NES movie fileformat converter

0. Contents

This is the documentation of nesmock-1.0.0.
   1. Purpose
   2. Usage
   3. Copying
   4. Requirements
   5. Thoughs
   6. Downloading

1. Purpose

This program converts different format NES movies to other formats.

2. Usage

deeng v1.0.0 - Copyright (C) 1992,2004 Bisqwit (http://iki.fi/bisqwit/)
Usage: nesmock [<options>] <inputfile> <outputfile>
Transforms NES movie files to different formats.
 --help, -h     This help
 --offset, -o   Set frame offset
 --version, -V  Displays version information

Supported formats:
  FMV  (Famtasia 5.1) - Read & Write
  FCM  (FCEU 0.98.12) - Read & Write
  VMV  (VirtuaNES)    - Read

Example:
  nesmock -o2 smb1a.fcm smb1a.fmv

The offset is sometimes (usually) needed because different emulators have different boot-up times.

Getting the right offset is usually trial&error work, and even so, it's possible that the resulting movie will not play properly (desync) in the target emulator. This is because the emulators run the game slightly differently. Sometimes it matters, sometimes it doesn't. Consider yourself lucky if the conversion works.

If you are doubting whether this program actually works at all, try converting Super Mario Bros movies. I have had complete success with them.

3. Copying

nesmock has been written by Joel Yliluoma, a.k.a. Bisqwit,
and is distributed under the terms of the General Public License (GPL).

If you are an emulator developer, you are welcome to hack this source code and add more format support to the code.
These things are currently missing:

4. Requirements

GNU make and C++ compiler is required to recompile the source code.
For the program (including the Windows binary), you need a commandline.

5. Thoughs

Different emulators emulate differently. This is a fact. For this reason, sometimes straight conversions of the movies don't just work.

It is unfortunately impossible to guess from the movie file alone where would the emulator need more / less frames than the other emulator.

A more elaborate conversion could be made by running the two emulators simultaneously and keeping track of their status, and when the other goes desync, backtrack and bruteforce the combination that puts it back to track. This kind of method is however extremely difficult to implement. And it still might be impossible - the timings just wouldn't match.

6. Downloading

The official home page of nesmock is at http://iki.fi/bisqwit/source/nesmock.html.
Check there for new versions.

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