City Connection’s Saturn Tribute line will continue after all, with the publisher announcing today that the Saturn version of Batsugun is coming to modern platforms this spring.
Batsugun is a vertical shmup made by Toaplan β developers of Truxton and Zero Wing, among others β for arcades in 1993. It was ported to the Saturn in October 1996 in Japan only. It’s considered the pioneer of the bullet hell subgenre of shmups.
The Saturn version includes both the arcade original and a “special” version, which was set to release in arcades but was canceled β it features a smaller hitbox, a shield protecting the player from one hit, more powerful bombs, new scoring items and the addition of multiple loops of increasing difficulty after completing the initial loop. The Saturn version allows players to switch the game to a horizontal orientation, too.
This one apparently won’t be as barebones as previous Saturn Tribute releases, which emulated the original game and added few additional features beyond save states, rewinding and perhaps unlimited credits. City Connection calls Batsugun the first installment in a new “Saturn Tribute Boosted” line, offering new features like a “Boost Up HUD” that displays an experience gauge, the current score, hidden bonuses and the title of the music track currently playing. Modern ports from M2’s ShotTriggers line offer similar on-screen stats.
As a “Boosted” Saturn Tribute game, Batsugun also will feature an online ranked mode with an increased maximum score for more challenge, according to the official website.
The site mentions that a newly arranged musical score will be made for this release, too. The artists tapped for the new music include Shinji Hosoe (Ridge Racer, Tekken), Yousuke Yasui (Mega Man Network Transmission, Eschatos), Hagane (Cotton Rock ‘n’ Roll, CrossCode), Daisuke Matsumoto (Crimson Katana) and WASi303 (Psyvariar, Dodonpachi Maximum).
Batsugun is set to release digitally on Switch, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Steam on May 25. Store pages aren’t live yet.
There will be physical editions β coming in both standalone and special edition varieties β of the Switch and PS4 versions as well. The special edition comes with a two-CD soundtrack with Batsugun’s original music and the newly made arranged soundtrack, not to mention a fanbook.
Various Japanese retailers will offer preorder bonuses. For example, the guest artists’ arranged soundtrack will be available on cassette tape as a bonus for those who order the special edition of Batsugun from City Connection’s own store, Clarice Shop.
The standalone physical games will cost 4,180 yen while the special editions will cost 7,480 yen β about US$31.51 and $56.39, respectively. There’s no word yet on digital prices for any region or whether the game will release physically outside of Japan.
Saturn Tribute games are the Saturn originals running on what City Connection calls the Zebra Engine, which dataminers have found appears to be a modified version of the SSF emulator. City Connection appears to use the “S-Tribute” label for the Saturn games from Taito that it’s handling, while games like Cotton 2 and Suchie-Pie are from other publishers and sport the “Saturn Tribute” label.
So far, 12 games have been released under either label: Cotton 2, Cotton Boomerang and Guardian Force, which came out in 2021; Layer Section & Galactic Attack, which came out last April; Cleopatra Fortune and Elevator Action Returns, which came out last November; the four games in the Suchie-Pai collection, which came out last December; and Metal Black and Bust-a-Move 2: Arcade Edition & Bust-a-Move 3, which came out last week.
It wasn’t clear whether the line would continue after Metal Black and the Bust-a-Move collection came out. They’d been announced with three other Taito games last year, and aside from a summer announcement about the Suchie-Pie collection that released in late 2022, City Connection had nothing else on its Saturn Tribute slate.
With the publisher calling Batsugun “the first” Saturn Tribute Boosted game, it appears that fans will have more to look forward to β not just in the way of Saturn games but Saturn games with expanded extra features, too.
Danthrax is a contributor to the Shiro Media Group, writing stories for the website when Saturn news breaks. While he was a Sega Genesis kid in the ’90s, he didn’t get a Saturn until 2018. It didn’t take him long to fall in love with the console’s library as well as the fan translation and homebrew scene. He contributed heavily to the Bulk Slash and Stellar Assault SS fan localizations, and has helped as an editor on several other Saturn and Dreamcast fan projects such as Cotton 2, Rainbow Cotton and Sakura Wars Columns 2.
City Connection is absolutely terrible. I’m sure this won’t be any better than their previous garbage releases. An absolute embarrassment to both them and the Saturn honestly.
Iβm willing to forgive C*** C***ection for their atrociously laggy ports if the input lag on this release is an acceptable amount.