Earlier news broke out that M2 was developing a handful of Mega Drive/Genesis collections for Xbox Live Arcade and individual releases on the Playstation Store. One of those sets included a number of Wonder Boy/Monster World games as part of the Sega Vintage Collection, which most notably included the English-translated release of Monster World IV. The game had never seen a release outside of Japan until Sega announced it would be bringing the game stateside to digital release platforms, including the Wii’s Virtual Console service. In fact, this release was a long time coming; It was revealed by an entry in Sega’s blog (which is gone by the way) on the 12th of May of last year. It just so happens that Nintendo has unceremoniously swept them in this week’s release schedule for the Virtual Console in the U.S. and has already seen a release in the U.K. as well. Both regions have a price point of 900 Wii Points.
Monthly Archives
May 2012
Game News, Game Secrets, Interviews, Sega Retro
Victor Ireland Talks Working Designs, Sister Sonic, Lunar and more on Retronauts
I used to be big on Retronauts, one of my favorite podcasts that I listened to at every release up until it’s host Jeremy Parish lost interest and eventually wound up as Editor in Chief of 1UP.com. Then writer Bob Mackey would pick the ball back up and relaunch the show as a live podcast to keep the show going despite the hardships that had hit 1UP in recent times. Admittably I don’t listen to it as often, change does become difficult to swallow sometimes, but every now and then comes an episode that strikes all the right chords of what I used to love on Retronauts: Silly non sequiturs overshadowed by rare facts and industry insight, along with uncovering childhood memories of yore, no matter how time-tested or scathing as they may have been.
This particular episode rings true for sure as Retronauts Live, in it’s new iteration, has a bigger emphasis on the hosts talking directly to the developers and figure heads of the industry, with the most recent episode featuring Victor Ireland, co-founder of Working Designs, a company driven to bringing niche Japanese titles to western markets adapted for their tastes and boasting a high quality standard for the games as proudly as possible. While the episode does cover topics regarding the Playstation, there’s still plenty of talk of Vic’s company dealing with Sega, including stories on Vay for Sega CD, the dire development on the last Sega Saturn game in the US, Magic Knight Rayearth, and extensive coverage on the Lunar series. Not to mention Working Design’s position during the brief decision from Sega of America to transform Popful Mail for Sega CD into Sister Sonic. Yes! The Hedgehog! Imagine playing a Falcom game designed around an as-then unnamed female relative, (Not Sonia the Hedgehog,) of Sonic the Hedgehog.
Check out the podcast here complete with shownotes. If you aren’t up for people talking about old video games, now’s a good time as any to shoehorn the opening theme to the Sega CD version of Lunar – The Silver Star (In English!) as they sure don’t make any upbeat video game music like this anymore. Or click here if you prefer it in Japanese…