FM Towns Preservation Project

[Cyothevile]

First of all Thank You to NFG for approving this. I wanted to go the formal route since I'm a guest in someone's house. Or someone's party. I think that's the right way to put it.

Early last year I got on board with Redump Team Towns and so far I've dumped approximately 139 CD ROMs for FM Towns and according to my folder on the PC about 180 unique floppy discs. Redump is not a "scene" or piracy group. The database can also be used to determine if your disc is damaged or not. Lots of big time collectors for consoles use it for that purpose; determine if their collection or discs have damage or not. So here is my high score list.

http://redump.org/discs/dumper/cyo.the.vile/system/fmt

The NeoKobe project by the great Kobushi had a great start. As of now the NK project has an estimated 19 pieces of unique software that hasn't been redumped. I would like to thank Kobushi for his hard work as it laid out a lot of groundwork. I do wish he was active again.

It should be noted although Redump focuses on CD ROMs we will also preserve floppy discs at the flux level for this project. Plexors and flux readers such as Pauline, Kryoflux and Greaseweazle. Protections must be retained in order to have a true archival copy. It is best to have an archival copy and then a playable "unlocked" copy as needed for protected floppy discs. Unfortunately I'm not an assembly wizard yet. Towns didn't have a lot of DRM. A few CD ROMs have it which I haven't posted the documentation for Zak McCraken yet for example prevents saving to FDD if it detects it's an illegal copy.

800 CD ROMs documented for the computer system so far although 1100+ unique pieces of software exist for it with much of it still not documented.

I am noticing as the FM Towns missing list grows smaller it's leaving some more obscure and expensive titles remaining. I'm primarily concerned for Fatal Fury Special. Neo Geo collectors don't have a price limit it seems. That might run out of my budget range. Yes Fatal Fury Special did come out on FMT in a very low production run since it was released in 1996 as the FMVs were about to be rolled out.

http://wiki.redump.org/index.php?title=Fujitsu_FM_Towns_Missing_Games

Note that Towns is a computer. Even applications and other software are needed for preservation which we do grab. We don't just do free games. We do preservation. The two primary dumpers/buyers which is me and wiggy2k do plan to eventually at some point get scans performed of all the games and booklets. We are not just about free games as we want to preserve this the right way. The idea is to eventually rotate them to "pro" scanners at our friends at Gaming Alexandria. Also when it's all said and done for the games list I will compile it into an card image for optical drive emulators. I think that's a fair deal.

MAME has also helped and documented known dumped software in their softlist on the CPP source on GitHub. The Tsugaru emulator by the best FM Towns programmer Captainys is also improving radically and will soon stand at a higher compatibility and cycle accuracy than the UNZ. It should be noted that a copy protected floppy disc dumped with a flux reader can be converted to MFM format and totally usable in MAME.

So my plee to anyone that reads this. Sure. Call it begging. Hoarders won't post anyway hence they be outed for gate keeping if they do. We know gate keeping occurs.

If you own any missing software and would like to dump it feel free to contact me. If you don't have the tools we will make them available to you if you feel uncomfortable mailing rare software around. Primarily being lost in the mail. We do have a lot of Plexor CD ROM drives available to anyone that wishes to help with the project. If you have some floppy discs I can look into some Greaseweazle flux readers to provide.

I have spent $28,000 USD last year on undumped FMT and you can look at my redump high score and conclude the same I hope. Some stuff did slip out of my hands such as sniper on Yahoo for the Marty with Sexy PK 2 World Cup Ban recently. However we must dust ourselves off, take the loss and keep an eye open. I know there are hoarders that refuse to share that will read this which is fine. Everyone knows this elephant in the room and it should be addressed. I'll just beat you at whatever remaining auctions come up that I beat you at already like for Ravenloft, Hometown USA (iT dOeSnT eXiSt as some said), TC MARTY set, Star Cruiser, Zak McCraken, ...

[Rygar]

Hi, this is a great project.

About missing games, for the last 10 years or more, I've been trying to find the game "Heroes of the Lance", or at least some screenshots, videos or any info from a some magazine or similar, and everything i found is two low quality pic of front and back cover. I'm crazy wondering if it's an identical version as DOS version, or it is a complete remake, like his sequel for FM Towns - "Dragons of the Flame".
I am ready to buy this game and dump but i do not have expirience where and how buy FM Towns games outside eBay. I found this and i do not know did this is stil alive beacuse translator didn't help me to much:

https://www.suruga-ya.jp/kaitori_detail/127000887

[Cyothevile]

Please direct message me.

Overall you will want to direct purchase from them which is possible