Hummer Team

Hummer Team
Example of a Hummer Team copyright.
Origin	Taiwan
Years	1992-2006
Consoles	Famicom, VT03
First game	Jing Ke Xin Zhuan
Last game	Final Fight 3 (probably the last as a full team) Harry's Legend (last known stand-alone game) ZDog plug & play system (last known release)
Sounds used	Hummer Sound Engine (all games except Final Fight 3 & Tiny Toon 6)
Engines used	Somari engine, SFII Engine, and others
Aliases	Somari Team, Hummer Technology Co., Ltd
Games published by	Ge De Industry Co., Yoko, JY Company, NT, Rinco, Trump Grand, ABAB Soft, Zechess
Related companies	C&E

Hummer Team (悍馬小組, Hanyu Pinyin: hànmǎ xiǎozǔ) was a pirate game developer that originated in 1992 after a few members left C&E. They were known for making what many consider decent NES ports of games that were on more advanced consoles along with having games published by many different companies including SuperTone, Yoko Software, Ge De Industry Co., JY Company and KaSheng. The team seems to have significantly reduced in size during the 64-bit era, but the remaining members continued to make games until at least 2006, mostly for multicarts and plug & play Famiclones (later VT03-based). Hummer Team ceased to exist after the release of the ZDog.

Aliases

• Somari Team (used before 1995) - For some reason, Supertone misspelled Somari Team as Someri Team on both AV Bishoujo Senshi Girl Fighting and Somari covers.
• Jing Tay Team (Seen in Tiny Toon Adventures 6) - As a reference to JY Company.
• Copyright (As seen in SMW & Aladdin - technically not an alias but still an identifying factor, most developers don't write the word "Copyright" in full)
• Hummer Technology Co., Ltd. / Simmer Technology Co., Ltd. (2006)

Staff

• Hummer Cheng - Head, sound designer, programmer in Titenic. One of the remaining staff members in 2006 (ZDog director).
• Silvers Lin - Programmer, producer, was part of C&E. Name can be found in Aladdin through a hex editor. Credited as "Hsiang _ Lin" in Donkey Kong Country 4, may also be "Light Lin" in Street Fighter IV (although Light Lin is credited for graphics, which Silvers Lin is not known to have worked on in other games).
• Kathy Chen - Graphics, was part of C&E. Credited as Kathy Chiang in Tiny Toon Adventures 6. Could be Lidia Jam in Street Fighter 2.
• Carroll Wu - Graphics. One of the remaining staff members in 2006 (ZDog graphic artist).
• Chris Ho - Programmer on Titenic and one of the remaining staff members in 2006 (ZDog programmer).
• Stevin Hseih - (Engine) programmer. S.S Hsieh in Donkey Kong Country 4.
• Terrissa Mao (Yao?) - Graphics, Yao appears on the background of the first stage in Street Fighter Zero 2 '97. Possibly credited as Sakula on DKC4 (pronounce: Sakura).
• Say Lee - Graphics, credited in Tiny Toon Adventures 6, and SAY appears next to YAO in SFZ2'97. Possibly credited as Freeman on DKC4.
• Y.Y.C - Graphics, was credited in Earthworm Jim 3 and Donkey Kong Country 4. He/she could be "Huei Fan" credited in Ultimate Mortal Kombat 4

This is a list of people who have appeared in Hummer Team's credits. However, it is unknown if these are real people or just nicknames:

• Alex Yeu - Sound designer, never seen in JY games but was credited in Earthworm Jim 3 and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 4 for music. Possibly Hummer Cheng.
• Barbara King - Sound designer for Street Fighter II: The World Warrior and Street Fighter IV (under B.B. King).
• Ming June - Programmer, only appeared in Earthworm Jim 3. A "Chen Ming Jiun" is credited in C&E's Sheng Huo Lie Zhuan & Hwang Shinwei used a similar nickname for Block Force (Hwang Jiun Ming)
• Juing Long - Programmer in Ultimate Mortal Kombat 4. Probably the same as above.

All the names used before JY Company era (particularly in Street Fighter II: The World Warrior and Street Fighter IV) are too hard to track because they are a lot more generic and different than the ones used in 1997.

Games

These are games that are known to be made by them.

SuperTone, Ge De, and Yoko Soft era:

• Jing Ke Xin Zhuan (SuperTone) - 1992
• Street Fighter II: The World Warrior (Yoko Soft) - 1992
• Master Fighter VI' (Yoko Soft) - 1993
• Street Fighter IV (Gouder Co.) - 1993
• Kart Fighter (Ge De Industry Co.) - 1994
• Somari (Someri Team, released by Ge De Industry Co.) - 1994 (With its hacks being published by KaSheng in 1996-97)
• AV Bishoujo Senshi Girl Fighting (Someri Team, released by Ge De Industry Co.) - 1994
• AV Jiu Ji Ma Jiang 2 - Late 1994 or 1995 (Published by Ge De Industry and later reprinted by KaSheng)
• Garou Densetsu Special <?> - 1994 (Later published and hacked multiple times by KaSheng)

JY Company and KaSheng era:

• Dragon Ball Z - Super Butoden 2 (JY) - 1994
• Mortal Kombat II (JY) - 1994 (Hacked to produce an '18 Peoples' version)
• Aladdin (JY) - 1995 (Hacked multiple times to produce title screen hacks, as well as Popeye II: Travels in Persia)
• Mortal Kombat II Special (JY) - 1995 (Hacked to produce Mortal Kombat III Special and Mortal Kombat 3 Special 56 Peoples)
• Power Rangers III (JY) - 1995 (Hacked to produce Power Rangers IV)
• Super Mario World (JY) - 1995
• Shin Samurai Spirits 2 (JY) - 1996
• Sichuan Mahjong II (KaSheng) - 1996 (Modified and rereleased by ABAB Soft in the 2000s)
• Tekken 2 (JY) - 1996 (Bundled with a hack called Toshinden)
• Yuu Yuu Hakusho Final (KaSheng) - 1996 (Exists in both English and Chinese, hacked multiple times)
• Donkey Kong Country 4 (JY) - 1997 (Bundled with a hack called Jungle Book 2)
• Earthworm Jim 3 (KaSheng) - 1997
• Street Fighter Zero 2 '97 (KaSheng) - 1997 (Later hacked to produce Street Fighter Zero 2)
• Tiny Toon Adventures 6 (JY) - 1997
• Ultimate Mortal Kombat 4 (KaSheng) - 1997
• Final Fight 3 (JY) - 1998
• King of Fighters '96 (KaSheng) - 1998 (Made for JY Company, but published by KaSheng)

These were made by only a few members of Hummer Team after 1998. Their original publisher is unknown, although some of these games were rereleased by ABAB Soft, and some were only released on a 15-in-1 multicart by an unknown company. Panda Adventure on the Super Cool Boy 4-in-1 has a Rinco (Ramar International) logo in the tiles, and Ramar produced some game cartridges around 2000 that were only sold in mainland China, so they may have been the original publishers. Some of these games later appeared on Trump Grand Famiclones such as the Power Joy Supermax.

• Dragon Running
• Dance Y2K
• Finger DDR
• Panda Adventure/Pink Jelly/Rings
• Ping Pong
• Space Shuttle Exploration
• The Egg / The Duck (Duck Hunt clone with DKC4's music)
• Titenic / Harry's Legend
• War
• War of Strike Mouse

Plug & play consoles

Zdog

These consoles were produced by Zechess Co., Ltd., a Taiwanese company that existed from around 2005-2006 run by Handel Liao - whose name also appears in the source code of ABABSoft's website - and they contain the last known games developed by Hummer. They are largely VT03-based although each contains at least one older game which still runs in standard Famicom mode.

• Samuri - 60 games, includes individual levels from the "Hummer" hack of Somari plus newer VT03 mini games.
• ZDog - comes with a toy dog which carries the actual console unit in its backpack. 44 games, which can be accessed through one of three modes: a standard game list, a map screen or a virtual pet style mode. Games include levels from Titenic, the Ping Pong game listed by ABABSoft plus similar VT03 mini games to the Samuri.

Logo and mascot

File:45-in-1 (JY-120A) (Unl) -U--!- 002.png

JY Company's logo

In numerous Hummer Team games there is a three-eyed sun/sea urchin hidden in the ROM; it can generally found by a button code and/or a sprite editor such as Tile Layer Pro, although sometimes (such as in Aladdin) it is incorporated into the level graphics.

A common misconception is that this is Hummer Team's logo, but it is in fact JY Company's, who published many Hummer games as well as numerous other pirates. This is why it isn't present in Hummer's games that are published by NT (Earthworm Jim 3 and Street Fighter Zero 2 97), but is present in Ei-How Yang's games published by JY, such as Mickey Mania 7 and Contra Spirits (which was published with a Hosenkan Electronics Co., Ltd. label).

Hummer

Hummer Team itself is not known to have had a logo, but from 2005-2006 they used a horse named Hummer as its mascot (a play on the Chinese characters for "Hummer" which mean "brave horse"). Hummer's first known appearance was in a hack of Somari on the 15-in-1 multicart, and he would later go on to star in many games on both the Samuri & ZDog plug & play consoles, as well as appearing on both consoles' intro screens. A pink cat called Pink Jelly also features prominently in these games, again having appeared first on the 15-in-1 cart.