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kingraph

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Everything posted by kingraph

  1. That is not minor! I misread and will update my post and likely odds. House will still honor all bets made before this information was known!
  2. Summer'20 GENS "A" Vegas Odds 1. AngryJay93 (STL) - 3000 8. PistolPete42 (VAN) +3000 Season Series (1-1) @angryjay93 is one of the all-time great ‘94 players ever. Multiple league titles over multiple years, multiple live event championships in BOTH Sega and SNES. He literally wrote the book on lineup options on teams that everyone references. And he just went 34-6 in the regular season, which just so happens to be the best 40 game record in Classic A Genesis EVER (or at least 12 years). Only two other times did someone go 33-7, and one of those was AngryJay93 (the other one was HABS). And he did it this season with St. Louis, in a league with some good veteran competition. It’s possible that AJ is playing his best ‘94 ever, which is scary for everyone else. Now here’s the intriguing part. @pistolpete42 was one of those 6 wins vs AJ! In his first Classic season, PistolPete managed to make the playoffs in the “A” league, which is a great showing for a newcomer. PistolPete proves that he can play ‘94, and will continue to get better as he plays tougher competition. And Vancouver matches up really well against St. Louis. All that speed and lightweight forwards will keep Hull off his feet, but I suspect AJ will find ways to counter that advantage. While PistolPete can steal a game, it’s just too much to beat AJ in a 7 game series. PREDICTION: STL in 4 2. Kingraph (LA) - 700 7. Zeppelin55 (WPG) + 700 Season Series (4-0 LA) kingraph took the LA Kings to a 31-9 regular season finish, earning him the #2 spot. One of 3 coaches who finished with over 2 on the goal differential, kingraph did it with the fantastic offense that LA has, finishing first in goals for in the league. On the flip side, Hrudey was 7th in goalie save % (of starters) and the Kings were 4th in GA/G. Raph will have to rely on his manual goalie and shot-preventing defense to make this team work for a chance at the cup. Zeppelin55, aka @kylewat, is always a tough competitor and frequently challenges all the top players in the leagues he joins. He favors the WInnipeg Jets, as he can use Phil Housley as an offensive weapon better than most other people. Zeppelin and kingraph met in Classic 2016 that resulted in a 7 game series! kingraph squeaked out a victory needing a 3rd period rally. The evidence is there that this series can go 7 games again and perhaps Winnipeg can pull the upset. PREDICTION: LA in 6 3. Uncle Set (QUE) - 1500 6. Scribe99 (TOR) + 1500 Season Series (3-1 QUE) @Uncle Seth came out of "retirement" to remind people that he’s one of the best players ever to pick up the Genesis controller. He took Quebec to a league leading Goal Differential of 2.56, consisting of a GF/G average of 5.51 and a stifling defense of 2.95 GA/G. Ron Hextall led all goalies with a .712 save %, showing that Seth is one of the best at manual goalie. Seth has always been at the doorstep of the cup. In his 2016 Classic, he had a 3-1 series lead over AJ before losing in 7. In the season before he also lost to AJ in 5 games in the finals. He lost to Plabax twice in the finals in Plablegs 01 and GDL16. I think the time off has given Uncle Seth a renewed hunger to make a deep playoff run and finally pick up one of those elusive titles. @Scribe99 is also continuing his '94 resurgence, coming back to the online scene after being away for a while. A veteran of the game who continues to practice, explore and share information, he took the Toronto Maple Leafs to the 6th seed with an impressive 24-16 record. His GA/G is stellar at 3.06 (3rd in the league), with Potvin posting a.710 save percentage! Clearly defense isn’t a problem for Scribe. On the offensive end, Scribe's GF/G is on the lower end of the league at only 3.34. That’s not going to cut it against Seth’s tight Quebec defense. So unless Scribe can find some more ways to bury the puck, it’s not going to be a pretty picture when they drop the puck in Quebec. PREDICTION: QUE in 5 4. Schmidt (MTL) - 110 5. Corbettkb (DET) - 110 Season Series (2-2 TIE) This 4/5 series has all the makings of an epic battle. Both @JSchmidt and @corbettkb have nearly identical GDif (1.50 and 1.46 respectively), and are reflective of the teams they are using. Corbett has the higher GF/G with Detroit’s explosive forwards, while Schmidt has the better GA/G with Patrick Roy in the pipes. Steve Yzerman led the league in points per game at 3.43, while teammates Dino Ciccarelli finished at 2.50 and Federov at 1.73. Montreal is a little more balanced, as expected, with Muller, Savard and Damphousse at 2.90, 2.45 and 2.41. Having played both of these coaches a lot over the last year, I feel they both have the ability to win the entire cup when they stay focused. And that’s going to be key here - the ability to stay focused in a 7 game series is a mental battle with yourself sometimes. Both of these coaches have a tendency of getting a little too loose too early if they fall behind which can lead to costly mistakes. However, when playing tight, they are as good as anyone. I have this at a coin flip (I make my $10 house cut!) and see this going to a game 7. The only thing I like better is Detroit’s firepower, but at the same time Montreal has the home ice advantage in a potential game 07! YIKES, this looks to be a good one. PREDICTION: DET in 7 (OT) ODDS TO WIN THE CUP (based on projected playoff path) The likely path based on my odds for Zeppelin/Scribe to win the cup would mean to beat kingraph, Uncle Seth, & AngryJay93 in 7 game series'. That would be one of the hardest runs ever! If PistolPete gets past AJ, he’d face Corbettkb, and then likely kingraph/UncleSeth in a finals. No small feat for our lower seeds for sure! AngryJay93 (STL) +350 kingraph (LA) +350 Uncle Seth (QUE) + 500 Corbettkb (DET) + 1250 Schmidt (MTL) +1300 Zeppelin (WPG) + 3000 Scribe (TOR) +3000 PistolPete (VAN) +5000
  3. Nice catch! 11th spot was definitely missing, so I added it back in. Appreciate the feedback!
  4. Place your bets...my 1st round predictions and Vegas odds to win the cup! SNES A East is one of the most stacked leagues ever assembled, but as I pierce through the top 3 seeds really stand out from the group. Remember, bet with your head, not over it. If you have a gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER. Summer'20 SNES A East Vegas Odds 1. The Professor (DET) - 1500 8. McMarkis (PHI) +1500 Season Series (2-0 DET) @TheProfessor comes in as a veteran of live King of 94 events, but this is his first online Classic league and he finishes 1st in the regular season standings with a 30-9-1 record! With that Detroit firepower, he put up 6.42 goals per game, while only giving up 4.02, a differential of 2.4! Anything over 2.0 is a super strong power ranking, and The Professor is one of 3 in this league to achieve this GDif. Well deserving of the top spot in a stacked league! One the other end of this matchup is @McMarkis with the Philadelphia Flyers. McMarkis edged into the final playoff spot with the head-to-head tiebreaker of kingraph's Kings (yikes). A veteran of the online scene, McMarkis is definitely a skilled SNES player who can compete with the best of them. However, the Flyers are ranked as the 16th best team and can be tough to use. Especially compared with the blistering offense of Detroit, and an elite coach in TheProfessor, this will be a very tough challenge for McMarkis to overcome. PREDICTION: DET in 5 2. Annatar (NYR) -1700 7. Chongo (PIT) +1700 Season Series (5-0 NYR) @annatar has won multiple Classic leagues with a lot of 2nd place finishes as well. Probably the most decorated online SNES player, he takes the New York Rangers to the 2nd seed with a powerful 29-10-1 record. Just like The Professor, Annatar has a 2.03 goal differential, with tighter defense at only 3.62 goals per game. He actually swept the regular season series, outscoring Chongo 27-13 in those games. @Chongo is another newcomer to the SNES world....sort of. He's the brother (I think?) of the two time KO94 champion Kingof94! That's about as good of a sparring partner you can get. Plus he has the best team in Pittsburgh on his side. However, given the regular season results and facing one of the best out there, I don't see Chongo moving past the first round. PREDICTION: NYR in 5 3. kingof94 (CHI) - 900 6. dangler (BOS) + 900 Season Series (2-0 CHI, 1 OT) kingof94 is arguably the best SNES player...ever. He is the only 2 time SNES KO94 champion, and most recent SoChel tournament champion against some heavy competition. His finishes this season with the highest GF/G at 6.73 and the lowest GA/G at 3.52...for a GDif of 3.21. Like I mentioned anything over 2 on the GDif has historically been dominant, and to be over 3 is rare. And this is the 3 seed? WTF. kingof94 really rounds out the "big 3" this season in terms of how they performed in the regular season in a competitive league. The Professor really got the best of him in the regular season to earn the #1 spot in their conference, but nobody should be betting against this guy. Getting kingof94 as the 3 seed is a tough draw for @dangler , who finishes in the #6 spot. Dangler is no slouch when it comes to SNES, don't let my odds fool you. And he has Boston, arguably the #2 team behind Pittsburgh. He's been around longer than anyone else in the online scene, so he knows what it takes to grind out and mentally focus in a 7 game series. kingof94 isn't unbeatable (even I won 2 games vs him...humble brag) but you're going to have to play flawless in order to take 4 out of 7 against that dude. I think Dangler will make a series of it, but ultimately he's facing someone who has proven in the recent years to be the best player out there. PREDICTION: CHI in 6 4. JotaC007 (MTL) + 200 5. BobKudelski (BUF) -200 Season Series (3-1 MTL, 2 OT) Despite the regular season going to @JotaC007, two of those games were in OT, with one having Montreal score in the final 5 seconds to tie it! So that's about as even as you can get! Jota has playing great 94 and is well-deserving of the #4 seed this season. However, his opponent @Bob Kudelski has consistently shown that he is a force to be reckoned with. Only 1 goal scored separates these two guys in the regular season as Bob's Sabres put up 200 goals vs Jota's Canadiens' 199. However, Bob K had a tougher defense, finishing 4th in goals against behind the "big 3" mentioned earlier. So while Jota has the higher seed, I still put Bob K as the slight favorite in this series. It will be a close one, but I have the Sabres edging out the Canadiens in a 7 game brawl! I already purchased my ticket to watch this series. PREDICTION: BUF in 7 ODDS TO WIN THE CUP (based on projected playoff path) If my predictions for the first round come true, we will see a matchup of kingof94 vs Annatar and The Professor vs Bob K in the semis. I can see all 4 of those winning the cup, what a decorated group! And if I'm wrong and we have an upset, the projected path does not get any easier for the lower seeds! kingof94 (CHI) +350 TheProfessor (DET) + 400 annatar (NYR) +450 BobKudelski (BUF) +800 JotaC007 (MTL) +1800 dangler (BOS) +2000 McMarkis (PHI) + 4000 Chongo (PIT) + 4500
  5. Win your last few and change the seeds! Otherwise we are not going to customize the rules to choose playoff opponents.
  6. I am likely a few weeks away from being able to dive into any of this, but it's very exciting. Question, if you pick one of the all star teams (27-28) or if using the expanded in the 34 team ROM for the season schedule, does it work? Or is it limited to using the first 26 teams in the ROM? Assuming you also swapped one of the teams in the league for 27+.
  7. Division winners are top 2 seeds, then next best 6 are seeded by win %. Right now you're #1 based on the fact you got all 40 GP. This will likely not hold as people play more games this week.
  8. Here are the classic playoff scenarios. This is a straight math calculation to give everyone a sense of how things are shaping out. NOTE -- admins may have the right to not penalize DNP depending on each situation. In the case of ties, the admins will have to look at head to head manually at the end of season. For now, GDif is the tiebreaker.
  9. Hey, maybe this will be helpful to you for this: I can also send you direct access to the Google Doc if you need, just PM me.
  10. Pretty much the same as Dan and Corbett's post.
  11. Nobody has attempted anything with 95 beyond what you or I have done, lol. Players would be an easy update via NOSE, but if I'm understanding correctly, you will put some 94 graphics into 95?
  12. When we say the hacked ROMs for Genesis had the graphics "decompressed", that's not exactly the right terminology. The graphics that are used, at least in the EA series that I've looked at, have shared tiles. They are not "compressed" as you can still see all the graphics when you open Tile Molester, but it won't look exactly like the "what you see is what you get (WYSIWYG)" in the game. That's due to the use of shared tiles. Back in the 90's, chip size was important/expensive, so the smaller you can make the game work the better. Graphic data by far takes up the most space on the ROM, so if you can re-use certain tiles for an image, that would help reduce the size without impacting the game. I'll explain how this works, and how @wboy and others fixed this. I won't go into how to find the locations/palettes as this can be found elsewhere in the forums. I'd also like to thank @slapshot67 for explaining this to me a while back. A few basics: Everything uses Hex values. This means each digit goes to F instead of 9 (base 16 instead of 10). Google for more info separately, but it's not that hard to grasp. Graphics in Genesis are broken down into tiles. Each tile is 8x8 pixels, or 64 pixels in total. Tiles are basically a "paint by number" - I explain that here Each tile can use one 16 color palette. There can be 4 different palettes to choose from First, let's take a look at how the data structure works in Hex for MOST graphics. There are instances where this may not be the same, but for the vast majority of graphics work this way. Let's start with the Anaheim Ducks team selection logo. This is a 6x6 (tiles) logo. The location of the information for the Anaheim logo is BF8D0 in the original ROM. Here's how everything looks in Hex. I'll break down each section and explain. The start of the graphic is always a 10 byte header, which I highlighted in green. I think it will make more sense to explain the header later. The purple highlighted section is the graphic tile data. This is the data that is much better viewed in Tile Molester. I'll explain and show you how TM translates this data to a user friendly interface. As I mentioned earlier, graphic tiles are 8x8 pixels. Each tile is represented in hex by 32 bytes, with each byte representing 2 pixels ,for a total of 64. Each digit is simply what color on the palette to load, starting on the top of the tile, working from left to right. For example, here is the first tile (first section of purple) translated from hex in TM: Not the greatest example, but it's easy to follow. When you see a bunch of "5555", that's the 6th color (starts at 0) in the palette, in this case white throughout the first tile. So the purple section is all the tile information for 34 total tiles (explained later). After all the graphic data, you'll see the tile layout information begin with the orange section. The orange section tells you what the layout is in the number of tiles in length x width. In our logo example, this is 6x6. That's pretty straightforward. The last highlighted section is the tile layout. Each 2 bytes represents which tile to use, and you'll find 36 tile layouts for the 6x6 logo graphic. The first digit is the palette being used: 0 - Palette 1 2 - Palette 2 4 - Palette 3 6 - Palette 4 If the tile is flipped vertically, the number is 1 higher (1,3,5,7). The next byte will show the horizontal flip. 0 is normal and 8 will flip horizontal. You're likely not going to be flipping tiles vertically or horizontally for your new image, so don't worry too much about that. The next byte is the tile number used. In our example, you'll see the tile layout starts with 2000, 2001, 2002...until all 36 are listed. This means the logo is using palette 2, tile 00, tile 01, etc. Now back to the header! The first 4 bytes of the header is the length of the data. This is usually just adding the header (10 bytes) and the graphic data (tiles). Remember, the graphic data is 32 bytes for every tile. The next 4 bytes is usually the length of the data plus the palette if it's located. A lot of times a graphic will have the palette located right after the tiles, and these bytes will account for the extra palette information. Our team logos do not, and as such the 4 bytes will both be the same. I'll show another example that has a palette later. The final two bytes is the number of tiles represented in hex. So in our Anaheim logo example header reads as follows "0000 044A 0000 044A 0022" Starting at the end - "0022" says that this graphic has 34 tiles (22 is hex for 34). The beginning and middle both have "000 044A". That represents a data length of 1,098 bytes (044A is hex for 1,098). Here's the math -- 34 tiles x 32 bytes equals 1,088. Add 10 for the header and you have 1,098! This is important to understand because when we expand the graphic, we will have to adjust the header accordingly for the game to understand. SO NOW, how do we "decompress" or make the graphics more hacking-friendly? Using our logo example, the first thing we need to do is make each graphic 36 tiles. You may have picked up that our Anaheim logo in the game has 34 tiles, which means that 2 tiles are used more than once in the graphic. If you looked closely at the layout, you will see that tile 17 is used 3x. This actually the blank tile, which is pretty common. So let's "decompress" Anaheim's logo to fix the shared tiles problem. The first thing we need to do is find some room in the ROM for the new logo! Wboy expanded the original ROM from 1MB to 2MB, thereby giving him plenty of space to put in some new graphics. Expanding from 1MB to 2MB is pretty easy, but I won't cover that here. Just know you need to find some space. The 95 ROM actually had enough blank space already for new graphics. Use TM to paste in the new picture in the empty part of the ROM, say location 1C85B8, and that picture is now 36 full tiles for Anaheim logo, not 34. Right before the tile data, we need to update the header for the graphic. The new size will be 36 tiles x 32 bytes or 1,152 bytes. Add 10 for the header and our data length is 1,162, or 048A in hex. We also know we are using 36 tiles, and that is 0024 in Hex. Our new header should read "0000 048A 0000 048A 0024 Immediately after the TM data, we need to now put the tile layout in Hex. The logo remains 0006 0006 (6x6) and the tile layout will be sequential since we are not using any shared tiles. The layout will be 2000, 2001, 2002....all the way to tile 36 (2023). This is how it looks like in the 30 team ROM: I highlighted the header and tile layout. So now that you have the full "uncompressed" graphic loaded, the final step is to change the pointers in the game to the new graphic. A pointer is just what it sounds like -- it points the ROM to the new graphic. You can typically find the pointer by looking for the header location in the ROM itself. So in our example, the Anaheim logo header for the original game was BF8D0. If you search for hex values "000B F8D0" in the ROM you'll find that the pointer is located at F86F2. If you change F86F2 to your new location (1C85AE), the game will now read the new logo. NOTE: In wboy's 30 team ROM, he also changed the location of the pointer table, so this particular part of our example won't be 1:1. I hope this was a helpful crash course into how graphics work and how we "decompress", or get rid of shared tiles. I'll give another example of a graphic that has the palette information within the data structure as a response to this post. This took me a little longer than I thought, lol. But basically every graphic that was hacked followed this procedure. In short: * Make or find room in the ROM for a new graphic * Make sure the header and layout information reflects that graphic correctly. * Change the pointer to the new graphic
  13. That would be AMAZING and would love if you can share how you do this for the hacking community. I don't think this is an easy task.
  14. I say yes. This isn't greatest players ROM, it's a greatest teams. So to the extent an awesome player was on two different, but all-time team, I'd have them on there.
  15. If any of the modders can make the logo and take a screenshot of the start menu with Seattle, it would make great social media fodder.
  16. This is great. I know there is some information out there on the internet, and even programs, that explain how the Sega Genesis music works and how you can create custom songs. I looked into this a while back as well, so I can dig up stuff if you haven't.
  17. @seventieslordis the foremost expert on legendary players and NHL history. Might be worth you two connecting on this as I think he was also considering a similar type of project for Genesis.
  18. Dear @Bob Kudelski, Thank you for your inquiry. Our stats department has working over the last 10 months to process your request and I am happy to report that they have finally updated the data for the last few Classic seasons. In the OP you will find the IIHF rankings based on the finish of Fall'19 Classic. Please note that your current ranking is #3, which you should feel good about. Please expect an invoice for services rendered in the next 9-12 months as our billing department is also restructuring. Sincerely, MANAGEMENT
  19. You also don't want a 26 team league -- those bottom tier teams really get tough to use. One time we mixed everyone together, gave the C guys top picks, B next and the A's had the bottom teams. That's also interesting if the numbers work out, but we had a lot of people this bonus summer season!
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