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rastsaga: MAME ROM Information.

History:

Rastan Saga (c) 1987 Taito.

A platform hack 'n' slash game in which a single player guides a barbarian hero through a number of fantasy-themed levels, fighting through swathes of mythological fantasy creatures, including orcs, skeletal warriors and multi-headed hydra. More powerful weapons can be picked up as well as bonus items which can increase the barbarian hero's health and give increased protection against enemy attack. Players should be wary that some collectable items are cursed and will have a detrimental effect on the hero's health and performance. Unlimited continues are available throughout the game.

- TECHNICAL -

Prom Stickers : B04

Main CPU : 68000, Z80

Sound Chips : YM2151, MSM5205

Players : 2

Control : 8-way joystick

Buttons : 2

- TRIVIA -

Released in March 1987.

This game is known outside Japan as "Rastan".

Rastan was inspired by the 'Conan the barbarian' saga novels, by Robert E Howard. In the background of the first stage, giant stone statues can be seen that bear more than a passing resemblance to the statues that featured in 'The Lord of The Rings - Fellowship of the Ring'. While the film appeared several years AFTER Rastan, the famous LotR concept artwork that featured in the deluxe addition of the book had been available for some time.

The main character, Rastan, appears as a selectable character, ''Miracle Rastan'', in "Champion Wrestler".

The game contains several bonus items that are not normally dropped by enemies: A golden armature, a brown scroll and a yellow scroll. Graphics for these can be seen in the tile-sets and modifications to game's data tables can cause them to be dropped. The golden armature acts like the existing armature, the scrolls do nothing.

The game contains a built in test mode, activated by the value of two bytes towards the end of the code roms. Invincibility can be selected, causing 'NO-HIT' to be displayed at the bottom of the title screen. The starting level can also be modified.

The game forbids the initials 'SEX' on the high-score table. If you try, they get changed to 'AHA'.

Pony Canyon / Scitron released a limited-edition soundtrack album for this game (Kyukyoku Tiger : G.S.M. Taito 2 - D28B0008) on 21/11/1988.

Zuntata Records released a limited-edition soundtrack album for this game (Zuntata History L'ab-normal 1st - ZTTL-0038) on 01/04/1999.

- UPDATES -

Rastan Saga has some differences :

* In the attract mode appears the intro (instead the description of the objects).

* If you waste too many time without advancing in the stage, only 2 bats will attack you (instead of 8).

- TIPS AND TRICKS -

* If you die on the final stage, the game ends and you cannot continue; this means that the entire final level must be completed on a SINGLE credit. In order to make this even remotely possible you should deliberately die at the end of the fifth stage while fighting the boss (a multi-headed dragon). You should then use another credit to continue and defeat the dragon with your first man (with as little damage as possible). If you cannot defeat him with the first man and little damage, kill off the remaining men and start with a fresh credit. Always go after the special weapons where possible; if special weapons run out, jumping and striking doubles the damage done with the sword. Pushing up and the jump button will jump higher than pushing the jump button alone.

* The game attract sequence does not reveal the purpose of the rod. If you are carrying it, killing an enemy of any type causes all other on-screen enemies of the same type to die.

* If you are going for a high-score, always 'pick-up' the poisons. They are worth a lot of points.

* The ring can always be obtained in the first level castle. Proceed past the 3 ropes, down the next long chain and then up the next long chain. Slowly nudge this chain offscreen and two enemies appear on the left-hand side, one of which always carries the ring.

* Chains in castles can often be traversed upwards much quicker by repeatedly jumping against a nearby wall. Others needing to be traversed downwards can be missed by jumping off and falling. The level 4 boss is virtually impossible to defeat unless this tactic is used, in order to meet him carrying the hammer.

* Repeated high vertical jumps are a good method to use to 'stall', when on slopes approaching bouncing fireballs.

* Many players don't know that the 'mud' first encountered on level 2 does not actually kill you, it just causes you to sink down requiring many quick jumps to get out.

- SERIES -

1. Rastan Saga (1987)

2. Rastan Saga II (1988)

3. Warrior Blade - Rastan Saga Episode III (1991)

- STAFF -

Game designer : Nenko Nishimura

Game programmers : Yoshinori Kobayashi, Hideaki Tomioka, Touru Takahashi, Hideo Kazama

Character designer : Nenko Nishimura

Art designers : Nenko Nishimura, Taira Sanuki, Seiji Kawakami, Genya Kuriki

Hardware engineer : Noboru Takeshita

Hardware designer : Masahiro Yamaguchi

Music composers And Sound Effects : Naoto Yagishita, Masahiko Takaki

Art advisor : Junji Yarita

Special thanks to : K. Sanbe

- PORTS -

* Consoles :

Sega Master System (1988)

Sony PlayStation 2 [JP] (July 26, 2005; "Taito Memories Joukan [Model SLPM-66057]")

Sony PSP [JP] (January 5, 2006; "Taito Memories Pocket [Model ULJM-05076]")

Sony PlayStation 2 (2005, "Taito Legends")

Microsoft XBOX (2005, "Taito Legends")

* Computers :

Tandy Color Computer (1988, "Warrior King")

MSX2 (1988)

Commodore C64 (1988)

Sinclair ZX Spectrum (1988)

Amstrad CPC (1988)

Amstrad CPC (1988, "Taito Coin-Op Hits")

PC [MS-DOS, 5.25''] (1990)

PC [MS Windows] (2005, "Taito Legends")

- SOURCES -

Game's rom.

MAME Info:

0.28 [Jarek Burczynski]

Artwork available

WIP:

- 0.145u6: Stefan Lindberg added clone Rastan (US). Brian Troha cleaned up parent/child order. Added DIP locations. Corrected ROM names and added additional information / notes. Changed 'Rastan (World, set 1)' to clone 'Rastan (World)', 'Rastan (World, set 2)' to parent 'Rastan (World Rev 1)', '(US, set 1)' to '(US Rev 1)' and '(US, set 2)' to '(US, Earlier code base)'. Renamed (rastan) to (rastana), (rastan2) to (rastan), (rastanu2) to (rastanub), (rastsaga) to (rastsagaa) and (rastsaga1) to (rastsaga).

- 0.145u5: ANY and The Dumping Union added clone Rastan (World, set 2). Changed parent description to 'Rastan (World, set 1)'.

- 0.136u1: Fabio Priuli added driver data struct and save states to Rastan.

- 0.133u1: Renamed (rastsag1) to (rastsaga1).

- 0.125u7: Stephane Humbert fixed Service Mode DIP assigned. Added 'Unused' dipswitch.

- 0.123u4: Corrado Tomaselli changed/verified clocks in Rastan.

- 0.119u4: Fixed rom names in clone Rastan Saga (Japan).

- 0.118u3: Stephane Humbert cleaned up several Taito drivers to use common input port macros. Fixed the dipwitches for all games (a few still remain unknown though) and added many notes. Added dipswitches 'Service Mode' and 'Unused'.

- 0.112u1: Gerald Coy added clone Rastan Saga (Japan Rev 1).

- 8th October 2006: Mr. Do - Aaron Giles has been purchasing and scanning stuff, that Ad_Enuff cleans up and converts for MAME. This week, we have Rastan bezel.

- 0.95u3: Bryan McPhail fixed rom names in Rastan.

- 0.90u3: Nicola Salmoria cleanup the Rastan driver, derived from schematics. ADPCM is now played through a MSM5205. Replaced ADPCM sound with MSM5205 (384000 Hz).

- 30th March 2001: David Graves and Jarek Burczynski fixed a few bugs and added state saving support to Rainbow Islands, Rastan and Operation Wolf.

- 0.37b11: Changed palettesize from 2048 to 8192 colors.

- 0.35RC2: Changed description to 'Rastan (World)'.

- 0.35b12: Changed description to 'Rastan (World?)'.

- 0.35b11: Nicola Salmoria added clones Rastan (US set 1) and (US set 2). Changed parent description to 'Rastan (Japan)' and clone 'Rastan Saga' to 'Rastan Saga (Japan)'.

- 1st April 2000: Jarek Burczynski added cocktail mode to Rastan.

- 0.34b8: Replaced 64k gfx roms with 128k in Rastan and clone Rastan Saga.

- 0.34b4: Brad Oliver fixed bug in the 68000 interrupt handling which causes Rastan Saga to not boot correctly. Juan Carlos Lorente added high score saving to Rastan.

- 0.33b7: Rastan use the dynamic palette [Nicola Salmoria].

- 0.31: New YM2151 emulator, used by Rastan and others and fixed ADPCM sample support in Rastan [Jarek Burczynski]. Barry Rodewald fixed crashes in Rastan. Aaron Giles added 16 bit color support for games which need it (e.g. Rastan, Gauntlet, Black Tiger, and many others). Changed description of 'RASTAN' to 'Rastan'. Known issues: Crashes often.

- 0.30: Tatsuyuki Satoh added sound in Rastan.

- 0.29: Brad Oliver added clone 'Rastan Saga'. Rastan Saga doesn't always boot, use F3 to make it start. Note that Rastan requires some new ROMs as well, which were missing from the previous release.

- 0.28: Jarek Burczynski added RASTAN (Taito 1987). Jarek Burczynski adapted the M68000 emulator from the System 16 Arcade Emulator by Thierry Lescot. The only known problem of this emulator is that it doesn't count CPU cycles, only instructions. The first driver to use the 68000 is Rastan, also provided by Jarek.

LEVELS: 6

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* FB Alpha

* Raine

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Romset: 1536 kb / 16 files / 475.7 zip

MAME XML Output:

<description>Rastan Saga (Japan Rev 1)</description>

<manufacturer>Taito Corporation</manufacturer>