[Found: Savage Quest] Dinosaur / T-Rex arcade game @ Segaworld Trocadero

[DamienD]

After reading Paul's "KLOV" thread it jogged my memory about something. Yes I know this section is really for Amiga games but I thought I might give it a shot anyway...

Back in 1999-2000 when I first arrived in London I used to go to Segaworld Trocadero every now and then with my twin brother. We used to play this awesome "Dinosaur" / "T-Rex" based game. It was 3D, you controlled a T-Rex and ran through lucious scrolling landscapes (left to right) fighting other dinosaurs etc. There were huge bosses at the end of the levels, I remember one where you'd come into a sort of ring / fighting pit and there was this huge contraption being controlled by cavemen.

I've been racking my brain for years trying to remember what it's called. I've checked various sites like The Killer List of Videogames (KLOV), System 16 - The Arcade Museum and many others but have been unable to find any mention of it at all. As far as I'm aware it also hasn't been released in MAME32 as yet

Anybody ever play this game at Segaworld Trocadero? Even better, anyone remember what it was called

[Galahad/FLT]

Primeval Hunt?

http://www.segaarcade.com/video/primevalhunt.aspx

[DamienD]

Thanks for the suggestion Galahad but unfortunately it's not this.

You used a joystick to control the T-Rex and there were two buttons. From memory one was "run" and the other was "attack".

Also, in one of the levels you were running through a forest type landscape, there were rivers / creeks cutting through and Deinonychus or Compsognathus would attack you.

Finally, another end of level boss was a Stegosaurus or Triceratops.

[DamienD]

I've created a post over at the MAMEWorld Forums, hopefully somebody knows this game

[DDNI]

Savage Quest? [ Show youtube player ]

[DamienD]

Absolutely legendary. One of the MAMEDevs Phil Bennett guessed it 7 minutes after I posted

The game is called "Savage Quest", see a YouTube video [ Show youtube player ]

[DamienD]

Just read some infomation about the game on KLOV:

Very Rare - There is one known instance of Savage Quest owned by one of our 900 members. It is an original dedicated machine (not another machine converted with a kit).

Of the 56,746 video games (3,416 unique) tracked by the Video Game Preservation Society, this game ranks a 1 on a scale out of 100 (100 = most commonly seen, 1=least common) in popularity based on ownership records.

Doesn't look like this will be emulated in MAME32 anytime soon

[Retroplay]

I wonder what hardware this game runs on besides the Pentium III processor.
http://www.answers.com/topic/savage-quest

[DamienD]

Years later and still "Savage Quest" doesn't work in the latest version of MAME

[Amiga1992]

Originally Posted by DamienD

Doesn't look like this will be emulated in MAME32 anytime soon

This is a PC probably with a 3D videocard, maybe a Voodoo?
[ Show youtube player ]

[DamienD]

Yes, it is a PC with Voodoo card.

From memory in later versions of MAME it gets past what is shown in that video i.e. passes the BIOS, floppy drive, sees the compressed hard drive, starts to load in DOS etc. but that's about all.

Hopefully someday it will be fully emulated

[Amiga1992]

Maybe the solution is to make tehse ROMs work on DosBox? Does DosBox have Voodoo 3dfx emulation?

[DamienD]

It's a good suggestion but can't imagine it's that simple.

I mean, I haven't used DOSBox in years. It does support Voodoo 3DFX as far as I'm aware but:

• Don't think it supports .CHD files?
• How do you see what files are being loaded / reside on the .CHD in order to create the "Config.sys" & "Autoexec.bat" files, plus required drivers and then load the actual game from whatever directory it's stored in?
• How do you tell it to also load / use the required ROMs?
• How do you setup arcade DIP switches / controls?
• etc...

The MAME guys are very smart cookies. If it's not fully emulated yet i.e. not even starting / showing the game then...

Anyway, I'm a patient man... Sure it will happen at some stage

[Amiga1992]

I am thinking that if Toni managed to make the Laserdisc arcades work on WinUAE, you can surely take DosBox and make these things run.

But for that you need DosBox to be still developed (its status is uncertain to me) and a developer that wants to add this support.

Since MAME opens the CHD images and all, it means there is source out there talking about them, accessing them and using them.

It has nothing to do with the MAME team not being smart. Sometimes the emulation is not there because there's just not a way to make it happen in that framework. Things like licenses come to mind.

It's the same reason why, I am guessing, Toni was asked to include Voodoo emulation on WinUAE because it was available in MAME, but there were a bunch of obstacles to do so, but they had nothing to do with anyone "not being smart".

Perhaps the MAME guys just can't, for whatever reason, have all the things that make a PC run added into MAME, not just yet.

Again, all assumptions from my hand. It seems pretty weird to not have a PC-based game not running nowadays.

[idrougge]

Speaking of the Trocadero, they had a Battletech arcade in the cellar in the mid-nineties. Reportedly the early Battletech cabinets were Amiga based.

[DamienD]

There is this interesting video on YouTube:

[ Show youtube player ]

Read the description and comments; these ones in particular:

Hey Trevor I got this game to work on my pc. Any ideas on how to get the joystick to work. Not using mame using the same setup you used. Thanks if you could give me ideas on how to get the joystick to work. Also figured out how to level warp in the game.

Jack, I was never able to get the game working with a joystick. I'm certain it needs the controller board that was housed outside of the PC unit.

Everything necessary has been provided to help the developers create an emulation. The video you see here is the original Savage Quest PC attached to a typical dell monitor, keyboard & mouse. The video is provided to the devs to demonstrate how the actual hardware behaves at boot up.

The game is not available online or on any console.

The game is only partially controllable with a ps2 keyboard. Enabling USB controllers makes no difference. So: no walk though videos. Sorry.

The actual arcade cabinet was on display at CAX 2011. Soon after, the huge monitor died. Attempts to fix the monitor yielded short playtime, then it would burn out again. We got tired of fixing it.

[Amiga1992]

So, everything works but controls, on a regular PC? Very interesting.
Maybe the PC interfaced to standard JAMMA with a custom interface.

[DamienD]

Originally Posted by Akira

So, everything works but controls, on a regular PC? Very interesting.

It seems that way.

Originally Posted by Akira

Maybe the PC interfaced to standard JAMMA with a custom interface.

Yeah, maybe

Hi DamienD,

Glad to hear you were looking for this game. I seem to be the only person who has 2 versions of this game version 1.0 and version 2.1

I am currently working on having another version of this game made.

Which will be strictly for version 2.1 as I have 2 of the computers running versions 1.0 If you wish to see both versions in action check out my youtube channel. [ Show youtube player ]

Yes Hopefully some day this game will get emulated. May I suggest you post on the mame forum requesting this game be emulated.
I already promised if version 1.0 gets emulated I would gladly donate version 2.1 to the mame team and have it dumped.

I am also looking for any other collectors who have this Super Rare Game.

I am also curious if there are any other builds of this game as i'd be willing to buy them.

Thanks for sharing the story in regards to one of my Favorite Rare Arcade Games of all time! I am just lucky I was able to find and fix these machines before they went extinct.

[DamienD]

Hey there DragonGamer,

Welcome to EAB

Yeah, would be very cool when this game is properly emulated in MAME

...and nice one about version 2.1.