Sega Saturn is difficult to turn into a mini console, says Sega boss

Thick Thighs Save Lives

Thick Thighs Save Lives

NeoGAF's Physical Games Advocate Extraordinaire
Sega President and COO Yukio Sugino has said that the Sega Saturn is proving difficult to adapt into a miniature console.

Speaking to Famitsu (translated by VGC), the Sega boss said: "The Sega Saturn is surprisingly high performance, so the difficulty of miniaturisation is also high.

"I don't think it's a case of saying 'let's make another one because it sells well', it looks like it's going to be a little longer.

"I'd like to think about it when we're in a situation where we can openly develop it together with people who have always loved the Sega Saturn and Dreamcast."

Performance-wise, while not a perfect comparison, the Sega Saturn was released in the same console generation as the Sony PlayStation and Nintendo 64.

While Sony has released a classic PlayStation console, Nintendo has yet to continue the trend it popularised of releasing miniature consoles. If it was to do so, the Nintendo 64 would presumably be next.

In June of last year, Sega's classic hardware producer Yosuke Okunari said that he had considered producing mini versions of the classic consoles, but claimed that the cost of producing parts for either a Dreamcast or Saturn would be prohibitively expensive.

Announcing the company's Mega Drive Mini 2 console, Okunari said: "Some of you may say 'This isn't a Sega Saturn Mini' or 'I wanted a Dreamcast mini', it's not that we didn't think about that direction."

More details in the VGC article below:

www.videogameschronicle.com

Sega Saturn is difficult to turn into a mini console, says Sega boss | VGC

Sega President and CEO Yukio Sugino has said that the Sega Saturn is proving difficult to adapt into a miniature console.
www.videogameschronicle.com www.videogameschronicle.com
 
You could at least remaster a couple of Saturn classics in a nice collection and release it on current gen hardware. But no, let's release another fucking Mega Drive collection vol.48 instead. I swear, this fucking company drives me nuts sometimes.
 
Hey SEGA… you could I dunno, start your own virtual console service on XSX|S / PS5… just saying (they are quite fast)… but no, please keep trying not to maximise profits. It is in line with how you managed the console after all ;).
 
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Emulating a Sega Saturn seems to be a real pain in the ass. It seems doable on an Android device.

Really it would be better to just release a Sega Saturn collection on Steam and license the Mednafen emulator.
 
While a mini console would be great, to be honest I'm running out of space in the guest room for all the damn mini consoles, so I don't see this as a big loss. I kind of wish Sega would just release the "Sega Saturn Catalogue" and a Dreamcast equivalent or whatever they'd wanna call it on Steam and all modern platforms as some kinda bundle or something just to get the games out there, don't know that we really need any more mini consoles, though they are cute as shit and I love the ones I own as collector's items.....even if I never really touch em.

Off topic, did they ever hack that second Genesis Mini they released around a year ago? I got one as I was kinda pumped for it, but I remember wanting to hack it like I did the SNES, but the hacking scene seemed to be moving a bit slow on crackin that bad boy open, has anyone made any progress there?
 
The best way to emulate a Saturn on PC is to just use Retroarch and the Beetle Saturn emulator. It is all plug and play.

The core is a port of Mednafen.

Unfortunately, the emulator does not let you bump up the resolution, but it is not buggy.
 
diffusionx said:
I thought this was obvious. And let's be honest the PS Classic was a total hunk of shit.
Click to expand...
It was Sony not tweaking the software, the fact it instantly became a better console when you installed RetroArch was hilarious, even moreso when a hacked SNES Classic played PS1 roms better lol
 
Ok, a Saturn one might be difficult due to the hardware used, but a RPi 4(00) equivalent hardware can emulate Dreamcast flawlessly on almost all titles.
Don't serve us bullshit Sega
 
For some weird reason, you need some beefy hardware to emulate a Saturn properly. The same with an N64. It is weird.

They have had a bitch of a time emulating those two consoles.
 
The Sega Saturn is surprisingly high performance
Click to expand...

SEGA still trying to save face with that piece of shit console.

Do what Sony did with the PS Classic - slap an off the shelf chipset in a tiny plastic shell and run an emulator with some roms on it. Done.
 
No problem mr. CEO, I've just played Virtua Fighter on the latest Saturn core for my mister system.

Layer Section also runs great but stil missing sound
 
Good potential for something around Master System and Game Gear in the meantime, especially with M2 being experts about these consoles. No, the Game Gear Micro doesn't count. Aleste Collection is proof that MS/GG games can come on our TVs is great condition.

Saturn was always going to be difficult. Good on them not to be satisfied with an half-assed effort like Sony did with the PS1 Classic.
 
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Doczu said:
Ok, a Saturn one might be difficult due to the hardware used, but a RPi 4(00) equivalent hardware can emulate Dreamcast flawlessly on almost all titles.
Don't serve us bullshit Sega
Click to expand...

Dreamcast was a much more straightforward architecture than Saturn, that is why it is easier to emulate.
 
There is some kind of voodoo going on with the Saturn architecture that makes it hard for people to wrap their minds around. Seems like only the Mednafen guy figured it out.
 
There are also the SSF and Bizhawk emulators.

Bizhawk kind of annoyed me that last time I tried to use it. Not that user friendly.
 
Thick Thighs Save Lives said:
Sega President and COO Yukio Sugino has said that the Sega Saturn is proving difficult to adapt into a miniature console.

Speaking to Famitsu (translated by VGC), the Sega boss said: "The Sega Saturn is surprisingly high performance, so the difficulty of miniaturisation is also high.
Click to expand...

Translation, the cheapest bottom of the barrel Allwinner Arm system on chips we used in past Sega mini consoles don't run the emulator well. We'd rather wait for prices to come down than spend a little extra on a chip that would be able to emulate Saturn games like something from Rockchip.

There is no magic or mystery around the Saturn emulation its just cost of doing it, they want it to be as cheap as possible.
 
Just make more Mega Drive mini, the 2 batches they did on different years sold out instantly...

After they're done with it they can do Saturn.
Krathoon said:
There is some kind of voodoo going on with the Saturn architecture that makes it hard for people to wrap their minds around. Seems like only the Mednafen guy figured it out.
Click to expand...
Understandably.

Saturn is like the ending of a Power Rangers episode. They had a lot of parts neither was that competitive on their own against Nintendo and Sony so they combine everything for maximum damage and end up with a behemoth of transplanted bolted on stuff, bus between CPU's was an issue, memory pools were separate and had different speeds. The thing had dual main processors and dual GPU (asymmetrical though) in 1994 for gods sake. It also had shit documentation (which was an issue for programmers and later on for emulator devs) and crappy dev tools.

Ken Kutaragi probably loved it as PS2 and PS3 felt like Saturn successors and fared better at that.
 
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Ok but what about Dreamcast Mini with online-playable PSO in it? If you can get that working then I don't need a Saturn Mini.
 
acm2000 said:
no, difficult to do cheap enough is what he really means.
Click to expand...

Yosuke Okunari said that he had considered producing mini versions of the classic consoles, but claimed that the cost of producing parts for either a Dreamcast or Saturn would be prohibitively expensive
Click to expand...

That's what the man said.


I didn't think it was ever going to happen on the hardware the other minis were delivered on.
 
Just wait for Sega to figure out how to produce this for $15. Then you'll get the $80 Saturn Mini with 10 games (maybe 15 in Japan), and then 10 months later, the $90 Saturn Mini 2 with 10 more games.
 
It's not as easy to emulate accurately as the PS1, that's for sure. It's going to need a bit of grunt to do so and those cheap ass socs they use don't cut it.

ReBurn said:
Don't worry Sega, someone is working on this for you.


www.makeuseof.com

What’s the Raspberry Pi CM4 Sega Saturn? What to Expect

The Raspberry Pi CM4 Sega Saturn is a great way to enjoy retro gaming nostalgia, Sega style.
www.makeuseof.com www.makeuseof.com
Click to expand...
That's trash. Any Pi based emulation box is trash. What will it even use for Saturn emulation? Kronos or Yabause? Both are pretty bad and Mednafen Saturn (the only good Saturn emulator) is too demanding for the Pi.


Doczu said:
Ok, a Saturn one might be difficult due to the hardware used, but a RPi 4(00) equivalent hardware can emulate Dreamcast flawlessly on almost all titles.
Don't serve us bullshit Sega
Click to expand...
Mednafen/Beetle Saturn is more demanding than Flycast. It requires a 4th gen i5 CPU to run every game at full speed. That's beyond the capabilities of any Pi device.
 
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My experience is you need something like an i3 / i5 with decent uhd graphics with mednafen
 
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