The announcement was made over on BlueSky and Twitter, where RockmanCosmo stated that an individual named Yuu had managed to dump the game (using the debug cable method outlined here) from a Taiwanese F905i phone, along with another i-Mode title — a Shadow the Hedgehog auto-scroller named Shadow Shoot.
Both games were originally released via Sega's Sonic Cafe service, which was a Japan-exclusive mobile service active from 2001 to 2007, with OutRun landing on the service back in 2001 while Shadow Shoot arrived 5 years later in 2006.
RockmanCosmo (@rockmancosmo.bsky.social)
A third #Sonic i-mode game has been preserved! Yuu preserved the i-mode version of Shadow Shoot, as well as the i-mode port of OutRun! These were preloaded on the Taiwanese F905i. Shadow Shoot is really fun, and listen to that remix of "Passing Breeze!" The video shows Shadow Shoot, then OutRun.
bsky.app
Similar to the original, the mobile port of OutRun saw players get behind the wheel of the iconic Ferrari Testarossa Spider to race against the clock, and included the option to listen to new renditions of nostalgic songs like Splash Wave, Passing Breeze, and Magical Sound Shower and upload scores to a national leaderboard.
Shadow Shoot, on the other hand, saw players take control of the antihero Shadow as he embarked on a quest to retrieve a bunch of stolen chaos emeralds from Dr. Eggman, with the goal being to spin-dash and shoot their way through a variety of different stages, including highways, forests, and snowy mountains.
The Chinese version of Shadow Shoot had previously been preserved, but this is the first time the original Japanese version has been recovered.
OutRun's Japanese Mobile Port Has Been Preserved
In addition to the Shadow the Hedgehog auto-scroller 'Shadow Shoot'
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