Official Sega Saturn NetLink Guide

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Xiden
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Re: SaturnPi

Post#41 » Thu Feb 02, 2017 10:59 pm

M1 IRON SIGHTS wrote:May I ask the point? How many people actually can afford the tiny netlink library such that there would be more than 1 or 2 people to play against? XBand would be far more interesting and accessible if anybody could remake the patches but realistically any spare funds or time would be best spent on Dreamcast, though it's not my favorite console either.


Why does anyone do anything :lol: Netlink is powered by xband, and xband on genesis is just 2 player too... except saturn netlink supports direct dial unlike genesis xband.

M1 IRON SIGHTS
rebel
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Re: SaturnPi

Post#42 » Fri Feb 03, 2017 12:04 am

I realize xband on genesis is 2 player, what I mean is that there is a very small number of collectors who posess the equipment neccesary to benefit from any investment put into Saturn development, while Dreamcast development is relatively accessible and benefits a larger community.

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SEGA RPG FAN
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Re: SaturnPi

Post#43 » Fri Feb 03, 2017 8:19 am

Well, there probably aren't many collectors with the necessary Saturn equipment because there currently isn't a way to use it. If there was a way there would be more motivation for people to pick it up. Dreamcast online seems to be making a resurgence now that it's more accessible.
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Xerxes3rd
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Re: SaturnPi

Post#44 » Fri Feb 03, 2017 8:43 am

M1 IRON SIGHTS wrote:realistically any spare funds or time would be best spent on Dreamcast, though it's not my favorite console either.


I decide how to spend my free time, thanks.

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Xiden
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Re: SaturnPi

Post#45 » Fri Feb 03, 2017 9:28 am

SEGA RPG FAN wrote:Well, there probably aren't many collectors with the necessary Saturn equipment because there currently isn't a way to use it. If there was a way there would be more motivation for people to pick it up. Dreamcast online seems to be making a resurgence now that it's more accessible.


M1 IRON SIGHTS wrote:I realize xband on genesis is 2 player, what I mean is that there is a very small number of collectors who posess the equipment neccesary to benefit from any investment put into Saturn development, while Dreamcast development is relatively accessible and benefits a larger community.


Well there is a small community like ours (http://www.saturnleague.com/) who were at one point pretty active until analog phones started being phased out :cry: But I agree with SEGARPGFAN, I think once a solution is discovered many more people will buy Saturn netlinks, as many people have bought Dreamcasts for online play. I'd certainly would rather have all the Dreamcast games online, but there's very little I can contribute due to not having a clue how reverse engineering the dreamcast works. I'm so very thankful we have an amazing developer Shu who is a super genius :) I love both consoles and it would be really cool to see another Sega console back in action as well.

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SEGA RPG FAN
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Re: SaturnPi

Post#46 » Fri Feb 03, 2017 9:47 am

Xiden wrote:If you can point a good voip adapter out for me. I might invest if its not too expensive.

Also it looks like netlink does support blind dial. http://www.saturnleague.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=597 just have to alter modem string I think


The SPA-1001 is very simple, small, and should provide all the configuration options to enable IP dialing and modem passthrough. $15 currently on ebay http://www.ebay.com/itm/Cisco-Linksys-S ... SwjXRXbpAi

These should also provide a dial tone, so no need to worry about blind dialing. The downside is that you would have to login to the adapter and change the dialing plan to include the IP address of the player you want to call, but even when people were using the netlink as designed, you still had to exchange phone numbers and manually enter it into the netlink dial page. So it's really not that much more work.
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Xerxes3rd
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Re: SaturnPi

Post#47 » Fri Feb 03, 2017 10:21 am

SEGA RPG FAN wrote:The SPA-1001 is very simple, small, and should provide all the configuration options to enable IP dialing and modem passthrough. $15 currently on ebay http://www.ebay.com/itm/Cisco-Linksys-S ... SwjXRXbpAi

These should also provide a dial tone, so no need to worry about blind dialing. The downside is that you would have to login to the adapter and change the dialing plan to include the IP address of the player you want to call, but even when people were using the netlink as designed, you still had to exchange phone numbers and manually enter it into the netlink dial page. So it's really not that much more work.


At that price with those features, it's probably not worth the effort of writing more code for DreamPi to handle Netlink stuff. Could you think of a setup that would allow 2 users to test this without having Saturn hardware? Set up one PC to dial another PC and see what the connection speed is like, or something along those lines?

Side note: has anyone here actually played any of the Saturn games over a modem before? Is it actually playable?

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Xiden
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Posts: 2219

Re: SaturnPi

Post#48 » Fri Feb 03, 2017 11:08 am

SEGA RPG FAN wrote:The SPA-1001 is very simple, small, and should provide all the configuration options to enable IP dialing and modem passthrough. $15 currently on ebay http://www.ebay.com/itm/Cisco-Linksys-S ... SwjXRXbpAi

These should also provide a dial tone, so no need to worry about blind dialing. The downside is that you would have to login to the adapter and change the dialing plan to include the IP address of the player you want to call, but even when people were using the netlink as designed, you still had to exchange phone numbers and manually enter it into the netlink dial page. So it's really not that much more work.


If that works that would be amazing. I'll probably go ahead and order one tonight then :) You still might have to walk me through the usage of it once you get it. FOR SCIENCE!

Xerxes3rd wrote:At that price with those features, it's probably not worth the effort of writing more code for DreamPi to handle Netlink stuff. Could you think of a setup that would allow 2 users to test this without having Saturn hardware? Set up one PC to dial another PC and see what the connection speed is like, or something along those lines?

Side note: has anyone here actually played any of the Saturn games over a modem before? Is it actually playable?


I know Yabuse Saturn emulator has netlink emulated where you can play it over lan, havent tried it yet though. I've played Saturn netlink via Phone Line Simulator which works perfect (Of course both consoles are in the same room so no surprise). From what I've read on Saturn Netlink League, the connections seem to be pretty good.

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Xerxes3rd
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Re: SaturnPi

Post#49 » Fri Feb 03, 2017 11:44 am

Xiden wrote:I've played Saturn netlink via Phone Line Simulator which works perfect (Of course both consoles are in the same room so no surprise). From what I've read on Saturn Netlink League, the connections seem to be pretty good.


Awesome! I was concerned that it might end up playing like Dreamcast Q3A does over dial-up (in other words, not really playable).

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SEGA RPG FAN
Developer
Posts: 601

Re: SaturnPi

Post#50 » Fri Feb 03, 2017 11:57 am

Xerxes3rd wrote:Side note: has anyone here actually played any of the Saturn games over a modem before? Is it actually playable?


I used to play Virtual On once in a while with a friend back when real phone lines were a given. It was virtually indistinguishable from a split-screen match, but he was also only about two miles away from me. I've also played all of the racing games using a phone line simulator between two Saturns. The main concern is going to be finding out at what point the latency becomes too much for the game to handle.

A good first step in testing would be to have two adapters on the same LAN, dial into one and have the second connected to a Dreampi and make sure that you can at least get a solid internet connection. Internet connections are tolerant of latency and packets being out of order so it would be a low bar, but important to verify.

The second step would be to do the same but with a Saturn connected to each adapter (still in a LAN setting). If that test passes, then full fledged internet testing could commence.
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