A homebrew developer named En83 posted some exciting news on SegaXtreme on Friday: “Hi guys, I’ve ported Celeste Classic to the Sega Saturn. This is a port from the C / SDL version by lemon32767 to JO Engine.”
The Sega Saturn homebrew port of Celeste Classic is available for download on itch.io.
Celeste Classic Released on the Sega Saturn! on Pigsy’s Retro Game Dev Tutorials
As stated by En83 in the SegaXtreme announcement and within the readme included with the game, this homebrew port utilizes the C source port of Celeste Classic intended for Nintendo 3DS and PC — here’s the relevant GitHub. This translation was necessary because PICO-8 games are written in a programming language called Lua, which cannot be read by the Saturn, but programs written in C can.
The port controls faithfully to the original and runs well on real hardware as well as a variety of emulators — helpfully confirmed by SHIRO! community member privateye.
“Awesome! It works fine on Beetle Saturn (RetroArch), Ymir, and Satiator, but it’s not working for me on Mednafen, Rhea/Phoebe and Fenrir. Mednafen is loading it as an audio disc so perhaps something is wrong with the disc image?
EDIT: Fixed in v1.01”
— privateye on SegaXtreme
This homebrew port appears to be En83’s first public Saturn project.
Celeste Classic is a 2D platformer that drew inspiration from Super Mario Bros 3 and the hobby of bouldering to create something minimal but engaging. The task is simple, help Madeline survive her journey to the top of Celeste Mountain, but getting there — regardless of the version of the game played — is no small feat.
Celeste Classic was originally created by the small team at Maddy Makes Games (effectively renamed Extremely Okay Games in 2019) as part of a PICO-8 game jam in July 2015. For those unfamiliar with the PICO-8, it is — according to the official PICO-8 website — a fantasy console designed with “harsh limitations… carefully chosen to be fun to work with, to encourage small but expressive designs, and to give… PICO-8 [games] their own particular look and feel.”
Celeste Classic would go on to be a hit in the PICO-8 scene, inspiring an expanded reimagining known simply as Celeste.
While less famous than its remake, Celeste Classic still holds enough appeal that the title has been ported to the NES, GBA, and other consoles — including the Saturn, now.
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