Ghost Manor time glitch using Harmony cart

[Northcoastgamer]

Some folks using a Harmony cart while playing Ghost Manor seem to get some kind of glitch allotting them an extra 65-70 seconds of game time. Recorded games using a Harmony cart and scoring over 500k have timed out at 4:30 for the game. Where as using a real cart and hardware, game time is around 3:27 or so. Any programmer insight into this would be appreciated.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

How does it look like when you play on Stella?

[Northcoastgamer]

Stella times out the same, around 3:27. I've tried 2 double ender carts and a single cart on real hardware. All time in around 3:27. I've tried B/B, B/A, A/B and A/A difficulties. All around 3:27.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

According to the manual the game should last 8*30 seconds (= 4:00).

 

I have never played the game, is the manual wrong? Or is there any way to loose or gain time?

[Northcoastgamer]

The manual is wrong. The only way to gain time is with the glitch that I've described. There is no way to gain time through normal play.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

Are the intervals for each grain of sand longer, or are there more intervals (e.g. the game does not stop when bottom part of the hour glas is filled)?

 

Also, are the videos uploaded somewhere?

[Northcoastgamer]

The game ends when the bottom half of the hour glass is filled. The following video game time is 4:30. Around the 1:20 mark in the video it shows the moving wall going right through the girl moving left and the player stays alive, when it should have taken a life. This doesn't fly in normal game play either.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

I suppose you are referring to this video?

 

 

There is a counter, initialized with 7 (NTSC, 6 for PAL), which decreases every 256 frames until it reaches zero. So that's 7*256 frames. At 60 FPS, this means 29.87 seconds for each grain of sand. And there are only 7 of them, so that's 209 seconds in total (3:29).

 

In the video, there are ~42 seconds for each grain of sand. This fits very well to a counter initialized with 10 (10*256/60 = 42.67 seconds), which results into 4:58.

 

The video runs at normal speed, so either the ROM used in there was hacked, glitched or there exists a different, yet not dumped version.

[Northcoastgamer]

That's what I've been thinking either a glitch or hack. This can't be done playing normally on real hardware. I have been saying for years that NOTHING else is the same as "Real Hardware". Emulation and things such as the Harmony cart are great for people that don't have or can't get access to real hardware, I get all that. For example, I lived in Buffalo NY for years, I have been all over the country. Numerous places serve "Buffalo Style Wings". But NONE and I mean NONE are the same as the original ones in Buffalo.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

This is not related to "real hardware" or not at all, unless his cart glitched at very fortunate places.

 

Combined with your other finding, this looks very much like a hack job. Which means, that he is cheating. You should call him out for that.

 

BTW: He seems to have a lot of other records, I wonder what would be the result if someone scrutinized those too.

[Northcoastgamer]

He is not the only one able achieve the 500k score and more time using a Harmony cart. A friend of mine with a Harmony cart is doing some testing. I'm not accusing anyone of anything. I just would like to know HOW..........................

[Northcoastgamer]

Do you Thomas or anyone else have a Harmony cart to test the ROM and the game time with a stopwatch?

[Thomas Jentzsch]

He is not the only one able achieve the 500k score and more time using a Harmony cart.

Any more videos?

[Northcoastgamer]

Not that i have seen.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

Do you Thomas or anyone else have a Harmony cart to test the ROM and the game time with a stopwatch?

I stop watched NTSC and PAL versions and got the results I described above (~30 seconds for NTSC and ~31 seconds for PAL).

[Northcoastgamer]

So a select few know how to employ some sort of glitch or possibly a hacked ROM and it's not the Harmony cart? Thanks for your input by the way, I appreciate it.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

I can create this timer hack in one minute now. Before maybe 5 minutes.

 

And yes, definitely not Harmony related.

Edited November 6, 2018 by Thomas Jentzsch

[Northcoastgamer]

Very interesting..............