Saturn TGS preview from EGM2 #1 w/ Silver Saturn console

Sorry it was Tokyo Toy Show, not TGS.

 

Nice scans, thanks

 

Except it was a champagne gold colour rather then silver. A Japanese person did bring one to CEX in London back in 1994 but wanted stupid amounts of money for it (about 3,000 UKP), it was quite nice and came in the standard gold box but had a plush red felt lined internal box.

Interesting to see how many companies on that list produced nothing on the Saturn...

 

That Daytona demo mentioned was the one I talked about seeing years ago. It's also the same one that I had a video of along with a very early Panzer dragoon demo, Battle Monsters under the name of Van Battle, Magic Knight rayearth (Very early version) as well as many other very early in development Saturn games. Oh, how I wish I still had that tape.

I'd love one of those champaign coloured Saturns mind you. So much better than the shitty grey one. Also, did you notice that in those pictures the arcade stick was white. Looks like Sega always did have white in mind for the Saturn before the 2nd version of it was released. So we have to ask the question why did they go with the ugly grey colour in the first place?

Yakumo

 

if only I'd known about this great system when it came out

 

Note that it says "CD-ROM/CARTRIDGE Entertainment system" on the CD lid. If I remember correctly there was a plan to use the Saturn as hybrid (cart+CD) console. I never knew where to bring up this idea of mine that has now been stucked for quite some time in my head, anyone know if this actually is a fact or am I making things up? :katamari:

 

i saw an auction on ebay with a description like this once:

"you can play the new saturn games and your old mega drive games too!" :lol:

i emailed him about it and he corrected it. hilarious stuff.

 

x

 

I seem to remember seeing pics of that Saturn elsewhere, too.

Ahh - THAT was the article with the 3rd party developer list!! Thanks, I've been looking for that!

 

Yeah, that is what made it to commercial distribution, but I somehow remember reading that there was also (dev, prototype?) software that booted from the cartridge. I think it was even someone on Assemblergames who wrote that.

 

You're welcome.

I had been looking for that article myself, both for the pictures of that pre-production Saturn, and of Ed Semrad playing VF. I knew it was in EGM2 but couldn't see the article until someone uploaded it to retromags.com

 

Some say that there was a Chinese chess or shogi? game that was cartridge only. It's never been pictured mind you so maybe it's another of those internet stories?

Yakumo

 

Only sorta-relevant, but can someone clarify for me?

Sega, being run by idiots then as now, initially shipped the U.S. Saturn with quite possibly the worst controller this side of the infamous XBox Duke: an angular brick that apparently threw out every lesson in ergonomics learned since the NES was in vogue.

However, the Saturn I got - Christmas 1996, I believe it was - had a different controller, a shiny black version of the Japanese one. It was quite some time before I understood that this was significant in any way, but I'm still puzzled as to the details. Did Sega simply replace the brick controller with the more sensible Japanese one, or did I get some kind of special deal? (Apart from the special Target deal that gave me Daytona USA, Virtua Cop and Virtua Fighter with the system?)

 

Ryusui, I was of the belief that the first model Saturn (oval black buttons) was supplied with the bad controller you describe. The second model (round grey buttons) came with the JP controller. This is reflected in the box art on the console box.

I liked both though, and still use the Western 'fatty'. I think it's nice.

 

BTW it's interesting how it was supposed to have built in VCD card or so i guess from the datas listed

"CG - dedicated hardware built-in" or maybe they meant something different?

 

Mh I don't think they meant the MPEG device that was used by Lunar ect. Those boring VF portrait discs for instance are also called "CG" and these are nothing more but standard mid-90 render-animations. Along with loads of other so called "multimedia discs" (that used fmv/cg) for the Saturn, I'd rather assume they were talking of such shit than of the VCD card.

 

x

 

I'm pretty sure there was something like a Mahjong-Game which was on Cartridge. Dont know if it was licensed but i think i read about it here in the assembler-board.

 

kick ass article.

it shows how RUSHED was the console. They got almost nothing to show on that day. The champagne design looks far better in my opinion, plus the white stickers.

Saturn should have been released in japan on march 1995, america and europe on september october 95.

For the price of 299$ or of 390$ with BUILT IN vcd card.

1994?? All the year making great dev kits and soft.

as motorhead would say..."too late too late"

 

Sure those aren't different models. I have (err... had) one of the original articles when the name officially changed from Saturn to Sega Saturn, and it was clearly Silver.