VF.net Restoration via Flycast (incomplete)

Hello,

The talented team that enabled us to play Virtua Fighter 4 with rollback netcode has begun to seriously look at VF.net implementation of this game. So far, it’s just netDIMM High Level Emulation (so estimates of what the code actually did) and some all.net endpoints, but this is a pretty big step for the game.



I’ll be sure to update this thread periodically whenever new progress comes out. Don’t expect anything, this will take lots of time and we won’t get all of the fancy features likely, but it’s nice that we could be on our way to preserving Final Tuned more fully.

 

First Update: The ability to give blank cards has been added

 

Wow, great job, JKTwice!

I have no experience with any of the vf4 arcade version. But I think I heard that there’s a certain move(s) each character can select/purchase? to use in the match. Does this apply to vf4ft?

Again, amazing job and thank you for your dedication to the game we love.

 

If it was me that did this I would be going into much greater detail how I plan to implement this system.

Currently the bulk of the work is being done by flyinghead, the lead developer of the Flycast project. Here’s a link to the github https://github.com/flyinghead/flycast

All the appreciation should go to him and the people he works with, not me. I’m just the messenger.

And yes, the Change moves are in this game. No word yet on how one can edit those but flyinghead has successfully edited Vanessa’s costume so it’s likely not far off.

 

https://virtuafighter.com/commands/?ver=4fta

Go into each character's command list and look on the right hand site under notes for moves that have 'Change Move' listed there. Each character had two moves that each had two different versions, and you would need to choose which ones you wanted in the customization menus. The moves usually had a FT or EVO style balance change and then a VF4 Vanilla style version that you could revert to. Exceptions being Goh and Brad who were new to EVO.

VF4FT was the only version that had this. If you didn't have a character card the game would default to the newer version of the move I am pretty sure.

 

Update 2: The ability to save match record has been added.

Flyinghead is a confirmed Vanessa main now.

 

Power to the People

 

Update 3: Multiple cards have been confirmed to be registered. Flycast's vf.net will also support all 3 of the latest versions of VF4 (Ver. C, Evo Ver. B, and FT Ver. B).

No word yet as to how this will work online. To my knowledge, cards will not let you rank up past 10th Dan without a network connection which seemingly is what's being floated online. However, it is reported to be very easy to transfer card files between PCs. So it's entirely possible that when all is said and done the only day to be a named rank is to play offline which IMO would be kinda dope but I know many people would not appreciate that.

Flyinghead is moving to push something out ASAP. If you would like to support him and his work, check out his github at https://github.com/flyinghead/flycast where a PayPal link also exists. I threw in $40 or so cause his work is awesome. If you wanna see this system come back in full, I recommend you do the same.

 

Update 4: You can now register your card. No online support yet, only offline (so everyone will likely be scrubby kyu ranks for a long time lol)

Interested in hearing from any NYC dudes that had cards. Did anyone actually care about rank? I can’t imagine people did just because the rank process was such a slog unless you had a lot of players around you.

https://twitter.com/vfdiscord/status/1652463854243201024?s=46&t=gZ09ooYO7dsuL_MMSpTS-g

 

Gazuaaa, a Korean player, has informed me that this is how items were gained in Final Tuned:

It is based on FT. roughly, number of items sold in VF.NET store is approximately
Head, face about 10 pieces, upper body and lower body about 28 pieces, VF1 modeling 1p, 2p each 1.
2 coin items given upon clearing Challenge Mode.
4 items obtained from VF.NET Battle Arena (mini text game).
3 curse items (including Tutankhamen)
2 fantasy items given when collecting 7 fantasy spheres.
5 wooden items obtained when certain conditions are met.
3 mission items you get when you complete a specific mission.
3 normal quest items.
4 event quest items.
2 special gifts for participating in the questionnaire (Halloween hat and Santa hat).
various gold, silver, and general skirmish items are around 20?
can change the color of each of the 4 parts for each character's outfit.
4 colors when unit promotion (5th level, first level, strong, overlord).
10 colors sold in stores.
1 color obtained from battle arena.
3 colors you get when you complete the quest.
and there are about 4-6 victory poses sold in stores for each character​

These mfs really making us pay for purple or black or white. At least it’s all in-game currency.

Thanks flyinghead for allowing us to access all this stuff for free!

 

I've summarized Shun's color options on VFnet:

His 12 numeric settings are:
1p Pants,1p tunic,1p shirt,1p belt,2p pants,2p shirt,2p shoes,2p belt,1p hair, 1p eyes,2p hair, 2p eyes

colors will vary on 1P vs 2P side - this is what I cataloged:


For hair:
0 - default
1 - black
2 - brown

don't know eyes yet

 

Update 5: Flyinghead has gotten items and change moves working in some limited fashion it seems. Will update when these attributes can be changed via vfnet.duckdns.org

 

Update 6:

Fuck this

Items are now available to be changed in the new VFNET! This will be torture to figure out.

 

Yep.... It sure will take a while to find all the items hidden in the hex values.

 

Update 7: Change moves have finally arrived. With that, the core vf.net feature set is now complete. The ability to use cards online however isn’t here yet.

If you would like to contribute to the flycast team’s continued efforts, I’d recommend donating to flyinghead and blueminder. Flyinghead makes the emulator work and blueminder contributes the GGPO networking plus additional fixes. They both had a hand in bringing this system back to life.

Flyinghead: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/FlycastEmu

Blueminder: https://ko-fi.com/blueminder

 

Update 8: Presentation messages can now be used.

 

Aye, cool!

 

Just a quick note: Evo Ver. B (GDS-0024B) and Ver. C (GDS-0012C) are now fully supported, however the hex values for Vanilla are different for the items.

I'd say this project is basically done. There will be another update when the Dojo fork merges the changes made in the dev build which will enable full online play with cards. Currently, the dev build is able to auto exchange card data in the P1 slot so no manual exchange of files is needed. It's pretty much ready for Fightcade 2 whenever that gets updated (which is hopefully soon!).

Also, the source code for the vf.net server is available on flyinghead's github, preserving his work and this system for the years to come. So, when he stops hosting it, or if someone wants to put up their own alternative server, that is something that can happen.