Nexen v1.4.1

A major feature and stability release with a complete TAS Editor, movie format system, 80+ performance optimizations, 300+ new tests, and CI fixes across all platforms.

TAS Editor (New)

The TAS Editor is now fully functional with a rich feature set:

• Piano Roll View -- Visual timeline for frame-by-frame editing with batch paint and multi-selection
• Full Undo/Redo System -- Every operation (toggle, paint, insert, delete, clear, fork) is undoable with O(1) incremental updates
• Greenzone System -- Instant seeking with automatic savestates and visual greenzone indicator
• Branches -- Fork, compare, and load alternate TAS strategies
• Input Recording -- Capture, insert, and overwrite modes with branch support
• Lua Scripting -- Automate TAS workflows via TasLuaApi with full undo integration
• UI Dialogs -- GoToFrame, Seek, Comment, Greenzone settings, Branch manager
• Multi-Selection & Context Menu -- Bulk editing with right-click actions
• Search -- Find specific inputs in the piano roll
• Metadata Display -- View movie metadata alongside the editor

Movie System (New)

Full movie recording, playback, and format conversion:

• Nexen Movie Format (.nexen-movie) -- ZIP-based format with JSON metadata, input log, savestate, and SRAM
• Movie Recording & Playback -- Record/replay inputs frame-by-frame with rerecording support
• Multi-Format Import/Export:
  • BK2 (BizHawk) -- Read/Write
  • FM2 (FCEUX) -- Read/Write
  • LSMV (lsnes) -- Read/Write
  • SMV (Snes9x) -- Read
  • VBM (VisualBoyAdvance) -- Read
  • GMV (Gens) -- Read
• Bug Fixes: LSMV stream leak, BK2 command-field parse bug, HistoryViewer time >59min

Performance (80+ Optimizations)

Extensive hot-path optimizations across the C++ and .NET codebases:

C++ Core

• std::format for controller text state, no-alloc parsing, reserve() pre-allocation
• std::erase, ranges::contains, C++20 contains() modernization
• Zero-copy stringstream::view(), ends_with, RewindData::str() optimization
• Eliminate redundant recursive locks in SetTextState/GetTextState/InvertBit
• SaveStateManager buffer reuse, CheatManager const-correctness
• ControllerHub const ref, GetControlDevices const ref, nodiscard audit
• Pre-compute HexEditor format string, std::endl removal
• NotificationManager send snapshot and registration lock overhead reduction

.NET / TAS

• InputFrame span-based parsing with StringBuilder and OrdinalIgnoreCase
• FrozenDictionary/FrozenSet for static readonly collections
• TryGetValue pattern replacing ContainsKey + indexer double-lookups
• ZipReader direct extraction, PianoRoll allocation removal
• MovieData CRC32 batched buffer, InputFrame.Clone skip-init
• O(1) StateLoaded, property notification batching, LINQ elimination
• Incremental ObservableCollection updates for Paste and Fork
• Zero-alloc PianoRoll cache eviction in render path

Testing (+300 New Tests)

Test count grew from ~2400 to 2790 (1633 C++ + 826 .NET + 331 MovieConverter):

• 75 TasLuaApi tests + fix lazy property init + fix branch creation bug
• 89 format roundtrip tests for InputFrame parsing
• 79 ViewModel integration tests for TasEditorViewModel
• 61 API doc generation + guard tests
• 58 ViewModel branch, controller layout, and frame navigation tests
• 30 StringUtilities and ControlDeviceState tests
• 29 C++ SetTextState/GetTextState round-trip tests
• 24 C++ TAS/movie tests (ControllerHub, RewindData, movie format)
• 23 greenzone, clipboard, clone, and frame operation tests
• 14 TAS recording mode and undo/redo state machine tests

CI / Build Fixes

All CI builds were previously broken. Three separate issues were diagnosed and fixed:

1. Pansy.Core project reference -- Added git clone of the Pansy repo to all CI jobs (the UI project references Pansy.Core via a sibling directory path)
2. std::jthread to std::thread -- libc++ (used by clang on Linux) doesn't support std::jthread; replaced with std::thread (the stop_token parameter was unused)
3. HdNesPack template destructors -- Added explicit destructor template instantiations for HdNesPack<1> through HdNesPack<10> (clang linker couldn't find them)

All 10 CI jobs now pass: Windows (x64, AoT), Linux gcc (x64, ARM64), Linux clang (x64, ARM64, AoT), AppImage (x64, ARM64), macOS ARM64.

Documentation

• Comprehensive README overhaul with accurate download links, expanded documentation tables
• New Movie System section documenting all supported formats
• New Emulation Core Documentation section (NES, SNES, GB/GBA, SMS/PCE/WS, Lynx)
• Expanded Developer Documentation (14 docs covering all subsystems)
• TAS algorithm reference documentation with undo system design

Supported Systems

NES, SNES, Game Boy / GBC, Game Boy Advance, Sega Master System / Game Gear, PC Engine / TurboGrafx-16, WonderSwan / WSC, Atari Lynx

Downloads

Note: Linux tarball builds require SDL2 (sudo apt install libsdl2-2.0-0). macOS: Right-click then Open on first launch.

Full Changelog: v1.4.0...v1.4.1