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Sega Saturn Appreciation and Emulation Thread

piggychan

Member
Just ordered another Scart cable, but this one is different as it has audio out:

That's a nice lead I might look for one in the not too distant future.. ebay ??


Also any of you guys pop your saturn game discs into the pc/laptop/mac to view it's contents??

You might find secret stuff.

Usually you might find a folder called OMAKE
Screen%20Shot%202015-05-12%20at%2006.45.15.png


Could lead to some extra art stuff.
Screen%20Shot%202015-05-12%20at%2006.47.56.png


Akumajo Dracula X aka SoTN
DX01.png


if you find the succubus offensive let me know and I'll take it down
http://i102.photobucket.com/albums/m113/secretsociety1/sega saturn scans and stuff/DX15.png

DX11.png


Jikkyo Osharbari parodius disc
PEN1.png


PEN0.png
 
Yeah, but I read you can hook it up to external sound setups like capture cards, speakers and such. Should help avoiding that audio buzz. Costs me around 22 bucks.

That's all? I know RCA's cost like that much just for standard ones. Hope they work out well for you.
 

Dereck

Member
Unlikely. Disc-based system have a completely different way of accessing data and audio than your PC CD-rom drive. Try playing a music-based game like Rez on a PS2 emulator: the game will keep freezing and stuttering because your PC drive loads and stops, while a console drive keeps spinning. The only way to properly play game discs is to make an image of it and mount it.

I wish someone would make drivers/firmwares to replicate this behaviour, but if it hasn't happened yet it's probably because it's easier said than done.
Thanks
 

StevieWhite

Member
Captured some more Steep Slope Sliders in connection with a writeup I was doing for my site - thought I'd share the full set of gameplay vids here:

https://youtu.be/hGvf5N4DWHI

https://youtu.be/rZ0NObfpb4c

https://youtu.be/o4K8faQUlwQ

Included this one in an earlier post:

https://youtu.be/jTjBwiFQvV8

It's a real shame this game slides (no pun intended) under the radar - it's probably one of the best playing snowboarders out there (probably due to its arcade roots). It looks remarkably good in motion for a game filled with the clunkiest of quadrilaterals.
 
Captured some more Steep Slope Sliders in connection with a writeup I was doing for my site - thought I'd share the full set of gameplay vids here:

https://youtu.be/hGvf5N4DWHI

https://youtu.be/rZ0NObfpb4c

https://youtu.be/o4K8faQUlwQ

Included this one in an earlier post:

https://youtu.be/jTjBwiFQvV8

It's a real shame this game slides (no pun intended) under the radar - it's probably one of the best playing snowboarders out there (probably due to its arcade roots). It looks remarkably good in motion for a game filled with the clunkiest of quadrilaterals.

This actually looks quite fun! I liked the second video showing how it is to actually play it. Cool the way the camera tips a little when turning.
 

KC-Slater

Member
Has anyone done this mod or knows of anyone who has done it?

https://gdemu.wordpress.com/about/

It's a optical drive replacement that reads disc images from an SD card. It doesn't seem too difficult to install but it's not cheap.

Yes, I have both the Rhea for Saturn and the GDEMU for Dreamcast, and both are fantastic. The GDEMU has the slight leg-up due to the fact that it is sporting a fully-functioning menu for game selection right now, but one is (allegedly) in the works for the Rhea.

The GDEMU is a breeze to install (zero soldering, only removal of the optical drive with a screwdriver) and the Rhea I purchased (revision 3) required some soldering, although I don't think this is necessary in more recent iterations.

My only slight nitpick would be that game-images must be ripped in to .cdi format using Windows-only (now defunct) software app called 'DiscJuggler'. As an OS X user (not wanting to mess around with a Windows-install) this was a pain, but very much worth it. It does support a few other formats, but compatibility is nearly 100% with .cdi, so it really is worth the effort to archive your library this way. Optionally, Rhea can automatically switch Saturn vertical refresh frequency to 50 or 60 Hz based on the region of the selected game. (This requires a more intense install, however.)

*I forgot to mention that currently the Rhea is really picky about which model of the Saturn you have. In order to ensure compatibility, you need a 20-pin, first gen Saturn. Even with that, you may be in for a unpleasant surprise and find that your hardware isn't compatible. All the details can be found on the site. If you're serious about getting in to the Saturn-scene, get in the queue now, and start saving the $150 or so it will cost. It's well worth it!
 
You guys are making me glad I bought Burning Rangers when I did. Heck, my mother was giving me shit for buying a game from 1998 for $50 at the time I bought it; imagine if I'd paid $250 @_@
 

Wereroku

Member
I'm using RGB Scart, but no extra upscaler.
I'll give my TV another go and see if I can make it behave with 480i.

Check with a different scart cable if you have one or just another cord to see if it's the console having problems or the cable.
 

Mzo

Member
You guys are making me glad I bought Burning Rangers when I did. Heck, my mother was giving me shit for buying a game from 1998 for $50 at the time I bought it; imagine if I'd paid $250 @_@

Yeah, I'm glad I spent my tips from my shitty teenage job on Saturn games.
 

Seik

Banned
Got my sa-weeeeet package and god damn, I love buying from Hit-Japan, the packaging was impeccable and the discs are all pretty much perfect! Except Space Invader which have a little scratch, but it's far from being anything 'heavy'­.

KVRp0tD.jpg


Gonna taste some Saturn goodness later tonight. :D
 

Khaz

Member
Has anyone noticed an increase in price for Dragon Force 2 since the translation is out?

I bought Shining Force ep2&3 in anticipation, and I need to get Policenauts Saturn too before its translation patch is out too
in five years time
.
 

Sinople

Member
Has anyone noticed an increase in price for Dragon Force 2 since the translation is out?
I don't know about e-bay but some shops in Japan have begun raising their price. A couple of shameless places even sell it for over 4000 yen! Though as of now it's still easy to find it for 1000~2000 yen, fortunately.
 

Timu

Member
Oh wow, the seller that I ordered those Saturn scart cables from asked me if I wanted the PAL/NTSC composite video or the NTSC only one with composite sync...and I chose composite sync to be safe. I read about composite sync here.
 

gooey

Neo Member
DOA and Fighters Mega Mix on the way. :)
Looks like im going to have to track down one of those Action Replay carts - not as many PAL games out there as I'd like.
 

gelf

Member
I was looking at scans of some old issues of Sega Saturn Magazine in various places and found a little info about Fighting Vipers in Issue 11 which reminded me of the Fighters Megamix vs VF2 graphics discussion earlier in this thread. FMM is pretty much using the FV engine so it still applies. Explains what was going on pretty well.



THE BACKGROUND STORY
The major compromise in bringing VF2 to the Saturn regarded the backgrounds. Gone were the incredible 3D buildings - in came some parallax scrolling and scaling to improve the sense of depth. Well, the story is much the same with Fighting Vipers, although the scaling has been improved immensely and there are some very small true 3D activities occurring to give the stages more depth. An example of this is the runway on Tokio's brilliant airport stage (the runway is in full 3D). To be honest, the compromise isn't so pronounced in Fighting Vipers because the immediate background (the surrounds of the ring) are in full 3D.
INTRODUCING SGL 2-1
So how does all of this new 3D trickery come about then eh? Fighting Vipers is only possible due to the hard labour from AM2 Research. Since the days of Virtue Fighter 2, AM2 have discovered even more graphical trickery inside the Saturn. Top of the list of new developments is light sourcing. The new SGL can dynamically alter the lighting on the polygons of the fighters, shading each polygon differently according to where the Saturn places the artificial light sourcing. A general overhead lighting (presumably from the Sun, as this level has an excellent sunset effect) is evident in Sanman's stage, whereas Grace's nighttime stage is lit from below. The effect is stunning, adding plenty of extra realism.

This dynamic lighting Is also evident In Tekken 2, but Fighting Vipers goes one better by Incorporating gouraud shading. Whereas the Namco title features very polygonal characters. AM2's game changes the colour on each polygon, merging them together to give a more organic look. This is a very time.consuming task for the Saturn - in fact, the coin-op original doesn't feature this type of shading. However, the Saturn's characters feature far less polygons than the arcade, with the shading making up for a lot of the lost polygons.

Considering that the Saturn is doing so much more extra work, you'd think that the speed is lower than Virtua Fighter 2. Not so - Fighting Vipers runs at the same speed as VF2 (60 frames a second, equalling the coin-op), with the only slight compromise being that the super-high resolution of VF2 hasn't been retained. Still. look at the screenshots, have you really got any complaints?

SSM was always great for hearing about technical details behind Sega's games. Though despite how they framed it here I always preferred the look of VF2 to FV and FMM. Hi-res mode was worth losing the lighting, shading and any 3D to the backgrounds for me.
 

piggychan

Member
I was looking at scans of some old issues of Sega Saturn Magazine in various places and found a little info about Fighting Vipers in Issue 11 which reminded me of the Fighters Megamix vs VF2 graphics discussion earlier in this thread. FMM is pretty much using the FV engine so it still applies. Explains what was going on pretty well.






SSM was always great for hearing about technical details behind Sega's games. Though despite how they framed it here I always preferred the look of VF2 to FV and FMM. Hi-res mode was worth losing the lighting, shading and any 3D to the backgrounds for me.

Great mag. I should have kept them all but when the dreamcast came in I threw a lot of saturn mags out....

I think Richard Leadbetter was part of that team writing up stuff on Sega Saturn. You might find him nowadays on Digital Foundry.

I wrote a post about it

Was playing it last night on my old CRT

P1020746.jpg


P1020745.jpg
 

gelf

Member
Great mag. I should have kept them all but when the dreamcast came in I threw a lot of saturn mags out....

I think Richard Leadbetter was part of that team writing up stuff on Sega Saturn. You might find him nowadays on Digital Foundry.

Oh yeah I was aware of Leadbetter, made sense to me that he ended up there. SSM went far more in depth into things then any other gaming mags I read at the time. Though I guess thats partly because particularly in the later days they had to fill more column inches with less games to cover when compared to other magazines.

I also threw out a lot of mags, I'm mad at my younger self for doing it.
 

Valkyria

Banned
Yesterday I started playing Rockman X4. Man that game it's hard. I can not kill a single boss in the game. I take too much damage and do little.
 

Ban Puncher

Member
So this happened today;

uxv9NoD.jpg



After many years of refusing to buy it on principle because of the stupid price, I happened to come across a mint condition copy of Radiant Silvergun that wasn't being sold at a ridiculous mark up. Nice to finally have it as part of the collection and the fact it was a bargain makes it all the more special.
 

Khaz

Member
After many years of refusing to buy it on principle because of the stupid price, I happened to come across a mint condition copy of Radiant Silvergun that wasn't being sold at a ridiculous mark up. Nice to finally have it as part of the collection and the fact it was a bargain makes it all the more special.

Oh my, it's now over $200! I remember it was $150 a couple of years ago. It's just crazy for a game that has a permanent position on eBay, there are always at least a dozen items on sale at any day. If they were all in auctions, that would be a $50 game, at most.
 
Yesterday I started playing Rockman X4. Man that game it's hard. I can not kill a single boss in the game. I take too much damage and do little.

For an easier time, start with Magma(rd) Dragoon and take the secret path through the lava to bring the power armor into the fight. It's impossible to dodge all of the bosses moves, but even if you get tagged by everything, you should be able to take him down to half health before the power suit explodes. The fight is way easier.

Once you have the fire power, Frost Walrus is free, and use a guide to follow the rest of the weaknesses.
 

piggychan

Member
So this happened today;

uxv9NoD.jpg



After many years of refusing to buy it on principle because of the stupid price, I happened to come across a mint condition copy of Radiant Silvergun that wasn't being sold at a ridiculous mark up. Nice to finally have it as part of the collection and the fact it was a bargain makes it all the more special.

nice looks almost brand new!
It's got a hidden omake folder on the disc so you can get some nice wallpaper for your pc/laptop
 
nice looks almost brand new!
It's got a hidden omake folder on the disc so you can get some nice wallpaper for your pc/laptop

To be honest, the wallpapers might look a little weird on a modern displays but judging by your previous pics you don't have any qualms about stretching 4:3 content to widescreen.
 

Valkyria

Banned
For an easier time, start with Magma(rd) Dragoon and take the secret path through the lava to bring the power armor into the fight. It's impossible to dodge all of the bosses moves, but even if you get tagged by everything, you should be able to take him down to half health before the power suit explodes. The fight is way easier.

Once you have the fire power, Frost Walrus is free, and use a guide to follow the rest of the weaknesses.

Thanks for the heads up! I'll try later when I arrive home.
 
After many years of refusing to buy it on principle because of the stupid price, I happened to come across a mint condition copy of Radiant Silvergun that wasn't being sold at a ridiculous mark up. Nice to finally have it as part of the collection and the fact it was a bargain makes it all the more special.

And now you can sell it to me for a not crazy price and keep that trend going imo. Just think of the possibilities!
 
If you just want to play it, sure. But it sounds like he wanted it for his collection and we all know digital games aren't future proof. 188 games were just pulled the other day with no warning.
 

piggychan

Member
To be honest, the wallpapers might look a little weird on a modern displays but judging by your previous pics you don't have any qualms about stretching 4:3 content to widescreen.

I've already spent years playing them on "normal" shaped CRTs. I don't mind a different perspective now and then :p
 
and Guardian Heroes too but I guess it's something else owning a physical copy of an original perhaps the analogy could be like holding an original painting from your favorite artist :p
That would be like owning the source code lmao. The disk is more like an original print than a one of a kind painting.
 
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