Chaos Control: An In-Depth Look at the 1995 Game's Variants

This article exists to catalogue and present my findings on the differences between various console and computer editions of the 1995+ game, Chaos Control, by Infogrames. I have extensively played and explored the filesystems of most versions of this game for another project. In my research, I have found inaccuracies regarding the game being reported, largely by people who have never played it and are repeating what they have heard elsewhere. I hope that this article will serve as a reliable reference to clear up the disinformation being spread regarding this game.

Chaos Control was originally released for the Philips CD-i in 1995, and ported to Sega Saturn, Sony PlayStation, MS-DOS and Apple Macintosh soon after, and more recently to Steam in 2018. No console versions were released for the North American market, with releases only in Europe and Japan. The MS-DOS version was however published in North America by I-Motion, Infogrames' North American publishing division at the time. The later Steam release was also made available worldwide. I have been unable to find any information regarding the distribution of the Macintosh version.

The CD-i version is the definitive version. The original from which all others were derived. I cannot confirm whether the CD-i version was released in languages other than English, my British CD-i disc contains only English language audio with a multilingual manual, but the game was made available elsewhere in Europe. The Sega Saturn versions were either Japanese only or multilingual English, French and German, and the PlayStation port was also Japanese only.

 

A claim regarding Chaos Control that I have seen across various sites, including Wikipedia, is that “an enhanced remake was released exclusively for the Sega Saturn in 1996”. Unfortunately, Wikipedia does not cite a reference for this claim.  This needs clarification as it likely stems from misunderstanding or misreporting.

To unravel this falsehood, I should first explain a little about the CD-i version’s video files. The CD-i’s video files were saved with the .RTF extension, which is an extension that is confusingly more commonly associated with text documents (Rich Text Format). However, these are nothing more than alternatively named MPEG video files.  They can be played in a capable video player, such as VLC, without issue.  Analysis of the media codec information in VLC reveals that the video resolution is 368x272 pixels and runs at 25 frames per second, al.

The Sega Saturn saw three editions released. The first edition, released in Japan in 1995, was titled ‘Chaos Control’ (in English) and subtitled in Japanese ‘カオスコントロール’.  This game was a reasonably faithful port of the CD-i original.  It was complete as it contained all levels and cutscenes, but all of the voice audio was in the Japanese language.  Happily, Sega Saturn discs are easily read by just about any CD-ROM drive and it’s easy to see the file structure on the disc and find that all of the video files are saved in the `.AVI` format.  Analysing the media codec information in VLC tells us that the video resolution is only 352x224 pixels and runs at a mere 15 frames per second. Furthermore, the visual quality is quite simply poorer in appearance, which appears to be due to the use of a reduced colour palette. This is hardly “enhanced”.  But wait, this isn’t the version referred to in the Wikipedia article. The article states that it was a 1996 Saturn release that featured enhanced video.  Let’s take a look at the other two…

 

The following year, in 1996, the European edition of Chaos Control was released for Saturn.  It featured audio in three languages, English, French and German. It is the first version of the game that allowed the game to be played with a light gun (the Saturn’s “Virtua Gun”) and to allow two players to play cooperatively. And as it’s a Saturn game we can easily look at the files on the disc.  There are significantly more video files on the disc than in the previous release. Many of them have been named similarly to each other, but suffixed with either E, F or G – these are separate audio translations for each of the videos that contain speech, in English, French and German respectively.  How did the developer fit all of this extra video onto the disc? By comparing all the files from previous versions you can see that they removed a huge portion of the game! The entire second area (the “Virtual” section) is completely missing. This amounts to four individual gameplay sequences. Ok, so this game is multilingual, but a shorter overall experience.

Later in 1996, Japan saw its second edition of the game released, and the third and final overall for the Saturn. This time it was retitled “Chaos Control Remix”, presumably to distinguish it from the first Japanese Saturn release.  This version adopted the same changes made for the earlier European release, allowing the game to be played with a light gun and by two players at once.  Unfortunately, a look at the files on the disc shows that this version also omitted the same large portion of the game.  This is a curious development as this release only contains one audio language, Japanese, and was therefore not subject to the same disc space constraints as the multilingual European edition.  But further examination reveals the likely reason. The filenames all match the filenames of the English language videos from the European disc. It seems that this Japanese version was just a hastily adapted conversion of the European version, having simply removed the French and German translations and replaced the English videos with the Japanese counterparts. Unfortunately, it was considered just too much effort to restore the missing section of the game.

Let’s take a look at the video file information. Once again, putting the files into VLC gives us some information about the video’s encoding. Unfortunately both the European release and the Japanese “Remix” reveal no difference from the earlier Japanese release. These video files are also 352x224 and 15 fps. So if the resolution and framerate across all three Saturn versions are the same (poorer quality than the CD-i original), what “video enhancements” does the Wikipedia article refer to?  Simply put, the visual quality of the Euro and Japanese Remix videos does look a little better than the first Japanese Saturn version, employing some dithering to help blend the colours.  This is where I think the misunderstanding originated.

The claim that 'an enhanced remake was released exclusively for the Sega Saturn in 1996' is incorrect. The enhancement can only be the use of dithering to improve the appearance of the videos between the 1995 Saturn version and the 1996 Saturn versions, barely an enhancement over the earlier Saturn release only, but still a net diminishment from the original CD-i version.

Comparing the video files across different versions

I also checked the PlayStation release, which was a Japanese exclusive in 1996. The file format was in a proprietary `.STR` format which I was able to analyse in a program called jPSXdec. This showed that the video resolution was 320x224 and 15 frames per second.  So PS1 had the lowest resolution of all the console versions, and worse still, reviewing the video files on the disc showed that, not only was the “Virtual” section entirely missing as with the Saturn releases, but so was one of the “Space” section levels!”  This is the smallest version of the game yet, and at poor quality.

  

Analysing the PS1 video files

 

Below, you can see a table comparing all of the video files available between the different console variants, which should hopefully highlight just how much of the game is missing from some of them.  Only the CD-i and first Japanese Saturn versions contain the whole game and, of those, the Saturn version has poorer video quality.

 

File Description	CD-i	Saturn JP1	Saturn EU	Saturn JP Remix	PS1 JP
Publisher Splash	philips.rtf	PHILIPS.AVI			KOKOPELI.STR
Infogrames Splash	tatou.rtf	TATOU.AVI			TATOU.STR
Introduction Pt 1	sonde.rtf	SONDE.AVI	SONDEE.AVI SONDEF.AVI SONDEG.AVI	SONDEE.AVI	INTRO00.STR
Introduction Pt2	intro1.rtf	INTRO1.AVI	INTROE.AVI INTROF.AVI INTROG.AVI	INTROE.AVI	INTRO01.STR
New York 1 Intro	intro2.rtf	INTRO2.AVI	TLIBE.AVI TLIBF.AVI TLIBG.AVI	TLIBE.AVI	DEC128.STR
New York 1 Game	lib.rtf	LIBERTY.AVI	LIB.AVI	LIB.AVI	LIBERTY.STR
New York 1-2 Cutscene	pl_li_fr.rtf	TLIB.AVI	TFRO.AVI	TFRO.AVI	TLIB.STR
New York 2 Game	fro.rtf	FRO.AVI	FRO.AVI	FRO.AVI	BRIDGE.STR
New York 2-3 Cutscene	pl_fr_ma.rtf	TMAN.AVI	TMAN.AVI	TMAN.AVI	TMAN.STR
New York 3 Game	man.rtf	MAN.AVI	MAN.AVI	MAN.AVI	TOWN.STR
NY Outro Cutscene	hqg.rtf	HQG.AVI	HGGE.AVI HQGF.AVI HQGG.AVI	HQGE.AVI	HQG.STR
VR Intro Cutscene
VR 1 Game	cpu.rtf	CPU.AVI
VR 1-2 Cutscene	pl_ca_fr.rtf	YOK0.AVI
VR 2 Game	fra.rtf	FRA.AVI
VR 2-3 Cutscene	pl_fr_vo.rtf	YOK1.AVI
VR 3 Game	vol.rtf	VOL.AVI
VR 3-4 Cutscene	pl_vo_vi.rtf	YOK2.AVI
VR4 Virus Game	vir.mpg	VIR.AVI
Space Intro Pt1	dep0.rtf	DEP.AVI	DEP1E.AVI DEP1F.AVI DEP1G.AVI	DEP1E.AVI
Space Intro Pt2	dep1.rtf		DEP2E.AVI DEP2F.AVI DEP2G.AVI	DEP2E.AVI
Space 1 Game	sp1.rtf	SP1.AVI	SP1.AVI	SP1.AVI
Space 1-2 Cutscene	pl_s1_s2.rtf	SP00.avi	TSP2E.AVI TSP2F.AVI TSPG.AVI	TSP2E.AVI
Space 2 Game	sp2.rtf	SP2.AVI	SP2.AVI	SP2.AVI	SPACE2.STR
Space 2-3 Cutscene	pl_s2_s3.rtf	SP01.AVI	TSP3E.AVI TSP3F.AVI TSP3G.AVI	TSP3E.AVI
Space 3 Game	s3.rtf	SP3.AVI	SP3.AVI	SP3.AVI	SPACE3.STR
Space 3-4 Cutscene	pl_s3_s4.rtf	SP02.AVI	TSP4E.AVI TSP4F.AVI TSP4G.AVI	TSP4.AVI
Space 4 Game	s4.rtf	SP4.AVI	SP4.AVI	SP4.AVI	SPACE4.STR
Space- Maze Transition Cutscene	vm1.rtf	DEC.AVI	VME.AVI VMF.AVI VMG.AVI	VME.AVI	DEC.STR
Maze 1 Game	mo1.rtf	MO1.AVI	MO1.AVI	MO1.AVI	MOTHER1.STR
Maze 2 (1 Left) Game	mo2.rtf	MO2.AVI	MO2.AVI	MO2.AVI	MOTHER2.STR
Maze 3 (1 Up) Game	mo3.rtf	MO3.AVI	MO3.AVI	MO3.AVI	MOTHER3.STR
Maze 4 (3 Up) Game	mo4.rtf	MO4.AVI	MO4.AVI	MO4.AVI	MOTHER4.STR
Maze 5 (3 Right) Game	mo5.rtf	MO5.AVI	MO5.AVI	MO5.AVI	MOTHER5.STR
Maze 7 (4 Left) Game	mo6.rtf	MO6.AVI	MO6.AVI	MO6.AVI	MOTHER6.STR
Maze 8 (4 Right) Game	mo7.rtf	MO7.AVI	MO7.AVI	MO7.AVI	MOTHER7.STR
Maze “Try Again” Cutscene	nexttry.rtf	TVM.AVI	TVME.AVI TVMF.AVI TVMG.AVI	TVME.AVI	TVM.STR
Lose Ending	dead.rtf	PER.AVI	LOSE.AVI	LOSE.AVI	PER.STR
Win Ending	win.rtf	GA.AVI	WIN.AVI	WIN.AVI	GA.STR
Epilogue	epilog.rtf	EPI.AVI	EPILOGE.AVI EPILOGF.AVI EPILOGG.AVI	EPILOGE.AVI	EPIL.STR
Credits	credits.mpg	CRED.AVI

 

There were other versions released. One for the PC running MS-DOS, and another for the Apple Macintosh.

The MS-DOS and Apple Macintosh versions defy my ability to analyse their files.  All of the DOS version’s data appears to be held within a single large file from which I lack the ability to extract any meaningful data.  However, I was able to play it in DosBox and found that it differs greatly from the console versions.  The same pre-rendered videos are used for the passive scenes where the player is not playing (cutscenes and the like) albeit at a significantly lower resolution of woefully poor quality; but the gameplay is very different. These appear to either be rendered in real-time or have been prerendered at a much-reduced poly-count to the original video (I’m inclined to think the latter, because the same trick of covering the destroyed ships with a smoke cloud until they leave the screen has been employed).  These playable sections are not just lower resolution, but lower quality 3D models were used.

I recorded gameplay footage of the MS-DOS version for analysis and estimated the resolution to be around 288x180 and the framerate to be in the region of 15fps.

I wasn’t able to play through the entire game unfortunately because it is punishingly difficult.  The MS-DOS version does not allow you to have any extra lives, so once your health is depleted, it’s game over.  The console versions allow you to have up to 9 extra lives, so this choice for MS-DOS confounds me. I can only imagine that it was considered too hard or infeasible to program handling for resuming the game with a life deducted and health replenished.  But in my limited playthrough I was at least able to ascertain that some levels were considerably abbreviated from their console counterparts.  The second New York stage ended halfway across the bridge, whereas the Console editions continue to a vertical flight alongside a tall building and beyond before concluding.  But i was able to see a full playthrough by a user on YouTube and it appears that all the levels are present, even if some are abbreviated.

I haven’t been able to play the Macintosh version or find any videos of anybody playing it. I suspect that this may be of similar quality to the MS-DS version.

The game is currently available to purchase on Steam. Unfortunately this is just the MS-DOS 1995 version and is provided with DosBox.  What a shame that the publisher didn’t take the opportunity to produce a new version with upscaled CD-i video files.  I think this was probably a lazy effort to make some easy money by cashing in on an IP that they had access to with minimum effort.

 

1995 CD-i version

1996 Saturn Version
(note the HUD is not central, allowing room for a second player's HUD)

1995 MS-DOS version

2018 Steam Version

Finally, it would be remiss of me to not actually try playing the CD-i release of Chaos Control with a lightgun.  My experience with the CD-i is that it rarely distinguishes between control methods, and it is usually up to the player to indicate what type of controller they are using in the game, so it might be possible to play with a lightgun regardless.  However, Chaos Control makes no such request of the player whether or not the Peacekeeper gun (the CD-i's only lightgun peripheral) is connected.  The game's cursor can be controlled using the Peacekeeper, but there is a significant offset that cannot be corrected as the game offers no way to calibrate. A disappointing omission, making lightgun operation infeasible in this game.

So what’s the best version to play?  Well, for video quality and completeness, the CD-i original is the one to choose.  However, this game is best played with a light gun, and only the European and Japanese Remix Saturn versions can offer you that functionality (I shall provide links to scans of the manuals to demonstrate that they are the only versions to mention light gun functionality).

That's it.  Here are some links to some supporting information that you might be interested in:

Sega Saturn (European) manual - Page 9 (indicates the Virtua Gun can be used)

Philips CD-i manual - Page 4 gives advice on using a joystick and recommends that a gamepad be used. There is no mention of a Lightgun, but then neither is there mention of a mouse which can be used.

MS-DOS manual - Page 9 indicates only that a mouse can be used

Apple Macintosh manual - Page 6 explicitly states that only a mouse can be used

Finding Japanese manuals can be hard.  if I come across the two Saturn Japanese manuals and the PS1 manual then I'll upload them to the Internet archive and -add the links here.

I have also published a short YouTube video comparing the main differences between most versions of the game:

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