Hopefully it won't take five or six years between showing a prototype and production as it was with the Saturn Pro controller.
TwistedPear 2 months ago • 100%
I don't know if it ever stopped. Seems like every other month there's a port or a homebrew that eventually goes retail.
The Atomiswave arcade ports are great.
Dreamcast Junkyard is the typical forum for all things that are "still thinking"
TwistedPear 3 months ago • 100%
Short answer, absolutely not.
The Virtex Ultrascale+ FPGA boards are $10,000 AND UP.
If you look up why Mister will not move up to more powerful FPGA chips, this is why.
Would it be cool? Yes. Definitely.
TwistedPear 3 months ago • 100%
Now imagine that, but on a keyboard. No mouse. That's pc controls for ZT
TwistedPear 3 months ago • 100%
Extreme G 2 on pc loses the analog steering from N64, which turns out is a big deal. Throwback Entertainment made a port-of-a-port and introduced a speed hack in the launcher menu where you can slow down the game a bit, which helps, but doesn't fix the issue.
In some other cases like Hexen, there were alterations on console that I find generally more appealing, like an ost remaster or lighting effects.
The Genesis game Zero Tolerance and Dreamcast version of Expendable are games I prefer on console simply because of the control schemes on pc.
TwistedPear 4 months ago • 100%
Yeah, the Doom 64 projects are a bit different in scope, so I figured they deserve separate listings. Anywho:
D64-RE is a decomp that you recompile yourself. There are some minor features like additional cheats, but it's a pretty raw "here is all the code" project that you can mess with yourself.
Doom64 EX + is a fork of the original work by SVKaiser, called Doom 64 EX.
Doom 64 EX is a mish-mash of reverse engineering and source port conversion. Famously, Kaiser now works at NightDive Studios and brought his proprietary KEX engine with him.
EX+ basically rips out Kaiser's KEX engine, while keeping the improvements of the modern commercial release like loads of bug fixes, performance increases, and aims to be faithful to the original game.
In addition, EX+ is able to be played on other platforms besides Windows, and can accept DeHacked64 patches. This allows for tweaks to values throughout the game (monster health, damage, weapons, etc), while bringing in support for a number of existing map packs.
Strangely, EX+ does not have controller support - at all. It is mandatory mouse/keyboard.
TwistedPear 4 months ago • 100%
The Sonic 1,2 and CD projects are cool since they are decomps of the remastered Android versions with proper widescreen plus modding support on 1 & 2 built in.
The Sonic Mania decomp allows you to choose your renderer (DX11 / DX12, and Vulkan), among bug fixes and mod support. Did you know the official release doesn't let you use more than one controller in Competition Mode? The decomp lets you fix that. Plus mod support, of course. Most of the mods for Mania are cosmetic, but occasionally you get some cool stuff like more abilities or extending movesets to other characters.
Gamebanana.com is a good resource on all counts of classic Sonic modding
TwistedPear 4 months ago • 100%
TwistedPear 4 months ago • 100%
The Rez version is great, and this remix is even better. This gets into the realm of licensed music, but it's made for the game, so I count it 😉
TwistedPear 6 months ago • 100%
@TheAgeofSuperboredom:
Do you celebrate relentlessness?
Are you also better than the best, megalomanical, and harder than the rest?
*pokes head out from behind a flood of posts* ...is it....is it safe to come out now? Anywho, Savaged Regime has been doing YM2612 arrangements for a whiles now, and has been tapped to do new Genesis games like this one and Astebros.
If you search "Godzilla NES remix" it's about impossible to find actual music and not creepypasta stuff.
I think this song benefits from having modern samples. Live instrument versions also generally sound good.
TwistedPear 6 months ago • 100%
He's mostly known for his stuff while at Tri-Ace: Star Ocean and the like, but has also done a few sports games for Nintendo - namely Mario Golf and Tennis.
In so far as works outside of games, I think you pretty much got it. He has a rock album called Gikyokuonsou.
I need to actually finish this game. 😅
Apart from just a cool remix, it's a nice glitch demonstration / behind the scenes compilation. Alternatively, a megamix of all this guy's MKII tracks are [here](https://yewtu.be/watch?v=JcAn9F_Q4fY). The channel is worth deep-diving, too. Lots of MK remixes.
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
Such a great ost overall, despite having a few artists involved.
I appreciate Mick's approach to legacy games. He shows lots of respect to the original tracks while adding his own touch.
In honor of Toriyama.
Too bad the game tried to push people toward a multiplayer that nobody wanted or liked to unlock single player content. Dope orchestral soundtrack, though. Turns out blaring brass sounds good when you know what you're doing.
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
Still have mine!
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
If someone told me you could finish that game by only sliding, I would believe them.
It was the era of the oontz, oontz, oontz beat, but no complaints here. The ost does its job.
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
Crafting / farm games don't usually have a reason to do much more than have chill bgm, but this is great
This roguelite Metroidvania surprised me with how well the randomized mechanics blended with exploration, and this track gives plenty of atmosphere to the third biome.
The Frontiers ost, and esp. the cyberspace stages are amazing as-is, but yeah, I can get down with this.
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
Indeedy. It was during the same concert of that year. Apparently, this is a thing they continue to do ala Video Games Live.
Themes from Mega Man 1 - 3 are here, including a couple of Wily Castles.
A turn-based rpg about travel and discovery in a very shonen kind of way. Now that I think about it, Skies takes a page or two from Laputa: Castle in the Sky. Anyway, one of the early lands has some of the most memorable music. The ost was released physically by Wayo Records [here](https://www.wayorecords.com/en/wayo-records/653-skies-of-arcadia-eternal-soundtrack-cd-edition.html). If you care enough about the soundtrack as a whole, it's a beautiful recording and a neat cd collection to own, despite missing a few tracks here and there. OC Remix also has a remix album [here](https://arcadia.ocremix.org/)
Prodeus might have been the first time in a while that I had a great time in an fps. Spent Fuel is a downbeat industrial metal track that symbolizes the game's "I'm here to kick ass and chew bubble gum" attitude.
The long, brooding original by Moraski is given a similarly dark and insidious treatment with heavy synths and punchy bass. Check out the rest of his Portal 2 remixes [here]( https://alexgiudici.bandcamp.com/album/the-portal-collection-volume-ii )
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
Terraport and Reclamation are my faves from each of these games. Good stuff
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
Bit Brigade just performed live in Louisville, KY recently. They played a double-header of Ninja Gaiden and Double Dragon. Great show.
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
I do like me a good sawtooth wave.
Most seem to prefer "Vitality" from the same album, but I rather enjoy the darker, more intense rhythms here. Helltaker is a slide puzzle akin to Slayaway Camp mixed with a waifu collector visual novel, and the ost has no business going this hard. I haven't played the game even once, but I've listened to this album for *hours*. You can support Mittsies on [Bandcamp]( https://mittsies.bandcamp.com/album/helltaker-soundtrack-complete ) but just be aware the artwork can be a bit....saucy. I would be remiss to mention SayMaxwell did very popular remixes to most of the tracks as well, including this one.
David Wise needs no introduction, and to an extent neither does Banjo Guy Ollie and his folksy covers of game music. Here, he teams up with Game Brass for a band cover of a classic. Support GameBrass on [Bandcamp]( https://thegamebrass.bandcamp.com/album/brassino-isles-tropical-cruise )
You didn't even know you wanted a synth cover of Doom music, did you?
Raptor comes from a specific era of MS-DOS shmups that also includes Tyrian/2000, Overkill and others. These were the days before Bullet Hell took over which focused on enemy patterns instead of sprays of bullet patterns. A Raptor Remake is in progress by Scott Host, one of the devs on the original project. You can find the Patreon [here](https://www.patreon.com/scotthost)
Pinball didn't need to be this weird, but the Crush series is among the most inspirational.
Ah, yes. The DnB days of the N64. XG2 already had a solid ost, but Mellow Sonic brings it up to a whole other level. Canous is my fave of the bunch, but if you're into it, the other tracks are well worth a listen Support them on Bandcamp here: https://mellowsonic.bandcamp.com/album/extreme-g-revised
Furniss replaced Forden's "The Bridge" theme, and I'm glad he did. 8-beats VGM shows how different a track can sound just by selectively muting channels. "ABACABB" by Alby Odum is a megamix worth checking out, too
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
Great game, and a cool ost
In before "Pineapple!"
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
Gotta love that iconic 90s rap. It's still not as cheesey as it could be. Another fighting game that has a rap for no reason is "Gorge!" on the Primal Rage ost.
Cliché, I know, but I'm all about Esaka. Especially since they've redone it so many times.
Synthetik's understated soundtrack makes tracks like these that go hard stand out. It doesn't hurt that it's some darn good psy-trance to boot. The sequel slips in a couple more tracks that also have a bouncy quality to them.
A Contra game that was widely overlooked in its day, and a gem in the series. Give it a shot if you missed it. Unknown artist. There's a sound team credited, but not for the music specifically.
Blair Zuppicich did a great job with 7th Legion (say what you will about the game), and though Steam just gives you the soundtrack in mp3 format, I was confused that several themes were missing. This is a problem that perplexed me for many years, especially since my favorite theme was not among these files. Then, I tripped over a user on YouTube one day, Nameless One, who had managed to rip some of these 'missing' tunes and uploaded them. Reinvigorated, I went digging. Through the use of a hex editor, opening one of the bgm.xm files shows a line at the top: "FastTracker 2.0". Of course, it's a program that no longer exists in its native form, BUT a user 8bitbubsy created a clone and uploaded it as a portable app on his site 16-bit.org. Using the tracker, I was able to rip the theme I was after, located in BGM12.XM. In my excitement to shout it from the rooftops, I made a quick guide in Steam linked here. Tangentially, Blair seems to have remade this track into a more conventional trance song in 2013, available on Bandcamp and calls it "Vision". You can check that out here: (https://plexusmusic.bandcamp.com/album/voyager)
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
PvZ came out of nowhere and was such a great take on the genre.
Have you seen the guzheng live cover?
A slow burn that's worth the wait. Played during the menu / lobby of AirMech. This and the follow-up soundtrack WarMech are greatly recommended for fans of FLA or progressive EBM.
This game has all of two songs, and they're both bangers. Discovered while looking up the artist, since I was already a fan of both Sub-Terrania and Adventures of Batman and Robin ost's on the Genesis / Mega Drive
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
Redout 1's ost is great. Lots of good fun.
I'm partial to the Cairo tracks, myself (Sand Warriors, and Desert Druids).
TwistedPear 7 months ago • 100%
Not to pile on, but print ads from the 90's are wild to look at. Sonic 3 launched at $70. You know, games that require a couple of hours to complete casually. Stuff got replayed a LOT.
TwistedPear 8 months ago • 87%
Definitely going to try this.
I have DNS adblocking / tracker blocking set up on an Android TV (spoiler: Amazon is very noisy, even if you don't watch anything on Prime Video), but it doesn't help against native launcher ads.
When the launcher first started showing ads, you could disable certain services, but it would break playback on other apps.
TwistedPear 8 months ago • 100%
To me that looks like RetroArch running Genesis Plus GX.
TwistedPear 8 months ago • 100%
Retro-bit, Retro Fighters, and Krikzz are a few more manufacturers I can think of making controllers with original ports.
In particular, Retro-bit's Saturn Pro pad is...interesting, let's say. I have also used Retro Fighters Striker Dreamcast pads - they're quite nice.
In yonder days, a few companies like ASCII and Hori come up a lot for reliable stuff.
TwistedPear 9 months ago • 100%
For just a few hours, the XFX Merc310 AMD 7900 XTX was $800 US, sold by Amazon (not a seller on Amazon, but Amazon themselves).
Hopefully, more price drops will be more common in the coming weeks.
After six months of study, practice, and refinement, I finished Primal Rage at the maximum difficulty without any damage to health. The run starts at 33:12
I'm on a quest to finish the game at difficulty 16 (Maximum) without taking a hit. During my first marathon of the journey, I got a new high score. The run is visible on Twitch / YouTube if one is keen to that sort of thing. https://piped.video/watch?v=t4k0A5zNf1c
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
This is a 32X romhack, correct. If you run it from a flash cart (like the Everdrive) and also have a Sega CD attached, then that enables the other features.
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
32X Doom tried to be like the original PC game, but it was rushed through development as a launch title with a small team. The result is.....tragic. Specifically: half the maps were missing, both the game window and resolution are reduced to get playable framerates, the original soundtrack famously sounds a bit like a farts at times, several visual effects like parallax texture scrolling, transparency, and lighting effects are gone. (there's a room in E1M5 near the end that the lights alternate between on/off, but the monsters on 32x are always visible.) This also means no invisibility power-up, or Spectre monsters.
My favorite jank is after the credits when you finish the game, it dumps you into a fake DOS prompt. It just shows C:\DOOM> and you are unable to interact with it in any way.
After silence for a good while, I thought they were done with this project, but apparently not. Additional effects, a lot of optimizations, and the bosses were added back in. There is so much grunt behind it now, that in the right configuration it uses the combined might of the Genesis, 32X, and Sega CD processing power all together. Catching anyone up who orignally didn't know about this: Doom 32X Resurrection is an attempt to bring the Sega 32X version of Doom to its full potential. The game now supports a laundry list of features it didn't before: local coop / deathmatch, link cable multiplayer, all the maps, sprites from all angles (they all used to face forward, even rockets), positional sound effects, CD music support, new FM ost by SpoonyBard, improved resolution, improved framerate, additional 6-button configs, and more. The romhack itself can be found at romhacking.net
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
I for one am thrilled to relive the jank. Hitscanners that can shoot through walls, auto aim that kinda-sorta works, tools that get used maybe three or four times the entire campaign...
Word around the highly suspect, not very reliable, rumor mill was that the source code was for this game was "lost" and that's why a port hasn't been worked on before now. I wonder if that information was wholly incorrect, or if another method was used to reverse engineer the game into KEX. In either case, Night Dive has been cranking out amazing releases, and I expect nothing less from this one.
As someone whose earliest exposure to Doom was on console, and possibly one of the bottom two or three versions of the game at that, this romhack blows me away. Modders went out of their way to actually make this version playable. Not only playable, but damn good. It adds Deathmatch / Coop, all the maps, new ost, new sprites, the works. It's basically a new game. If you have never played Doom on the Sega 32X, let me fill you in. This was meant to be a launch title, and there was precious little time to get it up and running. New system + rushed development + small dev team = 32X Doom. All the sprites face forward, even rockets - so you're essentially shooting rockets backwards. The music sounds a bit like the day after Taco Bell. The game is missing most of the maps. And my favorite - the end credits sequence dumps you into a fake DOS prompt. (It displays C:\DOOM that you cannot interact with in any way). That is why Doom 32X Resurrection is such a crazy romhack. The amount of improvement is remarkable. I can't imagine how much better it would have reviewed and sold if this is how it released.
Are you a Sanwa stan? Suzo Happ purist? Tried out a bullet topped Nobi? Or a Taeyoung Fanta lever? Crown? Hori? Anything far out in left field or unusual? What did you think of them? Any standout features or drawbacks?
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
I have been playing RotT Ludicrous Edition, and it's my first time through the game in general. I can't tell you how much of my time is spent on key hunting or looking for that one touch plate, so I get that.
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
I noticed a few things while playing the N64 campaign.
It's not 1:1 parity with the console version, and it's not meant to be (and that's a good thing, actually).
How it works is they use N64 textures, OST, and maps. Everything else is from the new engine - including the new enemy AI changes and balance adjustments, etc.
A good portion of the game is spent in anti-gravity. You may not have the rocket launcher, or much ammo for it yet, relying on grenades to take down bigger baddies like enforcers or tanks. The trajectory of a grenade on authentic hardware is net positive, so it's about impossible to aim. On Q2 Enhanced, it just means the grenade fires straight out of the barrel. Little things like that stand out.
The Nintendo 64 campaign on Hard, with deaths, took me about 3 hours. This is how I have always wanted to play this version of the game. It's indescribably better than trying to play it on an actual Nintendo 64 or even emulated.
Just like Quake 1, if you already own Quake 2, the enhanced version is available as a free update. Although unlike Quake 1, Quake 2: Enhanced is also available on GOG day 1. In addition to visual updates, there's a new episode "Call of the Machine", Quake 2 N64, a pass to the enemy AI which changes a few behaviors and attacks, removes machine gun recoil, a new infinite use item that shows the player where to go next, and a number of other qol and accessibility options. Anecdotally, I find the addition of Q2 N64 very appealing. It's a mish-mash of pared-down maps from vanilla Q2 and the expansions in a strictly linear fashion - no backtracking. Of course, there's also changes to the lighting and a new OST by Aubrey Hodges. Being able to control the game from keyboard / mouse is a godsend. I played the game in emulator with a modern gamepad and it was barely, *barely* doable, even when I could manually set deadzones and sensitivities and the like. It was awful.
Hold Back to Block visits the Arcade Stick Museum at EVO to get a rundown of sticks over the years dating back to early MAS and Neo Geo offerings.
Patreon supporters of Raptor: Call of the Shadows Remixed now have access to a beta SDL2 port of Demon Star in the Discord server
Announced at EVO, Killer Instinct is getting a new balance pass, improvements to online, and more. (Here's hoping those changes are coming to the PC version as well)
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
I've played it for about two hours, and the only hitch I've noticed is the midi ost can stutter. If you swap it for OPL, it's fine, though.
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
Yeah, it got a port on the N64.
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
When Retro-bit announced their licensing partnership with Sega, I was really excited. I got their first wave Saturn USB pad, and I now have a Big 6 that combined a 6-button pad with the style of the 3-button Genesis pad. Still waiting for that dual analog variant they promised though...
It was around the same time I think that Retro Fighters came out with a new original port Dreamcast controller, the Striker. Awesome controller. I got a Raphnet adapter just to use it on pc from time to time.
Then there's the arcade stick I custom built for the specific purpose of authentic arcade gaming at home. Uses a Suzo Happ lever (even though they used to be made by Industrias Lorenzo), and Industrias Lorenzo buttons.
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
If a don't need an analog stick, my go-to has been the Hori Fighting Commander Octa. It has a stick, but I don't use it often. The buttons are microswitched and it feels great.
If I do need the sticks, Series X controllers are fine, generally.
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
Update: Last Stand is there, comes with all the DLC gear, but does not carry over character progress from Steam (not that I expected it to). Just, you know, a heads up if you spent a few dozen hours triple prestiging every hero.
However, I'm dubious if it actually connects to any servers, matchmaking or otherwise. From the main lobby it shows I am the only player in General, where everyone online would be. Aaaaand nobody but me. Surely some other weirdo besides me is playing the game during daylight hours on GOG.
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
Thrilled to see it get added, but my first thought is if Last Stand works.
Plus DoW II has some of the best lines in the series from the Orks:
"Um, Boss, they'z blowed up those shiny bridges you like"
"You'ze betta be lyin' to me boy, an you'ze better be ded before I get dere, cuz I don't like bein' lied to"
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
While not a straight ready-to-go port....exactly, I was really impressed by DeltaTouch and QuadTouch. It ports over a bunch of id software sourceports to Android making it possible to play not only Doom, Heretic, and Strife, but Quake and Hexen II - most with mod and controller support.
There is a little bit of prep involved - eg. you still need legal copies of stuff, and you will need to move files around on your device, but otherwise not bad.
TwistedPear 1 year ago • 100%
Have you heard the SpoonyBard 32X Remixes?
It was used as the OST for the 32X Resurrection Romhack