Europia79

IPS File Format

IPS supposedly stands for "International Patching System" and is a patching format that was common with older ROMs back in the day.

The format is old and has limitations, so it's not often used today but I still wanted to keep the information alive as there are less sites documenting the format nowadays.

IPS addresses offsets to the original file in a 24-bit value, therefore it is limited to 2^24 meaning it can only patch up to the first 16 MiB of the file.
The patches themselves use 16-bit for the length and so it can only include patches up to 2^16 or 64 KiB at a time.

| Section | Size (bytes) | Description |

IUPAG

International Union of Pure & Applied Gaming:

"By Gamers, For Gamers: Committed to the Organization, Preservation, & Development of Romhacks" !!!

Table of Contents

Introduction
General Format
Naming Rules

0. Valid & Invalid Characters

I tried writing shell script, then actual code for this. Found some lists

https://github.com/Wiimpathy/CreateCat/blob/master/data/GBA/GBA_list.txt https://github.com/libretro/libretro-database/blob/master/metadat/genre/Nintendo%20-%20Game%20Boy%20Advance.dat

and even tried screenscraper api

but the problem always was finding and matching names correctly.

Gave up on that and simply used ChatGPT. It's reliable enough. Not many mistakes and even if it makes mistakes its not that big deal and overall this method is lot less painfull.

People

`:bowtie:`	😄 `:smile:`	😆 `:laughing:`
😊 `:blush:`	😃 `:smiley:`	☺️ `:relaxed:`
😏 `:smirk:`	😍 `:heart_eyes:`	😘 `:kissing_heart:`
😚 `:kissing_closed_eyes:`	😳 `:flushed:`	😌 `:relieved:`
😆 `:satisfied:`	😁 `:grin:`	😉 `:wink:`
😜 `:stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:`	😝 `:stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes:`	😀 `:grinning:`
😗 `:kissing:`	😙 `:kissing_smiling_eyes:`	😛 `:stuck_out_tongue:`

	#!/bin/bash
	# NES Flips Wrapper by Europia79
	##########################################
	# README #
	##########################################
	# (1) This script requires Linux, Mac, or Git-for-Windows:
	# https://gitforwindows.org/
	# https://git-scm.com/download/win
	# (2) This script also requires Floating IPS (flips) v1.31:
	# https://github.com/Alcaro/Flips

	#!/bin/sh

	input_file="gba.dat"
	output_file="output.json"

	# declare -A crc_to_genre
	# declare -A name_to_genre

	inside_game_block=false
	crc_to_genre_json=""

	/**
	* The MIT License
	* Copyright (c) 2015 Techcable
	*
	* Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
	* of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
	* in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
	* to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
	* copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
	* furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions: