SEGA Mega Drive/Genesis: Collected Works Kickstarter

[TrekMD]

I thought this would be of interest...

[align=center:2fpo2cve][size=180]The ultimate retrospective of the SEGA Mega Drive/Genesis. A documentary art book by Read-Only Memory.[/size][/align:2fpo2cve]

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Read-Only Memory's first title, Sensible Software 1986–1999 was successfully funded on Kickstarter last year and released in October 2013. Based on the strength of that book, we were invited by SEGA to pitch a title covering an aspect of their history. Being a die-hard Mega Drive/Genesis player from the age of 11, I leapt at the chance to create a book that would encapsulate everything that made that console so unique – the stylish hardware, the absorbing Hollywood-inspired atmosphere of the games, and most memorably, the bold and irreverent way that SEGA chose to market the console here in the West.

We are looking to publish the book as part of the two-year-long anniversary of the console's release (1988 in Japan, 1989 in North America and 1990 in Europe). We started research in early 2013, and are now full steam ahead on the project. The interviews, essay and photography are now largely complete, and we have already collated a huge amount of archive material, ready to be distributed across the book's 300 or so pages.

The Kickstarter Campaign can be found here:  SEGA Mega Drive/Genesis: Collected Works

[Shadowrunner]

Oh yeah, I will definitely be backing this! Really cool Sega is involved with it 

[TL]

Now this sounds absolutely fantastic!!!! 

[TrekMD]

I've already supported it. 

[zapiy]

Awesome news..

Hope the wife sees this:63:

[AmigaJay]

This is the first kickstarter ive backed! Looks great, cant wait.

[TrekMD]

The first update has been posted!

Hello Mega Drive/Genesis fanciers! Welcome to the SEGA Mega Drive/Genesis: Collected Works Kickstarter campaign. Over the past 48 hours I have completely failed to do anything but gape, unblinking in wonder as we thundered towards - and past - our £30,000 goal. I am staggered and gushingly appreciative at your enthusiasm for this idea.

So, despite this being the first update, I can confirm that this sleek black book will be landing on your doorstep next year! I accept my role as designer and editor with the steely determination of Joe Musashi, the quiet strength of Gilius Thunderhead and the really-quite-pallid complexion of Chakan: The Forever Man.

This is a subject matter which I am extremely passionate about. Games like The Super Shinobi/The Revenge of Shinobi, Golden Axe and Comix Zone are imprinted on my memory as some of the most visceral, stylish and fun games ever created. I started Read-Only Memory last year with the aim of creating beautiful and historically valuable books that document great moments in gaming history, and I am incredibly excited to be embarking on this journey with you. SEGA asked us to pitch for this project on the strength of our first book (a history of Britsoft legends Sensible Software) and we were granted a license.

The license - which is installed on a special rotating plinth in my flat - allows us to produce a book focussed on first party games, first party hardware, SEGA archive material and perhaps most excitingly, it has allowed us to conduct interviews with 20 original SEGA developers. We are also permitted to include some interviews with other developers who produced first party games.

I want this book to feel like a stroll around a SEGA Mega Drive/Genesis exhibition, with production artwork, in-game graphics and design documents meticulously presented as never before. Alongside all of this will be a 10,000 word history of the console and a comprehensive directory of detailed 'in-conversations' with the key SEGA developers hosted by our award-winning author Keith Stuart. As well as all of this, there will be specially commissioned photographs of selected hardware, a guide to SEGA Mega Drive/Genesis logotypes and a look at the hardware designs that were passed up in favour of the aerodynamic onyx box we all know and love. Basically, it's going to be plenty big and mighty good!

So, allow me to lift the lid on just a smattering of the specific things you'll be leafing through next year in a handy bullet-pointed guide...

As mentioned, we have in our possession the complete design document for Bare Knuckle/Streets of Rage. Entirely hand-written, it details the mechanics of combat and player interaction using a series of matrices and stick-diagrams. We will be asking our translator to decipher it and will assess the best way to present this on the page.
We have shown an abandoned controller design on the Kickstarter page. I'm excited to say there will actually be four different alternate concepts included in the book.
I'm about to receive some development artwork from Comix Zone developer (and backer!) Peter Morawiec. I've also been promised some Vectorman and Vectorman 2 production materials this week from an artist who worked on the franchise.
SEGA have provided us with a huge number of pencil drawings from Monster World IV, showing character animations, player actions and boss designs.
And I could just go on like that! Alongside all of the production artwork will be level maps, sprites and panoramic screens from some of the best SEGA games to soothe your eyes like a bubbling ToeJam & Earl jacuzzi.

I'm going to stick a square of paper over the Kickstarter totaliser on my monitor now and dive into some page planning. You'll hear more from me very soon with news of how the book is coming together, along with a look at some new archive material and details of what has been uncovered in our massive haul of exclusive SEGA interviews.

I'd really love to encourage plenty of communication during the project, so do say hello and leave a comment - please look at the list of featured games we're including and let me know any parts you'd like to see featured, let us know what you'd like Keith to touch upon in his history of the console that he might not have already or just let us know what it is about the Mega Drive/Genesis that makes you all hot and bothered. If you need to contact me directly just drop me a line at mailto:darren@readonlymemory.vg">darren@readonlymemory.vg

In my next update I'll be asking if anybody can help us track down the last few elusive US developers Keith has yet to speak to... We're hoping the project will have caught their attention by then and they can make some time to join our roster of interviewees.

Until then, please do follow Read-Only Memory on Twitter for daily updates on the project and other video game-related noises.

 Thank you for making this happen. I hope to make a book you will really treasure.

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[TrekMD]

Another updated has been posted:

Given that our SEGA Mega Drive/Genesis: Collected Works project - fuelled by unrelenting, worldwide 16-bit passions - has now reached a staggering £53,500 in only 4 days, a number of you have been asking about what that means for the book. Will we be adding stretch goals? New rewards? The actual baseball cap worn by the kid on the front of the Menacer packaging? Well, I must confess I had absolutely no idea the campaign would go like this, so I was entirely unprepared for this situation arising. My immediate instinct is to direct the money back at the book itself, so everybody benefits from a book with more pages, better production values (they were budgeted to be pretty darn nice already!) and even more impressive cover finishes. The addition of different paper stocks, 5th colours, posh bindings or even coloured page edges (this would be so nice: http://goo.gl/BDKRKJ) would mean that every backer would gain from the insane popularity of our project. We're currently speaking to our printers about what's possible.

'Wait! That's just commie nonsense!' I hear you cry! 'I want more stuff!' Well, imaginary materialist backer, let me know! If you have an idea related to what else we might offer, please leave a comment below. I'll be right here to chip in, make notes and scurry away to get costs.

In other news, we've managed to speak to some new industry veterans who will be contributing to our opening essay: Charlie Skillbeck (Developer of the peerless top-down racer Micro Machines), Scott Steinberg (former Marketing VP) and Mac Senour (former Producer) will be divulging all to Keith very shortly. Also, the new addition to our directory of interviews is a bona fide Genesis heavyweight: Greg Johnson, creator of ToeJam & Earl. I hope that gets pulses racing, it certainly did around these parts, I can tell you.

If there's anything you're wondering about the project, or if you'd just like a heated debate about which Mega Drive/Genesis Shinobi game is the best (it's the first one) then drop me a line here or at mailto:darren@readonlymemory.vg">darren@readonlymemory.vg.

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Dynamite Headdy's bonus boss considers our monetary options.

[zapiy]

Simply awesome.

[TrekMD]

Here is the latest update:

[font=georgia:1cxry69g][size=140]Won't You Take Me To... Funkotron[/size]

It seems there is unanimous agreement on how best to spend our extra coinage, and that's to soup up the book itself! Of all the ideas suggested, I thought that improved cover finishes, gatefold pages and most of all... more pages were the most effective way to invest our excess cash. I'm speaking to a selection of reputable printers to see how we can make best use of the money, so please do bear with me while I assess where I can get the biggest bang for our collective buck. Once I've weighed up the options and spent a good few hours agonising over paper choices I'll be right back with you for the full, mouth-watering lowdown on your upgraded SEGA book.

Meanwhile, I'm pleased to announce that we've introduced a couple of fantastic new interviewees into the fold: Rich Karpp (Developer of Vectorman and Vectorman 2) and Michael Latham (Producer of Eternal Champions) will be chatting with us about their Genesis experiences. In the last update I mentioned that Greg Johnson (co-creator of ToeJam & Earl) was on board and I'm excited to say he has sent us a big ol' .zip file full of early development artwork. I hope you will all find the below image just as exciting as I did...

Finally, I have a request! We've been trying – with partial success – to get in touch with Ed Annunziata (creator of Ecco the Dolphin). I consider him an essential part of the book and we'd love to add him to our interview directory. I know there are plenty of ex-SEGA-alumni amongst our backers and I'd love if somebody could assist us in getting in touch with him directly. Please message me if you think you might be able to help!

So, it's back to editing interviews and going over our new print quotes for me. If you'd like to get in touch, I'm always available at mailto:darren@readonlymemory.vg">darren@readonlymemory.vg, or you can follow Read-Only Memory on Twitter at @romalerts.[/font:1cxry69g]

[TrekMD]

Latest update:

[font=georgia:qlhipmkz][size=140]Wonder Boy? Wunderbar![/size]

Our revised print quotations are starting to arrive, detailing our options on adding extra pages, multiple paper stocks, fifth colours and exotic bindings. As soon as they have all arrived (we're still awaiting a few estimates) I can confirm just how much bigger and better our Mega Drive/Genesis volume will become. So, while Europe's leading art book printers diligently tap away on their calculators, I'd like to share with you some of the stunning material we have uncovered from the development of Wonder Boy III: Monster Lair.

I think of all of the material we'll be including in our book, it's the rough sketches and early design documents that are the most fascinating. As you'll see below, the Wonder Boy III boss characters were planned out on gridded paper, with sizes, animation frames, actions and projectile behaviours explicitly described for the artist. We have around 30 of these in total, detailing each of the bosses from Westone Bit's hybrid shooter/platformer and their attack patterns.

On the text front, we've boosted our interviewing firepower in the form of ex-EGM editor Greg Sewart and Nintendo Life editor Damien McFerran. Both are assisting Keith in gathering interviews from far and wide to feed into our opening history essay. I must tip my hat to the learned William T. Carpenter Jr. for suggesting the idea of enlisting games journo royalty to help us out.

You can expect my next update to cover the luxurious additions to your book, along with another hearty glug of never-before-seen archive material. Perhaps a bit of Bare Knuckle/Streets of Rage? Oh, alright then![/font:qlhipmkz]

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[TL]

Awesome! I really want to get this!

[TrekMD]

There's still time left to contribute.  It's already at 2½-fold what they needed to make it real and they are just pouring the money into the book itself to make it even better. 

[TrekMD]

This has been funded and here is today's update!

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[font=georgia:11dqhyw4]Our SEGA Mega Drive/Genesis: Collected Works campaign has just – this moment – crossed the finishing line, with a staggering £98,725 (!) worth of pledges to its name! I've been completely overwhelmed by the support for the project and for the enthusiasm you've all shared with me over the course of the month. To all of you who've tweeted, blogged and podcasted about the project too - I am idiotically grateful.

A great number of you have also been in touch directly to share expertise, industry contacts and game ephemera - because of this input, the book has become considerably bigger in scope over the past month. I'd say that's a big advertisement for crowdfunding right there!

We have been making substantial progress with the book while the campaign has been running. Pages are beginning to take shape, interviews are being copy-edited and translations are being perfected. I look forward to sharing our news and discoveries over the coming months as everything comes together in what will now be a bigger and even more beautiful object than I had hoped to create.

Most of all right now though, I'd just like to say 'thank you' and offer my assurances that our Mega Drive/Genesis book will blow you away when it arrives next year - bursting with new insights, axe-wielding warriors, rare hardware, space-trekkin' hip hop aliens, never-before seen artwork, anthropomorphised shooting stars with stretchy arms, exhaustive interviews and... ninjas. So very many ninjas.[/font:11dqhyw4]

[TrekMD]

Here is today's update on the project...

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I know, I know. It's Christmas and you couldn't eat another thing. Well, allow me to offer Yuletide indulgence of a different kind - enough soft-centred Mega Drive/Genesis moments to have you loosen your belt yet another notch. And! A digital gift to wash it all down with. So, let us begin gorging mindlessly on some brandy-infused production news...

[size=140]Production[/size]

I've received brand new print quotes from a selection of the best art book printers in the land, taking into account a plethora of options from fifth colours to painted page edges. I'm now certain that the book will be 352 pages – 50 pages more than I'd planned – allowing me to comfortably include as much written and visual material as possible. Additionally, I now intend to include several gatefold pages throughout the book, allowing us to appreciate some of the visual material in full panoramic glory. Most excitingly, this means we'll be able to reproduce several level maps in their full, start-to-finish splendour - perhaps an overview of the Green HIll Zone? Or the complete first level from Dynamite Headdy? I'll be experimenting to see what works most effectively over the coming weeks. Of course there will be other upgrades to the book to come, however I'm keen to begin pulling the design together a little more before deciding upon these extra special bells and whistles, as I want to ensure the upgrades serve the content of the book itself. I'm currently tempted by seriously boosting the cover finishes, making every copy as covetable as possible. Naturally though, I'll keep you all updated as I decide between the myriad options of foils, cloths and vellums.

[size=140]Writing[/size]

The written sections of the book have been receiving a great deal of attention over the past month, most notably in the form of a pair of new VIP contributors. I'm delighted to announce that you'll be hearing from both Tom Kalinske and Hayao Nakayama – ex-Presidents of Sega of America and Sega of Japan respectively – in our opening essay. They will both be speaking with Keith about their time at Sega and offering candid recollections about the decisions that led to the console's global dominance. There are several other Sega heavyweights that will be joining Mr. Kalinske and Nakayama-san, however I will wait for a future update to unveil them all. I wouldn't want you to spill your eggnog (or, 'Robotnog' as it's named in the West) in over-excitement.

Also, we've submitted all 27 of our long-form developer interviews to Sega for approval. From these, I'd like to offer you the following chocolate-coated Sega facts...

1. Yu Suzuki informed us that Space Harrier was initially planned to be a Harrier Jump Jet simulator. After realising that it would take a whopping 64 frames of animation for the jet to rotate convincingly, it was decided to opt for a flying human protagonist who would fight monsters in a fantasy world, as the graphics would not need to be so animation-dependant. The only part of the initial game plan to survive would be the 'Harrier' part of the title.

2. Naoto Oshima revealed that there were several rejected level ideas during the creation of the first Sonic the Hedgehog. Among the ideas not to make it into being were Chinese World Zone and Gold World Zone.

3. Makoto Uchida shared with us how he perfectly tuned the difficulty on hit games such as Golden Axe and Alien Storm. He discovered that after two or three days without sleep - common at the end of a game's development - hardened developers would play a lot like a newcomers to the game, allowing them to perfectly calibrate the difficulty levels.