Zoids Legacy Recomp

A native Windows port of Zoids Legacy (Game Boy Advance, USA) made by statically recompiling the game with GBARecomp. It runs at a steady 60 fps, supports adaptive widescreen, applies the community's English retranslation to your own ROM when the game starts, and has a small set of settings and mods built into the game's own menus.

You need your own legally dumped copy of the game and of the GBA BIOS. This project contains no ROM, no BIOS and no game data. See Legal.

Features

• Native speed: the game's own code is recompiled to C++ and runs natively at 60 fps. Your BIOS is not recompiled: it runs through the framework's built-in BIOS emulation, with its interpreter bridging two BIOS routines (the program's exit report calls this NOT_STATIC, and that is accurate). Xbox controllers work by default: plug one in (any Xbox-style pad) and play, no setup. The keyboard works too.
• Adaptive widescreen that follows the window shape: the field, the world map and the battle screens use the extra width; menus, shops and screen transitions keep the original 4:3-ish layout.
• Better English text: the retranslation from ZoidsLegacyDecomp (variable-width font and rewritten script) is applied to the ROM in memory. Your ROM file is never modified.
• Settings inside the game, on the title screen: Options > Config. has Widescreen, FPS counter, Battle speed and a list of installed mods.
• Battle speed: battles can run from 1.0x to 3.0x (default 1.5x). Only battles are affected.
• Return to title from the pause menu (with a confirmation prompt).
• Mods list: a mod registers itself and gets an ON/OFF row in the Config screen. The first one is a painted main character, included in the release download (off by default, not in the source repository).
• Sharp pixel scaling by default, fullscreen on F11, and 9 save-state slots: Shift + F1-F9 saves, F1-F9 loads.

Controls and hotkeys

Game (controller)	Xbox controller works by default: D-pad, A / B buttons, bumpers = L / R, Start, Back = Select
Game (keyboard)	arrows, X = A, Z = B, C = L, V = R, Enter = Start, Right Shift = Select (rebindable in the framework's keybinds)
F11	fullscreen
F	FPS counter on/off
[ and ]	battle speed down / up (shown top right, saved)
Shift + F1-F9	save a save state into slot 1-9
F1-F9	load the save state from slot 1-9
Esc	quit

Settings are saved in zoids_settings.ini next to the program.

Getting started

Download (easiest)

Download the Windows zip from the project's Releases page, unzip it anywhere, then:

1. Put your GBA BIOS in the bios folder, named gba_bios.bin (the standard 16 KB BIOS, SHA-1 300c20df6731a33952ded8c436f7f186d25d3492).
2. Put your Zoids Legacy (USA) ROM in the rom folder (a .gba file, any name, SHA-1 460fa2158606097f6e6f63ce966d2d6ecdd58d70).
3. Double-click ZoidsLegacyRecomp.exe.

Dump both from hardware you own. The first start takes a few seconds: the translation is applied to a copy of your ROM. If a file is missing or wrong, the program tells you what and where.

ZoidsLegacyRecomp/
  ZoidsLegacyRecomp.exe     (plus SDL2.dll and the Visual C++ runtime DLLs)
  bios/              your GBA BIOS (gba_bios.bin)
  rom/               your Zoids Legacy (USA) ROM (.gba)
  mods/              mods, one folder each (the painted hero comes ready in hires-hero/, off by default)
  saves/             your save files (created for you)
  cache/             the translated ROM image and save states (created for you)

Using the release

• Settings: on the title screen choose Options > Config. to change Widescreen, the FPS counter and the battle speed. Changes are saved in zoids_settings.ini.
• Painted hero (optional): the mods/hires-hero folder holds a painted version of the main character. It is off by default: in Options > Config. set Mod: Painted hero to ON. Delete the folder to remove it.
• Saves are written to the saves folder; copy it to keep or move your progress. Save states (F1-F9) go in cache.
• Windows warning: the program is not code-signed, so Windows SmartScreen may say "Windows protected your PC". Choose More info and then Run anyway.
• A message box appears at start: it names the missing or wrong file (BIOS or ROM) and the folder it expects it in. Check the SHA-1 values above.
• Nothing happens on double-click: make sure you unzipped the folder first (do not run it from inside the zip), and keep all the files next to the exe.

Build it yourself

You need Visual Studio 2022 ("Desktop development with C++" and "C++ Clang tools"), CMake, Ninja, Python 3 and git (details in docs/BUILDING.md). No BIOS or ROM is needed to build the program, only to play.

1. Double-click Setup.bat: it downloads GBARecomp and SDL2 and builds them (about 1 minute).
2. Put your ROM in rom/ (the build reads it to generate the game code) and double-click Build.bat (a few minutes). This makes ZoidsLegacyRecomp.exe in the project folder.
3. Put your BIOS in bios/ and double-click Play.bat (or the exe).
4. To make the release zip: powershell -File package.ps1.

Mods

See docs/MODS.md for how a mod gets into the Config screen, and for the painted hero mod (the art itself is only in the release zip, not in this repository).

Project layout

Path	What it is
bios/, rom/, mods/	the folders described above
gbarecomp_game/	the game project: game.toml files, host program, widescreen, settings, mods list, battle speed, patch loader
framework-patches/	our small changes to GBARecomp, as a patch applied by setup.ps1
tools/	two small scripts the build uses (BPS patch applier, file embedder)
docs/	build guide and mod guide

Known issues

• Shop and lab doors in widescreen have only been checked through the transition rules, not recorded door by door.
• In the Config screen the cursor jumps back to the top after a row is changed.
• Battle music pitch follows the battle speed.
• Battle widescreen was checked on the desert arena; other arenas may show small margin glitches.

Credits

• mstan/GBARecomp: the GBA static recompiler and native runtime this is built on (PolyForm Noncommercial 1.0.0).
• jmacato/ZoidsLegacyDecomp (Jumar Macato): the decompilation project and the English retranslation patch used here (MIT).

The full list, including the models used for the optional painted-hero art, is in CREDITS.md.

Legal

This is an unofficial fan project, not affiliated with or endorsed by the rights holders of Zoids (Atari, Tomy, Hasbro, and others). Zoids Legacy, its code, art, music and text belong to their owners. Dump your game and your GBA BIOS yourself, from hardware you own; do not ask for or share them.

The program contains game logic translated from the original program code (as in every GBARecomp game release) but none of the game's graphics, music, text or other data: those are read from your ROM when it runs. Nothing derived from the BIOS is included; the BIOS is read from your own file. This project is for noncommercial use (see LICENSE); nothing built from it may be sold.