Pier Solar: Official Thread

[Joe Redifer]

That's because I cannot respect anyone who doesn't take responsibility for their product. They keep trying to lay the blame on this or that. They should be as forthcoming as they possibly can (which ALWAYS wins points with the customers), but for some reason they never have been. We've scared most of Watermelon away from here for this reason. Remember how most of them were around when we were lavishing nothing but praise on them? Zebbe's apology is one thing, but I want an apology for skirting the issue in the first place, for trying to blame everything else possible but themselves. Until Watermelon can officially do this, I cannot respect them. To many people they come across as not much more than a bunch of self-important ne'er do wrongs. Tulio Adriano's absolute disrespect for me as a person has a lot to do with it as well. He is a very unprofessional human being who has no regard for others' time and work. I have absolutely no respect for him. He does not deserve any respect whatsoever. He's also a poor programmer when it comes to the Sega CD. The audio on the "enhanced" CD was steered to the left or right, can't remember which direction. Tulio Adriano said he programmed that part himself. He failed. Would not admit it. Too proud. Testers didn't catch it, either. So either he messed with something after the testers got it or the testers are incompetent. So much wrong with Pier Solar and everyone laying the blame on things they say they have no control over. That's very cowardly.

No matter what, though, Tulio Adriano is a disrespectful and unprofessional human being who does not care about others.

[retrospiel]

Wow, seems I opened a can of worms here...

[QuickSciFi]

[Genesis Knight]

I would try to confirm, but my original CD worked as far as I've played. (Model 2 NTSC Sega-CD.)

[makinagenesis]

I would try to confirm, but my original CD worked as far as I've played. (Model 2 NTSC Sega-CD.)

I've got 3 Mega Cd's, the original and copies of the disk have played perfect on them all

[retrospiel]

As far as the CD reader is concerned, pressed and burned discs are the same. All it cares about is the ability to read data. It is easier to read pressed CDs than burned CDs.

I am not 110% sure but I don't think you can test a work-in-progress CD by simply burning a CD-R. You will have to test whether the actual pressed CD works. CD-Rs are different indeed.

[djshok]

Why do you want people to "start" crying?

I meant stop lol.

But seriously, it's been over a year. Can we let this go already.

[SpaceFlea]

Watermelon is the ONLY ones who have had this issue. Good Deal Games hasn't, to my knowledge.

Good Deal Games' Battletech game doesn't work on a model 1 SCD (not on mine at least), but it works fine on my model 2. At first I thought my model 1 was broken, but I tried a few "real" games on it and they all worked.

[TmEE]

I had to replace all capacitors in Zebbe's MCD1 for Pier Solar CD to work properly in it. I never had problems using my MegaCD2 for the CD.

[Joe Redifer]

I am not 110% sure but I don't think you can't test a work-in-progress CD by simply burning a CD-R. You will have to test whether the actual pressed CD works. CD-Rs are different indeed.

Yeah, 100% agree. That's not what I was getting at, though. And I do think some (many?) discs made it out of the plant fine. Others didn't. I doubt the batch had 100% consistency.

[Zebbe]

Oh I doubt it. It is Watermelon that failed. I can understand it not working with, say, the LaserActive. But model 1 Sega CD? Come on. As far as the CD reader is concerned, pressed and burned discs are the same. All it cares about is the ability to read data. It is easier to read pressed CDs than burned CDs. Just admit you guys went to a shitty factory to press them already. Watermelon is the ONLY ones who have had this issue. Good Deal Games hasn't, to my knowledge. Nobody in the TurboGrafx community has. Nobody in the Dreamcast community has. Plus I don't think it is you who should be the one apologizing. Watermelon did not handle the whole situation well at all. You can say it had nothing to do with money, but I DON'T BELIEVE YOU. If that was the case, why did the reprints cost so much more with no CD? Because of the clamshell? Please. They made an initial price point and didn't want to ask people to suddenly pay more money.

Still nobody has answered my original question. Do people not even use the CDs they bought?

PS - eargasm

Yeah, we failed, but it's much more complicated than just blaming it on bad printing. As you said, I have no technical knowledge, so I'll just leave that discussion. The reason why the reprint costed much more is exactly the point you are bringing up - all materials for Pier Solar have been produced in factories who know what they are doing, and that costs money. WaterMelon team members have several times taken their own personal money to cover costs pre-orders couldn't do, so even if you DON'T BELIEVE ME, I stand by the statement.

[Barone]

I don't want to put my hand in this can of worms but I feel that I need to make some comments...

The first model of the Sega/Mega CD is more prone to have problems with CD-Rs or pressed discs, fact.
IMO its laser assembly is underpowered in comparison to the Sega/Mega CD 2's. Remember that the original discs were 500MB and not 700MB ones. And that to use CD-Rs with the PS1, for an example of another finicky device, you need to higher the laser assembly's potency in order to achieve better results using such discs.
Model 1 Sega/Mega CD are undeniably older than the model 2 units, so you also have to consider a fair chance of having bad capacitors, like TmEE said, which may lead to an even "weaker" laser.
We also need to consider a possibly worn tracking mechanism for the first model of the Sega/Mega CD, which would lead to less accurate seeks... Maybe not a problem for 500MB discs but maybe for the 700MB ones... And probably the model 1 mechanism is less accurate by construction in comparison to the Mega CD 2's.
On top of that, we need to consider which laser assembly model is more common for the model 1 unit. As far as I know it's not the same model that is more common for the Sega/Mega CD 2... And each laser assembly has its own weaknesses and strengths.

IMO the best model to use CD-Rs or pressed discs is the Sega/Mega CD2 equipped whit the Sony KSS210. These units are pretty reliable and need to be used to death to give you any sign of a "weak" laser assembly and usually you can fix that pretty easily by cleaning it (much easier process than on a model 1) or just giving a bit more power to the laser (which is a piece of cake to do).



After all, I'm also interested to get the Joe's question answered by some owner of both classic/collector's edition disc and the OST pack's one. Someone that had faced problems with the former... Heck, that was a lot of guys complaining here about it back in those days, I'm pretty sure that some of them might have bought the new version, dangit!

[makinagenesis]

I don't want to put my hand in this can of worms but I feel that I need to make some comments...

The first model of the Sega/Mega CD is more prone to have problems with CD-Rs or pressed discs, fact.
IMO its laser assembly is underpowered in comparison to the Sega/Mega CD 2's. Remember that the original discs were 500MB and not 700MB ones. And that to use CD-Rs with the PS1, for an example of another finicky device, you need to higher the laser assembly's potency in order to achieve better results using such discs.
Model 1 Sega/Mega CD are undeniably older than the model 2 units, so you also have to consider a fair chance of having bad capacitors, like TmEE said, which may lead to an even "weaker" laser.
We also need to consider a possibly worn tracking mechanism for the first model of the Sega/Mega CD, which would lead to less accurate seeks... Maybe not a problem for 500MB discs but maybe for the 700MB ones... And probably the model 1 mechanism is less accurate by construction in comparison to the Mega CD 2's.
On top of that, we need to consider which laser assembly model is more common for the model 1 unit. As far as I know it's not the same model that is more common for the Sega/Mega CD 2... And each laser assembly has its own weaknesses and strengths.

IMO the best model to use CD-Rs or pressed discs is the Sega/Mega CD2 equipped whit the Sony KSS210. These units are pretty reliable and need to be used to death to give you any sign of a "weak" laser assembly and usually you can fix that pretty easily by cleaning it (much easier process than on a model 1) or just giving a bit more power to the laser (which is a piece of cake to do).



After all, I'm also interested to get the Joe's question answered by some owner of both classic/collector's edition disc and the OST pack's one. Someone that had faced problems with the former... Heck, that was a lot of guys complaining here about it back in those days, I'm pretty sure that some of them might have bought the new version, dangit!

I'm losing the will to live

[Joe Redifer]

Good!

Anyway Zebbe at least my suspicions were correct that the game was initially priced too low. Agostinhobaroners, why would the drive be able to read a CD-R perfectly but not a pressed disc? Both would be of the 700MB variety. Fonzie has always claimed there there were "a lot of reasons" but couldn't be bothered to explain them. I couldn't get it working on a CD-X, either. I did adjust the laser intensity upwards and it didn't make a difference until I adjusted it too far to the point where it couldn't read anything.



CAPTAIN HINDSIGHT TIME! Perhaps Watermelon should have just sent out CD-Rs. Or better yet, simply offered the ISO for download to those who wanted it like they eventually did. Lots of costs and grief saved. Of course they could have still had the pressed disc in the OST release. I think the CD would have worked perfectly had it been redbook audio instead of the low-fi streaming stuff. Another option, if there is the bandwidth available, would be to stream the audio to the CD sound chips from the cart.

[Kamahl]

I think the CD would have worked perfectly had it been redbook audio instead of the low-fi streaming stuff.

You're correct, but they wouldn't have been able to store so many songs on the CD.