SNES 50/60Hz Guestions

[maz4ruth]

I finally got round to modding my PAL SNES with the two switches (one to disable the region chip, the other to switch between 50 and 60Hz)

This is all fascinating stuff but there I have a few questions which have been torturing me for the past few days!

1. If I play a PAL game at 60Hz (lets use mario world for an example, I am aware of the games that this won't apply to) does it run at exactly the same speed as it's NTSC counterpart? This would mean that the ROMs for PAL and NTSC games are almost identical. The only difference would be if they found any bugs in the game after the US release and of course the region code.

I ask this because I remember in the past Nintendo told us European gamers that one of the reasons we got our games about a year later was because of the time it took to "convert" the games to run on our systems, so basically that was a load of lies then!

2. I have a pirated SNES JR. It is regionless and locked at 60Hz (with no switches), it also displays crystal clear RGB through and unmodified Gamecube RGB SCART cable. The thing is, this runs Mario RPG fine! (although, you cannot reset the game, you have to power off the console)

I though Mario RPG wouldnt work if the region chip was disabled (which it must be because it runs PAL games)!? How did they do this?

Sorry if I went on a bit, but this is driving me crazy, I just have to know!

Oh BTW, I am NEVER playing a PAL game again, unless I really have to!!!

[Guest]

I ask this because I remember in the past Nintendo told us European gamers that one of the reasons we got our games about a year later was because of the time it took to "convert" the games to run on our systems, so basically that was a load of lies then!

Europe got the games later because Nintendo cared mainly about the American market.

I though Mario RPG wouldnt work if the region chip was disabled (which it must be because it runs PAL games)!? How did they do this?

What happens when you run Mario RPG on your (newly modded) PAL SNES?? Does it run or not??
Maybe your SNES JR has a securty chip inside, which is necessary to run some of the games, but the CPU ignores it and runs in any case.

BTW  Many games that use additional hardware will have problems when sped up, some  games (Mario Kart for example) have been changed and run faster than the NTSC versions.
Moreover most (all?) PAL games are altered to play the music with the correct speed.

[Endymion]

The timing and resolution differences between PAL and NTSC broadcasts are pretty easy conversions, not too likely this was ever a big hold-up. Localising to specific languages of course takes time but I don't know enough about various PAL language differences to say what titles may have been delayed for this, Spanish, French, German etc. though all would have their own localisation tasks. In almost every case though the wrangling that makes you wait for games you want is a legal issue as the title is licensed to another party for sale in different regions.

[maz4ruth]

When I run Mario RPG in the modded PAL SNES it does not boot (blank grey screen)

I know Mario Kart screws up a bit and runs really fast when you run the PAL version at 60Hz. This is probably because it uses a DSP chip. The PAL version of the game is pathetic (at intented speed) compared to it's NTSC cousiins!

I know Nintendo cared more about the JP/US market way ahead of us, which is pretty awful really but that's the way it is! At least nowthe video game console industry is at it's best ever regarding that IMO, it just seems a bit more "world wide" now. We do still get most of our stuff behind but the gap is closing! Infact, some stuff we even get first!

[FM-77]

Super Mario World is PAL optimized and will run way too fast if you play it in 60Hz, there will also be some slight graphical bugs. I think it's more enjoyable at that speed, though.

Most games aren't PAL optimized, though - and will run at their native speed in 60Hz. Music mostly runs at the same speed regardless of refresh rate (the music in Pilotwings will run too fast in 60Hz).

Why European releases were delayed was partly because they "tested" the games on America. The games that didn't sell well in America didn't get released in Europe. In short - we mostly got the good games (in terms of sales numbers) in Europe.

[maz4ruth]

Mario World runs great at 60Hz, feels better to play and there's no graphical errors whatsoever!

Also, the music is identical whether it is 50 or 60Hz, no speed change in the audio.

Running it at 50Hz now feels so crap, can't believe we put up with these inferior games all those years ago!