Invincibility Passwords [locked]

2005-09-20 07:25:23 am

Does anyone know how the invincibility passwords work?

I mean internally. What is it about
NARPAS SWORD0
000000 000000

That triggers, whatever it triggers. I'm guessing some kind of programmers/debug mode.

Anyway, I was working on a password generator for metroid. I want a slightly nicer interface than the one done by SnoBro, and it has to work in Windows, Linux, and Mac OS-X (SnoBro's is windows only).

I've been looking at his work, and doing my own research. I know what 116 out of the 128 bits of the password data are. The remaining 12 are a complete mystery, though I have never seen 11 of them on in any password metroid has given me. The one I have seen turned on hasn't triggered any obvious effect.

On gamefaqs, there are two other passwords which trigger invincibility, but are supposed to trigger added benefits.

NARPAS SWORD0 000003 037251
NARPAS SWORD0 000000 086073

The first one supposedly has Ridley and Kraid killed. The second one just Ridley. SnoBro's password generator has the correct bits for Ridley and Kraid set on these passwords, but Ridley and Kraid are not dead. It also says the door to the tourian bridge is open, yet it's closed in all the passwords.

My conclusion is that the password has nothing to do with the password data and everything to do with the name. This begs the question, what does

NARPAS SWORD0 0000 mean?
The last 8 characters can be anything. The checksum does not need to be correct, either. The original with 8 trailing 0's has a bad checksum (according to SnoBro's pw generator) Any password (I've not checked them all of course, but I've randomly entered in 20+ passwords to see) that starts with these 16 characters triggers the debug/programmer's mode.

Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

Thread title:

Does anyone know how the invincibility passwords work?

I mean internally. What is it about
NARPAS SWORD0
000000 000000

That triggers, whatever it triggers. I'm guessing some kind of programmers/debug mode.

Anyway, I was working on a password generator for metroid. I want a slightly nicer interface than the one done by SnoBro, and it has to work in Windows, Linux, and Mac OS-X (SnoBro's is windows only).

I've been looking at his work, and doing my own research. I know what 116 out of the 128 bits of the password data are. The remaining 12 are a complete mystery, though I have never seen 11 of them on in any password metroid has given me. The one I have seen turned on hasn't triggered any obvious effect.

On gamefaqs, there are two other passwords which trigger invincibility, but are supposed to trigger added benefits.

NARPAS SWORD0 000003 037251
NARPAS SWORD0 000000 086073

The first one supposedly has Ridley and Kraid killed. The second one just Ridley. SnoBro's password generator has the correct bits for Ridley and Kraid set on these passwords, but Ridley and Kraid are not dead. It also says the door to the tourian bridge is open, yet it's closed in all the passwords.

My conclusion is that the password has nothing to do with the password data and everything to do with the name. This begs the question, what does

NARPAS SWORD0 0000 mean?
The last 8 characters can be anything. The checksum does not need to be correct, either. The original with 8 trailing 0's has a bad checksum (according to SnoBro's pw generator) Any password (I've not checked them all of course, but I've randomly entered in 20+ passwords to see) that starts with these 16 characters triggers the debug/programmer's mode.

Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

Chanoire

2005-09-20 01:42:51 pm

Isn't that one hard-coded? I'm pretty sure that I read that there was one password that's provided for specifically in the code, and NARPAS SWORD* was it. But maybe someone who actually knows this game can be more specific.

jdratlif

2005-09-20 04:47:08 pm

Quote from Chanoire:

Isn't that one hard-coded? I'm pretty sure that I read that there was one password that's provided for specifically in the code, and NARPAS SWORD* was it. But maybe someone who actually knows this game can be more specific.

This seems to be correct.

According to answers.com, it could be an acronym for the person who developed the password system for metroid: Tohru Narihiro.

If this is true (and it seems logical, that or NAR = North American Release -- either one would be a good enough explanantion), then there is only one question left.

Why can only the last 8 characters be random? You can enter just NARPAS SWORD and leave everything else blank, but if you put anything in those next 7 characters, it doesn't work. However, the last 8 characters can be whatever. Weird.

I guess it isn't important, but I don't really care about generating passwords as much as knowing how it works.

I wish SnoBro had a valid email. The email in all his programs returns with a full mailbox error, and I can't contact his homepage on home.sol.no; seems home.sol.no is gone. Anyone know how to contact SnoBro (aka Kent Hansen)? He did a disassemble and fairly good reconstruction of the original metroid source (it can be found on the metroid database), but I didn't see anything specific to this in there. But he might know where to look.

[quote="Chanoire"]Isn't that one hard-coded?  I'm pretty sure that I read that there was one password that's provided for specifically in the code, and NARPAS SWORD* was it.  But maybe someone who actually knows this game can be more specific.[/quote]

This seems to be correct.

According to answers.com,  it could be an acronym for the person who developed the password system for metroid: Tohru Narihiro.

If this is true (and it seems logical, that or NAR = North American Release -- either one would be a good enough explanantion), then there is only one question left.

Why can only the last 8 characters be random? You can enter just NARPAS SWORD and leave everything else blank, but if you put anything in those next 7 characters, it doesn't work. However, the last 8 characters can be whatever. Weird.

I guess it isn't important, but I don't really care about generating passwords as much as knowing how it works.

I wish SnoBro had a valid email. The email in all his programs returns with a full mailbox error, and I can't contact his homepage on home.sol.no; seems home.sol.no is gone. Anyone know how to contact SnoBro (aka Kent Hansen)? He did a disassemble and fairly good reconstruction of the original metroid source (it can be found on the metroid database), but I didn't see anything specific to this in there. But he might know where to look.

Liam

2005-09-20 09:12:22 pm

Well, the last three characters contain the code rotation and the checksum. Since those aren't checked when using a hard coded password it doesn't matter. But somewhere before there are some unknown weird settings, which can reset the first code lines and thus changing NARPAS SWORD to something else, that isn't recognized as the hard coded password anymore.