An Emulator is a program that is made to mimick or emulate a certain console or video game system. It interprits data just as the system would. Emulators are basically copies of video game system or computers. Roms are copies of the games that run on them. for example you can olny play genesis roms on genesis emulators. ok but the real exciting thing is that emulators, if there good enough, can even run games better than the original system. you even get more feature like savestates and screenshots.so in general emulators are just plain fun. Where do i get roms and emulators Emulators are very easy to find, try Zophar's Domain. Or do a google search. ROMs on the other had are a bit more difficult, depending on the system. Remember, even though they may be 20 years old, they still are illegal copies. You're best bet is a google search. what is hex and hacking? well hacking is not the hacking you think of, this is not illegal al all. all you do is edit values in the games hex. this is done using a hex editor. you can edit thing like art,level layout, hey wait a sec you can edit anything =P. in save states its the same but easier, you can edit stuff like level, lives ans stuff like that. ok now what is hex. il tell you. hex is number system based on 16 or 1-F(1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,a,b,c,d,e,f,10). example 16 would be eqaul to f and 10 woul be eqaul to A. its pretty simple, but its a pain to convert so most hex editers come with converters. You would need a hex editor. I recommend Hex Workshop, It is shareware, but it is worth the registration fee by far. Before you open a Genesis game in your editor it MUST be in .bin format. Sonic HAcking Wiz Pro and most other utilities can convert from smd to bin. Now with your editor open, the side on the left is the offset or location in sets of 16 (depending on your settings) . the right colum is the hex it self. that will be in its own spaced colums by each byte( for example you want to go to 2AF, first go to 2A0 and move over F or 15 spaces then edit the value you want to edit. its that easy. Now What Learn. It's that simple. Look for values in the ROM and try editng them. I recommend going to SSRG, you will learn a Lot there. Also check out the Links Section. | |