
“Tsugaru” – FM Towns Emulator Project - app4soft
http://ysflight.in.coocan.jp/FM/towns/Tsugaru/e.html
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wk_end
A fun fact about the FM Towns - several American games, originally for DOS,
had unique and arguably superior FM Towns ports.

Big ones off the top of my head include LOOM (CD music, 256 colours, uncut
dialogue), Wing Commander (fully reprogrammed as a 32-bit protected mode game
that actually runs at a consistent speed) and Ultima VI (with Ultima VII-style
keywords and a highly questionable voice track).

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lower
Zak McKracken: The FM Towns version is the only one with 256 colours.

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tluyben2
When the FM Towns came out, I always dreamt of having one (not the Marty, but
the tower one). Only around 2 years ago I managed to pick one up and it did
not disappoint. Very top notch when it came out, but only in the Japan.

They had picture in, I think TGM [0] (quick check; seems I have all of these
in paper still) we could drool over, but not buy or play with it.

[0]
[https://retrocdn.net/Category:The_Games_Machine_(UK)_scans](https://retrocdn.net/Category:The_Games_Machine_\(UK\)_scans)

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jchw
It’s fascinating, ever since I first saw the FM Towns II (which was recent; I
was not old enough during that era of computing,) I’ve had a nagging desire to
try to purchase one. Sadly, shipping something like this to the U.S. from
Japan is quite expensive, so maybe I will just be grateful someone is working
on emulation software. :)

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9nGQluzmnq3M
Out of the loop: what exactly is "FM Towns"?

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convFixb
Kinda-sorta like a mashup of a DOS PC and a Japanese game console of the SNES
/ Genesis era.

It's cute and retro-cool but also very Japanese, and thus almost entirely
unknown in the west.

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Leynos
What made it interesting to gamers was that its sprite handling was well in
excess of that offered by the 16-bit consoles of the time, allowing some very
accurate ports of early nineties Japanese arcade games. Combined with the big
box packaging, this led to many of these ports becoming expensive collectors
items.

Being one of the earlier instances of a fully integrated CD-ROM computer with
x86 underpinnings, it also saw a lot of PC ports, some of which were enhanced
in interesting ways, such as a fully voiced version of Ultima VI.

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major505
Its nice to see the FM Towns getting some love .

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app4soft
Yeah, _Soji Yamaka_ is not only just one of limited number of persons who try
keep FM Towns alive, but also is active FM artist on demoscene.[0]

[0]
[http://ysflight.in.coocan.jp/FM/e.html](http://ysflight.in.coocan.jp/FM/e.html)

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Answerawake
I was lucky enough to meet him at last years Demosplash 2019 Demoscene party
that was held at CMU. He is a brilliant and very nice guy. The work that he is
doing on FM Towns reminds me of the amazing things hackers accomplished back
in the day. Hope to see him again at a future Demosplash.

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whywhywhywhy
Really love the industrial design and UI design of this era of Japanese PCs
like the Towns and the X68000. Often try to imagine what computing today would
be if these had become the dominant platforms.

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slater
I remember being in my early teens, ca. 1991, seeing photos of FM Towns and
X68000 cases, and those systems' graphics capabilities, and thinking "holy
moly THIS is surely gonna be the future!" :D

