Even before 3D graphics and advanced shaders became common in the gaming world, there were concerns that virtual violence looked too realistic. Fighting games in the 1990s were routinely toned-down by having gratuitous displays of blood removed, which was often seen as disappointing by dedicated fans. [Raphaël Boichot] has been working to right this wrong in one obscure case, by rectifying the lack of blood in Sengoku 2.
Sengoku 2 was a title released in 1993 for the Neo Geo AES/MVS and the Neo Geo CD. It hit the market with relatively tame graphics that didn’t reflect the realistic amount of blood that should be released when an enemy was chopped in half with a sword. Noting that there was no simple DIP switch configuration or bit to flip to enable a more adult version of the game, [Raphaël] decided to create a custom blood hack the hard way. What ensued was a heavy-duty reverse engineering effort, swapping out palettes, and carefully editing tilesets in order to turn the censored graphics into something more lurid. A lot of artistic decisions had to be made to manipulate things just so in order to create a pleasing effect that didn’t mess up other aspects of the graphics at the same time.
If you’re a big Sengoku 2 fan, or you just want to learn more about reverse engineering and hacking on an obscure platform, dive into the project and enjoy the learnings. Otherwise, dive into the entirely different sorts of blood-related hacks we’ve featured over the years.
I was going to make a comment but then decided against it. 🥲
I’m glad you didn’t, I wish I did the same thing.
I was going to ask you both why and then decided against it =:>
Hacking retro anything with modern tools feels pretty wild. Cracking the case of something then and feeling how daunting it was versus looking into that same device or software now is a whole other matter. Good on Raphaël Boichot for this little passion project. Scientist by day, blood spattering video game hacker by night?
That’s it 🙂
Hey Zoe, you might as well disable comments on this one, that will take less time than removing all comments every time someone posts something not to your liking.
and to be on topic again: where is the uncensored Lazy Larry?
Leisure suit Larry. Lazy Larry is something entirely different.
yeah, that one
“ken sent me”
“You wonder how many naugas had to give their all just to decorate this sleazehole”
Author here. Hope you will enjoy this hack !