Turrican 2 AGA (PC-DOS conversion) - Released!

[Torti-the-Smurf]

Originally Posted by lionagony

>Erik goes on:Why even bother with a pimped up version ?
>;we have already pulled out all the registers.

That's too bad

It´s even worst when you read the "subtext",
because Erik must have been very frustrated by the Amiga Community.

They had there background in the Amiga Demoscene and left out any copy protection on purpose because they knew it would be cracked anyway
but maybe quality would sell he said in issue 11/93.

It did not and people copied it like crazy (hope you are proud of yourself )

Thats why when he said "Why even bother with a pimped up version ?
,we have already pulled out all the registers."

It´s like.. what would be the point ? ;We put our hard and soul into it and made it as good as we could and people still pirated it like crazy, so why go to all those troubles again with an AGA version.

They also where burned out;
they really gave them all and even worked over the X-Mas holidays.

Did people reward them for it ? No, of course not.

They where so frustrated that Erik and Henk left Thalion afterwards.

Erik also said in an 2019 Amiga Joker 1/19 issue: (no scan available)

"Lionheart was a colossal flop (financially) ,a console version might have prevented the financial debacle, but that was not feasible for Thalion.
Unfortunately we had no experience with consoles.

Quote end.

So; you see his "Why even bother with a pimped up version ?
;we have already pulled out all the registers." now in a different light/context.



It was a financially disaster and Thalion was almost at the End, Ambermoon could not save it either. Same story. Was pirated like crazy.

THANKS GUYS !!!!!!

Then the Psygnosis era began.....

That was a bit of Thalion & Lionheart trivia.

But back on Topic.

I tried the Challenge Mode today for the first time and made it in the fist try.
Who said Turrican is hard ???????

I post some Pics. The score could be improved by collect all Gems and stuff
but it was my first "just for Fun" try.

Maybe we do a challenge guys; who is up for it ?

Highest score in Challenge mode or a Lemon challenge ?

What do you think guys ?

Yours, Torti

[lionagony]

I bought Lionheart here in Canada at the time which wasn't too easy to do. After playing the coverdisk demo I had to have it. Even though it didn't work out financially for Thalion there is still something to be said for a lasting legacy and I think Lionheart and Ambermoon and No Second Prize achieved that.

[Cris1997XX]

If the original developers can't (And don't want to) do it, then the fans themselves can bring the dream to reality

[Predseda]

Originally Posted by Torti-the-Smurf

It did not and people copied it like crazy (hope you are proud of yourself )

...

Did people reward them for it ? No, of course not.

...

It was a financially disaster and Thalion was almost at the End, Ambermoon could not save it either. Same story. Was pirated like crazy.

THANKS GUYS !!!!!!

I pressume all your games were boxed originals back then.

[CCRider]

Originally Posted by Predseda

I pressume all your games were boxed originals back then.

Spot on.

[Torti-the-Smurf]

Originally Posted by Predseda

I pressume all your games were boxed originals back then.

Yes, they where mostly Original Games.

(There is a specific Thread about that)
https://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?t=112847

But in short; i got the copy/cracked version first because it was ridiculously easy,
more so than an original. Sounds crazy but true.

I played the cracked version first and when i really liked the game i bought it.

Simple as that.

I know i was sadly in the minority

[Retro-Nerd]

Lionheart didn't have any kind of copy protection. At that time you could rent Amiga games in computer stores, so it was pretty easy to pirate.

[Torti-the-Smurf]

Yup, exactly there was no copy protection of any kind in Lionheart; on purpose.

The only place i could rent Amiga Games where in one private family Videothec,
but they only had a handful Amiga Games and only for a short time.

I remember renting Blues Brothers & Double Dragon III there.
Good times

[Djay]

This AGA version is amazing, loving the new options and added secrets!

If "they" ever make a sequel Muzza needs to be onboard...

One request, please add pressing "H" on the title screen shows all highscores and speedrun times.

Now to find all the secrets

[skan]

Just tested the game on an Analogue Pocket, it works like a charm! Only issue is with cd32 joypad emulation, but I just can't understand if it's the Amiga core still buggy or the game doesn't like the pocket that much anybody else here with that toy who could run a quick test?

[dlfrsilver]

Originally Posted by Torti-the-Smurf

It´s even worst when you read the "subtext",
because Erik must have been very frustrated by the Amiga Community.

They had there background in the Amiga Demoscene and left out any copy protection on purpose because they knew it would be cracked anyway
but maybe quality would sell he said in issue 11/93.

It did not and people copied it like crazy (hope you are proud of yourself )

Thats why when he said "Why even bother with a pimped up version ?
,we have already pulled out all the registers."

It´s like.. what would be the point ? ;We put our hard and soul into it and made it as good as we could and people still pirated it like crazy, so why go to all those troubles again with an AGA version.

They also where burned out;
they really gave them all and even worked over the X-Mas holidays.

Did people reward them for it ? No, of course not.

They where so frustrated that Erik and Henk left Thalion afterwards.

Erik also said in an 2019 Amiga Joker 1/19 issue: (no scan available)

"Lionheart was a colossal flop (financially) ,a console version might have prevented the financial debacle, but that was not feasible for Thalion.
Unfortunately we had no experience with consoles.

Quote end.

So; you see his "Why even bother with a pimped up version ?
;we have already pulled out all the registers." now in a different light/context.



It was a financially disaster and Thalion was almost at the End, Ambermoon could not save it either. Same story. Was pirated like crazy.

THANKS GUYS !!!!!!

Then the Psygnosis era began.....

That was a bit of Thalion & Lionheart trivia.

But back on Topic.

I tried the Challenge Mode today for the first time and made it in the fist try.
Who said Turrican is hard ???????

I post some Pics. The score could be improved by collect all Gems and stuff
but it was my first "just for Fun" try.

Maybe we do a challenge guys; who is up for it ?

Highest score in Challenge mode or a Lemon challenge ?

What do you think guys ?

Yours, Torti

Let me illustrate with my own experience back in the day regarding Lionheart.

Of course, it was impossible for me to get this game as a copy. It had to be an original.

So, i bought the game via mail order to the shop based in NICE called 'Jessico'.

The game was sold 99 francs. Do you see the total nonsense ?
This means that Thalion's folks work was completely sold off ! This game retail price should have been 245 francs (something like 25.99 pounds in UK).

My conclusion regarding this, was that this game costed lots of money to Thalion, and then this ridiculous price in the retail shops ? The distributors and the publisher were doing a total mess of a wrong job ! That's the only explanation so far. And the very same kind of shit happened to Turrican.
The games were great, and they were : badly mastered on at least machine, badly distributed, and distributed in very limited quantities !

Come on ! Read next :

While ordering on the phone, the woman who was the shop owner told me this when i questioned her about Lionheart :

Me : "The game price is anormaly low, how can that be ?"

Her : "This is the distributor pricing. I can also tell you that i had lots of problems to get a stock of this game. The best i could have was 4 boxes of Lionheart. Minus the one you bought, i have 3 remaining, and i don't know if i will get others. The distributor has "lots of troubles" to get us just few copies".

So you see, If Lionheart was a colossal financial disaster for Thalion, it was not only because Thalion could not manufacture enough copies, but the distributor itself has set ridiculously low prices for this jewel of a game.

How could Thalion make money when a top game like this was sold at the price of a low quality budget game and in limited quantities ?

One can even wonder if the piracy was not fuelled by the limited quantities sold in the shop !

Another point : In France, at the time we had around something like 5xx shops selling hardware and computer games. the shelves were the games were disposed in 1993 were small. Nothing like what we have these days.

Now do the maths : a publisher manufactures 50.000 copies of a game for the whole european countries concerned. 500 shops to sell the games in a single country. How many copies per shop per country ?

The amount of copies per shop is ridiculous.

[alexh]

That was not the UK experience. I pre-ordered Lionheart from the top UK mail order supplier and it was the correct RRP price. It arrived on launch day. I saw it in one or two UK retail shops in later weeks for the correct price.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing but the choice of no-copy protection at all was IMO the wrong choice. Even though cracks come out within hours of retail copies going on sale, copy protection offers a small window of a few days to rack up those retail sales. If the game has been previewed early enough and the demand high enough retail sales could be good.

[TCD]

Originally Posted by alexh

That was not the UK experience. I pre-ordered Lionheart from the top UK mail order supplier and it was the correct price.

Same here in Germany. Here's a price example from Amiga Joker November 1993:

[dlfrsilver]

Originally Posted by alexh

That was not the UK experience. I pre-ordered Lionheart from the top UK mail order supplier and it was the correct RRP price. It arrived on launch day. I saw it in one or two UK retail shops in later weeks for the correct price.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing but the choice of no-copy protection at all was IMO the wrong choice. Even though cracks come out within hours of retail copies going on sale, copy protection offers a small window of a few days to rack up those retail sales. If the game has been previewed early enough and the demand high enough retail sales could be good.

this illustrate again the publisher/Distributor team combo bullshit.

Tell me why you'd pay 25.99 pounds in UK and me less than 10 pounds in France ? Lionheart had correct sales. however, i wonder who many copies they sold in the end.

[torturedutopian]

[offtopic]
I wish I could get back in time to my 11y.o self and stick to my A600 and buy games instead of upgrading my computer endlessly and just trying random games in a perpetual loop...

And spent the rest of the time actually making creative stuff. Oh well. Never too late I guess...

Likewise, the thing I could do RIGHT NOW is getting rid of YouTube and all social media and reading one book at a time...
[/offtopic]

What is pathetic is that I was actually already aware of that, 30 years back...

[Don_Adan]

Originally Posted by dlfrsilver

this illustrate again the publisher/Distributor team combo bullshit.

Tell me why you'd pay 25.99 pounds in UK and me less than 10 pounds in France ? Lionheart had correct sales. however, i wonder who many copies they sold in the end.

I think, You bought illegal copy of LionHeart game. Some shops solds copy of Amiga games as "original". Only disk labels, box and manual must be printed.

[torturedutopian]

Yep, either illegal or "destocking" maybe ?

[Aulapatchuc]

Originally Posted by Don_Adan

I think, You bought illegal copy of LionHeart game. Some shops solds copy of Amiga games as "original". Only disk labels, box and manual must be printed.

Yeah the same happened here in Portugal. I had to import all my software from the UK if I wanted originals.

[dlfrsilver]

Originally Posted by Don_Adan

I think, You bought illegal copy of LionHeart game. Some shops solds copy of Amiga games as "original". Only disk labels, box and manual must be printed.

Nope. Jessico got the games through the distributors. Here for Lionheart, she ordered copies to the Thalion german distributor.

My copy is perfectly legit. I own it till this day. It's was the 1st collector release, with the black box and lionheart in overprint on the inside cover.

[Don_Adan]

Originally Posted by dlfrsilver

Nope. Jessico got the games through the distributors. Here for Lionheart, she ordered copies to the Thalion german distributor.

My copy is perfectly legit. I own it till this day. It's was the 1st collector release, with the black box and lionheart in overprint on the inside cover.

Do You compared your disks against IPF version of Lionheart? Its identical?