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Thread: Was Propeller Arena ever actually produced in US?

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    Kirby (Level 13) diskoboy's Avatar
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    Default Was Propeller Arena ever actually produced in US?

    Another post got me thinking...

    In the US, Propeller Arena was cancelled because of 9/11/01. But wasn't this game supposed to be released a week later? Because I remember reading the hype of this game on IGN a few weeks prior, and then Sept. 11th happened, and Sega cancelled it that very day. Gamespot still even has it's release date listed as 9/25/01 on it's 'last days of dreamcast' page.

    This being the case, obviously, the game went gold since it's always in the newsgroups, and I have a CDR copy, myself. Was this game actually published and just not sent to stores? Are there any copies, anywhere, that have an actual CD jewel case, a professionaly printed manual, a real GD-rom (not a CDR backup..)?

    I find it hard to believe there are no legitimate copies of this game floating around out there.

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    Good point! You would think that a game that close to release would be sitting around in a warehouse somewhere. So how do you get one of those CDR's and get it to work on your Dreamcast? I've always wanted to play that game.
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    Great Puma (Level 12) anagrama's Avatar
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    Default Re: Was Propeller Arena ever actually produced in US?

    Quote Originally Posted by diskoboy
    Was this game actually published and just not sent to stores? Are there any copies, anywhere, that have an actual CD jewel case, a professionaly printed manual, a real GD-rom?
    No.

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    Propeller Arena was cancelled, though it was complete, for two reasons:

    1. There were levels in the game where dog fights took place amist towering skyscrapers. 9-11 happened right before the gane was set to be released.

    2. The Dreamcast was already that the end of its life cycle.

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    drowning in medals Ed Oscuro's Avatar
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    Good question, that's really up against the edge. Thanks to regional disc and media creation centers/factories, I think many games are now produced around that last week or two before it ships to stores (I think Half-Life 2 was an example of one whose production got crammed in), so they may or may not have completed a manufacturing run. It might also be the case that production started on inserts or manuals but they never got any discs made.

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    Kirby (Level 13) diskoboy's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Iron Draggon
    Good point! You would think that a game that close to release would be sitting around in a warehouse somewhere. So how do you get one of those CDR's and get it to work on your Dreamcast? I've always wanted to play that game.
    Do a google search for "Utopia boot disc dreamcast". Just pop it in your DC, let it load up past the bios screen until you see the reindeer, then without turning the DC's power off, take out the boot disc and put in your backup game.

    But if your patient, someone will post the self-booting version.

    It's a shame this was never released. It's just as fun as Crimson Skies, IMO. The online play sounded fun, too.

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    Strawberry (Level 2) Saabmeister's Avatar
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    Sligtly off-topic, but this game and Shenmue II was why I bought a Dreamcast.

    I was unbelievably pissed when they were cancelled.

    One of these days I need to put my eye-patch and get myself a copy of Propellor Arena off th 'net.

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    Kirby (Level 13) diskoboy's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ed Oscuro
    Good question, that's really up against the edge. Thanks to regional disc and media creation centers/factories, I think many games are now produced around that last week or two before it ships to stores (I think Half-Life 2 was an example of one whose production got crammed in), so they may or may not have completed a manufacturing run. It might also be the case that production started on inserts or manuals but they never got any discs made.
    Ah! That's my point! When I worked at babbages (around the time of the DC's end), sometimes we got high production games weeks in advance and just kept them in back until the street date. Then alot of the budget games or so-so games that no one cared about, we got shipped to us the day before the street date. Unless we actually worked at a distributor, how would any of us know for sure? The game I'm playing seems 100% finished. And the people that leaked the game on the web had to get it somewhere!

    I'll bet dollars to doughnuts there's a new Dreamcast holy-grail out there somewhere!

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    drowning in medals Ed Oscuro's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by diskoboy
    Ah! That's my point! When I worked at babbages (around the time of the DC's end), sometimes we got high production games weeks in advance and just kept them in back until the street date. Then alot of the budget games or so-so games that no one cared about, we got shipped to us the day before the street date.
    That's interesting. When did you work at Babbage's (had to have been more than a few years ago, given the name change)? It seems a lot of games are in the news now for really pushing development right up until the last week or two...but I wonder if most of those still allott enough time for a half-month shipping schedule.

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    Quote Originally Posted by diskoboy
    Quote Originally Posted by Iron Draggon
    Good point! You would think that a game that close to release would be sitting around in a warehouse somewhere. So how do you get one of those CDR's and get it to work on your Dreamcast? I've always wanted to play that game.
    Do a google search for "Utopia boot disc dreamcast". Just pop it in your DC, let it load up past the bios screen until you see the reindeer, then without turning the DC's power off, take out the boot disc and put in your backup game.

    But if your patient, someone will post the self-booting version.

    It's a shame this was never released. It's just as fun as Crimson Skies, IMO. The online play sounded fun, too.
    Mine boots without it. I just have to turn the system on and off 2 times. Same thing with Half-Life and PBA Bowling.

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    I think this link covers the propeller arena can of worms pretty well...


    http://www.assemblergames.com/forums...ad.php?t=8332&

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    Ed, I worked at Babbages between November 2000 and I quit the week before the attacks. I remember because I was supposed to start my new job on 9/11. I was about to turn off the TV and walk out the door when the second plane hit the WTC. After that, I just couldn't peel myslef from the TV. Fortunately, I didn't get fired.

    So unfortunately, I was gone right before PA was supposed to be released. I even had it reserved, but I ended up getting the ten bucks back. The store I worked at closed down about a year later. They talked about changing over to GameStop when I was there, but it obviously never came to be.

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    Quote Originally Posted by ProgrammingAce
    I think this link covers the propeller arena can of worms pretty well...


    http://www.assemblergames.com/forums...ad.php?t=8332&
    So did they steal a sealed copy of the game or buy the GD-R gold pressing from Sega? I'm still confused...

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    I've got a self-booting version of PA, and I love it. I think it's a bit better than Crimson Skies in some ways. I certainly think the music is better. Aiming is also easier in PA. CS has the edge in terms of visual beauty, but PA doesn't look terrible by any means. I would have loved to play it online. Maybe Sega will throw it into a game collection down the line with web play. Better late than never and all that.

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    ServBot (Level 11) roushimsx's Avatar
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    shame a disc image of the original GD ROM isn't available.

    It'd be a great thing to have instead of the resampled rip when Dreamcast emulation matures.

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    The original GD-R that the publicly availible rip was taken from is still around. Untouched and uncompressed.... just waiting there....

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    Quote Originally Posted by diskoboy
    Quote Originally Posted by Iron Draggon
    Good point! You would think that a game that close to release would be sitting around in a warehouse somewhere. So how do you get one of those CDR's and get it to work on your Dreamcast? I've always wanted to play that game.
    Do a google search for "Utopia boot disc dreamcast". Just pop it in your DC, let it load up past the bios screen until you see the reindeer, then without turning the DC's power off, take out the boot disc and put in your backup game.

    But if your patient, someone will post the self-booting version.

    It's a shame this was never released. It's just as fun as Crimson Skies, IMO. The online play sounded fun, too.
    What the heck are you talking about? It's a selfbooting image to begin with. The copy I have boots first time everytime no problem. Don't tell me I'm going to have to start distributing them preburned again. The duplicates were of a review copy if I remember correctly. It's 100% complete and plays on the DC no problem because - okay everyone - ALL DC's have MIL-CD compatibility except for those few rumored Asia only models made later on.

    The game was canned becase of the original concept cover art (planes against skyscrapers) and because of the Tower City level.

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    I wrote a review of the game for the DP print zine. It made it there, but not to the site. It's archived on mine, though: http://www.robohara.com/?p=67

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    Quote Originally Posted by ProgrammingAce
    I think this link covers the propeller arena can of worms pretty well...


    http://www.assemblergames.com/forums...ad.php?t=8332&
    Figures.

    Self-booting image is what I have. Plays great, still fun to play. Game had some real quality to it, shame never released.
    My Gaming Collection (Now at Google Drive!)

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    Quote Originally Posted by ProgrammingAce
    The original GD-R that the publicly availible rip was taken from is still around. Untouched and uncompressed.... just waiting there....
    Great news! I'll have to scour the interweb and see if I can turn up a copy of it. Is there a cache of raw DC rips out there (mainly for prototypes, like Half Life and such) or is Propeller Arena a rare exception to the norm?

    If not, it's going to suck having to redump all of this crap all over again.

    edit VVVVV

    Quote Originally Posted by Leo_Ames
    Found a place to buy it, but hate the idea of paying someone who is making it sound like its an original legitimate copy and profiting off it.
    I agree... people that charge money for what isn't theirs make my stomach turn. It's even funnier when they try to say it's to pay them back for their services, not for the pirated warez. IMO there's two types of pirates...people that like to swap software and cocksuckers.

    People that charge for warez are cocksuckers.

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