Panzer Dragoon Saga Disc 2 - Uru bug, impossible to continue

[marcellmueller]

I've encountered a bug while playing Panzer Dragoon Saga with the Beetle Saturn core. After some googling it looks like I'm not the only one to encounter this bug and it has existed for a couple of years at least. I know I've beat the game with Mednafen years ago and read that it used to be fully playable with Beetle Saturn core though currently it doesn't seem possible.

The issue happens on Disc 2 in Uru when you go into the tunnel that takes you to the northern area for the first time. Once you get past the first door you are stuck in a small room with invisible walls blocking your path and are unable to continue or even leave the way you came.

I don't know what is happening but suspect that there is a bug with the game streaming data for the next area. I encountered this on the Android version of Retroarch on my Retroid Pocket Classic 6, but also transferred my files to my iPad and pc and had the same issue on all three versions.

I've attached a save state that loads the game in Uru on disc 2, right at the entrance of the tunnel.

This is the area you are stuck in, there is an invisible wall here and you can't progress further or go back:

PDS - Disc 2 Uru bug savestates.zip

[Megyomo]

I just used your save state on my Xbox Series S running Beetle Saturn on Retroarch through Dev Mode. Managed to get through the entire cave up to "Uru-Deep North" and a (presumably) boss fight, meaning I didn't get the glitch and made it all the way through without encountering invisible walls or soft locks. From what I've read about this glitch, it mainly affects users using Beetle Saturn on Android and Apple based operating systems such as macOS, iOS, iPadOS etc. I noticed you used an Android device, iPad and a Mac so you would fall on the affected users criteria. Seeing as I used an Xbox Series S this doesn't seem to happen on Windows based systems. Coincidentially, all the users I've seen affected by this have reported using Android or Apple OSs, not Windows so that's something the Libretro team could use as a lead on why this has been happening. Sorry I couldn't help your specific issue but maybe this can lead the developers on the right path to squash that nasty bug so that everyone, whether on Android, Apple, Windows, Linux etc can enjoy this game on Beetle Saturn until the end. Greetings!

[marcellmueller]

@Megyomo hey thank you so much for looking into this, I really appreciate it!

This was a helpful comment, I loaded this save state up on my x86 linux machine and the bug does not exist there, the game works as intended. This seems to confirm what you've said about the affected platforms and that it is likely a bug exclusive to ARM builds of the core.

Well hopefully it can get sorted out eventually so that more people can enjoy this classic! Cheers.