Master System Ristar: The Shooting Star (Port) SMS

[Juiceala]

Port of the Game Gear game to the SEGA Master System, this game does benefit from the additional screen.

Download Links​

• Ristar: The Shooting Star (Port) SMS
• -

 

[Juiceala]

The 8-bit version of Ristar is greatly overlooked by the gaming community – which is a shame because it's just as great as the Genesis version.

This one has a couple exclusive stages that aren't in the Genesis version. One of which (Round 2-1 rainbow stage) could only be played if you inserted the game onto Japanese Game Gear; otherwise, the game skips straight to Round 2-2. Luckily, this hack is automatically set to JPN mode making 2-1 fully playable.

Sega of America had requested the removal of Round 2-1 for the western release because of a survey where a majority in children could not comprehended the idea of walking on a rainbow (I cannot even make this up lol).
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Another reason why I was encouraged to share this since changing the region of the GG version on an emulator could be tricky and I can never go back to the US version.

See, I never knew the reasoning behind this, at the time I remember reading a "theory" that maybe they thought kids would be afraid of the concept of playing levels in a dream coughmario2cough and since level 2-2 and 2-3 (which is the boss) are both set on a pirate ship you can make the argument the theme was a ship, except the boss is literally sleeping and he changes the scenery in his dreams, so I guess this theory falls flat, idk.

 

[Scotty]

The 8-bit version of Ristar is greatly overlooked by the gaming community – which is a shame because it's just as great as the Genesis version.

This one has a couple exclusive stages that aren't in the Genesis version. One of which (Round 2-1 rainbow stage) could only be played if you inserted the game onto Japanese Game Gear; otherwise, the game skips straight to Round 2-2. Luckily, this hack is automatically set to JPN mode making 2-1 fully playable.

Sega of America had requested the removal of Round 2-1 for the western release because of a survey where a majority in children could not comprehended the idea of walking on a rainbow (I cannot even make this up lol).

 

[mrrgrrgrr]

Not a bad port, but it has the same issue that a lot of other GG2SMS ports have: Despite the additional screen real-estate, some elements still adhere to the original Game Gear resolution. You can see what I mean on the screenshot of the title screen. See how the planet to the top left of Ristar is cut off? That's where it cuts off on the title screen of the Game Gear version.

Aesthetic things like that are minor and don't necessarily detract from the overall experience, but this does affect gameplay as well. There are some things you can see beyond the original Game Gear resolution (such as the collectable stars and background objects), and there are some that you can't. In this case, enemies don't spawn until they're really close to you (about half a Game Gear resolution's length away, funny enough). They basically phase into existence while you're playing. You get used to it, but it can be pretty jarring at first.

The reason that GG2SMS ports became popular among hobbyists is because of how easy it seems to be at the forefront. The Game Gear hardware is a more advanced version of the Master System hardware, but it's still fundamentally the same hardware nonetheless. Aside from the increase in resolution, you may need to adjust the game pallet to account for the reduction in color options that the Master System has when compared to the Game Gear. Then you adjust the inputs and voila! Simple, right?

Well, not really. Aside from the enemy spawn issue I brought up earlier, some Game Gear games have a bunch of tiles hidden off screen. When revealed, they look like a mess. That's because developers never intended for us to see this. This is why the GG2SMS port of titles like Tails Adventure required a full blown patching program to go along with it - there's more going on under the hood with that one to make the game work in both aesthetics and gameplay.

Anyways, what were we talking about again? Oh, right, Ristar for the Sega Master System. The game's alright I guess.

 

[Nelson2001 Nelson2001]

For a completely based port of the Game Gear version, it is well achieved and has a wider field of view, although it has fewer colors, it is not that bad, however, it has limitations, for example, that the scenarios are not drawn so well on the sides, leaving only the background of the screen, although in the future that can be solved, but it is a good attempt at conversion at least.