Hello fellas, I'm interested in the Saturn as a dev. target for some homebrew. ¿What are the current status of homebrew loading? I mean. I have some serious plans for Saturn as a platform, so ¿Whats the current status of original media to deploy software? ¿Can it be licensed to create a limited run? If unavailable ¿PseudoSaturn Kai via Burned Cd are the only way? ¿Releasing something semi-commercially for the Saturn (as the latest Dreamcast releases) requires an oficial devkit for good ingame performance? (devkits +2500$ ebay prices PC not included) I'm just testing waters.
Jo Engine will, in the future, ditch SGL, so you might be able to legally sell a game made with it in the future (in one or two years). I suggest you start with that, there are good examples included with it and it makes everything more simple than with SGL, so you can learn like I did. The homebrew scene is REALLY small, I wouldn't be surprised if there is less than 2-3 ongoing projects right now, so you have to be prepared to do everything on your own since there is almost nobody who can help or answer your questions, and the hardware is a total mess, so it's really hard to master. Pseudo Saturn doesn't work with Jo Engine for some unknown reasons, but I don't think anybody seriously investigated the issue yet. Website : http://jo-engine.org/
I second that. It's needlessly complicated. With so many features, it's hard to keep track of all the limitations.
There's no way to make "self-bootable" discs, so your audience would be severely limited. Unless you pack in a boot cart with some Pseudo variant on it? (Actually if you do that you won't even need a game to sell )
Including a cart is one option. You could, eventually, pair it up with the Satiator device; of course, that game version wouldn't be on CD. I don't see your point about not selling a game. There are still some Saturn gamers who have integrity.
What I meant was that there's probably enough demand for Pseudo carts so that if someone made them, they would sell well enough on their own, without a game included. No piracy implied.
Sure. I think the cart would have to be bundled with no implied cost to the buyer. There may be another option.
In order to develop for Saturn, you need skill, patience, dedication, and time. No third party developers have a license to publish or test their software on the original copy-protected CD media. Dev kits can be hard to come by and are usually expensive. Also, the kits are, oftentimes, missing parts. There are approximately five options for software development: Jo Sega Saturn Engine & Map Editor, Saturn Orbit, Official Sega Dev package with 1st or 3rd party dev hardware, ietx Yeti 3D Engine w/SatLink application, or an original hand-coded engine/map editor/game.
