SuperSakura 0.96.2 Released
Happy new year 2026! To start off strong, a new release of SuperSakura!
Although the amount of commits fell compared to the last release, there are still 3 new completable C's Ware games and one more game somewhat playable, not to mention a handful more games partially convertable. Counting PC-98, DOS, and Windows versions separately, that's now a total of 28 completable distinct games, 10 games at least playable, and a hefty 267 games with at least some resource conversion possible.
The stated goal for 0.96.2 was to figure out PNGX support, but alas, this bedeviled author is afflicted by a terrible curse: whatever goal was stated will specifically not get completed, and probably didn't even get started. (The internet suggests this is called internal "demand avoidance"... huh.) So what cool new stuff did we end up with instead?
The most noticeable new feature is the sound system's wave playback capability. While midi music became supported in the previous version, now voiced dialogue works as well! So far, voice is supported only in one game, C's Ware's Kindan no Ketsuzoku, which was localised as Fatal Relations. However, it should be quite easy to now extend support to further voiced games.
Speaking of music, a volume control was added. While testing, it turned out different midi soundfonts have different loudness levels, never mind whatever the Windows GS SoftSynth is doing. The new volume control halves the previous default music volume, which gives a decent range of adjustability up or down as appropriate for each user. The only slight issue is that there's no graphical volume slider yet, so you have to edit the supersakura.ini file, or use the built-in debug console to set $_midivolume to an appropriate number.
The second-most noticeable new feature is user interface zoom. You can use the same familiar controls as you would in a web browser to change the text size – control and the mousewheel, or control and the plus or minus keys. Quite handy for accessibility!
Ctrl-XYZZY to enable debugging, then Ctrl-D for the console.Fatal Relations was already mentioned – both the PC-98 and Windows versions are now playable and completable. This was the first game by C's Ware, and is also among the earliest games localised into English, so it has significant historical value. The game puts you into an adoptive family wealthy enough to ignore social mores and common decency; are you doomed to fall to the same corrupting allure?
Etsuraku no Gakuen was C's Ware's second game, and uses the same engine, so it was easy to add support to its original PC-98 version. The Windows version has a slightly strange scripting format, so it'll need a bit more effort to get working. This game was localised with the title Love Potion, and has you work on an unexpectedly dangerous undercover investigation at an educational institute, where a previous investigator already vanished. This job has a real risk of leading to a sticky end...
Not all new features in SuperSakura are immediately obvious. Every release has a fair amount of internal tweaks and improvements. A great new internal feature is the ability to work with "thin" data files. Normally all game resources are built into a single DAT file before you can play a game; this is quite neat, and makes it wonderfully easy to rage-uninstall a game – just delete the DAT file!
However, while trying to add support to a new game, having to build and rebuild this whole DAT file every time you've made any change takes a lot of effort, and grinds down the storage drive to boot! A new sakutool switch allows building a DAT with only the script and string files, while everything else is loaded from loose files when you run the game. It's a messier way to do things, but also immensely faster.
In addition to small optimisations around SakuraScript compilation, game resource loading, and smarter frame rate limiting, another cool addition is a command for dumping all strings from a game. You can use the sakutool "dump" command to get a standard TSV file that can be loaded by any spreadsheet program or just a plain text editor if you prefer. The TSV file contains a simple table with every single string of text from the game's script. These are fascinating to read, and may even facilitate automatic translation.
Charme's lizard Filemot, or maybe Philemouth, is the best character in the game.C's Ware developed a string of hit games with star designer Hiroyuki Kanno, until he left the company. All of those are already playable in SuperSakura. The first game C's made after Kanno's departure was a return to their roots, Gloria, a loose sequel to their first game. The PC-98 version of this is now playable and completable in SuperSakura; the Windows version again will require a bit more work. Gloria puts you into another wealthy family's mansion, but the hot take this time is: rich people don't have it easy either.
The other game that is at least somewhat playable now is Fairy Dust's Uki Uki Island. It has nice graphics, but the plot seems to mostly involve a group of youths who've come to a sparsely populated island, where they make copious use of the natural springs and apparently get lost in the forest a lot.
As usual, this release would have been much wimpier if not for helpful fellow enthusiasts. Many thanks indeed to MindrustUK, Alatalo, Reyaziel, and Sneikkimies! All research contributions are gratefully received, and there's already a stack of further research notes just waiting to be integrated into SuperSakura.
And that's it for 0.96.2. Tune in to our next episode, whereupon I will or will not have worked on supporting a whole slew of games, perhaps including a truly parasidic trilogy!.. Like and subscribe!