The source code for Disney's The Little Mermaid II: Pinball Frenzy for Game Boy Color was released by its sole developer

[delete12345]

According to the author:

The emulator I wrote is in the mgb/ directory and it uses SDL 1.x.

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The source copy I have is closer to the Japanese version and the build
result merm.gb doesn't byte for byte match the released USA version, which
is readily available on rom download sites. I spent some time trying to
get the output to match but it's hopeless. I should have archived the code
associated with the final USA release so I could always rebuild it... but
oh well.

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This person implemented their own SDL gbc emulator to facilitate faster testing, which while useful isn't exactly something we lack nowadays.

cgb/code at master · dashxdr/cgb

Color Gameboy Development stuff circa 2000. Contribute to dashxdr/cgb development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

Close if old. I did a search for "mermaid", thinking I'd get a hit, but nope.

 

[Ashlette]

looks at code/anim/anim.c

I'm never knocking a licensed game boy color game again.

 

[Deleted member 12790]

looks at code/anim/anim.c

I'm never knocking a licensed game boy color game again.

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most of that is just a rote SDL application, though. that's what tool development is like. That's not really GBC stuff, that's a PC application. The most gnarly part of that is just bitshifting and bitwise operations, because you're working on byte sized data on a retro machine like the GBC.

EDIT: Here's the good stuff, this is the actual game:

cgb/code/gb/usamerm/pin.asm at master · dashxdr/cgb

Color Gameboy Development stuff circa 2000. Contribute to dashxdr/cgb development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

 

[Komo]

I just wanna mention that the THUG source code is also on github, so is Jedi academy and Outcast.

 

[kodax_shc]

Are we able to compile this into a playable gb file?

 

[Deleted member 12790]

Are we able to compile this into a playable gb file?

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yes, install z80-asm on your machine. You'll need to set up some environment variables in your linux distro to match his setup, then run the makefile. mimicing his toolchain would be the most annoying part, but not impossible.

EDIT: Oh, durr, he includes a specific assembler: https://github.com/dashxdr/cgb/tree/master/code/gbasm

just run make and put it in the appropriate directory, then run make in the usamerm folder and it'll generate a binary called merm.gb

 

[kodax_shc]

Thanks :D

 

[MegaRockEXE]

This is pretty neat. Assembler and low-level programming is a lost art.

 

[Fularu]

This is pretty neat. Assembler and low-level programming is a lost art.

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That's mostly because high level compilers are very, very efficient and compile your x language code into something close to machine language.

a good example is Oracle's PL/SQL which is a super simple logical programming language that's compiled into machine language by the database's compiler. Making it optimal (as long as your pl/sql is good that is, bad code will still compile as bad code)

 

[DiipuSurotu]

How is this legal?

 

[Filipus]

yes, install z80-asm on your machine. You'll need to set up some environment variables in your linux distro to match his setup, then run the makefile. mimicing his toolchain would be the most annoying part, but not impossible.

EDIT: Oh, durr, he includes a specific assembler: https://github.com/dashxdr/cgb/tree/master/code/gbasm

just run make and put it in the appropriate directory, then run make in the usamerm folder and it'll generate a binary called merm.gb

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Looking at that code just gave me flashbacks of college semesters where I wanted to cry. Never again CS, I refuse to write in anything that is not human readable.

 

[Fularu]

Looking at that code just gave me flashbacks of college semesters where I wanted to cry. Never again CS, I refuse to write in anything that is not human readable.

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ASM is perfectly human readable, especially older chips like the Z80 and x68k

it's about knowing the instruction set and how to use it

x86 asm though... *shudder*

 

[Filipus]

ASM is perfectly human readable, especially older chips like the Z80 and x68k

it's about knowing the instruction set and how to use it

x86 asm though... *shudder*

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dohitflipperboth:

        ldh    [hTmpLo],a    ;weaken amount

        ldh    a,[pin_x]

        sub    c

        ld    c,a

        ldh    a,[pin_x+1]

        sbc    b

        ld    b,a

        ldh    a,[pin_y]

        sub    e

        ld    e,a

        ldh    a,[pin_y+1]

        sbc    d

        ld    d,a

        push    bc

        push    de

        push    hl

Perfectly human readable is reaching but sure, there's a reason why I struggled and every other CS nerd cruised happily through assembly. We did do a bunch of x86 asm so trauma translates to all asm.