The Sims: Bustin' Out - Static Recompilation

The Sims: Bustin' Out - Static Recompilation

An unofficial native PC port of the original Xbox release of The Sims: Bustin' Out (USA), produced by statically recompiling the game's x86 XBE with the XboxXBERecomp SDK fork (vendored in sdk/ as a submodule at SDK commit c3d4335). Windows uses Direct3D 12 and XAudio2; Linux is a native Vulkan and SDL3 build — no Wine.

Status: playable on Linux. The native Linux build boots, plays the intro movie whole and correctly proportioned with SDL3 audio, and drives title → main menu → save select → name entry → Create-a-Sim → save → a loaded, playable household at 2176 draws/frame with 0 skipped and 0 dropped draws on the final check of the committed build (docs/black-scene.md; docs/status.md, docs/playtest.md). Game speed is measured at 1.000 game-seconds per real second at 60, 144 and uncapped fps. The Vulkan allocation-ordering defect in UploadAlloc/AllocDrawSet is fixed and proven (stalealloc 0 over a full boot → household run, SDK e809cd4; docs/black-scene.md).

aspect_ratio = "auto" presents the aspect the title is actually projecting — 16:9 on any output 3:2 or wider, because the host answers the console's widescreen flag there, and 4:3 on a narrower one — so a 16:9 display fills edge to edge with no black bars. A display wider than 16:9 still gets that 16:9 picture pillarboxed: true Hor+ widening is written but gated off behind SIMSBO_HORPLUS and is not safe to enable yet (docs/ultrawide.md lists exactly what is still wrong with it).

What is still untested: no controller has ever been plugged into the test machine (the gamepad path is unexercised); saving and reloading through visible play is unproven; and the remaining cheat rows and the per-call frame-rate consumers in docs/frame-rate.md are unproven in play. Full, evidence-cited state: docs/status.md.

This repository contains no game code and no game assets. It holds tooling, configuration and host-side glue only. You must supply your own legally acquired copy of the disc.

The game

Field	Value
Title ID	0x45410043 (EA-67)
Region	North America
XBE	default.xbe, 3,211,264 bytes, SHA-1 6feea04a12fb134253abe2b5662da634d0048232
Built	2003-11-13
XDK	5558 (XAPILIB, XBOXKRNL, LIBCPMT, LIBCMT, D3D8, XGRAPHC, DSOUND, XMV)
Kernel imports	160

The build is pinned to this exact XBE. A different region or revision needs its own analysis pass.

Status

Stage	State
Disc image read and extracted (tools/xiso_extract.py)	done — the XBE is in assets/
XBE identified and analysed (tools/xbe_info.py)	done — see the table above
XDK build matched against the SDK's signature set	done — sdk/xdk/5558/ bootstrapped from 5849 (see docs/status.md)
Repo scaffolded (this repository, Windows + Linux build files)	done
config/game.toml written by xbe_symbols	done — 194 of 242 [symbols] named, 48 at 0, 12 of 12 [data] (recounted from the file; the 48 are accounted for in docs/gap-analysis.md)
Recompilation and native build	done on Linux — 27,492 functions (generated/game/x86_recomp_stats.txt); Windows never compiled
Kernel import coverage (tools/kernel_coverage.py)	done — 160 of 160 (docs/kernel-coverage.md)
Boot, rendering, audio, saves	boot, intro, menus, Create-a-Sim, audio and a visible playable household proven on Linux (docs/status.md, docs/playtest.md, out/shots/house3_house.png); save/reload through visible play not proven

Controls

The game itself only ever reads an Xbox pad, so the host translates keyboard and mouse into one on port 0, and controllers are picked up in the order they are plugged in. This is the host layer's mapping as src/common/input_kbm.cpp implements it. In play, arrows, Space, Esc and Enter are screenshot-proven (docs/playtest.md); no controller has ever been plugged into the test machine, so the gamepad path is unexercised.

Keyboard / mouse	Pad	In game
W A S D	left stick	walk; menus that read the stick
arrow keys	D-pad	menu and dialog navigation
mouse, right button held	right stick	camera
Q / E	right stick left/right	rotate the camera
R / F	right stick up/down	zoom the camera in / out
mouse wheel	right stick up/down, in pulses	zoom the camera in / out
space	A	accept, interact
escape, backspace	B	cancel, back
X / Y	X / Y
Z / C	left / right trigger
1 / 2	black / white
enter	Start	"press Start", pause menu
tab	Back
shift / ctrl, middle mouse	left / right stick click

Keys are read only while the game window has focus. While the F1 settings panel is up it owns the keyboard and the mouse and the game sees neither.

Settings, F1 / F2 overlay

F1 opens the host settings panel (display mode, resolution, aspect ratio, ultrawide, vsync, frame cap, render scale, anisotropic filtering, HDR on Windows, and the Cheats section) and F2 the frame-time graph. In the F1 panel the Resolution control is greyed out in borderless mode — borderless always follows the display it is on, so no chosen resolution can apply there; it is editable in windowed and fullscreen, and the stored value survives a mode switch (src/common/overlay.cpp, superproject 4fae9fc). F3 captures a frame when XBE_CAPTURE_DIR is set (see below). Settings are kept in settings.toml beside the executable (src/common/game_info.cpp: .settings = "settings.toml"); the first run also creates logs/ and hdd/ (where saves go) beside it. Keys read by sdk/runtime/app/settings.cpp (defaults from sdk/runtime/app/app.h):

Key	Values / default
display_mode	fullscreen / borderless / windowed (default borderless)
width, height	output size in pixels; 0 = desktop mode (default)
render_percent	render scale as a percent of the output height (default 100)
fps_cap	frame-rate cap; 0 = unlimited (default 60)
vsync	true / false (default true)
anisotropic_filtering	0 = as the game asks (default)
aspect_ratio	auto (default), 4:3, 16:9, 16:10, 21:9, 32:9 — on Vulkan this sets only the aspect the finished picture is presented at (PresentSrcAspect() in sdk/runtime/gpu/vulkan.cpp); auto presents at the title's own 4:3
ultrawide	true (default) / false — on Linux/Vulkan this has no visible effect today: the factor is computed in sdk/runtime/app/settings.cpp and read by the Vulkan backend for logging only, the frame target is never widened, and the picture stays pillarboxed at the presented aspect (see docs/ultrawide.md). The widening path exists only in the never-compiled D3D12 backend
hdr, hdr_paper_white, hdr_peak	Windows/D3D12 only: off (default) / auto / on; paper white default 200, peak 0 = display maximum
join_ip	system-link co-op host address (empty by default)

The F1 panel's Cheats section enters the game's own pad codes the game's own way (docs/cheats.md); Give Money has been entered in play through the game's own setter (log: cheats: entered Give Money (code 1): on, the game's cheat mask is now 02, out/shots/ui2.log). The other rows are not yet exercised in play.

Diagnostic environment variables

Variable	Effect
XBE_PERF=1	per-second perf: log lines (fps, draws, upload, clears) mirroring the D3D12 backend (sdk/runtime/core/diag.h)
XBE_VK_DEBUG=1	Vulkan validation layer (VK_LAYER_KHRONOS_validation) + debug-utils messenger (sdk/runtime/gpu/vulkan.cpp) — ⚠ WARNING: do not use on this machine. It hard-froze the whole machine twice (journal ends 06:47:47 in run fix1 and 12:50:29 in run house5), each less than 0.5 s after a periodic frame capture, with no kernel message (the boot command line has nowatchdog). No run without the validation layer has ever frozen. Use logging and the capture dumps (XBE_PERF, XBE_CAPTURE_DIR, XBE_VK_CAPTURE_EVERY, XBE_VK_DEBUG_DRAW) instead.
XBE_CAPTURE_DIR=<dir>	where F3 frame captures and periodic front-buffer dumps are written (sdk/runtime/core/diag.h)
XBE_VK_CAPTURE_EVERY=<n>	dump the guest front buffer every n presents into XBE_CAPTURE_DIR (sdk/runtime/gpu/vulkan.cpp)
XBE_MUTE=1	silence SDL audio output for capture/benchmark runs (sdk/runtime/audio/sdl_audio.cpp)
SIMSBO_NO_STEP=1	disable the frame-step fix in src/game/hooks.cpp: the stock 1/60 s quantiser runs untouched, so game speed is tied to frame rate as on the console at high fps
XBE_VK_DEBUG_DRAW=1	full per-draw Vulkan dump (sdk/runtime/gpu/vulkan.cpp)
XBE_CAPTURE_PROBE=<x>,<y>	F3 capture probe point, as fractions of the presented picture's width and height: the capture lists clears/draws that changed that pixel (sdk/runtime/core/diag.h)
XBE_NO_UVRECT=1	disable the UV-rect clamp for 2-D sprite quads, for bisecting a texture seam (both backends: sdk/runtime/gpu/vulkan.cpp, sdk/runtime/gpu/d3d12.cpp)
XBE_STATE_VERIFY=1	render-thread state tracking compares every state piece each frame and logs changes no dirty mark covered (sdk/runtime/gpu/render_thread.cpp)
XBE_NO_STATE_DIRTY=1	render-thread state tracking compares every state piece each frame, as before the dirty marks (sdk/runtime/gpu/render_thread.cpp)
SIMSBO_AUTOSTART=1	scripted pad self-test on port 0 (blind Start/Up/A cycle; src/common/game_info.cpp) — it never finishes name entry, so it cannot reach a household unattended
SIMSBO_STEP=<file>	step mode: each token written to the file is one burst of pad-0 pulses (src/common/game_info.cpp)

Unset is the normal path. Presence alone switches most of these on (any value, including "0"); the exceptions are XBE_MUTE and the SIMSBO_NO_* switch in src/game/hooks.cpp, which treat "0" as off (sdk/runtime/audio/sdl_audio.cpp, src/game/hooks.cpp).

Layout

assets/        your disc image and/or the files extracted from it (never committed)
cmake/         windows-cross.cmake - clang-cl + xwin toolchain for building the Windows exe on Linux
config/        game.toml - the recompiler config written by xbe_symbols, then hand-corrected
docs/          analysis and bring-up notes
sdk/           XboxXBERecomp SDK checkout (recompiler, runtime, XDK HLE, renderers)
src/common/    host-side code shared by every game on this engine family
src/game/      hooks and overrides for recompiled functions (excluded from the host glob)
tools/         xiso_extract.py (XDVDFS reader), xbe_info.py (XBE reader),
               kernel_coverage.py (kernel import coverage), env.bat (toolchain PATH)
generated/     recompiler output (never committed)

Build it from source

You supply the game: the USA Xbox release, in one of two supported shapes:

• the whole disc image (.iso) on its own in assets/, or
• the fully extracted files in assets/ (default.xbe plus every other file from the disc).

Warning: a folder holding only default.xbe is the one shape that does not work. The build needs assets/default.xbe there (to hash and recompile it) while the game needs its data files, so that folder alone leaves the title with nothing to load and it will report a dirty or damaged disc. Either extract the full image into assets/ or leave the .iso itself in assets/.

1. Put your disc image in the repository root, or default.xbe plus the files extracted from it in assets/.

2. Extract it:

   python tools/xiso_extract.py info    "<your>.iso"
   python tools/xiso_extract.py extract "<your>.iso" assets
   

3. Check that the XBE is the one this configuration targets:

   python tools/xbe_info.py assets/default.xbe
   

   The SHA-1 must match the table above.

4. Build for your platform:

   Windows (Direct3D 12 / XAudio2) — never run on Windows. The exe has only been cross-compiled on Linux (windows-cross preset; commands in docs/toolchain.md) and run under Wine; the native route below has never been run:

   tools\env.bat
   build.bat
   

   build.bat configures the release preset, builds xbe_symbols, writes config/game.toml from the XBE and the SDK's XDK signatures, then recompiles the XBE and builds SimsBustinOut.exe into out/build/release. release.bat packs that exe with the README, the SDK's THIRD_PARTY.txt and an empty assets/ folder into SimsBustinOut.zip.

   Linux (native Vulkan + SDL3, no Wine):

   ./build.sh
   

   build.sh does the same job with the linux-release preset and builds SimsBustinOut into out/build/linux-release. Pass a preset name to override it, e.g. ./build.sh linux-debug. You need clang, cmake and ninja on PATH, plus SDL3 and the Vulkan headers and loader for your distribution. Run it from beside the binary with the assets/ rule above satisfied, e.g. XBE_PERF=1 ./out/build/linux-release/SimsBustinOut. ./release.sh packs that binary with the README, the SDK's THIRD_PARTY.txt and an empty assets/ folder into SimsBustinOut-linux.tar.gz; it refuses to package anything from assets/, generated/ or out/ other than the executable.

   Either way, the first build is long: it compiles one C++ function per guest function (27,492 of them, generated/game/x86_recomp_stats.txt). config/game.toml is already written and committed for this XBE, so step 4 does not need to regenerate it.

Working on the port

• Never edit anything in generated/; it is rewritten on every recompile.
• Behaviour changes go in src/game/ as X86_FUNC(sub_XXXXXXXX) overrides (call __imp__sub_XXXXXXXX for the original) or as [[hook]] entries in config/game.toml.
• Analysis mistakes are corrected in config/game.toml with [[function]], [[switch]] and [xbe] data_ranges.

Legal

Bring your own disc. Do not commit or distribute the XBE, the disc image, extracted assets, or any key material. assets/, generated/, *.iso and out/ are ignored by git for that reason. The SDK is MIT licensed; see sdk/LICENSE and sdk/THIRD_PARTY.txt.