Quite some time ago, I was provided with the email of Jim Trethewey
from a fellow Sonic researcher to conduct an interview with him, who helped
in the porting of Sonic CD to PC.
It was posted on my failed Sonic CD PC Hacking Guide on the SSRG.
Note that I'm not in association with them anymore and, obviously, my email
and the webpage listed at the end are now different. =P
Here is the email interview I conducted with him. =)
My email:
From: Ryoga Masaki
To: Jim Trethewey
Subject: Your resume & experience with Sega...
Date: Fri, 22 Sep 2000 05:42:45 -0400 (EDT)
Dear Mr. Trethewey:
My name is Ryoga Masaki, and I am writing to you on behalf
of the Sonic Stuff Research Group (SSRG). It's come to ou attention that at
one time, you assisted Sega in porting a Sonic the Hedgehog game from the Genesis
to the PC.
I would now reccommend looking at our site, located at http://ssrg.emulationzone.org,
to get a better idea about us. We are a group of dedicated Sonic the Hedgehog
video game fans who wish to catalog everything about said games... including
their secrets. There are many loose ends in the Sonic video games that we must
tie up, and that involves researching the origins of the games, the original
creators, etc.
With that said, I have a few questions that I would be most
obliged to you if you would answer. I realize that Sega may have put you under
contract or a "vow" of secrecy to what the content of the game was, but anything
you can or are willing to answer would aid us greatly.
1) There were several games released from Sega for the PC,
most of which were ports from Genesis. Could you please specify which game?
We suspect it was Sonic the Hedgehog CD, but it could have been Sonic & Knuckles
Collection (Sonic 3, Sonic & Knuckles, Sonic 3 & Knuckles).
Our main source of concern lies in the area of Sonic CD
for PC. Hence, most of these questions will relate to that game. If you worked
on Sonic & Knuckles Collection or a different port instead, please ignore the
questions:
2) In Sonic CD, while porting it, were you ever aware, or
did you ever hear anything of a possible \R2 directory? The current level structure
jumps from R1 to R3, and R2, a long-lost missing level, is, of course, not there.
3) Could you please give an overview of how the DLLs relating
to Sonic CD are layed out, and what their routines are? We have managed to edit
Sonic CD graphics, tiles, and music, but the actual PC port programming still
mystifies us.
4) Were there any planned upgrades from the Genesis/Sega
CD version to the PC version? In other words, were there any plans made to increase
the playability and take more advantage of the computers power in the port?
5) We have found a secret Level Select menu and a Debugger
menu in Sonic CD for PC. Most of the commands listed are self-explanatory; however,
if you could, a rundown on each command would be very nice.
6) When you worked on the port, was the Windows graphics
system using DINO or DirectX? We have discovered two versions of the Sonic CD
port, each of which ueses either the former or latter of what I said previously.
I am sure there are many, many questions we would like to
ask, and if you don't mind, I'd like to keep an open communication between you
and the SSRG.
Thank you for your time! We are most appreciative at even
the smallest amount of information you can give us.
-Ryoga Masaki
http://ssrg.emulationzone.org/scdhack
http://www.segasonic.net/ryogamasaki
His reply:
From: Jim Trethewey
Subject: Re: Your resume & experience with Sega...
Date: September 23, 2000 1:09:05 AM EDT
To: Ryoga Masaki
>My name is Ryoga Masaki, and I am writing to you on behalf of the Sonic
>Stuff Research Group (SSRG). It's come to our attention that at one time, you
>assisted Sega in porting a Sonic the Hedgehog game from the Genesis to the
>PC.
That is true.
>With that said, I have a few questions that I would be most obliged
to you
>if you would answer. I realize that Sega may have put you under contract or
>a "vow" of secrecy to what the content of the game was, but anything you can
>or are willing to answer would aid us greatly.
The NDA's (Non Disclosure Agreements) were for a period of 18 months
after shipment, and that has now expired, so I should be able to tell you anything
that I can remember.
>1) There were several games released from Sega for the PC, most of which
>were ports from Genesis. Could you please specify which game? We suspect it
>was Sonic the Hedgehog CD, but it could have been Sonic & Knuckles
>Collection (Sonic 3, Sonic & Knuckles, Sonic 3 & Knuckles).
Sonic CD was first. The idea was supposedly "hatched" at a Silicon Valley
face-to-face meeting of Andy Grove (who then was CEO of Intel; he is now chairman
of the board) and the CEO of Sega. I think his name was Idei-san or Toyoda-san.
I can't remember. I may be confusing with our relationship with Sony!
Back then, the only "good" games were on consoles, or ran on MS-DOS.
The only games that ran on Windows were card games like Solitaire. But DOS was
very limiting, many people were trying to use "DOS extenders" (e.g., Tenberry's
DOS/4G) to work around the problem. We wanted to "fix Windows". Direct X had
not been invented yet (DirectSound 1.0 and DirectDraw 1.0 were introduced after
Sonic CD was completed, and it was much longer before Direct3D, DirectInput,
or DirectPlay came along).
The original Sonic CD game (for the Genesis CD player, and later CDX)
was developed by a team on Kanpachi-dori Ave. (Haneda, Ota-ku, Tokyo) in 1993.
The group that ported the code from assembler to MS-C was around the
corner and down the street in a nondescript, concrete, leased office building
(I think it was called the HK Building, on Route 181, Nishi-kojiya, Ota-ku,
Tokyo... I went there on two separate trips). The technical lead engineer (he
called himself the "planner") was Junetsu Kakuta. His team did only the "raw
game" port. The business manager of the Sega PC software group was Shinjii Fujiwara.
This happened in the summer of 1995 (we started in March or April, and shipped
around October.... most of the "crunch work" was in June, July, and August).
The Windows game library work ("Dino", later officially called "RSX",
the "Realistic Sound Experience") was done by Ken Rhodes and his team in the
Intel Architecture Labs ("Jones Farm" site, Hillsboro, Oregon). "Dino" was a
bunch of DLLs for Windows that mimicked the kinds of graphics and audio operations
that were available on the Genesis, but do them on Windows. An engineer named
Rohan Coelho was another one of the smart guys on that team.
I did all the remaining Windows work: the Install program, joystick calibration
utility, menu bar, dialog boxes, help files, and so on. I was part of Intel's
OPSD (OEM Products and Services Division, "Hawthorn Farm" site, also Hillsboro,
Oregon). Our goal was OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) distribution of
the game. I was supported by a team of about 20 quality testers who worked on
the game for about 4 months, checking for interoperability with other Windows
applications, compatibility with adapter cards & drivers of various OEMs.
We ended up selling about 5 million copies of the OEM version of the
game. Over 3 million of those went to Packard Bell. Another big buyer was Hewlett
Packard. And a handful of others. The games was "bundled" with PC's, i.e., came
"in the box" with new PC's.
Sega PC group also developed a "retail" version of Sonic CD, later. I
think they used DirectX for that. They changed the Help->About dialog box, and
took out all the credits for the Intel contributors.
I still have a copy of the OEM version.
Sega PC also developed "Virtual On!" for the PC (don't know if it ever
shipped to retail, I don't have a copy).
They also did the "Sonic & Knuckles Collection" which consists of: "Sonic
the Hedgehog 3", "Sonic & Knuckles", and "Sonic 3 & Knuckles". I have a copy
of that.
I am also fairly certain that they did "Sonic Spinball" for the PC as
well. I swear I had a copy of that, but cannot find it now.
I personally worked ONLY on the OEM version of Sonic CD.
>Our main source of concern lies in the area of Sonic CD for PC. Hence,
most
>of these questions will relate to that game. If you worked on Sonic &
>Knuckles Collection or a different port instead, please ignore the >questions:
>2) In Sonic CD, while porting it, were you ever aware, or did you ever
hear
>anything of a possible \R2 directory? The current level structure jumps from
>R1 to R3, and R2, a long-lost missing level, is, of course, not there.
Kakuta-san explained to me the manner in which the games was developed:
each level was "owned" (coded and debugged) by a single engineer, so there was
a separate engineer for each level (they were in charge of all three "phases"
of the level, "past", "present", and "future"). These engineers worked entirely
in parallel and independently. Kakuta-san did the "framework" code to "hold
all the levels together". He said the original (Genesis version) of the game
was done the same way. I asked about the R2 level. Although not explicitly stated,
my impression from him is that the designer of level R2 didn't do a very good
job, so they left it out of the final product. It was never shipped in any form.
>3) Could you please give an overview of how the DLLs relating to Sonic
CD
>are layed out, and what their routines are? We have managed to edit Sonic CD
>graphics, tiles, and music, but the actual PC port programming still
>mystifies us.
I don't have the Dino specs. You'd have to ask Ken Rhodes about that.
I still have my source code for the other stuff (menu bar, dialog boxes,
joystick cal), but I think you would not find that interesting at all.
The amazing bit was how they translated the game from assembler to C,
because the code was very funny -- when I read it on the screen (I don't have
a copy) in the office in Tokyo, it was obvious that the C code was "emulating"
the assembler code logic, rather than being a "fresh re-design".
>4) Were there any planned upgrades from the Genesis/Sega CD version
to the
>PC version? In other words, were there any plans made to increase the
>playability and take more advantage of the computers power in the port?
Absolutely not. It was always stated, and required, that the PC version
of the game be as faithful a copy to the Genesis game as possible. Realize that
our goal was to show that a Pentium processor based PC running Windows could
be "as good" (or better) than a console. The only way we could honestly show
that was by doing an "apples to apples" comparison (as exact a port as possible),
rather than an "apples to oranges" situation. The ONLY part of the game I remember
us consciously re-doing was the Save Game screen, which was very unintuitive
in the Genesis version.
>5) We have found a secret Level Select menu and a Debugger menu in Sonic
CD
>for PC. Most of the commands listed are self-explanatory; however, if you
>could, a rundown on each command would be very nice.
I will have to look at my records on my PC at work to find those. I may
or may not have that information any more.
The purpose of those things was for our 20 testers, e.g., in order to
test the last level, they didn't have to play it all the way from the beginning.
Also, the coders in Tokyo on Kakuta-san's team only were interested in debugging
the levels that each one was responsible for.
>6) When you worked on the port, was the Windows graphics system using
DINO
>or DirectX? We have discovered two versions of the Sonic CD port, each of
>which ueses either the former or latter of what I said previously.
We used Dino. That was for the OEM version.
As I said earlier, I was pretty sure they rewrote it using DirectX for
the retail version, which shipped about a year later.
>I am sure there are many, many questions we would like to ask, and if
you
>don't mind, I'd like to keep an open communication between you and the SSRG.
That would be fine.
>Thank you for your time! We are most appreciative at even the smallest
>amount of information you can give us.
Glad to help.
It was quite a while ago (about five years), and many things are forgotten.
--JimT
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