If a SEGA Master System emulator and Wolfenstein 3D ports weren’t enough, VBT has now released a beta port of the Mac CD version of Flashback: The Quest for Identity for SEGA Saturn using the Reminiscence engine, which can be found over on SegaXtreme.
Flashback released on the Amiga in 1992 in France — where VBT is from — before being ported to DOS and various consoles over the next couple years across the world. It’s a sidescrolling platformer that uses rotoscoped graphics for its fluid animation.
Back in February this year, he asked the SHIRO! Discord community if they could test his build. After reaching out to him about some game-crashing moments during my playthrough, a back and forth started with me testing his new builds out and reporting any issues, which he’s fixed all of and more. VBT is now asking the community to test the beta build out and let him know if they find any glitches or other issues. He said if there is no feedback, this is the public release.
Here’s an interview with VBT about the project:
SHIRO!: When did you first hear about/play Flashback, and which version was it?
VBT: “Maybe in Joypad 11 (august 1992), I played the Megadrive version in 1993.“
What made you want to bring Flashback to the SEGA Saturn?
“There was already a port of Reminiscence in 2009 by HKZ (a member of the scummvm dev team), it was the PC version. Later there was a request by Mr^Burns (in 2021) to get an upgrade of this port as Reminscence supported Mac high res version. I expected it would be an easy task and a step before porting HODE with a hard point : 512×448.“
Which version are you porting, and what made you choose it over the others?
“I started to port the Mac version, the floppy one, with in mind to add CDDA from the Mega CD and digital voices. The proof of concept was fairly underestimated at the 2024 compo. Initially, it needs 4 buffers/layers of 512×448 in RAM and assets are twice compressed. How do you make that fit on Saturn and get the needed speed with bitmap rendering? It was a miracle it was running and a real pain to port. When the console was out of RAM, it moved to use unused VRAM and ran slower.
After some headache to manage the memory areas, using an Excel file, it was updated to use the 4MB cartridge. It allowed pre-decompressed sprites of around 2MB for the RAM level 2, which explains why the MAC needed 4MB of RAM to run the game.
The drawback is there was less testers/future players and there was random graphics bugs on the console because of the Saturn cartridge port but it helped to go further on the port. The bitmap rendering was removed, sprites became Saturn sprites, the front and back layers were merged thanks to a trick (Fafling’s idea): The Saturn can do pixel priority on 2 colors every 16 colors, which allows 32 colors for a simulated front layer. With a dynamic reindexation of the palette and the picture it saved 228kBytes.
The next step was to remove the 4MB requirement (basically find 2MB of RAM):
– 228kBytes, already found
– 600 frames of conrad sprites moved to 4Bpp => -50% of memory
– monsters moved to 4Bpp => -50% of memory
– split cutscene images to 2 layers of 4Bpp
– rewrite multiple times decompressors (lzss,C103,C211)
– pre-decompress some sprites in LWRAM, HWRAM, VRAM others are done on the fly
– remove libs
– remove sound driver
…well, back to the question, after adding Amiga-exclusive cutscenes, I tried to add multi-language support. As the floppy version contains only one language, I moved to the Mac CD version, which supports both French and English text (accessed by pushing left or right on the main menu, voices will remain in English).
Latest improvements were about the game saves management, there is a new menu called ‘resume game’ with a room preview for each save state. Game saves are now double compressed to preserve Backup RAM and In-game save station goes to Saturn’s remaining RAM.
Last words, big thanks to (no order):
– Gregory Montoir
– Cerbero
– Double Dime
– Ced
– Wesker
– Benjamin Siskoo
– Fafling
– FCare
– Willl
– Tails Of Saturn
They all helped in different ways on this port.”
Saturn cover concept by Frogbull
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