Mario Kart Arcade GP DX

Mario Kart Arcade GP DX
Developers: Bandai Namco, Xeen Publisher: Bandai Namco Platform: Arcade (Namco System ES3) Released in JP: July 25, 2013 Released in US: 2014 Released in EU: Early 2017 This game has unused areas. This game has unused code. This game has unused graphics. This game has unused music. This game has unused text. This game has debugging material. This game has regional differences.

To do: The US cabinet (version 1.05) has been dumped, check for unused content in that version. Interesting executable strings (Rev 1.10), for example: JP notes in EXE. 1.18 has more source files. More Regional differences.

Mario Kart Arcade GP DX, the third game in the Arcade GP series, ditches the other Pac-Man characters in favor of only including the Pac himself and removes Rainbow Cup, but adds character palette swaps, gliding (from Mario Kart 7), underwater (also from Mario Kart 7), and Don-chan. Oh, and no more Mario Card!

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Unused Text Unused text and debug strings.

Developer Leftovers

Source Files

Autodesk Models

Present in Data\Model, Data\System\Model and Data\Model\menu\eggslot, the files spe25_dekatibi_R.xsi and spe25_dekatibi_F.xsi were added in the 1.10 update.

Download Autodesk model sources from MKAGPDX File: MKAGPDX_AutoDeskModelSRC.zip (12,483 KB) (info)

Bishamon Effect Solutions

Present in Data\Effects\bmsln, are solutions for a portion of the models made from the Bishamon middleware used from Matchlock Corporation. They were made from 2012-2013.

Download Bishamon solutions from MKAGPDX File: MKAGPDX_BishamonEffectsSRC.zip (152 KB) (info)

Maya Collada

Present in Data\Effects\model are a portion of raw collada files. Almost all of them were created by S_Ihara, likely Sayo Ihara, who is part of the visual effects team at Xeen Inc. in the credits. The source file exported is usually located in D:/MK3/EF/3D/maya/scenes/sozai.mb and related textures are in D:/MK3/EF/3D/maya/image/*, where star could be something like ef_3D_common_a01.dds or ef_3D_tornado.png. The only file that isn't created by that person is obj_warp02.dae where the author is not present in the file but the texture compilation location D:/users/imaki/projects/MK3/effects/model/ef_3D_warp02.dds suggests that Toshifumi Imaki who is also part of the same group from the same team made it.

Download Maya colladas from MKAGPDX File: MKAGPDX_MayaColladasSRC.zip (75 KB) (info)

Uncompiled Effect Shaders

The base game and update(s) have uncompiled shader effect files Shift-JIS encoded in the directory Data\System\Shader. Similar files are separated across them.

Download Uncompiled effect shader files MKAGPDX File: MKAGPDX_UncompiledShadersSRC.zip (157 KB) (info)

Ruby Scripts

To do: Upload them, putting them here raw would just make the page bigger.

Present in Data\Effects\shader are Ruby scripts for making the shaders.

Maya Swatch File

Present in Data\Model\kart\mario\spe23\.mayaSwatches is a single file titled mark_mario_col.dds.swatch, being a Maya swatch file that has no use by the game. It was created by imaki-toshifumi on I-0911, where I-0911 is likely the computer or workspace while imaki-toshifumi is likely Toshifumi Imaki, who takes part of the visual effects team at Xeen Inc. as seen in the credits of the game. The file was created on Monday August 18th at 20:12:45/8:12 PM in 2014.

Raw PNG Textures

The Data/Effects/model directory has two modified source PNG files before converting to DDS, one (ef_3D_common_a01) also has a DDS file but the other (ef_3D_tornado) doesn't. The first doesn't have the fire particles.

Unused Graphics

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Present in flash/data_jp/common_tex/tex/test.pac are test character icons of all the characters from the first release (Rosalina is there as well because her files are present in the first release) in dds format. The most notable difference is Pac-Man, as he uses his older model from GP1/2. In the final, he uses his appearance from Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures. There's also smaller versions of the same icons.

flash/data_jp/test_data/test_datatex.pac contains two Mario icons (much like the ones in test.pac), and sprites for a test menu and two images of old cars in Japan, most likely at some kind of car show- the car on the right is a Messerschmitt Kabinenroller. They may have been used to test the camera.

flash/data_jp/select_00/select_00tex.pac has placeholder sprites for the class selection and other sorts. It reuses artwork from GP1/2, Mario Kart Wii, and Mario Kart 7.

Cut Yoshi Colors

Character Sprites

flash/data_jp/common_tex/tex/chara_p00.pac, in the first release, are character photo icons for Yellow Yoshi, Red Yoshi, and Blue Yoshi. These use a similar style to the test versions of the other character icons. They also seem to be poorly edited, since their chests have a different color as well. There may have been plans for more palette swap Yoshis as DLC, but got cut for unknown reasons. It's possible they were deciding which Yoshi colors to go with. In the first release of the game, palette swap characters also weren't implemented yet, so it's also possible they were experimenting with different palette swap characters using slots 14-18. When palette swaps were added, only Red Yoshi and Black Yoshi were released. At this point, Black Yoshi's wasn't added yet. Yellow Yoshi's slot ID is 16 (0x10), Red Yoshi's slot ID is 17 (0x11), and Blue Yoshi's is 18 (0x12). In later versions, slot 16 would be used by Baby Peach, slot 17 would be used by Daisy, and slot 18 would be used by King Boo. Red Yoshi's final slot is 105.

Present in flash/data_jp/common_tex/tex/chara_p02.pac, in the first release, are character select icons for Yellow Yoshi and Blue Yoshi, this time using official artwork. Red Yoshi uses the same one as his released one, except at slot 17.

Color Icons

Early	Final

flash/data_jp/common_tex/tex/color_icon.pac, in the first release, contains character icons for swapping color palettes for Yellow Yoshi, Red Yoshi (slightly early version due to some outline differences), and interestingly, Light Blue Yoshi. Light Blue Yoshi is using the same slot as Blue Yoshi is for the other icons, so this makes it rather odd. Either this was a mistake, or they were debating between Blue and Light Blue Yoshi.

Character Names

flash/data_jp/common_tex/tex/chara_name_p00.pac, in the first release, contains the character names for Yellow Yoshi, Red Yoshi, and Blue Yoshi. These all use the same color as regular Yoshi's name, rather than having their own colors. These sprites are still present in later releases in chara_name.pac. Smaller versions of these exist as well in chara_name_p01.pac. Yellow Yoshi's and Blue Yoshi's final sprites shows Baby Peach's and King Boo's, since their slots were replaced by them.

Early (Yellow Yoshi)	Final (Baby Peach)

Early (Red Yoshi)	Final

Early (Blue Yoshi)	Final (King Boo)

Photo Banners

Early	Final

flash/data_jp/common_tex/tex/nam_p00_l.pac, in the first release, contains the character banners for the photo screen of Yellow Yoshi, Red Yoshi, and again, Light Blue Yoshi, all using early versions of Yoshi's regular one, only showing his eyes. The IDs for these are odd; for some reason, Red Yoshi is at slot 16 (slot 17 for the other sprites), Light Blue Yoshi is at slot 17 (slot 18 for the other sprites), and Yellow Yoshi is at slot 18 (slot 16 for the other sprites). Smaller versions of these exist as well in nam_p00_s.pac.

Cut Palette Swap

According to version 1.10, some placeholder sprites exist for a palette swap of Rosalina that was in development, but this got cut. In later versions, most of these sprites were dummied with blank images, except the photo icon sprite, which is still her black silhouette, but without the text and is transparent. It uses slot ID 112. Sadly, no model of this exists.

Graphic	Pac File	Comment
	chara_p00.pac	The character banner sprite. Shows a black silhouette of Rosalina, but it has text that says "レーシングロゼッタ" (Racing Rosetta/Rosalina). This palette swap might be referring to her biker outfit from Mario Kart Wii.
	chara_p01.pac	Character portrait of Racing Rosalina.
	chara_p02.pac	Character select icon of Racing Rosalina.
	chara_name_p00.pac	Character name for Racing Rosalina.
	chara_name_p01.pac	Small character name for Racing Rosalina.
	color_icon.pac	Color icon for Racing Rosalina. There's no color icon for default Rosalina.

Early Character Sprites

Metal Mario

Since Metal Mario exists in the first release of the game, but weren't released till later, he also uses some early sprites as well.

Early	Final	Comment
		The character banner sprite. Uses Mario's test sprite with Japanese katakana on it saying "Metal".
		Character portrait of Metal Mario. Uses a somewhat unique custom pose(?). The shading seems unfinished in it.
		Character select icon of Metal Mario. Uses a black silhouette of Mario's sprite with "Metal" on it.
		Photo banner for Metal Mario. It seems poorly edited and less based on Metal Mario's colors. This one was actually edited off of an early version of Mario's photo banner.

Rosalina

Same situation as Metal Mario, she also has early sprites in the first release of the game.

Early	Final	Comment
		The character banner sprite. Just uses different official artwork from the final's, but cropped differently.
		Character portrait of Rosalina. Uses a somewhat unique custom pose(?). The shading seems unfinished in it.
		Character select icon of Rosalina. Uses a black silhouette of Rosalina's sprite, using the other official artwork, with "Rosetta" on it.
		Photo banner for Rosalina. It seems more cartoonish than the final's, and it only shows one of her earrings.

Fire Mario

Only 2 early sprites exists for Fire Mario, using slot ID 14. A placeholder character banner sprite for the photo screen, using a black silhouette of Mario's with Fire Mario's name on it in Japanese, and an early version of his color icon. His icon interestingly has a Fire Flower next to it, which was removed later. It's possible this was just to reference Mario obtaining a Fire Flower, since Mario's early default color icon has a Mushroom next to it, possibly a similar reference. The same probably would of been for Tanooki Mario having the leaf icon, Luigi having a Mushroom, and Ice Luigi having the Ice Flower if this was kept in. These still exists in later versions, since this character slot doesn't get replaced later. Fire Mario does still get moved to a different slot, however, which is slot 100.

Early	Final	Comment
		Color icon.
		Photo banner.

Tanooki Mario

Tanooki Mario has some placeholder sprites in the first release of the game, using slot ID 15. There's also a few in version 1.10 for when he was in development as a palette swap. Slot ID 15 would later be used by Baby Mario, and Tanooki Mario would later use slot ID 200.

Earliest	Early	Final	Comment
			The character banner sprite. Has 2 early versions. One of them is in version 1.10. The earliest uses Mario's test sprites with Japanese hiragana on it saying "Tanuki". The later version uses a black silhouette of Mario that says "Gold Mario" on it. An early version of Gold Mario's that was used during it's development was probably copied over.
			Character select icon of Tanooki Mario. Has 2 early versions. Both use a black silhouette of Mario's sprite, except the earliest one says "Tanuki", and the later version says "Gold Mario".
N/A			Color icon.
	N/A		Photo banner.
			Tanooki Mario's name sprite. Has 2 early versions. The earliest one uses the same color as Mario's name, and the later version uses a placeholder of Gold Mario's name.
			Tanooki Mario's small name sprite. Has 2 early versions.

Tanooki Mario also has a placeholder character portrait sprite, but it's just a duplicate of Mario's character portrait.

Other Characters

In the first release, some of the first release characters have early sprites, some of which never got used for anything, or did but was in development during this time.

Color Icons

Early	Final	Comment
		Mario's icon used to have a Mushroom.
		Yoshi's icon didn't have proper shadows.

Photo Banners

There's a file for the photo banner sprites called nam_p00_m.pac that contains early versions of most of the characters from the first release of the game. This file doesn't get used at all. The "m" most likely means "medium", since there's also nam_p00_l.pac and nam_p00_s.pac which are for "large" and "small" versions of the photo banners. For the "m" version, the characters end at Metal Mario, which was probably when this file was abandoned. This file still exists in later versions untouched. Since there's no medium version for comparison, the final large version will be used.

Early	Final	Comment
		Peach looks like she had more details, besides crown looking like it's not there.
		Almost the same as the final's, besides his ears having different shading, and different hair tip.
		Less detail.
		Just Yoshi's eyes.
		Used the same one from GP 1/2, but the shading is different and the eyes are smaller.
		Less details.
		Used a black silhouette of Mario's.

Lakitu Photo Banner

Lakitu does have sprites for a photo banner, but for whatever reason he didn't get one. His large icon is a placeholder using a black silhouette of Toad's banner, with Lakitu's name in Japanese (Jugemu), and his small icon is actually his own banner.

English Single-Player Mode Select

SELECT_MODE_02_PACK	SELECT_MODE_02_EF_PACK

While the Japanese version has a single-player menu that lets the player choose either Grand Prix or National Battle, this screen goes unused in the US version, with instead a screen letting the player choose a normal or mirror course. This version's graphics has been translated in English, and National Battle is known as "Worldwide Versus", suggesting that it was planned to be a fully playable game mode like it's Japanese counterpart.

By replacing the files in /flash/data_jp/select_mode_02 in the 1.10 Japanese version with it's English files, the unused menu will load properly with it's layout being fully functional.

Trivia! Screens

	TIPS_MAME_001	TIPS_MAME_003	TIPS_MAME_005
Japanese (Used)
American (Unused)

In US version 1.05 of the game, three Trivia! screens go unused. These screens are about saving karts and items to BANAPASSPORT Cards, Worldwide Versus Mode, and special codes. All of the content here is accessible in the Japanese version, suggesting that this was planned as well for the American cabinets. A few differences can be seen between both graphics for both the American and Japanese versions.

• The BANAPASSPORT Card in the American graphic uses a unique design based on the title screen, while the Japanese version uses the default card design.
• The artwork of Mario in the Worldwide Versus Mode graphic is the same as the BANAPASSPORT Card and special codes graphic, while the Japanese version uses Mario's artwork of him pointing.
• The special codes graphic uses a different design for the back of the card with the QR code. The QR code card also has a blue circle around the code itself in the American graphic. The Japanese version has a shiny background, removes the blue circle around the QR code, and a bigger QR code card.

Worldwide Versus Tips

	BUN_TIPS_000	BUN_TIPS_001	BUN_TIPS_002	BUN_TIPS_003	BUN_TIPS_004
Japanese (Used)
American (Unused)					N / A

A set of tips graphics meant for starting Worldwide Versus for the first time in bun_tips.pac. Aside from translations, a few minor differences are present between both the Japanese and American graphics. The Mario Coin counter in the screenshot on the tip screen asking the player to select an avatar (BUN_TIPS_003), is missing in the American version. Also, the American version does not have a tips screen graphic about ghosts being created when winning and conquering areas (BUN_TIPS_004).

Courses

Toad Cup

MR_billboard_marge_b

MR_billboard_marge_b.dds contains textures for a few sponsor banners from the first two games, specifically of Mario, Peach, Yoshi, and Toad.

test_banner

test_banner.dds is the Toad sponsor banner from the first two games as well.

Pac-Man Cup

The files for the Pac-Man Cup courses has an texture named FC_auvision_images01.dds, being a screenshot of the title screen of the 1.07 version of the game, with kanji for "temporary" (仮) in front of the graphic. Seeing how this shares the name FC_auvision with the textures for the screens in Pac-Man Stadium, this is most likely used as a placeholder graphic for the screens.

Lakitu U-Turn Sign

Japanese	English

Lakitu's object graphics (jugemu_parts_col.dds) have a U-turn sign, along with a specular map for it (jugemu_parts_spe.dds), for when the player goes backwards, but since the player can't go backwards, it goes unused. There's also no model for it. A glitch can be done to force the player to go backwards by disabling the warps at Peach Castle or Kingdom Way, but the sign doesn't attempt to appear either.

Grid Test?

The texture and model directories in Data\Effects have this file called test_01.dds, the base and update(s) of the game have this file.

Error Popup Textures

flash/data_jp/common_tex/tex/popup_error.pac / flash/data_en/common_tex/tex/popup_error.pac has error message popup textures, but unfortunately they went unused as the game pulls strings from the error list text file to display over the "Call Attendant" message instead when an error occurs during bootup or gameplay.

Japanese	English	Comment
	N / A	The English version of this message does not exist. The Japanese graphic translates to "IC card R/W (Unit 1) not connected"
	N / A	The English version of this message does not exist. The Japanese graphic translates to "Failed to initialize IC card R/W (Unit 1)"
	N / A	The English version of this message does not exist. The Japanese graphic translates to "IC card R/W (Unit 2) not connected"
	N / A	The English version of this message does not exist. The Japanese graphic translates to "Failed to initialize IC card R/W (Unit 2)"

Unused Tracks

To do: Find/create new videos of tracks.

There's a total of 4 unused tracks in this game. One debug track, and 3 regulation maps.

Debug Stage

In Model/stage_debug, all the folders for the tracks are present, but all are empty except the KP folder (Toad Cup). In it, is a debug track with only the dirt road texture and the skybox texture with one of the areas from the Toad Cup tracks, and the skybox model. The track is an early/unfinished version of Kingdom Way with only a dirt road of the entire track. The video shows how the track looks (the water, mushroom model, star model, and shadows aren't originally part of the track). This track also doesn't have its own collision file or any other sort of file.

Regulation Maps

In the Develop directory, there's 3 folders called RegulationMap00, RegulationMap01, and RegulationMap02. 00 is an early version of Bon Dance Street, 01 is a very early version of Omatsuri Circuit, and 02 is an early version of Aerial Road. Unlike the debug track, these have their own collision data.

Omatsuri Circuit actually has a bit of different mapping, like a shortcut slope, which is similar to the ones in GP1/2, and the part where the underwater section is, has a higher height. This track is also possible to fall through because a small part of the road isn't solid, and under all tracks is actually completely solid road that goes on forever. This could be because there's no areas in the game where the player would fall off, so the road most likely prevents the player from falling forever just incase a glitch ever happened. However, it's impossible to complete a lap under the track.

Under the unused Omatsuri Circuit track.

Aerial Road doesn't have a cloud section at all, just a wooden road.

Unused Code

3rd Palette Swap

According to the character lists in the game's code, it's possible for all the characters to have a 3rd palette swap. They all have their regular character data set by default. Either 3rd palette swaps were considered, or this was a placeholder incase they planned more.

Removed Test Song

Race Test

Sound/Bank/NUS3_BANK_BGM.nus3bank has a song called race_test, but the wav file was removed.

Removed Sound Test Sounds

According to the sound names in NUS3_BANK_COMMON.nus3bank, there were a total of 7 sounds for playback in the sound test at one point, but two were removed. They were named (in order) SoundTest1 and SoundTest2, most likely these were the same sound file.

Oddities

Information Skip Sound

NUS3_BANK_COMMON.nus3bank has a sound going by se_sys_skip, in the USA version of the game, this was used when skipping information during the loading screen or end game tip by pressing ITEM, but the JP version didn't allow you to skip the loading tips as no option allowing you to do so is displayed but you could for the end game tip.

Fire Mario

For whatever reason, if Fire Mario's slot ID (0x0E) is moved to a different character slot, such as Mario's, by editing the file CharacterSelectParameter.bin in MenuParam/data, his icon will display and name, but regular Mario will appear in T-pose. When he's selected, the game can't go to the next menu, selecting the kart. Along with this, Fire Mario also has files for a separate character (Model/driver/f_mario), as he's normally a palette swap of Mario. The used files for him are with Mario's files.

Rosalina and Metal Mario

In the first release of the game, Rosalina and Metal Mario have all of their files present, almost fully complete. The only things missing are some icons for them, as they use placeholder ones, and Rosalina uses one early icon for the camera image. They were even added into the game before Bowser Jr. was added, as their slot IDs are 0x0B (Metal Mario) and 0x0C (Rosalina). Bowser Jr.'s is 0x0D.

AI Identifier File

The directory Data/RivalCarParam/Clone has a empty file named こちらは分身対戦モード用AIデータです ("Here is AI data for online ghost vs. battle mode") without an extension. It refers to a mode that was exclusive to the Japanese release where the player raced AI opponents that adopted the habits and style of other players from across Japan.

Launch Commands

The game executable mentions such a few launch commands in Unicode, the first majority affect the framework while the others affect the game.

• -forcehal= Forces a HAL device type.
• -noerrormsgboxes= Hides message boxes.
• -forcevsync:1 = Enables V-Sync.
• -fullscreen = Forces the game to run in fullscreen.
• -windowed = Forces the game to run in a window.
• -forceapi:10 = Makes the game use the oldest version of the API.

Internal Character Names

Internal name	Full name
BMAR	Baby Mario
BPCH	Baby Peach
DKY	Donkey Kong
DON	Don-chan
DSY	Daisy
JGM	Jugemu/Lakitu
KJR	Koopa/Bowser Jr.
KNP	Kinopio/Toad
KPA	Koopa/Bowser
KTRS	King Teresa/King Boo
LUI	Luigi
MAR	Mario
MTL	Metal Mario
PAC	PAC-MAN
PCH	Peach
ROS	Rosetta/Rosalina
WAL	Waluigi
WAR	Wario
YOS	Yoshi
---	未使用 (unused)

Internal Project Name

The game executable is named MK_AGP3_FINAL, the window of the game is also named mkart3, this likely means Mario Kart Arcade GP/Grand Prix 3 is the internal project name to relate to proper sequel numbering for the third Arcade GP title.

SVN Revision

As of Rev.1.10.22/JP, it is 29438.

Build Paths

Version	Path
Rev.1.00.00/JP	D:\work\MK3\repos\branches\Master_1st\Bin\Final\MK_AGP3_FINAL.pdb
Rev.1.05.21/EN	D:\repos\branches\Global\Update1_off_AO\Project\Bin\Final\MK_AGP3_FINAL.pdb
Rev.1.10.22/JP	S:\workspace\rom\branches\jpn\update4\Bin\Final\MK_AGP3_FINAL.pdb
Rev.1.18.00/JP	F:\workspace\rom\branches\jpn\update8\Bin\Final\MK_AGP3_FINAL.pdb

The executable has external pdb file directories mentioned.

Regional Differences

The Japanese version has an online feature that uses a Banapassport to not only check player stats, unlockables, and titles, but to let players compete against each other nationwide and fight random opponents. Each item can be unlocked by playing and beating other opponents. In the International releases, all of the online features (ranging from VS Online Battles and titles) were removed and the items that can be unlocked were now picked randomly through item roulette before starting the race.