Winter Gold

Winter Gold
Developer: Funcom Oslo Publisher: Nintendo Platform: SNES Released in EU: November 28, 1996 This game has hidden development-related text.

Winter Gold is a Winter Olympics-themed game notable for being one of the few SNES titles to use the Super FX 2 chip (alongside Doom and Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island; Star Fox 2, which also uses the chip, wasn't officially released until 2017).

Build Date

Present at 0x53DD, alongside an early title:

FX SKIING NINTENDO 96 
29/1-1996 18:49

This early name is also seen during the intro/attract loop, which flashes up various phrases one letter at a time:

WINTER
SPORTS
SPEED
RECORDS
CROWDS
COMPETITION
CHAMPIONS
FX SKIING
GET READY
SNOWBOARD
BOBSLED
SKI JUMP
FX SKIING
LUGE
DOWNHILL
AERIAL
NINTENDO
CRASH AND BURN
WIPEOUT
SUPERB
STYLE
ELEGANCE
FUNCOM
USA
FRANCE
NORWAY
PRESS
START
TO
PLAY

The logo "FX" is also used on the ski jump level.

Cheat Mode

The button combination Up, A, X, Down, B, Up, Down is in the game's data at 0x8BED and lets you "Compete against Stuart". Enter it at the "Press Start" menu and you will hear a chime.

Development-Related Text

Various snippets of development-related text, found scattered all over the ROM.

! ! L A N D I N G ! !
! ! L A N D I N G ! !
! ! L A N D I N G ! !
! ! L A N D I N G ! !
! ! L A N D I N G ! !
! ! L A N D I N G ! !
! ! L A N D I N G ! !
! ! L A N D I N G ! !
! ! L A N D I N G ! !
! ! L A N D I N G ! !
! ! L A N D I N G ! !
! ! L A N D I N G ! !
F:%d
#:%d
TAR: %d
VEL: %d
POS: %d
POWER:%d
Charge
Landing
No landing
WOOOW !!!
AIR:%d
[%d] (+%d)
MODE:%d
[%d/%d]
DBG4 (%d)
DBG3 (%d)
DBG2 (%d)
DBG1 (%d)
PRIO:%d
TRICK:%d
HACK
POS: %d
[%d/%d]
IF:%d
POS: %i
HACK
DELTA: %d
TILT: %d
------->DEV:%d
POWER:%d
------->DEV:%d
ERROR: J0001!
TapCombo ---- %d
TELEMARK LANDING
CRASH!
X:%d
Y:%d
(<PZdn
PRIO:%d
TRCK:%d

No errors
Error: Current item is no item
Error: Current item without pointer
Error: Unlocking screen without a pointer
Error: Tryed to jump to a Screen without a pointer
Info: Same screen.
Info: Other screen.
Error: Cant move to prev item
Error: Cant move to next item
Event: Right
Event: Left
Event: Up
Event: Down
Event: Next state
Event: Prev state
Event: Next screen
Event: Prev screen
Event: Select
Error: Screen without pointer
Error: Item in ring without pointer
Error: Counted over 100 items

Assert(%s) failed at line %u in file %s.
No such file or directory
Arg list too long
Bad file descriptor
Not enough memory
File exists
Invalid argument
File table overflow
Too many open files
Not a console
Permission denied
I/O error
No space left on device
Result too large
Argument out of domain
Exec format error
Read-only file system
Cross-device rename
Nothing to read
Unknown error
Cannot apply packed chunk to SpriteMatrix
No VRAM for SpriteMatrix
SpriteMatrix tried to free NULL_VRAM
TextSprites_Free: Invalid struct
TextSprites_Free: NULL Pointer
Pointer to Anim was NULL
Pointer to TextSprites was NULL
No VRAM for SpriteChars
Anim pointer was NULL for SpriteChars
Frame pointer was NULL for SpriteChars
Pointer to PropList was NULL
Pointer to TextSprites was NULL
Cannot use packed chunk for TextSprites
Cannot use packed chunk for TextSprites
FlexiFrame tried to free NULL_VRAM
Cannot apply packed chunk to FlexiFrame
No VRAM for FlexiFrame
Unable to allocate memory for IFF at %08x

Region Error

Attempting to run the game on an North American or Japanese console will display the above message.

(Source: Original TCRF research)