Super Mario Advance: Super Mario Advance - SNES Color Restoration

Super Mario Advance, like many Game Boy Advance games, features bright and washed out colors in order to compensate for the unlit screen of the console's original model.

This hack replaces the palettes in the "Super Mario 2 / USA" portion of the game with the ones from the SNES (Super Mario All-Stars) version where applicable. The palettes for the new objects, screens and menus were also updated to go along with the imported palettes. Additionally, a few graphics have been altered to fix some oddities or to match how they looked in the SNES version.

As for the "Mario Bros." portion of the game, all palettes have been adjusted to have their brightness slightly toned down.

Additional information can be found in the “Readme” file included.

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Super Mario Advance - SNES Color Restoration
v1.2 by Mister Man
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Introduction
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Super Mario Advance, like many Game Boy Advance games, features bright and washed out colors in order to compensate for the unlit screen of the console's original model.

This hack replaces the palettes in the "Super Mario 2 / USA" portion of the game with the ones from the SNES (Super Mario All-Stars) version where applicable. The palettes for the new objects, screens and menus were also updated to go along with the imported palettes. Additionally, a few graphics have been altered to fix some oddities or to match how they looked in the SNES version.

As for the "Mario Bros." portion of the game, all palettes have been adjusted to have their brightness slightly toned down.

Please note that this hack is not an edit of Asaki's "Super Mario Advance Color Restoration" hack.
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Changelog
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v1.00
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* Initial release

Palettes:
* Replaced the palettes in the "Super Mario 2 / USA" portion of the game with the ones from the SNES (Super Mario All-Stars) version where applicable.
* With the exception of the inside of vases, all in-door areas had their background palettes dimmed to match how they looked in the SNES version during gameplay.
* The palettes for the new objects, screens and menus were also updated to go along with the SNES palettes.

Graphics:
* Birdo's bow now uses proper shades of red instead of being mostly mixed with colors from her body (this was more noticeable with Green Birdo).
* Consequently, Robirdo's graphics were remapped to a new palette in order to make the bow display its colors correctly.
* Fixed the cloud background in the first part of the ending cutscene using the wrong color for the darkest shade of the clouds.
* Fixed the yellow strip in the "Yoshi Challenge" logo using the darkest shade of yellow (Non-Chinese versions only).
* The snow platform from the level previews was remapped to a new palette to match how it looked in the SNES version.
* Slightly altered the Ace Coins and the heart pick-ups, as they didn't look well with the SNES palettes.
* Fixed one of the shadow tiles in the "Yoshi Challenge" level previews not being entirely shaded.
* A few changes were done to the title logo in the Chinese version:
* The borders for the logo when initially pulled from the ground were redone. Originally, they were left unedited from the American/European version.
* Removed two stray pixels at the top and fixed a few incorrectly colored pixels in Mario's leg.
* Fixed the buttons in Mario's overalls being transparent in the "Choose a Game" screen (Chinese version only).
* Fixed Mario's face in the title logo being white when initially pulled from the ground (Japanese version only).
* Removed a stray pixel in Small Peach's carrying animation.

Code:
* Changed the palette attribute of the following graphics to match their appearance in the SNES version:
* Hoopster (brown and red -> red and black).
* The explosion effect of the cracked blocks (purple -> brown).
* The pyramid in World 2 / 6's level previews (the right side is now darker than the left side).
* The treetop (blue -> light blue), the snow platform (blue -> light blue) and the cloud (grey -> blue) in World 4's level previews.
* A new palette, taken from the SNES version, was inserted to restore the colors of the treetop and the snow platform.
* The pillar (green -> grey), the cloud (grey -> blue) and the cloud platform (purple -> pink) in World 7's level previews.
* A new palette, taken from the SNES version, was inserted to restore the color of the pillar.
* Fixed the giant trees in World 5-3 having a slightly brighter 8x8 tile.
* Fixed a misplaced shadow tile in the normal level previews.
* Fixed a partially miscolored character in Luigi's "Bonus Chance" screen (Chinese version only).
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v1.1
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* Added two optional patches (see below).

Palettes:
* Tweaked some of the new palettes that were created for this hack:
* The title logos.
* The blue sky in the title screen.
* The players in the "Choose a Player" screen.
* The "Choose a Game" banner in the "Choose a Game" screen.
* The "MVP" letters in the ending cutscene.
* The player icons in the HUD / Bonus Chance Screen.

Code:
* Fixed the players being one pixel above the platform in the second part of the ending cutscene.
* Changed the palette attribute of the following graphics to match their appearance in the SNES version:
* Autobomb (gray -> teal).
* Pigdit (purple -> blue).
* Beezo (non-homing variation) (yellow -> red).
* Magic carpet (red -> orange).
* The smoke created by POW Blocks (orange -> grey).
* Fixed Wart's sprite despawning too soon in the second part of the ending cutscene.
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v1.2
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Palettes:
* Tweaked some of the new palettes that were created for this hack:
* Robirdo's palette.
* The Yoshi Challenge Screen (orange color in the letters).
* Yellow Yoshi's palette.
* The score numbers.
* The rocks that pop out of the ground in the title screen.
* Peach's dress in the "Choose a Player" Screen.
* All palettes in the "Choose a Game" Screen.
* All palettes in the "Mario Bros." portion of the game have been adjusted to have their brightness slightly toned down.

Graphics:
* Readded an extra color in Robirdo's graphics (extra shade of light blue) that was initially omitted when the graphics were remapped to a new palette in v1.0.
* Fixed a transparent pixel in the "Mario Bros." pipe in the "Choose a Game" Screen.
* Brightened up the red color in the letters of the "Yoshi Challenge" logo.
* Removed the dark shading in the "O" in the "Yoshi Challenge" logo to mantain consistency with the other letters.
* The rocks that show up when a big object is plucked from the ground / a cracked block explodes has been replaced with the rock graphic used in the title screen.
* Fixed Small Mario's gloves having blue shading in one frame of his running animation.
* Fixed an incorrect color in the bottom border of the "Mario Bros." logo which caused the palette animation to look slightly messed up.

Code:
* Changed the palette attribute of the following graphics:
* The smoke created by Robirdo (orange -> grey).
* Fixed the boss rooms in World 2-3 and World 4-3 having broken-looking tiles in certain parts.
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Patching
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Inside the download, two folders can be found:
* "\Main Patch", which contains the patches with the changes mentioned in the "Changelog" section.
* "\Optional Patches", which contains optional patches that modify some aspects of the game (see "Optional Patches" for more information).

To apply these patches, any program that supports the IPS patch format (like LunarIPS) is required.

Please note that the abbreviations in the end of each filename indicates which version of the game is the patch compatible with:
* "_JPN.ips"
* Super Mario Advance - Super Mario USA + Mario Brothers (Japan)
* Super Mario Advance - Super Mario USA + Mario Brothers (Japan) (Virtual Console)

* "_USA_KIOSK.ips"
* Super Mario Advance (USA) (Demo) (Kiosk)

* "_USA.ips"
* Super Mario Advance (USA, Europe)
* Super Mario Advance (USA, Europe) (Virtual Console)

* "_CHN.ips"
* Chaoji Maliou 2 (China)
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Optional Patches
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* Please note that:
* The main patch must be applied first before applying any of the optional patches.
* These patches do not affect the "Mario Bros." portion of the game.

GBA-Style Player Palettes:
* This patch modifies the palettes of the players to look closer to the original GBA release:
* Mario and Luigi's overalls are now blue.
* Toad's vest is now purple and his cap is brighter.
* Peach's dress is now slightly redder.
* Other palettes (Choose a Player Screen, HUD) were also updated to match the new player palettes.

Original Enemy Colors:
* This patch replaces the colors of some enemies with the ones from the original GBA release:
* Hoopsters are now brown and red.
* Autobombs are now grey.
* All Beezos are now yellow.
* Pidgits are now purple.
* Magic Carpets are now red.
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Tools Used
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* Advanced Palette Editor
* GIMP
* Hex Workshop
* LunarIPS
* mGBA
* NO$GBA
* YY-CHR.NET (sprite, program and palette editors)

Database match: Chaoji Maliou 2 (China)
Database: No-Intro: Game Boy Advance (v. 20210227-023848)
File/ROM SHA-1: 4FC77A2397086408554C50F9BF06327ABE04066E
File/ROM CRC32: 14A87B75

Database match: Super Mario Advance - Super Mario USA + Mario Brothers (Japan) (Virtual Console)
Database: No-Intro: Game Boy Advance (v. 20210227-023848)
File/ROM SHA-1: 146FDC181061A8B6CF6A97D4DA0530B0E45C5FD2
File/ROM CRC32: 49684D37

Database match: Super Mario Advance - Super Mario USA + Mario Brothers (Japan)
Database: No-Intro: Game Boy Advance (v. 20210227-023848)
File/ROM SHA-1: 5AB5ADE42EA0C5F255B3FBF00CDCC07B71BA20B8
File/ROM CRC32: B993B92F

Database match: Super Mario Advance (USA) (Demo) (Kiosk)
Database: No-Intro: Game Boy Advance (v. 20210227-023848)
File/ROM SHA-1: 05E41B04CDCD73194C0F836639C5774779F50A3F
File/ROM CRC32: 69924CBD

Database match: Super Mario Advance (USA, Europe) (Virtual Console)
Database: No-Intro: Game Boy Advance (v. 20210227-023848)
File/ROM SHA-1: B646CE9765A5061AAC9F1A52346A1F5E42B3D871
File/ROM CRC32: 5251F2BF

Database match: Super Mario Advance (USA, Europe)
Database: No-Intro: Game Boy Advance (v. 20210227-023848)
File/ROM SHA-1: F071D45D8F5CB05B48D7D2B804C6CB6A79AD96FB
File/ROM CRC32: 1E4C6D6A