Dreamcast titles coming on XBLA/PSN

[aris13]

Sega Considering Saturn Download Releases

Also more details regarding the dreamcast releases.

The ports are being handled by Sega Shanghai, which also did the PS2 ports of Dynamite Dekka and Nights. Asked if the original staff is having a say in the projects, he said that Sonic Team is supervising Sonic Adventure.

The use of the term "port" here is intentional, as according to Okunari, the games are not running through emulation. One reason for this is due to technical hurdles with emulating Dreamcast, issues that arise in part because of peculiarities with the system's PowerVR2 GPU. Beyond this, the staff wanted to make adjustments to the games, and decided that porting over the source code would be the best bet. No current in-development releases are running under emulation, said Okunari.

Some of the changes being readied for Sonic and Crazy Taxi include updates to visuals. The games run at 720p and are seeing their framerate boosted up to 60 frames per second.

[Carnivol]

Does Sega even have the source code to any of their Saturn games?

I thought most of the "ports" of stuff last gen were either ground up remakes/replicas or based on the PC versions (due to unavailability of the original Saturn code)

[Zombie Fred]

Sega lost the source code for Panzer Draggon Saga. That's the only game I would care about on seeing again.

[CrimsonElder]

Jet Set Radio or go away.

Ha yes! I loved this game. I'l definatley buy this one.

[valentinesdead?]

Sega lost the source code for Panzer Draggon Saga. That's the only game I would care about on seeing again.

How the hell does a gaming company lose their 1st party source code??? That's pretty bad, lol.

Although, I like the idea of them going back to the source code and having the games run on the actual ps3/360 hardware. It's the best thing they can do to ensure the best quality possible.

[Carnivol]

There are many ways to lose your backups of stuff. (Anything from accidents to deliberately trashing things)

Though, back in ye olde days, it wasn't unheard of that some companies just kept stuff on rewritable media and deleted everything shortly after the title had shipped. So they could cheap out and save a few bucks on not having to buy new storage media for their next project.

[Zombie Fred]

Time for some computer nostalgia time folkes!

Backing up data on rewritable media wouldn't really add much to the cost if the data was being backed up via server tapes (having a few dozen back up tapes to have a source code stored on first party titles and technology wouldn’t be too expensive for a company such as Sega.). The only thing I could see on data being deleted was having no backup and then deleting all data on the working servers/local machines in the working environment. (1995 they would have been using Digital Data storage which around the time could store around 4-5 gigabytes value of data on each tape.) The only problem with this is that DDS was prone to being corrupted if overwritten over time or being damaged physically; DDS tapes are easily fragile to be damaged if not handled carefully.

The big issue back then (for computers anyhow) was making sure the data is put in a secured place because if you delete all data that is not needed due to having a backup, the production team ready to start on the next project and clearing all space for all new data to be stored*, then kiss your source code and other data goodbye if you loose those tapes or them getting damaged. And most cases it’s always been accidents with DDS tapes getting damaged due to poorly secured places. Some of the stuff I have heard on businesses with the above here is cringe worthy on what valuable data was gone because of fire incidents (a lot of people always had their data left in some cabinet or storage room somewhere in the building.

It still happens even today; the previous school where I use to work own server’s shadow data back up was corrupted due to the previous technician using the same old back up tapes, which would wear quickly after a few dozen uses, which caused for the backup software to start errors and then disabling some of the backup functions. Luckily I sorted this out because the following month when I moved away, the school’s servers malfunctioned and got damaged because of the other technician messing with the recovery data!

Most days now people use different methods such as data being stored at a different site or a more costly approach with online data backup.


(*Hard drive storage would be a problem here considering the maximum capacity around 1995 would be approx around 1 gigabyte of data for one physical hard drive. Most likely chance that the servers would be having the maximum capacity and the standard working computers in the business environment would most likely being small due to cost efficiency and relying on server backups. Crazy to think back then it was just a few years before the computer boom really started.)


You can guarantee Sega most likely having their backup functions being damaged in some fashion, and some of those old title's source codes being obsolete in the process. But this is just speculation since we don’t know how they “lost” their source code on some of their older titles (or if not more than that) but you can be sure it’s going to be related to some part of data storage.

[Humor Tumor]

It really sucks I miss out on Xbox Live and PSN stuff because I can't get broadband at my house.

I miss out on so god damn much these days

[Summoner]

I definitely want to see Jet Set Radio, Evolution, and Project Justice. Possibly Slave Zero as well, though the last 3 are highly unlikely. How about Phantasy Star Online? Universe was terrible in comparison.

[DONNIemo]

It really sucks I miss out on Xbox Live and PSN stuff because I can't get broadband at my house.

I miss out on so god damn much these days

Good God how do you survive??

[OKeijiDragon]

Sega lost the source code for Panzer Dragoon Saga.

And that, my friends, was the saddest-ass fucking day in Sega Saturn's history.

[aris13]

Sonic Adventure hits XBLA on September 15

[doomed]

The evidence so far shows that these are lazy, cheap ports from the PC versions.

If you can find them (or if you already own them), it's much better to get the PC versions. The XBLA/PSN port of Sonic Adventure runs on 4:3 with no AA. The PC versions can be hacked to properly display 16:9 widescreen and force stupidly high amounts of AA even on outdated computers.

So don't get your hopes up for titles such as Shemnue which was released only on Dreamcast because so far it seems that Sega wants to minimize their effort and maximize their revenue.

Even the number of titles they said they'll port "from the Dreamcast" fits the number of Dreamcast titles that Sega PC had ported to the PC years ago.

Confirmed: http://www.1up.com/do/reviewPage?cId=3181366
Editor rating: D

It really is a lazy (and worse) port of the PC version.
I expect their next title, Crazy Taxi to be a cheap port from the PC version as well.

[Carnivol]

The Crazy Taxi website brags about 16:9, so that's at least something.

But, yeah, no big loss on Adventure being half-assed if you ask me... never liked it before and doubt I'll like it now.

Now, if they half-ass Jet Set Radio on the other hand... then someone's gonna get an apocalyptic beat down from the god hand or something.

[aris13]

Crazy Taxi re-releasing on November 24

Crazy Taxi will re-release on XBLA and PSN on November 24 in Europe, Sega said this morning, with the classic hitting the US PSN on November 23.