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ROM Enhancement Hacks: Yea or Nay?

Somewhat recently I've found a board for patches for old NES and SNES games that add changes like a mini map for Metroid or a re translation for Castlevania II: Simon's Quest, and I wanted to know how you guys felt about those. Do you think ROM enhancement hacks provide essential fixes that make the games more enjoyable today, or do you believe they taint the original creator's intended vision for the game?
 

MarkMe2525

Gold Member
They can transform those garrish looking castlevania titles on the gba, into beautiful looking games. The road rash enhancements for genesis also significantly improves the frame rates.

Lesson being, they are awesome.
 
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nkarafo

Member
Ocarina of Time Redux has a ton of quality of life fixes, like having the different boots and ocarina on the d-pad as extra quick items. No more menu juggling in the water temple. It's the best version of the game, other than the native homebrew PC port.

DOOM Resurrection 32X has all the missing levels from the original, runs in full screen while having better frame rate on top and has a remastered soundtrack which sounds amazing. It's so much better than the original, it's not even funny. It's even better than the PS1 port IMO.

These mods work on real hardware too. They don't rely on powerful hosts emulating the systems.
 
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64bitmodels

Reverse groomer.
There's a mod for Earthbound that changes nothing but the controls to make them more inline with modern JRPGs. And i consider it essential to any playthrough of the game in modern times.

Fucking yeah rom enhancement hacks are the shit. especially the decensor/retranslation ones.
 
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Fake

Member
Vary.

There are roms indeed that got improved, but others there are someones 'take'.

I remember liking a lot the Sonic 3&K Air, until the guy behind start to make annoying and uncessary mofications, like changing animations, tried to push the 'remastered' version of the OST...


IMO roms need to get bugs and glitches fixed. If improvement, just performance and resolution.
 

nkarafo

Member
I remember liking a lot the Sonic 3&K Air, until the guy behind start to make annoying and unnecessary modification, like changing animations, tried to push the 'remastered' version of the OST...

It's been a year since i updated this but i remember the remastered soundtrack being the exact same as the original, with a bit better sound quality. It's not like it was a remix or something. Not sure about the animations. I think most of them are optional?

S3&K had a great soundtrack though. I mentioned DOOM 32 Resurrection. This mod does have a remixed soundtrack. It sounds nothing like the 32X original fart sounds. Would you say it's a good thing in this case?
 

Fake

Member
It's been a year since i updated this but i remember the remastered soundtrack being the exact same as the original, with a bit better sound quality. It's not like it was a remix or something. Not sure about the animations. I think most of them are optional?

S3&K had a great soundtrack though. I mentioned DOOM 32 Resurrection. This mod does have a remixed soundtrack. It sounds nothing like the 32X original fart sounds. Would you say it's a good thing in this case?

Became optional by demand, and he change animations like Sonic falling showing fall animation in spots that they never do. Flickys and animals don't fall from the precipice.

Is start to get his 'take' of the game. Almost feel like he never liked those games to begin with. Is the commom 'Is good, but I can make better' premisse.
 

nkarafo

Member
Became optional by demand, and he change animations like Sonic falling showing fall animation in spots that they never do. Flickys and animals don't fall from the precipice.

Is start to get his 'take' of the game. Almost feel like he never liked those games to begin with. Is the commom 'Is good, but I can make better' premisse.

I do agree with what you say but i honestly didn't feel this way with Sonic A.I.R. I loved every improvement. And i especially loved the (optional) Flying Battery to Ice Cap transition where Sonic is using the smashed Flying Battery door to surf, instead of some random surf board. TBH, i didn't notice these changes you just mentioned.

Btw, there is a mod for the original ROM that's called "Sonic 3 Complete" and works on the original console. It has most of AIR's additions and they are also mostly optional.
 

Fake

Member
I do agree with what you say but i honestly didn't feel this way with Sonic A.I.R. I loved every improvement. And i especially loved the (optional) Flying Battery to Ice Cap transition where Sonic is using the smashed Flying Battery door to surf, instead of some random surf board. TBH, i didn't notice these changes you just mentioned.

Btw, there is a mod for the original ROM that's called "Sonic 3 Complete" and works on the original console. It has most of AIR's additions and they are also mostly optional.

Thats 'why' I say vary.

As I see, changing animations without reason or against the original dev don't look an improvement to me. For me, any form of boost perfomance, resolution, remove bugs and glitches is an improvement. As soon as the modder start to make those change, is not improvements anymore. He can call whatever he want, but the ideia of 'improvement' in this context is subjective.
 
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