Fantasy Zone - Arcade port from Hidecade

[Pyron]

After 4 years of work, Hidecade's Mega Drive port of Fantasy Zone is complete!

Complete Video playtrough


Project blog with details and challenges through 4 years of devolvement
https://ameblo.jp/arcade-cabinet/entry-12659552849.html

***More details will be included

[Black_Tiger]

This has been one of my dream ports and one of the biggest disappointments of the early Mega Drive line up was a lack of ports of Sega arcade games like this.

[Edek]

TBH ive always thought the game the Megadrive got, Super Fantasy Zone, is superior but its still great to see the original arcade ported.

[homerhomer]

This is very cool. Stuff like this proves that the Genesis really was an arcade capable system. I hope this shows up on cartridge format someday.

[Black_Tiger]

It looks like they actually did the bgms as well instead of just using the bonus tracks from Super Fantasy Zone.

It would be cool to hear a comparison between all three.

It sucks that the video appears to use emultion with dprite limits turned off. If this never gets released, it would be nice to at least see a quality recording from real hardware that shows what was actually achieved.

[Pyron]

It looks like they actually did the bgms as well instead of just using the bonus tracks from Super Fantasy Zone.

It would be cool to hear a comparison between all three.

It sucks that the video appears to use emultion with dprite limits turned off. If this never gets released, it would be nice to at least see a quality recording from real hardware that shows what was actually achieved.

In the video description, he says that is using the real MD hardware with Triple Bypass mode,
the video was captured using OSSC scaling the image to 720p 60

[Gryson]

It sucks that the video appears to use emultion with dprite limits turned off. If this never gets released, it would be nice to at least see a quality recording from real hardware that shows what was actually achieved.

You can see sprite overflow occasionally if you pause it, like here: https://youtu.be/HwcK-5n5o_w?t=687

What part were you thinking exceeded sprite limits?

[turboxray]

If I were to take guess, I'd say he's probably thinking about that spiral boss? Because that's the first thing I thought! haha. But it looks like the sprites are 24x24 pixels. I mean if all your objects are 24px wide, then you could have 13 of them on a line. And it looks like he has 11 sprites in a horizontal line for a specific rotation/angle.

[Black_Tiger]

You can see sprite overflow occasionally if you pause it, like here: https://youtu.be/HwcK-5n5o_w?t=687

What part were you thinking exceeded sprite limits?

The Mockstar and Dollamicca bosses should have at least flicker in the main stages. After looking again, I'm suspecting that they might have made the player's shot lower priority which would suck for gameplay.

I can't find anything clear on my phone other than the PCE version, but it looks like the Mockstar boss cyclones are 32 x 32 in the arcade. Maybe they've been redrawn to be 24 x 24 in the MD version.

The Dollamicca boss might use a tile layer in the final boss fight but sprites in the main stage.

The play through seems to be dancing around causing flicker, which made the Mockstar boss seem possible the first time I watched it.

They kill the Dollamicca boss instantly on the main stage, perhaps to avoid showing the flicker and then let it float around for a while during the boss rush version which only has a single-layer used for the background.

[Wesker]

This is very cool. Stuff like this proves that the Genesis really was an arcade capable system. I hope this shows up on cartridge format someday.

Unlikely, Sega doesn't seem to give licenses for any game in their old systems anymore. Even Darius is licensed by Sega in the Mega Drive Mini release but isn't in the cartridge Darius Extra releases. Third party games are more likely to appear on cartridge releases because they usually license their IPs and Sega simply doesn't bother, but regarding a Sega fully owned game this may be much more difficult to ever happen.

[Gryson]

Unlikely, Sega doesn't seem to give licenses for any game in their old systems anymore. Even Darius is licensed by Sega in the Mega Drive Mini release but isn't in the cartridge Darius Extra releases. Third party games are more likely to appear on cartridge releases because they usually license their IPs and Sega simply doesn't bother, but regarding a Sega fully owned game this may be much more difficult to ever happen.

There's no real precedent here, though. We're not talking about some random homebrew developer from outside Japan. Hidecade has connections at Sega who were willing to work with him to include Darius on the MD Mini--specifically, Sega producer Yosuke Okunari, who has supported Hidecade in the past.

It's also interesting to note the reaction people had when Hidecade first posted videos of the Darius port, which mostly consisted of "Why won't you release this online?! It will never be officially approved!" In the end, his decision not to release it resulted in Sega/Taito supporting it.

There's a very real chance the same thing could happen again, whereby a 3rd-party cart manufacturer is able to work with Sega to release the game. I have little doubt Hidecade has already been contacted by Columbus Circle to discuss it.

[Black_Tiger]

I'm hoping that they were motivated to complete it based on inside info about future devices Sega is planning that the game could potentially be included on.

Even if ot's just another Mega Drive compilation for current consoles, the inclusion of something unique would motivated people to buy a set of the same digital games yet again.

The arcade ports in the PS3 (or 3?) Genesus Collection sealed the deal for me.

[Pyron]

Could be an MD mini DLC or a new package of games to be included?

Would be very cool, or it could be included in a new M2 collection in the future.

[homerhomer]

Looks like he previously made a Pac-man port that ended up in a my arcade handheld unit.
https://youtu.be/UgLY7wg3R1A

[BrianC]

Looks like he previously made a Pac-man port that ended up in a my arcade handheld unit.
https://youtu.be/UgLY7wg3R1A

Telling from videos, and the Cookieman version on one of the lesson pages of Hidecade's site, the Pac-Man port on the My Arcade unit is different. It is a nice port, though.