Ryuichi Nishizawa translated wbml into english in 1987. That particular arcade board then sat in a Sega warehouse for almost 3 decades. Till they've pulled that out, and used it a base for the virtual console release.

What was the reason why Sega chose to NOT officially release wbml in western arcades? Also how were bootleggers like Galaxy Electronics UK able to decrypt the japanese roms so fast? I remember playing an english boot of wbml in late summer 87. Must have been mere weeks after the japan release.

>>11798465 (OP)
Probably for the same reason they didn't release the SG-3000 version of The Dragon's Trap until it was exhumed for the latest collection.

>>11798465 (OP)
>What was the reason why Sega chose to NOT officially release wbml in western arcades?
Probably because it's the rare case of an arcade game where credit feeding only makes it harder to complete and people had no strong ties to Wonder Boy 1

>>11798465 (OP)
I remember playing this version in various arcades a bunch of times. I'm in Australia. Maybe it was a bootleg or something I don't know.

Why is the picrel port hated?

>>11798658
Plenty of wbml bootlegs in the wild. Three of these can be played in mame.

>>11798658
Me too but the SC3000 computer was also released here in limited quantities, Sega even sponsored a touring car in 1984. It was on C64, Amiga and Atari ST so I would have thought it would have been popular in PAL territories.

I still chuckle at "queer gown", "body stiffen" and the other nonsense in the bootleg.

>>11798498
>rare case of an arcade game where credit feeding only makes it harder to complete
How so? When I played the arcade version, continuing just dropped me back at the start of the level I died on with exactly the same gold, health, and gear I had when I started it.

>>11798465 (OP)
>That particular arcade board then sat in a Sega warehouse for almost 3 decades. Till they've pulled that out, and used it a base for the virtual console release.
probably more like: sega found binary copies of the roms in their archive.
>Also how were bootleggers like Galaxy Electronics UK able to decrypt the japanese roms so fast?
the keys were cracked and bootleggers added their own CPU board to get their decrypted software to function. "galaxy electronics uk" is most likely just the name of the distributor, not the people that cracked it. you'd have bootleggers selling kits or entire boards and various businesses/aliases would just slap their name on them.

>>11798658
> Maybe it was a bootleg
most likely. bootleg arcades in australia were quite rampant back in the 1980s. you could find them all over the place, especially in tiny shops/delis. last notable bootlegs i remember in australia were the street fighter 2 hacks. i think i saw at least 2 or 3 different hacked "turbo" versions not too long after its release.

>>11800404
Yeah, my first exposure to WBML was via a bootleg ROMset in MAME back in the early 2000s. Honestly wouldn't be the same experience without the nonsense. I honestly wonder why the bootleggers put in the effort to translate it at all, especially since they clearly didn't know English and were just doing straight translations with a dictionary

>>11800570
> deli
Western Australian Detected.

>>11800591
My only complaint is the sphinx quiz is messed up. I used to do it "fairly" each time by always paying for the clues then use a save state to get past. Im sure someone will call me shit but assuming the modern port is accurate, the questions are supposed to be easy when they are not fucked up.

>>11800404
dragon was robot

it may come from star

>>11800541

>>11800470
were you playing a modded version or what?

>>11801060
war is over

>>11801249
You gonna tell me how the arcade version you played made it harder when you continued or what?

>>11801062
nice. i would love to look around inside this "warehouse".

>>11800541
>probably more like: sega found binary copies of the roms in their archive.
With the way some companies seem to be, I'd actually be more inclined to believe that they had the physical EPROMs in storage. I'm pretty sure that's how Konami sourced the tradeshow build of Gradius III that they're including in the upcoming collection; they even showed photos of their design documents and EPROM sets.

>>11802940
Back then they would do that on actual hardware. So they could take these prototype PCBs to jamma trade shows and show upcoming titles off.