Squirrel's Guide to Macintosh Emulation

(last updated: 30/07/2012)

Following my troubles emulating Dark Castle for black and white Macintoshes, I felt it was worth writing a guide. Put simply, Macintosh emulation is dreadful from a user perspective, so any help to solve that issue is time worth spent.

This is intended primarily for Windows users, though no doubt there'll be some tips for other platforms too. I'm not an amazing source for knowledge when it comes to Macs, but I solved a problem and want to share results.

Super Hang-On

Many thanks to Andlabs, who demonstrated that in order for a game to work in one emulator, sometimes you have to use two.

A quick one because it's interesting. Super Hang-On, the Macintosh version. This is a rare breed - for one, it's a Sega game on a Mac, and in 1987 that didn't happen. It's also almost entirely different to the arcade version, so it hardly qualifies as a port at all. How fancy.

Mr. Nutz: Hoppin' Mad

...on Blog Squirrel.

Can't get this on Nintendo!.. or Sega... officially. Mr. Nutz: Hoppin' Mad, once set to hit your Sega Mega Drives in early 1994, before being cancelled by the man, plunging the world into fifteen years of misery and turmoil.

Thankfully we have been liberated from the darkness and oppression, as we now have both prototype source code and working ROMs of this game to play with. No doubt a good day for the world.

Spitting Image

Such is the life of Squirrel that this is the second fighting game involving Mrs. Thatcher to cross my path... but the first not to display all its text in Korean.

Erm yes, look, another comedy sketch show turned video game for the Amiga. This one's a fighting game, made in the days before we knew how to make fighting games. What such productive lives we lived in the late 1980s.

Monty Python's Flying Circus

This is what the kids want - a platform/shoot-'em-up game based on a then-twenty year old comedy sketch show. Monty Python's Flying Circus for the Amiga, released in 1990 by the future creators of Tomb Raider.

My brain hurts.

SOOG: Squirrel's Laws on Sequels

I'm a part-time Sega fan - there's a statement that will stun the world. Once in a while I wander over to SegaBits to get a glimpse of Sega-related news, only to then wish I hadn't, because as lovely as the site is, they clearly need to read up on the company they're plugging.

Not too long ago an article entitled "reasons why Sega is failing in the western markets" was posted. It's universally agreed that Sega is clueless these days, but one area of "concern" caught my eye - "too many risky, new IP's. Not enough of the old ones". Misuse of the apostrophe aside, this statement needs a response! Because inter-blog fights are fun or something.

High Speed

Pinball on the NES. Think it will work? My vote is no.

Vigilance on Talos V

There is only one major issue I have with Super Metroid - it's a SNES game. Try as I might to sit down and finish it, Nintendo's unique take on audio coupled with the slow and dark nature of 16-bit Zebes means I often struggle to keep my eyes open while playing.

Thankfully, there are alternatives. Here's one; Vigilance on Talos V, released in 1996 for DOS. Gradient heavy mid-90s graphics, questionable voice acting, low production values... it's perfect.

SOOG: Sega Pico

Something new, something fresh. Something with fewer images because ImageShack keeps deleting them.

Because I'm not entirely sure whether the whole "Squirrel reviews a game you're not aware of" format always works, I figured it was time to try something different. So I present to you a potentially short-lived column: Squirrel's Opinions on Gaming. Or SOOG.

I also thought I'd start on something more positive (I use this term very loosely) before this degrades into rants about trivial features of the industry. My adventures with the Sega Pico - the Sega console nobody talks about. It'll be educational for all sorts of reasons.