Hummer Team Explained

Hummer Team (Chinese: 悍馬小組) was a Taiwanese developer of bootleg video games which was founded in 1992 and closed down in 2010.

Hummer Team
Native Name Lang:Chinese
Type:Private
Founded:1992
Defunct:2010
Founder:Hummer Cheng
Location:Taipei, Taiwan
Products:Video games

History

Hummer Team was founded in Taipei, Taiwan in 1992 by Hummer Cheng, who had previously worked at Sachen.[1] It was originally dedicated to the development and publishing of unauthorized ports of video games for the Nintendo Famicom. The first video game published by Hummer Team was Jing Ke Xin Zhuan (1992), a role-playing video game. Upon the releases of Kart Fighter (1993) and Somari (1994), the company began to gain attention.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Hummer Team experienced economic troubles because it had difficulty developing for the fifth generation of video game consoles. This caused Hummer to begin making games for plug and play consoles, and working on things other than the Famicom. Examples include the Samuri 60-in-1 and Z-Dog, the latter of which was released in 2006 by Zechess and was their final product. Most of their later plug-n-play consoles were based on OneBus "VT03" enhanced NES clone hardware by the Taiwanese company V.R. Technology.[2]

Recognition (1992–2006)

Hummer Team's first game, Jing Ke Xin Zhuan, was released in 1992. The company was known in Argentina by its publisher, Yoko Soft, after the release of Street Fighter: The World Warrior in 1993. Some of Hummer Team's better known games include Street Fighter II: The World Warrior, an unlicensed port of Street Fighter II, Kart Fighter, a Street Fighter clone infamously using characters from the Super Mario Bros. series, and Somari, a port of the original Sonic the Hedgehog game to the Famicom, featuring Mario instead of Sonic. Somari in particular gained a bit of notoriety, having been made fun of by many content creators and video game journalists for its poor physics, modified object placement and replacement of Sonic as the main character.

Games

!Game!Chinese Name!Note!Published
Jing Ke Xin Zhuan荊軻新傳Chinese language RPG. Hummer Team's first production.1992
Street Fighter II: The World Warrior街頭霸王 II:世界勇士1992
Street Fighter IV快打傳説An enhanced port of Street Fighter II, with new characters and locations.1993
Kart Fighter瑪莉快打Another port of Street Fighter II, this time featuring the cast of Super Mario Kart.1993
Somari索馬里A port of Sonic the Hedgehog with Mario as the main character.1994
Dragon Ball Z – Super Butoden 2龍珠 Z – 超級武神 21994
Tekken鐵拳1994
Mortal Kombat III 眞人快打 3In actuality, a port of the original Mortal Kombat. Also known as Mortal Kombat IV.1994
Aladdin阿拉丁Based on the Capcom title released for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System.1995
Super Mario World超级马里奥世界A port of the SNES game of the same name.1995
Sanguo Chunqiu: Sichuan Sheng三國春秋 四川省1996
Yuu Yuu Hakusho Final宇宇白皮書終稿1996
Street Fighter Zero 2 '96街頭霸王零式 2 '961996
Street Fighter Zero 3 '97街頭霸王零式 2 '971997
The King of Fighters '96拳皇'961997
Tiny Toon Adventures 6小香椿歷險記 6A port of Tiny Toon Adventures: Babs' Big Break, originally released for the Game Boy.1997
Sonic & Knuckles 5索尼克與指關節 5A hack of Somari that replaces Mario with Sonic the Hedgehog.1997
Donkey Kong Country 4大金剛 4An unlicensed port of Donkey Kong Country, which was originally released on the SNES.1997
Earthworm Jim 3蚯蚓吉姆 3An unlicensed port of the Sega Genesis version of Earthworm Jim, published by NT.1997
Final Fight 3最後的戰鬥 3A port of the SNES game.1998
The King of Fighters '98拳皇'981998
Mortal Kombat 2眞人快打 22000
Mortal Kombat II special眞人快打II 特別版2000
King FishingA fishing game inspired by Sega Bass Fishing. King Fishing was commissioned by Apollo Electronics for a fishing rod-shaped plug and play.2001
The Hummer悍馬A hack of Somari with an altered character sprite resembling Hummer Team's mascot, a horse named Hummer.[3] 2002
Mortal Kombat 4眞人快打 42003
Titenic泰坦尼克號2003
Mighty Morphin Power Rangers III強大的嗎啡電力別動隊 III2003
Shin Samurai真侍魂II2003
Super New Year Cart 15-in-1超强年度新卡A Famicom multicart released by ABAB Soft. Contains versions of earlier Hummer Team games altered to remove copyrighted materials, most notably Titenic. It also contains several original games containing reused assets from earlier games as well. Created presumably to celebrate Lunar New Year.2005
Titenic Remake泰坦尼克號翻拍A remake of the original Titenic.2005
Z-DogZ狗A plug-and-play console published by Zechess. The last product released under Hummer Team before their closure.2006

Notes and References

  1. Web site: 2012-06-20 . PGC Forums-您好 / Hello . 2024-05-29 . PGC Forums . en-gb.
  2. Web site: 2011-06-15 . PGC Forums-Samuri/Star Angel - a Hummer Team plug & play console . 2024-06-02 . PGC Forums . en-gb.
  3. Web site: Somari - The Cutting Room Floor . 2024-08-02 . tcrf.net.