SEGA Saturn Action Replay Plus Cart flash success!

Upon receiving the cartridges from Play-Asia.com (best price as of post) I proceeded to burn some CD-R for the flashing process. I followed the guide by the previous youtube video link to burn the CD-R and it was relatively quick and easy.

The safest way to flash the cartridges is to use a Saturn that can read backup games, such as modchipped Saturns. The alternative way is to use timed disk swaps while the machine is booting up, personally I leave disk swapping to club DJs. So I used my modchipped Saturn to flash the cartridge.

Relatively painless and the process takes about 15 to 20 minutes. Everything is navigated by the joypad and important steps involve multiple button presses to ensure the user do not stuff the process up. 

Upon booting a CD-R, the Saturn will cycle through the boot up screen, the SEGA splash screen, then it will go to a specific code screen where it will detect the Saturn game and allow the user to boot it up manually.

The game I decided to use also utilises the RAM expansion, has the ability to detect a cheat cart (hence blocking the boot-up) and was a foreign region game (as SEGA region locks consoles) and that game is...

I am happy to report all is well EXCEPT the pseudo saturn does not allow the NTSC signal to pass through, instead it uses the consoles' native video output.So PAL consoles will only output PAL etc.

Some more games I tried:

This was truly an aweful game. And finally I played a bit of Capcoms excellent Warrior of Fate 2 original NTSC-J disk. 

Overall I rate the mod to be relevant as there are some games I manage to boot up that would not do so on my modchipped machine.

Happy Birthday SEGA Saturn!

I decided to celebrate my favourite console by hooking it up to its company's flagship arcade cabinet.

And I realised that it was the first time I connected a SEGA Saturn to an arcade cabinet! It was quite an impressive sight as the console's video output matches the cabinets display. All this was made possible with Viletim's SCART to JAMMA adapter (available here Viletims SCART to JAMMA ) with a PlayStation1/2 controller module and also a PlayStation to Saturn controller adapter which is no longer made.

It was a good night.

LED in a game room

I recently watched a video put up by Mark of Retro Core and decided it is a good idea to trial such a thing in the game room.

And so off I went to purchase a similar setup on Trademe. The best value one I can find was $36 from a seller in Kilbirnie here RGB LED from yewdolighting. 5 meter is more than enough for most kitchen benches and it was definitely enough to display at the lower end of the game room where most of the candy cabinets are.

Apart from the wonky labeling of colours on the remote (i.e. pressing yellow on the remote makes the LED shoot purple!) it was quite a decent kit.

I have not fixed the LED strip to anything yet because the fixture will be permanent thanks to the 3M tape stuck to the strip, so I will be going to the hardware store to get some command hooks to anchor and direct the strip in the best possible way.

Also, try not to activate the quick cycling flash mode because it will cause epilepsy or at least a nauseating sensation.

SEGA Saturn fever my PAL!

Got a PAL SEGA Saturn from Trademe for $80NZD a week ago with 2 controllers and Street Fighter Alpha.

 Primarily for the upcoming Pro Action Replay cart mod that I intend to do to make it play CD-R plus region free gaming as seen here:

The only anomaly is the seller had work done on one of the controller and the plug had the connector installed upside down.

So first thing I did when I got the machine home is to check the cartridge slot. The pins were dead straight, thanks to the fact the RAM carts were never released in New Zealand. Then I proceeded to test the machine with the game on the PVM.

As you can see, composite is nothing spectacular.

Then I dug up my SCART cable and the result was like night and day.

Also I rekindled with my console gaming screen of all.

I played Ryu to the end and having only the Japanese version before, my personal translation of the ending was vague at best. The PAL version set everything straight and confirmed Ryu (in Alpha 1) to be a wanker indeed.

Now the waiting game for the P A R begins.

The return of the final piece of the Blast City

I have finally installed the missing piece of the Blast City, the service panel. It was restored by Luke from http://garagearcades.co.nz/ and its nothing short of spectacular.

So give him a call/message if you ever run into any arcade/game machine related needs. His list of services is growing as well and now even help with game board repairs.

On a related note, the seller came to party with the missing bits and pieces from the Blast and offered some games in exchange. One particular game of note was Thunder Dragon seen here on my LCD screen at work (via the AV7000):

So now the transaction is complete.