was also home to exclusive games such as Pulstar, by the guys that created 
Rtype, Windjammers and various others. The Neo Geo is a very classic system and I am
pleased that I can help more people appreciate it.
On top of these this emulator now emulates (in part) the Sega System 16 & 18 hardware.
This was home to various Sega classics such as Shinobi, Altered Beast, Alien Storm
among others.


How do I use it ?
-----------------

Keys
----

Insert Coin - F3
Start P1 - F1
the 6 CPS buttons - A,S,D,Z,X,C
Movement - cursor keys
Toggle FPS - F11
Exit - F12


WITH FRONTEND
-------------

Basic Usage
-----------

In order to play the games you obviously need the romsets. A simple search on the Internet
should yield results... (supported games are listed in the gamelist file). Neo Geo games
also require a BIOS file, which is also trivial to locate. Google is your friend...

Once you have these load up !RiscCPSFE. The icon will appear on the iconbar. You have a
choice on how you want to proceed. You can either 

a) put all the roms within the Roms directory within !RiscCPSFE 
or
b) place roms for each system where you like (noting that each systems roms must be located 
in the same place). Then select options from the menu and either drag the directory where
each romset is located to the relevant writable fields or drag a file from each directory. 
Once you have done this choose Save. Then from the iconbar menu select Rescan Paths.

Now click with select on the iconbar icon you will note that Play is greyed out - coz
no game is selected. Click on the menu icon and a menu will appear with submenus for each
system. Just choose which game you want and click play. The game should now run.


Intermediate Usage
------------------

Now that you are familar with the frontend you can play with the options, which are fairly
obvious. As well as the separate rom paths you can :

Show FPS - Choose whether the FPS counter is displayed from the start.

Frameskip - Specify the number of frames skipped. 0 means none, 1 means display alternate...

Sound options are currently unavailable

Console Mode - this puts the Neo Geo emulation into console mode. Ie it runs as if it is the
home version of the hardware.


Advanced Usage
--------------

If you want to modify some other settings more specfically for your system you can...
The !RiscCPSFE reads its settings from a human readable file contained within the app
called gamedat.
Each game is set out like this :

[game]
name = 
publisher = 
year = 
rom = 
parent = 
type = 
wimpslot = 

Name -> this is the name displayed in the Name box in the main window
Publisher -> the publisher of said game
Year -> Year the game was made
Rom -> romname to look for (you shouldn't change this as the emulator will be using its own 
internal database)
Parent -> the parent romset. This can be changed, just make sure it refers to a valid parent set
Type -> tells the f/e what type of rom set it is. 
	0 -> CPS1, 1 -> CPS2, 2 -> Neo Geo, 3 -> Sys 16/18
Wimpslot -> how much wimsplot is allocated before running each game. 

WITHOUT FRONTEND
----------------

Note
----

In order to use the ini file style configuration without a frontend. You must have 
<RiscCPS$Dir> set. The filer seeing the !RiscCPSFE app will be enough to do this.

CPS 1/2 Usage
---------

Since this is an emulator of an arcade system you need a fair wodge of RAM... indeed
it employs dynamic areas just to cope with the size of some games. You will need a 6MB
wimpslot (which is used for temporary areas while decoding). The RAM required on top
of this varies on a game by game basis... for example :

Final Fight a CPS1 game requires 16MB
Strider another CPS1 game requires 21MB
Darkstalkers a CPS2 game requires 46MB

Neo Geo Usage
-------------

The Neo Geo emulation can require wildly varying amounts of RAM depending on the game.
The size of the ROM is a good indication of how much you will need. Both dynamic area
used and wimplot will vary. wimpslot usage should never exceed 10MB. Note that RAM usage
will go up once sound emulation is added as the sound roms are not loaded. Some examples
of usage for Neo Geo games :

Magician Lord requires 7MB dynamic + 4 MB wimpslot
Metal Slug requires 30MB dynamic + 10MB wimpslot
Shock Troopers requires 49MB + 10MB wimsplot

Neo Geo games also require BIOS images. These aren't hard to find... and should be 
kept in the zip file preferably named neogeo in thesame directory as the !RiscCPS file. 
If you wish to use a different name just override the parent name as shown below.

You can switch the Neo Geo emulation into console mode by adding -consile to the commad 
line eg :

!riscps -f 3 -console mslug

This will run Metal Slug in console mode with a frameskip of 3


General Usage
-------------

The amount required is stated on initilization and the emulator will exit cleanly if
the dynamic area cannot be created.

Also the emulator uses a 480x352x16bit mode so ensure you have a valid definition -
the machine has one by default (or at least should do...)

OK if you have got enough free ram you need to set up the emulator rather like MAME.
All games must be kept in a zip file with the roms in the root of the zip not in a
sub directory. Ie when you open it in !Sparkplug the rom files are visible not a
directory. This zip file should be placed in the same folder as the !RiscCPS file and
must be named correctly, which should be depending on where you got it of course. An 
example is Final Fight... it should be in a zip file called ffight - dos extensions 
are ignored, so in theory games should work as is when downloaded.

OK once all that is set up. Just type : 

!RiscCPS [option] <game>

eg. !RiscCPS ffight

There are very few options currently available :

-h  - this will show the help
-f <num>  - this will set the frameskip, it defaults to 1
-p <parent romset> - this will set the parent romset
-console - this will set the Neo Geo emulation into console mode

There is currently no sound output, all the emulation code is present, but the emulator isn't
running fast enough for decent sound to be generated.

Some games expect the screen to be rotated 90 degrees... as this isn't implemented yet the
screen will obvioulsy be oriented wrong. The games are still playable, but the keys are
confusing!


PARENT ROMS
-----------

Different regional versions of games generally use the same data, just different code. So
parent romsets exist. The parent set is usually the initial release of the game. So in the
case of Final Fight it would be the ffight romset. To play the Japanese version you would
have to have both the ffight set and the ffightj set. Assjming names without extension you
can run the emulator like this :

!risccps ffightj

and it will work. However if you have the DOS extension on the parent set this won't work. 
You can either strip the extension or override the filename of the parent set. Eg.

!risccps -p ffight/z ffightj


PROBLEMS
--------

If you have a crash please tell me! Give me as much info as you can, otherwise it won't be 
fixed. Sorry, but I'm not psychic...
 
*FAQ*
----- 

Why are my Roms images not working ?
-------------------

If they are in the supported list. Tell me what the problem is... and where you
got the romset from. You should note that there are various versions of each game
and each one supported is clearly marked in the gamelist provided.
If its not supported, just wait patiently and maybe it will be added. Note that
CPS2 games are still being decoded so it may not even be ready yet.

Where's the sound ?
-------------------

Answered above...

Why so few options ?
--------------------

Why not ???


Why no filtered mode ?
----------------------

Errr... are you insane ??




Copyright and Disclaimer
------------------------

This emulator is copyright David McEwen 2001. You may not attempt to pass off
any part of this work as your own, although you may distribute it freely as
long as you supply the complete archive (that is, all the files supplied to
you).

This software is supplied "as is". I make no claims about the reliability or
suitability for any purpose of this emulator, and any use of it is undertaken
at your own risk. No responsibility is taken for any failure of the software,
or for any loss or damage caused directly or indirectly by the software.

Whilst I will endeavour to help you if you have problems with this emulator,
no such support is guaranteed.

In the above "This emulator" refers to everything supplied within this
archive, which is specifically the !RiscCPS application and all the files
contained within it, and also the documentation files (including the one you
are reading now).



COMMENTS
--------


Any comments :
email : david@acornemus.freeserve.co.uk (Home)
	davidm@argonaut.com (Work)
Website : http://www.acornemus.freeserve.co.uk

Thanks
------

Capcom/SNK/Sega - without them this emulator would be rather pointless ;-)
ACE author - kudos and many thanks for answering my questions
Dayvee - Final Burn pioneered so many things (I will forever remember playing
         Power Drift on it). Thanks for releasing the source so others may learn!
MAME guys - lots of useful info in there. thanks
Calice guys - thanks for the info gleaned from your driver files!
CPS2Shock - without you guys CPS2 emulation would still be a dream.
Karl Stenerud - the Musashi 68K core is sooo useful. Thanks!
Neil Bradley - mz80... 
Data East - Since I grabbed a Windjammers graphic for the icon ;-)

