Retro-GAF unite!

Played through the Mega Drive version of Ghouls n Ghosts today, and almost all of the game was damn fun, however once again I got screwed over at the end of my second run on stage 5-2 so I ended up losing the special weapon you need to fight the final boss. Cue 20 or so minutes of me struggling to get it back... I love the game and don't really have an issue with difficulty per se, but the weapons balancing is terrible in the game - where the lance, knife and discus are the only viable weapons, and if you end up with an sword, flame, axe etc. your basically stuck in certain areas as the game doesn't feel like it was ever intended to be beaten this way (I'm sure that's not the case, but it sure feels like it). Then once I got the special weapon back I trounced through the level and beat that pushover final boss on my first try.
 
Khaz said:
Oh that's cool. I had a couple of M3adapters back in the day, but their batteries dies and aren't easy to replace. Might try it out!
[edit] the cartridge is sticking out :/ I'll wait for a revision.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm still on my EZF4 due to the form factor :/
 
My pickup today:

O9QR6HF.jpg
Click to expand...

I already owned the german version of Soleil, but its nice getting an english version since my german is pretty bad. The Rocmans are for replacing my pal-carts, I now own all of them except Rocman 2!
 
Morfeo said:
My pickup today:



I already owned the german version of Soleil, but its nice getting an english version since my german is pretty bad. The Rocmans are for replacing my pal-carts, I now own all of them except Rocman 2!
Click to expand...

Very nice. I can't go back to the PAL Rockman's after playing the Japanese versions. The speed difference (and music not being slowed down in 1&2) were game changers for me. That and playing the Japanese versions via RGB were glorious on my modded AV Famicom.

Mercs is a brilliant port - the MD version not only has a decent arcade port but also a brand new mode that is brilliant, I sunk tons of hours into that game. Mega Twins is a great port as well, its a bit on the easy side but its a great action/platformer game.


Update on my Supergrafx pain in the ass - I acquired a cheap hu card only copy of Daimakaimura and tried that today. Still gets a white screen... So my POS Supergrafx is completely unable to play the one game I want to play on it. I've ordered a Gamebit to open the console up, as I want to take a closer look and give it a good clean. Not sure why it has problems playing just one game, but its really annoying. So I now think the console must have issues and not the game, as two copies of the game game have exactly the same issue (yet any other PCE or Supergrafx game work fine). I swear NEC hardware hates me - my first PCE had sound issues, my GT had screen issues and now this. Still, more reliable than anything Xbox related, I have horrible luck with those (so many dead consoles) yet my launch NES works as good as the day I originally brought it!
 
Morfeo said:
I already owned the german version of Soleil, but its nice getting an english version since my german is pretty bad. The Rocmans are for replacing my pal-carts, I now own all of them except Rocman 2!
Click to expand...

Nice pick-ups, Morfeo. Seeing Discworld games always reminds me that I have to get them before it's too late (and they are already quite high in price...). Very good stuff.
 
D.Lo said:
Damn that sucks. Never heard of issues with core PCEs, but Duos pretty much all die.
Click to expand...


Well it did give me the kick I needed to get a Duo R, which is glorious. Not only does it actually work but its modded for RGB output so the games look wonderful on it. The GT I sold to a friend on another forum and he's since fixed it up and upgraded the screen. Its the Superfrafx I'm pissed off about, they aren't cheap and I only wanted it for a couple of Capcom games, now I'm super paranoid about even getting 1941 since I have no guarantee it'll even work. I'll be emulating the system for now until I can fix this issue with Daimakaimura...
 
Yeah I've had a dojindance RGB Duo RX for a few years now. Replaced my old Duo.

I prefer the look of the normal Duo, but being able to use a Mega Drive 2 power cord instead of the custom Duo plug, and having the AV plug go out the back instead of the side, plus solid reliability, mean an R or RX are by far the most practical choice.
 
davidwhangchoi said:
does white duo r and duo rx also die like the us versions?

i was looking into getting a white one
Click to expand...
No, it was the standard PCE Duo (and US equivalent) that had a combo of bad lasers, bad board design, and bad capacitors.

All white ones (PC Engine Duo R and PC Engine Duo RX) are known to be very reliable.
 
D.Lo said:
No, it was the standard PCE Duo (and US equivalent) that had a combo of bad lasers, bad board design, and bad capacitors.

All white ones (PC Engine Duo R and PC Engine Duo RX) are known to be very reliable.
Click to expand...

oh ok, thanks for clarification =) i thought so too but i just off shoot drive-by read the "all duos" and got worried.

cool man! i'm just waiting for the right time.

so far my needs are:
NES (to be RGB modded)
and pc engine duo (RGB modded)
 
Shadowman16 said:
Update on my Supergrafx pain in the ass - I acquired a cheap hu card only copy of Daimakaimura and tried that today. Still gets a white screen... So my POS Supergrafx is completely unable to play the one game I want to play on it. I've ordered a Gamebit to open the console up, as I want to take a closer look and give it a good clean. Not sure why it has problems playing just one game, but its really annoying. So I now think the console must have issues and not the game, as two copies of the game game have exactly the same issue (yet any other PCE or Supergrafx game work fine). I swear NEC hardware hates me - my first PCE had sound issues, my GT had screen issues and now this. Still, more reliable than anything Xbox related, I have horrible luck with those (so many dead consoles) yet my launch NES works as good as the day I originally brought it!
Click to expand...

That's so odd... I've had the opposite problem with my brand new copy of Ridge Racer 2 for the PSP, which absolutely refused to load up on any console I've had the chance to try it (two European 2000s and one Japanese 1000). But yeah, that was the game, strangely dead out of the box. I've bought another copy, and that was fine.

Totally uneducated guess... You said you're recycling video/AV cables from another system, with your SuperGrafx. Could it be they're causing some sort of malfunction, afflicting Daimakaimura alone for whatever reason?
 
On PCE circles, if you say 'I have a Duo' it usually means a regular Duo, not 'any Duo model' etc. The other models are usually referred to as Duo R/RX or just 'R' or 'RX'.

Ashby said:
Where do you guys get your retro stuff offline? There's no retro game shops around by me.
Click to expand...
Ebay, Yahoo.
 
Galdelico said:
That's so odd... I've had the opposite problem with my brand new copy of Ridge Racer 2 for the PSP, which absolutely refused to load up on any console I've had the chance to try it (two European 2000s and one Japanese 1000). But yeah, that was the game, strangely dead out of the box. I've bought another copy, and that was fine.

Totally uneducated guess... You said you're recycling video/AV cables from another system, with your SuperGrafx. Could it be they're causing some sort of malfunction, afflicting Daimakaimura alone for whatever reason?
Click to expand...

I'm using the power supply and AV cables supplied with the console, but the AV cable does table a bit of jiggling to get to display the picture. It might be the cable, but every other game I try loads up straight away so I'm not sure if that is the issue. I also wondered if it was the power supply (since I'm in a PAL region its running via a stepdown transformer, I wonder if a native power supply would be better?) I'll see how I get on with the clean tomorrow, see if that makes a difference. But either way, I'm stumped.

I did configure an emulator in the mean time, got the correct aspect ratio, scan lines and my arcade stick (closest thing I had that actually as a good D Pad) and its glorious, so worst case scenario I use that until I fix things.
 
Shadowman16 said:
I'm using the power supply and AV cables supplied with the console, but the AV cable does table a bit of jiggling to get to display the picture. It might be the cable, but every other game I try loads up straight away so I'm not sure if that is the issue. I also wondered if it was the power supply (since I'm in a PAL region its running via a stepdown transformer, I wonder if a native power supply would be better?) I'll see how I get on with the clean tomorrow, see if that makes a difference. But either way, I'm stumped.
Click to expand...

Totally understand, and I cross my fingers you can sort it out with a good cleaning.

And I don't know why I thought you had a loose console with recycled leads... Bad neurons, sorry. ^^
 
Galdelico said:
Totally understand, and I cross my fingers you can sort it out with a good cleaning.

And I don't know why I thought you had a loose console with recycled leads... Bad neurons, sorry. ^^
Click to expand...

I did post a couple of weeks back about potentially picking up a loose Supergrafx with no cables, it could be that your thinking of?

Either way, fingers crossed that the console just needs a good clean, else I'll try new cables, and if that doesn't work I give up!
 
I understand the pain of non-working consoles/games.

The number of Colecovision/Intellivision items i've gone though... I think Microsoft learned their build quality from Coleco.

It's funny the way things age beyond their expected lifespan. Basically all Game Gears died at the 10 year mark of bad caps. All Game Boy and Virtual Boys lose screen connections from dying glue at the ~20 year mark (both can be fixed with no replacement parts just by heating the connections to re-adhere them).

It will be worse in the future too. I remember reading an engineer saying that due to their poor designs (primarily from a heat perspective), basically just using a PS3 or 360 normally slowly damages it. Each console has a limited number of play hours and will eventually die from use.
 
D.Lo said:
It will be worse in the future too. I remember reading an engineer saying that due to their poor designs (primarily from a heat perspective), basically just using a PS3 or 360 normally slowly damages it. Each console has a limited number of play hours and will eventually die from use.
Click to expand...

This is why people need to embrace the SuperSlim PS3. The drive door mechanism might be kinda weird but it runs way cooler than older revisions.
 
I personally can't wait to start getting my daughter into games. She's only three months old, so her only experience so far has been napping in my arms while I've played Wolfenstein The New Order, Final Fantasy X, and Resident Evil Code Veronica (The only games I've played for the past few months).
 
Well after spending a couple of hours with my Supergrafx the closest I got to Makaimura working was getting a garbled title screen and demo screen playing. Also, my copy of Shinobi doesn't work on the console either (and a quick check on my Duo R has that game boot up immediately). Its either the console or card slot, but I'm nowhere near skilled enough to know how to debug this further.
 
Bought a PC Engine Duo R.

I was kind of on the fence about it. This is by a wide margin the most expensive retro console I've purchased, and the PC engine scene in general is expensive. Plus I don't think there are that many games on the system I'm really into.

But I managed to get a decent price and no risk of import charges (won't have it in hand until December though). And this stuff just keeps getting more expensive; if there's ever a time where I suddenly start liking shmups it'd be good to have the hardware before prices get even worse. It'll be great to have a way to play Rondo of Blood on real hardware too, and I like to think that by getting new systems I can push myself to try new stuff -- it's working so far with the 90s PC I built.

Shadowman16 said:
Well after spending a couple of hours with my Supergrafx the closest I got to Makaimura working was getting a garbled title screen and demo screen playing. Also, my copy of Shinobi doesn't work on the console either (and a quick check on my Duo R has that game boot up immediately). Its either the console or card slot, but I'm nowhere near skilled enough to know how to debug this further.
Click to expand...

Probably the card slot is corroded. Have you tried like inserting and removing a game a few times quickly to just scrape off some corrosion? Preferably with a not super valuable game.
 
entremet said:
What about the new 360s?
Click to expand...

I don't really have as much experience with them but I bet they'd hold up in the long run better than older 360s.

I bought a late-model S recently for this very reason (I'm pretty sure it's the same inside as an E) and it certainly runs cooler than my ~2009 Jasper original.
 
SheepyGuy said:
Bought a PC Engine Duo R.

I was kind of on the fence about it. This is by a wide margin the most expensive retro console I've purchased, and the PC engine scene in general is expensive. Plus I don't think there are that many games on the system I'm really into.

But I managed to get a decent price and no risk of import charges (won't have it in hand until December though). And this stuff just keeps getting more expensive; if there's ever a time where I suddenly start liking shmups it'd be good to have the hardware before prices get even worse. It'll be great to have a way to play Rondo of Blood on real hardware too, and I like to think that by getting new systems I can push myself to try new stuff -- it's working so far with the 90s PC I built.



Probably the card slot is corroded. Have you tried like inserting and removing a game a few times quickly to just scrape off some corrosion? Preferably with a not super valuable game.
Click to expand...

Yeah, tried that many times and barely had any improvement. So at the point I'm clueless as to how to proceed :(
 
So rather than toy around with my Supergrafx any more I just decided it'd be easier to emulate GnG for the time being. Finished it twice through and I think its a awesome port, I can see why its often held as the best of the console ports. Only two issues I really have with it - the first is the cost of the game + console. The port is good, but the improvements over the MD version feel minor at best, it has extra bits of animation here and there and it manages to push a few more enemies on screen to make it feel closer to the arcade version (not without sprite flicker on the final level though, which is ultra annoying) but its really not worth the console (or hassle!) in getting a Supergrafx just to experience a slightly better version of the game.
Second is limited continues. There is a cheat to push that up to at least 9 but still there are a couple of choke points in the game (3-2, 4-2 and 5-2) that still cause me a few problems, so having a limit only makes things more tense.

So I'd probably still side with the MD version of GnG being my preferred port. It runs super fast, is only missing a few graphical tricks here and there, has infinite continues, it has better music (in my opinion) and for some reason I just prefer the Arthur sprite from the Mega Drive version (no idea why). But really, Supergrafx or Mega Drive, you can't go wrong. And GnG is still probably my favourite of the series, perfect length, great level design and an excellent soundtrack. Only issue I have with the game in general is the boss of level 5 seems impossible if your not careful since his swarm attack seems impossible to dodge if he gets you in a corner, and Loki is the biggest pussy in the entire game (its the biggest anti climax to playing the game through two full times).
 
Saturn/Playstation have the best ports of all.

EDIT: and X68K if you have a spare grand lying around lol.
 
Shadowman16 said:
Very nice. I can't go back to the PAL Rockman's after playing the Japanese versions. The speed difference (and music not being slowed down in 1&2) were game changers for me. That and playing the Japanese versions via RGB were glorious on my modded AV Famicom.

Mercs is a brilliant port - the MD version not only has a decent arcade port but also a brand new mode that is brilliant, I sunk tons of hours into that game. Mega Twins is a great port as well, its a bit on the easy side but its a great action/platformer game.
Click to expand...

Thanks! Yeah, I agree, especially Pal Mega Man 2 is a mess for me with how that iconic music is played so damn slow. I need to pick that up soon to complete the series. Really looking forward to Mercs, its a game ive been meaning to pick up for a long time. Really hope you can sort out you Supergrafx btw!

Galdelico said:
Nice pick-ups, Morfeo. Seeing Discworld games always reminds me that I have to get them before it's too late (and they are already quite high in price...). Very good stuff.
Click to expand...

Thanks! Yeah, I prefer to play those kind of games on a PC, but then I dont really play on the PC anymore, so then it had to be PS1-version. Really looking forward to check them out!
 
SheepyGuy said:
This is why people need to embrace the SuperSlim PS3. The drive door mechanism might be kinda weird but it runs way cooler than older revisions.
Click to expand...
I have one. Super slim is whisper quiet when not playing a disc. Running games off the hard drive is amazing. Not a peep.

I agree it also runs very cool.
 
D.Lo said:
Saturn/Playstation have the best ports of all.

EDIT: and X68K if you have a spare grand lying around lol.
Click to expand...

I was technically ignoring actual arcade ports that came later, because they should definitely be the best of the bunch since the hardware could handle the game without compromises by that time (though the tiny load times on the Saturn version were a tad annoying at times).

I was tempted to get the X68K version (I have Final Fight, SFII" and SSF2 but never got the computer itself, and don't feel like spending even more money right now!)
 
Shadowman16 said:
I was technically ignoring actual arcade ports that came later, because they should definitely be the best of the bunch since the hardware could handle the game without compromises by that time (though the tiny load times on the Saturn version were a tad annoying at times).

I was tempted to get the X68K version (I have Final Fight, SFII" and SSF2 but never got the computer itself, and don't feel like spending even more money right now!)
Click to expand...
Haha I think 68K is the ultimate japanophone platform. I have Akumajou Dracula for it but no console either.
 
BNGames said:
If you would like to see a guy who can't speak Japanese try to play retro Import games and determine if they are Western Friendly ive been running a series for a while

Check it out:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL67A5B0CB96FE2470

I plan on doing more soon, ive got a number of good ones in recently I think are worth doing videos on.
Click to expand...

Subscribing in a heartbeat. I already own many games out of those you've covered so far, so we probably share similar tastes as well. Thanks for sharing!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Like The Witcher games? Join me in my quest to create a "readthrough" of the books GAF
4
1K
mindfreak191 replied
  • Locked
What is the current GAF membership in comparison to how it was?
13
7K
Mikey Jr. replied
  • Poll
Bless Ye Gaf, Curse Ye Gaf!
0
1
SomedayTheFire replied
Battlefield 1 |OT2| "All Quiet on the GAF Front"
33 34 35 36 37
2K
214K
Insane Metal replied
Lefty PC Gamers of GAF - What mouse do you use?
0
657
SweetJohnnyCage replied
Top Bottom