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Sega Saturn Appreciation and Emulation Thread

HyperHip

Member
So I finally went and attempted to replace my Saturn battery today but noticed the black ribbon or whatever was missing. Am I screwed?
 

Khaz

Member
I was referring to the black piece that you use to tug out the battery. I saw one in a vid I watched on how to replace it and noticed I didn't have one. But I managed to replace it anyway so i'm all good.

The only ribbon I had on my brand new Saturns I got back in 1995 was the one to protect battery contact. You were supposed to take it away so that you can save your games normally. I've never seen an eject ribbon like you describe?
 
There isn't an eject ribbon. The ribbon of which you speak is intended to prevent contact with the circuit that uses the battery while it's still in store shelves, so it doesn't die before you can even use it.

Adding a ribbon back in will just cripple your ability to use the battery save. Don't do that.
 
Well, it's not the most rare game, but recently I had a lot of fun with Rayman Jungle Run and the Origins/Legends games so I decided to try the original.

ccy6KRs.jpg
 
It's wildly different. Significantly slower-paced, for one thing, which I actually like.

It's also balls-hard, and has a ridiculous 10-continue limit, in a game where lives are scarce and don't respawn after being collected (sure, you get one for every 100 Tings, but your Ting count also resets to 0 when you die, so). My recommendation is to just tap in Up Down Right Left (I believe) whenever your continue limit hits 2 or lower, resetting it to 10, and act like the game had infinite continues to begin with. It's much, much more satisfying to play; still PLENTY of challenge to the game without arbitrarily expecting you to beat the entire game (which is pretty lengthy!) in only 10 continues.
 
Well, it's not the most rare game, but recently I had a lot of fun with Rayman Jungle Run and the Origins/Legends games so I decided to try the original.

Rayman's a real good game, much harder than its 'cutesy' appearance would lead you to believe. And being 2d with those eye-popping colors and artstyle, still pleasant on the eyes 20 years later. As stated above its more methodical than rayman origins/legends, which are pretty much designed as 'speed-run' type games.
 
It's wildly different. Significantly slower-paced, for one thing, which I actually like.

It's also balls-hard, and has a ridiculous 10-continue limit, in a game where lives are scarce and don't respawn after being collected (sure, you get one for every 100 Tings, but your Ting count also resets to 0 when you die, so). My recommendation is to just tap in Up Down Right Left (I believe) whenever your continue limit hits 2 or lower, resetting it to 10, and act like the game had infinite continues to begin with. It's much, much more satisfying to play; still PLENTY of challenge to the game without arbitrarily expecting you to beat the entire game (which is pretty lengthy!) in only 10 continues.

Is that a cheat code? Wow, it's been a long time...

Rayman's a real good game, much harder than its 'cutesy' appearance would lead you to believe. And being 2d with those eye-popping colors and artstyle, still pleasant on the eyes 20 years later. As stated above its more methodical than rayman origins/legends, which are pretty much designed as 'speed-run' type games.

Well, untill now, the game really is much more difficult than the newer entries. It's Slower paced too. The graphics are still phenomenal and Saturn can put a really clear image in my Samsung LCD with it's normal cables.

I'm wondering if Saturn can hold Rayman Legends/Origins with some tweaks

Very fun and cute game, so far
 

Khaz

Member
I'm wondering if Saturn can hold Rayman Legends/Origins with some tweaks

I'm not sure, Rayman Legends and origins have some massive sprites and terrain deformation. It's very much using a 3D engine in disguise, not unlike Castlevania SOTN, and I don't know if the effects could be reproduced in a 2D sprite engine. Rayman is lacking arms and legs for a reason, so they don't have to be stretched when he launches a punch.
 

IrishNinja

Member
getting back in the swing of things - finally beat Panzer Dragoon Zwei the other night, looking to dive into Saga finally soon enough!

looking at my backlog, Saturn's one of the largest ones - still got Dragon Force, MKR, Shining Ark & Wisdom, and to clean up Albert Odyssey one day

How's Shining Force III?

a pain in the dick to find for like $75 or less
 

Mrdrboi

Banned
Lightguns specificaly only works on 50/60Hz 15kHz CRT monitors.
- CRT = big, bulky, heavy monitor
- 15kHz = not VGA computer monitor or arcade monitor
- 50/60Hz the standard, non-enhanced refresh rate. Later higher end CRT monitors had a doubled refresh rate (100/120Hz) to mitigate the strobe that could happen with interlaced signals. That's probably your problem.

Or your gun has a broken sensor. Could happen too.


It worked before on the same TV. Might be the gun itself.

Is there a way to replace the sensor or would I have to buy a new Saturn lightgun?
 

IrishNinja

Member
Is that even possible? I'd figured it's safely $100+ at this point. Maybe $150, haven't checked.

it's my white whale, but it does happen - just last fall or so, a gaffer PM'd me to say he found one BIN for that price, which of course was long gone when i saw it after my shift. earlier that year, another retro from seller (EU guy) was selling it for $65 and i'd missed it by minutes...

so yeah, i know it (and others) go well over double that now, but i'm gonna catch it for my price, one day.
 

Teknoman

Member
it's my white whale, but it does happen - just last fall or so, a gaffer PM'd me to say he found one BIN for that price, which of course was long gone when i saw it after my shift. earlier that year, another retro from seller (EU guy) was selling it for $65 and i'd missed it by minutes...

so yeah, i know it (and others) go well over double that now, but i'm gonna catch it for my price, one day.

Does condition matter to you?
 

cireza

Member
pretty decent graphics engine and and great turn based strategy to add as well. I wasn't too keen on the music tho. iirc Motoi Sakuraba also did the music to SiTHA which I think is head and shoulders above SFIII

Shining The Holy Ark has indeed a fantastic soundtrack. The OST, with all themes arranged, is awesome. Also one of the Saturn games that have real transparency effects on many spells and monsters.

SFIII still has the right themes at the right moment, contributing a lot to the atmosphere of the game. I really like SFIII, and having played the two following scenarios, I prefer the first one. Scenarios 2 and 3 also have a lot of slowdown on the battle maps, which really annoys me.
 

Teknoman

Member
Shining The Holy Ark has indeed a fantastic soundtrack. The OST, with all themes arranged, is awesome. Also one of the Saturn games that have real transparency effects on many spells and monsters.

SFIII still has the right themes at the right moment, contributing a lot to the atmosphere of the game. I really like SFIII, and having played the two following scenarios, I prefer the first one. Scenarios 2 and 3 also have a lot of slowdown on the battle maps, which really annoys me.

Its strange how Holy Ark has the better soundtrack. I havent had the chance to play either yet (own both though) but listening to the soundtracks...I think the older Shining Force games, especially 2 and CD, had the better soundtracks.
 

IrishNinja

Member
Does condition matter to you?

not really no - as long as the disc can be played & manual has all the pages! at this point i'd be tempted to just print out the back cover, totally did that for Burning Rangers when a gaffer sold me a disc-only copy for a fair price

i'm just done paying crazy high prices, is all. even tossed a burn of the US bomberman in with my legit JP one just in case i wanna see those levels, haha
 

UMGAWA

Member
This is totally fake, right?

You read the description right?

This is a resin/plastic model of a Sega Pluto system that preceded the 2 known working Sega Pluto prototype systems. There are two mock controller ports, mock power, reset and open buttons, mock power cable port and mock video ports as shown in the pictures. The top mock lid can be removed showing the material that was used for this model.

This is only a model and not a functioning prototype.

This is from one of the other item this seller has:
Our items are coming from my husband's personal collection from when he worked at Sega and launched the Dreamcast
 

cireza

Member
Its strange how Holy Ark has the better soundtrack. I havent had the chance to play either yet (own both though) but listening to the soundtracks...I think the older Shining Force games, especially 2 and CD, had the better soundtracks.

I like SFII OST, but it is probably my least favorite of all.

However, SF CD has a very good soundtrack, and there is one simple reason to this : it is true Redbook audio. Musics on Saturn for SFIII (and Holy Ark I think) are compressed/programmed. Only a few games could afford having Redbook audio. It is the case of Hexen and Doom. Hexen has an amazing soundtrack, one of my favorite on the system.

SF CD does not have that many tracks however, but they are awesome. Audio quality on Sega CD was the best, way above Saturn and PSOne because it was Redbook audio. No surprise that there is a lot of love for the Sega CD, it is a very unique system after all.

Saturn still had a much better audio quality than the PSone. Compressed music like the one you can listen to in Guardian Heroes is still amazing.
 

sarcoa

Member
You read the description right?



This is from one of the other item this seller has:
I read the description, but who's to say it's accurate? A white mock up box of a prototype that was only (relatively) recently unearthed AND it's going for $10,000? Seems suspect.
 

Khaz

Member
I read the description, but who's to say it's accurate? A white mock up box of a prototype that was only (relatively) recently unearthed AND it's going for $10,000? Seems suspect.

We agree on the price being ridiculous. Such item, if legit, would go for a few hundreds at best as an auction.
 
I read the description, but who's to say it's accurate? A white mock up box of a prototype that was only (relatively) recently unearthed AND it's going for $10,000? Seems suspect.


Holy crap, good thing I finished my coffee or it would've been all over my laptop lol. That's insanely suspect, then again I've never paid attention to any other sales of prototype/mock up gear on ebay.
 
that's actually pretty sweet start to it, I just started collecting and those games especially the vs. ones usually go for $30+ on ebay.

Thanks, funny enough the reason I purchased the JP version of the capcom fighters is that I prefer the coverart compared to their US counterparts, though being a bit cheaper certainly helped too.
 

Timu

Member
Saturn is now like the 2nd most expensive to do retro collecting on today...at least from what I seen for the rare games and such.
 
Saw Dragon Force (US) at a local retro store. I used to own it long ago at the height of my saturn collection, but let it got then I trimmed down. Wasnt cheap at $90, but I would have gotten it if it wasnt for a chip at the edge of the disc.
 
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