Retro Gaming

[jenius]

SoR4 is owning my few minutes of gaming time right now. I'm not as good as I expected to be.

[Valkyrie Hunter D]

I like how the SoR3 characters kept their special moves with certain weapons.  I also like their special move risk/reward dynamic where you get your health back from using specials, as long as you don't get smacked.

[JB0]

8 hours ago, mikeszekely said:

So I'm a tad confused are the games on it arcade roms or the AES versions?  Or is there really not much of a difference? 

There's no difference at all in most cases. Most games, the arcade and home carts used exactly the same ROM chips. The game chose the proper mode to run in (quarters coming in, pause functionality, player-accessible option menu) based on the motherboard's BIOS ROM.

[Black Valkyrie]

 

 

[Black Valkyrie]

 

 

[mikeszekely]

Nice.  After emailing me a few weeks ago to tell me that my expected delivery date for the TurboGrafx-16 Mini was pushed to 2021, I got an email today that said it's been pushed up and I might have it by the end of the month.

[JB0]

45 minutes ago, mikeszekely said:

Nice.  After emailing me a few weeks ago to tell me that my expected delivery date for the TurboGrafx-16 Mini was pushed to 2021, I got an email today that said it's been pushed up and I might have it by the end of the month.

The future is now!

[mikeszekely]

3 hours ago, JB0 said:

The future is now!

I'm kind of excited.  I didn't have a TG16 as a kid, but a friend of mine did and I remember playing Bonk at his house.

Plus I'm starting to think mini consoles are my thing.  After the TG16 Mini the only one I don't have (not counting anything by AtGames, or regional differences like the PCEngine Mini or the Famicom Classic [although I do have a Super Famicom Classic]) is the Commodore 64 Mini.  I heard they made a non-mini version of their mini with a working keyboard; maybe I should track one down.

 

EDIT: Oh, I see 8bitdo is making a wireless controller for it that's the same price as the official wired controllers.  Sweet!

Edited May 15, 2020 by mikeszekely

[mikeszekely]

Well, my TG16 Mini arrived today.  I love the early 90's neon orange box.

The menus remind me a lot of the NES and SNES Classic's.  It's clear whoever Konami contracted to build it is familiar with those systems.  There's some nice touches, though, like how when you pick a game you see an animation of the HuCard or CD-ROM being inserted.

The software selection is a bit baffling.  Given that it's $40 more than the 30-ish game NES Classic (1 controller) and $20 more than the 20-ish game SNES Classic (2 controllers) or the 40-ish game Genesis mini (also 2 controllers) you'd expect that Konami would either go all-in on pack-ins or software.  Well, no the pack-ins, you just get one controller in addition to the usual USB and HDMI cables.  So is it the software?  It's been advertised that the TG16 mini has 57 games, so that must be it!

Except the software decisions are, honestly, kind of baffling.  Like, when you start up the console, you'll only see 25 games.  That's way less than 57!  Well, it turns out that those 25 games are all the American games which include some TG16 Turbo Chips and some TurboGrafx-CD games.  So, where are the rest?  Well, in the bottom of the screen you'll see a PCEngine icon; clicking it switches the menu to the PCEngine menu, which has it's own list of games.  These games are also a mix of HuCard and CD-ROM² games, and they're all in Japanese.  Well, that makes a certain amount of sense, right?  I mean, the PCEngine was way more popular in Japan than the TG16 was in the States.  And hey, the PCEngine games include Dracula X, so win, right?

Look, I'm the last person on earth to complain about getting Dracula X, but there's still some very weird decisions here.  For one, games in one series can be split between menus.  For example, Bonk's Adventure (aka PC Genjin) is a PCEngine game, but the sequel, Bonk's Revenge, is a TurboGrafx game.  Then there's stuff that seems like it should have been included but isn't.  Just continuing with Bonk, the third game, Bonk's Big Adventure, isn't included.  Nor is Keith Courage in Alpha Zones, despite it having been the original TG16 pack-in game.  Fair enough, we can't have everything, right?  Ok, but do we have to waste space on doubles?  Games like Neutopia, Neutopia II, and Y's Book I & II are in both the TG16 and PCEngine menus, and that 57 game total is counting both versions separately.  What's more, while stuff like Castlevania and Aldynes is easy enough to play even if you don't understand Japanese, good luck playing stuff like Snatcher, Dungeon Explorer, Nectaris, or Jaseiken Necromancer if you don't.

Now, I'd thought that all this might be because Konami decided to make and use just one system for all markets, just with different shells around the hardware.  Japanese fans would probably want stuff like Snatcher even if foreigners can't read it, and for text-heavy games released in both markets you'd have to include both, right?  But then I looked, and nope.  The Japanese PCEngine Mini has Tengai Makyo II and Tokimeki Memorial, which the TG16 Mini is missing.  And the TG16 Mini has Salamander, which isn't on the the PCEngine Mini, plus there are differences in the PCEngine version of Splatterhouse compared to the TG16 one.  If they were able to make those differences it's puzzling why they couldn't make more.

All that said, after some digging it was revealed that the TG16 Mini runs on basically the same hardware as the Genesis Mini, and the team behind the Project Lunar Genesis Mini hack announced that Project Phobos, a hack for the TG16 Mini, will come after they get the 1.1 update with folder support out for Project Lunar.  So it sounds to me like if you have a favorite game that missed the official cut there's hope yet.

End of the day, I'm getting serious '90s deja vu... the TurboGrafx-16 Mini is a fun little console, but with a weaker software library than the Nintendo and Sega consoles it's competing with.  Sure, the 57-game library might seem like it's trying to make up for quality with quantity, but the reality is once you take out the doubles and the Japanese games with an insurmountable language barrier you're probably dropping closer to the Genesis Mini's 42 games, making it the better retro deal at $20 less plus a second controller (and that's to say nothing of the sheer quality of the libraries on the two Nintendo Classics).  So, while I don't regret picking one up at all, more casual players just looking for something they played as a kid can probably let the TG16 Mini pass them by.

[Convectuoso]

https://metro.co.uk/2020/05/24/next-sega-mini-console-should-play-saturn-dreamcast-games-readers-feature-12745128/

 

[vladykins]

I actually rigged up my old Atari 2600 and Genesis (along with all the playstations) to our Samsung 75". I had to get an RF demodulator for the Atari and Sega, since I had long since ditched our VHS player, but it's been worth it. I have the Atari Flashback 7800 as well and the original Adventure on the 2600 is much more difficult (that frakking bat is much harder on the original).

[Black Valkyrie]

 

 

[Ryoma]

Probably one of my favourite shoot em up of all time. Great design and perfectly balanced gameplay. 

[mikeszekely]

No idea what games it has, and yeah, it looks really tiny.  But I want one.

[JB0]

1 hour ago, mikeszekely said:

No idea what games it has, and yeah, it looks really tiny.  But I want one.

Needs a tiny TV tuner cartridge.

[jenius]

No.

[mikeszekely]

Ugh. So apparently it's not one device with multiple games that's available in for colors, each color has four different games. And with that I think I'm out.

[Scyla]

Bummer. I would totally buy a second SNES Classic Mini in a different color if it had other games on it though. 

[mikeszekely]

34 minutes ago, Scyla said:

Bummer. I would totally buy a second SNES Classic Mini in a different color if it had other games on it though. 

Why not just add to the one you have? 

[Scyla]

I don’t know, collector mindset? I also have 4 sets of Joy Cons and I need really only one. 

[jenius]

4 minutes ago, Scyla said:

I don’t know, collector mindset? I also have 4 sets of Joy Cons and I need really only one. 

I have two sets of Joycons... but bought a separate controller because joycon drift pain IS REAL.

This Game Gear mini makes zero sense to me on any level. They should just emulate the Game Gear on the switch and give you 100 Roms for like $19.99. A $50 piece of hardware with a few games and a tiny screen to suck any joy from it?? Nah, pass. The 'mini' aspect of the consoles is just a cute convenience, for a mobile system it's a massive inconvenience. 

[Scyla]

I had a Game Gear back in the 90s and it was impressive since I only had a Game Boy before that. What wasn't impressive was the weight, size and the hunger for batteries. So I would be up for a renewal Game Gear that was sleeker with longer battery life.

I still have two Game Gear cartridges lying around somewhere (Columns and Halley Wars). Sadly the system itself broke some years back.

However the limited game selection and the tiny form factor is a big no for me.

[JB0]

Honestly, I think this is more like the keychain LCD games from the turn of the century than anything else. It isn't meant to be a great game platform, it is a cute little nostalgia piece.

[JB0]

9 hours ago, jenius said:

a tiny screen to suck any joy from it

Sega has you covered on that front.
 

I thought they were shitposting, as they are known to do. But no, they are actually selling a replica screen magnifier to go on their replica Game Gear.

Sega gonna Sega.

Edited June 4, 2020 by JB0

[jenius]

The whole thing is funny bad, not funny good.

[mikeszekely]

All Sega needed to do make a Game Gear in the same size case or slightly smaller, with a better screen, rechargeable battery, and emulation software by M3 with maybe 30-40 games (and enough storage for hackers to add more later).  Maybe thrown in an HDMI out on the top and some USB ports to use the Genesis mini's controllers and play on the TV.

Instead we get overpriced novelties.

[jenius]

27 minutes ago, mikeszekely said:

All Sega needed to do make a Game Gear in the same size case or slightly smaller, with a better screen, rechargeable battery, and emulation software by M3 with maybe 30-40 games (and enough storage for hackers to add more later).  Maybe thrown in an HDMI out on the top and some USB ports to use the Genesis mini's controllers and play on the TV.

Instead we get overpriced novelties.

Yeah, that sounds pretty good. They could tweak it a bit and re-release it later as the Sega Nomad Mini with a slightly different group of 40 games from the MD/Genesis catalog.

[JB0]

6 minutes ago, jenius said:

Yeah, that sounds pretty good. They could tweak it a bit and re-release it later as the Sega Nomad Mini with a slightly different group of 40 games from the MD/Genesis catalog.

Didn't ATGames already do that like six times?

[jenius]

Yeah, but they did the mini thing too and those still sold.

[Black Valkyrie]

 

Really not worth it. 

 

[ScrambledValkyrie]

On 6/3/2020 at 3:30 PM, jenius said:

I have two sets of Joycons... but bought a separate controller because joycon drift pain IS REAL.

Did you ever try to get them fixed by Nintendo? They were doing that for free at one point, and we got my son’s joycons taken care of that way.

 

On 6/3/2020 at 3:30 PM, jenius said:

The 'mini' aspect of the consoles is just a cute convenience, for a mobile system it's a massive inconvenience. 

This is especially true when you take into consideration the fact that these companies that are trying to tap into nostalgia are doing so with an audience whose aging eyes aren’t what they used to be. I’m at the point where I need reading glasses to play my Gameboy Advance. I actually got myself a DSi XL to make it easier to play DS games.

On a somewhat related note, here’s a photo I posted recently on another thread. This little monitor doesn’t get a whole lot of playtime, but it’s still pretty cool, I think.

 

[Black Valkyrie]

 

I love Poison, do you ?  

 

[TheLoneWolf]

On 6/14/2020 at 2:52 PM, Black Valkyrie said:

 

I love Poison, do you ?  

 

When the palette swap of a minor enemy character becomes the game's most recognizable character.

[mikeszekely]

1 hour ago, TheLoneWolf said:

When the palette swap of a minor enemy character becomes the game's most recognizable character.

I mean, is she, though? Genuinely asking.  I remember Guy well enough, because he was usually my pick.  I remember Cody and Hagar, mostly as the dudes I didn't pick. And I know she was a generic enemy in the game, but I didn't think twice about her until she turned up in Street Fighter X Tekken.  Then I remember there being some controversy about her being transgender, and I couldn't tell you if she's been in any games since (to be fair, I haven't played a Final Fight game since the SNES days, and the last Street Fighter I played was the vanilla version of Street Fighter IV).  

[TheLoneWolf]

Honestly, it probably depends on who you ask. Older gamers will say it's Cody, Guy, etc., but to younger gamers (and most likely future gamers too), it's going to be her.