So why is the SNES so much more expensive

[substantial_snake]

to develop and/or distribute homebrew projects on?

Both the Watermelon team and SuperFighterTeam have expressed that it is more expensive to follow through to completion SNES projects then their Genesis projects. Is this a physical cart issue or is the SNES just harder to develop games for?

[MyTurnToPlay]

I suspect the Watermelon gang may just be too lazy to develop anything for the SNES. And also, looks like they grew up mostly on Sega Genesis, so it's a bunch of Sega fanboys. Nothing wrong with that, the Genesis is a great system. But I think that explains why their hearts are not into a SNES project.

kinda dumb if you ask me. Tons of money to be made developing a SNES game...but oh well.

thank you.

[A Black Falcon]

Genesis homebrews have been made before, so they know what to make to make a Genesis cart and contents. That's part of it. Also, SNES carts have lockout chips in them. There are ways of getting around it, obviously, but that's going to add some cost for sure. And while US and Japanese games will work in the other systems, cart shape aside, European games have an additional hard lock to get around. There never has been a homebrew SNES game before -- they're in uncharted territory here. All of these things have to add to the cost, and that's why I believe them when they say it's more expensive.

[theclaw]

People weren't yet interested enough in new games back when the emulation boom was starting to grow (some SNES games could still be purchased at stores then). They demanded Final Fantasy V English, now. And had the skill and motivation to see that goal through no matter how difficult. Managing to succeed even before Square's PSX release.

Ultimately for commercial projects users answer with their wallet. More SNES coders will only rise from the woodwork if they think it's worth doing. There hasn't really been a major proof of concept launch to determine market potential.