BANKED (whole-binary byte-gate, the sole arbiter): func_8014D2A0 (80 ins ×138) · func_80158638
(87 ×138) · func_8016B6BC (94 ×138). Stubs in ov_SC01_077: 150 -> 147, 0 new stubs.
R22 CLEAN-FLEET: extract-all 139/139, check-all 140 passed / 0 failed. dedup 1886/0,
0 NON_MATCHING (G4). Fleet 81.7% instr / 69.3% distinct-code / 89.52% fn-count.
- WAVE STOPPED at Drew's request with 15/24 agents returned, ALL 15 status=match. Only the
completed drafts were gated; in-flight ones are still being written (§90d).
- PRE-GATE, both oracles, all 15: match_one MATCH + reloc_verify ALL RESOLVED. Routed 7 plain /
8 to the §81 jtbl carve chain.
- THE BLOCKER, MEASURED: 7 of 7 plain drafts failed PLUMBING, 0 DIFF, 0 compiler walls — the same
shape as SESSION-20's T0.2. §58b applies: the draft sig is byte-TRUTH (it MATCHed), the header
decl is the stale stub-era guess, so conform the DECLS.
- §85 RETURN-AXIS WIDEN, all-or-nothing: 3,471 decl sites / 1,736 files, precondition verified
(ZERO callers consume the return => byte-neutral by construction) + an R32 completion assertion
(old-form decls remaining: 0). func_8014D820's s32 return is load-bearing — forcing `void` costs
2 instructions (302 vs 304), so the decls had to move, not the draft.
TWO HONESTY ITEMS:
1. I REPORTED "0 of 7 banked"; the true number was already 2. My diagnostic pass printed only
lines starting with "- func_" (the failures) and hid its own successes while I read it for
error text. A script that prints only failures cannot tell you it succeeded — the R32
silent-skip shape aimed at my own instrumentation. Ground truth is the stub count (§55b(3)).
2. A REAL FINDING fell out of that mistake: same drafts, same tree, minutes apart — gate_stage's
full ladder banked 0/7 while bare harvest_verify banked 2/7. The LADDER REGRESSED two drafts
the bare gate accepts (§19's "sig_unify regresses already-canonical drafts", one level up, and
the exact mirror of SESSION-20's missing-ladder false 33%). Neither "always ladder" nor "never
ladder" is right — run both, let the byte-gate arbitrate. One build per draft.
OPEN: func_8014D820 still a stub — after the widen its error moved from `conflicting types` to an
assembler-stage failure, not finished diagnosing. Recorded as open, NOT as a wall.
BFM-decomp
A matching decompilation of Brave Fencer Musashi (PlayStation, SLUS-00726, USA 1998) — the first public decompilation effort for this game.
What "matching" means
The goal is C source code that, compiled with the original-era toolchain (PsyQ 4.x / GCC 2.7.2-family + ASPSX via maspsx), produces a byte-for-byte identical SLUS_007.26 and, eventually, byte-identical overlay binaries. SHA1 checksums are the ground truth; "functionally equivalent" does not count.
No ROM content
This repository contains no game assets, no disassembly output, and no ROM-derived data — only source code, build configuration, symbol names/addresses, hashes, and documentation. To build or contribute you must provide your own dump of the game disc (4-track BIN/CUE, redump layout). See .gitignore for the firewall.
Project status
Latest (Phase 19, 2026-06-20): the project builds 136 binaries byte-identical from a clean tree (the EXE + the resident engine + all 134 location overlays);
make check-all→ 136/136. Fleet byte-identical-from-source is 58.0% (function-instance-weighted; see the PhaseEnds for the byte-weighted ~30% figure and what it includes). Shared engine functions are matched once inov_SC01_077and propagated ×134 viatools/dedup_propagate.py. (The narrative below is Phase-11/12-era; a full refresh is part of the public-flip prep.)
Gen1 (foundation) complete — the matching pipeline is proven end-to-end. make extract && make build && make check rebuilds SLUS_007.26 byte-for-byte identical (SHA1 143dbb89…) from C + assembly, reproducibly across many sessions.
- Compiler pinned by evidence:
gcc-2.7.2-psx -O2 -G0 -mips1 -mcpu=3000+maspsx --aspsx-version=2.56 --expand-div. - 52 functions hand-matched to byte-identical machine code — including the LZSS streaming decompressor — with a decomp-permuter + matching-cookbook "flywheel" to accelerate the next.
- 959 PsyQ SDK functions linked byte-identical (libcd, libgs, libgte, libspu/libsnd, libgpu, libc2, libmcrd, libapi/libcard, libetc) straight from the real PsyQ 4.0 libraries instead of re-decompiling them — bringing byte-identical-from-source coverage of the EXE to ~50%.
- File-loader / overlay system reverse-engineered, with the resident engine blob + location overlays' load addresses proven byte-identical against a live PCSX-Redux RAM dump.
About half the EXE is still INCLUDE_ASM stubs (correct bytes, not yet C), and the bulk of the game lives in compressed overlays inside the .CD archives — Gen2 (overlays & engine at scale) is underway:
- The build toolchain is binary-agnostic (one parameterized pipeline builds any binary), and the always-resident engine blob rebuilds byte-for-byte from source (SHA1
8e17e02f…) — the second binary reconstructed exactly, after the EXE — and is now 86% hand-matched C (123 / 146 functions, up from 0): its scripting turned out to be compiled-MIPS state/mode dispatch, not a bytecode VM, and the save-file + sound (SQV) formats are documented. The harvest used a reusable swarm-of-agents + bit-for-bit byte-gate method (a wrong match can't be accepted) —tools/harvest_verify.py+tools/match_one.py, which carry straight into the overlay phase. - A cross-binary deduplication pipeline is live: a Ghidra-free signer fingerprints all 134 location overlays, and the report finds ~9,000 byte-identical function groups shared across binaries (~28 MB of collapsible code) — a single engine function is byte-identical in all 134 overlays. This is "one match unlocks many": each engine match will be auto-credited across the overlay fleet.
Current phase and detailed progress live in phase-ends/ (newest PhaseEnd_*.md = current state); methodology, rules, and the full roadmap are in PROJECT_CONTEXT.md; environment setup in docs/SETUP.md.
This project is developed primarily by Claude Code driving Ghidra through an MCP server; see CLAUDE.md.
License
Private repository for now. AGPL-3.0 is planned at public release, modeled on sotn-decomp. tools/brave-CUE/ is CUE's BRAVE extractor (GPL, source included) and retains its own license.