# Castlevania: Symphony of the Night: matching decompilation across PlayStation, PSP and Saturn builds

> Recreates C source for Castlevania: Symphony of the Night from its PlayStation, PSP and Saturn binaries, aiming for code that compiles byte for byte to the original game files. The work-in-progress build combines decompiled code with assets and assembly extracted from a user-supplied disc image, then checks per-version SHA-1 hashes. Native PC experiments in the same tree are documented as unfinished and are not a released port.

- Type: Case study
- Targets: Game
- Category: Independent reconstruction cases
- Relationship: Independent reconstruction project
- Sources reviewed: 2026-10-18
- Added to the catalog: 2026-10-18
- Original resource: <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp>
- Primary source: <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/README.md>
- Catalog page: <https://awesomerea.org/resources/sotn-matching-decomp-case/>
- Record JSON: <https://awesomerea.org/resources/sotn-matching-decomp-case/record.json>
- Chinese version: [简体中文](https://awesomerea.org/zh/resources/sotn-matching-decomp-case/index.md)

## Requirements & limits

- **Prerequisites:** The repository includes no game assets and none of the assembly needed to compile; README requires a prior copy of the game. The Build wiki asks for an unmodified US PlayStation disc as BIN/CUE, while the pinned Makefile reads both PSP-derived builds from a European Dracula X Chronicles ISO and the Saturn build from a Saturn BIN/CUE, each placed under disks/ with a version-specific name.
- **Prerequisites:** The Build wiki is tested against Ubuntu 24.04 LTS in CI and also covers Windows through WSL 2 and Arch-based distributions; a Dockerfile provides an Ubuntu Noble environment. Builds need Go, Rust, Python 3.12+, MIPS and SH binutils, a MIPS GCC, ninja and submodule tools such as m2c, maspsx, asm-differ, mipsmatch and decomp-permuter. Project-hosted prebuilt archives, including cc1-psx, mwccpsp, a Cygnus 2.7 toolchain and wibo, are checked against SHA-256 files; the Saturn build also uses dosemu.
- **Scope:** README describes a work-in-progress matching decompilation of four builds: us (PlayStation SLUS-00067, the reference), hd (an unreleased Japanese PS1 build found in Castlevania: Dracula X Chronicles data), pspeu (the European Dracula X Chronicles release) and saturn (the externally developed Saturn port). The Build wiki notes that some non-matching functions remain behind a NON_MATCHING macro and are not guaranteed to be functionally equivalent. README links mutable progress pages on sotn.xee.dev and decomp.dev.
- **Testing evidence:** Unless SKIP_CHECK is set, the pinned build code hashes its outputs against config/check.<version>.sha, which lists main.exe, DRA.BIN, RIC.BIN and stage and overlay files for us and shorter lists for hd, pspeu and saturn. The wiki still names a make check step that the pinned Makefile does not define. These checks compare file identity for the supplied version.
- **License:** The Makefile also accepts a pc version and src/pc holds native-port code, but the PC Port wiki page says no working end-to-end port based on the decompilation exists yet. The repository declares AGPL-3.0, while disc images, extracted assets and assembly, and the downloaded compilers keep separate rights. CONTRIBUTING allows coding-agent assistance only for changes contributors can justify and operate manually and requires commits and pull requests without autonomous tooling.

## Primary sources

1. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/README.md>
2. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/Makefile>
3. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/LICENSE>
4. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/CONTRIBUTING.md>
5. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/.gitmodules>
6. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/Dockerfile>
7. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/disks/README>
8. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/tools/requirements-debian.txt>
9. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/tools/sotn-assets/build.go>
10. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/tools/sotn-assets/check.go>
11. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/config/check.us.sha>
12. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/config/check.hd.sha>
13. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/config/check.pspeu.sha>
14. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/blob/eddaf22fe86f5189b85fd34915afe6564f19df20/config/check.saturn.sha>
15. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/wiki/Build/720bcf3b1212d130b28bb6ccbeda2b887ea96457>
16. <https://github.com/Xeeynamo/sotn-decomp/wiki/PC-Port/ebe1b37979d1a1966abb68d388b753e4407cfd3c>

## More in Games

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- [GoldenEye 007: matching Nintendo 64 decompilation for three releases](https://awesomerea.org/resources/goldeneye-007-matching-decomp-case/index.md) · Case study
- [Gran Turismo 4: an agent-assisted PS2 engine matching decompilation](https://awesomerea.org/resources/gran-turismo-4-matching-decomp-case/index.md) · Case study
- [Halo 2: an agent-assisted matching decompilation of an LTCG Xbox build](https://awesomerea.org/resources/halo2-matching-decomp-case/index.md) · Case study

## About this entry

The description was reviewed against primary sources.
Original editorial content: MIT. Linked projects, papers and assets retain their own rights and licenses.