Question about Rom names

[ctrl-alt-delete]

Really quick. Do not have much time.

In rom names, I have always wondered...how do you know which version is which, which version is superior, etc.?

Example (U) [!]
Example (U) [b1]
Example (U) [b2]

This is something that I have always been curious about, but have never known the answer to.

Something tells me Mottz is going to have the best answer for this.

[Modus Ponens]

He probably is, but I can tell you that [!] marks the spot. I once saw a chart explaining what all these things meant, and I can't remember all of it, but I do know that [!] indicates a perfect ROM dump. [b] probably means "bad dump" or something, so [b1] and [b2] would be if the collector(s) got ahold of two bad dumps of the same game. Assuming I'm right in the first place, you can just ignore [b]s if you have a [!].

You may run into (PRG) once in a while, be it (PRG0) or (PRG1) or something else. I believe PRG to stand for pseudorandom generator. My guess (which, hopefully, can be corroborated by someone else who knows better [or, if he or she is posting at the same time as I am right now, perhaps already has been]) is that with games where you see (PRG) in the title, something about the programming of the game or maybe the dumping caused the random number generator to behave slightly differently between the dumps, but they both may well be flawless dumps. Oftentimes in the TAS community you'll see time attacks done to, say, Super Mario Bros. (JU) (PRG0); it's specified because if you have the wrong PRG, the movie will desync.

Okay. Enough talking out of my ass. It's someone else's turn.

[MottZilla]

[!] means the dump was verified good. [b] is bad dump. (PRG #) refers to the REVISION of the game. PRG 0 is the earliest known version. You'd have to ask me specifically about others. But usually you just see (U) or something for region and maybe [!] if it's known to be good. Avoid [b] as they probably have major problems. You also may see [o] which is Overdump, where the dumping may have additional garbage data on the end.

[Modus Ponens]

Thank you, Professor.

[ctrl-alt-delete]

Thanks a lot, buddy.

That was something that has bothered me for about 10 years now. Haha.

I am glad that I always used the [!] versions. I just wondered if [b1] meant the betas for the games...

Also, I wondered if other random crap like [randomcrap] meant that they had released a newer version to fix a glitch...like the game ending glitches that need to be fixed.

Good to finally know.

[MottZilla]

Well, if something is a beta or prototype you'll see it in [ ] or ( ). Also, (PRG #) you see with NES but SNES you're far more likely to see a (V1.#). Generally you want to use the newest version. Also something you'll see [T-Eng] with translated roms.

[AlexMax]

If you have some random ROM's that you've downloaded from some random ROM website, that are improperly named, you can use a program such as RomCenter to help you verify what kind of dump you've come across.

[ctrl-alt-delete]

Nah, I have a good rom package that I got from a torrent on a private tracker.