The Official Turbografx 16 Thread!

[NeonSpaceBeagle]

nice haul!  I used to have that big joystick as my only turbo controller when I had my first tg16 that i traded to a school chum for my gameboy back in the day.

 

re: altered beast...  that was my first game along with columns when I got the genesis.  I liked it and thought it looked great.  The only games I had for the TG16 at that time and trade was Keith Courage and Bonk's Revenge and I loved both of those too..  They were so colorful!  Of course when the SNES came out I felt like it blew them all out of the water.  I was definitely a bi gamer back in the day with the genesis and snes at the same time.  and i guess the tg16.   the funny thing is we were actually dirt poor and lived in the projects, but my grandparents who raised me were extreme gamblers and whenever they would win they would pull me aside and buy me videos games as long as I didn't tell the other one they won.

[+GoldenWheels]

I have to say as a kid, the commercials/screenshots for Altered Beast impressed the crap out of me, and definitely made my NES seem "old". At least from a tech perspective, it was a LOT like when I saw screenshots of China Warrior.

 

In looking at the PC-E games list, and just using the standard original TG16 release date of August 1989, it is interesting to consider pack-in options. There aren't a TON of great options (you can sot by date for PC-E/Japan):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_TurboGrafx-16_games

 

Myself? I could see Bikkuriman World, The Kung Fu (a la Altered beast for Genesis, a tech demo to glean screenshots from for mags), Son Son II (with lots of conversion work), and Dungeon Explorer as pack ins. Maybe even something like Vigilante, that had arcade appeal?

 

Legendary Axe makes sense since it was an American hit anyway but I wonder if maybe it wasn't so big in Japan? I also often see people say R-Type would have been good...I just think it is too niche/weird (as a "bio" shooter it was kind of gross) and it is damn HARD.

[Rhomaios]

5 hours ago, GoldenWheels said:

Myself? I could see Bikkuriman World, The Kung Fu (a la Altered beast for Genesis, a tech demo to glean screenshots from for mags), Son Son II (with lots of conversion work), and Dungeon Explorer as pack ins. Maybe even something like Vigilante, that had arcade appeal?

 

Legendary Axe makes sense since it was an American hit anyway but I wonder if maybe it wasn't so big in Japan? I also often see people say R-Type would have been good...I just think it is too niche/weird (as a "bio" shooter it was kind of gross) and it is damn HARD.

I thought about maybe Dungeon Explorer, but I worried it might have been seen too much of a Gauntlet rip-off?

[DragonGrafx-16]

Bomberman would have been a great pack-in but it came out a year too late. For 1989 games I would have chosen Blazing Lazers but I'm a shmup fan so I may be biased.

[Rhomaios]

I love shooters too and Blazing Lazers is great, but it definitely wouldn't have had that mass market appeal that Legendary Axe or Altered Beast had.

[NE146]

I was going to say Blazing Lazers definitely had that eye-catching popping wow factor to me and my friends, but then again we were 20 something-year-old males  ?. Still though, I think it would’ve been considered  pretty well had it been a pack in.

[Tanooki]

11 hours ago, GoldenWheels said:

I have to say as a kid, the commercials/screenshots for Altered Beast impressed the crap out of me, and definitely made my NES seem "old". At least from a tech perspective, it was a LOT like when I saw screenshots of China Warrior.

 

In looking at the PC-E games list, and just using the standard original TG16 release date of August 1989, it is interesting to consider pack-in options. There aren't a TON of great options (you can sot by date for PC-E/Japan):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_TurboGrafx-16_games

 

Myself? I could see Bikkuriman World, The Kung Fu (a la Altered beast for Genesis, a tech demo to glean screenshots from for mags), Son Son II (with lots of conversion work), and Dungeon Explorer as pack ins. Maybe even something like Vigilante, that had arcade appeal?

 

Legendary Axe makes sense since it was an American hit anyway but I wonder if maybe it wasn't so big in Japan? I also often see people say R-Type would have been good...I just think it is too niche/weird (as a "bio" shooter it was kind of gross) and it is damn HARD.

For me it didn't other than the sprites being a bit larger in pictures, then later at a kiosk in store, there was nothing that reached out to me saying you have to own this.  A lot of the early Genesis stuff was subpar to the TG at the time in ways, and wasn't really raising the bar but a nudge over the more premium tier quality NES releases of 1989-90 either.  The one, finally the one that stood out of all things was Sonic, that one finally felt like they did something the NES could choke and die over but by that rate Nintendo already was teasing out the SNES in 1990 in NP and third party stuff.  Sega ran with it though, the big stack of games and blowing smoke ads and it worked for a little while.  I'm kind of surprised they never took shots at NEC, they made them look bad, even if they were minor compared to Nintendo.

[+GoldenWheels]

9 hours ago, Tanooki said:

For me it didn't other than the sprites being a bit larger in pictures, then later at a kiosk in store, there was nothing that reached out to me saying you have to own this.  A lot of the early Genesis stuff was subpar to the TG at the time in ways, and wasn't really raising the bar but a nudge over the more premium tier quality NES releases of 1989-90 either.  The one, finally the one that stood out of all things was Sonic, that one finally felt like they did something the NES could choke and die over but by that rate Nintendo already was teasing out the SNES in 1990 in NP and third party stuff.  Sega ran with it though, the big stack of games and blowing smoke ads and it worked for a little while.  I'm kind of surprised they never took shots at NEC, they made them look bad, even if they were minor compared to Nintendo.

Ha! I was DEFINITELY easily screenshot/graphics swayed. And that ad for the Genesis with Altered Beast....whoah. My eyes were probably as big as dinner plates when I saw that. I remember seeing ONE China Warrior screenshot in EGM or whatever and being like...."Look how big the character is OMG!!!!"

[Tanooki]

The TG always through third party magazines wow'd me more.  It was obvious to me that it had better visuals, more color, and later hearing it, clean audio both tone and sample over the tinny muffled scratch fest that was Genesis.  It's ironic I guess TG is technically a hybird 8/16bit system, yet Genesis being what it was, looked and sounded lesser.  Sega cut some as usual serious corners.

[Zoyous]

1 hour ago, Tanooki said:

The TG always through third party magazines wow'd me more.  It was obvious to me that it had better visuals, more color, and later hearing it, clean audio both tone and sample over the tinny muffled scratch fest that was Genesis.  It's ironic I guess TG is technically a hybird 8/16bit system, yet Genesis being what it was, looked and sounded lesser.  Sega cut some as usual serious corners.

The 8/16-bit issue isn't as big a differentiator as the marketing made it into - after all, the Intellivision was the first 16-bit console. However, I would say the original Genesis console didn't cut corners on audio. The Yamaha YM2612 is a nice synthesis chip capable of very clear and rich sound. It was the mid-late 90s revisions of the hardware that used lesser components - and subsequently bad clone/emulation consoles and applications have muddied the representation of Genesis audio. Ultimately I would say Sega did make a very positive difference by being the first Japanese company to put a music composer's real name front and center on the title screen of a game (Yuzo Koshiro on Revenge of Shinobi in 1989) which was a pretty big departure from the status quo of the time.

 

The TG16/PCE had its own share of questionable design decisions that could be considered cutting corners, such requiring consumers to buy additional hardware simply to have more than one controller port and improved AV outputs. When many, if not most, kids could usually only expect to get a few new games each year for their birthday and the holidays, any additional expenses like that would cut into how many games they could get, so that had to factor in when people were weighing which system to get.

[+jeremiahjt]

Altered Beast was a great choice for me. Seeing Altered Beast packed in with the system really made me want a Genesis so I could play a top arcade game like that at home. Now I did not get a Genesis until Sonic the Hedgehog had replaced it, but it definitely sold me on the system.

 

As far as Keith Courage in Alpha Zones, I thought that was a good choice too. My step-brother had a TurboGrafx-16 with a handful of games and I played Keith Courage quite a bit. I also played a lot of Battle Royale so maybe my opinion should not count for much.

[+jgkspsx]

Hey, I LIKE Battle Royale! It’s a lot better than a lot of official WWF games that are drab and boring.

[+jgkspsx]

2 hours ago, Zoyous said:

The TG16/PCE had its own share of questionable design decisions that could be considered cutting corners, such requiring consumers to buy additional hardware simply to have more than one controller port and improved AV outputs.

The joke when I was a kid was that the TG-16 was the console for only children. It really hurt the utility of the console.

[DragonGrafx-16]

NEC was too lazy to add a second controller port on the TG16 despite their being room on the case for all 5. The original PC Engine on the other hand was so compact (there's handheld consoles bigger than it) that they could only fit one.

[Tanooki]

3 hours ago, Zoyous said:

The 8/16-bit issue isn't as big a differentiator as the marketing made it into - after all, the Intellivision was the first 16-bit console. However, I would say the original Genesis console didn't cut corners on audio. The Yamaha YM2612 is a nice synthesis chip capable of very clear and rich sound. It was the mid-late 90s revisions of the hardware that used lesser components - and subsequently bad clone/emulation consoles and applications have muddied the representation of Genesis audio. Ultimately I would say Sega did make a very positive difference by being the first Japanese company to put a music composer's real name front and center on the title screen of a game (Yuzo Koshiro on Revenge of Shinobi in 1989) which was a pretty big departure from the status quo of the time.

 

The TG16/PCE had its own share of questionable design decisions that could be considered cutting corners, such requiring consumers to buy additional hardware simply to have more than one controller port and improved AV outputs. When many, if not most, kids could usually only expect to get a few new games each year for their birthday and the holidays, any additional expenses like that would cut into how many games they could get, so that had to factor in when people were weighing which system to get.

Agree to disagree on the audio part alone on Sega.  Most the games were just tinny and metallic sounding, often samples were either well muffled or scratchy.  Visually the system did nicely with a good fast output of sprites, no argument there, but it really did lack color unless someone cheated and used techniques per like scanline refresh to tease a few more out faster than the eye could detect.

 

And no doubt NEC was kind of scummy having one controller port with like a $15-20 multiplayer tap which was just bad.  I do recall though TG games tended to cost less than both Sega and Nintendo, likely due to the style of media they used with those flat cards, less plastic, less everything there.  Sega used the cards and walked away from those on the SMS era stuff.  NEC though they stuck with it, and when space became an issue, they just got fatter for a battery (Populous) or more chip space(SF2CE.)

[Zoyous]

1 hour ago, Tanooki said:

I do recall though TG games tended to cost less than both Sega and Nintendo, likely due to the style of media they used with those flat cards, less plastic, less everything there.  Sega used the cards and walked away from those on the SMS era stuff.  NEC though they stuck with it, and when space became an issue, they just got fatter for a battery (Populous) or more chip space(SF2CE.)

I thought the cards, and the fact that they came in CD-style jewel cases, were one of the coolest features of the system. Although it wasn't until decades later that I actually held one of the cases and was surprised to see that it has a solid black back rather than a clear back with another printed insert like CDs have. That's interesting that they physically became larger for batteries or more chips, I haven't seen those.

[DragonGrafx-16]

4 hours ago, Zoyous said:

I thought the cards, and the fact that they came in CD-style jewel cases, were one of the coolest features of the system. Although it wasn't until decades later that I actually held one of the cases and was surprised to see that it has a solid black back rather than a clear back with another printed insert like CDs have. That's interesting that they physically became larger for batteries or more chips, I haven't seen those.

Not all HuCard cases were like that... at least for PC Engine games... many actually have info and screenshots on the back like the PC Engine version of Soldier Blade. 

[+jgkspsx]

1 hour ago, DragonGrafx-16 said:

Not all HuCard cases were like that... at least for PC Engine games... many actually have info and screenshots on the back like the PC Engine version of Soldier Blade. 

I don’t have any legitimate PC Engine games with screenshots on the back. Maybe one of them.

[Steven Pendleton]

11 hours ago, Zoyous said:

The Yamaha YM2612 is a nice synthesis chip capable of very clear and rich sound. It was the mid-late 90s revisions of the hardware that used lesser components - and subsequently bad clone/emulation consoles and applications have muddied the representation of Genesis audio.

Honestly some of the YM3438 systems sound great, as well. Out of my VA4 MD, VA6 MD, VA0 MD2, Nomad, and Mega Jet, the Mega Jet has the best audio. People seem to like to say that the YM3438 systems in general have bad audio, but it's definitely not true, as the Mega Jet and the Nomad both have good audio. I've never particularly cared for the PC Engine's sound chip, but I'll still always take that and the YM2612/YM3438's lossless tinny buzzsaws over super-compressed and muffled SPC700 farting, though~

[+GoldenWheels]

18 hours ago, DragonGrafx-16 said:

NEC was too lazy to add a second controller port on the TG16 despite their being room on the case for all 5. The original PC Engine on the other hand was so compact (there's handheld consoles bigger than it) that they could only fit one.

I think this (along with the case re-design they did--based on the worst kind of nonsense) were two of their biggest mistakes, and both IMO more costly than the pack in being Keith Courage.

 

If you're going to take MONTHS re-designing the case...put a second control port on it! If not....save the time, release the damn thing as is, and start gobbling up the 16 bit landscape! Delaying the release but not IMPROVING the system in any way while in doing so? Worst of all worlds decision.

[+GoldenWheels]

11 hours ago, jgkspsx said:

I don’t have any legitimate PC Engine games with screenshots on the back. Maybe one of them.

I'd have to check my shelves but I think with PC-E stuff, the huey backs are largely blank, but the CD title backs have art, copy and screenies? I think?

 

I know many of my spare huey cases started life as Pro Yaikkyu whatever #, and horse racing, and mah jong....they were all black with a round sticker on the back. Because man did I remove a lot of those stickers.

[+jgkspsx]

Oh, yeah, I think both US and JP CDs had normal jewel cases with photos on the back. I don’t look at the CD cases that often since I only play them off the SSDS3 ?

[Tanooki]

23 hours ago, Zoyous said:

I thought the cards, and the fact that they came in CD-style jewel cases, were one of the coolest features of the system. Although it wasn't until decades later that I actually held one of the cases and was surprised to see that it has a solid black back rather than a clear back with another printed insert like CDs have. That's interesting that they physically became larger for batteries or more chips, I haven't seen those.

Well yeah it is, but as you probably read before I got here, not all were that way.  The rear though wasn't entirely bare, they put a large circle sticker roughly a little larger across than 1/2 the side on the back usually white then has the game name, publisher, bar code, few other useless bits of info in there and fairly bland with 1-2 colors to it(outside of black and white).  Most of the HuCard releases though were, CDs were basically mostly normal jewel cases with rear art, though a few did lack it for some odd reason, such as both Bomberman 93+94 I own both have rear art and open view.  Also early CDs like Gate of Thunder and Ys Book 1+2 are like this, or perhaps at least the pack-in versions were as such.

 

Street Fighter 2 CE I own, that one falls into a double jewel case.  The thickness of the game, that hump you see is not quite double the base card, but fairly close, maybe 2/3 as much in depth over the rest larger.

 

I stole this image, but here's what it looks like.  The interior middle part it's built out like the usual HuCards more less so it has slots on the interior for a card so really you could I guess hide an extra in there.:

Edited July 12, 2021 by Tanooki

[DragonGrafx-16]

 

My latest PC Engine pickup...

[+jeremiahjt]

I bought a non-working TurboStick. The stick part does not work. The game store had looked into it and said it needed a new capacitor. Does that sound right? If so, how easy or difficult will the repair be?