Darkaiser | The Lost The Wrath Of Cortex Minigame Has Been FOUND! @Darkaiser | Uploaded June 2024 | Updated October 2024, 1 day ago.
A new prototype build of Crash Bandicoot The Wrath of Cortex has been secured and released, courtesy of Xhaos. This build is very special because it features a fairly well-known cut content that has been mentioned for years in the community, but had no screenshots or videos of. I'm talking about the scrapped minigame on the loading screens, a feature that almost saw the light of day if not for a Namco patent on the loading screen minigames that caused Konami to hold it back and ask for it to be removed. This explains why the loading screens are so long on the initial PlayStation 2 release, as Traveller's Tales apparently didn't have enough time to clean up the code and strip out the minigame data.
An anonymous source was kind enough to dump the disc and share the ISO with Xhaos, who is now releasing it. Despite being dated only 10 days before the initial PS2 1.0 version, this build also has some other minor differences. You can play it yourself and try to find out what else is different.
Download:
Additionally, if you are interested in this game and its modding potential, Xhaos is also working on a reverse engineering project to decompile and port the game to PC. You can join the Discord server in the pinned comment.
A new prototype build of Crash Bandicoot The Wrath of Cortex has been secured and released, courtesy of Xhaos. This build is very special because it features a fairly well-known cut content that has been mentioned for years in the community, but had no screenshots or videos of. I'm talking about the scrapped minigame on the loading screens, a feature that almost saw the light of day if not for a Namco patent on the loading screen minigames that caused Konami to hold it back and ask for it to be removed. This explains why the loading screens are so long on the initial PlayStation 2 release, as Traveller's Tales apparently didn't have enough time to clean up the code and strip out the minigame data.
An anonymous source was kind enough to dump the disc and share the ISO with Xhaos, who is now releasing it. Despite being dated only 10 days before the initial PS2 1.0 version, this build also has some other minor differences. You can play it yourself and try to find out what else is different.
Download:
Additionally, if you are interested in this game and its modding potential, Xhaos is also working on a reverse engineering project to decompile and port the game to PC. You can join the Discord server in the pinned comment.
![Crash Team Racing (Aug 5, 1999 prototype) - Time Trial Mode [Part 3]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Osm2Vt1O6_Y/hqdefault.jpg "Crash Team Racing (Aug 5, 1999 prototype) - Time Trial Mode [Part 3]
This is the eight preview video of the prototype of Crash Team Racing (PS1).
This gameplay is from the August 5th 1999, a beta version of the game built a month and a half before the final NTSC build date of September 24th 1999. This build is dongle protected, which means you cant play via normal means, so attempting to run it will result in a black screen. Were solving this problem, so it will eventually be released to the public. Dont ask for a release date because even we dont know and were also busy with other stuff, so please be patient and enjoy the videos.
A full documentation of the differences will be available at The Cutting Room Floor article, and a download link will be posted on Hidden Palace website. At the time, both pages are being worked on.
A HUGE thanks to almarkowbender, gdias/Darkaiser (me), Gh0stBlade, let-over-lambda, mementomori/madmarsrocks, Niko, and psx-collector for making this release possible.")
![Crash Team Racing (Aug 5, 1999 prototype) - Citadel City & N. Oxides Challenge [PART 4]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/QgpW3YUdoqU/hqdefault.jpg "Crash Team Racing (Aug 5, 1999 prototype) - Citadel City & N. Oxides Challenge [PART 4]
The August 5th, 1999 build is a preview version of CTR built a month and a half before the final NTSC build date of September 24th, 1999. This beta version was widely given out among North-american video game magazines to be used in preview articles before the game is released.
A full documentation of the differences can found at: https://tcrf.net/Proto:Crash_Team_Racing/August_5th,_1999_build
Download the game, patched and ready to go: https://hiddenpalace.org/Crash_Team_Racing_(Aug_5,_1999_prototype%29
This build has protection to prevent people from using the disc outside of Naughty Dog, or their reviewers.
Protection level 1:
If the disc does not detect a special memory card dongle, then the game will not boot. It is as simple as if you see a string on the memory card, then boot. If the string is not on the memory card, then freeze. Interestingly, the dongles internal name is E3 dongle Copyright 1999 Naughty Dog, Inc., leading to believe that it was made specifically for E3 demo but later reused in subsequent builds.
Protection level 2:
After the game boots, there are 7 function pointers that are assigned incorrect values, which are incremented by an RNG before being executed. If a controller dongle is inserted, the controller will inject data into the RNG, then the RNG will increment the incorrect function pointers to the correct function addresses. Without the dongle, the incorrect pointers will execute, and crash the game.
In previous videos, we only had one function pointer working correctly, by setting a breakpoint before execution in no$psx emulator, and overriding the value manually. There were several bugs and instabilities.
Niko has spent over a year researching the retail game (94426), so within a few days, he finally was able to find how the entire function pointer system worked, and insert ASM that forces the RNG to return one value, which corrects all 7 function pointers, allowing the game to run.
Niko also fixed one of Naughty Dogs mistakes that was present even with the dongles, that would prevent the game from loading Relic Race on Slide Coliseum and Turbo Track.
In the link below, there are miscellaneous content for this prototype:
- GameShark codes that allow you to instantly beat Adventure Mode 100%, and unlock all rewards.
- A guide for playing the original ISO by making your own memory card dongle, and using GameShark to apply the rest of the fixes.
- We documented exactly how the ISO was patched, to learn how it was done.
Miscellaneous Content:
https://www.mediafire.com/file/sh93l6fmimh3e16/CTR+(1999-08-05+prototype)+-+Misc+Content+(Updated+2021).zip/file
Huge thanks to almarkowbender, gdias/Darkaiser, Gh0stBlade, let-over-lambda, mementomori/madmarsrocks, Niko, and psx-collector for making this release possible.")
