The Paprium saga continues to be one of the most gripping stories in the world of retro gaming. Developed by WaterMelon Games – the same team behind the likeable Wii U RPG Pier Solar – side-scrolling fighter Paprium was designed to push the Mega Drive to its limit, and many people pledged their cash way back in 2017 in the hope of getting a physical copy (including us).
However, the game's release was heavily delayed and, at the time of writing, we're still waiting on the delivery of our copy – although some are out in the wild now, and copies are being offered on eBay for utterly crazy prices.
We've just received an email from WaterMelon which outlines the current situation, and it makes for rather disappointing reading. Basically, shipments of the Mega Drive version of the game are now on hold as WaterMelon is having problems getting the money paid to it by those who pre-ordered via PayPal. However, the company is keen to stress that it "won't give up" on its customers, and that physical copies will be shipped "eventually". Given that some have been waiting since 2017, that's not the most encouraging of news.
The other interesting point of note is that Paprium is going to be ported to "modern platforms" and a crowdfunding campaign will be established to support this. We'd imagine that will include the Switch.
Here's the statement that was sent out via email:
Unfortunately we cannot resume shipments. PAYPAL is playing dumb paying us only a fraction of what you had originally paid.
First, we won't give-up on you. Anyone still waiting for their games will receive them eventually.
Second, we will not take any further loans to deliver and we are in the impossibility to restore e-commerce services.
It is heartbreaking for us but we have no choice but to flip our vest 180° and embrace digit-fart.We are porting PAPRIUM to more modern platforms and we will proceed with a crowdfunding campaign in the next few days.
To clear any doubt, we will ensure people awaiting their copies will get served first and be certain nothing can beat the original SEGA hardware, a lot of surprises to be reveleated!
All our other products that were to be announced in April 2020 are postponed until further notice.
All difficulties do not apply to the ???? project, which is still on schedule thanks to the few individuals who dared circumvent the GAFAMs grip!
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Comments 30
Interesting, I understand and admire Fonzie's dedication and passion to the original physical hardware and doing really cool and custom stuff with the cartridge board, but at the same time I dig getting this content accessible to the wider audience who'd like to play a solid and passionate Mega Drive / Genesis game with modern conveniences.
I'd be all for getting this on the Switch.
Well they certainly captured the seizure inducing Genesis commercials of the 90s. It does look pretty awesome, hope it ends up on Switch eventually.
Took them a year to do so, just to ensure the ridiculously overpriced physical carts would sell, and then... a crowdfunding? For what? They can simply publish this thing on Steam with the money earned in the past months.
This is beyond cynical.
@rushiosan
It might be to cover the cost of converting their elaborate proprietary Genesis / Mega Drive ROM and board technology to a digital solution.
They will actively avoid distributing anything resembling a ROM and will go at lengths to build an executable that won't rely on emulation so you can't extract a ROM
So yeah, cover the cost of software conversion and publishing to various platforms.
My concerns is if they go overboard with the crowdfunding campaign and start promising extravagant physical rewards at high tiers or something.
I've first-hand seen the fruits of their passion and the Paprium kit is exceptionally produced and premium stuff, but getting this stuff made and in customer's hands is an excruciating process.
Point is if the campaign is no-nonsense digital only, I don't think there's too much to worry about.
FINALLY!
First Razion and now this, could This day get any better?
I just hope the campaign is a success..
EDIT: I just hope they don’t mess up the crowdfunding campaign somehow, especially considering the garbage-fest that’s surrounded the genesis release and how much of a terrible human being Fonzi is..
Unfortunately WaterMelon Games/Fonzie has had more than a few controversies over this game (including a letter included with every copy of the game that included a bunch of reasons/excuses for the delay, some of them somewhat racist, and telling people to donate to him with contact information), the game outright not working on certain consoles/Sega-made Genesis revisions, the game spending 8 years in development and giving no info to people who pre-ordered the game for many of them, the main dev at one point having only him work on the game and lock it away so nobody else can access it, the "launch party" a couple years back showing the game in an immensely unfinished state after 6 years of development,
and many other issues, so it's worth being wary of the final product and isn't a good idea to pre-order this.
Luckily received my copy on Megadrive months ago. Such great quality from the packaging. To the actual game itself:)
Still waiting on my copy of Paprium.
Will I support this digital endeavor? I'm a big sucker for preordering already so probably. In for a penny, in for a pound.
At this point it feels like the Mega Drive was still cutting edge hardware available to buy in all good retail stores when this game was announced!
@BionicDodo
For some buyers it might feel that way.
Oh boy this is gonna be a good one
If they release on the Switch I would surely buy it, but I won't give any money before seeing the game on the e-shop!!
I would pay for a Steam copy
Eesh, yeah I would advise staying well clear of this crowd funding campaign.
@Reprise but if nobody gives him Money then there's no chance we will ever get the game...
I reckon we'll get 90's Arcade Racer or whatever it's called now, before this.
how stupid one has to be to pay to this d*ck in advance, AGAIN ?! DD
@Whitestrider jesua you really THIS naive ???
I actually have a copy of Paprium. I was honestly surprised they came through and delivered it. It's not a bad game, looks pretty nice in motion, but honestly the gameplay is pretty bland. I wouldn't get too excited for this one if I were any of you. And I absolutely wouldn't give them any money ahead of time.
And eventually you will receive.... Sure.
Not.a.penny.
PayPal doing same shiz with another company. Scumbags.
"Give me money to spend a year porting this game you already paid for 5 years ago and still havent received to modern platforms."
Game was garbage anyways, they even managed to release it with DRM that prevents the game from working on a model 3 Genesis, Sega Nomad, clone consoles, and the Analogue Mega Sg simply because the creator of the game dislike Analogue. I say only buy this if you want another mediocre beat em up after market game for your Genesis otherwise just avoid this, it's nothing special compare to the old Streets of Rage and Final Fight games. The game also came with a cart with loose screw and a microSD adapter so they could update the game further and continue blocking more compatibility. A lot of people who back the game also never receive their copy either so I say don't support this Kickstarter, it's likely they just want more money.
How the hell does a digital game require crowd funding? I'll give this a pass until it exists. Waiting eight years for the MD version was quite enough.
I wouldn't fully accept the whole PayPal being at fault on this one. Fonzie the games creator has been known to complicate matters with others that deal in the production in the past. His arrogance on the release of this game also didn't help and when it was finally released after he went quiet for years made it seem like he would never release this on modern systems because that's not how he wanted it played.
Dealing with people is certainly not in his skill set and I personally cancelled my order for the physical game after it all seemed to fall apart after a "launch party" that had a broken early version of the game that was no where near finished. Then he essentially went into hiding while the game was being worked on where no one but him knew what was going on and not even a message to all those who invested the money to begin with.
He's been pulling the same 💩 since the days of Pier Solar, a very mediocre attempt at a JRPG for the Genesis. You can download that garbage anywhere now but I have better things to do... Like find another blue coin in Sunshine 🌞
These scumbags have already scammed me once, not sending me any product or even responding to my emails. They can go ***** themselves with a teatnus infected chainsaw if they expect any further money.
2 of 4 Paprium cart chips have been dumped.
https://github.com/ArcadeHustle/WatermelonPapriumDump
Palate data has been extracted, as well as game strings, and audio.
https://github.com/ArcadeHustle/WatermelonPapriumDump/tree/main/Extracted
@TechaNinja probably because they blew past deadlines and never communicated with people. While they make good games, I can see why people would bitch to paypal and paypal wouldn't want to process payments. And seeing as another article I saw said they did the same on a new paypal account they set up, I wouldn’t be surprised if that (making a new account after the last one had issues) violated PP's tos.
WATA graded Paprium just hit the eBay market. https://www.ebay.com/itm/165338852477
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