“Futatsugi then told us the politics behind Saga’s disappearance, which we can’t reveal, but the gist of it has to do with the original code having been lost, making a port – in case you’re wondering – all but unlikely.”
Just wondering what you guys know about the circumstances surrounding the loss of the source code of Panzer Dragoon Saga. Also, I’m not really in the know about programming and developing, but couldn’t Sega reconstruct something close enough to the original code if they have the builder or know something about how the game was built?
Well they probably discussed source code in a broad term, they also probably lost all the original source content files making the whole porting process pretty time consuming. Of course, an emulated version wasn’t discussed.
SEGA owns the copyright and trademarks of Panzer Dragoon, it wouldn’t be a problem for them to hand the rights to a team and say “reverse engineer this” although for as much time as it would take, it would probably easier just to re-make the entire game from scratch (which has been done by many games companies for other games).
Although I’m pretty sure the story with SEGA losing source code was that they were ordered to dispose of all projects that weren’t seen as profitable in the eyes of sega’s management at the time?
I find the idea that not even one of the staff snuck a copy out for themselves to be a little absurd.
First I’m going to say that even though I minored in computer science in college, I am not the most knowledgeable dude about how games are made so I could be mistaken about a few things.
Anyway, if the code is gone, a port become incredibly difficult. Basically the easiest thing to do would be to make a Saturn emulator for whatever system the desired port would be for. Otherwise ‘reverse engineer’ it by seeing what is done and replicating it. This is really tough since no programmer memorizes exactly how they did certain things.
It would be possible for a team of developers to remake the game for a modern system (about the equivalent in terms of work as ‘reverse-engineering’ the original Saturn version). However this really is a lot of work. It would be comparable to making a whole new game.
On top of this, re-releases/remakes are pretty much never A-list sellers and Sega would have to put a small price tag on it from the start; this guarantees limited profits especially since outside of the ‘hardcore gamer’ community, the PDS fanbase is pretty tiny. There is no reason for Sega to remake/release a port of PDS with its small target audience and large amount of work needed to make it.
However, it seems fishy to me that the source code would be lost. Generally a programs source code is backed up on multiple formats. When a game is finalized, it is usually burned onto an archival “gold” CD. In addition to this there should have been backup tapes or harddrives or zip disks or something. I don’t know if this was standard practice way back in 1997-8 but I’m surprised something like this could have happened.
Maybe when Team Andromedia was dissolved they threw out all the backups but I would think Sega would keep them in a closet or something. I don’t really know.
I agree with this… Orta just seems like a developed fanfic to me[/quote]
I understand the feeling of mystery and speculation left behind with Azel, but it would be nice to see some other development in the history of the world. I don’t need a sequel to Azel, but I would have liked to have seen a prequel that perhaps touched on when and how the drones and towers were created.
Of course, (impossibly) I would much rather this come from as many original TA members as possible as opposed to a totally new set of hands reshaping the story. sigh
[quote=“Nemoide”]First I’m going to say that even though I minored in computer science in college, I am not the most knowledgeable dude about how games are made so I could be mistaken about a few things.
Anyway, if the code is gone, a port become incredibly difficult. Basically the easiest thing to do would be to make a Saturn emulator for whatever system the desired port would be for. Otherwise ‘reverse engineer’ it by seeing what is done and replicating it. This is really tough since no programmer memorizes exactly how they did certain things.
It would be possible for a team of developers to remake the game for a modern system (about the equivalent in terms of work as ‘reverse-engineering’ the original Saturn version). However this really is a lot of work. It would be comparable to making a whole new game.
[/quote]
Comparable but not undoable.
Metal Gear Solid Twin Snakes for Gamecube is a good example where the game is pretty much re-made from scratch, not using any of the assets of the original at all (seeing as the gameplay mechanics are different). But all of the original conception was previously done, so a lot of the work of actually designing the game was removed (Story, and characters for example).
It wouldn’t be totally comparable though, you already have your character designs, environment designs and other work all planned out.
You also already have your music composed in a synth friendly format that could easily be played back through a modern synthesizer and re-arranged to bring it up to speed (Although I think in many cases they could re-use the original tracks without too much detracting from the work). Saturn Dev Kit’s sound box has Midi in/Out
“sourcecode” might be a mistranslation, from what I heard the graphical assets were lost. that means ingame text, 3d models, textures and animation data. a port would be especially unlikely because PDS has a very special custom pseudo 3D engine, the polygons are actually not drawn in 3d but are distorted 2d polygons most of the time (expecially the backgrounds and larger bosses) so porting the engine would be way more difficult than using exisiting assets with a new 3d engine tailored to the target platform.
To be honest, I’d prefer if they did a RE Zero and recreate the game from scratch, with the same general layout but extra stuff, better use of graphics technology, etc. Panzer Dragoon Saga is one of the best games I’ve ever played but the graphics looked a bit dated in 2003, never mind now.
Eh it was released in 1998. Of course it looked dated by 2003, we were well into a full generational leap until then, though PCs had almost reached a second… It’s still a beautiful game. I don’t think they could do the visuals justice without a huge budget (not even sure if that’d be enough), fitting of a brand new RPG. I also don’t think they’d be willing to fund such a project. So, an emulated version would be great, perhaps with remastered FMVs to get rid of the sloppy compression artifacts and distortions and another improvements.
If you were going to emulate it you’d need to emulate what the Saturn is capable of as far as FMV’s are concerned, although they could re-do the FMVs with more polys and re-render them out to the old files, then make some kind of plug in that anti-aliases the video after it has been rendered by the emulator
Considering re-makes, if it was a financially viable decision I’m sure it would have been done by now (Source or no source!) as the will to make money is enough to push a software house beyond source-excuse boundaries. (See Final Fantasy III for DS)
Although, if the creator of SSF ever releases his code or ports it to mutli-platforms, I’m sure Panzer Dragoon SAGA and other Saturn games will eventually make appearances on download services.
