Monthly Archives: March 2022

Motor Raid

Road Rash meets Wipeout in a futuristic bike racing game, And another game Sega forgot to port to home consoles

Two game modes are on offer, championship and practice. Championship is the main game mode and sets the player accords different tracks. The first track is always Yendas, depending on what position the player can then will dictate which plant race track will be played next.
Other players can be attacked by pressing the punch and kick buttons. Holding down the punch button will charge the attack which will deal further damage and will knock off the rider. You can also lock an attack on another player with your weapon,
Weapons can be lost if you are attacked, or if you throw and attack it with another player.

Turbo mode can be activated by pressing the accelerate button repeatedly. This is hard to pull of when your playing on a keyboard since the game was designed for analogue controls, which makes it hard when you are playing with digital controls. If can take a couple of attempts for the game to register.
The Turbo meter in the bottom left screen will recharge after a few seconds, and the payer can activate it immediately or wait a few moments for it to charge fully, where it will have the best effect.
As with all futuristic racing gasme, techno music dominates the soundtrack and is drivern by the Sega SCSP spund trip.

The game runs on the Sega Model 2A arcade board, the same that Manx TT Superbike ran on. The games test mode allows several settings to be amended that affect the difficulty of the game, the amount of laps the player needs to race and the engine sound level. Like other Model 2 racing games, cabinets can be linked together to allow multiplayer games with other players.

Characters:

There are four characters to choose from, each with different stats which affect the gameplay.
Robin: Best grip
IO: Best attack
Gunz: Best speed
Gelia: Best acceleration
Each character has their own voice which can be heard when attacking and activating turbo mode. There is a back story for each character.

Tracks

Yendas: The first and easiest track to race on, and is basically a loop track. Placing first in championship will progress onto Junos, otherwise Ido will be the next track if 2nd or lower.
Ido: Set on a planet with a load of flying bugs (These dont affect the gameplay)
Junos: A snow/arctic planet with some tough corners
Reef 8: Lots of water in this one and has a few tight bends
Bowel: Sent on a volcanic planet, thunder can be heard in the background
Segal: A bonus track that appears when you get a good score in Champtionship mode, but can also be accessed by pressing a cheat code on the track selection screen. Rumored to be named after Stephen Segal

A lot of the environments of the track reminds me of that Sonic Saturday AM cartoon with how dystopian some of them look. If you’ve played Wipeout XL/2097 it has a very similar astethic.

Emulators

Nebula Model 2: Capable of running the game fully but is dated and has a few inaccuracies

MAME: Latest revision is capable of playing the game somewhat but has a multitide of issues, some of the texture mapping is incorrect.

SimCity 3000

The next installment of the popular SimCity series of games, where the goal is to build and maintain your own city. All aspects of city-building have to be managed, from the power stations to building roads and zoning for different houses/buildings, all whilst being prepared for any disaster that might strike.

Playing SimCity

Residential:
Where sims will live, the density relates to how large the buildings are, with low density being used for small houses, and higher density for apartments.

Commercial:
Shops and businesses, where sims go to work and spend their money

Industrial:
Another place where sims can work, but also where materials are manufactured and produced, and also helps with jobs for your sims.
Farms are one of the types of industry available, but they are difficult to actually have them be built. Every time I zone for farmland, it does start to build a farm but eventually, it will lose out to dirty industry with farm lots being replaced with a bunch of smog-o-matics. I can’t see why they would not just give farms their own industry zone?
Supposedly the key is to not give them any water, just power and roads. But then the news ticker will keep bugging about sims being too far from any water.

Have no idea why the text is missing…

Versions / Ports

SimCity was ported to most of the popular PC platforms, even a port for Linux operating systems. Sadly a port for OS/2 was not released, as IBM had phased the operating system out by then.

SimCity 3000 was not released on any consoles of the era.

Windows (Original Release)

The Windows release only supports Windows 95 or 98 onwards, it does not support NT 4 unless service pack 3 or higher is installed. DirectX does not seem to be used, running solely through the Win32 API.

Windows (Unlimited/Edition)

Released a year later and features a few changes compared to the original release.

  • The user interface was changed slightly, with the query button being moved to a more prominent place on the UI
  • The music was changed with some tracks being added and others being removed
  • This version of the game is available on gog.com and will run effortlessly on modern Windows versions.
  • New city templates have been added which are based off real-world locations, like Liverpool, London, Berlin, Madrid, etc
  • Some existing cities have been renamed, Metropolis has become Europolis but remains the same
  • Some existing cities have been removed in favor of the new cities: Littleburg, Big Mountain City, Sim Isle
  • New scenarios mode has been added, which are small cities that have objectives to complete
  • Outside of the game, new tools have been made like the scenario creator tool which uses the Microsoft Access engine to create and customize customs scenarios

MacOS

Simcity 3000 was released for the PowerPC Mac OS platform and was targeted for the classic Mac OS. The Mac platform only had a port of the original Windows version, it did not receive the updated unlimited edition that was released for Windows and Linux.

Compared to the Windows version, there are a few differences, the opening FMV seems to have less compression compared to the Windows version and appears to be of higher quality, the animations on the menu buttons are much more fluid on the mac (Is this due to the graphics card?), lastly the close button on the menu box is on the left side for the mac, and on the right side for the PC.

Playing this on modern Macs is a challenge as modern MacOS does not have native support for PowerPC or applications using the older mac libraries. You must use emulation software like QEMU (screenshots above) or Sheepsaver. The last version of OS X to support PowerPC applications was OS X Leopard (10.5)

Linux

Corel Linux

The installer worked, but the game would not run.

Ubuntu

A Linux port of the game was released by Loki games in 2000, and is a port of the Windows PC version. It’s mostly accurate to the Windows version but is more difficult to install and get working, depending on the distro and the libraries/packages installed. I’ve tested it on a few distros of the era, and some more modern distros.

Installing and running the game on Ubuntu

  1. Install the game as normal, remember to note the install directory – you will need it later
  2. Download the official Loki Simcity 3000 patch
  3. Run the patch installer, preferably as root. Easy way is to open a root terminal session (Should be an option in your Linux application launcher) Easy way is to copy the patch file to your home directory/folder, open the terminal and run the command: sudo sh sc3u-2.0a-x86.run -keep (Why you can’t just double-click to run the installer in Linux I do not know)
  4. Once this is finished, you should see a success message
  5. Now you need to run the game in a specific way, in the terminal you have to run the below command: LD_ASSUME_KERNEL=2.4.26 /usr/local/bin/sc3u

Hopefully, it should now start the game and you should see the intro movie play. This worked well on Ubuntu 4.04 running inside a VirtualBox VM, although there were a few issues. The sound was rather high-pitched and played too fast, and would stutter at high resolutions or when having a busy/large city map. Also running in a windowed mode wasn’t perfect, since it would display in the upper left part of the screen whilst the Ubuntu desktop remained in the background. The fullscreen mode works fine though. This could be due to the lack of drivers in my Ubuntu VM, it’s likely using stock/fail-safe drivers which provide little to no acceleration.

You could just use the Windows version running through Wine, although where is the fun in that? Plus it’s nice to play a native Linux game and in early 2000 there was a push for certain developers to embrace Linux as an alternative to Windows, That said, I can see why this didn’t take off…

Mandrake 7

Worked but had issues but these could be due to the emulation in 86box. The game installs and runs mostly Ok but some of the colors are messed up, the game also runs very slowly. Interestingly this uses a graphical installer which is missing when running in either Ubuntu or Corel Linux.

Tekken 2

The sequel to the first Tekken game, released for arcades and was ported to the Sony PlayStation and eventually the Zeebo console

A lot of improvements have been made, with the graphics for the character models being improved and refinements to the character move-sets. The stage background have also been redesigned, featuring more detailed backdrops. Unlike the first Tekken, the stages don’t seem to be based off a specific location and the stage name no longer appears in the bottom right corner, rather they are inspired by a series of locations, e.g Jun’s stage is inspired by a European countryside, Lei is based off being at the top of a city skyscraper (Similar to Joe’s stage in Last Bronx) and King’s stage being set in a Church.

A removed feature is the view change option, In the first Tekken game you could change the viewing angle in the first 10 seconds of the match, now only one view is available in Tekken 2.

Characters

  • Lei: Jackie-Chan inspired cop, Namco forgot to give him a Time Crisis game
  • Jun: Greenpeace activist, and the only mainstream game she appears in (Also appears in the Tag Tournament spin offs)
  • Jack-2: Jack with with a upgraded processor
  • Baek: Tae Kwon Do fighter, similar to Hworang
  • Bruce: Muay Thai kickboxer
  • Roger: / Alex: Genetically altered animals who are capable of fighting
  • Angel: A literal Angel sent to save Kazuya’s soul

Most of the previous characters return from the previous game, except for the mysterious WildCard

Heiachi finding out he’s no longer the final boss

Arcade Version

Released in 1995 for the arcade and running on the same System 11 arcade platform as the previous game which allowed for operators to upgrade their machines by swapping out the ROM board.

There are a few versions of the arcade version, the original released and a Ver.B update that has a few game-play changes in regards to the AI behaviour. The title screen has also been amended indicating the new release.

MAME is able to run both versions of the game without any issues, although it has the imperfect graphics flag set. Zinc, a high level System 11 emulator is also capable of emulating Tekken 2, but was last updated in 2005 and its plugins are very outdated but they do enable bilinear filtering and upscaling.

Namco would later port this version to the PS2 with the release of Tekken 5, along with Tekken 1 & 3. This is not a direct port as some changes have been made. The audio from the PSone versions have been used since Namco System 11 uses its own custom sound hardware that the PS2 does not emulate. I’m also not sure if these games run on the PS2 I/O CPU, tapping into its native backwards compatibility or if Namco ported these games onto the PS2 Emotion Engine.

Zinc emulator

The Zinc emulator can be configured to apply texture filtering to reduce the blocky artifacts and enhance the overall image quality, resolution can also be increased too.

Unfortunatly where the Zinc emulator falls short is the emulation itself, suffering from various sound issues due to lack of mature Namco sound emulation. As such the music sounds out of tune and many sound elements are missing.

PlayStation

The game was ported to the PlayStation with some additional features added. The soundtrack was also revised with an arranged remix making used of the PlayStations CD audio, the arcade original music also exists and can be selected by the user.

Like the first Tekken home port, FMV endings have been added for each characters that details their backstory. Namco expanded these to have their own soundtrack, compared tot he first game where every characters would have the same music playing over the FMV.

Additional game modes have been added such as survival, training and team battle mode. Also, when pausing the game you can view the character move and command sets. These would also be carried over to future home releases of Tekken games.

Most emulators wont encounter any issues playing Tekken 2, but there are a few issues with PXGP being added. Polygons have a tendency to warp with this enabled, and the character portraits can go off model.

Zeebo

The game was ported to the Zeebo console in 2008 and was similar to the PlayStation version but with slightly improved graphics. The textures appear to be cleaned up from the PlayStation version with some filtering enabled. The music however was butchered beyond repair due to the limited ROM sizes of the game. Zeebo games were distributed over the mobile network using UMTS, which meant games had to be of a certain size in order for them to be downloaded quickly which limited the music of these game to polyphonic like sounds.

I’m also not aware of any emulators or known dumps of this version, so the only footage exists that was uploaded on Youtube.

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Corel Linux

An early Linux distro, this time by Corel who also developed Corel Draw and is known for PaintShop Pro and WordPerfect office suite

Install

The installer has a very Windows-like look to it, at least going by the window styles.

Originally I tried using the Cirrus Logic GD5440, but the X Window system would not start up with that card. Instead, I tried S3 Vision968 instead, which actually worked fine. I guess certain cards have issues running under Linux

Boot

The logon screen on the left, and the default desktop after a fresh install. It seems that most drivers for the hardware were detected and installed, all except for the sound.

Sound

This was an issue trying to get the sound to work with this distro, at first I tried using the SoundBlaster AWE32 (both normal and PnP versions) and using the sndconfig command in the terminal to configure it but I had no luck. The PnP version said it was detected and set up but after rebooting there still wasn’t sound. Using the regular AW32 resulted in no devices being detected, even after using the –noprobe switch to force it into selecting the soundcard values.

Lastly, I tried using the Ensoniq that 86Box emulates and although this is automatically detected by the OS, I still had no luck getting the sound to work.

Meanwhile, everything else seemed to work, the network card & the SCSI adaptor.

Applications

There are a few applications bundled with the OS, some will also appear in other distro’s

Games

kblackBox (0.3.0) No idea how this game works…

Konquest (0.99.1) Not much luck with this one either

Mahjong (0.4.1) Typical Mahjong clone

Minesweeper (kmines 1.0.1a): Standard Windows minesweeper clone

Patience (0.7.3) Looks like another solitaire clone

Poker (kpoker 0.5)

Reversi (kreversi 1.0.1)

SameGame (0.4) Objective is to clear the board by clicking on groups of colours

Shisen-Sho (kshisen 1.1): Looks like Mahjong, objective is to move pairs of matching pattens/tiles that are on the same line, within 3 spaces of each other

Smiletris (Ksmiletris 1.1) Sort of like Tetris, but blocks drop in pieces of three. According to the help documentation, at least two blocks vertically have to have matching patterns to be removed.

Snake Race (0.2.1): A bizarre take on the snake game formula, you have to control your snake and eat as many apples as possible, whilst avoiding the computer-controlled snake. There is a ball flying about, but I have no clue as to what that does? Annoying it you open the menu to change difficulty, the game does not pause and will continue playing in the background.
You can also customize the game itself, like changing the background image. Or set the amount of computer-controlled snakes.

Sokiban (ksokoban 0.2.2) A game where you have to push the diamonds into the correct holes in order to progress to the next level. Same as what was included in Mandrake 7.

Graphics

the GIMP (1.0.2) Image and photo editing application

PS Viewer (kghostview 0.7) Simple image viewer

Multimedia

CD Player: Standard CD Player, I couldn’t get this to recognize any mounted CD audio formations (They were mounted as BIN/CUE)

Media Player (kmedia 1.0) plays back WAV format files

MIDI/Karaoke Player: Starts up fine, but unable to test any MIDI files due to the lack of working sound

XMMS (0.9.5.1): X Multimedia system, sort of acts like WINAMP. Has support for MP2 and MP3 files.

Network

KVIRC (1.1): An IRC client that asks a lot of questions on startup, like where you want the config files to be saved, and if you want an icon placed on desktop.

KRN (0.6.0) : Newsgroup client

Samba Server Wizard: Sets up your computer to share files within a workgroup, and to share printers if needed, Samba is the protocol that Windows uses to share files within a local network.

System

Corel Update: Searches for updated packages and new components to be installed. No longer functional since the update servers are now offline.

Event Viewer: Similar to the Windows event viewer, shows any issues or events logged with the system. Very useful for troubleshooting, here it found that the AWE32 soundcard was not being detected properly.

Font Manager: Shows X11 and KDE fonts currently installed on the system

MIME Editor: Change application file type defaults, i.e which program to open DOC files in

Process manager: Like the task manager, shows running processes and how much resources they are consuming

User manager: Add and manage user accounts, and any background users for specific processes.

Utilities

Archive Administrator (0.5): Create and open tgz files

Calculator (kCalc 1.2.7): Functions as a regular or a scientific calculator, looks very similar to the one found in versions of Microsoft Windows

Console: Enter bash terminal commands here

Format Floppy (kFloppy 1.1.2) : Formats a floppy disk, supports both 3.5 and 5.25 inch drives

Hex Editor: View hex value for certain files

Note (knote): Similar to sticky notes, you can add different post it notes to the desktop

Text Editor (kwrite 0.98): Text editor, like Windows notepad

Online Services

Corel also bundled a few links and utilities to online services, these were typically links to products Corel had developed or had sponsored.

Other Applications

Netscape Navigator (4.7): The default web browser for the system.

Most of the built-in links have expired and do not return any proper webpages, some even throw up a phishing warning by my ISP (CorelCity).

Still, I was able to load Richard Stallman’s own website, although the archive version works better

Acrobat Reader: I’m surprised that this was here, I didn’t think Adobe developed Acrobat for Linux, unless this is a Wine port. Sadly it refused to work, with only an error message appearing.

Control Center

Various elements of the Corel Linux operating system can be configured here, and details of the system will be shown here. In essence, it’s the systems Control Panel.

There’s a variety of themes to choose from they add style to the windows, taskbar and background image. You can also stick with the default theme, and just use a different preset colour scheme, or you can modify the individual colours themselves.
There are also system sounds, but I could not get the soundcard to function in this operating system.

Sample Themes


Screensavers are also offered here and there is a good selection compared to a typical Windows install.

Window minimizing effect

86Box Configuration

  • 86Box Version 3.3
  • Motherboard: Intel Advanced/ZP
  • CPU: IDT WinChip 2 – 240Mhz
  • 128MB RAM
  • Video: S3 Vision968 (SPEA Mercury P64V) 4MB VRAM
  • Sound: None (Tried Ensoniq AudioPCI ES1371 and SoundBlaster AWE32)
  • Network: Realtel RTL8029AS
  • SCSI: NCR 53c860
It’s now safe to turn off your computer

Windows Longhorn Milestone 4

Forth major milestone for the pre-reset development phase of Windows Vista

SESSION3_INITIALIZATION_FAILED

Well this was another great start, To fix this had to create a new VM, but using the workstation 14 configuration. It seems the newer VMware configurations break compatibility.

The second stage install process which looks the same as Windows XP

The logon screen, similar design to XP but with a new colour scheme. It shows the date and time along with any user accounts, similar to how Windows 8 and onwards show it on their lock screen. If there is only one user account without a password, the system will automatically logon to that user.

The desktop after a fresh install, still resembles Windows XP

Didn’t take Windows Explorer long to crash, the later pre-reset Longhorn builds were not known for their stability.

The My Hardware section, a more user friendly version of the Device Manager. This would later evolve into the Devices & Printers in later Windows versions.

The display properties has been overhauled and contains more user friendly options. In my opinion its too dumbed down since it takes longer to find the settings that you want to change. If you were used to navigating the old Display Properties (Which can still be accessed) then its a backwards step.

Its not 100% complete however and there are a few missing sections that have yet to be fully implemented.

Not a very good desktop look..

This is a lot more better, setting a gradient colour background. This was never carried forward in the final builds, closest was setting a solid colour.

Windows Media Player 8 ships with the operating system

Logon screen with a user account displayed, again very similar to XP but with a different colour scheme.

Desktop with the sidebar enabled, these were an early form of Windows gadgets

Internet Explorer 6.05 which comes with an alter toolbar background.

Plex style theme, one of the shipped visual styles that come with this build. The older Luna styles are also included, along with the Windows Classic scheme.

Lastly the Windows Explorer panes have been updated and reflect the type of content in those folders. The photos/picture folder will give you options for creating an album, viewing a slideshow and burning photos to a DVD. Back in the days when cloud storage wasn’t a thing. The music folder will give link to playing or ripping a CD, or where to purchase music online (Might as well give a link to Napster)

Nicktoons Racing

Cart base racing game featuring popular Nicktoons of the time, complete with powerups

The opening FMV, and a look at the games menu and track selection screen

The character selection screen, You can choose from:

Rugrats: Tommy & Angelica

Hey Arnold: Arnold & Helga

Wild Thornberry’s: Eliza and Darwin

Spongebob Squarepants: Sprongebob and Patrick

Other playable characters include Ickis from Ahhh Real Monsters, Ren from Ren & Stimpy, Catdog The Angry Beavers, and a Mystery Rider that is unlocked by beating the game.

Tracks

Many tracks are based upon each Nicktoon show and follow the respective art style of that show.

Many of the tracks have shortcuts, which the NPC drivers will use more on a higher difficulty level. There are also many pickups and speed boost pads spread across the track. Some tracks will branch and split into two different section which can vary in speed and difficulty, one path might be shorted but with less pickups, or might have a few tricky bends which have to be navigated.

I’m disappointed they didn’t expand on the Rugrats themed tracks, considering they already released Rugrats games previously, why not have tracks that were based off Search for Reptar? like Toy Palace, or the Mini Golf levels.

Windows

Game can be installed to the hard drive and offers a minimal or a full install, with the full install including the opening FMV and music. At the end the user is given a choice to register their copy of the game.

The PC version benefits from a higher framerate, resolution and texture quality compared to the PlayStation version.

PlayStation

The game was ported to the PlayStation in 2001 and is a straight port of the PC version, with lower resolution graphics. However this version has issues when the CD drive is played at a higher speed and can lead to the opening FMV video skipping, which can also happen with the music. When being played on Duckstation, it is recommended to use the default CD drive speeds (2X/ 300K)

The PlayStation was the only console the game was released on, and did not see a release on any sixth generation console, despite the game being released from 2000-2003

Arcade

An arcade version was released in 2003 and was an adaption of the PC version and was distributed by Chicago Gaming Company

Last Bronx

Another Sega fighting game, but with weapons

Title Screen

Set in Japan (But from the title you would assume Brooklyn, new York) the game features actual real life locations set in Japan. It was the first Sega fighting game to use motion capture footage giving the character detailed and accurate move sets compared to Virtua Fighter.

The fights typically take place in the evening or night, and most of the stages have a dark urban tone to them in contract to Virtual Fighter 2 where most stages take place in the daytime since its meant to be based on a worldwide tournament, Last Bronx has a more underground fight club like feel to it.

Stages

All characters have their own stage, but when you select their characters their personal stage is skipped until the end, where you will face Red Eye on that characters stage

Cross Street: which is complete with advertising billboards and may be based off the Tokyo/Shibuya crossing. This is the first stage for all characters, unless you choose Tommy then Tears Bridge will be the first

Tears Bridge: is set near a warehouse / cargo park near a large bridge, hence the name. At this point the game is set in the evening, and most stages thereafter have a night time ambiance to them.

Dark Rooftop: reminds me a lot of Lei Wulong’s stage in Tekken 2, as its set on top of a skyscraper helicopter pad, with many building in the background. From the sky it looks like its set in the evening sunset, but Tears bridge gives the impression it is already night time, assuming the game is intended to simulate nightfall.

Saturn Version of the brilliant room stage

Moonlight Garden: A nice stage which is a departure from the industrial urban settings, this appears to be set on a garden or a large park and is a nice departure form the other stages

Lust Subway: Which is your typical Japanese underground subway, complete with display monitors. Thankfully this isn’t set at rush hour. This will be Yoko’s stage

Nightmare Island: Set on a construction or a building site, despite the name insisting its an island, you will fight Zaimoku on this stage.

Naked Airport: Set on an airport runway and reminds me of the Shooting Hoops track from Ridge Racer Type 4 This is Yusaku’s stage

Radical Parking Lot: Kurosawa’s stage, not much to say here except its set on a moderately used parking lot.

Brilliant Room: Hidden and only available if you beat Red Eye with the lowest time

Lust Subway from the Model 2
A common occourance – Saturn Version
Survival Mode Results

Modes

Arcade: The main game mode, you choose a character and progress through 8 stages, with a bonus 9th stage if you complete the game with a new time record.

Saturn/PC mode: Similar to arcade player but features a story mode complete with cut scenes, and opponents are chosen at random

Team Battle: Pick multiple fighters who will battle

Survival Mode: You only have one life, and the health bar carries over to the next round. Objective here is to last the longest

Training Mode: A basic training mode that show the different fighting moves across the roster

Network Play: On the PC version, allows two players to play over a LAN

Character Select

There is also an extra mode in the Saturn/PC version that allows you to view unlocked FMVs

Versions

Arcade

The game was released on the Sega Model 2 arcade board, and was designed to be an upgrade for Virtua Fighter 2. This version has the best graphics, and it makes full use of the Model 2 graphics hardware which was more powerful than the Sega Saturn or common Windows PC’s of the time, in terms of 3D performance. However this version lacks FMV endings. It should be noted that the AI in this version is difficult to beat, since it was intended for the player to use multiple credits within a single play-through, you’d be surprised at how hard it is to beat on a single credit, despite using the easy settings in the games config.

This version of the game is fully playable in the Nebula Model 2 emulator, but is still unplayable in MAME as of 2021.

Most of the other screenshots captured are from the arcade version, except where noted.

Sega Saturn

Introduced a Saturn Mode which is similar to arcade mode but the opponents are randomized. This has a few changes compared to the arcade version, with the 3D background options being exchanged for sprite based background which are handled flawlessly by the Saturn’s VDP2. You will mostly notice the effect when the charicters move to an extent where the camera has to pan to follow the player. FMV videos are also present in the Saturn mode. Although they are in Japaneese, English subtitles are provided.

Most Saturn emulators will play this game, being a 3D titles it will play slowly on less powerful hardware. The Nvidia Shield struggles to play at full speed using the Yaba SanShiro emulator, and the FMV videos pixilate whilst playing. Mednafen Saturn will work the best

Microsoft Windows

A Windows PC port was released in 1998 and is very similar to the Sega Saturn version, and makes use of DirectX. Saturn game mode is renamed to PC Mode but remains the same with random opponents. The PC version supports higher resolutions then the Saturn version, and retains most graphical effects but lacks the texture quality and geometry of the arcade version.

Like most PC titles that were released in the 90s, the game is reliant on using analogue CD audio, which can cause problems on modern systems that use SATA or IDE CD drives without the CD audio line being connected. The reason is that from Windows 2000/ME on wards, Microsoft introduced digital audio for CD decoding, where audio is sent via the IDE cable itself rather then than the CD audio line. There’s no easy workaround unless you play the game in Pcem or 86box, otherwise the game will play but with no background audio or music.

I’ve not tested the game on modern Windows NT based release, but can confirm the game to be playablle using PCem or 86Box using any Windows 9x based operating system with a 3DFX or S3 based accellerator.