The developer of 1997 3D platformer Croc interviewed the Saturn version of the game’s programmer and posted the answers on X yesterday, shedding light on how it was made and why differed from the PlayStation version.
Argonaut, the original developer of Croc that’s also behind its remaster set for later this year, has been posting fun facts about Croc this month as part of a “Croctober” campaign.
“Saturday is #SaturnDay, and as a special treat we asked programmer Matt Porter to answer some of the questions posed by the Croc community about the Saturn version of the game,” Argonaut posted yesterday. “Earlier this week he kindly agreed. It gets a bit technical, but we hope you enjoy it! #Croctober 🪐🐊”
In case the posts are deleted or X otherwise disappears in the future, SHIRO! has reproduced the entire thread, which included questions in text and answers in images and one short video, below.
Some of the most interesting revelations include how the headless Croc bug that’s specific to the Saturn version happened — Argonaut set a register incorrectly us its own code libraries and the development kit boot loaders they used to test the game set the register correctly — and the fact that the game uses both SH2 processors as well as the SH2s’ DSP co-processor, which they used for geometry transformation.
Sega also apparently thought so much of Argonaut’s Saturn port of Croc that they offered them a job — Making Red Dog: Superior Firepower for the Dreamcast, which was indeed published by Sega in Europe, where Argonaut is based. (It was published by Crave Entertainment in North America.)
In January 1997 Matt made a confident bet that Saturn Croc would be finished in 2 months, vowing not to cut his hair until it was complete. It was finished in November. In this photo we see longish-haired Matt with his Croc wannabe boy band colleagues Saviz and Chris!
The most commonly asked question about the Saturn version of Croc is the infamous “missing head” bug that occurred on the first production run of the game. What caused it, and how did it slip through the net?
Were there any differences between Saturn and PSX where you needed to take a different approach for technical reasons?
One of the most obvious visual differences between the Saturn and PSX versions is the front end menus. Is there a particular reason why?
Why do the individual rooms in the Saturn port feel like they’re a different size to the PSX version, as if Croc has been shrunk down when compared to the other versions?
The lighting in Croc is different for each version, with the PSX having ‘smoother’ and more vivid lighting than the Saturn. What are the reasons for this?
Why is it that semi-transparent objects such as balloons and jelly jumps on the PSX are solid in the Saturn port?
The backgrounds in the Saturn version are flat and fixed to the camera, but the PSX backgrounds seem rounder, enveloping the play area. Sometimes if the player gets high enough up in a level they can look down on the clouds and backgrounds. Why is that?
Looking back, what comes most to mind when you summarize the process of programming the Saturn version of Croc?
How did working on the Saturn port of Croc influence your next project?
Danthrax is a contributor to the Shiro Media Group, writing stories for the website when Saturn news breaks. While he was a Sega Genesis kid in the '90s, he didn't get a Saturn until 2018. It didn't take him long to fall in love with the console's library as well as the fan translation and homebrew scene. He contributed heavily to the Bulk Slash and Stellar Assault SS fan localizations, and has helped as an editor on several other Saturn and Dreamcast fan projects such as Cotton 2, Rainbow Cotton and Sakura Wars Columns 2.
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