Sonic 25th Anniversary Party Swag Bag

This past July 22nd, 2016 SEGA celebrated the 25 years of Sonic the Hedgehog with an official party at the House of Blues during the San Diego Comic-con. Although I consider myself a big SEGA and Sonic fan, sadly I was unable to attend the party due to financial and scheduling reasons (mostly financial lol). For those who were able to attend, they were treated to special guests, exclusive 25th Anniversary merchandise and musical performances by Crush 40 and Hyper Potions.

Included in the swag bag are the following:

- Sonic the Hedgehog 25th Anniversary bag

- Sonic the Hedgehog 25th Anniversary coin

- Sonic the Hedgehog 25th Anniversary USB thumb stick

- Sonic: Mega Drive #1 variant comic

- Sonic the Hedgehog 25th Anniversary New Era Hat

- Sonic Plushie

- Totinos hat

Hope you guys enjoyed the share! Would love to know if any of you were able to attend the Sonic the Hedgehog 25th Anniversary party at SDCC. Feel free to share your love for SEGA, Sonic and any special moments from the event. As always, game on brothers and sisters!

PS2 component video and CRT

On my Slim PS2 everything works but PS1 games loaded via PSXLauncher (my imports for example). As I don't have a PS1 at the moment, using component with my PS2 will be a no go for me. The issue with PSXLauncher and using a component cable is that the colors are wrong and the image is too bright, it looks horrible.

The other thing is, unlike with the Xbox, I didn't notice much improvement over composite, so I'll just keep using composite.

Xbox and component 480i

This may be useful for some. I just found out how to make my original Xbox work with the component cable and my Toshiba CRT. The problem I had was, after the boot up sequence which displayed fine, I'd get diagonal video at the EvoX dashboard. That was because the XBox was throwing 480p video to a TV that only takes 480i.

It was as simple as launching the MS dashboard (my first option in EvoX) and going to the video settings. Just tell the Xbox you don't have a 480p or 720p capable display. The MS Dashboard displays video in 480i to keep thing compatible. After resetting the Xbox, Evox and everything else worked just fine. The 480p/720p/1080i options don't show up in settings unless the component cable is hooked up.

A huge improvement in video quality over composite. From what I've read if you're already using S-Video on a CRT you won't notice much improvement if you go the component route.

LG V10

I've had this device for two weeks and I absolutely love it. This replaces a personal Note 2 and my work S4. I can do without a replaceable battery but a removable SD is a must. Everything looks, well, big, but does not compromise in quality. The second screen notifications are a blessing, I dont get interrupted while composing an email, checking the calendar, working with the terminal emulator, relaxing watching the tube, etc

Everything works super fast, I can use it with one hand (I have big hands).

On the downside it is not "scene" friendly. Still with some work it can be rooted and Xpossed can be installed. Custom roms cannot be installed unless you posses the US T-Mobile version or the European H960A (except France). Given the unique qualities of this phone I wouldn't advice installing a custom rom anyways.

Battery life is great if you are on Android 5.1.1, with a fresh installation of Marshmallow the battery still drained quickly.

(re)Tinkering with the Wii

Lately I've been tinkering with my Nintendo Wii (you may have heard of it). In order to play newer stuff it is necessary to update some cIOS. 

Otherwise, at the very least you'll get a black screen, or if the game loads it may not be fully functional. I had this issue where Rodea the Sky Soldier would reboot all the way back to the system menu when I tried to change the in game language. And the voice would remain in english (bleajh).

At the very least cIOS 249 and 250 need to be updated with the d2x cIOS. Use the beta 53 if you want better usb support, use the beta 52 if you want better emunand support. This is how I allocated the cIOS: 

cios 247 base 37 

cios 248 base 38 

cios 249 base 56

cios 250 base 57

cios 251 base 58

Regarding cIOS 236, it seems it is no longer needed, still it doesn't hurt to (re)install it. Just make sure you use the "mod" or "pro pirate" version of the installer. If you use the regular one make sure to press "2" especially if your dvd drive is hosed.

Other things I did were update the homebrew channel from 1.1.0 to 1.1.2, install Boomii as IOS (no vulnerable "boot1"), install Priiloader and update USB Loader GX (especially for its superb Nintendont integration).

Selecting the cIOS 250 Rodea now allowed me to change the language, and other black screen games now load. 

All in all, the Wii is a great machine and homebrew development still seems to be going strong. It is my go to emulation machine for pretty much everything (but arcade). Component video is a delight on a CRT, almost as good as RGB.

Well, that's it for now.

Soft modding the vWii

Last night I decided to go ahead and soft mod my Wii U's "Wii mode". Main motivation to do this is to play emulators via the HDMI interface and see if input lag would improve, another reason was to try GC games using progressive scan.

The process is simple enough if you have the right tools. In my case I procured a copy of Smash Bros Brawl many moons ago to perform the Smash Stack on a relative's red Wii. I kept the game in case it was needed in the future.

The process is pretty much the same as with a regular Wii, 

- Start "Wii mode" 

- Delete any Smash saves

- Launch Smash

- Create a save

- Delete custom stages

- Go back to "Vault"

- Insert a regular SD card (< 2gb one) with the smash stack and the Hackmii installer

- Go to the stage builder, the Hackmii installer should begin

- Install the Hombrew channel as usual

I tried FCEU GX, I can even load roms from my NAS. Picture quality and lag improved by a lot compared to using my Wii with composite. Super Mario 3 and Tecmo Super Bowl were definitely playable.

Nintendon't worked like a charm using the SD card exclusively. Great picture quality at 480p, and flawless control with the Wii U Pro controller.

I couldn't get the external USB hard drive to work even using a "Y" cable. It seems the Wii U USB ports are utter garbage. The same drive works great on the Wii and using a regular cable. I'll test tonight with a powered enclosure and report back.

Another issue I found is that with certain homebrew apps (tested multimods, wad manager and the intellivision emulator) after the the app starts the Wii remote disconnects and it doesn't connect back, so it is impossible to use the app or get back out of it, so I have to unplug the console. Multimods screen saver kicks in so I know the console is not locked, just the remote is not syncing. I'll have to do some research.

Update 1: Just read some newer controllers maybe incompatible with certain apps. Last night I was using a Luigi edition remote with integrated motion plus. I'll test with an old regular regular remote and report back.

Update 2: Using a powered interface I solved my hard disk issues, homebrew can see the hard disk no problem. Using an old regular Wii remote solved my controller problems, that one works fine with all homebrew apps (Atari 2600 yay!).