The Oman Archive refers to a leaked archive of coding and documents relating to the Nintendo 64 console. This leaked content had pioneered early emulations of Nintendo 64 games, including of course, Super Mario 64. Since this archive was covered by an NDA, it is illegal to obtain or use said archive. There is no link to said archive because of this.
Contents
Backstory and Contents
An anonymous former worker for Silicon Graphic Inc. (SGI) was involved with the development of the Nintendo 64 console (then known as the "Ultra 64); one part of the "Dream Team" Nintendo had selected. When SGI was at it's closing doors, said anonymous worker found contents relating to how the Nintendo 64 had worked in a .rar file given the name of "Oman". The worker had leaked the assets found on the Oman Archive through the internet, which the coding was used by early Nintendo 64 emulators and altered a bit in order to not face legal repercussion.
The contents of the Oman Archive are alleged to contain coding and documents for the Nintendo 64 and its development. Contents of the Oman Archive include the hardware descriptive languages for the RDP and RSP chips, among other coding for the console to function. These contents were later used by early Nintendo 64 emulators, albeit altered.
Theories
There are two types of theories that are going to be discussed. The first set of theories would be about the fate of the anonymous worker, while the second set would dicuss the alleged censorship of the Oman Archive and the theoretical contents of the censored parts. Not much info related to the Oman Archive is known, so speculation would run rampant
The Fate of the Worker
As it stands right now, it is unknown what happened to the leaker of the Oman Archive. Two possible simple theories had risen because of this. Since the Oman Archive is personal information that was covered by the NDA, it is possible that the anonymous worker was either sued by Nintendo for leaking personal assets relating to the Nintendo 64 and its coding, or was arrested because of said info.
However, since the personalisation AI of Super Mario 64 was not discussed by the Oman Archive, it is possible that the anonymous worker of SGI may not be who he seems to be. Super Mario 64 was one of the first few titles worked on for the Nintendo 64, and it could be most likely that SGI was involved in developing the game along with the console itself. It could be possible that the worker was a Nintendo employee setting up a fake archive in order to keep the personalisation contents a secret and to deceive the common eye that the Nintendo 64's contents are simpler than what's really there.
The Censorship of the Oman Archive
One major set of theories regarding the Oman Archive was that it was censored, if the Archive was authentic. Since the Archive was covered by an NDA, Nintendo would most likely try to cover up anything regarding said archive. It is possible that the Oman Archive's contents aren't fully revealed by the anonymous worker, and Nintendo (and possibly SGI) probably had a good part in hiding the parts that aren't seen in the archive.
Since SGI was one part of the "Dream Team" by Nintendo to make the Nintendo 64, it is possible that Nintendo disclosed information regarding Super Mario 64 in order to help the company work on the console and the graphics used for it. With this being said, it's not unlikely that SGI had archived information relating to how the game had worked, in order to help work the game onto the console. If this information could be true, then the Oman Archive could be censored so that information regarding Super Mario 64 would be removed.
The censored content of the Oman Archive has been speculated to be about the personalisation AI of Super Mario 64 and how it works. Any coding related to the personalisation of the game seems to be not visible by any archived decompilation of Mario 64, including the Oman Archive. Nintendo is very secretive when it comes to the AI of Mario 64, as it can lead to potentially harmful effects.
Trivia
- The name of the archive file is "oman.rar", leading some to speculate that the name of the archive means something, and it might, but it's worth pointing out that the leaker went by the moniker "oman" even before the archive was leaked.
