More Freaky Homebrew Games & Ports (A Pig Quest, Wild Wood, Wolfenstein Maze 3D)

As you guys know I’m always on the lookout for cool homebrew games and ports/demakes for retro consoles and recently I’ve come a across a few more excellent ones.

Firstly is A Pig Quest for the Commodore 64 that uses some clever colour cycling tricks to force more colours than you normally can into the gameplay area resulting in it looking better than most c64 games. It’s cool environment effects are equally impressive with detailed moving backgrounds, leaves falling, rain, lightning and monsters that change more due to some animation compression tricks too. It’s full of so much crazy stuff they’re apparently having problems putting together the physical cart for real Commodore 64s lol!

Website: https://piggy18.itch.io/a-pig-quest

Second is another new game in the making called Wild Wood that’s also pushing the Commodore 64 to it’s limits with colour tricks and extra layers of parallax scrolling resulting on a lot of background movement! The artwork is truly incredible and the game just looks utterly amazing for a c64 game.

Website: https://www.wildwoodgame.co.uk/

Civilization 1 Bonus Episode Video – SNES, Genesis/MD & Playstation Console Conversions

This bonus video shows you some of the console conversions for Sid Meier’s Civilization 1, such as the Super Nintendo SNES version and the very different 2.5D isometric Sony Playstation version (made from a equally rare Sega Saturn version) as well as a quick preview of a fan made Sega Genesis Megadrive version in the making. This is the first episode in a special bonus series where I try out mobile & console conversions of every Civilization genre game I can. This console conversion video series is a bonus sub series to my main how to play classic Civ genre games in HD video series. To see how I was able to play Civ1 in HD with DOS graphics and sounds see my main tour video here:
https://blakessanctum.wordpress.com/2021/11/14/civ-video-series-ep-01-civilization-1-hd-tour-with-mods-scenarios/

VIDEO:
youtu.be/xZ9pNNOsr2A?list=PLZqnaGtTZxFbq3F5R6lqzyVvYzg9tRBPY

More awesome retro ports & homebrew games (Starfox, Wonder Boy, TMNT, Castlevania, Sonic)

Found some more awesome indie and homebrew retro console games out there or in the making! Love seeing fans pushing these old consoles to their limits and making games and ports we could only dream of as kids.

Firstly GASEGA68k who I’ve posted about before due to his amazing SuperFX chip like games/demos on a regular SEGA Genesis/Megadrive (eg Wolfenstein, F-Zero, Mario Kart) has released new videos showing just how far his Starfox conversion has come along. Just amazing to think this is on a regular un-modded MD and he reckons he’s got some more tricks up his sleeve to gain back more FPS too!

New video of current status of Starfox demo for Sega Genesis/MD.

The scramble intro sound and the music during gameplay are streaming sample rate at 12khz (2 to 1 compresion adpcm type, the same format I used on wolf3d) playing with the z80. #starfox, #SegaGenesis, #Megadrive pic.twitter.com/iIL7T2CSLz

— Gasega68k (@gasega68k) January 5, 2023

Next comes a very cool looking Wonder Boy like game for the Nintendo Gameboy called Tales of Monsterland that is clearly WB3 inspired with its cool monster changes. They’ve even done a nice physical collectors boxset version!

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2021/09/tales_of_monsterland_is_yet_another_new_game_boy_game_and_its_getting_a_fancy_limited_edition

Then comes some truly awesome projects going on at the moment for the SEGA Master System. Firstly a fellow named xfixium is working on a port of the brilliant Arcade version of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles! When you compare this to the official original NES port of the game the difference is remarkable!

https://www.smspower.org/forums/18324-SMSTMNTHomebrew

More Amazing Intellivision Homebrew Games (Mario, Megaman, Dragon Quest, Shadow of the Beast)

A few years ago I posted about my nostalgic love for my very first console in the 1980s, a second hand Intellivision with about 50 games, and also how now days all these decades later there’s been some truly amazing homebrew releases and ports of famous games from other consoles such as Defender of the Crown, Castlevania, Price of Persia, Final Fantasy, and Wonder Boy. You can check out that old post about them HERE !

I also mentioned in that post my excitement for the up and coming Intellivision Amico console however after waiting all these years things are not sounding too good and even if the console does somehow survive it sounds like it wouldn’t have run original classic Intellivision games anyway so a lot of the old fanbase has lost interest. However the good news is thankfully Elektronite (creators of many new and awesome Intellivision games) and fans have been busy working towards making their own new Intellivision console using FPGA tech. The equally awesome news and the main reason I’m making this new post is that sure enough the super talented creators I mentioned in my previous post, in particular a fellow named Skywaffle has been busy over the last few years creating even more amazing playable Intellivision demos and complete conversions of famous games we all know and love that you’d never expect to see on the old 70s console lol! I just had to show you guys these as the Mario one below is just unbelievable!!! Hope he does Sonic, Alex Kidd or Wonder Boy in Monster Land at some point too haha!

Super Mario Bros by Skywaffle
https://forums.atariage.com/topic/334585-super-mario-bros-for-intellivision/

Shadow of the Beast by Skywaffle
https://forums.atariage.com/topic/305640-shadow-of-the-beast-demake-experiment/

Megaman 2 by Skywaffle
https://forums.atariage.com/topic/296524-megaman-2-work-in-progress-rough-demo/

Dragon Quest by Skywaffle
https://forums.atariage.com/topic/324263-dragon-quest/

Sonic The Hedgehog & Super Mario Bros on Commodore 64

Wow!! The world (and Nintendo’s lawyers lol) went bonkers a few years ago when Super Mario Bros was successfully ported to the Commodore 64 and was actually fast & looked good (I’ll put a link & video below if you missed all the fuss). Well now it’s Sonic’s turn as Sonic The Hedgehog 1 from the SEGA Master System has been ported to C64 and it looks & sounds really good! I love seeing people in the homebrew scene pushing the limits of old consoles like this.

C64 Sonic The Hedgehog:
https://www.indieretronews.com/2021/12/sonic-hedgehog-is-coming-to-c64-and.html

C64 Super Mario Bros:
http://www.indieretronews.com/2019/04/hot-news-super-mario-bros-has-been.html

Wolfenstein and Super Nintendo Mode 7 3D Effects on SEGA Genesis Mega Drive

Wow! This super talented creator named GASEGA68k has managed to get Super Nintendo SNES like Mode 7 3D scrolling graphics like effects on a SEGA Genesis/Mega Drive with no extra chips. Naturally he used the effect to create a F-Zero like game. Of course to get this working on a Mega Drive he had to the lower the resolution a bit but wow..

Download: https://gendev.spritesmind.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=1959&start=45#p36187

It just amazes me when fans achieve things like this on retro consoles that professionals thought were impossible back in the day. Here’s another one of his Genesis mode 7 demos. This time its a retro Sonic Team Racing game (basically Mario Kart but with Sonic) that SEGA should have made back in the day.

Download: https://gendev.spritesmind.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=1959&start=30#p27666

The talented creator behind these videos is also the same guy that made the popular Wolfenstein 3D SEGA Genesis Mega Drive game from a few years ago. Another utterly amazing technical achievement considering no extra chips were used and is just running on default hardware.

Download: https://gendev.spritesmind.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=33633#p33633

New Bubsy games in 2018!

There are a lot of Bubsy haters out there but there are a lot of Bubsy lovers out there too. Personally I loved Busby on my SEGA Mega Drive although I never was able to finish it as it was much harder than the Sonic games lol! I still remember its gorgeous colourful vibrant graphics even today (especially those train and river levels). Darn it I’ll finish it one day (probably through an emulator where I can cheat my ass off lmao)!

I never did get to buy the sequel Busby 2 and apparently I was not missing anything when I didn’t play Bubsy 3D on Playstation as it was labelled one of the worst games on the console which considering how large the PSX library is that is saying something. In fact it was so bad it killed the Busby franchise for nearly 2 decades!

Until recently that is! At the end of 2017 Acclaim released a brand new Bubsy game for PS4 and PC called Bubsy: The Woolies Strike Back! It wasn’t a huge hit with reviewers however it must have sold well as now they’ve announced another busy game for 2019 called Bubsy: Paws on Fire which looks like it has some pretty cool alternative game modes such as piloting a Woolies spaceship and first person roller coaster like special levels. Check out the trailers below!

Bubsy: The Woolies Strike Back

Bubsy: Paws on Fire

SEGA Master System Visual Compendium Book

I recently posted about the awesome guys at Bitmap books making a hard copy book of the awesome History of Computer RPGs pdf. Well I’ve got to post about this too even if I am rather late on it!

After Bitmap books successful C64, Amiga, NES, SNES, Art of Point & Click Adventure and other releases they’ve thankfully and naturally now turned their attention to SEGA. Being a SEGA kid this was the moment I’d been waiting for! This year they did a kickstarter for a SEGA Master System Visual Compendium book and it was quite successful! I managed to back it just in time but if you missed out then don’t worry they’ll put more up on the bitmap books website in 2019. I missed all the Nintendo kickstarters yet I was able to get the books from their website. What’s arrived so far has blown me away. I love the 3D lenticular slipcase covers! (eg turn the book and Mario will jump & coins will spin). Fingers crossed they do a Sega Mega Drive (Genesis) book soon too as that’s my real retro console love!

Original SMS Kickstarter:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2146199819/sega-master-system-a-visual-compendium

Bitmap Books Website:
https://www.bitmapbooks.co.uk/

Long lost never released Sim City Nintendo game found!

This is pretty cool. Very late in the process Nintendo abandoned it’s 8-bit NES conversion of Maxis’s classic Sim City in favourite of releasing the game in its superior 16-bit SNES system. Copies shown at various trade shows disappeared never to be seen again.. until now!

The awesome guys at the Video Game History Foundation have located and purchased a copy of one of the original trade show cartridges and done a archaeological dig into the cart and done this comprehensive article on its contents and the interesting history of its making (some big names were involved!). They’ve even released the rom for people with emulators!

Check it out here:
https://gamehistory.org/simcity/

 

Bitmap Books To Print C-RPG Book

This is great news! Bitmap Books those awesome guys behind the amazing video game art books for Nintendo, SEGA, C64 & Amiga etc have teamed up with the guys behind the excellent CRPG Book – A Guide to Computer Role Playing Games that I posted about earlier this year.

I’ve actually already printed out my own copy and have been slowly reading it over the last month (it’s huge!) and it has introduced me to so many great classic RPGs I didn’t know about. You’ll find all the favourites in there such as Elder Scrolls, Might & Magic, Final Fantasy, Quest for Glory and Starflight just to name a mere few. I absolutely love how it covers what the best version is to get (eg between PC, C64, Amiga, Sega & Nintendo etc) and what the best fan mods are for many of the games.

I also recently ordered Bitmap’s other products such as the NES, SNES, Master System and Art of Point & Click Adventure books. What’s arrived so far has blown me away. I love the 3D lenticular slipcase covers! (eg turn the book and Mario will jump & coins will spin). So I think I’m going to have to get this new book too haha. Fingers crossed they do a Sega Mega Drive (Genesis) book soon too as thats my real retro console love!

https://www.bitmapbooks.co.uk/blogs/news/the-crpg-book-a-guide-to-computer-role-playing-games