Do you think the TG16/PCE has held up over time? (Also lack of follow-up)

[JaguarVision]

I do sometimes wonder to myself why the Super Grafx wasn't just made the standard PC Engine console after it was released. Too expensive, maybe? Limited foresight on NEC's part? Who knows.

NEC also made a lot of weird moves that pissed of developers and consumers. I read about some devs complain about their lack of strategy with the Duo and Supergrafx releases.

 

It seems like they really were not expecting it to take off and quickly cement the TG16 in the market.

 

What NEC should of done is move the Super Grafx to 1990. That would have given them enough time to court developers and give the TG16 3 years alone in the market. Then they could have positioned the Supergrafx as a new console with a collection of games and fight with the SNES.

 

Instead we got the Super Grafx with only 6 games in 1989.

[Austin]

Yeah we'll never know. The extra gfx prowess and the introduction of HW parallax (2 FG and 2 BG layers [unsure how the mixer chip stacked the dual gfx output]) really would have helped in competing with the Genesis, albeit the CPU and Sound were a weak spot at that point, still ...

Yeah, it was a shame. That port of Ghouls 'n Ghosts is killer. Not arcade perfect mind you, but it was as close as we got back then until the Capcom Generation versions for PS1 and Saturn. It would have been great to see what other CPS1 games would have turned out like, especially with CD support.

[Punisher5.0]

nah I dont care how many colors it can display on a static screen, the small sprites and the atari 2600 sound effects kill it for me, I dont care how much generic J-ROCK and 4 fps macromeida flash cut scenes the cd rom provides over its 256k-byte card games

 

I am more forgiving if I forget its a "16 BIT MACHINE", its a really kick ass 8 bit machine (with 16 bit color palette) butttt

Ive always questioned how many colors it could actually display in game. I havent seen any games come close to what wikipedia says the hardware can do.

 

Anyways, I think its a neat system. I still enjoy playing it but it definitely feels more antiquated compared to the other 16 bit systems. The two button controller is very limiting for games of that generation

[phoenixdownita]

Ive always questioned how many colors it could actually display in game. I havent seen any games come close to what wikipedia says the hardware can do.

 

....

You probably already checked these out but just in case:

http://www.racketboy.com/retro/tg16-pc-engine-games-that-pushed-the-limits-best-graphics-sound

 

Keep in mind the Genny is limited at 64 on screen and the SNES can do 32K but usually 256 (it's not that easy to get useful effects via subtractive/additive gfx but it is possible), likely the PCE can do somewhere in between the 2 with ease (technically 480+ is the actual limit when you account for all the 16 BG palettes and 16 Sprite palettes as mentioned https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_game_console_palettes#TurboGrafx-16 )

 

I always felt the 64 colors at once was a limit for the Genny, 128/256 would have been much better, I never felt PCE or even less the SNES were color-count challenged at least not in the same way the Genny was (and it was painfully evident with SegaCD games that just dared to have movie style FMV).

[Tanooki]

I'm not insulting you. I'm pointing out yet again you're wrong is all, and you don't take well to it, which you may have noticed quite a few are now calling you out on.

 

I did say your friends were dumb pointing out that it was a much better device and far better appreciated in their home land since it got a fair releases schedule of games with lots of variety. Where I'm taking a dig at you specifically is your ignorant belief there were issues with the CD side of things, especially your misinformed belief about how poorly the CD worked and so on which definitely wasn't worse than what others like Sega and SNK at the time put out when it came to long lagging loads. There was no big reliance on FMV at all with the hardware, they were more about the cartoon drawn stuff with speech like the Ys or Cosmic Fantasy cuts, very little that was more MadDog or Voyeur with digitized FMV people going on with them. You said you got burned out by revisions, and I'm thinking you didn't actually know much of anything about their optical releases and just drew false conclusions based on bad information to cement a belief.

 

As I said I had a Duo, lots of games on the CD side from both sides of the pond back in that era. I've waffled for half a decade over the Duo with how bad the prices got on it and discs of any interesting value, along with the shoddy problems of them failing over caps and the rest. Eventually I did something smarter, I got a PC Engine Core Grafx 2 and I've got around a couple dozen games for it, and looking into an everdrive eventually. I was going to get that SSS3 thing but at $300USD for something with hardware flaws I backed off it, but that would solve the disc issue if you can find them well anymore after the whole TIZ implosion.

 

In the end for the 2D based style CD devices for consoles in that earlier part of the 90s before the PS1, Saturn, 3DO type stuff came along pushing polygons to the front NEC had the best spread for games in quality and quantity on a global scale, and the hardware seemed to pop out the best performance of those three too if you'd actually bother to look instead of just acting all fake knowledgeable about things.

[JaguarVision]

Ive always questioned how many colors it could actually display in game. I havent seen any games come close to what wikipedia says the hardware can do.

 

Anyways, I think its a neat system. I still enjoy playing it but it definitely feels more antiquated compared to the other 16 bit systems. The two button controller is very limiting for games of that generation

Tg16 could never display 482 colors on screen even when stationary. Most defvs were able to get 90-96 colors at best, with few exceptions going over 100.

[Tanooki]

It still displayed more than the Genesis would on screen and was very obvious too. It also handled sprites, objects and various layers nicer too. It gets old people imagining that it was some backwater for the sake of arguing with others hoping its sort of US based obscurity makes it easier to do so.

[Gentlegamer]

I answered 1. but the real answer is 'games do not age.'

 

Also

 

[Gentlegamer]

I own a Duo-R (with Arcade card), a SuperGrafx and a PC-FX .... I love my Duo-R, the SuperGrafx was promising with twice the graphic chips & VRAM and 4 times the work memory but there were too few games to justify it (unclear why it was abandoned, maybe it costed too much to manufacture), the PC-FX is just a novelty.

 

And I agree the sound of the PCE is on the weak side.

 

PCE has superb music!

 

Check these out http://www.superpcenginegrafx.net/music.html

[Tanooki]

 

PCE has superb music!

 

Check these out http://www.superpcenginegrafx.net/music.html

Agreed. Of the big 3 then (excluding the obvious home arcade board Neo Geo) I felt that the PC Engine had the best chip generated style audio, and second in overall with the SNES on top due to the sampled style music it used. There was a real presence to the audio setup of the TG that's very well done and easily recognizable. It never had that tinny issue Genesis games commonly had. Listen to that awesome SF2 soundtrack on there, awesome as are some others like Ninja Spirit.

Edited September 11, 2018 by Tanooki

[Gentlegamer]

I should note the site I linked to is Black Tiger's, and the music clips are recorded from genuine hardware, no emulation.

[mbd30]

It still displayed more than the Genesis would on screen and was very obvious too. It also handled sprites, objects and various layers nicer too. It gets old people imagining that it was some backwater for the sake of arguing with others hoping its sort of US based obscurity makes it easier to do so.

 

The TG16 could show more colors. But it's my understanding that the Genesis did almost everything else better including parallax scrolling.

[JaguarVision]

I'm not insulting you. I'm pointing out yet again you're wrong is all, and you don't take well to it, which you may have noticed quite a few are now calling you out on.

 

I did say your friends were dumb pointing out that it was a much better device and far better appreciated in their home land since it got a fair releases schedule of games with lots of variety. Where I'm taking a dig at you specifically is your ignorant belief there were issues with the CD side of things, especially your misinformed belief about how poorly the CD worked and so on which definitely wasn't worse than what others like Sega and SNK at the time put out when it came to long lagging loads. There was no big reliance on FMV at all with the hardware, they were more about the cartoon drawn stuff with speech like the Ys or Cosmic Fantasy cuts, very little that was more MadDog or Voyeur with digitized FMV people going on with them. You said you got burned out by revisions, and I'm thinking you didn't actually know much of anything about their optical releases and just drew false conclusions based on bad information to cement a belief.

 

As I said I had a Duo, lots of games on the CD side from both sides of the pond back in that era. I've waffled for half a decade over the Duo with how bad the prices got on it and discs of any interesting value, along with the shoddy problems of them failing over caps and the rest. Eventually I did something smarter, I got a PC Engine Core Grafx 2 and I've got around a couple dozen games for it, and looking into an everdrive eventually. I was going to get that SSS3 thing but at $300USD for something with hardware flaws I backed off it, but that would solve the disc issue if you can find them well anymore after the whole TIZ implosion.

 

In the end for the 2D based style CD devices for consoles in that earlier part of the 90s before the PS1, Saturn, 3DO type stuff came along pushing polygons to the front NEC had the best spread for games in quality and quantity on a global scale, and the hardware seemed to pop out the best performance of those three too if you'd actually bother to look instead of just acting all fake knowledgeable about things.

I didn't say that CD was full of FMV only games, I said there was heavy use of FMV, and there was. Games where your playing then the game freezes to load an FMV, goes back to game walk 30 feet, another FMV. Most of the time you can't skip them either, and occasionally if the FMV doesn't play properly it'll screw up the game and have to restart. It's not all games but a good number of the common/popular ones have FMV cutscenes spread around the game to verying degrees.

 

As for loading times, you can see videos of the load times yourself on YouTube (on videos where they are not cut out) including recording the TV videos which make them more legit. Even this very form discussed Turbo CD load times!

 

Being better than SNK or Sega doesn't mean the TG16 has good load times, just because you have a higher tolerance level doesn't mean That I and a bunch of other people are "wrong".

[JaguarVision]

It still displayed more than the Genesis would on screen and was very obvious too. It also handled sprites, objects and various layers nicer too. It gets old people imagining that it was some backwater for the sake of arguing with others hoping its sort of US based obscurity makes it easier to do so.

Or you are grasping for straws. Punisher said he never noticed the TG16 using 482 colors and I gave him the answer, no Dev released a game with 482 colors on screen because they couldn't.

 

Not sure where you're pulling your assumptions from because they're baseless so far.

[mbd30]

I've only played it in emulation. It's a great system for shooter fans with games like Blazing Lazers, Sinistron, Side Arms and a nice port of R-Type. Not to mention Gate of Thunder and Lords of Thunder if you have the CD attachment.

 

Splatterhouse is probably my favorite hu-card title that I've played. There isn't much else like it, other than the sequels on the Genesis.

[Tanooki]

It did have it in parallax, the system processor itself could only handle one layer, but you'd see it was worked around looking at the game library I guess using software routines, but it didn't touch the Genesis or SNES in layers.

 

Both ran nearly the same CPU speed 7.Xmhz. The TG was 8bits on the CPU and Gen 16, same with data bus. Both had 512 colors, but TG did 482 on screen to Gen at 64. Gen had 64K of WRAM to the TG 8 but both had 64k of VRAM. TG16 won in audio with 32kb to Gen at 8k yet both had 6 sound channels. The TG could do 64 to 80 sprites on Genesis, but has a larger 32x64 max size to 32x32 on Genesis.

Each had a trade off clearly. TG had more on screen but the same palette so it could detail stuff out far nicer to be more arcade accurate or uniquely nice and larger objects too. The CPU were nearly as nice, computation level that is though workhorse of untapped power Gen won. Despite being 8bit on the CPU the thing still stomped the SNES in that department even. Overall in video effects the TG aped the Genesis, same with the audio too on paper, but people have their own ideas of whats better or worse.

[Tanooki]

Jag you're using fake facts to make up this stupid ongoing argument about the system as you've done repeatedly in all your other spam threads. I'm not sorry that a few of us are calling you out on it and pointing stuff out. If you can't handle it, that's fine, but to keep twisting in the wind and trying to move the goal post a bit further to confuse things and try and look smart isn't going to end well for you.

[digdugnate]

i used to drool over these types of ads in the Sears catalog. I miss going through before Christmas every year and looking at all the COOL STUFF.

 

 

[jaybird3rd]

Or you are grasping for straws. Punisher said he never noticed the TG16 using 482 colors and I gave him the answer, no Dev released a game with 482 colors on screen because they couldn't.

 

Not sure where you're pulling your assumptions from because they're baseless so far.

If you continue to bait and pick fights with other members, there's nothing preventing us from locking this thread, just as we did the last one. This is your second warning of the day.

[JaguarVision]

If you continue to bait and pick fights with other members, there's nothing preventing us from locking this thread, just as we did the last one. This is your second warning of the day.

 

How about this time you explain why you don't read the thread and only seek to come and warn me of things? You completely ignored the fact the poster I am talking arguing with insulted ME and picked a fight with ME several posts back. is there some shield i get when i reach 1000 posts? I'm honestly asking you did you actually look at the thread? it may seem like that questions attacking you btu I'm not i am genully confused as to where youi're getting your conclusions from.

 

I mean i get in the last thread you didn't really want to deal to responding to that fact for whatever reason, even after another user pointed out the same thing, but I think i should get a "reason" why you are actually being selective to who's "starts fights" with who.

 

We can even go through the thread together and you can see literally the guy I am responding to in your quote immediately came in insulting me for no real reason and started this whole argument. If you don't think that's true, then maybe you or another guy could explain the issue in a message to me via DM and we can go over the posts in this thread because to be honest this looks extremely lopsided and it's not even remotely fair and I think that if you are going to call me out for "starting fights' I should be made aware of what posts brought you to that conclusion otherwise I'll I'm seeing is a thread interrupted with a threat of closing for no reason.

 

And I honestly don't think that's an unreasonable request.

[Eltigro]

spidey senses tingling...

[jaybird3rd]

Fine, I'll explain what I'm seeing, even though I don't believe for a minute that you'll understand or accept any of it. You have started several of these open-ended discussion threads, usually heavy on editorializing, and just about all of them have devolved into quibbling over trivia. You consistently post walls of text, and then proceed to bicker with other members over their interpretations of what you said, or over their recollection of unimportant details. Your style of communication is unnecessarily confrontational and abrasive: you always manage to find ways to disagree with other members, or to exacerbate the disagreements raised by others. You haven't demonstrated any ability to see the other side of an argument or to accept corrective feedback; instead, you respond by accusing others of arguing in bad faith ("grasping for straws," "baseless assumptions," etc.). You also don't seem to be self-aware enough to realize how you come across to everyone else; when someone pushes back, you react as if it happened "for no reason whatsoever."

 

These threads are starting to look like thinly-veiled trolling attempts. Please don't start any more of them.