Since it appears that a lot of questions and emotions have arisen on account of the news headline informing everyone that complete-in-box copies of Hyper Fighting have been making it into the homes of various Virtual Boy enthusiasts, I figured that the time has come for me to explain my role in this whole thing, and hopefully doing so will give people a better understanding of what all has happened in this regard, and maybe it will also cause certain emotions to settle.
How the Virtual Boy game that is now known as “Hyper Fighting” began to come into being is quite remarkable, to say the least. It actually began in the middle of June in the year 2012 with a forum thread that was started here on this site by PVB User: bigmak on the subject of a game titled “Skullgirls.” In this thread, he posted a link to a site containing pictures that allegedly showed Skullgirls being worked on for the Virtual Boy. Basically, one of the pictures just showed the PC version of Skullgirls being displayed on a laptop which was sitting next to a Virtual Boy, but the colors of the game had been changed to all red and black in order to create a mockup of what the alleged Virtual Boy version might look like. There were also photos of written notes lying on the laptop’s keyboard regarding the plans for how the game would be converted over to the Virtual Boy. It is very likely that the originator of these photos never had any intention to make a version of Skullgirls for the Virtual Boy and that the photos were simply posted as a joke. Nevertheless, I responded to the thread on Planet Virtual Boy with the following comment:
“It’s hard to tell if they’re being serious or not about actually making a Virtual Boy version of this game. If they’re looking for monetary support for the main version of the game, though, they would certainly get a lot from me if they truly intend to make this into a Virtual Boy game as well.”
It’s a very obscure little forum thread here on Planet Virtual Boy, and as of the time that I’m writing this, it has only ever received one other comment besides bigmak’s and mine. I never would have imagined that just this little thread would be the start of something truly great! Since I have had my e-mail address displayed here on my Planet Virtual Boy Profile ever since I joined the site about 4 years ago, even people who do not have actual Planet Virtual Boy User accounts have the ability to contact me if they so desire. Well, only a couple days after I posted that comment, an individual who had read it, who prefers to remain known as “Mr. Anon,” contacted me about it. He explained to me that he had run into some financial difficulties and asked me if I would be willing and able to pay him to work full time for a few months on any kind of Virtual Boy game that I desired, alleging that he would be able to produce a game for me like none other I had ever seen on the Virtual Boy. Obviously, I was very intrigued by this offer, but on the one hand, I wondered just how capable this one was of doing such all by himself, and on the other hand, I thought that such an undertaking would certainly require so much time on his part that there was probably no way that I would be able to offer a monetary amount by myself that would be satisfactory for such an endeavor. Well, since the biggest thing that I myself had to worry about was whether or not I would be able to pay him a satisfactory amount for his work, I discussed with him the upper end of about what I would be able to afford, and to my surprise, we were able to agree on a total price for all of his work that he would do for me. It was then time for me to choose the game that he would make for me!
The subject of Skullgirls did get me thinking that my Virtual Boy collection at the time truly was lacking something in the one-on-one fighting genre, so I really did want a one-on-one fighting game of some kind to be made for me. The thing is, there are not too many one-on-one fighting games that I have really enjoyed over the years, though I have played my fair share of them, but out of all of the ones that I have ever played, “Street Fighter II Turbo” for the SNES was by far my favorite one. I had owned it since about the fifth grade and had easily put over a thousand hours into that particular version. I’ve also played other versions of Street Fighter II, such as on the Game Boy and the 3DO, and I very much enjoyed the subtle differences between the versions. A person who doesn’t put much time into each version might not notice too many differences between them all, but one like me who has put hundreds of hours into each one can pick up on many subtle differences between the versions, primarily with regard to the computer player’s artificial intelligence on any particular difficulty level and the human player’s ability to execute various moves and combos with each character in any given situation. Thus, I feel that each version of the game released on a different platform has to be viewed as its own unique game, since certain strategies that might work with some characters in certain situations in one version of the game will not work in similar situations in another version. But in any case, all versions of the game, in my opinion, are so great and fun to play as well as fun to master! Well, all of this got me thinking: What better choice would there be than for me to have Mr. Anon make me a version of Street Fighter II for the Virtual Boy? I figured that the end result would no doubt be a game that would be different enough from the other versions, primarily with regard to computer AI and performing certain moves and combos in different situations, but at the same time, it would also be similar enough that I would know for sure that I would enjoy it and would love mastering it, like with the other versions I had played. The best thing about this choice, I thought, is that I would not have to give Mr. Anon any guidance at all as to what characters and moves I would want in the one-on-one fighting game that he would make for me. I could just tell him, “Please make me a version of Street Fighter II that is as close as possible to the SNES version of Street Fighter II Turbo,” and then he could use that as the basis to make the whole game that I wanted, without my constantly having to come up with original characters and moves for an all new one-on-one fighting game or constantly having to test out demos of the game that he would have to make and send to me, in order for me to ensure that the game was being made to my satisfaction. I figured that if I am going to pay Mr. Anon a good bit of money to make me a one-on-one fighting game for the Virtual Boy, I want to make sure that the end result is going to be something that I will definitely enjoy and that it won’t require much conversation between me and him during the whole development process or a lot of testing of the game on my part to ensure that I would enjoy the end result, which would take up a lot of time for the both of us. This is the biggest reason why I decided to have an already known game, which I already loved, be made for the Virtual Boy for me.
With the full price for all of his work being set and with the game to be made being determined, it was now time to decide how the project would be carried out by both parties. Since Mr. Anon convinced me by his various messages that he sent to me that he was fully competent to carry out his end of the deal and was fully serious about doing so, I wanted to take steps to show that I was fully serious about carrying out my end of the deal. Thus, we agreed that I would pay him on a weekly basis for the work that he was doing for me and that he would keep me updated on his work by sending me demos of the work-in-progress. I was willing to send him partial payments for the first couple of weeks that he worked on the game for me, even before I received the first demo of his work. I figured that even if he ended up not fulfilling his end of the deal, sending him just a couple of payments wouldn’t be too much of a loss for me, and I would at least feel good about having helped out one who had run into financial difficulties. Nevertheless, if I wouldn’t have received a demo after a few weeks of sending payments, I would have stopped sending more payments until the first demo arrived. Well, it turned out that I didn’t have to worry about such. After just a couple of weeks, Mr. Anon sent me his first demo, which contained a menu that allowed me to choose to listen to many of the different sounds and music that would be in the finalized game. To say the least, I was completely blown away! I myself do not know much about programming for the Virtual Boy, but I was well aware that a lot of homebrewers here on Planet Virtual Boy have had difficulty incorporating sound into their Virtual Boy games, and the sounds and music I was listening to on my Virtual Boy sounded so great that if someone had sent me that demo, saying that it was a sound demo that Capcom itself had made back in 1995, when rumors were going around in Japan that Capcom was working on a version of Street Fighter II for the Virtual Boy, I would have believed the person. But this wasn’t a demo made by an entire video game company but rather, as far as I knew, by a single individual! After receiving that sound demo, I was very reassured that I had gotten myself into a great deal, and it would only be a few weeks after that when I would receive my first demo of actual gameplay. It was then that I would truly feel like a giddy little schoolboy! I remember thinking, “Oh my gosh! I am actually fighting with Ryu against Sagat on my Virtual Boy! I am playing a demo of my favorite one-on-one fighting game of all time on my favorite video game system of all time! What more could I ask for?” Well, I could have asked for the finished game, of course, but after receiving that demo of the gameplay, I felt full assurance that Mr. Anon would fulfill his end of the deal. Thus, I kept sending him the weekly payments until the full, agreed upon price was reached, and he kept sending me updates on his progress.
The biggest thing that amazes me about Mr. Anon’s capabilities is that not only does he prove himself to be a master at programming and coding, but he is also an exceptional artist. To me, it is very amazing for an individual to excel in both of these areas. Through the various e-mails that I exchanged with him, I learned that he was designing all of the graphics in the game completely from scratch, rather than simply taking existing sprites and graphics from another version of the game. Not only that, but he told me that he himself had the ability to design and make his own cart for the game, which would be necessary since he learned during development that the finalized game would require twice the storage capacity of what the FlashBoy Plus has, which is the flash cart that is currently available for purchase from Richard Hutchinson and which is necessary for playing homebrew games on an actual Virtual Boy system. He also said that the finalized game would be able to support the 2-player link cable. Now, since there is currently only one official link cable that has ever surfaced and fallen into one PVB User’s hands, I assumed from this that he had the ability to make his own link cables, though he never actually mentioned that he would make and send me one, which didn’t matter all that much to me anyway since I don’t have anybody close to me who would ever want to meet up with me to fight against me in the game. He even told me that he would design and produce his own instruction booklet and box, both containing lots of artwork, which he would send to me as part of the final product. I couldn’t believe it. Mr. Anon seemed to have the ability to do everything by himself! Now, I have no idea of what all programming and coding was involved in the process, but one thing he did tell me about this was that he was using a fighting engine that was made by PVB User: M.K. I don’t know how exactly he got access to this fighting engine, but I assumed that he must at least be an online acquaintance of M.K., since I don’t believe M.K.’s fighting engine has been made publicly available to this day.
Well, the project did end up taking Mr. Anon longer than he originally anticipated. I had actually sent him all payments months before he ended up finishing the project. Nevertheless, he kept in communication with me, and I was certain that he would finish the game eventually. Then, one day, to my great surprise, a very plain-looking prototype cart of the practically finalized game arrived at my house in the mail. As a slight reference to Napoleon Dynamite, Mr. Anon had made my wildest dreams come true! The version he sent me was so complete and well-made that I considered his part of the deal fulfilled, even if I didn’t get the other things that he had told me he would eventually have made and sent to me. Nevertheless, he continued to work on the game for a little while after that, and then one day, another package arrived at my house, and boy was I excited to see that now, not only did I have an interesting, though rather plain-looking, prototype cart of the game in my possession, but now I had a very official-looking cart, box, and instruction booklet of the game, which looked like it had been made by Capcom itself! The truly finalized version of the ROM on this new cart was even more finished, professional-looking, and polished than the ROM on the prototype cart that had been sent to me before.
Well, it was a short time after this that I learned from my daily visits to Planet Virtual Boy that other people were getting copies of this cart, box, and instruction booklet sent to them. I don’t know any of the specifics relating to how all of this went down, but this had nothing at all to do with the original agreement that was made between me and Mr. Anon, and I myself certainly have no part in this. The original agreement was that I would pay Mr. Anon to make me and only me a one-on-one fighting game for the Virtual Boy. The purpose of this was both to help Mr. Anon out with his financial difficulties and to make my wildest Virtual Boy dreams come true. I never planned to let it be known that this game was in my Virtual Boy collection, since I didn’t want to tease others with what a great game I could play on my Virtual Boy, and I also have no plans to try to make a single penny off of this game myself, in order to try to recover any of the money that I spent to have this game made for me. I don’t know many of the details about copyright laws, but I felt that if I simply paid Mr. Anon to make me a game and then kept the game to myself, without sharing it with anyone or making any money off of it, I would not be violating any copyright laws, though the game would look and play like a copyright-protected game. Whether or not that is true, I don’t fully know, but I certainly know that Capcom would have never found out about this or cared at all about it if such had remained the case. Nevertheless, since multiple copies of this game have been made and are now out there in others’ hands, I felt it necessary to explain my part in this whole thing, since eventually some who have this game in their possession will learn that I myself am a hidden character within the game, who can be unlocked, and these people might wonder just why this is so. You see, Mr. Anon really made my wildest dreams come true, for not only can I play my favorite one-on-one fighting game of all time on my favorite video game system of all time, but I can do so as myself, who has all the abilities of the character I’m best with, Ken. Thus, no longer must I play as Ken, for I can now play as myself, Ben!
To be clear, I am not at all upset that others are enjoying this great game, though I very likely paid much more for it to be made than anyone else. Nevertheless, I do realize that now that news about this game has gotten out, many are upset that they might never get to play this gem, at least not the full version of it. If that is the case, I hope that none of them will hold it against me. I also want to make it perfectly clear that I will never give anybody a copy of the ROM of the finalized game, as I will have no part in its distribution, so it is best for one not to waste one’s time asking. It must be understood that this was just supposed to be a private project between me and Mr. Anon. Now, I myself have no idea if Mr. Anon is getting any money from the distribution of the copies of these CIB games, but I am fully convinced that if I had told Mr. Anon to make an original one-on-one fighter for the Virtual Boy, he would have done an amazing job and wouldn’t have had to worry about copyright laws at all if he then chose to sell and distribute copies of his game. I fully believe that Mr. Anon deserves to get paid for his programming work, as he is incredible at it, and I feel that people who want new games for the Virtual Boy, who don’t want to get into programming themselves, should be willing to pay programmers to make games for them, or give them some other incentive to make games for them, rather than expect free handouts from the hard work and dedication of others. Nevertheless, Mr. Anon, in this case, did not choose to make a new version of a copyright-protected game; I made that choice, and I did so for all of the reasons previously explained, which just made things easier given the specific circumstances. Therefore, if anybody out there decides to disrespect all this by trying to make a nice profit off of the sales of copies of the end result of this project that began as a personal thing between me and Mr. Anon, I am not at all shy to say that I seriously hope that trouble will come your way. If Capcom itself doesn’t come after you, then likely the good ol’ PVB mob here will. 🙂
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Benjamin Stevens
I honestly wouldn’t care if the ROM got released. What we paid for was the physical copy playable on the virtual boy.
Yeah there’s definitely a full ROM.. Not sure what the criteria for that one was..
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This reply was modified 9 years, 8 months ago by speedyink.
DogP wrote:
And who knows… maybe they’re redoing the characters, graphics, sounds, etc. and planning a full release.
I wondered about the feasibility of this, but didn’t really want to be cheeky and ask.
Like you say, who knows…
Really interesting read about the genesis of this great piece of homebrew.
I’m really happy that Ben was able to fund his dream project and get a copy to play. I find myself frustrated with the whole thing a little bit, though. As we are all a community of VB enthusiasts and are all foaming at the mouth for new releases, I wonder: Why wasn’t this open for purchase for *all* community members if it was going to be sold to anyone except Ben?
It’s one thing to say “oh well we don’t want to violate copyright”, but then why were *any* other copies sold to people at all?
I’m not angry about the situation, and really I haven’t even contributed all that much to the community (if anything at all) except for a shared love of the VB. Honestly I’m just really quite jealous that there’s a game — a NEW game — that I never had a chance to buy but other people did. That’s certainly the programmers prerogative, but I wish everyone had kept it secret, then. I don’t mean to sound entitled, as I really am not and I know that. Knowing that some people got it but that not everyone had a chance feels kinda bad.
I certainly don’t know the money involved but I would *love* to help fund the creation of a new VB project. Something like Patreon might be better than Kickstarter, though: A talented programmer could accept a regular monthly donation to help fund their work. If 10 of us chipped in $50/mo — much less than a mobile phone bill most of the time — that’d be a spare $500/mo for a dev to make something like this AND share with the donors.
All of that being said, I’m really glad that it got made. I’m bummed I didn’t have a chance to buy one, but it’s really not my business, I guess. I just hope I can meet one of you guys that have it in real life so that I can play it some time. Anyone up for PlanetVB Convention? 🙂
Regarding the copyright infringement area, and speaking purely hypothetically:
What would the legal standpoint be with regard to Capcom’s IP if such a Hyper Fighting VB cartridge were to be sold supplied with a genuine copy of Street Fighter II for the SNES (approx price £5-10)?
Theoretically, of course.
They would still have to do something about it. Capcom would have to protect their trademark/copyright. Even thou the code wasn’t copied. The graphics and sound are protected under audiovisual work.
By allowing anyone to sell street fighter as a clone on any console without being licensed, they aren’t defending their copyright. By not defending their copyright they have less legal standing in future copyright infringement cases and could eventually lose their copyright.
Capcom might be fine or even happy if fans flock to a small demo on a system like the virtual boy. It shows how much their fans love the street fighter series and they want to support that. But, when a website or a post is made to sell a full game that violates Capcom’s trademark/copyright mark. A line has been crossed and they must take legal action.
Some people might think that Capcom wouldn’t care for such a small following the virtual boy has. You would be incorrect. For a more recent precedent you could look for further then ‘princess rescue’. For those of you that don’t know..a programmer was able to create a Super Mario clone for the Atari 2600.
http://www.polygon.com/2013/7/16/4528818/princess-rescue-super-mario-bros-atari-2600
Nintendo’s legal team got involved and you can’t purchase this game on-line anymore. Why ? Nintendo had to protect their Mario trademark/copyright, or risk losing it.
That is why Richard/tusk and I decided against making and selling the game early on. None of us do this as a living..it’s just a hobby to help support the community. We can’t afford legal troubles.
Now it seems as thou someone HAS made some games to give to friends so people can actually enjoy the game on hardware. There are prob 4 or 5 on this site that have the hardware ability to do it..and lord knows how many that don’t post often and aren’t on this site. It is nice that this game can actually get played on hardware after so much work was put into it. But, I can’t picture this game getting made in any large quantities or being sold online (maybe 1 will pop up on ebay after a few years..who knows).
-Eric
Well all I know is that I would have paid into this, if I had had the chance! Hopefully one pops up for sale sometime, and I somehow get an opportunity to buy it…
