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facsmth

Registration Date: 09-04-2006
Posts: 46

Kinda old MAME utility (Turaco)

I think it might have been made around 1998 or so.

I snagged their sample picture.

http://patsy.cis.rit.edu/Software/turacoCL/classic/img/screenshot.gif

To put it briefly, this is a way to snag sprites right out of the game (graphic hack?) without having to worry about taking a screenshot, erasing all the many BG sprites, etc. etc. etc.

I dunno, maybe you already knew about it?

Anyway, here's the url= http://patsy.cis.rit.edu/Software/turacoCL/classic/

It lets you open up a MAME rom and directly edit its sprites. NOTE: I'm pretty sure you have to download Turaco & Age together.

EDIT!!!!

Okay, so I figured out a little bug. Turaco has to be in the same file as its DRIVER file and its turaco.ini file to work. So in that case, the ROM PATH should be set to where you have your ROMS. Sorry for the mix-up.

. The program uses special ".ini" files to recognize where to find the graphics are and what each file in the rom does.

Here's an example.

Inside the TMNT.in there is....

I found out something a little annoying. Atleast the various TMNT inis seem to be looking for the same ROMS. I'm trying to figure out something... I kept extracting all the ROMS into one central file which Turaco is supposed to use as the "rom" folder. I dumped every game I had into this folder, yet the program refused to admit there were any palates available. I'll have to read each .ini file and correct them as to which ROM files Turaco should be looking for.

(And by extension if you want to use Turaco, so will you.)

If you think Turaco has an ugly interface, try just using it to open up the palates for the games. Then, use another spirte editor to do the actual cosmetic changes.

quote:

[GraphicsRoms]
Rom1 = 0 524288 963-a28
Rom2 = 524288 524288 963-a29
Rom3 = 1048576 524288 963-a17
Rom4 = 1572864 524288 963-a18
Rom5 = 2097152 524288 963-a15
Rom6 = 2621440 524288 963-a16

Here's the compatibility list I've found (I"m not sure if it's current)

http://www.csh.rit.edu/~jerry/turaco/1.0/list.html

Here's the interesting part: It is feasible to for someone to get another game to become compatible with Turaco which isn't listed on their website.

You just have to figure out how to make an ".ini" file for the game you want to do sprite ripping from. I've got a bunch of utils in my computer now I downloaded from Zophar's Doman. (www.zophar.net)

Let me check and see if I can find a program that will generate the info found in one of the ini files for Turoco.

In the meantime, check it out for yourself. I don't want to get too ahead of myself, so I won't share my own supposition of what ELSE besides MAME files Turoco can be used on.

Okay......... I found another utility he released. http://yorgle.cis.rit.edu/Software/turacoCL/

This one operates on a command line and just extracts images.

__________________

I stink at making gifs....

This post has been edited $posts[editcount] time(s), it was last edited by $posts[editor] on 09-08-2006 02:23.

09-08-2006 00:16

elevator_kart $posts[username] is a male

Code name: Golgo 13

Registration Date: 06-26-2005
Posts: 1,917
Location: Bahrain

It's looks cool but It's really hard to get it working!

quote:

I'll have to read each .ini file and correct them as to which ROM files Turaco should be looking for.
(And by extension if you want to use Turaco, so will you.)

For example I opened PUCKMAN.ini in the DRIVERS folder and it give me this

code:
1: 2: 3:	[GraphicsRoms] Rom1 = 0 4096 pacman.5e Rom2 = 4096 4096 pacman.5f

What should I do here? should I rename something in this file to get it to work.

__________________
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09-08-2006 20:08

facsmth

Registration Date: 09-04-2006
Posts: 46

Thread Starter Thread Started by $thread[starter]

I haven't gotten it to work either.

I think when they made the list for ROMS used in the bottom of the .ini files, they used the wrong names. So you'll have to look up each distribution of a certain game (parents and clones) and compare those to the inis to make sure you got the right files. Adjust the inis if you have to.

Try a program called WINmerge to read the files. Or maybe just good ol' notepad or wordpad.

I'll see if I can dig up that site which has the database of MAME games....

http://www.mameworld.net/maws/

I'm just surprised that the thing doesn't work right away. Frown

But they compiled the inis by reading the source code for MAME and weren't really using the appropriate source of info.

ACk. Try reading the source code to see if it's correct.

IF anyone can get this thing to work, please tell me. Big Grin

Anyway, here's an example:

These are the roms that the file PUCKMAN (Japanese parent of Pacman) should have:

namcopac.6e
namcopac.6f
namcopac.6h
namcopac.6j
pacman.5e
pacman.5f
82s123.7f
82s126.4a
82s126.1m
82s126.3m

It's all here on this page: http://www.mameworld.net/maws/romset/puckman

Sorry it took so long to respond.

__________________

I stink at making gifs....

This post has been edited $posts[editcount] time(s), it was last edited by $posts[editor] on 09-27-2006 00:42.

09-27-2006 00:33

facsmth

Registration Date: 09-04-2006
Posts: 46

Thread Starter Thread Started by $thread[starter]

Dang... I can't even get Turaco to load now. Frown

I'll try to transfer the program to my Windows ME computer to see if that will let me use the program.
Another thing... turacocl won't let me use it on the XP command line. It needs a "posix" something or other. Wonder if I can run it using DOS?

I'll fiddle with it.

Here's a little snippet from a README file that might be helpful.

quote:

TURACO DOES NOT SUPPORT ROMS THAT ARE COMPRESSED INTO .ZIP FILES!
DE-COMPRESS THEM INTO THEIR APPROPRIATE DIRECTORY! ie: mspacman.zip
should decompres "5e.bin" and "5f.bin" (or whatever the files are
called) into the directory called "mspacman".

So the files have to be put into their own individual folders for each game. Woops. I didn't know that. Try this instead. I figured it would be "easier" to just let the program sort out what file was where. Maybe this is the problem I was having. *smacks head*

OKAY!!!!!!! MSDOS Prompt on Windows ME will let me set the tdrivers and troms for Turacocl (CL as in command line), but it tells me a file is not big enough. It's expecting larger.

quote:

==== ROMS used ===
puckman.5e: .
file was wrong size.
was 640, was expecting 4096.

SO maybe I have to edit the inis anyway....? Then again.... I think there were updated drivers I downloaded. This is just stupid.

I'm transferring files from my computer to an old computer via a double-headed USB cord and Intellimover's FileTransfer program.... all because I opted not to get a damn 3.5 disc drive on my new computer. Wink

Second try with turacocl..... waiting..... it still says "roms used" loading....

__________________

I stink at making gifs....

This post has been edited $posts[editcount] time(s), it was last edited by $posts[editor] on 09-27-2006 20:03.

09-27-2006 17:50

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