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This thread is making me excited about doing more FZ2 homages like this one from just one year ago...

http://www.smspower.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=10327

mr0919 wrote

I personally hope you won't release it to the public at this point to avoid ruining their efforts.

It really is an amazing effort, as much a new game based on an old concept as a "remake" in the traditional sense, and I hope everyone buys it. It lives up to all the fantasies and missed opportunities that always haunted this series.

That said, I hope someone extracts the ROM and does a MAME build to support it, because I really don't want to play this on a PS2, which has less and less reason to stay in my current console rotation. If it makes it to MAME, I'll still be playing it years from now.

Eventually it will be emulated anyway, so there's no urge extracting and releasing anything right now. It's only fair to buy and play their original offer.

mr0919 wrote

System 16, an 80s mediocre arcade board.(The game was created in System 16 Emulation Environment and this means PS2 is just an emulator for System 16.)

I think "mediocre" would actually mean "middle", as in mid-80s arcade board. - System 16 was ultra high end in 1985. It has about the same specs as the NeoGeo.

Christuserloeser wrote

mr0919 wrote

System 16, an 80s mediocre arcade board.(The game was created in System 16 Emulation Environment and this means PS2 is just an emulator for System 16.)

I think "mediocre" would actually mean "middle", as in mid-80s arcade board. - System 16 was ultra high end in 1985. It has about the same specs as the NeoGeo.

It think 'mediocre' could mean that System 16 was a mid-range board. Yes it was very powerful for 1985-86 but I don't think it was "ultra high end".
It was certainly not SEGA's most powerful board of the mid to late 1980s.

Sega had their higher-end "Super-Scaler" boards that had two (sometimes three) 68000 CPUs as well as more powerful graphics hardware/ video chips that provided more colors, more sprites and most notably, scaling & rotation. I would say it's the Super-Scaler boards could be called the ultra high end boards of the 80s.

The X Board that powered After Burner II, Thunder Blade, Super Monaco GP among other games, is a prime example. According to System16.com the X Board handled 256 sprites (twice as many as System 16). could use 4096 colors on screen out of a 32,768 palette, did full scaling & rotation unlike System 16.

The System 16B board provided some form of limited scaling (as seen in Altered Beast), but not to the level of the X Board or the other Super-Scaler boards like OUT RUN hardware, SPACE HARRIER Hardware.

The Y Board that powered Galaxy Force II, Power Drift, G-LOC, among other games, was even more powerful.

System16 and System 16B of 1985/1986 was not quite as powerful as Capcom's CPS1 board of 1988 or NEO-GEO of 1989/1990, even though System16 was still an impressive, powerful board and obviously significantly more powerful than the MegaDrive/Genesis.

With that said, I am absolutely very happy with what Sega has done here, by remaking Fantasy Zone II with System 16 standards. I don't think they've done anything like this before and released it, at least not that we know of. I would so much want Sega to do with with some of their other 8-bit and 16-bit games (console only and arcade). I'd like Sega to remake games that were not originally upto System 16 standards (SMS & Genesis games) as well as make sequels to existing System 16 games. There are dozens of games I can think of that I'd like to see done in the same way Sega did FZIIDX.

Christuserloeser wrote

I think "mediocre" would actually mean "middle", as in mid-80s arcade board

parallaxscroll wrote

It think 'mediocre' could mean that System 16 was a mid-range board.

"汎用" was used as an adjective on the main page written in Japanese and its correct meaning is "many used".(almost similar to "popular") I used "mediocre" for translation but I don't think this is a serious matter. Sorry if you guys are confused by the word "mediocre".

"System 16, a popular arcade board in 80s"

I played the trial last night. Very impressed!

OVERSEA BUYERS MUST READ! Updated in 16 Oct 2008

VIII. Free Order Page for FZCC

The white T-shirt that the gentleman is wearing in the photos on the first page of this thread can be purchased from the King of Games. It is lovely.

http://www.the-king-of-games.com/english/shop/index.php?mode=catalog_list&type=console&console_id=5

guest wrote

Maxim wrote

Someone familiar with System 16 might be able to determine if this is how it works, and maybe even to extract the ROM. (Even if it is compressed, it should be easy to extract it from memory.) Unfortunately, I'm not that person.

I can confirm 100% this has now been done - I personally played the extracted ROM on a System 16B Board in an Arcade Cab just last night - it does require the addition of more RAM to the System 16B Board (game needs lots of work ram)

Newest coded game running on the oldest arcade hardware?

If anyone has any details I would appreciate it. Before anyone gets on my case, I have purchased the DX set and own a large PCB selection. This is purely for my own usage.

You need to upgrade the RAM from 16 to 64 KB.
There is a thread you might want to read:
http://smspower.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11949

Bock wrote

You need to upgrade the RAM from 16 to 64 KB.
There is a thread you might want to read:
http://smspower.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11949

Bock, thanks for the link. I did indeed read that and was very interesting. Would be interested in meeting up with you or them if you are ever in Kanto again! We could hold a forum in my retro otaku room.

You mention upgrading the RAM but the actual ROM placement on the B board and extraction is what I am really interested in finding out so I can play this game on its original hardware.

Personally, I am not quite sure these kinds of technical details should be discussed here or anywhere else.

Often arcade hardware (CPS-1 and CPS-2 board sets, AES cartridges, etc.) are purchased, stripped of their original game-specific parts, modified, and resold with more popular software by bootleggers. These efforts came about as a side-effect of the hard work and research done by emulator authors which made such information available to the public.

I would hate to see even a small market be created where there is an incentive to convert System 16B boards to Fantasy Zone II DX, considering that we still have not found and dumped all variations of the games on that platform. I doubt the bootleggers would take the time to read/preserve ROM and security data of older and obscure games that would be crucial to preservation efforts.

I understand the personal desire to play FZ II DX on The Real Thing (I'd like to do that as well), but disclosing that kind of information would make it all too easy for unscrupulous types to profit from doing their own conversions.

Is it inevitable that they will do so anyway, given enough time? Yeah, probably. Do we want to help or accelerate that process? I'd like to think not.

Just my 2 cents. :D

Charles MacDonald wrote

Personally, I am not quite sure these kinds of technical details should be discussed here or anywhere else.

Often arcade hardware (CPS-1 and CPS-2 board sets, AES cartridges, etc.) are purchased, stripped of their original game-specific parts, modified, and resold with more popular software by bootleggers. These efforts came about as a side-effect of the hard work and research done by emulator authors which made such information available to the public.

I would hate to see even a small market be created where there is an incentive to convert System 16B boards to Fantasy Zone II DX, considering that we still have not found and dumped all variations of the games on that platform. I doubt the bootleggers would take the time to read/preserve ROM and security data of older and obscure games that would be crucial to preservation efforts.

I understand the personal desire to play FZ II DX on The Real Thing (I'd like to do that as well), but disclosing that kind of information would make it all too easy for unscrupulous types to profit from doing their own conversions.

Is it inevitable that they will do so anyway, given enough time? Yeah, probably. Do we want to help or accelerate that process? I'd like to think not.

Just my 2 cents. :D

Charles,

I totally understand your view on this and appreciate what you've done for the community in the past but I do question what info has been released. As an arcade collector myself I find it appalling when I see CPS-II and System 16 encryption broken but yet this info is not freely shared and is instead hoarded. (CPS-III is freely playable for anyone but my WarZard can still die and cannot be revived.) A number of the CPS-I' titles still do not have battery fixes out there but there have been bootlegs in Asia for a decade now. TypeX and TypeX2 have been bootlegged already but the info to uncensor Samurai Spirits Sen on a legit ROM still isn't out there. Things like this make me question this info hoarding practice.

Sorry to derail the thread but will be experimenting making FZ2 DX myself in the near future.

Sorry for another off topic post. :D

Quote

As an arcade collector myself I find it appalling when I see CPS-II and System 16 encryption broken but yet this info is not freely shared and is instead hoarded.

Just because I have worked with these systems personally, I really want to assure you all the CPS I/II/III and System 16 information is fully documented in MAME and available to the public.

Quote

(CPS-III is freely playable for anyone but my WarZard can still die and cannot be revived.)

CPS-III can't be revived as the hardware design makes it physically impossible. But it is easy to do for System 16 and CPS-II which is why those games can be revived.

Quote

A number of the CPS-I' titles still do not have battery fixes out there but there have been bootlegs in Asia for a decade now.

It is difficult to make a battery fix because of how the original CPS-1 boards work. Bootleggers made their own boards to bypass the problem instead of solving it -- so they never really made a battery fix!

That's why bootlegs exist for some games that have no corresponding battery fix for collectors. The bootleggers cheated. :)

Quote

TypeX and TypeX2 have been bootlegged already but the info to uncensor Samurai Spirits Sen on a legit ROM still isn't out there. Things like this make me question this info hoarding practice.

Wish I had an answer, I don't know much about the new fighting games. :D

Charles wrote

Just because I have worked with these systems personally, I really want to assure you all the CPS I/II/III and System 16 information is fully documented in MAME and available to the public.

CPS-III can't be revived as the hardware design makes it physically impossible. But it is easy to do for System 16 and CPS-II which is why those games can be revived.

Sorry, I should've been more specific. The info for the fixes are being hoarded as Razoola and segaresurrection are charging for them.

Wasn't aware about the CPS-III hardware limitation for a fix. Is there a link you can give me so I can read up on it?

Charles wrote

It is difficult to make a battery fix because of how the original CPS-1 boards work. Bootleggers made their own boards to bypass the problem instead of solving it -- so they never really made a battery fix!

That's why bootlegs exist for some games that have no corresponding battery fix for collectors. The bootleggers cheated. :)

Fixes can be made as they do already exist for some titles but once the titles were emulated, I would say only collectors went back and looked how to do the fix but many are still missing. I would think for the sake of preservation that we would want to be able to permanently fix the PCBs still out there and not only look at emulation.

Over the years, I've often had queries from the MAME team to borrow PCBs but never had the inclination to do so as I still do not view emulation really benefitting collectors as much as gamers who are out to just play arcade stuff for free. I would welcome a change to my opinion and still have/access to a number of PCBs that aren't dumped/heard of/etc. Please PM me if you want to have further conversations. :)

Shou wrote

I still do not view emulation really benefitting collectors

Needless to say, emulation is not about benefitting collectors, but about preserving the old games.

I've dumped some of the games I had that were seen as rare (and just didn't exist in the internet), without receiving any "benefit" in exchange. Why? Because, in a sense, those were still pieces of history that needed to be preserved somewhere.

ICEknight wrote

Needless to say, emulation is not about benefitting collectors, but about preserving the arcade games and playing them for free.

I fixed it for you :)

Ah, collectors vs. emulation fans :)

Emulation gets the hardware documented and the software dumped. Collecting gets the physical artefacts preserved. So we all win.

Collectors letting the hardware collect dust and the software bitrot are bad, but so are the people who use emulation to avoid spending money they could afford.

Maxim wrote

Collectors letting the hardware collect dust and the software bitrot are bad, but so are the people who use emulation to avoid spending money they could afford.

I like that viewpoint.

Furthermore, I'm not sure how buying an arcade machine off a collector is any different to Sega than someone downloading a ROM. Either way they aren't making money off it and people are playing the games. Some collectors even open up their houses and charge fees like old arcades, Sega/etc doesn't see any of that. Of course the "law" gets in the middle here somewhere which lets some people (mostly collectors) take a form of high ground.

I think collectors of computer related hardware are just upset that their assets decrease in value once emulated. Which is understandable I think, but if you're buying arcade machines as investments I think you're a pretty bad investor. ;) . There is still a lot of charm in seeing the original machines in their cabinets that will never be replaced by emulation.... and that means there is still value in owning the originals over emulation.

Anyone can translate the diferences between the four versions of FZI Arcade please??

weirdzod wrote

Anyone can translate the diferences between the four versions of FZI Arcade please??

I haven't been by in awhile but saw your post but no reply so here you go:

OLD (JA) - the original version released in Japan, rpobably the most common and popular version

OLD (JA rev. A) - later released Japanese version, added sound track titles which appear on screen - Note that in Japan, we often refer to this as the NEW version

NEW (OVERSEA) - later released for the overseas markets, continues are available

NEW (US rev. A) - based upon the later releases, it has been even more balanced

There is an event on the 23 in Tokyo (it's a holiday in japan).

「ファンタジーゾーン初心者講習会」 Fantasy Zone Beginner Class
http://blog02.mi-ka-do.net/?eid=1023410

Teaching Fantasy Zone tricks (despite the lovely name I expect it to be quite hardcore). They will have 5 Fantasy Zone cabinets setup and 2 with the new Fantasy Zone II DX. Will try to go if I can.

11_23_fz.jpg (47.79 KB)

^ 5 Fantasy Zone cabs, two of which are FZIIDX! That is pretty awesome!!! :-)

Shou wrote

weirdzod wrote

Anyone can translate the diferences between the four versions of FZI Arcade please??

I haven't been by in awhile but saw your post but no reply so here you go:

OLD (JA) - the original version released in Japan, rpobably the most common and popular version

OLD (JA rev. A) - later released Japanese version, added sound track titles which appear on screen - Note that in Japan, we often refer to this as the NEW version

NEW (OVERSEA) - later released for the overseas markets, continues are available

NEW (US rev. A) - based upon the later releases, it has been even more balanced

Thank you ^^

There is a Fantasy Zone related video event streaming right now (just started) from Mikado's Tokyo arcade:
http://ustre.am/mviM
( I don't know details about this, just learned about a minute ago )

Author	Message
Embryo Joined: 05 Jan 2006 Posts: 19	Posted: Sun Oct 05, 2008 3:50 pm
Embryo Joined: 05 Jan 2006 Posts: 19	This thread is making me excited about doing more FZ2 homages like this one from just one year ago... http://www.smspower.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=10327

Frogacuda2 Guest	Posted: Mon Oct 06, 2008 6:51 am
Frogacuda2 Guest	mr0919 wrote I personally hope you won't release it to the public at this point to avoid ruining their efforts. It really is an amazing effort, as much a new game based on an old concept as a "remake" in the traditional sense, and I hope everyone buys it. It lives up to all the fantasies and missed opportunities that always haunted this series. That said, I hope someone extracts the ROM and does a MAME build to support it, because I really don't want to play this on a PS2, which has less and less reason to stay in my current console rotation. If it makes it to MAME, I'll still be playing it years from now.

Bock Site Admin Joined: 08 Jul 2001 Posts: 8652 Location: Paris, France	Posted: Mon Oct 06, 2008 7:29 am
	Eventually it will be emulated anyway, so there's no urge extracting and releasing anything right now. It's only fair to buy and play their original offer.

Christuserloeser Joined: 26 Dec 2004 Posts: 295 Location: Pangea	Posted: Sun Oct 12, 2008 5:14 pm
	mr0919 wrote System 16, an 80s mediocre arcade board.(The game was created in System 16 Emulation Environment and this means PS2 is just an emulator for System 16.) I think "mediocre" would actually mean "middle", as in mid-80s arcade board. - System 16 was ultra high end in 1985. It has about the same specs as the NeoGeo.

parallaxscroll Joined: 13 Oct 2008 Posts: 2	Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 3:08 am
parallaxscroll Joined: 13 Oct 2008 Posts: 2	Christuserloeser wrote mr0919 wrote System 16, an 80s mediocre arcade board.(The game was created in System 16 Emulation Environment and this means PS2 is just an emulator for System 16.) I think "mediocre" would actually mean "middle", as in mid-80s arcade board. - System 16 was ultra high end in 1985. It has about the same specs as the NeoGeo. It think 'mediocre' could mean that System 16 was a mid-range board. Yes it was very powerful for 1985-86 but I don't think it was "ultra high end". It was certainly not SEGA's most powerful board of the mid to late 1980s. Sega had their higher-end "Super-Scaler" boards that had two (sometimes three) 68000 CPUs as well as more powerful graphics hardware/ video chips that provided more colors, more sprites and most notably, scaling & rotation. I would say it's the Super-Scaler boards could be called the ultra high end boards of the 80s. The X Board that powered After Burner II, Thunder Blade, Super Monaco GP among other games, is a prime example. According to System16.com the X Board handled 256 sprites (twice as many as System 16). could use 4096 colors on screen out of a 32,768 palette, did full scaling & rotation unlike System 16. The System 16B board provided some form of limited scaling (as seen in Altered Beast), but not to the level of the X Board or the other Super-Scaler boards like OUT RUN hardware, SPACE HARRIER Hardware. The Y Board that powered Galaxy Force II, Power Drift, G-LOC, among other games, was even more powerful. System16 and System 16B of 1985/1986 was not quite as powerful as Capcom's CPS1 board of 1988 or NEO-GEO of 1989/1990, even though System16 was still an impressive, powerful board and obviously significantly more powerful than the MegaDrive/Genesis. With that said, I am absolutely very happy with what Sega has done here, by remaking Fantasy Zone II with System 16 standards. I don't think they've done anything like this before and released it, at least not that we know of. I would so much want Sega to do with with some of their other 8-bit and 16-bit games (console only and arcade). I'd like Sega to remake games that were not originally upto System 16 standards (SMS & Genesis games) as well as make sequels to existing System 16 games. There are dozens of games I can think of that I'd like to see done in the same way Sega did FZIIDX.

mr0919 Joined: 05 Mar 2008 Posts: 36 Location: South Korea	Posted: Mon Oct 13, 2008 6:27 am
	Christuserloeser wrote I think "mediocre" would actually mean "middle", as in mid-80s arcade board parallaxscroll wrote It think 'mediocre' could mean that System 16 was a mid-range board. "汎用" was used as an adjective on the main page written in Japanese and its correct meaning is "many used".(almost similar to "popular") I used "mediocre" for translation but I don't think this is a serious matter. Sorry if you guys are confused by the word "mediocre". "System 16, a popular arcade board in 80s"

parallaxscroll Joined: 13 Oct 2008 Posts: 2	Posted: Tue Oct 14, 2008 2:33 am
parallaxscroll Joined: 13 Oct 2008 Posts: 2	I played the trial last night. Very impressed!

mr0919 Joined: 05 Mar 2008 Posts: 36 Location: South Korea	Posted: Thu Oct 16, 2008 10:30 am
	OVERSEA BUYERS MUST READ! Updated in 16 Oct 2008 VIII. Free Order Page for FZCC According to Yahoo Japan's Auction the Orgel was sent recently and I got its picture. If you ordered this item on Play-Asia or some other malls try to contact with its admin to ask for re-delivering.

Mike C Joined: 10 Oct 1999 Posts: 211 Location: Lebanon, New Hampshire, USA	that t-shirt that one dude is wearing Posted: Fri Oct 17, 2008 1:54 pm
	The white T-shirt that the gentleman is wearing in the photos on the first page of this thread can be purchased from the King of Games. It is lovely. http://www.the-king-of-games.com/english/shop/index.php?mode=catalog_list&type=console&console_id=5

Shou Joined: 29 Feb 2008 Posts: 18 Location: Central Tokyo, Japan, Asia, Earth, Solar System, Milky Way	Posted: Mon Oct 05, 2009 2:07 pm
	guest wrote Maxim wrote Someone familiar with System 16 might be able to determine if this is how it works, and maybe even to extract the ROM. (Even if it is compressed, it should be easy to extract it from memory.) Unfortunately, I'm not that person. I can confirm 100% this has now been done - I personally played the extracted ROM on a System 16B Board in an Arcade Cab just last night - it does require the addition of more RAM to the System 16B Board (game needs lots of work ram) Newest coded game running on the oldest arcade hardware? If anyone has any details I would appreciate it. Before anyone gets on my case, I have purchased the DX set and own a large PCB selection. This is purely for my own usage.

Bock Site Admin Joined: 08 Jul 2001 Posts: 8652 Location: Paris, France	Posted: Mon Oct 05, 2009 2:40 pm
	You need to upgrade the RAM from 16 to 64 KB. There is a thread you might want to read: http://smspower.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11949

Shou Joined: 29 Feb 2008 Posts: 18 Location: Central Tokyo, Japan, Asia, Earth, Solar System, Milky Way	Posted: Mon Oct 05, 2009 11:13 pm
	Bock wrote You need to upgrade the RAM from 16 to 64 KB. There is a thread you might want to read: http://smspower.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=11949 Bock, thanks for the link. I did indeed read that and was very interesting. Would be interested in meeting up with you or them if you are ever in Kanto again! We could hold a forum in my retro otaku room. You mention upgrading the RAM but the actual ROM placement on the B board and extraction is what I am really interested in finding out so I can play this game on its original hardware.

Charles MacDonald Joined: 28 Sep 1999 Posts: 1197	Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2009 12:59 am
Charles MacDonald Joined: 28 Sep 1999 Posts: 1197	Personally, I am not quite sure these kinds of technical details should be discussed here or anywhere else. Often arcade hardware (CPS-1 and CPS-2 board sets, AES cartridges, etc.) are purchased, stripped of their original game-specific parts, modified, and resold with more popular software by bootleggers. These efforts came about as a side-effect of the hard work and research done by emulator authors which made such information available to the public. I would hate to see even a small market be created where there is an incentive to convert System 16B boards to Fantasy Zone II DX, considering that we still have not found and dumped all variations of the games on that platform. I doubt the bootleggers would take the time to read/preserve ROM and security data of older and obscure games that would be crucial to preservation efforts. I understand the personal desire to play FZ II DX on The Real Thing (I'd like to do that as well), but disclosing that kind of information would make it all too easy for unscrupulous types to profit from doing their own conversions. Is it inevitable that they will do so anyway, given enough time? Yeah, probably. Do we want to help or accelerate that process? I'd like to think not. Just my 2 cents. :D

Shou Joined: 29 Feb 2008 Posts: 18 Location: Central Tokyo, Japan, Asia, Earth, Solar System, Milky Way	Posted: Tue Oct 06, 2009 11:52 pm
	Charles MacDonald wrote Personally, I am not quite sure these kinds of technical details should be discussed here or anywhere else. Often arcade hardware (CPS-1 and CPS-2 board sets, AES cartridges, etc.) are purchased, stripped of their original game-specific parts, modified, and resold with more popular software by bootleggers. These efforts came about as a side-effect of the hard work and research done by emulator authors which made such information available to the public. I would hate to see even a small market be created where there is an incentive to convert System 16B boards to Fantasy Zone II DX, considering that we still have not found and dumped all variations of the games on that platform. I doubt the bootleggers would take the time to read/preserve ROM and security data of older and obscure games that would be crucial to preservation efforts. I understand the personal desire to play FZ II DX on The Real Thing (I'd like to do that as well), but disclosing that kind of information would make it all too easy for unscrupulous types to profit from doing their own conversions. Is it inevitable that they will do so anyway, given enough time? Yeah, probably. Do we want to help or accelerate that process? I'd like to think not. Just my 2 cents. :D Charles, I totally understand your view on this and appreciate what you've done for the community in the past but I do question what info has been released. As an arcade collector myself I find it appalling when I see CPS-II and System 16 encryption broken but yet this info is not freely shared and is instead hoarded. (CPS-III is freely playable for anyone but my WarZard can still die and cannot be revived.) A number of the CPS-I' titles still do not have battery fixes out there but there have been bootlegs in Asia for a decade now. TypeX and TypeX2 have been bootlegged already but the info to uncensor Samurai Spirits Sen on a legit ROM still isn't out there. Things like this make me question this info hoarding practice. Sorry to derail the thread but will be experimenting making FZ2 DX myself in the near future.

Charles Guest	Posted: Wed Oct 07, 2009 1:44 am
Charles Guest	Sorry for another off topic post. :D Quote As an arcade collector myself I find it appalling when I see CPS-II and System 16 encryption broken but yet this info is not freely shared and is instead hoarded. Just because I have worked with these systems personally, I really want to assure you all the CPS I/II/III and System 16 information is fully documented in MAME and available to the public. Quote (CPS-III is freely playable for anyone but my WarZard can still die and cannot be revived.) CPS-III can't be revived as the hardware design makes it physically impossible. But it is easy to do for System 16 and CPS-II which is why those games can be revived. Quote A number of the CPS-I' titles still do not have battery fixes out there but there have been bootlegs in Asia for a decade now. It is difficult to make a battery fix because of how the original CPS-1 boards work. Bootleggers made their own boards to bypass the problem instead of solving it -- so they never really made a battery fix! That's why bootlegs exist for some games that have no corresponding battery fix for collectors. The bootleggers cheated. :) Quote TypeX and TypeX2 have been bootlegged already but the info to uncensor Samurai Spirits Sen on a legit ROM still isn't out there. Things like this make me question this info hoarding practice. Wish I had an answer, I don't know much about the new fighting games. :D

Shou Joined: 29 Feb 2008 Posts: 18 Location: Central Tokyo, Japan, Asia, Earth, Solar System, Milky Way	Posted: Wed Oct 07, 2009 4:42 am
	Charles wrote Just because I have worked with these systems personally, I really want to assure you all the CPS I/II/III and System 16 information is fully documented in MAME and available to the public. CPS-III can't be revived as the hardware design makes it physically impossible. But it is easy to do for System 16 and CPS-II which is why those games can be revived. Sorry, I should've been more specific. The info for the fixes are being hoarded as Razoola and segaresurrection are charging for them. Wasn't aware about the CPS-III hardware limitation for a fix. Is there a link you can give me so I can read up on it? Charles wrote It is difficult to make a battery fix because of how the original CPS-1 boards work. Bootleggers made their own boards to bypass the problem instead of solving it -- so they never really made a battery fix! That's why bootlegs exist for some games that have no corresponding battery fix for collectors. The bootleggers cheated. :) Fixes can be made as they do already exist for some titles but once the titles were emulated, I would say only collectors went back and looked how to do the fix but many are still missing. I would think for the sake of preservation that we would want to be able to permanently fix the PCBs still out there and not only look at emulation. Over the years, I've often had queries from the MAME team to borrow PCBs but never had the inclination to do so as I still do not view emulation really benefitting collectors as much as gamers who are out to just play arcade stuff for free. I would welcome a change to my opinion and still have/access to a number of PCBs that aren't dumped/heard of/etc. Please PM me if you want to have further conversations. :)

ICEknight Joined: 03 Apr 2001 Posts: 601 Location: Asturias	Posted: Thu Oct 08, 2009 1:09 pm
	Shou wrote I still do not view emulation really benefitting collectors Needless to say, emulation is not about benefitting collectors, but about preserving the old games. I've dumped some of the games I had that were seen as rare (and just didn't exist in the internet), without receiving any "benefit" in exchange. Why? Because, in a sense, those were still pieces of history that needed to be preserved somewhere.

Shou Joined: 29 Feb 2008 Posts: 18 Location: Central Tokyo, Japan, Asia, Earth, Solar System, Milky Way	Posted: Thu Oct 08, 2009 2:54 pm
	ICEknight wrote Needless to say, emulation is not about benefitting collectors, but about preserving the arcade games and playing them for free. I fixed it for you :)

Maxim Site Admin Joined: 19 Oct 1999 Posts: 14745 Location: London	Posted: Thu Oct 08, 2009 4:18 pm
	Ah, collectors vs. emulation fans :) Emulation gets the hardware documented and the software dumped. Collecting gets the physical artefacts preserved. So we all win. Collectors letting the hardware collect dust and the software bitrot are bad, but so are the people who use emulation to avoid spending money they could afford.

PoorAussie Joined: 26 Aug 2008 Posts: 292 Location: Australia	Posted: Fri Oct 09, 2009 3:33 am
	Maxim wrote Collectors letting the hardware collect dust and the software bitrot are bad, but so are the people who use emulation to avoid spending money they could afford. I like that viewpoint. Furthermore, I'm not sure how buying an arcade machine off a collector is any different to Sega than someone downloading a ROM. Either way they aren't making money off it and people are playing the games. Some collectors even open up their houses and charge fees like old arcades, Sega/etc doesn't see any of that. Of course the "law" gets in the middle here somewhere which lets some people (mostly collectors) take a form of high ground. I think collectors of computer related hardware are just upset that their assets decrease in value once emulated. Which is understandable I think, but if you're buying arcade machines as investments I think you're a pretty bad investor. ;) . There is still a lot of charm in seeing the original machines in their cabinets that will never be replaced by emulation.... and that means there is still value in owning the originals over emulation.

weirdzod Joined: 29 Sep 2010 Posts: 5	Posted: Wed Sep 29, 2010 3:47 pm
weirdzod Joined: 29 Sep 2010 Posts: 5	Anyone can translate the diferences between the four versions of FZI Arcade please??

Shou Joined: 29 Feb 2008 Posts: 18 Location: Central Tokyo, Japan, Asia, Earth, Solar System, Milky Way	Posted: Fri Nov 19, 2010 7:10 am
	weirdzod wrote Anyone can translate the diferences between the four versions of FZI Arcade please?? I haven't been by in awhile but saw your post but no reply so here you go: OLD (JA) - the original version released in Japan, rpobably the most common and popular version OLD (JA rev. A) - later released Japanese version, added sound track titles which appear on screen - Note that in Japan, we often refer to this as the NEW version NEW (OVERSEA) - later released for the overseas markets, continues are available NEW (US rev. A) - based upon the later releases, it has been even more balanced

Bock Site Admin Joined: 08 Jul 2001 Posts: 8652 Location: Paris, France	Posted: Fri Nov 19, 2010 3:31 pm
	There is an event on the 23 in Tokyo (it's a holiday in japan). 「ファンタジーゾーン初心者講習会」 Fantasy Zone Beginner Class http://blog02.mi-ka-do.net/?eid=1023410 Teaching Fantasy Zone tricks (despite the lovely name I expect it to be quite hardcore). They will have 5 Fantasy Zone cabinets setup and 2 with the new Fantasy Zone II DX. Will try to go if I can. 11_23_fz.jpg (47.79 KB)

Christuserloeser Joined: 26 Dec 2004 Posts: 295 Location: Pangea	Posted: Fri Nov 19, 2010 7:34 pm
	^ 5 Fantasy Zone cabs, two of which are FZIIDX! That is pretty awesome!!! :-)

weirdzod Joined: 29 Sep 2010 Posts: 5	Posted: Sun Nov 21, 2010 11:35 pm
weirdzod Joined: 29 Sep 2010 Posts: 5	Shou wrote weirdzod wrote Anyone can translate the diferences between the four versions of FZI Arcade please?? I haven't been by in awhile but saw your post but no reply so here you go: OLD (JA) - the original version released in Japan, rpobably the most common and popular version OLD (JA rev. A) - later released Japanese version, added sound track titles which appear on screen - Note that in Japan, we often refer to this as the NEW version NEW (OVERSEA) - later released for the overseas markets, continues are available NEW (US rev. A) - based upon the later releases, it has been even more balanced Thank you ^^

Bock Site Admin Joined: 08 Jul 2001 Posts: 8652 Location: Paris, France	Ustream @ Mikado Posted: Sun Jan 02, 2011 11:13 am
	There is a Fantasy Zone related video event streaming right now (just started) from Mikado's Tokyo arcade: http://ustre.am/mviM ( I don't know details about this, just learned about a minute ago )

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