Ontario, CanadaIt's not about cheating.
A very big part of speedrunning this game revolves around the player's ability to manipulate the framerate by killing enemies ASAP, or just outright avoiding onscreen objects that slow things down. This is to keep the framerate as high as possible at all times so that the autoscroll moves as fast as possible, because the rate at which the autoscroll moves at is directly tied to the framerate. Emulators still don't ¤¤perfectly¤¤ replicate the speed/performance characteristics of this game as seen on the real hardware.
Star Fox is just so ridiculously sensitive to the game framerate that it doesn't make sense to put runs achieved on the real hardware next to runs achieved on an emulator. It would be kind of unfair.
Yeah I'm definitely interested in what (if any) differences there are between v1.1 and v1.2. I suspect it's nothing significant, but still would be interesting to see someone who owns both spend some time doing runs with both carts and seeing if they notice any speed differences.
Purely anecdotal I know, but definitely seems like v1.2 is more common based on eBay listings (have yet to see any v1.1's, but have seen several v1.2's). But who knows really, heh.
EDIT: I suppose it's also quite possible that there are no gameplay differences between 1.1 and 1.2 either. Could be that Nintendo changed the PCB layout or something else manufacturing related, but the game code remained unchanged.
Yeah, sorry just took a second look at the photo I linked and I guess I kind of took it at a crappy angle as you can't see the letters, lol. On the back there is only 2 digits, no letter. And the "LR0G1801" on the top-left of the PCB also indicates v1.0. I believe my dad bought us this brand new in late 1993 / early 1994, so the front/back cart shell wasn't swapped with a different game or anything like that.
EDIT: At any rate, ordered a v1.2 cart off eBay (letter 'B' stamped on the back).
Interesting. At the very least should update the doc to include info about the 1.1 and 1.2 differences (how to tell them apart). And we should probably update the run submission so you can choose 1.2, though maybe not really necessary I guess as far as time differences go.
Also, just FYI the big indent on the front does not signify a v1.1 or v1.2 cart. My v1.0 cart has that same big indent.
My guess is that all 1.1 runs so far are 1.2. But we'll soon see!
Been doing some research on the different versions that are out there for this game. Reading various posts I've found via Google, it does seem like there were 3 versions:
1.0 = no letter stamped on back label, just 2 digits 1.1 = 'A' stamped on back label after 2 digits (a.k.a. "Revision A") 1.2 = 'B' stamped on back label after 2 digits (a.k.a. "Revision B")
The 'A' and 'B' lettering does correspond to what Nintendo did with other games on not just the SNES, but the N64 too and probably other systems.
But what interests me is that I've read on a bunch of places that the 1.1 / Revision A is either exceedingly rare or was just not released, as it seems people can find 1.0 and 1.2 carts easily enough, but never a 1.1.
Can anyone who has a 1.1 cart actually confirm that there is a letter 'A' stamped on the back label and not a letter 'B'. LowKeeee actually would probably be best to check this since he has most of the best run times at the moment. Alternatively, if you have a gamebit you can open up the cart and take some photos of the PCB to 100% confirm which revision it is (if you are able to do this, this page has more info on how to tell what version is what from the PCB http://www.snescentral.com/pcbboards.php?chip=SHVC-1C0N ).
Anyway, the whole reason I'm bothering to post this is just that I've been looking around to find a 1.1/1.2 cart and wanted to check on this info first as either there's been some confusion (here or maybe it's just me, heh) or people on the various random forum posts I've found on Google are not that knowledgeable (which would not surprise me, lol).
