Silhouette Mirage
Image: Treasure

Treasure really knew how to make Sega's hardware sing, and its developers produced a string of classics across the Mega Drive / Genesis and Saturn.

Sadly, due to the Saturn's lukewarm commercial performance in the West, not all of these titles got an English-language release at the time – at least not on Sega's console.

1997's Silhouette Mirage is one example of this; while it would be localised for North America by Working Designs on the PlayStation, the Saturn version was exclusive to Japan. Thankfully, due to the efforts of Rasputin3000, soniccd123 and Malenko, we can now experience the Saturn version of the game in English (thanks, Sega Saturn Shiro).

The team has released a patch which translates the game's text into English. Version 0.999 will work on both original hardware (via an ODE) and emulation. The patch uses Knight0fDragon’s Sega Saturn Patcher utility, which is included in the zip file and can be downloaded from this page on SegaXtreme.

The patch’s readme notes:

  • Patch will work with all Saturn versions of the game. This includes: v1.001 (Demo), v1.003 (Release), V1.100 (Rev. A)
  • “+ Region Free Patch” must be UNSELECTED when patching in SSP otherwise the game will crash on boot.
  • If the game is having difficulty loading on Fenrir ODE, then try patching with “Separate Track Files (if applicable)” SELECTED in SSP.

Also acknowledged are two known issues:

  • Centering of “Insufficient RAM” text
  • “Continue” screen sprites are untranslated

"This is going to be treated the ‘release’ version as we currently do not have the skill set to decompress then continue screen sprites or center the ‘insufficient RAM’ text,” said Rasputin3000 in Shiro’s Discord server. "Neither of these lingering issues impact one’s ability to play the game to completion though (they are effectively polish)."

[source segasaturnshiro.com]