Out now! Please read the description before downloading.
After 27 years, Lara Croft has finally returned to the Sega Saturn, in Tomb Raider: Unfinished Business. This expansion to the original Tomb Raider was released exclusively for the PC back in 1998, with lead development by Phil Campbell. It brings Lara back to Egypt, where things will seem familiar at first, but are soon to get more and more mysterious. Lara then returns to where she originally left off, in a highly action-packed Atlantis, where a brutal battle with the last remaining mutants awaits her. Unfinished Business was received well by fans in particular and is still considered a must-play game to this day. It was ported twice to the PlayStation 1, with the first attempt released in 2014.
A Saturn port was long overdue. I originally started development back in early 2022. Much like the PS1 ports, my Saturn port uses the original Tomb Raider engine. I admittedly had no insight into Saturn's specifications, so I hardly knew what I was getting myself into. Data conversion went pretty smoothly at first, until it was time to import level textures: memory limitations caused all levels to crash, except one. These limits were expected, given that the PS1 ports suffered the same during development. However, it turned out that memory was a much bigger problem on the Saturn, due to different memory management.
In order to prevent the memory from breaching, data had to be seriously optimized. Various tricks and techniques were invented and implemented by me over a long period of time, and proved to be quite successful. Unused meshes and animations were deleted, while duplicate meshes and animations were reused. Required pathfinding data that's used for climbing enemies was forcefully removed, since none of the enemies in Unfinished Business can climb anyway. Two huge alternate rooms in one level were removed, with the difference being replicated in a much more efficient way. And then there were many, many more tricks applied. Eventually, I managed to make every level work without any noticeable compromises.
There's so much more to talk about, but for now I'll just say it has been such a fulfilling journey working on this project. A very special thank you to Retro dad, who has shown tremendous support and dedication this year, providing all the feedback I needed in order to make this a quality experience. Check out his awesome Sega channel here: @retrodadandmodernlad9857
Without further ado, I hope you enjoy Tomb Raider: Unfinished Business on the Sega Saturn!
Key features
- Three different regions: American (NTSC-U), European (PAL-E) and Japanese (NTSC-J)
- Expert edition (no NTSC-J for now): Atlantis levels first and inventory reset for Egypt levels, based on how it was originally intended by the developer
- Improved texture and SFX quality compared to the OG Saturn releases
- Restored and corrected SFX and sprites
- Correctly rotated/mirrored object textures
- Subdivided meshes (to reduce warping)
- Ability to perform the handstand
- Ambience (wind/heartbeat) tracks playing almost continuously
- New loading screens
- New statistics screen
- Extended credits (ported from the NTSC-J version and modified)
- Gym loading screen in the PAL version (ported from the NTSC-U version)
- Fixed crocodile distance damage bug
- Improved rendering for certain texture surfaces
Current issues
- [PAL] Fatal rendering issue at certain angles near walls. This issue has the potential to affect the following areas in particular (spoilers):
* "Return to Egypt": getting hit by the boulder right before the third secret;
* Atlantis levels: getting too close to the winged mutants.
- [ALL] Temporary corrupted textures after a static camera view is interrupted. To avoid this, don't press any buttons until the camera has refocused on Lara again.
- [ALL] The ambience track in the Atlantis levels might pause when a mutant explodes near you. Open and close the inventory to resume the audio.
Credits
Ported by...
JRTombRaider/RetroRaiderJohn: level/object/sound/sprite data conversion and optimization (done with custom tools), game executable patching, artwork design and conversion
With special thanks to...
- Retro dad and modern lad: extensive QA, suggestions and support
- RingsOfSaturn (RoS): rendering patch for improved surfaces and additional fullscreen fixes, visual QA and suggestions
- Spyros: artwork help
- Troye: gameplay testing and suggestions
- Cyblitzer: gameplay testing and suggestions
- SuiKazeRaider: Atlantean Stronghold crash fix (PC version)
- Dominik: object modification advice
- Arsunt: fix for crocodile distance damage bug (PC version)
- Esppiral & paul_met: fullscreen patch and centering
