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Smurfs Travel the World : Prototype
Post Posted: Mon Jul 07, 2008 11:09 pm
Found this beauty a few days ago:

Smurfs Travel the World Prototype
(aka Les Schroumpfs Autour du Monde)
(aka Smurfs 2)
for the Sega Master System

Sitting on a 171-5587 development board (4*128K EPROM Slot, battery backed SRAM, 315-5235 mapper) with dual export & japanese connectors.

Originally owned by the developer of the game.

I dumped it - It is a near-master build with only 2 different bytes of data compared to the mastered version, with only 1 meaningful byte, the other being a checksum byte. Will be released shortly and eventually we'll find out what's the purpose of this byte and if it's likely pre-master or post-master (maybe a bug has been fixed after releasing the master).

Notice the sticker dated 12/08/96 (probably 12 October, not 8 December, since developer was french) which puts a date into this game. Clearly the last European retail game.

Anyway it's a pretty nice item, and those 2-connectors boards are particularly sexy.

As I reminder, I am always on the lookout for any Sega 8-bit prototype, sample, advertisement, development or any non-retail item.
With this one, I now have 76 non-retail games + 5 systems so far :)
IMG_7022-small.jpg (168.36 KB)
IMG_7022-small.jpg
IMG_7026-small.jpg (106.69 KB)
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IMG_7028-small.jpg (90.55 KB)
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IMG_7032-small.jpg (155.83 KB)
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IMG_7033-small.jpg (143.5 KB)
IMG_7033-small.jpg

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Post Posted: Tue Jul 08, 2008 8:00 am
Excellent find, where did it come from? If it was from the original developer can you ask him more about it?
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Post Posted: Tue Jul 08, 2008 8:26 am
I didn't get it directly from the developers but from a friend of him. I'm trying to get in contact now.
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Post Posted: Tue Jul 08, 2008 10:56 am
O
M
G

I want to see this one on ebay with the auction cancelled one hour before the ending to see what it would reach :)
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Post Posted: Tue Jul 08, 2008 11:30 am
I own a copy of the Smurfs 1 :)
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Post Posted: Tue Jul 08, 2008 6:26 pm
This is an incredible find, good work.

.. and 76 non-retail games!! makes me realise I am such a lazy collector :)
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Post Posted: Tue Jul 08, 2008 8:58 pm
Congratulations man!!!


I am still looking for a demo, or proto cartridge................
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Post Posted: Fri Jul 11, 2008 7:49 pm
Bock wrote

With this one, I now have 76 non-retail games + 5 systems so far :)


Have all 76 of these games been shown on the site already?
And 5 non-retail systems? theres the proto sms, two demo units but what else have you got?
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Post Posted: Sat Jul 12, 2008 2:16 pm
playgeneration wrote
Bock wrote

With this one, I now have 76 non-retail games + 5 systems so far :)

Have all 76 of these games been shown on the site already?


All the interesting ones should have been shown.
There's probably 10 duplicate of display unit cartridges. And many prototypes are plain cartridge with no label or interesting information. For example my Pat Riley Basketball came in a simple EPROM board without casing. So the most interesting is the data dump, really.

Quote
And 5 non-retail systems? theres the proto sms, two demo units but what else have you got?


I have an official dev Game Gear with TV output, and a the development board for SMS and Game Gear. I haven't properly got around to photograph this one yet.
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Post Posted: Sat Jul 12, 2008 7:15 pm
This is fantastic news! Maybe finally Bock will be able to shed some light on the history of this game if he manages to speak to the developers! :) Can't believe you managed yet again to get hold of something so unbelievably rare!
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Post Posted: Fri Nov 21, 2014 1:11 am
Bock wrote
Notice the sticker dated 12/08/96 (probably 12 October, not 8 December, since developer was french) which puts a date into this game. Clearly the last European retail game.

12/08/96 would be the 12th of August, not October. :)

Bock wrote
I dumped it - It is a near-master build with only 2 different bytes of data compared to the mastered version, with only 1 meaningful byte, the other being a checksum byte. Will be released shortly and eventually we'll find out what's the purpose of this byte and if it's likely pre-master or post-master (maybe a bug has been fixed after releasing the master).

The changed byte is at $05aa9. In the prototype its value is $08 and in the final version it is $20.

This byte is part of a word which contains the X-coordinate of a crystal on the Australia level. If you enter the password "GPSB" for Australia, then drop to the floor below the starting platform, there is a crystal on the left hand side.

In the prototype, the crystal is only 8 pixels from the left-hand side of the map. This makes it very hard to see because the game masks the left-hand 8 pixels of the screen (and the crystal is on a grey background). The final version moves the crystal so that it is not covered by the mask and is against a contrasting background:

_____Prototype Crystal Placement______ ________Final Crystal Placement_______


This is clearly a bug fix in the final version, so the prototype is "pre-master".
Smurfs2Prototype.gif (27.12 KB)
Smurfs2Prototype.gif
Smurfs2Final.gif (27.37 KB)
Smurfs2Final.gif

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Post Posted: Sun Nov 23, 2014 6:29 pm
Nice find, Paul! How did you manage to track it?
Did you had the whole game running with a breakpoint set on that ROM location?
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Post Posted: Mon Nov 24, 2014 10:19 am
Using the MEKA debugger, I set a read breakpoint on the area of ROM surrounding the changed byte:
b r rom 5a00..5aff
I then spent a little time on each level, using these passwords. The breakpoint triggered (exactly on the changed byte) on the Australia level.

I then tried to follow the code to work out what the byte does. This showed me that it is part of a 16-bit word, but I was unable to find out its purpose. Therefore, I decided to use the memory editor to change the value. Setting the word to $0080 caused a crystal to appear in a new position, leading me to carefully compare the crystal locations between the two versions.
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Post Posted: Sat Jan 17, 2015 4:07 am
Yes, great find, Paul! I love knowing what these small differences actually do, and I'm rather fond of Smurfs 2/STtW -- it's actually quite a fun little game, significantly more so than the 16-bit versions.
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Post Posted: Sat Jan 17, 2015 5:32 pm
That is an amazing find, congrats!

Imagine the price that would fetch on eBay... my god! haha!

Well done! :)
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