R-Type Plus 1.0 (e71b5a7)

A patch for the 1987 arcade R-Type (Irem, M72 board) that adds four things the original never had, on the original board's own program (and a PLUS, in the logo's own colours, under the title):

• Two players at once. A 2P start begins co-op; either player can join a game later with a coin and their start button. Player 2 flies a crimson R-9 with a Force of its own, the beam gauge splits while both play, and a lost ship flies in again where the game is while the partner plays.
• A stage select. On the start screen, left and right pick the stage (STAGE n on the credit line).
• Armour. Up and down on the start screen pick CLASSIC, ARMOUR or BOSS RUSH. In Armour an enemy's hit with ships to spare costs a ship and a laser level, and the game goes on where it is (a wall still destroys the ship).
• Boss Rush. The seven bosses back to back (stage 3's, the whole battleship, is left out), every ship fully armed (the Force, the blue laser, two bits, missiles, a speed-up), against a run timer, with a ranking table of its own (kept until power-off, like the game's).

It runs in MAME, and on anything that runs MAME's rtype set. MAME warns that the ROMs' checksums are wrong: they are changed, that is expected.

What you need

• Your own copy of the game: MAME's rtype set (R-Type, World), as a zip or a folder. The files are found by their contents, whatever their names; a merged set with the clones in it is fine. These 22 files (the three PALs MAME lists are not needed):

File	Bytes	SHA1
m72_a-8l-.ic66	256	00e20cf754b6fd5138ee4d2f6ec28dff9e292fe6
m72_a-9l-.ic75	256	f13b0a4b52dcc6704063b676f09d83dcba170133
rt_b-a0.3c	32768	687061ecade2ebd0bd1343c9c4a831791853f79c
rt_b-a1.3d	32768	130bf6af521f13247a739a95eab4bdaa24b2ac10
rt_b-a2.3a	32768	95c3b64f50e6f673b2bf9b40642c152da5009d25
rt_b-a3.3e	32768	9529ecdedd30e2a0400fb1083117992cc18b5158
rt_b-b0.3j	32768	5b390770e56ba2d35e108534d7eda8dca996fdf7
rt_b-b1.3k	32768	700905a3e9661e0874939f54da2909e1396ce596
rt_b-b2.3h	32768	14222eaa3e67e5a7f80eafcf22bac4eb2d485a9a
rt_b-b3.3f	32768	e2683d0e7415f3abd147e518bf6c87e44744cd4f
rt_r-00.1h	65536	1e3bc498861946278a0b1fe24259f5d224e265d7
rt_r-01.1j	32768	6741eb7f2d9d985b5a89eefc73ea44c3e38de6f7
rt_r-10.1k	65536	d2873d05aa3b257e7699c188880ac3daad672fa5
rt_r-11.1l	32768	5239a97222212ac9c019177771cb2b5096b7bc17
rt_r-20.3h	65536	01cf0a60f47fa5e2ed430a3f075e69e6cb762a48
rt_r-21.3j	32768	7e55a9a11fcd989db39bce6be48821b747c7d97f
rt_r-30.3k	65536	60a394ab53afdcbbf9e88083b8dbe8c897170d77
rt_r-31.3l	32768	b5467d1f22f6e5f90c5d8a8ac2d55974f287d589
rt_r-h0-b.1b	65536	0b9d5474bc5963224923126cf84d74a39b8270cc
rt_r-h1-b.1c	65536	008d1dc289df2ae2ba8f93d319c2b2c108cb9b89
rt_r-l0-b.3b	65536	3001c1b87cd1d441ba1226fb5b9dd6268458c0e8
rt_r-l1-b.3c	65536	0144c846fd0bdb3e4d790f6cb7bb64829e931b76

• Python 3.8 or later (macOS, Linux or Windows; nothing else to install).

How to use it

python3 rtype_plus.py path/to/rtype.zip

(on Windows: py rtype_plus.py path\to\rtype.zip). It writes rtype-plus/rtype.zip; your files are only read. Put that zip where MAME looks for ROMs in place of the original (keep the original elsewhere) and run rtype.

With --set rtypeu it writes rtype-plus/rtypeu.zip instead: the same game as MAME's R-Type (US) clone, which sits beside an untouched rtype.zip (front-ends list it as "R-Type (US)"). -o FOLDER picks the output folder. Every file written is checked against the SHA1 it must have, so a wrong or damaged input stops with the files it could not find.

Tested with MAME 0.289 and MAME 0.258.

What is in the patch

None of the original game. The program gets 9631 bytes of the hack's own (its code and data in the program's free space, the jumps where it hooks in and the small stubs they lead to, and the boot test's checksum word). Any 3 bytes or more in a row that your program already has anywhere, 8854 bytes in all (the instructions each hook moves aside into its stub, and short sequences the new code happens to share with the original), are copied from your own program at patch time, so the patch holds no 3 bytes in a row of the original's. The new graphics (player 2's crimson HUD glyphs, its mirrored beam gauge, the Armour cells, the timer's colon, the 1P / 2P tags) and player 2's two palettes are made from your own ROMs by the script's code, as recoloured or rearranged copies of the game's; the title's PLUS is drawn by the script's code too (its own art, in the pens of the logo's palette). Every file written is checked against the SHA1 it must have.

Legal

This is an unofficial, free fan project, not affiliated with or endorsed by Irem or any rights holder. R-Type and its program, graphics and sound are Irem's, and R-Type is their trademark, named here only to say which game the patch is for. The patch is not the game and cannot run without it: it holds none of the game's program, graphics or sound (see above), and you need your own lawfully obtained copy of the original ROMs. None are included here, none are linked to, and none are sent on request: please do not ask. The patcher and the patch's own code are under the MIT licence (LICENSE), which covers only the files here and grants nothing for Irem's work. If you hold rights in R-Type and object to this patch, write to [email protected] and it will be taken down.

Contact

[email protected], or an issue on this repository. More about how the patch was made, with videos and screenshots: https://rtypeplus.com/