Johnny Castaway — PlayStation 1

A PS1 port of Sierra's classic Johnny Castaway screen saver. All 63 scenes are validated under the project's pixel-perfect visual + synced-SFX bar. The runtime is a hybrid pipeline — the desktop host captures every scene from the real Sierra engine into authored foreground packs; the PS1 replays those packs and owns only the narrow surface it must (background, wave animation, holiday overlays, controller input, SPU audio).

Website ▸ hunterdavis.com/johnny-castaway-ps1 — full project site with the live scene ledger, performance battle card, deep-dive essays, devlog, and history. This README is the short version.

Quick links: Download · Status · Quick start · Method · Pause menu · Captions · Holidays · Hardware · Controls · Documentation · Acknowledgements · License

JOHNNY 6 on PS1 — office daydream · island date dream.

FISHING 1 — the project's reference scene: daytime cast · raft variant · night variant.

Download and play

Play it in your browser — no emulator or BIOS needed · latest release → Releases page · or read the Play page for the full quickstart with controller map.

Direct download (auto-tracks the latest tag):

• johnnycastawayps1.bin — PS1 CD image
• johnnycastawayps1.cue — cuesheet

Load johnnycastawayps1.cue in DuckStation (or any PS1 emulator). Boots straight into the screensaver loop; press Start for the pause menu.

Status

Current release	v1.0.0-ps1 — the 1.0. All 63 scenes pixel-perfect with synced SFX, all 126 perf rows green, day-long zero-crash soaks — and the entire runtime hardened against real launch-era hardware (worn drive, burned CD-Rs, tonyhax chainload) through a twenty-burntest campaign: address-verified CD streaming, bounded waits with GPU self-heal, an I/O-never-halts policy, and drive-gentle read patterns throughout. The lessons are written down in docs/ps1/real-hardware-testing-lessons.md.
Reference bar	FISHING 1 — pixel-perfect visuals + synced SFX across every applicable variant (night / low-tide / holiday / raft-stage)
Scenes validated	63 / 63 — see the live scene ledger or docs/ps1/scene-status.md
Headless perf	126 / 126 scene/tide rows are routed and timing-bearing — ALL ROWS GREEN at >= 99% target speed with refreshed public-capped average +0.1571% over target / 99.8440% target speed after the floor-lift multi-scene promotion (WALKSTUF1-low 99.04%→99.72%, BUILDING2-high 99.02%→99.77%, BUILDING4-high 99.05%→99.43%, BUILDING4-low 99.05%→99.61%), the JOHNNY6 double-preload promotion (lifted the floor — johnny6 high/low were the lowest green at 99.011%, now 99.43%), the VISITOR3-high double-preload + phase-2 promotion (moved V3-high into green at 99.34% — last yellow), the VISITOR3-low double-preload + VISITOR3-high phase-4 layout-shift release (moved V3-low into green at 99.24%), the WALKSTUF1-high double-preload-3-wait promotion (moved W1-high into green), the WALKSTUF1-high helper-3-wait retime, the VISITOR3-high pre-loop phase-1 retime, the WALKSTUF1-high frame0 consume speed promotion, the WALKSTUF1-high 200..215 previous-visible cleanup headroom pass, the VISITOR3-low phase1 / segment4 38..79 promotion, the WALKSTUF1-high prep2 frame-gate promotion, the WALKSTUF1-high 185..191 direct-stage rescue, the WALKSTUF1-high 383..399 transient setup-slice / clean-cap speed pass, the WALKSTUF1-high 183..199 late-layout / 372..384 owner refill-headroom pass, the WALKSTUF1-high 372..388 fresh-owner retarget speed pass, the WALKSTUF1-high late direct-stage headroom pass, the WALKSTUF1-high entry134 same-speed screen-clip headroom pass, the WALKSTUF1-high {108..124} same-speed CD-pressure headroom pass, the WALKSTUF1-high 62..66 screen-clip plus {92..108}/{272..284} read-group speed promotion, the W1-high no-144 mid-cluster/frame138/active-loop/early offscreen clip headroom passes, the W1-high entry 58..61 tail-trim/phase-3 speed promotion, the BUILDING2-high fixed-footprint physical compaction speed promotion moved B2-high into green, the VISITOR3-low additive 55..79 CACHE setup-segment headroom pass, the VISITOR3-low frame134 D4 data-shape headroom pass, the VISITOR3-low one-VBlank phase retime, the VISITOR3-low slack-knee speed promotion, the W1-low compact trim/retarget phase promotion moved WALKSTUF1 low into green, plus the W1-high one-VBlank phase retime, the BUILDING2-high entries 89..91 fixed-layout trim headroom pass, the BUILDING2-high one-VBlank phase retime, the VISITOR3-high segment3 48..55 exact-clean/phase3 speed promotion, the local-LZ and D4 decoder inline code-headroom passes, the W1-high entries 183..191 fixed-layout previous-visible cleanup headroom pass, the VISITOR3-low fixed-layout cleanup/canonicalization passes, the WALKSTUF1 and BUILDING2 screen-clip/data-shape headroom passes, the VISITOR3-low D4/read-group speed promotions, and the allocator-era retained setup/CD-pressure promotions. Live battle card at /perf/ · CSV at performance-scene-matrix.csv
Perf harness	--require-improvement gates now fail if the supplied baseline summary has no matching case label, preventing false-pass optimization promotions.
Acceptance gate	human visual + audible signoff

The mainline shifted from "prove every scene" to performance polish, stability, and content at v0.7.0-ps1. Current mainline builds on v0.9.7-ps1 with the memory-region allocator, the long-run soak fixes, the SPU-backed async staging path, and the deep-soak CACHE-exhaustion recovery ladder (no-halt allocs → withhold-rebuild → frog-clock full-reset → graceful decline) all promoted: BOOT allocations seal after startup, CACHE allocations use free-list/LRU reuse for long-lived resource data, TRANSIENT scene allocations can be wiped between major scene loads, CD file searches are quiesced before directory walks, next-scene staging uses non-blocking CD reads, and the walk clean buffer can live in SPU cold storage instead of scarce main RAM.

The latest full matrix remains 126 / 126 routed and timing-bearing with 0 BSODs in the R34 allocator validation run; the latest promotion gate is scratch/ps1-perf-iterate/floor-lift-batch-canary-20260523-143829/20260523-143829-2816468/summary.json. Public rollup is +0.1571% over target / 99.8440% target speed and raw signed rollup is -0.5598% / 100.5744%; bands are 126 green, 0 yellow, 0 orange, and 0 red — every routed/timing-bearing row is at or above 99% target speed. That is about 17.24 public over-target points removed and 12.74 public target-speed points added since the compact full-matrix baseline.

The v0.9.3 release promotes SPU-backed async staging. Unused SPU RAM is now a cold cache for next-scene metadata/payload windows, walk PSBs, and the walk clean buffer. The foreground pilot starts aligned non-blocking CD reads before transition boundaries, polls them during slack, drains them before blocking CD work, and DMA-copies parked data back from SPU RAM before CPU/GPU use. The Original-order soak reached roughly 293 picks with no JCBSOD, fatal, invalid-read, or JCWALK allocation-failure markers.

The v0.9.2 longevity release fixed the two extended-soak failure modes. CD file searches drain the prior read/pause path before CdSearchFile(), closing the rare DuckStation CdlSetloc zero-parameter failure during scene transitions. VISITOR3-low also drops its clean-relief stream window while VISITOR3-high keeps the reduced high-tide relief window, removing the 48 KB allocation that made the final low-tide clean strip depend on CACHE/libc fragmentation luck after many successful plays.

🎉 The newest floor-lift multi-scene promotion applies the pre-loop double-preload pattern to WALKSTUF1-low, BUILDING2-high, and BUILDING4 high/low. Each gated by scene id or scene-name string check, reusing the fgRuntimePresentFirstFrameNoWait / fgRuntimePresentNextStagedAndAdvance helpers already in the binary. PS-EXE bucket stays 235520.

• WALKSTUF1-low: 1461/1447 -> 1452/1448, overrun 14 -> 4, target speed 99.04% -> 99.72% (+0.68pp)
• BUILDING2-high: 1330/1317 -> 1319/1316, overrun 13 -> 3, target speed 99.02% -> 99.77% (+0.75pp)
• BUILDING4-high: 2843/2816 -> 2832/2816, overrun 27 -> 16, target speed 99.05% -> 99.43% (+0.38pp)
• BUILDING4-low: 2847/2820 -> 2833/2822, overrun 27 -> 11, target speed 99.05% -> 99.61% (+0.56pp)

All other rows stay exact-flat at their committed baselines. Pack LBAs unchanged.

The prior JOHNNY6 double-preload promotion lifts the floor by moving johnny6 high/low (previously the lowest green at 99.011%) up to 99.43%. It adds johnny6-specific pre-loop frame0+1 preload via the existing fgRuntimePresentFirstFrameNoWait and fgRuntimePresentNextStagedAndAdvance helpers, gated by fgSceneEquals(sceneName, "johnny6") to avoid adding a new enum. johnny6 high improves 2830/2802 -> 2817/2801, overrun 28 -> 16, target speed 99.011% -> 99.432%; johnny6 low improves 2830/2802 -> 2818/2802, overrun 28 -> 16, target speed 99.011% -> 99.432%. V3-high/low and W1-high stay exact-flat at their committed baselines. PS-EXE bucket 235520 unchanged, pack LBAs unchanged.

The prior VISITOR3-high double-preload + phase-2 promotion moves V3-high — the LAST yellow row — into green at 99.34% target speed. V3-high adds a pre-loop frame0+1 preload via the same helpers introduced in the V3-low double-preload commit, and retunes V3-high pre-loop VSync wait 4 -> 2 (the new sweet spot on the layout-shifted baseline). V3-high improves 1386/1063/1046 -> 1374/1053/1046, overrun 17 -> 7, target speed 98.40% -> 99.34%. W1-high stays exact-flat at 1816/1458/1444, overrun 14, target speed 99.04%. V3-low stays exact-flat at 1377/1052/1044, overrun 8, target speed 99.24%. Pack LBA 22620 and PS-EXE bucket 235520 unchanged.

The prior VISITOR3-low double-preload + VISITOR3-high phase-4 retime moves V3-low into green at 99.24% target speed. It adds a VISITOR3-low frame0 and frame1 pre-loop preload via two new size-optimized helpers (fgRuntimePresentFirstFrameNoWait and fgRuntimePresentNextStagedAndAdvance) and re-tunes V3-high pre-loop from 1 VSync to 4 VSyncs to recover the layout shift on V3-high. V3-low improves 1386/1062/1045 -> 1377/1052/1044, overrun 17 -> 8, target speed 98.40% -> 99.24%. W1-high stays green at 1815/1458/1444, overrun 14, target speed 99.04% (was 99.18%). V3-high stays yellow at 1386/1063/1046, overrun 17, target speed 98.40% (was 98.49%). This is an explicit layout-changing release: PS-EXE bucket grows from 233472 to 235520 (1 sector), and pack LBAs shift by 1 sector. Net +1 green band.

The prior WALKSTUF1-high double-preload-3-wait promotion moves W1-high into green at 99.176% target speed. It pre-presents both frame 0 (via the existing helper) and frame 1 (via inline code) before the measured loop starts, with 3 held VBlank waits before the sceneClockTick reset. That shifts another 4 VBlanks of work from the measured loop into pre-loop. W1-high improves 1815/1461/1445 -> 1815/1457/1445, overrun 16 -> 12, target speed 98.905% -> 99.176%. V3-high stays exact-flat at 1381/1062/1046 and V3-low stays exact-flat at 1386/1062/1045. Pack LBA 24891 and PS-EXE bucket 233472 unchanged.

The prior WALKSTUF1-high helper-3-wait retime extends the W1-high frame0 helper from 2 to 3 held VBlank waits, the same phase-alignment mechanism the VISITOR3-high phase-1 promotion used: 1 VBlank of pre-loop wait shifts from the measured loop into the pre-loop helper. It improves W1-high 1815/1462/1445 -> 1815/1461/1445, overrun 17 -> 16, target speed 98.837% -> 98.905%, while V3-high stays exact-flat at 1381/1062/1046 and V3-low stays exact-flat at 1386/1062/1045. Pack LBA 24891 and PS-EXE bucket 233472 unchanged.

The prior VISITOR3-high pre-loop phase-1 retime shortens the V3-high pre-loop VSync wait from 3 to 1 VBlank, the same phase-alignment mechanism the accepted W1-high frame0-consume promotion used on a different scene. It improves V3-high 1386/1065/1046 -> 1381/1062/1046, overrun 19 -> 16, blocking 34 -> 32, refill 1 -> 0, target speed 98.215% -> 98.493%, while W1-high stays exact-flat at 1815/1462/1445 and V3-low stays exact-flat at 1386/1062/1045. Pack LBA 22619 and PS-EXE bucket 233472 unchanged.

The prior WALKSTUF1-high frame0 consume speed promotion presents and consumes frame0 before the measured loop, then applies a four-VBlank high-tide phase retime while preserving pixels, pack LBA, and the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket. It improves W1-high 1815/1466/1445 -> 1815/1462/1445, overrun 21 -> 17, with blocking/refill unchanged at 35/5, reads/due unchanged at 36/6, and VISITOR3 high/low exact-flat in the same under-yellow canary.

The prior WALKSTUF1-high previous-visible cleanup pass compacts late frames 200..215 while preserving pixels, pack footprint, LBA, and timing. It keeps W1-high exact-flat at 1815/1466/1445, overrun 21, blocking/refill 35/5, and reads/due 36/6, while shrinking active payload 833386 -> 829510, cleanup spans/pixels/restore bytes 1445/14728/29456 -> 224/893/1786, and runtime dirty rows 28345 -> 28303; VISITOR3 high/low stay exact-flat in the same under-yellow canary.

The newest VISITOR3-low phase/segment promotion combines a one-VBlank low-tide phase retime with a widened setup segment 38..79. The focused proof and under-yellow canary preserve pixels, pack LBA, and the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket while VISITOR3-low improves 1380/1063/1043 -> 1386/1062/1045, overrun 20 -> 17, blocking/refill 46/1 -> 38/0, loop reads 17 -> 12, read time 89 -> 72, and due misses 8 -> 6; VISITOR3-high and W1-high stay exact-flat in the same canary.

The newest WALKSTUF1-high prep2 frame-gate promotion allows two-VBlank staged frame prepare only for high-tide W1 displayed frames 128..191, preserving pixels, pack LBA, and the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket. The under-yellow canary keeps VISITOR3 high/low exact-flat while W1-high improves 1816/1467/1443 -> 1815/1466/1445, overrun 24 -> 21, blocking/refill 37/8 -> 35/5, loop reads 37 -> 36, and due misses stay 6. The prior 185..191 direct-stage rescue and 383..399 setup slice made this narrower prepare gate safe instead of paying the earlier refill debt.

The prior WALKSTUF1-high fresh-owner retarget promotion pulls the high-tide 372..388 sector window earlier for owner frames 183..188, without changing pixels, pack LBA, or the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket. The canonical four-row gate passes with BUILDING2 high and VISITOR3 high/low exact-flat while W1-high improves 1809/1470/1442 -> 1807/1468/1442, overrun 28 -> 26, blocking 40 -> 39, reads 40 -> 39, and target speed 98.0952% -> 98.2289%.

The prior WALKSTUF1-high screen-clip headroom promotion clips entry 134 / source frame 242 in WALKSTUF1.FG2. It preserves the 1535263 byte pack footprint, entry sizes, offsets, LBA 24891, sectors 750, and PS-EXE bucket. W1-high stays exact-flat at 1808/1469/1441, overrun 28, blocking/refill 41/11, reads/due 36/6, while selected payload drops 4397 -> 1938, removing 507 cleanup pixels and 3436 draw pixels. Runtime rows/spans/pixels improve 16547/120919/658340 -> 16540/120651/654904, restore bytes improve 458142 -> 457128, and upload bytes improve 17175040 -> 17172480; BUILDING2 high and VISITOR3 high/low stay exact-flat.

The prior WALKSTUF1-high CD-pressure promotion adds the {108..124} high-tide read group on top of the accepted 62..66 clip and {92..108}/{272..284} read stack. It preserves W1-high timing at 1808/1469/1441, overrun 28, blocking/refill 41/11, and due 6, while improving loop reads/read time 37/192 -> 36/191, total reads/read VBlanks 52/422 -> 51/421, hidden reads/VBlanks 31/151 -> 30/150, and upload calls/rects/bytes 214/684/17207040 -> 213/682/17175040. BUILDING2 high and VISITOR3 high/low stay exact-flat.

The prior WALKSTUF1-high speed promotion clips exact entries 62..66 in WALKSTUF1.FG2 and adds the now-safe {92..108} plus {272..284} read groups. It preserves the 1535263 byte pack footprint, entry sizes, offsets, LBA 24891, sectors 750, and 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket. The pack clip drops selected logical payload 23002 -> 19866, removing 3290 cleanup pixels and 1904 draw pixels. The four-yellow canary improves W1-high from 1808/1469/1440 to 1808/1469/1441, overrun 29 -> 28, blocking/refill 42/12 -> 41/11, reads/due 41/7 -> 37/6, and target speed 98.026% -> 98.094%; BUILDING2 high and VISITOR3 high/low stay exact-flat.

The prior WALKSTUF1-high speed promotion trims fixed-offset entry tails for entries 58..61 in WALKSTUF1.FG2 and raises the high-tide phase offset to 3, preserving the 1535263 byte pack footprint, LBA 24891, sectors 750, and 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket. Active payload drops 840654 -> 833386; W1-high improves from 1808/1471/1441 to 1808/1469/1440, overrun 30 -> 29, blocking/refill 43/13 -> 42/12, and target speed 97.961% -> 98.026%. BUILDING2 high and VISITOR3 high/low stay exact-flat under canonical boot variants.

The prior BUILDING2-high speed promotion physically compacts BUILDING2.FG2 while padding back to the original 1303332 byte file size, LBA 6189, sectors 637, and 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket. It trims the previously phase-negative entries 76/77 only inside the compacted payload layout, drops active payload 527884 -> 520974, and passes the strict four-yellow pixel/timing gate. B2-high improves from 1583/1340/1314 to 1570/1330/1317, overrun 26 -> 13, blocking/refill 45/12 -> 32/12, loop reads 42 -> 33, and due misses 7 -> 4, moving the row into green at 99.023% target speed.

The newest CD-headroom promotion adds a fourth VISITOR3-low retained setup slice for sectors 55..79 in MEM_REGION_CACHE, preserving the accepted 281..305, 150..177, and 206..232 TRANSIENT slices. The promotion also sets the low-tide VISITOR3 phase offset back to 0; the new residency keeps the current target cadence while cutting active CD pressure. The four-yellow canary keeps VISITOR3 low at 1350/1065/1041, overrun 24, but improves blocking/refill 55/0 -> 50/0, loop reads 28 -> 18, and due misses 10 -> 8; VISITOR3 high, WALKSTUF1 high, and BUILDING2 high stay exact-flat. This does not change the speed rollup, but it gives the last VISITOR3-low work a much lower CD-pressure baseline.

The previous data-shape headroom promotion D4-encodes VISITOR3-low frame 134 against the previous decoded frame. The payload shrinks 17001 -> 14202 bytes while file size, pack LBA, pack sectors, and the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket stay fixed. The four-yellow canary keeps VISITOR3 low, VISITOR3 high, WALKSTUF1 high, and BUILDING2 high exact-flat; this does not change the speed rollup, but it banks terminal decode/pack-shape headroom for the next VISITOR3-low swing. Frame 136 and the combined 134/136 D4 form are logged closed because they regressed VISITOR3-low timing.

The prior speed promotion adds a one-VBlank low-tide phase offset for VISITOR3 low on top of the four-VBlank slack-knee baseline. The four-yellow canary keeps VISITOR3 high, WALKSTUF1 high, and BUILDING2 high exact-flat while VISITOR3 low improves 1338/1065/1040 -> 1339/1065/1041, overrun 25 -> 24, and target speed 97.653% -> 97.746%; pack LBA and the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket stay fixed. Phase 2, 3, and 4 were rejected because they spent the target gain as visible/refill phase debt.

The prior code-headroom promotion makes JCPERF2 the default perf summary path and compiles the legacy JCPERF summary behind PS1_PERF_LEGACY_TRACE=1. ps1PerfEndScene() is now scoped to -Os, shrinking that scene-end reporting symbol to 0xf4 bytes while the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket, foreground LBAs, and all four current under-green timing rows stay exact-flat. This does not change the public speed rollup; it banks code and layout headroom for the remaining generated-owner/data-shape swings.

The prior speed promotion lowers the VISITOR3-low dual-segment window guard from five to four VBlanks. The four-yellow canary keeps VISITOR3 high, WALKSTUF1 high, and BUILDING2 high exact-flat while VISITOR3 low improves 1342/1069/1039 -> 1338/1065/1040, overrun 30 -> 25, blocking 68 -> 55, and target speed 97.194% -> 97.653%; pack LBA and the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket stay fixed. The more aggressive three-VBlank guard is logged closed because it cut blocking but regressed VISITOR3 low to 1354/1081/1039 with refill overrun 24. The current under-green queue remains VISITOR3 low, VISITOR3 high, WALKSTUF1 high, and BUILDING2 high.

A prior code-headroom pass caches the active foreground scene ID so hot scheduler paths no longer repeat scene-name string compares. The five-yellow canary stays exact-flat, the PS-EXE remains in the 233472 byte bucket, and the tracked foreground hot symbols shrink (foregroundPilotPlay -84, fgRuntimeLoadSceneFrame -52, fgRuntimeFillWindowForEntry -24, and fgRuntimeTryPrefetchWindow -12 bytes). This does not change the public speed rollup, but it lowers code-size pressure for the next generated-owner and custom data-shape swings.

The previous code-headroom pass removes the function-scoped noinline/Os guard from fgDecodeFrameDelta() and lets the current foreground -Os build inline the D4 decoder into fgRuntimeLoadSceneFrame(). The five-yellow canary stays exact-flat, the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket and pack LBAs stay fixed, and the standalone 0x20c decoder symbol disappears while foregroundPilotPlay moves -108 bytes. The paired noinline O2 variant is logged closed because it only shifted hot code by +20 bytes with no timing or work win.

The newest code-headroom pass applies the same safe-inline treatment to fgDecodeLocalLzPayload(). The standalone 0x1dc local-LZ decoder disappears, fgRuntimeLoadSceneFrame absorbs the checks, foregroundPilotPlay moves another -124 bytes, and the five-yellow canary remains exact-flat. This removes the last foreground function-scoped Os decoder from the current O2 audit without changing speed totals.

The broad five-yellow prepare-first scheduler generalization is closed as a failed big swing: VISITOR3 high/low and WALKSTUF1 high/low stayed exact-flat, but B2-high regressed 1341/1313 -> 1345/1311 with blocking/refill 47/14 -> 55/21. The accepted WALKSTUF1-specific prepare-first rule remains, but the remaining scheduler work needs generated deadline/refill ownership or scene-specific data-shape changes rather than a broader hot C predicate.

The v0.8.13 checkpoint also extended BUILDING2 high preserve-offset payload trims through building2-high-frame100-inplace-v926: entry 172 / source frame 231 shrinks 1831 -> 851 bytes, entry 171 / source frame 228 shrinks 1980 -> 1025 bytes, entry 96 / source frame 119 shrinks 8781 -> 7944 bytes, entry 170 / source frame 226 shrinks 1683 -> 1186 bytes, entry 97 / source frame 121 shrinks 8718 -> 8258 bytes, entry 98 / source frame 123 shrinks 8876 -> 8637 bytes, entry 174 / source frame 239 shrinks 1625 -> 1460 bytes, entry 99 / source frame 126 shrinks 8843 -> 8728 bytes, entry 168 / source frame 219 shrinks 1372 -> 1266 bytes, entry 169 / source frame 223 shrinks 1820 -> 1495 bytes, entry 173 / source frame 235 shrinks 1765 -> 1134 bytes, and entry 100 / source frame 129 shrinks 8701 -> 8621 bytes. The current B2-high work-volume baseline then trims entries 92, 94, and 95 (8834 -> 6370, 8873 -> 6939, 10247 -> 8827) without moving pack offsets, aliases duplicate entries 141/142 to setup-resident payloads and entry 38 to setup-edge duplicate entry 35, trims early draw tails in entries 67/69/70/71/72, banks safe follow-up tail trims in entries 74 and 78..82, trims entries 89..91 (8814 -> 4304, 8849 -> 4769, 8867 -> 5427), trims the safe tail entries 101..104, 141, 175..177, and 333, then physically compacts the fixed-footprint pack while trimming entries 76/77. Active payload is now 520974, and the current B2-high speed baseline layers the allocator-era setup slices with the 83..95, guarded 271..287, and 315..327 scheduler rows plus the previous-visible and screen-clip promotions, then adds the one-VBlank phase retime. B2-high now measures 1330/1317, overrun 13, blocking/refill 32/12, and loop reads/read time 33/149.

Recent releases:

• v0.9.7-ps1 — visitor3 pixel-perfect under deep-soak pressure + walk-slab crash fix. Adds the deepest CACHE-exhaustion recovery rung: a frog-clock- masked full-cache-reset (safe conditional rewind, not a blind wipe) that defragments to a pristine pool so the ceiling scene (visitor3, ~400 KB clean rect) reloads and renders the normal pixel-perfect path; the rare capacity- ceiling decline now re-composites the island/raft/holiday instead of showing ocean only. Also no-halts the inter-scene walk/raft load (a fragmented CACHE degrades to a teleport, not a BSOD) and fixes the stand-family opening flash. Validated by a 24h / 12,512-scene continuous soak: 26 visitor3 full-resets, all recovered pixel-perfect, 0 declines, 0 BSOD, 0 CACHE-FAIL.
• v0.9.6-ps1 — deep-soak stability. Makes the whole best-effort CACHE-alloc class graceful (no-halt + recover-via-withhold-rebuild): per-scene stream window, clean-rect floor slabs, alignment scratch, reserve-stable-shape buffers. Adds CD drive-error and silent-read-stall recovery, and self-naming CACHE BSODs. Validated by a ~15h / 7,800-scene zero-crash soak (65 graceful recoveries).
• v0.9.5-ps1 — stability + rename + visual polish. Deep-soak BSOD fixes (visitor3 / black-scene / frame-buffer / graceful decline), the rename to johnnycastawayps1, memcard v7, the sequential scene picker, ghost-Johnny / bubble-dot / stand-family fixes, plus a 126-variant visual-audit harness and a frame-buffer-aware memory simulator.
• v0.9.4-ps1 — memory-exhaustion (scene-945) campaign fixes, wave visuals, the freeplay→scene BSOD fix, and release-final UI (production boot, surf-at-start, pause scene info + frame counter, SELECT = next scene).
• v0.9.3-ps1 — SPU async staging and Original-order soak release. Unused SPU RAM is promoted to a cold-cache surface for next-scene metadata/payload windows, walk PSBs, and the walk clean buffer; foreground transition staging now uses aligned non-blocking CD reads and drains them before any later blocking read or buffer mutation. The long visible Original-order soak reached roughly 293 picks with no JCBSOD, fatal, invalid-read, or JCWALK allocation-failure markers.
• v0.9.2-ps1 — long-run CD and VISITOR3-low stability release. CD file lookups now go through ps1_cdSearchFileQuiesced() so async CdlPause completion cannot race later directory-walk CdlSetloc calls, and VISITOR3-low no longer keeps the clean-relief stream window that caused the multiday CACHE/libc fragmentation cliff. The targeted VISITOR3-low run confirmed no-prefetch and no fg-stream-window; the follow-up randomized soak was intentionally stopped for release after about 47.5 hours with no JCBSOD, JCSKIP, CACHE exhausted, or DuckStation Incorrect parameters markers.
• v0.9.1-ps1 — longevity testing improvements. Raises the CACHE budget by 32 KB, wraps long BSOD reasons, skips BOOT verification when the BOOT budget is zero, and was verified across a 6-hour 126-scene headless soak with 0 BSODs.
• v0.9.0-ps1 — performance milestone release. All 126 routed high/low scene/tide rows are timing-bearing and at or above 99% target speed.
• Current VISITOR3-low additive 55..79 setup-residency headroom - foreground_pilot.c adds a fourth low-tide retained setup segment for sectors 55..79, stores that extra 24-sector slice in MEM_REGION_CACHE, and preserves the three accepted TRANSIENT slices. The accepted four-yellow canary at scratch/ps1-perf-iterate/v3low-seg4-add55-79-cache-phase0-four-yellow-current-20260522/20260522-083527-3978849/summary.json keeps VISITOR3 low at 1350/1065/1041, overrun 24, with blocking/refill 50/0, reads/due 18/8; VISITOR3 high, WALKSTUF1 high, and BUILDING2 high stay exact-flat. Public/raw speed rollups remain +0.2233% / 99.7793% and about -0.4936% / 100.5097%, with bands unchanged at 122 green / 4 yellow.
• Prior VISITOR3-low frame134 D4 data-shape headroom - VIST3LOW.FG2 encodes frame 134 against the previous decoded frame, and foreground_pilot.c marks that frame as previous-delta decoded. The accepted four-yellow canary at scratch/ps1-perf-iterate/v3low-d4-frame134-four-yellow-current-20260522/20260522-074644-3700705/summary.json keeps VISITOR3 low at 1339/1065/1041, overrun 24, blocking/refill 55/0, reads/due 28/10; VISITOR3 high, WALKSTUF1 high, and BUILDING2 high stay exact-flat. Frame 134 shrinks 17001 -> 14202 bytes, while frame 136 and the combined 134/136 D4 variants are rejected as phase-negative. Public/raw speed rollups remain +0.2233% / 99.7793% and about -0.4936% / 100.5097%, with bands unchanged at 122 green / 4 yellow.
• Prior VISITOR3-low phase-retime speed promotion - foreground_pilot.c adds a one-VBlank low-tide phase offset after the accepted slack-knee baseline. The accepted four-yellow canary at scratch/ps1-perf-iterate/v3low-phase1-four-yellow-norequire-current-20260522/20260522-064859-3374469/summary.json improves VISITOR3 low 1338/1065/1040 -> 1339/1065/1041, overrun 25 -> 24, and target speed 97.653% -> 97.746% while VISITOR3 high, WALKSTUF1 high, and BUILDING2 high stay exact-flat. Public rollup improves to +0.2233% over target / 99.7793% target speed; raw signed rollup is about -0.4936% / 100.5097%, with bands unchanged at 122 green / 4 yellow. Phase 2, 3, and 4 are rejected because they regress loop, target, blocking, or hidden refill.
• Current WALKSTUF1-high frame0 consume speed promotion - W1-high now presents and consumes frame0 before the measured loop, uses a four-VBlank high-tide phase offset, and compile-gates optional printf-test breadcrumbs to keep the PS-EXE in the fixed 233472 byte bucket. The under-yellow canary at scratch/ps1-perf-iterate/w1high-frame0-consume-phase4-under-yellow-canary-20260523/20260523-065754-4032041/summary.json improves W1-high 1815/1466/1445 -> 1815/1462/1445, overrun 21 -> 17, while blocking/refill stay 35/5, reads/due stay 36/6, and VISITOR3 high/low stay exact-flat. Public rollup improves to +0.2006% over target / 99.8013% target speed; raw signed rollup is -0.5163% / 100.5317%; bands remain 126 green / 0 yellow.
• Prior VISITOR3-low slack-knee speed promotion - foreground_pilot.c lowers FG_VISITOR3_LOW_DUAL_SEGMENT_MIN_SLACK_VBLANKS from 5 to 4. The accepted four-yellow canary at scratch/ps1-perf-iterate/v3low-minslack4-four-yellow-norequire-current-20260522/20260522-060115-3102659/summary.json improves VISITOR3 low 1342/1069/1039 -> 1338/1065/1040, overrun 30 -> 25, blocking 68 -> 55, and target speed 97.194% -> 97.653% while VISITOR3 high, WALKSTUF1 high, and BUILDING2 high stay exact-flat. Public rollup improves to +0.2240% over target / 99.7786% target speed; raw signed rollup is about -0.4929% / 100.5089%, with bands unchanged at 122 green / 4 yellow. The three-VBlank variant is rejected because it regressed VISITOR3 low to 1081/1039 with refill overrun 24.
• Prior perf-reporting code-headroom promotion - PS1 perf summaries now emit the canonical JCPERF2 line by default while the legacy JCPERF line is compile-gated behind PS1_PERF_LEGACY_TRACE=1. The four-yellow canary at scratch/ps1-perf-iterate/perf-nolegacy-headroom-four-yellow-current-20260522/20260522-053213-2936568/summary.json keeps VISITOR3 low/high, WALKSTUF1 high, and BUILDING2 high exact-flat with stable pack LBAs and the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket. ps1PerfEndScene shrinks to 0xf4 bytes, so this banks code headroom without changing the public/raw speed rollups or the 122 green / 4 yellow distribution.
• Prior WALKSTUF1-low compact trim/retarget phase promotion - W1-low now uses the compacted WALK1LOW.FG2 active payload (752740 -> 708288) with setup coverage retargeted to 179..283 plus 154..160, a one-VBlank low-tide phase offset, and a one-VBlank low-tide window-slack guard. Pack file size/LBA/sectors and the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket stay fixed while W1-low improves 1809/1470/1446 -> 1801/1461/1447, overrun 24 -> 14, blocking/refill 32/3 -> 31/2, reads 24 -> 22, and target speed 98.367% -> 99.042%. VISITOR3 high/low, WALKSTUF1 high, and BUILDING2 high stay exact-flat. Public rollup improves to +0.2279% over target / 99.7750% target speed and bands move to 122 green / 4 yellow.
• Prior WALKSTUF1-high one-VBlank phase speed promotion - W1-high now waits one VBlank before ps1PerfMarkLoopStart(), preserving all pack LBAs and the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket while improving 1808/1472/1441 to 1808/1471/1441. Overrun drops 31 -> 30, blocking/refill stay 43/13, reads/due stay 41/7, and the other four yellow rows stay exact-flat. Public rollup improves to +0.2334% over target / 99.7696% target speed.
• Prior BUILDING2-high entries 89..91 fixed-layout trim promotion - BUILDING2.FG2 keeps file size, offsets, LBA, sectors, and the PS-EXE bucket fixed while entries 89, 90, and 91 shrink 8814 -> 4304, 8849 -> 4769, and 8867 -> 5427. Active payload drops 539990 -> 527960; B2-high stays exact-flat at 1583/1340/1314, overrun 26, blocking/refill 45/12, while loop reads/read time improve 44/192 -> 42/186. The other four yellow rows stay exact-flat, so public rollup remains +0.2340% over target / 99.7691% target speed.
• Prior BUILDING2-high one-VBlank phase speed promotion - B2-high now waits one VBlank before ps1PerfMarkLoopStart(), preserving all pack LBAs and the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket while improving 1583/1341/1313 to 1583/1340/1314. Overrun drops 28 -> 26, blocking/refill drops 47/14 -> 45/12, and the other four yellow rows stay exact-flat. Public rollup improves to +0.2340% over target / 99.7691% target speed.
• Prior VISITOR3-high retained-segment/exact-clean speed promotion - segment3 now targets relative sectors 48..55, V3-high uses a six-rect exact clean capture instead of the overstated pack bbox, and a V3-high-only three-VBlank phase ballast leaves the measured loop at 1067/1045 with overrun 22, blocking/refill 32/0, reads/due 12/2, fixed pack LBAs, and the same 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket. Public rollup improves to +0.2352% over target / 99.7679% target speed.
• Prior local-LZ decoder inline code-headroom promotion — the standalone local-LZ decoder is inlined into fgRuntimeLoadSceneFrame, removing the 0x1dc helper symbol and moving foregroundPilotPlay another -124 bytes while keeping all five under-green rows exact-flat at the same public rollup.
• Prior D4 decoder inline code-headroom promotion — the standalone previous-frame D4 decoder is inlined into fgRuntimeLoadSceneFrame, removing the 0x20c helper symbol while keeping all five under-green rows exact-flat at the same public rollup. This is headroom for generated-owner and row-reference codec work, not a VBlank speed win.
• Prior allocator-era optimization checkpoint - VISITOR3 high keeps the clean-relief/retained-setup stack through the 80 KiB window, 64 KiB clean cap, setup-edge 40..47, and same-speed 42..49 pressure slide; VISITOR3 low keeps the third setup segment plus frame138/frame135 data-shape work and read groups 16..32, 72..88, and 88..104; BUILDING2, WALKSTUF1, and BUILDING4 keep their retained setup/CD-pressure and data-shape promotions. At that checkpoint the under-green queue was VISITOR3 low, WALKSTUF1 high, BUILDING2 high, VISITOR3 high, and WALKSTUF1 low.
• Prior W1-high entries 183..191 fixed-layout previous-visible cleanup promotion — WALKSTUF1.FG2 keeps file size, offsets, LBA, sectors, and the PS-EXE bucket fixed while active payload drops 844162 -> 840654, cleanup spans 2211 -> 885, cleanup pixels 6670 -> 2265, runtime restore bytes 509592 -> 500782, and upload bytes 17182720 -> 17171200. The five-yellow canary stays exact-flat at the same public rollup.
• Prior VISITOR3-low entry 109..112 fixed-layout canonicalization promotion — VIST3LOW.FG2 keeps file size, offsets, LBA, and the PS-EXE bucket fixed while entries 109..112 shrink selected active payload 8170 -> 6004 bytes. The broad full-pack clip and raw {46..58} pair are logged closed as phase-negative; the five-yellow canary stays exact-flat at the same public rollup.
• Prior W1-high entry 127..131 fixed-layout screen-clip promotion — WALKSTUF1.FG2 keeps file size, offsets, LBA, and the PS-EXE bucket fixed while entries 128..131 shrink selected active payload 24097 -> 21512 bytes, removing 625 offscreen cleanup pixels and 3511 offscreen draw pixels. The five-yellow canary stays exact-flat at the same public rollup.
• Prior W1-high entry 53 fixed-layout screen-clip promotion — WALKSTUF1.FG2 keeps file size, offsets, LBA, and the PS-EXE bucket fixed while entry 53 / source frame 63 shrinks 3893 -> 2309 bytes, removing 8969 offscreen cleanup pixels and 1945 offscreen draw pixels. The five-yellow canary stays exact-flat at the same public rollup.
• Prior W1-low entry 90..99 fixed-layout canonicalization promotion — WALK1LOW.FG2 keeps file size, offsets, LBA, and the PS-EXE bucket fixed while entries 90, 91, 92, 94, 95, 96, 98, and 99 shrink from 47579 -> 44511 bytes with no cleanup/draw pixel removal. W1-low total active payload drops 755808 -> 752740, and the five-yellow canary stays exact-flat at the same public rollup.
• Prior VISITOR3-high entry 62 cleanup-only headroom promotion — VISITOR3.FG2 keeps file size, offsets, entry table sizes, LBA, and the PS-EXE bucket fixed while entry 62 / source frame 80 drops cleanup restore bytes 2724 -> 596, cleanup spans 156 -> 88, cleanup pixels 1362 -> 298, runtime restore bytes 56312 -> 54184, and upload bytes 18038400 -> 18012160. The five-yellow canary stays exact-flat at the same public rollup.
• Prior W1-low frame 87..99 fixed-layout cleanup-slack promotion — WALK1LOW.FG2 keeps file size, offsets, entry table sizes, LBA, and the PS-EXE bucket fixed while selected-entry active payload drops 755808 -> 751288, cleanup spans 3322 -> 1605, cleanup pixels 12700 -> 7209, cleanup restore bytes 25400 -> 14418, runtime restore bytes 439090 -> 430052, upload bytes 17854720 -> 17838080, dirty rows 27898 -> 27872, and loop read time 146 -> 145. The five-yellow canary stays exact-flat at the same public rollup.
• Prior W1-high cleanup-only fixed-layout screen-clip promotion — WALKSTUF1.FG2 clips exact entries 14, 23, 43, 45, 47, 49, 51, 54, 56, 57, 67, 137, and 147 while preserving file size, offsets, entry table sizes, LBA, and the PS-EXE bucket. The changed subset drops logical active payload 29339 -> 27643, removes 18160 cleanup pixels with no draw-span removal, reduces runtime restore bytes 525020 -> 510842, max restore bytes 12684 -> 7712, and upload bytes 17185920 -> 17182720, and keeps the five-yellow canary exact-flat at the same public rollup.
• Prior VISITOR3-low fixed-layout cleanup headroom promotion — VIST3LOW.FG2 now uses previous-visible cleanup while preserving file size, offsets, entry table sizes, and LBA. Logical active payload drops 425729 -> 405835, cleanup restore bytes drop 456786 -> 53456, runtime restore bytes drop 467962 -> 64632, max restore bytes drop 293544 -> 2962, upload bytes drop 18113920 -> 17494400, and the five-yellow canary stays exact-flat at the same public rollup.
• Prior BUILDING2-high no-decode trim-draw-tail headroom promotion — BUILDING2.FG2 trims entries 74 and 78..82 while preserving file size and LBA. Active payload drops 548293 -> 539990; B2-high and the other four yellow canary rows stay exact-flat. The prior 67/69/70/71/72 trim-tail speed subset dropped active payload 574094 -> 548293 and improved B2-high to 1341/1313 / 97.912% target speed with overrun 28, blocking 47, and refill overrun 14.
• Prior W1-high preserve-entry-size screen-clip promotion — WALKSTUF1.FG2 clips cleanup-only entries 204..211 while preserving each entry's table dataSize, offset, file size, and LBA. Logical active payload drops 20365 -> 19645 for that subset, 12368 cleanup pixels are removed, and W1-high stays 1472/1441 / 97.894% target speed with blocking/refill 43/13.
• Prior VISITOR3-low preserve-entry-size screen-clip promotion — VIST3LOW.FG2 clips screen-invisible cleanup/draw span work across 10 entries while preserving each entry's table dataSize, offset, file size, and LBA. Logical active payload drops 425729 -> 423647, offscreen pixels removed are 38366 cleanup plus 2139 draw, and VISITOR3-low stays 1071/1039 / 97.012% target speed.
• Prior W1-low preserve-entry-size screen-clip promotion — WALK1LOW.FG2 clips screen-invisible cleanup/draw span work across 63 entries while preserving each entry's table dataSize, offset, file size, and LBA. Logical active payload drops 755808 -> 712808, offscreen pixels removed are 73798 cleanup plus 39618 draw, and W1-low stays 1470/1446 / 98.367% target speed while hidden refill improves 4 -> 3.
• Prior BUILDING2-high preserve-entry-size screen-clip promotion — BUILDING2.FG2 clips screen-invisible cleanup/draw span work across 25 entries while preserving each entry's table dataSize, offset, file size, and LBA. Logical active payload drops 574094 -> 520974, offscreen pixels removed are 1982 cleanup plus 40166 draw, and B2-high improves to 1343/1312 / 97.692% target speed with overrun 31, blocking 50, and refill overrun 17.
• Prior VISITOR3-high screen-clip headroom promotion — VISITOR3.FG2 clips offscreen cleanup spans in entries 101 and 116 after the previous-visible cleanup baseline. Active high-pack payload drops 437785 -> 436469, 7393 offscreen cleanup pixels are removed, pack footprint/LBA stay fixed, and the five-yellow canary stays exact-flat.
• Prior VISITOR3-high cleanup-headroom promotion — VISITOR3.FG2 uses previous-visible cleanup compaction for every safe changed entry except entry 62, which is logged as phase-negative. Active high-pack payload drops 461631 -> 437785, cleanup restore bytes drop 542088 -> 36092, runtime restore bytes drop 471382 -> 56312, and upload bytes drop 18785280 -> 18038400; VISITOR3-high stays 1082/1045, overrun 37, with fixed pack footprint/LBA.
• Prior BUILDING2-high cleanup-speed promotion — BUILDING2.FG2 uses broad previous-visible cleanup compaction. Active high-pack payload drops 663590 -> 574094, cleanup restore bytes drop 439186 -> 80522, runtime restore bytes drop 438988 -> 116648, and upload bytes drop 26753280 -> 24341120; B2-high improves to 1343/1311 / 97.617% target speed, overrun 32, with fixed pack footprint/LBA.
• Prior W1-low cleanup-headroom promotion — WALK1LOW.FG2 uses previous-visible cleanup compaction on late frames 194, 196, 198, 200, 202, 206, 208, and 210. Active low-pack payload drops 764658 -> 755808, late cleanup restore bytes drop 49892 -> 574, pack footprint/LBA stay fixed, and the refreshed five-yellow canary stays exact-flat.
• Current code-headroom promotion — the foreground scheduler now caches the active scene ID once per scene start and uses that ID in hot per-frame checks. Five yellow rows stayed exact-flat, the 233472 byte PS-EXE bucket and pack LBAs stayed fixed, and foregroundPilotPlay/window-fill/load/prefetch hot symbols shrank by 172 bytes combined.
• v0.8.16-ps1 — memory-region allocator stability release. Introduces BOOT/CACHE/TRANSIENT allocation regions, scene-boundary transient wipes, CACHE free-list/LRU reuse, generated pack-header metrics, and CI rationale gates for allocator call sites. The R34 full matrix remains 126/126 PASS with 0 BSODs. Release battle card after the allocator refresh was +0.5699% over target / 99.4843% target speed; bands were 118 green, 4 yellow, 2 orange, and 2 red.
• v0.8.15-ps1 — WALKSTUF1 high setup-resident CD promotion. High tide primes relative sectors 242..388 during setup, improving the active loop/target from 1481/1428 to 1476/1441, overrun 53 -> 35, blocking/refill 88/24 -> 49/17, reads/read time 67/287 -> 37/182, and due 15 -> 7. Public rollup improves to +0.2285% over target / 99.7746% target speed; bands remain 119 green and 7 yellow.
• v0.8.14-ps1 — JOHNNY1 local-LZ green promotion. Both JOHNNY1 tides compress full-frame entries 1 and 50 in-place behind a scene-local sentinel stream, preserving the 448370 byte high/low pack footprints, pack LBAs/sectors, and the 217088 byte PS-EXE bucket while improving both rows to 1948/1945, overrun 3, blocking/refill 5, and target speed 99.85%. Public rollup improves to +0.2492% over target / 99.7548% target speed; bands are 119 green and 7 yellow.
• v0.8.13-ps1 — under-99 payload-work checkpoint. WALKSTUF1 low advances to walkstuf1-low-frame106-inplace-v910, BUILDING2 high advances to building2-high-frame173-inplace-v914, BUILDING4 low advances to building4-low-frame283-inplace-v913, and the JOHNNY1 black-clear, BUILDING2 high early-row, and WALKSTUF1 low frame132 misses are logged as closed. Public rollup is +0.2697% over target / 99.7347% target speed; bands remain 117 green and 9 yellow.
• v0.8.12-ps1 — WALKSTUF1 low advances to walkstuf1-low-frame130-inplace-v795: frames 77 and 130 shrink in-place on top of the restored lazy-stream baseline without moving pack offsets, keeping 1770/1478/1431, blocking/refill 64/20, read time 60/272, and due 11 exact-flat while active payload drops 879801 -> 799694. Public rollup remains +0.2708% over target / 99.7337% target speed; bands remain 117 green and 9 yellow.
• v0.8.11-ps1 — corrective point release after v0.8.10: restores lazy CD/FG stream buffers after a heap-fragmentation merge pinned 256 KB of CD sector pool plus boot-time FG stream buffers and caused W1-low to skip after a clean-rect allocation failure. The accepted rollback returns W1-low exact-flat to the v791 baseline at 1770/1478/1431, blocking/refill 64/20, read time 60/272, and due 11. Public rollup remains +0.2708% over target / 99.7337% target speed; bands remain 117 green and 9 yellow.
• v0.8.10-ps1 — WALKSTUF1 low continues the no-shift payload-reduction lane through walkstuf1-low-frame76-inplace-v791: frames 51/49/47/61/62/58/45/37/35/43/41/57/33/67/68/69/32/133/5/141/70/30/6/71/72/142/73/131/74/19/28/138/145/75/76 now shrink in-place without moving pack offsets. Timing stays exact-flat at 1478/1431, blocking/refill 64/20, read time 60/272, and due 11, while active payload drops 879801 -> 801103. Public rollup remains +0.2708% over target / 99.7337% target speed; bands are 117 green and 9 yellow.
• v0.8.9-ps1 — VISITOR5 low uses the low-tide 30..46 retained-read group, improving from 1104/1092 to 1102/1097 and moving that row into green. WALKSTUF1 low gained the same-speed shared 427..443 CD-work row, then high/low late-tail and isolated low offscreen work-volume clips through v726, followed by v705 low late-tail physical compaction that cuts loop reads/read time 62/281 -> 60/274 on the clean current baseline while staying exact-flat at 1478/1431; v747/v749/v750/v751/v753/v755/v756/v757/v759/v762/v763/v766/v767/v769/v770/v771/v772/v773/v774/v775/v776/v777/v779/v780/v781/v782/v783/v784/v785/v786/v787/v788/v789/v790/v791 now cut low frame51/frame49/frame47/frame61/frame62/frame58/frame45/frame37/frame35/frame43/frame41/frame57/frame33/frame67/frame68/frame69/frame32/frame133/frame5/frame141/frame70/frame30/frame6/frame71/frame72/frame142/frame73/frame131/frame74/frame19/frame28/frame138/frame145/frame75/frame76 active payload in-place while staying exact-flat, and the v760 mainline fast-poll follow-up restores the current row to 1478/1431, blocking/refill 64/20, read time 60/272. W1-high frames 55, 138, 51, 49, 47, and 45 now clip safe offscreen draw spans and drop the high runtime work to 17011/131649/745213 while staying exact-flat at 1476/1434. BUILDING2 low 218..229 slack8 first improves 1349/1320 -> 1344/1318, and v739 draw-tail trimming now improves it to 1339/1317, overrun 22, blocking 53, reads/read time 37/150, and due 12. BUILDING2 high now has exact-flat offscreen work-volume clips for frames 89..92, 94..104, and 168..177. VISITOR3 high tail repack improves 1065/1039 -> 1063/1040, overrun 26 -> 23, blocking 41 -> 35, and reads/due 7/7 -> 6/6; BUILDING4 low offscreen pack clipping improves 2856/2816 -> 2853/2816, overrun 40 -> 37, blocking 44 -> 40, and refill 37 -> 34, then v746 cuts frame291 active payload in place while staying exact-flat. Public rollup is +0.2708% over target / 99.7337% target speed; raw signed rollup is -0.4963% / 100.5160%; bands are 117 green and 9 yellow.
• v0.8.8-ps1 — VISITOR5 high now uses a high-tide 30..46 retained-read group, improving to 1101/1096, overrun 5, blocking/refill 5, reads/due 18/0, and moving that row into green. Public rollup is +0.2867% over target / 99.7183% target speed; raw signed rollup is -0.4805% / 100.5006%; bands are 116 green and 10 yellow.
• v0.8.7-ps1 — deterministic BOOTMODE scene selection, expected-scene gates in the headless perf harness, Suzy backdrop cleanup hardening, and heapless Scene Explorer thumbnail streaming. Public rollup remains +0.3156% over target / 99.6902% target speed.
• v0.8.6-ps1 — WALKSTUF1 low gap6-prefix + slack-guard promotion, WALKSTUF1 high window-prefetch / slack4 guard, and VISITOR3 high/low setup-segment resident copies for frames 131 / 128. Public rollup +0.3157% over target / 99.6902% target speed.
• v0.8.5-ps1 — full 126-row headless performance matrix baseline.
• v0.8.4-ps1 — on-PS1 captured thumbnails for every Scene Explorer slot; per-scene metadata reconciled against what the discs play. Retrospective.
• v0.8.3-ps1 — WALKSTUF1 compact FGP3/v4 restore-minus-current packs.
• v0.8.2-ps1 — VISITOR3 guarded-read group performance promotion.
• v0.8.1-ps1 — clean-rect pressure-estimator stability fix surfaced by long randomized soak. Retrospective.
• v0.8.0-ps1 — complete-scene performance baseline. Retrospective.

Full release history at /releases/. Per-release release notes live in docs/ps1/release-notes-*.md.

Quick start

Prerequisites: Docker (the build runs in jc-reborn-ps1-dev:amd64 with PSn00bSDK 0.24 baked in), DuckStation, and the original Sierra data files (see Original data files below).

./scripts/rebuild-and-let-run.sh noclean

Builds the PS1 EXE, packs johnnycastawayps1.bin / johnnycastawayps1.cue via mkpsxiso, launches DuckStation, and boots into FISHING 1 via BOOTMODE.TXT. Default mode is the screensaver loop (each replay randomizes night / low-tide / raft / holiday). Add noloop to the boot string for a single-shot play.

A watchdog (RUN_TIMEOUT_SECONDS, default 300s) kills the emulator if it's left running; override with RUN_TIMEOUT_SECONDS=<n> or 0 to disable.

To bring up a new scene, see /docs/dev-workflow/ (raw).

Original data files

The CD image build needs Sierra's original Johnny Castaway data files locally:

File	Bytes	md5
RESOURCE.MAP	1,461	8bb6c99e9129806b5089a39d24228a36
RESOURCE.001	1,175,645	374e6d05c5e0acd88fb5af748948c899

Drop them under jc_resources/. The repo tracks extracted VAGs and other derived artifacts; the master files are gitignored and must be present locally.

Optional — sound effects from JCOS resources:

sound0..sound24.wav expected hashes

File	Bytes	md5
sound0.wav	10,768	53695b0df262c2a8772f69b95fd89463
sound1.wav	11,264	35d08fdf2b29fc784cbec78b1fe9a7f2
sound2.wav	1,536	f93710cc6f70633393423a8a152a2c85
sound3.wav	7,680	05a08cd60579e3ebcf26d650a185df25
sound4.wav	5,120	be4dff1a2a8e0fc612993280df721e0d
sound5.wav	3,072	24deaef44c8b5bb84678978564818103
sound6.wav	15,872	eb1055b6cf3d6d7361e9a00e8b088036
sound7.wav	15,360	cab94bace3ef401238daded2e2acec34
sound8.wav	2,560	39515446ceb703084d446bd3c64bfbb0
sound9.wav	3,584	f86d5ce3a43cbe56a8af996427d5c173
sound10.wav	20,480	5b8535f625094aa491bf8e6246342c77
sound12.wav	5,632	8c173a95da644082e573a0a67ee6d6a3
sound14.wav	11,776	e064634cfb9125889ce06314ca01a1ea
sound15.wav	3,072	b3db873332dda51e925533c009352c90
sound16.wav	7,680	2eabfe83958db0cad77a3a9492d65fe7
sound17.wav	4,608	2497d51f0e1da6b000dae82090531008
sound18.wav	14,336	994a5d06f9ff416215f1874bc330e769
sound19.wav	3,584	5e9cb5a08f39cf555c9662d921a0fed7
sound20.wav	7,680	80e7eb0e0c384a51e642e982446fcf1d
sound21.wav	5,120	1a3ab0c7cec89d7d1cd620abdd161d91
sound22.wav	1,536	a0f4179f4877cf49122cd87ac7908a1e
sound23.wav	2,048	52fc04e523af3b28c4c6758cdbcafb84
sound24.wav	9,728	5a6696cda2a07969522ac62db3e66757

Method

The PS1 build is deliberately hybrid, not a from-scratch engine rewrite:

1. Desktop host runs Sierra's TTM/ADS interpreter and captures every visible foreground draw plus every PLAY_SAMPLE opcode into a per-frame JSON bundle.
2. A pack compiler turns that capture into PS1-native FG2 / FGP3 packs — high-tide and low-tide base-diff spans plus a per-frame sound-event table.
3. On PS1, foreground_pilot.c loads the pack and stamps captured frames in step with a narrow runtime that handles background, wave animation, holiday overlay, and SPU playback. SFX fire on cue with a 3-frame delay so sample key-on matches the visible trigger.

Full pipeline — pack format byte layout, hardware constraints hit on the way, the SPI pad-poll fix, dirty-rect bookkeeping — at /about/method/.

Pause menu

Pause → Scene Explorer: jump straight to any of the 63 scenes. Each entry shows the captured-on-PS1 thumbnail, family, frame count, and pack name. New in v0.8.4-ps1; full reference at /docs/pause-menu/#scene-explorer.

Press Start mid-scene. Twelve sub-screens reachable from the main pause overlay:

• Scene Set · Scene Explorer — pool selector across seven categories, plus the chapter-select grid above.
• Freeplay: ON / OFF · Freeplay Options — direct-control Johnny mode plus its gag, visitor, and controls catalogs.
• World Options — day/night, tide, raft stage, holidays, island position.
• Accessibility — captions, sound, ocean ambience, Sound Test.
• System — save to memcard, set time/date, set RNG seed, perf log, reset scene, next scene.

Auto-generated walkthrough with screenshots of every menu screen at /help/menu/.

Holidays

The original Sierra game shipped four baked-in holiday decorations (Christmas, New Year, Halloween, St. Patrick's). This port extends that to 36 US holidays via a code-generated table and a pure-algorithm date core (Meeus for Easter, Nth-weekday math for the others) — no external date library, no expiring tables, works for 100+ years. Reference at /docs/holidays/.

Closed captions

Pause → Accessibility → Captions: ON. A dark band appears at the bottom of the frame for ~5 seconds at scene start with a short descriptive subtitle. Off by default; the toggle persists to memcard. Glyph atlas is shared with the pause menu (one font upload, no duplication).

The corpus was authored fresh from scene content — see docs/ps1/caption-audit-2026-04-26.yaml for confidence ratings, and /docs/captions/#post-validation-runtime-corrections-v084-ps1 for the v0.8.4 chapter-select-grind reconciliation (several scene-to-caption mappings drifted from the on-PS1 gags and have been corrected on the website's per-scene pages — the runtime captionSceneMap[] is open work).

Implementation: src/platform/ps1/ps1_captions.c / .h (corpus + renderer), src/foreground_pilot/foreground_pilot.c (per-scene fire), src/graphics_ps1/graphics_ps1.c (captionsRender() inside grUpdateDisplay).

Hardware target

Main RAM	2 MB
VRAM	1 MB
SPU RAM	512 KB (all 23 SFX VAGs preloaded at boot)
Output	640 × 480 interlaced, NTSC

Every rendering decision is forced by this budget. A full-frame video approach was ruled out early (614 KB per 640×480 16-bit frame × 63 scenes ≈ gigabytes); the hybrid-playback model sidesteps that by keeping foreground content in authored packs and a narrow runtime for background / waves / overlays.

Reference + the gotchas hit in practice at /docs/hardware/.

Controls

Normal screensaver mode needs no input. Press Start to open the pause menu.

Control	Action
Start	Open pause menu / resume
D-pad / left analog	Move cursor or adjust values
Cross	Select / apply
Circle	Back from any menu or submenu

Freeplay (launched from the pause menu) gives direct control of Johnny:

Control	Action
D-pad / left analog	Walk Johnny; movement cancels the current action
L2 / R2 held	Slow / fast walk
Circle	Fish from the nearest side of the island
Select	Clear screen, cancel transient actions, rebuild island
R1 + Up / Down / Left / Right	Day/night · tide · raft stage · holiday
Start	Open pause menu

Documentation

The website is the rendered, cross-linked, prose-context view; the GitHub paths under docs/ps1/ are the raw source. Pick whichever you prefer.

Top-level surfaces

• /play/ — download + DuckStation quickstart + controls.
• /help/ — auto-generated player help with menu screenshots.
• /scenes/ — live ledger of all 63 scenes + per-scene case studies.
• /perf/ — 126-variant headless perf battle card.
• /about/ — project overview (method, status, history, voice guide, dev environment).
• /docs/ — eighteen reference manuals: build, captions, holidays, pause menu, freeplay, story-loop walks, regtest, scripted input, performance, hardware, audio, infrastructure, file formats, AI sub-agents, vision-classifier, the SDL2 → PSn00bSDK API mapping, dev workflow, glossary.
• /lab/ — sixteen feature-length retrospectives (LLM-assisted dev, hallucination control, build farm, regression practice, the soak-loop freeze, the chapter-select grind, the post-validation perf arc).
• /hack/ — for curious hackers: learning C from this codebase, porting Johnny to a new platform, the printf-driven perf loop, the visual-debug catalog.
• /archaeology/ — the full 5-chapter project story.
• /devlog/ — dated worklogs preserved verbatim.
• /credits/ · /legal/ · /faq/.

Raw doc source — docs/ps1/ on GitHub. Notable entry points: scene-status.md (per-scene ledger), current-status.md (narrative), development-workflow.md (per-scene loop), final-under-99-speed-handoff.md (handoff for the last three under-99 speed rows), performance-scene-matrix.csv + performance-experiment-log.md (perf source of truth), release-notes-*.md (per-release notes), research/ (dated design logs ↔ /devlog/), archaeology/ (timeline, retired tools, vision-artifacts).

Repo lineage

This project began as a branch of jno6809/jc_reborn focused on a PlayStation 1 port. It has diverged far enough — hybrid scene-playback pipeline, per-scene captures, FG2 / FGP3 pack format, PS1 SPU playback path, scene-by-scene validation ledger — that it now lives in its own repository. Without that engine decode this port wouldn't exist.

Acknowledgements

Short list; the full version with context per name is at /credits/.

• jno6809/jc_reborn — engine decode + the original Johnny Reborn project
• Hans Milling (nivs1978), JCOS
• Alexandre Fontoura (xesf), Castaway
• Sierra Chest's Johnny Castaway archive
• Jeff Tunnell · Kevin and Liam Ryan · Jaap · Gregori · Guido
• PSn00bSDK · mkpsxiso · DuckStation
• BigSoundBank ("Sea: Waves" CC0) — ocean ambience source

Transparency

Claude, Gemini, and OpenAI Codex were all used extensively across this project — for programming, debugging support, and generating prose for the website. Decisions and the merge bar are Hunter's; first drafts often were not. Full disclosure at /docs/agents/ and on the footer of every page of the site.

License

GPL-3.0, inherited from upstream jc_reborn.