Virtua Cop 3 - SEGA Chihiro

[Mark H]

Hi All,

Whilst I've seen many Virtua Cop 2's for sale over the last few years, the third iteration (released in 2003) does seem a rarity and not one I've seen in any arcades for years including Retro Arcade (Warrington) and AC (Bury & Leeds). The game was published on the Chihiro arcade platform (same architecture as Xbox) and it does appear to be a great game from the Youtube videos I've seen (if you like gun games of course) but for some reason it is not commonly seen...

Comments please.

Cheers

Mark

 

[John Bennett]

It wouldn’t surprise me if fewer were made as arcades were on the wane by then.
But I’ve seen a few around - there was a recent thread with experiments involving a short throw projector into the 50” DLX.

 

[trev1976]

They should of ported this too the xbox

 

[ShinraArcade]

Think you can actually play this on an original Xbox if you upgrade the ram. Sure there's a video on YouTube somewhere.

 

[ShinraArcade]

So who actually made the Chihiro hardware Microsoft or Sega?

hmmm...

 

[Sbdesign]

doesn't really answer it but...

Source

"The Sega Chihiro is an arcade system produced by Sega in 2003. It is based upon the Xbox, using the same Pentium III CPU and NVIDIA graphics card. Unlike the Xbox however it uses GD-ROM media instead of DVDs (with some exceptions; see below), has more RAM and an earlier revision chipset which is used in the Xbox debugging unit (MCPX2). Because of the similar hardware, it is in theory relatively easy to port Chihiro games to the Xbox and PC. The GD-ROM board can be configured to store up to 1GB of data from the GD-ROM like with the Triforce."

Sbdesign2020-02-27 12:16:44

 

[ShinraArcade]

Interesting, I reckon it was Microsoft's doing since it's basically a PC of that era, I think Sega would have used custom chips which probably contributed to their downfall. I wonder what would have happened if Sega took the same x86 architecture and launched their own Sega Xbox. Would they have been successful?

Was there any more to this story of MS and Sega working on anything together?

Sorry to take off topic.

 

[prof5]

Biggest problem with the chihiro was failure because of overheating on the xbox board due to poor cooling as the fans died.
I have converted one of my naomi universal to a shooting cab and run house of the dead, ghost cop and virtual cop 3 in there, using netboot and piforce single so I can just swap memory card, and boots straight into the game

 

[Sbdesign]

Interesting, I reckon it was Microsoft's doing since it's basically a PC of that era, I think Sega would have used custom chips which probably contributed to their downfall. I wonder what would have happened if Sega took the same x86 architecture and launched their own Sega Xbox. Would they have been successful?

Was there any more to this story of MS and Sega working on anything together?

Sorry to take off topic.

Well the dreamcast ran on windows

Sega exited the console market

MS then joined the market with a console that looked like a sega

Sega backed this console

Sega used the MS console in the Chihiro

But there is probably factual documentation somewhere of what was going on without reading into my observation leading to conspiracy.

 

[NaokiS]

Interesting, I reckon it was Microsoft's doing since it's basically a PC of that era, I think Sega would have used custom chips which probably contributed to their downfall. I wonder what would have happened if Sega took the same x86 architecture and launched their own Sega Xbox. Would they have been successful?

Was there any more to this story of MS and Sega working on anything together?

Sorry to take off topic.

It was a joint effort. Sega adapted the Naomi GD-Rom interface to the xbox ide interface and made the baseboard which handled inputs and video. Microsoft supplied the motherboard which is little more than a debug xbox with a different bios.

Same story for the triforce really.

 

[ShinraArcade]

Thanks both, I prefer conspiracy...

I guess either they had no interest in the home market or they didn't have a strong enough hand to strike a deal with MS..

But Xbox would be so much cooler if it had a Sega Logo on it!

Is there compatibility the other way around, I mean can you run Xbox games on the arcade hardware? Geometry Wars would be great on a cab for one.

 

[NaokiS]

Thanks both, I prefer conspiracy...

I guess either they had no interest in the home market or they didn't have a strong enough hand to strike a deal with MS..

But Xbox would be so much cooler if it had a Sega Logo on it!

Is there compatibility the other way around, I mean can you run Xbox games on the arcade hardware? Geometry Wars would be great on a cab for one.

Well, you can just plug the Xbox into the VGA, RCA to the amp etc... But in theory you could run the games as the chihiro software is simply xbox games with special hardware. However you may have bios calls to deal with and it might not be able to read the JVS board. But this is speculative

 

[Smraedis]

I think another reason why these are rare is because almost all cabs were the deluxe version, most of those have that title screen screen burn on it.

If there were more of the smaller cab version, am sure it'd be much more popular, as you don't see many other deluxe light-gun cabs elsewhere too.

 

[Sbdesign]

The UK Naomi style cab was certainly full of hazards for an op & nearly as much space as the DX ...

They should have done the wooden USA style which is like a HOTD 2

May as well have a DX on here...

UK

US

Sbdesign2020-02-27 12:16:17

 

[jasonm737]

Last time i seen one was in August 2019 in a little dive bar in Liverpool named Motel Bar on Fleet Street. Had a Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter 2, NBA and House of the Dead too.

 

[John Bennett]

I know rear-projection has its flaws, but you're got to admit that looks sh*t.

I definitely think the bigger the better with shooting games.

 

[NaokiS]

The projector has been changed for a tv. Unless that's what you meant JB

 

[John Bennett]

The projector has been changed for a tv. Unless that's what you meant JB

Indeed. I know that’s a cutscene, but it still looks tiny and squashed.

 

[Robbiedog]

It was Microsoft that designed Chihiru, it is the xbox hardware,
Dreamcast has the option for developers to use direct x which is why it had the Windows logo, it didn't run windows after all.
I'm a bit of a fan of modern vintage gamer, he did a good video on the dreamcast2.
11 mins in

 

[ShinraArcade]

Interesting always thought the Dreamcast had a Windows CE OS of some sort but apparently not, thanks.

Sometimes I think I should do some googling before asking these types questions but then it just kills the conversation

Just realised I was already subscribed to Modern Vintage Gamer too!