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Please bear with us here.
In the mean time, you may go to the DCEmulation forums and find lots of information and help there. The site has been based on the forums for years, anyway.
News
We keep you up-to-date with Dreamcast scene news. Whenever something happens it will be posted here. If you are looking for any news older than this week, check our news archive.
Makaron update: It beeps! VMU Emulation
Posted by Darc 15:47, 5 May 2008 (CDT)
Deunan has posted an update regarding Makaron on his blog:
I've got good news and bad news.
Bad is I've not touched Makaron sources for weeks now. Guess it needs to ripen some more :) I got to the point where I have two or three ways to solve a problem, and each has it's pros and cons - and I just can't decide which one to pick. But I will get to it, eventually.
The good news is Yuki bought some VMUs with games on them and it got me pretty interested. I'm going to try and emulate standalone VMU now. Just think, since it's rather simple and low-spec I could easily use SDL to make it work. Hell, ScummVM uses SDL. I'm somewhat familiar with the API too (my old MOD player used SDL for both sound output and visualisation).
That would make a VMU-on-PC emulator. But guess what, there are SDL ports to Dreamcast available too! So the project could be made to compile and run on DC as well. And at this point it would run under Makaron of course. I mean, how do you say no to VMU-on-DC-on-PC emulator? :]
The main problem right now is VMU BIOS. Apparently it's not possible to access ROM memory directly while running from FLASH, so no easy way to dump it. KATANA dev kit comes with VMU BIOS but I'd rather not rely on it. You know, copyright stuff and all. Also, I'd like to have an English one from one of my own VMUs.
Source: dknute.livejournal.com
RACE!DC update coming soon
Posted by Darc 15:05, 5 May 2008 (CDT)
It's been two years since we've seen any activity regarding GPF's port of RACE!DC to the Dreamcast, but one of the original authors of the Neo Geo Pocket Color emulator has mentioned doing some work on it in an interview with GameSetWatch regarding his part in a project to translate the Japanese Neo Geo Pocket Color game SNK Vs. Capcom: Card Fighter’s Clash 2 to English:
GSW: Are you planning on working on anything else?
F: I've always got something else to work on. Though, I don't often plan what will be the next project. I don't know. I was fixing up the Dreamcast version of RACE the other day. That's pretty much done now, though. I've got some other ideas, but my main upcoming project is raising a - to be in about a month - newborn daughter.
It is possible that this release is just a bug fix, but we could perhaps also see some improvements in other areas.
UPDATE: I have spoken with Flavor, and it appears this will be a bugfix release. This is what he wrote to me regarding the update:
Well, there isn't much new code in it. It's mostly GPF's port of the emulator. There was one main problem with GPF's version, though. I don't think it had any way of writing a save-game file. My current version does.
Source: GameSetWatch
DUX pre-orders now being taken!
Posted by Darc 14:33, 5 May 2008 (CDT)
Posted today on the HUCAST blog...
You can now pre-order DUX for Dreamcast.
Here you can see DUXs cover art. The final may looks slightly different but all in all it will look like this. When pre-ordering you will receive an bonus poster that shows the cover art.
DUX will also runs region free on every DC build before 2001 which are the very most of DCs ever build.
Source: HUCAST blog
Posted by Darc 06:23, 3 May 2008 (CDT)
This video shows parts of the first stage finished to roughly 90%. The final stage has more lenght and the boss enemy will have more attacks.
Download: dux_stage1_teaser.avi (29,1MB/H.264)
Overall there will be 6 stages and I will explain each stage when time is given. Just for now you will encounter a space port, an water filled cave, a mine facility, a hyper space zone, an atomicly radiated den and last but not least the hideout of the terror itself.
Additional videos of DUX to follow when more stages are ready.
Source: HUCAST blog
Giana's Return - Screenshots
Posted by Maturion 13:36, 2 May 2008 (CDT)
New Screenshots of Giana's Return:
Uh, is there a bonus cave in front of me?
Can I mange to jump over this ground? I am scared!
This bridge was for sure not stable…
The first boss… will I survive to save Maria?
Source: gianas-return.de
Giana's Return - Engine on, Gear up!
Posted by Maturion 14:42, 30 April 2008 (CDT)
Another update on gianas-return.de:
Yesterday the storyline pictures were converted to look as good as possible in 240 colors only, as this will still allow us to use another additional 16 colors for a font, to display the story. We used the original material first (where pictures do have more than 1000 colors), but the SDL downscaling possibilities are rather limited and looked pretty poor. We hope that at least the storyline is optically in better shape now and will go on with more tasks soon!
PS: We might add a bunch of pictures of World 1 sometime tonight, but no promise on that.
Source: gianas-return.de
Giana's Return Updates
Posted by Maturion 10:08, 29 April 2008 (CDT)
The Giana's Return Team has updated their site with some news:
Lack of sleep...
...more news will follow in 2 days. 7 Espresso's can't keep the newser up atm ;-)
PS: After 2 hours, we now have the first level enhancements. In particular World 1 Level 8 and World 2 Level 8 are ready!
Level up!
We decided to increase the amount of levels per world from 7 to 8, due to having two music tracks per world and we did not know how to split up in a fair way. So we have a new music track every 4 levels, along with seperate boss music.
If all our plans go well... we have a total amount of 56 instead 49 levels. This is more than enough for 2-3 hours of entertainment.
Answer from Spellbound, permission still there!
Unfortunatly a quote in german language again:
Hallo Herr removed, solange ihr Projekt unsere Hinweise beachtet und als Freeware erscheint, können Sie es nach wie vor veröffentlichen. Wir bitten aber darum, uns die Finale Version vor der Veröffentlichung zuzusenden. Viele Grüße removed
It basically says. If we release the game for free and don't use any rips, we can still release everything, but we need to send them a final version (probably for preview).
Now those are great news and another great news it to come, which we can not talk about right now.
Waiting for Spellbound AG...
As reported earlier, we have sent an E-Mail to a person at Spellbound asking about the HBV license and if they still mind to release Giana's Return or not. The mail has been not read, which might be a sad sign.
Image: http://www.gianas-return.de/images/email.jpg
Light into the Dark? Part II
We just wrote an E-Mail to Spellbound AG, who own the rights for "The Great Giana Sisters", basically we were asking for clearification if there would be any troubles with a release of "Giana's Return". Depending on the answer, we will discuss about further steps inside the team, after all we are working to bring you guys freeware pleasure, but not at any cost.
Source: gianas-return.de
DUX Update: Know Your Enemy
Posted by Darc 17:22, 28 April 2008 (CDT)
The DUX blog has been updated with more information about the game.
Let's continue with the enemies of DUX.
Lasor
This one comes in groups and each of every Lasor enemies is connected via some sort of laser with another of its type. You have to squeeze your ship trough those lasers by chance.
Plumps
Rushes down the waterfalls and stays on the waters surface. They will spit several bullets simultaneously at you. They also will try tracing your ship while sliding on the waters surface. You better eliminate them as fast a you can.
Chuba
Chuba flies around the cave's corners without shooting, which would be pretty hamrless when they wouldn't come in masses.
Buxa
Buxa is dropping some explosive bombs from its back at your ship. You can eliminate those bombs with your pod, try avoiding them or just eliminate the Buxas itself.
Blumes
This flower sticks on the walls to spit some pollen at you. Shoot 'em up or fly trough their flower shower without getting hit.
All these enemies appear to be in stage 2.
Source: HUCAST blog