​

After twenty long years of suffering caused by the Sega Saturn's infamous hardware-based DRM, James Laird-Wah, a computer engineer known as "Dr Abrasive", has finally cracked the twenty year-old console. This DRM was so unique due to its mechanic that required a special groove to be present in all its CDs, requiring a rare modchip for any kind of homebrew. This solution involves a USB emulation of the disc drive.

This is not a public release as of yet, but this represents major progress for the Saturn homebrew community as hardware testing will now be much more accessible. Post your thoughts below!

Interview with Dr Abrasive:
​

 

[Pluupy]

Maybe he should've waited 200 years so this accomplishment would actually be impressive, like an archaeological discovery. Make a leather notebook, use a heavy ink pen, and write in cursive his findings.

 

[DaFixer]

I think Sega Saturn's emulation is the worst for any system I've ever seen. All the 5th generation consoles in particular were difficult.

That becase the Saturn is a nightmare to make games for, worse then the PS3.
It uses a dual cpu architecture and eight co processors....
And to make worse both CPU's uses the same data bus, so programing that all run on the same time was a real pain in the *ss.

I think if it was easy to make games for the saturn,then we really have seen the power of saturn.
Only Panzer Dragoon Saga and the Shenmue proto demo real shows what the saturn can do.

 

[Meteor7]

All of my excitement. Hugely impressive feat of reverse-engineering aside, I would be jazzed if I can eventually buy a card, slot it into my old, dusty Saturn, and have access to backups and homebrew on my Saturn.

 

[XiTaU]

Currently use Pseudo Saturn but this would be much nicer if he ever releases the board just plug in a usb full of games instead of changing cd's and hoping your drive doesnt die.

 

[GuyInDogSuit]

Would this be better than Rhea and Phoebe since you could run backups and still have a free CD drive and RAM slot for games and accessories?

Assuming this ever becomes publicly sold.

What are those?

i have a racket boy modchip in my saturn fully working still but doesnt play well with burning rangers :/
awsum news however

I used to have one, too. Model 1 Saturn for the win. All my games worked on it, even Burning Rangers. Must have been your rip.

I think Sega Saturn's emulation is the worst for any system I've ever seen. All the 5th generation consoles in particular were difficult.

Yes, it is, I agree. Most games would not even boot.

 

[kingraa777]

What are those?



I used to have one, too. Model 1 Saturn for the win. All my games worked on it, even Burning Rangers. Must have been your rip.



Yes, it is, I agree. Most games would not even boot.

it has problems in the fmvs they dont want to play the rip is fine i tried with an emulator the same iso
???

 

[civickm]

Sweet nice work!

 

[hollowtip]

What are you guys on about? The Saturn's AP protection was broken years ago, we just lacked a writer capable of reproducing the non-digital protection strip (Rings of Saturn, one of which is wobbly data while the other is literally a logo burned into the surface) on the disc. The modchips aren't "rare" and they're comparatively simple to replicate, the ring data is available, the mechanism is well-known and relatively understood, homebrew is plentiful and even without a hardware solution you could still disc swap using any original Saturn disc to bypass checks - the AP is a complete non-issue in 99% of the games, the latter 1% being games with custom AP and random ToC/loading checks in-gameplay, and even those can be mitigated. The one and only benefit here is ODDE loading, which is indeed an amazing feat as lasers all die eventually and mechanical/optical drives should be replaced as soon as possible, but to say that it's a groundbreaking development is a bit of a stretch.

That's probably why it took twenty years, not because it was really difficult. Not a lot of people were interested in cracking DRM as functional workarounds were already available.

 

[Foxi4]

That's probably why it took twenty years, not because it was really difficult. Not a lot of people were interested in cracking DRM as functional workarounds were already available.

Few attempts were made, but as mentioned in the video, reading the ROM, even with a microscope, was problematic and ultimately unsuccessful. That, coupled with lack of interest and the fact that the console was an underdog to begin with all contributed to a lack of meaningful development and a mostly guesswork-based approach. The same applies to the original Xbox - most of its top titles were made available on PC so we *still* don't have a decent emulator or a complete instruction set of the custom NV2.5 GPU. That, and the documentation for both systems is extremely scarce.

 

[robertman2]

Few attempts were made, but as mentioned in the video, reading the ROM, even with a microscope, was problematic and ultimately unsuccessful. That, coupled with lack of interest and the fact that the console was an underdog to begin with all contributed to a lack of meaningful development and a mostly guesswork-based approach. The same applies to the original Xbox - most of its top titles were made available on PC so we *still* don't have a decent emulator or a complete instruction set of the custom NV2.5 GPU. That, and the documentation for both systems is extremely scarce.

Too bad the port of Halo 2 sucks

 

[Kurt91]

I'm a little curious about something. I keep reading that all of the different developers who made games for the Saturn found it too difficult to learn how to use both processors efficiently and limited themselves to only using one, and it was too difficult to deal with the 4-sided polygons so they "cheated" them into 3-sided polygons even though the extra side was supposed to reduce the number of polygons needed to make a model. I also read that theoretically, the Saturn was supposed to be a more powerful system than the N64 and PlayStation. Were there any games that used the Saturn to it's full potential, and showed off the absolute upper limits of what the system could do?

By the way, off-topic, but I also remember something about there being code to do things much better for the N64 as well, that was declared off-limits by Nintendo. Is there anything that shows off what that system could have done as well, if the developers had permission to go balls-to-the-walls with the system? (But anyways, Saturn topic, so feel free to ignore this second question.)

 

[robertman2]

I'm a little curious about something. I keep reading that all of the different developers who made games for the Saturn found it too difficult to learn how to use both processors efficiently and limited themselves to only using one, and it was too difficult to deal with the 4-sided polygons so they "cheated" them into 3-sided polygons even though the extra side was supposed to reduce the number of polygons needed to make a model. I also read that theoretically, the Saturn was supposed to be a more powerful system than the N64 and PlayStation. Were there any games that used the Saturn to it's full potential, and showed off the absolute upper limits of what the system could do?

By the way, off-topic, but I also remember something about there being code to do things much better for the N64 as well, that was declared off-limits by Nintendo. Is there anything that shows off what that system could have done as well, if the developers had permission to go balls-to-the-walls with the system? (But anyways, Saturn topic, so feel free to ignore this second question.)

Panzer Dragoon Saga and the Shenmue prototypes for the Saturn, and Conker for the N64, I believe

 

[GuyInDogSuit]

<snip>

I'm a little curious about something. I keep reading that all of the different developers who made games for the Saturn found it too difficult to learn how to use both processors efficiently and limited themselves to only using one, and it was too difficult to deal with the 4-sided polygons so they "cheated" them into 3-sided polygons even though the extra side was supposed to reduce the number of polygons needed to make a model. I also read that theoretically, the Saturn was supposed to be a more powerful system than the N64 and PlayStation. Were there any games that used the Saturn to it's full potential, and showed off the absolute upper limits of what the system could do?

By the way, off-topic, but I also remember something about there being code to do things much better for the N64 as well, that was declared off-limits by Nintendo. Is there anything that shows off what that system could have done as well, if the developers had permission to go balls-to-the-walls with the system? (But anyways, Saturn topic, so feel free to ignore this second question.)

The Panzer Dragoon series, specifically Saga/Azel. The Saturn was also a better 2D system than the Playstation, though it could NOT do transparencies, so some games, for example, Akumajo Dracula X: Gekka no Yasoukyoku (Japanese Symphony of the Night), had issues with transparencies and slowdowns, making the game rather inferior to its PS1 counterpart, despite the additions.

 

[the_randomizer]

I'm a little curious about something. I keep reading that all of the different developers who made games for the Saturn found it too difficult to learn how to use both processors efficiently and limited themselves to only using one, and it was too difficult to deal with the 4-sided polygons so they "cheated" them into 3-sided polygons even though the extra side was supposed to reduce the number of polygons needed to make a model. I also read that theoretically, the Saturn was supposed to be a more powerful system than the N64 and PlayStation. Were there any games that used the Saturn to it's full potential, and showed off the absolute upper limits of what the system could do?

By the way, off-topic, but I also remember something about there being code to do things much better for the N64 as well, that was declared off-limits by Nintendo. Is there anything that shows off what that system could have done as well, if the developers had permission to go balls-to-the-walls with the system? (But anyways, Saturn topic, so feel free to ignore this second question.)

Yeah,. there were two modes, Turbo3D and Fast3D microcode, one (Fast3D) had an output of 100,000 triangles/sec and the other(Turbo3D) could go as high as 300-400,000/second, but Nintendo discouraged its used due to graphical degradation. However, companies like Boss Game Studios, Factor 5, Rare all wrote custom microcode to do insane things. World Racing Championship pushed the limits of the N64 with polygons that had a higher count than the average PSX game, supposedly. Factor 5 did some insane things with the N64 hardware as well.

Getting back to the Saturn, many developers had a helluva time because the hardware was a royal PITA to develop for, the dual processors added to that, and the fact the polygons used quads and not triangles; a very weird design choice.

 

[AyanamiRei0]

View attachment 55902
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After twenty long years of suffering caused by the Sega Saturn's infamous hardware-based DRM, James Laird-Wah, a computer engineer known as "Dr Abrasive", has finally cracked the twenty year-old console. This DRM was so unique due to its mechanic that required a special groove to be present in all its CDs, requiring a rare modchip for any kind of homebrew. This solution involves a USB emulation of the disc drive.

This is not a public release as of yet, but this represents major progress for the Saturn homebrew community as hardware testing will now be much more accessible. Post your thoughts below!

Interview with Dr Abrasive:
​

This was pretty interesting to say the least.

 

[Schizoanalysis]

I have about 6 of these "rare" modchips.

Guess I'm lucky..

 

[raulpica]

Jeez, I can understand Haider Raza being a n00b/fail-troll/whatever, but what about you older members steering this thread off-topic THAT much? You should've known better

 

[Foxi4]

Jeez, I can understand Haider Raza being a n00b/fail-troll/whatever, but what about you older members steering this thread off-topic THAT much? You should've known better

It was related by extension - we're essentially talking about three absolute losers when it comes to console wars. The Saturn fell on its face everywhere except Japan, much like the Vita and the Wii U did, although with Wii U it's the North American audience that embraced it. You're right though, we've gone too far off track.

 

[Dr Eggman]

I'm not sure why all the negativity : regardless, this is a breakthrough in the sense that it is using the VCD card slot instead of disk drive emulation or cartridge motherboard access.

I don't think it's adequate to say "well we have Rhea" when it's prohibitively expensive and small batch produced. I couldn't get one, and paying 165€ for that? I'm sorry, I could buy like 3-4 Saturn's, chip them, and burn disks until their lasers die. In addition, you lose the functionality of being able to play disks (my big problem with it and GDEMU)

I welcome this progress , especially considering how we never saw any progress from the "saroo" cartridge. Though it was open sourced. Maybe someone will be willing to take on the torch and get pcb and software working.

 

[The Catboy]

I am actually kind of impressed that it took this long to actually hack. Compared to the Dreamcast, which was just pathetic.