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GBA for MiSTer
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Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising (Portrait Visual Glitch) #113

Open Chromagram opened 2 years ago

Chromagram commented 2 years ago

Kind of a eerie looking but harmless issue, gameplay-wise. Very precisely, main characters' portraits seem to render just fine (Andy, Grit, Sonja, etc.), but random side NPC portraits (unnamed soldiers mostly) render as this creepy blue coloured fill. Doesn't cause any issues with gameplay, but it's definitely consistent. Attached a photo for reference.

IMG_0243

This is on the newest build release as well.

RobertPeip commented 2 years ago

I did play this game quiet a bit and didn't notice that. Could you maybe go back the releases and see when it broke?

Chromagram commented 2 years ago

[EDIT] Reported a bit too early, updated to yesterday's new release and it appeared to be okay. But upon closer inspection, I've found Orange Star and Green Earth's NPC profiles appear okay. Blue Moon and Yellow Comet's though, they are the issue.

I'll go back and try the prior releases to see where it works normally.

Chromagram commented 2 years ago

Okay, conclusive update.

I systematically went back release by release, all the way back to 2020-01-29 (the ones before that won't boot the game at all). They all have the issue.

I thought maybe it might be my ROM, so I tried it with 3 fresh installs from 3 different locations. Same issue.

I honestly don't know what it is. It's such an oddly specific issue, only affecting the portraits of the NPC troops of Blue Moon and Yellow Comet, but not any of the COs, or the NPC troops of Orange Star or Green Earth. I can't put my finger on what it could be.

I wonder if it could be replicated or if something like my boot.ROM or my .sav file could cause it? I didn't think that would affect anything graphically. But yeah, if you did want to try replicating it, fastest way (if you don't already have a save) is to play the first few campaign missions until the Blue Moon missions open, then play Colin's level. A Blue Moon NPC portrait appears there.

P.S. When these glitched out portraits are on screen, the text box where the dialog is also intermittently flickers.

RobertPeip commented 2 years ago

Thanks for the deep research! I will take a look when I have time for it.

Chromagram commented 2 years ago

Just wanted to pop back in a few months later and continue the reporting. Issue still persists on the newest version of the core. I keep a save file right on the mission where it's prevalent so I can re-test it for new updates, if it helps.

Thanks again for looking into this.