199 replies to this topic

[viperxmns]

Heh someone's being optimistic.

Maybe we should pretend it's actually happening, keep posting about it and Sega will believe it and release it. It'll totally work.

[Noctourne Wonderland]

Quoted for Posterity:

On July 5, 2011, SEGA will re-release the original game from SEGA Saturn NiGHTS into Dreams. This time SEGA will upgrade Original 3D of Sega Saturn and the remake in 2008 PlayStation 2. SEGA will porting the original game to Playstation 3, Wii, XBOX360.

What does that even mean? "his time SEGA will upgrade Original 3D of Sega Saturn and the remake in 2008 PlayStation 2."? The port will be better than the remake? In 3D?

[Penelopi]

Hot damn, can you say BOOST? The campaign just jumped another 1000 votes.

(No, it only jumped about 50 votes.)

Not 1000, but it has been gaining steam. I've been checking every day, and sometimes I see 15 added within an hour (and then 0-3 the next, but whatever ). There does seem to be more coming per day than before. There's already over 4100.

That Wiki page is awesome! Maybe that particular statement isn't true, but I don't think we should let the page go so easily. I'll dig up my old Wiki account and edit it to say there's a movement that wants that to be true. Then maybe put a link in the other NiGHTS-related Wiki pages.

[TRAViS]

I love the lengths some people will go to to try and spread the word. Though there are better channels with a wider audience...maybe we need some kind of light bribery. A giveaway, if you will. Or would that ruin the point...?

Or even better, who wants to send me the $40 fee so I can get a custom "-NID15-" license plate?

[viperxmns]

Sega is having a Sonic20th hashtag for his b-day, maybe on July 5th whoever among us is on Twitter should spread birthday messages to NiGHTS with a NiD15 hashtag (maybe we can get some Sega people on board too)

[Utter Magic]

I second the hashtag idea, so that we can SPAM THE HELL OUT OF IT on Twitter, and such. I propose #NiGHTS15, or something like that.

What is everyone doing for the actual birthday, by the way? I wanted to do a special cover of one of the songs, but the last few weeks have been hectic and I could only work on a very small part of what I wanted... oh well.


*cough* and I propose a new DreamCast episode *cough* =P




EDIT: I didn't want to not do anything, so I did a rough concept digital thing for NiD15. Here it is!
What do you think?

[Noctourne Wonderland]

That's beautiful, Utter Magic!

I just realized I'll be on a train to NYC tomorrow. No NiGHTS for me. Good thing I have today to do things! Where's the paper?

[Utter Magic]

Hee, thanks, Noctourne!
Sucks that you're going to be on a train tomorrow. Hey, maybe you can fill your mp3 player with NiGHTS-related tunes, and have your own private celebration ; )





EDIT: I did a lengthy blog post about the whole thing, and explaining newcomers a bit about what NiGHTS is. You can check it out over here. Let me know what you think and pass it around, if you feel so inclined!

This is me trying to push this thing as much as I can, heh =P

Edited by Utter Magic, 04 July 2011 - 04:50 PM.

[Utter Magic]

Happy birthday, NiGHTS! =D (GMT)

[viperxmns]

Already dedicated my PSN profile to NiGHTS, in case I'm not on it for a while.. and set my ringtone to Message from Nightopia, just as it was Green Hill for Sonic's b-day

[Utter Magic]

The boards are kind of quiet now, but it feels as if a lot is going on, like everyone is out to buy candles or whatever
=P

[Penelopi]

I was wondering if we would hit the 6000 mark by today, and we did! 6031 so far.

Very Happy Birthday, NiGHTS!

The boards are kind of quiet now, but it feels as if a lot is going on, like everyone is out to buy candles or whatever
=P

Everyone is probably out playing NiD

[GIGA-XISBASS VISITOR]

The boards are kind of quiet now, but it feels as if a lot is going on, like everyone is out to buy candles or whatever
=P

Maybe they're playing NID or JOD. Or anything NIGHTS related like the projects they're working on. I have a NIGHTS RP going on on Fanfiction.net and need RPERS to revive it as everyone stopped RPING. I cant RP without anyone else. Also there's the other NIGHTS RP I'm part of there that's still alive. Plus we need to bet back into the RPING groove with the RPS here on NID.com.

I was wondering if we would hit the 6000 mark by today, and we did! 6031 so far.

Very Happy Birthday, NiGHTS!



Everyone is probably out playing NiD

Dare I say it? WHAT DOES THE SCOUTER SAY BOUT THE VOTING LEVEL? IT'S OVER 6000!!! WHAT 6000!? XD. That I do dare. Be more effective with 9000 but we're a long ways from there.

[Utter Magic]

(...)
Everyone is probably out playing NiD

I'm actually in the process of making my Saturn work and play the game, too! =)

[GIGA-XISBASS VISITOR]

I'm actually in the process of making my Saturn work and play the game, too! =)

Cool.

[iLLViLLAiN]

Fifteen years later and the original game still looks good! Can't say the same for a few other 3D games of that time.

[Utter Magic]

Fifteen years later and the original game still looks good! Can't say the same for a few other 3D games of that time.

Very true. Which is why, I think, the JP PS2 port had the Sega Saturn graphics available as well. They just look good. If a new port is to come, I do hope that the old Saturn graphics (and sounds, if changed) come back for us to remember the old one once all our Sega Saturns are dead (and while no one invents something that can read Saturn games).

[Level 99]

So...shall we start planning for NiD20 yet?

[Jof]

So...shall we start planning for NiD20 yet?

The only way we could top this year is by making a sequel game ourselves (is entering 3rd year of games design)(ohohohohoh).

[infractus]

...it's never too early.

[iLLViLLAiN]

Very true. Which is why, I think, the JP PS2 port had the Sega Saturn graphics available as well. They just look good. If a new port is to come, I do hope that the old Saturn graphics (and sounds, if changed) come back for us to remember the old one once all our Sega Saturns are dead (and while no one invents something that can read Saturn games).

Until you posted this I don't think a lot of people even noticed that Saturn compatible hardware wasn't being made. I mean, there's so many machines made all the time that run Genesis, SNES, and NES games but people seem hesitant when it comes to the 3D stuff. I guess it's copyrights and all but it'd still be nice if a person came along and introduced a machine that could run Saturn games.

[Utter Magic]

So...shall we start planning for NiD20 yet?

Let's do it! I'd actually like to have something to do with it this time around, no matter how small my contribution may be.

Until you posted this I don't think a lot of people even noticed that Saturn compatible hardware wasn't being made. I mean, there's so many machines made all the time that run Genesis, SNES, and NES games but people seem hesitant when it comes to the 3D stuff. I guess it's copyrights and all but it'd still be nice if a person came along and introduced a machine that could run Saturn games.

Exactly. A few months back I was at GAME and I noticed a yellow box with a bunch of old Sonic & Knuckles artwork on it. I went to check it out and it was a little box that you could put Genesis cartridges on it and plug it in to your TV and play it. Until then I had no idea that there were "third party consoles" being made, but it was very interesting to see. Cheap, too, although that can be the case for any number of reasons such as the fact that the Genesis is substantially old.

When's the Saturn anniversary? July 8, 1995 is the retail availability date for Europe. I say we do a Sat16 and ask for a relaunch in Saturn production! =P

[DiGi Valentine]

So...shall we start planning for NiD20 yet?

Ah, NiGHTS 20th. That will surely be a landmark to celebrate. But there is one major problem overlooking that 20th celebration - the blue hedgehog will be celebrating his 25th that year.

In fact, it's always going to be like that. Every time NiGHTS reaches a fifth year milestone so will Sonic. And we all know which series SEGA will be putting money on.

But ...i have a crazy idea ...it probably won't work ...but it's an idea, none the less. Let's see.

[Level 99]

Ah, NiGHTS 20th. That will surely be a landmark to celebrate. But there is one major problem overlooking that 20th celebration - the blue hedgehog will be celebrating his 25th that year.

In fact, it's always going to be like that. Every time NiGHTS reaches a fifth year milestone so will Sonic. And we all know which series SEGA will be putting money on.

But ...i have a crazy idea ...it probably won't work ...but it's an idea, none the less. Let's see.

I like when you have ideas. I like them even more when you tease everyone else. You big ol' tease you. Seriously: we just release what could possibly be one of the grandest scale fan projects for the entire NiGHTS franchise and you're already out teasing an idea for five years down the road? Some things never change. (nor should they!)


I realize you were joking about the Saturn coming back into production, but that got my mind running on a long rant about the Saturn and about 3rd party consoles in-general. So don't take this as an attack on anything, as its just my technical mind goop spilling out.

Going back to the third party console talk, the reason the Saturn has zero third party consoles is one of the same reasons the Saturn failed in the first place (along with the same reason why nobody's been able to emulate the system close to 100% yet): the hardware design was horrendous. I'm not saying it wasn't powerful, I'm not saying it didn't have the potential for making great games, but the big two undeniable issues are a) it was unbelievably expensive to manufacture and it was slapshodily engineered and designed. The Saturn, which debuted at $399 US in 1995 ($566 dollars plus tax in 2011 money, so this thing is similar to a PS3 priced launch with just as many launch titles), was made from numerous off-the-shelf components which were not necessarily designed to work together whatsoever. Like the PS3 it was a multiple core system, probably one of the first of its design. It had two "main cpus", two video processors, one geometry processor/memory access controller, two sound components (one processor + one controller), and one peripheral controller (I'm not counting the controller for the CDRom since that was unprogrammable). In comparison, the playstation 1 had a single main CPU (which had onboard 3d processing and data processing), a single graphics processor, and a single audio processor. Even today, game programmers struggle to efficiently code multi-core games properly, and this is a good 16 years after the Saturn's release. While it is much easier now to do so with more powerful hardware and much better indoctrination for coders to use multiple processing threads, it still is few and far between that the public sees a truly multicore optimized game (a good example of which would be the Uncharted series, which truly takes advantage of all that the Cell processor has to offer). I'm hoping that a lot of this isn't over everyone's heads too much, but since I do programming I can say I'm still astounded at some of the games which game out of the Saturn despite the labrynthian hardware design.

The 3rd party consoles for stuff like the NES, SNES, Genesis, and so on exist because they have been fully documented, completely emulated, and have been deconstructed hardware-wise for so many years. It is easy and cheap to just put together a system designed to run a soft-emulator or a hardcoded emulator with built in roms. Also, since these were cartridge-based systems, the memory size of the cartridges is small enough that modern MicroSD memory is enough capacity in a small space that, even if it weren't to support the original game cartridges, the systems are easy to make. I don't think I've yet seen a 3rd party console for any disc-based game system, even the PS1 which has been emulated for years as well. I still love tinkering with SSF, which is a Saturn emulator made by a single person in Japan, because it is surprisingly sophisticated and fully emulates at least parts of the Saturn hardware. Some stuff isn't 100% yet, nor do I think it ever will be, because the amount of interest in making a Saturn emulator is not proportional to the complexity of the hardware and time needed to completely emulate it.

Porting games for the Saturn is still hard but it CAN be done, and it HAS been done, and hopefully it will CONTINUE to be done.

Holy crap wtf I am such a nerd.

[Utter Magic]

(...)
I realize you were joking about the Saturn coming back into production, but that got my mind running on a long rant about the Saturn and about 3rd party consoles in-general. So don't take this as an attack on anything, as its just my technical mind goop spilling out.

Going back to the third party console talk, the reason the Saturn has zero third party consoles is one of the same reasons the Saturn failed in the first place (along with the same reason why nobody's been able to emulate the system close to 100% yet): the hardware design was horrendous. I'm not saying it wasn't powerful, I'm not saying it didn't have the potential for making great games, but the big two undeniable issues are a) it was unbelievably expensive to manufacture and it was slapshodily engineered and designed. The Saturn, which debuted at $399 US in 1995 ($566 dollars plus tax in 2011 money, so this thing is similar to a PS3 priced launch with just as many launch titles), was made from numerous off-the-shelf components which were not necessarily designed to work together whatsoever. Like the PS3 it was a multiple core system, probably one of the first of its design. It had two "main cpus", two video processors, one geometry processor/memory access controller, two sound components (one processor + one controller), and one peripheral controller (I'm not counting the controller for the CDRom since that was unprogrammable). In comparison, the playstation 1 had a single main CPU (which had onboard 3d processing and data processing), a single graphics processor, and a single audio processor. Even today, game programmers struggle to efficiently code multi-core games properly, and this is a good 16 years after the Saturn's release. While it is much easier now to do so with more powerful hardware and much better indoctrination for coders to use multiple processing threads, it still is few and far between that the public sees a truly multicore optimized game (a good example of which would be the Uncharted series, which truly takes advantage of all that the Cell processor has to offer). I'm hoping that a lot of this isn't over everyone's heads too much, but since I do programming I can say I'm still astounded at some of the games which game out of the Saturn despite the labrynthian hardware design.

The 3rd party consoles for stuff like the NES, SNES, Genesis, and so on exist because they have been fully documented, completely emulated, and have been deconstructed hardware-wise for so many years. It is easy and cheap to just put together a system designed to run a soft-emulator or a hardcoded emulator with built in roms. Also, since these were cartridge-based systems, the memory size of the cartridges is small enough that modern MicroSD memory is enough capacity in a small space that, even if it weren't to support the original game cartridges, the systems are easy to make. I don't think I've yet seen a 3rd party console for any disc-based game system, even the PS1 which has been emulated for years as well. I still love tinkering with SSF, which is a Saturn emulator made by a single person in Japan, because it is surprisingly sophisticated and fully emulates at least parts of the Saturn hardware. Some stuff isn't 100% yet, nor do I think it ever will be, because the amount of interest in making a Saturn emulator is not proportional to the complexity of the hardware and time needed to completely emulate it.

Porting games for the Saturn is still hard but it CAN be done, and it HAS been done, and hopefully it will CONTINUE to be done.

Holy crap wtf I am such a nerd.

Yeah, the Saturn was ahead of its time when it came out, but in a bad way. I've heard of game developers and game companies back in the day were kind of trying to steer clear of doing games for the Saturn because it was horrendous to work with. Japan had the most lasting stock of Saturns, taking them off production only in 2000, while North America and Europe let them go in 1998-ish.

And, yes, it's a lot easier to work with cartridge-based systems, for any number of reasons. Truth is, leaving all those reasons aside, those systems were also better designed than the Saturn was.
Speaking of which, why is it that emulation of systems post-PSOne is so hard? And why has SEGA steered clear of making game consoles?

[DiGi Valentine]

I like when you have ideas. I like them even more when you tease everyone else. You big ol' tease you. Seriously: we just release what could possibly be one of the grandest scale fan projects for the entire NiGHTS franchise and you're already out teasing an idea for five years down the road? Some things never change. (nor should they!)

Lololol. Well, let's see, dude. Let's see. I guess my brain never really shuts up, does it, lol. And i said after Lucid Dreaming i was gonna take a break. XD;;;

I mean, from where i'm sitting, for the first time since the run up to Journey of Dreams, SEGA got one hell of a response when they mentioned the name NiGHTS. I know of the guy who made that post on FaceBook and i highly doubt anybody in the office expected such a massive response in such a short time. I ain't lying when i say this, according to what i've been told (and from my own thorough checking) no other post on the official SEGA FaceBook page has had a response that huge in at least two months. And that actually includes any Sonic Generations posts made on the SEGA page too.

Think about that for a second. SEGA are hyping the hell out of Sonic Generations, it's the hedgehogs biggest birthday yet. While Sonic will obviously get more support on his own facebook page (and he has done so, with something like 6000+ likes), on the main SEGA one it has been a NiGHTS related post that ushered in a wave of likes and comments on a grand scale. Lol, no no, i'm not saying NiGHTS is bigger than Sonic, that would be a dumb thing to say ...but what i am saying (and this is what i have been saying to SEGA all along) is that the NiGHTS community is small for the simple fact that we don't have a lot to our name anyway so the community itself will obviously be tiny. But ask people in the general gaming populace if they thought NiGHTS was cool back in the day and you're gonna get some good numbers to count through, lol. What happened on the FaceBook page confirmed my theory. I hope it's opened their eyes.

Honestly, with any luck, i'm praying for a great new start for NiGHTS. Maybe in five years time we won't need to do anything at all and it will just be natural. I guess what our goal really is right now is to start planting the ideas in to SEGA's mind FOR what can happen in the next five years. Don't wait until 2016 to come around and then ask SEGA where NiGHTS is. You want to show them NiGHTS now. Show them you still care.

It's all about planting the idea's now.

Well, i say that but it ain't just SEGA that needs to be clear on things. I feel our community may need to have a big ol' heart to heart chat about our stance on things as well.

Again, all in due time.

[TRAViS]

But ask people in the general gaming populace if they thought NiGHTS was cool back in the day and you're gonna get some good numbers to count through, lol. What happened on the FaceBook page confirmed my theory. I hope it's opened their eyes.

It's honestly strange that a game/franchise with as little to its name as NiGHTS is so widely recognized, especially when you consider its host system was short-lived and forgotten under the Playstation (and, later, the N64). The distinct lack of a flagship Sonic game was probably a big help, all things considered...

Yet I still wonder what it is about the NiGHTS franchise specifically that drew such a massive response. Is it trendy to like things with a niche following? Is everyone a hipster now? Or is my dream coming true...that everyone's finally fed up with games where the story's shoved down your throat like a movie, and want something light on story with plenty of room to fill in the gaps with your own content?

Either way. The more exposure, the better, and maybe someday I won't need to explain NiGHTS to everybody who asks what that "jester," "sonic thing," "purple clown," or "stripper*" on my background is. >_<

And NiD20? Hmm. Time to sharpen up my programming skills.

*Yes, someone actually asked this. I skipped the explanation and just said it was something from a Sonic game. An awkward 10 seconds later it was never brought up again.

[Level 99]

LOL Travis, that was amazing. NiGHTS into stripclubs. Totally worth it.

Oh, and I really want to just throw all caution to the wind and write a fanfic where NiGHTS and Reala are two human soldiers fighting in World War 2, occupied Germany. They experience loss, hardship, but in the end the bonds of camaraderie overcome their differences and they go on to save the day. I think Sega would totally buy into NiGHTS if it were a CoD clone, right?


Guys?


......


(no seriously, I'll come up with a better idea eventually)

Oh, and going back to emulation, the reason post-PS1 systems are so hard to emulate is that their innards are as fast as modern PC components AND specialized. If it were just another run of the mill pc it would be fine, but we're talking mostly RISC (reduced instruction set CPU) processors and streamlined systems with their own coding parameters. I'm blown away that the PS2 has been able to be emualted as it is if only by nature of its video processor being ridiculously complex. It has some of the fastest ram to exist at the time but the size of ram was so low that it couldn't be used for texture buffering unless you pulled some really smart coding tricks. I doubt that we'll be able to emulate the cell processor for at least another 10-15 years. The XBOX hasn't been emulated due to lack of interest (the majority of things put on the xbox were also ported to pc, and ironically the xbox is the closest thing to being a vanilla computer game system). The gamecube has some pretty good emulation going on right now, and it can also emulate the Wii pretty well. Dreamcast has some tight emulation going on, though definitely still buggy in certain areas.

[CROSSiNG]

Oh, and I really want to just throw all caution to the wind and write a fanfic where NiGHTS and Reala are two human soldiers fighting in World War 2, occupied Germany. They experience loss, hardship, but in the end the bonds of camaraderie overcome their differences and they go on to save the day. I think Sega would totally buy into NiGHTS if it were a CoD clone, right?

Just add Jackle and I'm on board

Oh, and going back to emulation, the reason post-PS1 systems are so hard to emulate is that their innards are as fast as modern PC components AND specialized. If it were just another run of the mill pc it would be fine, but we're talking mostly RISC (reduced instruction set CPU) processors and streamlined systems with their own coding parameters. I'm blown away that the PS2 has been able to be emualted as it is if only by nature of its video processor being ridiculously complex. It has some of the fastest ram to exist at the time but the size of ram was so low that it couldn't be used for texture buffering unless you pulled some really smart coding tricks. I doubt that we'll be able to emulate the cell processor for at least another 10-15 years. The XBOX hasn't been emulated due to lack of interest (the majority of things put on the xbox were also ported to pc, and ironically the xbox is the closest thing to being a vanilla computer game system). The gamecube has some pretty good emulation going on right now, and it can also emulate the Wii pretty well. Dreamcast has some tight emulation going on, though definitely still buggy in certain areas.

Or they could remake it completely the same just with better graphics. That would most likely be easier.

[Noctourne Wonderland]

LOL Travis, that was amazing. NiGHTS into stripclubs. Totally worth it.

Oh, and I really want to just throw all caution to the wind and write a fanfic where NiGHTS and Reala are two human soldiers fighting in World War 2, occupied Germany. They experience loss, hardship, but in the end the bonds of camaraderie overcome their differences and they go on to save the day. I think Sega would totally buy into NiGHTS if it were a CoD clone, right?


Guys?


......


(no seriously, I'll come up with a better idea eventually)

NAZi into Dreams? There's potential! I want to draw Reala in an SS uniform now...

[viperxmns]

Big question: Is this possibly something we should be excited about http://segabits.com/...ng-to-a-job-ad/

[Saifer Dracondrali]

I... don't have high hopes.
BUT I will try to stay optimistic.
Gimme mah NiGHTS! D=<

[iLLViLLAiN]

Like Saifer, I'm not expecting much. I fear it really will be Sonic's limelight hogging you-know-what once a-fracking-gain. Not that I have any problems with Sonic but you know where I'm coming from.

[Noctourne Wonderland]

Don't Colors and Generations count as a new standard for Sonic? I doubt it will be NiGHTS, since we just got JoD, but you never know...

[Sundial]

I've learned that getting my hopes up too much usually results in them eventually getting horribly smashed to bits, so I'm just going to sit back and watch. If it's NiGHTS, woo! If not, maybe it's another series I could get into? (that's not Sonic)

[Saifer Dracondrali]

Don't Colors and Generations count as a new standard for Sonic? I doubt it will be NiGHTS, since we just got JoD, but you never know...

Well... it worked for em both times didn't it? lol
At this point though I think other titles have a better shot at this... Jet Set Radio (wouldn't mind that one bit), Skies of Arcadia (I DEFINITELY wouldn't mind that), etc.
But what the hey... I'll keep my fingers crossed for NiGHTS.

[iVYRAVE]

Has SEGA said anything since that facebook comment on NiGHTS' birthday?

[viperxmns]

^Nothing more so far

[Draikin]

Are there actually any other websites like nid15.com for other classic Saturn titles? I'm asking because I'm currently working on a website similar to nid15.com but for the Panzer Dragoon series. Panzer Dragoon Saga has its 15th anniversary next year, with the XBox title Panzer Dragoon Orta also reaching its 10 year anniversary at the end of the year. Couple that with the upcoming release of Project Draco, the Saturn conversions to XBLA and the ongoing support for nid15.com, and there's really no better time to start this project and try to get Sega to port the old Panzer Dragoon games to XBLA/PSN.

Obviously I'd have my website link to nid15.com, as I still regard the original NiGHTS to be one of the best games I've ever played. I hope nid15.com could then do the same and link back to my website, as I think we could only benefit from the synergy between the two communities. I'm currently coding the website from the ground up and I still have quite a bit of work to do, but I hope to have it up and running in a couple of weeks from now.

[Alex Atkin UK]

Come on SEGA, I want me some:


I have resorted to playing the PS2 remake on PCSX2 with an Xbox 360 pad, which actually feels odd with the looser analog sticks (though better than on a real PS2 as those are even more loose and poorly located on the pad).

I swear its harder to score links too as it seems to timeout faster. Is that perhaps the difference between NTSC and PAL timings in the game? I never tried the NTSC Saturn version to see if it felt different.