Extremely Crazy Easter Egg!

[Tama-Hacker]

Hello community! I am new here. So I recently had the idea to take my gen.2 tamagotchi and hold down some of the buttons while resetting it to see what would happen. And... it broke. But then I fixed it. So I tried it again. I held down B and C and pressed reset. The screen went black. I thought I broke it again, but then I hit A and the screen changed to a checkerboard pattern. I pressed B and it changed, then I hit C and it changed again. Here is the weird part. When I hit A on the fourth screen the words “Ver 5” appeared. I’ll try to upload a picture. So I started fooling around with it on that screen. I eventually pressed B and C at the same time. Then ANOTHER screen popped up and it said “0956 KHz”. What does a tamagotchi have to do with kilohertz? Then I pressed A and it showed the following string of numbers and letters: “00E27B46” I have no idea what this means. Can someone try this out themselves and please let me know how your experience went? Also please let me know what you think of the mysterious screens. Also please use this topic to talk about other Easter eggs you have encountered! Thank you in advance.

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Hi there Tama-Hacker, and welcome to TamaTalk!

As far as I know, this isn't an Easter Egg (so I've moved it to another section of the forum, accordingly) - it sounds like you've stumbled across a feature that's usually referred to as a "ROM Test", which is an on-board debugging feature (something that's usually used by programmers or repairmen) that tests and provides information about a Tamagotchi's hardware and software.

There is a bit more information about what ROM-testing is all about in this thread by @hwd45, although please note that the linked thread is about a different series of Tamagotchi models to the recent Gen 1 and Gen 2 reissues, and so not all of the information will apply.

 

[Tama-Hacker]

Hi there Tama-Hacker, and welcome to TamaTalk!

As far as I know, this isn't an Easter Egg (so I've moved it to another section of the forum, accordingly) - it sounds like you've stumbled across a feature that's usually referred to as a "ROM Test", which is an on-board debugging feature (something that's usually used by programmers or repairmen) that tests and provides information about a Tamagotchi's hardware and software.

There is a bit more information about what ROM-testing is all about in this thread by @hwd45, although please note that the linked thread is about a different series of Tamagotchi models to the recent Gen 1 and Gen 2 reissues, and so not all of the information will apply.

Hi Penguin-keeper! Thanks for responding. Your explanation is very interesting. I will definitely check out that thread about rom testing and do some research. If you could please try this out and post some pictures that would be great. Thanks. (By the way I used a Gen.2 reissue for this not an original)

 

[hwd45]

Indeed this is the ROM test mode on the rerelease P1/2 models  as I recall, the versions are as follows:

Ver 0 - P1, Japan
Ver 1 - P2, Japan
Ver 3 - P1, International
Ver 5 - P2, International

The frequency is, I think, likely related to the frequency the Crystal oscillator is oscillating at, though don’t quote me on that. As for the other thing that appeared, that seems to be a checksum of some sort - this is the “ROM test” bit of the test mode; it’s checking the data on the ROM matches an expected checksum

 

[Penguin-keeper]

If you could please try this out and post some pictures that would be great. Thanks.

No problem at all! Here are some pictures of my Tamagotchi Original Gen 1 Sunset, and my Tamagotchi Original Gen 2 Sky devices (so, also the modern re-issues), after the LCD-test part of the ROM-test;

I did not get a screen displaying the frequency - pressing a button after the checksum was verified sent both of the English devices straight to the standard egg screen.

As a bonus, though I don't have a Japanese Gen 1 remake to show alongside it, here's a picture of my Shuku 20 Shunen Tamagotchi Gen 2 Hiragana;

The Japanese device did not show or verify a checksum, and it also didn't show the frequency - pressing a button on the version-number screen sent it straight to the standard egg screen.

As you can see, the odd thing is that the version numbers don't match up with @hwd45's list! As far as that goes, I have two more English Tamagotchi Original Gen 1 devices (the Purple and Neon ones, which are both plain colours), and I can test those too if anybody would like me to.

 

[hwd45]

As you can see, the odd thing is that the version numbers don't match up with @hwd45's list! As far as that goes, I have two more English Tamagotchi Original Gen 1 devices (the Purple and Neon ones, which are both plain colours), and I can test those too if anybody would like me to.

Ah apologies, my mistake. The numbers I put in for Ver 1 and 3 should’ve been switched

 

[Penguin-keeper]

Ah apologies, my mistake.

No problem at all!

The numbers I put in for Ver 1 and 3 should’ve been switched

Ahh! That makes more sense!

I presume that they skipped 4 for superstitious reasons, here?

 

[hwd45]

I presume that they skipped 4 for superstitious reasons, here?

Ahh, that would make sense! Though I’m not sure why 2 was seemingly skipped, unless they were reserving a spot for a localisation in a language they’d not done before, or something.

 

[Tama-Hacker]

Hello everyone! There is another ROM-Test feature I recently discovered. If you hold down A & C and then press reset you should see the letters "SE" and then underneath those letters you should see "00". If you push A you can change the number displayed and if you push B it will play a sound. Each number corresponds to a sound that is on the Tamagotchi device. by pressing A you can cycle through every sound on the device and listen to it. I will try to post pictures as soon as I figure out how to . If anyone knows of a ROM-Test feature that hasn't yet been added to this topic please post it here. Thanks!

 

[hwd45]

Hello everyone! There is another ROM-Test feature I recently discovered. If you hold down A & C and then press reset you should see the letters "SE" and then underneath those letters you should see "00". If you push A you can change the number displayed and if you push B it will play a sound. Each number corresponds to a sound that is on the Tamagotchi device. by pressing A you can cycle through every sound on the device and listen to it. I will try to post pictures as soon as I figure out how to . If anyone knows of a ROM-Test feature that hasn't yet been added to this topic please post it here. Thanks!

The Sound Test is also present on a number of the Nano devices

 

[OldSchoolVPQ]

Okay clever people - has anyone figured out if all the ROMs are on the same chip, and if it's possible to suss them out?