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Bug!


Genre: Platform
Release Year: 1996
Developer: Beam Software
Publisher: Sega
Age Rating: 10+
Playability Status: Fully playable (minor issues only) (Windows 7) Unplayable (Windows 8)
Tested On: Windows 7 x64, Windows 8 x64
Availability: Copyright retained - Out of print/unavailable

This colourful platform game originally début on Sega’s classic Saturn games console. A year later Windows users were treated to the cool little insects antics. Bug isn’t your typical platform game hero, he’s a hotshot in Hollywood and in this game, he’s just scored his biggest break ever. In the amazingly scripted movie Bug’s agent has signed him up for, he must rescue his girlfriend from the evil Queen Cadavra. To do this, he’ll have to run and jump his way through several levels of platform mayhem (apparently before they signed Bug! it was going to be a Bee movie).

So, the plot may be kind of threadbare but the game itself is still a lot of fun. Children will love the bright and colourful graphics and fun sound effects and adults old enough to remember the game the first time around will no doubt relish the chance to play again. Bug was one of the earliest examples of a fully 3D platform game and so it has historical interest too.

Installation

Bug should install without any major issues on modern systems. If you find that you cannot start the autorun program normally, you may need to explore the CD and run the “Setup95” program manually yourself. When prompted to choose an installation type, choose “Maximum Installation”. By default the game will install itself to C:\SEGA\BUG! If you change this directory remember that the game needs to be able to write to the directory it is installed to, so you may need to change permissions on the folder for other users.

Running the game

Bug is a little bit of a pest to get running perfectly on modern machines, but with perseverance it is possible on Windows 7. Thanks to changes Microsoft made to the desktop we have not been able to get the game working in Windows 8. Windows 7 users should start by opening the Bug! Installation folder and find the BUG!.EXE executable file. Right click on the icon and choose properties. From the properties window, select “Compatibility” and set the following compatibility options:-

Run this program in compatibility mode for: Windows 95
Run in 256 colors
Run in 640 x 480 screen resolution

If you’ve never used the compatibility options for a game before, there’s a full tutorial here on how to use them. These settings will get us as far as the intro, but then the game will crash saying it is incompatible with high resolution screens. The problem is that Bug! likes to change between full screen and windowed mode while it starts up, this confuses the compatibility tools in Windows which think that the game has finished running and switch the desktop back to its usual resolution and colour depth. To work around this problem we’re going to need a tool called QRes.

Using QRes

Confusingly there seem to be not only multiple versions of this program on the internet but also multiple authors who have written similar programs with the same name. The version we’re going to be using to get Bug! to work is by AKSoftware and can be downloaded from this page Edit – seems that site is down, grab the file from this link instead (link broken? let me know here). The file is downloaded as a zipped folder. Once it is downloaded, open the zip folder and copy the Qres.exe executable file into the Bug! Installation directory.

What we need to do next is create a batch file. This file will firstly change the screen resolution to 640×480 with 256 colours. It will then shut down Windows Explorer (to prevent that from interfering with the game), launch Bug! and wait for the game to play. When the game is finished, pressing a key will restore Windows Explorer and your original screen resolution.

If that all sounds complicated then don’t worry, we’ve created the batch file for you and you can download it here. Our hosts have now started demanding we store all batch files inside zip archives, so you will need to download and extract the file into your Bug! game folder. In order to run it on your system you will need to make one change. To edit the script, right click on it and choose “Edit”. The file will then open up in Notepad. The file is shown below:-


 

What you need to do is edit the last line. Instead of 1920 and 1080 you need to substitute the values of your desktop resolution. If you don’t know these values, the easiest way to find them is by opening the screen resolution settings window. You can do this in Windows Vista by following this tutorial or in Windows 7 by following this tutorial. So for instance if your regular desktop resolution is listed as 1024×768 in Windows, you’d replace ‘1920’ in the batch file with ‘1024’ and 1080 with ‘768’. Save the file once you have finished editing it. Just one more thing to check now before starting the game.

Bug! uses CD audio tracks for music and requires that the CD be left in the drive during game play. If your computer has more than one optical drive, you must use the drive that has the first drive letter. So for instance if you have a DVD drive on drive letter E: and a DVD-Writer on drive F:, the Bug! CD-ROM must be placed in the DVD drive (letter E:). Once you’ve verified this, start the game by double clicking on the “LaunchBUG” batch file. If you followed all the steps above, the game should now start. Bug! must be played full screen on a modern PC, so press the F4 key as soon as the game starts to switch into full screen mode. If you don’t play in full screen, expect the colours in the game to be incorrect. Just press F4 any time the game decides to switch into Window mode again (it may do this while it’s starting up) and the colours should then be corrected.

Gamepads/Controllers

Bug! did originally support gamepads and joysticks, though it’s unlikely that the support provided by the game itself will be adequate for modern controllers. Once again Xpadder is the best solution, below are the keyboard controls for the game:-

MOVE BUG: Press the arrow keys UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT
SPIT: Press the S Key.
DUCK: Press the D Key.
ZAP: Press the A Key.
JUMP: Press the Spacebar.
Full screen toggle: F4

This is the Xpadder profile we created for use with the game:-

 

 

Bug! can be moved with either the analogue stick or the d-pad. The actions are assigned to the buttons on the right, duck is also available on the right trigger for quick and easy access. Enter is assigned to the pads Start button, allowing the game to be quickly started without having to reach for the keyboard. Finally, since Bug! likes to start in windowed mode, pressing the back button on the 360 controller will automatically toggle between window and full screen mode.

Gameplay

Just for fun we made a little video of Bug! being played on our Windows 7 machine, a quad core system with a GTX580 graphics card. The games chunky pixel graphics have dated, but still have a certain charm and at twice the resolution of the Sega Saturn original this is the definitive way to enjoy this classic title.

 

 

Can you submit a fix?

Know how to get this game working in Windows 8 or 10? Help the community by submitting a comment and letting us know!

84 comments

  1. Devan says:

    HELP!!! when i got to the batch it messed up my pc screen its on disorted and cant fix it please help me :(!!!

    • BuckoA51 says:

      At that point, make sure the Bug window is selected and press F4, you should now be good to go. If the game decides to go window mode again, hit F4 again.

  2. Orangestar says:

    The CD install doesn’t seem to work for me. I’m getting “Can’t open file E:\WIN95\BUG!.EXE”. Any help?

  3. Simon says:

    I downloaded my version from (SNIP – warez download links not allowed here)
    I done everything you said above, but when I launched batch and the BUG! window comes up followed by “Could not open level File. check that the path is correct in the BUG!.INF file.”
    I’ve tried searching online about inf files but it seems complicated, i’m wondering if you can help please.
    Thanks Simon

  4. Mr.x says:

    the game installs in spanish with no option to change language. i dont understand all settings when i have launched the game what do i do?

  5. Gonny16 says:

    Thanks for helping me get the game running. Is it possible to save the game? I see that there are checkpoints and the option to continue if you lose your lives, but I don’t want to play through the entire game in one sitting.

  6. Skoffing says:

    I just made it work on WINDOWS 8, I first tried every single way it occured to me but I only got it working on black and white, but the solution is kind of weird and pretty much random.

    Run this program in compatibility mode for: Windows XP (Service Pack 2)
    Run in 256 colors
    Run in 640 x 480 screen resolution

  7. jussara cardoso says:

    não consigo baixar o jogo do bug… como faze-lo por favorl

    • patryckpo says:

      tente procurar em sites de pesquisa, o que é ilegal. se bem que nem sei se existe ainda para venda… tente o google, aqui só explica como rodá-lo em sistemas mais recentes.

  8. roy says:

    hey, where is the download link?? I couldn’t find.

  9. jugonatural says:

    i was having the same problem as simon and your suggestion worked !
    i can now play the game.
    the only problem is that i can’t listen the music :/

  10. Kyle says:

    I got the game to work beautifully where graphics were concerned, but there is no music.

    I am using the original game disc, I only have one DVD drive (D:), and the game is installed to a short file path.

    Any ideas?

    Thanks!

    • BuckoA51 says:

      Bug uses CD-Audio, are you able to play normal audio CDs through your computer? There is a tool that supposedly fixes a lot of audio CD problems in older games, looking into it is on my to-do list.

      • Lizard says:

        It is called “_inmm”. It is by a Japanese programmer. Most people are downloading a ripped version of the game with no CD audio tracks. You can rip the audio tracks from your legally obtained copy of the PC version or your legally obtained Sega Saturn version in MP3 format (using Windows Media Player). Place those in a directory and use _inmm to modify the executable so that it will use the MP3s. I’ve done this on tons of older games.

        As I said, it does not appear that Qres and the bat file do anything at all. According to the command line prompt they simply fail in the background as you launch the game and play it. They are not necessary.

        Windows XP SP2 mode also seems to work as well as Windows 9X mode.

  11. Kyle says:

    Hey thanks for the response!

    By normal audio CD’s, do you mean just an ordinary MP3 music CD or something else?

    What took was it that supposedly fixed this problem?

    Thanks!

    • BuckoA51 says:

      Not an MP3, an ordinary audio CD, you know, the type people used to buy in record stores :)

      • Kyle says:

        Hmm.. Grabbed an old Pink Floyd disc and put it in (D:).

        Windows Media Player opened up and started playing the audio tracks from the CD along with their titles and album art. Here’s an explorer screenshot of the contents of the CD: http://puu.sh/8OZLj.png

        I noted that the URL bar does say “Audio CD” and that the files are ‘.cda’ extensions – Audio CD tracks. So they are for sure not MP3’s.

        So, it does look like the CD drive is working fine regarding audio CD’s.. But for some reason with the original BUG disc in the drive, there is no audio in the game.

        Again, graphics are working perfectly, loading, no crashes, everything is fine – not to mention the sound effects like jumping and the announcer’s voice are working just fine. Extremely frustrating that it is just the music. It really is quite disappointing trying to play BUG again without the memorable audio tracks. :(

        • BuckoA51 says:

          and can you play the Bug game CD in Windows Media Player too, in the same fashion?

        • Lizard says:

          This is a common problem when running Windows 9X games in NT based operating systems. You will have to modify the executable to play MP3s ripped from your legally obtained game, stored in your game directory.

  12. Kyle says:

    Well, if I click on the CD drive it just loads the installer. I right-clicked to see if Windows Media Player would show up – but it isn’t showing up as one of the options.

    I scoured the CD for the music files, and the only thing that remotely resembles music files would be in the “WIN95” folder: http://puu.sh/8P3ft.png

    A bunch of .SND files. Tried to open a few with Windows Media Player and got this error: http://puu.sh/8P3hu.jpg

    I assume this is because Windows Media Player doesn’t have the MIDI decoder, codecs, or whatever it needs to properly play these .SND files. The music player for these files is supposed to be built into the game.

    I tried running the game with the CD ejected, and it says to please insert the game CD. So it is definitely recognizing that the CD is in the drive when I run it. It’s just not using/playing/recognizing the music files..

    • BuckoA51 says:

      Open Windows Media Player first and THEN insert the Bug CD, you should then see the audio tracks and be able to play them if there’s nothing wrong with the CD (unlikely, but possible).

      • Kyle says:

        Hmm.. tried following your instructions, and unfortunately WMP is telling me that the disc is empty… http://puu.sh/8P4Jy.jpg

        Strange because the CD is in excellent condition with no visible scratches..

        After seeing this, I obtained ISO’s for this game from two different sources and burned them onto separate CD-R’s. Unfortunately, I still got the same result using these newly created CD’s.

        I also downloaded a CD drive emulator that allows you to mount ISO’s to a virtual CD drive that shows up in My Computer. Tried mounting those ISO’s one at a time to see if that would work, and sure enough, although it detected the game “disk”, the game still wouldn’t play the music.

        Also, I don’t see anything here in the technical support info section of WMP that would indicate an ability to play SND (AU format sound) files.. http://puu.sh/8P5P4.png

        • BuckoA51 says:

          You have the original store-bought CD too? That’s odd I am sure the game used cd-audio tracks. Using a CD-ROM emulator like Daemon or Alcohol was the next thing I Was going to suggest. If you do that however, you have to make sure that the drive letter of your virtual CD-ROM is BEFORE your physical one. Also I’d make my own CD image from a store bought original rather than trust a dodgy internet downloaded one.

          • Kyle says:

            Yes, I’m using the original CD. Still have the case and manual. :)

            I used Daemon. Also, I used device manager to disable my physical CD drive (freeing up D: for assignment) – then assigned (D:) to the virtual drive. Of course BUG detected the ISO as the game disk, but it did not play the music as usual.
            Note that I also tried using drive letter (E:) and (F:) one at a time. (I disabled the physical drive so there was no D: to be in front of either of those.)

            I also trust the original CD more than some ISO’s from the internet but I thought it could be worth a try. Strange how they also refused to play the music but everything else worked just fine…

            I just ordered a new original disc. When it gets here I’ll update and let you know if that one works or not. Fingers crossed…

            • BuckoA51 says:

              Honestly I don’t think ordering a new CD is going to help anything. Here’s how Bug! should look in Windows Media Player. There are 10 tracks after the data track that are the games CD audio:-

              https://www.play-old-pc-games.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/bug-cd-in-media-player.jpg

              For whatever reason your PCs not reading mixed mode CDs correctly. Please note you cannot browse to CD audio tracks when using mixed-mode CD-ROMS, all you will ever see in Explorer is the data track.

              What was the file size of the Bug CD image you downloaded/made? It should be around 700 Megabytes.

              • flamepanther says:

                Some of the budget Sega rereleases from Expert Software are actually missing their red book CD audio for some reason. I’ve got a copy of Sonic R like that. Professionally pressed disc, legit publisher. Physically lacks anything after the first track.

  13. Eric mack says:

    I have windows 7 32 bit version. should bug still play?

  14. Crocro77 says:

    Hi,
    As Bug! doesn’t work on Windows 8, should i bother to try with a Vista one ?
    Thanks (great site btw) !

    • BuckoA51 says:

      Well it works on Windows 7, so I don’t see why it wouldn’t on Vista.

      • Lizard says:

        Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 10 share most of the same code.

        I would be very surprised if it didn’t work in Windows 8. It is more likely you are not following the instructions or have an incomplete or damaged game.

        • BuckoA51 says:

          There’s a fair bit changed between those versions of Windows, particularly with relation to legacy DirectDraw emulation. Windows 10 is incompatible (tried it on the weekend, though need to try the ACT fixes suggested by Iceman when I have more time). I’ve not re-tested Windows 8 as I don’t have it any more.

          • BuckoA51 says:

            Tried the fixes, gets further but still no dice sadly.

          • Lizard says:

            There really isn’t much of a difference. I know MS engineers that helped design WIndows (more specifically Windows Phone 8, which shares the same NT kernel). It is all based on the NTFS Server Kernel. There was a more dramatic difference–under the hood–between Server 2003 and Server 2008 R2 than between Windows 7 and Windows 10.

            Legacy Direct Draw emulation–if it was indeed changed–is a very small aspect of the entire operating system. It is more likely that some of the new “features” no one asked for are blocking this legacy support that is still extant in the code of the OS.

            • BuckoA51 says:

              In this respect it was changed quite significantly, well, significantly as far as running old games was concerned. Many titles were affected and need special fixes in Windows 8. Notice the “disable desktop compositing” option is gone in Windows 8 and 10 too.

  15. VirtuaIceMan says:

    Okay I got it working on Win8.1 64bit Nvidia 980, as follows:
    1. Install the game as mentioned above.
    2. Use Microsoft Application Compatibility Toolkit against BUG!.EXE and apply the following Compatibility Fixes:

    Force640x480
    Force8BitColor
    IgnoreException
    OPTIONAL: tick DXPrimaryEmulation – then edit it’s Parameters and add the following to remove borders and possibly increase framerate: -DisableMaxWindowedMode

    The game *should* now work, but the 2 issues I’ve noticed are:
    1. Intro videos play small and duplicated twice at the top of the screen.
    2. Pressing F4 (to swap back to windowed mode to access menus to Load a game (for example) crashes the game, as it says it won’t run in high resolution.

    Not sure if there’s an ACT fix to FORCE Windows to stay 640×480 even when coming back out of an app, feel free to play around some more BuckoA51!

    • VirtuaIceMan says:

      I should add: when the game starts (in a window), press F4 or use the menu to select Full Screen, or it’ll go back to a tiny window when the title appears and close, saying it’s too high resolution!

      • VirtuaIceMan says:

        Additional: whilst you shouldn’t/can’t press F4 to revert to a window, pressing Ctrl+L WILL allow you to load a saved game, and it then goes back into the game, without closing about being in high resolution!

      • BuckoA51 says:

        Good effort, did you try forcing Windows down into 640×480 mode using Qres or whatever your preferred method is?

        • VirtuaIceMan says:

          Nope, just used ACT off the back of noticing that using 640×480, 8bit colour and NOT using Win95 compatibility = crash when reaching opening video, but if I DID use Win95 compatibility the screen stayed black but the game played (sound etc), so I figured if I go through the Win95 compatibility flags in ACT, something may cause it to work AND have graphics, which luckily, it did!

          Next up, the rarer sequel, Bug Too!, which on XP I had to install on a virtual machine and copy over the game and Registry strings… let’s see if it’s easier on Win8.1…

  16. VirtuaIceMan says:

    Hmm Bug Too! is a different beast… more on that one tomorrow. Installing it is slightly annoying, then it says it can’t initialize the video mode, whatever you try. The same manual install method on Win98 virtual machine works fine.

    I’ll explain more tomorrow.

  17. VirtuaIceMan says:

    Update: replace the DXPrimaryEmulation + -DisableMaxWindowedMode with the ACT flag NoGDIHWAcceleration, it’s more compatible and better!

  18. STBPD says:

    I got this game running on Windows 8 with the compatibility tool you’ve mentioned, but there’s a problem at the intro, when the game pass the “Realtime associates, inc” logo, the game crashes.

    I tried to use the batch file and also pressed F4 but nothing happened, it still crashes.

    Do you know what I could do to fix this?

  19. ariel says:

    Where I download this game?

    I want :(

  20. TheLukic says:

    And where exactly is link for downloading?

    • BuckoA51 says:

      It’s not available for download, you should check eBay etc if you need a copy.

    • Eric Mack says:

      I usually use *snip* for emu games. I tried to sega saturn emulator from that site, way more complex than I could handle, getting the settings on it right was about as easy as picking a combination lock lol

  21. cy says:

    The links to qres downloads are broken. I’m a casual pc user, so can’t get the game to stat without them…

  22. TimeSplitter says:

    Any chance on an updated tutorial on how to get this to work on windows 10… I can get it to launch but it launches windowed fullscreen however if i ctrl alt del then click task manager there is a small minimized window titled bug in the corner if i click that it becomes true fullscreen. I would like to get true fullscreen when i click f4 not a windowed fullscreen.

  23. Eric Mack says:

    You miracle worker! & to think my first error messege said “incompatible software”(!)
    The only issue now is changing the diffculty from hard to easy in the game’s options, it seems to be unchangable.
    I am so emailing sega & begging them to rerelease this game, or at least port it to xbox live & playstation network!

  24. Luis Tinoco from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil says:

    I got it! Thanks!

  25. IAmDaBoss says:

    Where can I download the game ?? I can’t find the download link.

  26. chilistudios says:

    my copy of the game isn’t physical and every time i open the game a window pops up saying “unknown problem loading the specified device driver”. and the game plays without music even with the music setting turned on! what do i do?!

  27. ArseBiscuits says:

    How is this the only page I can find about this masterpiece of a game? Honestly my all time favourite growing up but no one knows or has even heard about it :(

    What are your thoughts on getting it to work in a 98 virtual machine?

  28. SegaBugGame says:

    Any luck with sega bug on windows 10? It is loading till the Realtime screen and then crashes.

  29. James says:

    Hi, I was able to get the game to load and it now opens to full screen and everything is good, but my issue is the game is in black and white, and if I keep the settings and reboot the computer, the display colors are set to 8bit. My graphics card is 660 gtx and I am on a Windows 7 Ultimate. Thank you!

  30. Marty says:

    Hi everybody,

    I found a way to get the game working in Windows 10! It’s a little bit of a hassle, but it works.

    First of all, you’ll need DXWnd. If you don’t have it, then you can download it here: https://sourceforge.net/projects/dxwnd/

    Create a directory called “C:\Sega\Bug” and copy the following files from the CD to this directory:

    Bug!.bak
    Bug!.cfg
    BUG!.exe
    BUG!.inf
    L*.LVL
    W*.SND

    In the Bug!.exe executable, go into the “Compatibility” tab and check “Run this program in compatibility mode for Windows 95.” Then, in settings, check “Run in 640 x 480 screen resolution.

    Open DXWnd and drag the “Bug.exe” executable onto the DXWnd window. Right click and choose “Modify.”

    In the “Main” tab, check “Run in Window” and (if you like) “No Banner.”

    In the “Video” tab, set the “Initial Virtual Color Setting” to “8 BPP.”

    In the “Compat” tab, check the “Fake Version” check box and choose “Windows 95” from the corresponding menu.

    Now you’re ready to play! Just run the game from the DXWnd console. Make sure that, when you load the game, you go into the “Options” menu and set the game to “Full Screen” (or hit “F4” to have this done automatically). Otherwise, the colors are completely off (why Sega didn’t provide the option to run the game in Fullscreen by default is a mystery to me…).

    • Marty says:

      Disregard this. The game crashes in the middle of “Insectia 1” with this method. A virtual machine running Windows 95 is, at this point, probably your best bet if you want to play this game.

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