Turrican 2 MS-DOS AGA conversion

[Muzza]

Yes ScummVM is probably the closest analogy. I hadn't thought about naming, but I suppose it is safer to find something without the word Turrican in it, and something that reflects that it is an rewrite/emulator of sorts. If anyone has any more ideas, please post!
Another small issue is that the data compressor exe runs on Windows only. Meaning you'd have to prepare the build on a Windows PC then copy it to an Amiga. I tried a lot of data compressors, using another is possible but sacrifices disk space (a problem on floppy), loading times or RAM usage.

[alexh]

T2 '22

[lmimmfn]

TurricAGA 2?

You could have a build for windows that requires the original files(found elsewhere), builds the amiga files and does a checksum to ensure it will work.

[TCD]

Bren's Mod AGA.

[jotd]

Turrican 3 sources are available. I didn't say I tried to generate the game with those though...

Which data compressor are you using?

[ross]

Turricano

From IGN Italia:
"Ebbene, "narra la leggenda che", per scegliere il titolo del suo nuovo gioco, un indeciso Manfred Trenz sbirciò a casaccio l'elenco telefonico di Dusseldorf, scovando il nome di un immigrato di origini italiane, un certo signor Turricano"

Well, "the legend tells that", to choose the title of his new game, an undecided Manfred Trenz looked at random at the telephone directory in Dusseldorf, finding the name of an immigrant of Italian origin, a certain Mr. Turricano.

Of course it's a legend

[TCD]

Originally Posted by ross

Well, "the legend tells that", to choose the title of his new game, an undecided Manfred Trenz looked at random at the telephone directory in Dusseldorf, finding the name of an immigrant of Italian origin, a certain Mr. Turricano.

I always thought that it was a mix of 'Technical' and 'Hurricane'. Source: My head

[dlfrsilver]

Originally Posted by jotd

Turrican 3 sources are available. I didn't say I tried to generate the game with those though...

Which data compressor are you using?

You can generate the game with the sources. You need to use winuae and activate longtrack writing $33A0.

[dlfrsilver]

Originally Posted by Muzza

Yes ScummVM is probably the closest analogy. I hadn't thought about naming, but I suppose it is safer to find something without the word Turrican in it, and something that reflects that it is an rewrite/emulator of sorts. If anyone has any more ideas, please post!
Another small issue is that the data compressor exe runs on Windows only. Meaning you'd have to prepare the build on a Windows PC then copy it to an Amiga. I tried a lot of data compressors, using another is possible but sacrifices disk space (a problem on floppy), loading times or RAM usage.

Thurricane 2 AGA

[AMike]

Originally Posted by Muzza

Another small issue is that the data compressor exe runs on Windows only. Meaning you'd have to prepare the build on a Windows PC then copy it to an Amiga. I tried a lot of data compressors, using another is possible but sacrifices disk space (a problem on floppy), loading times or RAM usage.

That's a smart idea to fix all the copyright problems. I'm really looking forward to the release - it's going to be epic. Finally a "new" and better Turrican II for the Amiga - I was never that happy with all the clones and the other parts of this series.

T2AGA

[Don_Adan]

I think that at first You can contact Factor 5 and ask if Factor 5 want to officiallly publish Your version of Turrican 2 AGA. If I remember right one owner of the Turrican 2 rights is EAB member too. If Factor 5 dont want to publish Your version of T2 you can try to change port name.

[Muzza]

Originally Posted by jotd

Which data compressor are you using?

I'm using nrv2x written by ross. It strikes a good balance between decompression speed and compression rates. And allows in-place decompression. The code (and code modules) use shrinkler to get a little extra compression, but it is noticeable slower to decompress.

[Muzza]

Originally Posted by Don_Adan

I think that at first You can contact Factor 5 and ask if Factor 5 want to officiallly publish Your version of Turrican 2 AGA. If I remember right one owner of the Turrican 2 rights is EAB member too. If Factor 5 dont want to publish Your version of T2 you can try to change port name.

The situation with the rights is unclear. I did have one discussion with a 'friend of a friend of a friend', but it did not seem like something that could happen smoothly.

As best as I can tell, Eggebrecht bought the rights to Turrican (or possibly only some of the rights), tried to make new games via Factor5 and TouchFactor, but both companies failed. Factor5 then joined Epic games and Eggebrecht claims in an interview that Epic allow them to do Turrican work on the side outside of their day work. From my experience, working on a project like this 'on the side' sounds like the kind of big idea that a manager has that then fizzles out.

Factor 5 also licensed out the rights to Strictly Limited who made the Turrican Anthology games for switch and PS4.

Finally, Eggebrecht hates the PC version, either because of the 'terrible graphics' or because 'it didn't pass through his hands' depending on who you ask.

None of the above may be true, and at best it is only parts of the story. I had previously hoped Ziggurat had the rights when they acquired the Rainbow Arts back library. They seem like they would have been more open to this kind of project, but I believe Turrican was not included in the deal.

Of course it would be nice to be official, but realistically it does not look likely to me, and is just as likely to result in the forced shut down of the project.

[Don_Adan]

I sent to You PM.

[jotd]

Ok, now mcgeezer released Turbo Sprint (and charged 10 eur for it) and nothing (bad) happened.

I released 4 arcade game remakes that are distributed in modern compilations (Namco museum DS, Konami classics...) and nothing (bad) happened.

Release the project, and if someone asks you to remove it, do it. Same goes for 1942 conversion... I can't imagine so much work has been done without the public being able to play it.

[CFou!]

Originally Posted by jotd

Ok, now mcgeezer released Turbo Sprint (and charged 10 eur for it) and nothing (bad) happened.

I released 4 arcade game remakes that are distributed in modern compilations (Namco museum DS, Konami classics...) and nothing (bad) happened.

Release the project, and if someone asks you to remove it, do it. Same goes for 1942 conversion... I can't imagine so much work has been done without the public being able to play it.

Although I am a lawyer, it didn't prevent me from sleeping to release an archive of EOB1 & 2 AGA including files from the MS-DOS version. So far I haven't had any negative feedback...

[Muzza]

If Turrican had not had a recent release on PS4/Switch I would be less concerned that anyone cares.

[jotd]

who owns an amiga?
if Windows people want to play 256 color version are they going to take the hassle to configure WinUAE properly if they're not familiar with it to play your version or just download 'abandonware' MS-DOS Turrican and use DosBox (much easier to use) to play it?

I bet that the new Turrican has nothing to do with Turrican 2.

Well, your choice. but pity.

[Muzza]

I don't really understand what you are saying.
If I do decide to play it safe and require the MS-DOS version, this is how it would work:
To play on Amiga, you would run a program that I provide that takes the MS-DOS original file (which would likely come from the abandonware downloads you mention), and converts it to a new format that can be run on your Amiga.
If I release the PC version too, then you would be able to run it natively on Windows, as long as the original MS-DOS files are present.

The alternative is that I release the final bundled files myself including the assets I don't own the rights to. The final playable game is the same either way.

[Muzza]

Also, I’ve played the dosbox version extensively as you can imagine. I can promise you my release for modern PCs would be a much nicer experience