Support NeoGAF

[borghe]

Commodore has said they're looking into releasing C64 games elsewhere, but there's certain issues at the moment.

yeah, commodore has always had major licensing issues in NA since they pulled out the Amiga brand in the US in the mid-90s. IIRC (I could be wrong) it has to do with how they were bailed out here then. Pretty sure another company actually holds partial licensing here for commodore products (including emulators) if not the brand name itself.

I would LOVE to see C64 games over here (and amiga, even more really). but they're basically tied up in the same licensing hell that many of the best games from yesteryear are tied up in.

I admit matters may have changed more recently, but I've a nagging feeling that while EU tellies have happily managed to run in 60Hz since the early nineties or so, I seem to remember that when I did a bit of research in the subject a while back it was actually quite rare to find a US telly that would run 50Hz without complaining; I suspect this could be the biggest issue for any PAL-to-US imports.

correct. add into that all of the VC emulators running at native resolution and scan rate (hence all of your guys' complaints of 50Hz games) and yeah, it would be tough to bring an unaltered PAL game over here unless it ran 60Hz originally.

 

[Princess Skittles]

For me that's the truth of all things in the non-portable current gen except VC.

Your avatar looks familiar (and very old school), what is it from?

 

[ChackanKun]

Your avatar looks familiar (and very old school), what is it from?

Star Ocean i think

 

[crowphoenix]

Star Ocean i think

It's actually Rena from the Star Ocean 2 anime, which is a rather bleh anime to a great game.

 

[sfog]

Are there any PAL imports we could actually get?

We've gotten Alien Soldier and Super Fantasy Zone already. There aren't any other EU exclusive games on there yet aside from Devil World, but that's only out in Japan right now.

 

[KeeSomething]

Don't bother. Kee looks predisposed to dislike it, and to be quite honest, Ys was never a franchise for everyone. It's also hard to find a 20 year old game that's aged gracefully. Nostalgia helps lend long-time fans a much-needed filter to approaching such games so far beyond their prime. Without that, or at least the desire to walk into such an experience optimistically, I couldn't recommend Ys Book I&II.

I never said I disliked it. How can I? I never played it. I just have no intention too. Maybe if I played it, I'd enjoy it. Who knows? But I'm running low on memory space on my Wii, and I don't want to spend more Wii points on a game that I'm not even interested in.

*Shrugs*

I'm not doubting that it is a good game, and that everyone who likes it is blinded by nostalgia, I'm just saying that based on everything that I saw, I'm not interested.

 

[Mejilan]

I never said I disliked it. How can I? I never played it. I just have no intention too. Maybe if I played it, I'd enjoy it. Who knows? But I'm running low on memory space on my Wii, and I don't want to spend more Wii points on a game that I'm not even interested in.

*Shrugs*

I'm not doubting that it is a good game, and that everyone who likes it is blinded by nostalgia, I'm just saying that based on everything that I saw, I'm not interested.

I never said that you said that you disliked it. I merely said that Ys I&II were never games fit for everyone, and that's certainly truer today, 20 years after the fact. I did judge (accurately, it seems) your predisposition towards the games to be a vaguely negative one, and state that you'd be better off saving your money.

 

[MoxManiac]

I dunno, this is my first time playing Ys I and II, and I think it's great so far. I think it's a disservice to the game to dismiss it out of the perception of blind nostalga.

 

[Princess Skittles]

Honestly, I am really amazed how many people are playing this for the first time and enjoying it. I really though the antiquated battle "system" would really kill the game for anybody that didn't play it way back when. But I guess that goes to show just how great a game it really is regardless of that.

 

[crowphoenix]

The combat in the game is a lot more fun than I feel like it should be, especially once the enemies become extremely dangerous- one slip and the enemy could take you from full health to dead in two seconds. All the combat is, is running into the enemy at angles, but it's so quick that you can't help but feel powerful.

 

[borghe]

Honestly, I am really amazed how many people are playing this for the first time and enjoying it. I really though the antiquated battle "system" would really kill the game for anybody that didn't play it way back when. But I guess that goes to show just how great a game it really is regardless of that.

the game is an action rpg, and the "antiquated" battle system is just an alternative to the "press a button to swing" system. It IS enhanced by the positioning and shield/armor aspects.

I mean the game is old yeah, and the gameplay is definitely showing its age.. but even today it is still a solid action rpg with enough difficulty to probably challenge many of today's gamers.

 

[Iam Canadian]

You know, if anyone ever calls me out on my statements that Nintendo hates Mother fans, I'm just going to show them this image. I mean, honestly. Now they're just making fun of us.

 

[mollipen]

That image isn't seriously real... is it?

 

[SuomiDude]

That image isn't seriously real... is it?

Nope (the Earthbound part I mean). Though I had check the actual e-mail again just to be sure:lol

 

[djtiesto]

Holy shit, the first Monday I didn't check the release schedule (I was busy out in the Bronx all day yesterday) and not one but 2 amazing games were released. I hope this is gonna be a turning point for the VC...next up, Earthbound, Shining Force 2, Phantasy Star 4, Lufia 2 and Super Mario RPG.

 

[Baron]

Rumors wants that Ys book is played in its original resolution without any filtering. Can someone with half a brain confirm this?

Yes, no blur.

Wait, what is this? Are they implying that the TG-16 emulator on the VC has been updated to remove the "filtering" blur? Is this true? Only this game? Huh?

 

[borghe]

I would really have to boot two games up right after another, but by my eyes it's still there, just seems lessened.

of course I could be wrong and it could be removed. one thing that stands out on this release though is that the game runs at 320x240, as opposed to almost every other TG16 release so far that runs at 256x240. That might have something to do with it. Don't know if there are any other games on the system right now at 320x240 (though the Cinemaware games probably would be if they ever get released).

 

[DDayton]

I would really have to boot two games up right after another, but by my eyes it's still there, just seems lessened.

of course I could be wrong and it could be removed. one thing that stands out on this release though is that the game runs at 320x240, as opposed to almost every other TG16 release so far that runs at 256x240. That might have something to do with it. Don't know if there are any other games on the system right now at 320x240 (though the Cinemaware games probably would be if they ever get released).

Yeah, there's is no filter on this game... although if it's a 320 instead of a 256 game, I suppose that could be why... maybe....

 

[borghe]

Yeah, there's is no filter on this game... although if it's a 320 instead of a 256 game, I suppose that could be why... maybe....

tg-16 was capable of 3 horizontal resolutions. 512, 320, and 256. Most games (99%) ran at 256x240. A few (Ys being the most notable) ran at 320x240. The only game(s) known to run at 512x240 were the two Sherlock Holmes titles.

 

[djtiesto]

The topic title for this thread these past few months made me dread peaking in. I love RPGs. Have there been any good ones I should turn my Wii on for to pick up? Help is appreciated.

Phantasy Star II on VC, and now Ys Book I and II. I just got Baroque for my birthday, haven't opened it yet though, so I couldn't tell you how that one is. And Opoona looked neat.

 

[JoshuaJSlone]

Ys is the first Turbo CD game I've downloaded. It's pretty crazy getting (some) voice acting, quality recorded audio, and having the room for plenty of images to tell a story with on what's otherwise NES-to-Genesis-level technology. And perhaps more than ever it seems crazy that N64 didn't have a CD drive when it launched 6.5 years after this game.

 

[borghe]

Ys is the first Turbo CD game I've downloaded. It's pretty crazy getting (some) voice acting, quality recorded audio, and having the room for plenty of images to tell a story with on what's otherwise NES-to-Genesis-level technology. And perhaps more than ever it seems crazy that N64 didn't have a CD drive when it launched 6.5 years after this game.

when I booted it up last night, the first bit of nostalgia that crossed my memory was how ungodly freaking impressive this game was back in the day. THIS is really the game that set the cinematic storytelling style of games like FFVII. Sure other square games setup the complex (and emo) storylines and such.. but this one was really one of the first that had cinematic movies between sequences, an extremely compelling fully orchestrated soundtrack, etc. When the game hit these shores in 1990-1991, I know I had personally never seen anything even close to that. I think the closest I ever came outside of Ys (and later Lunar and Cosmic Fantasy 2) were Wing Commander 2 and Ultima VII on the PC. When I started it up last night I instantly remembered how much of impression it made on me, and consequently how well the game has aged because of that.

although to your point, CDs REALLY weren't as important as the PSX and Sony made us believe they were and the N64 played host to some amazing titles of that generation. By the time the N64 hit "6 years later" audio compression, advanced hardware and larger ROM sizes made the N64 vastly superior to the TG-CD in terms of storage. Ogre Battle 64 was a 320Mb cart which through compression of things like audio and game data could easily come close to half the size of what the TG-CD was doing on CD, if not more. I mean yeah the PSX was capable of these same things AND had a CDROM, but let's not forget that many of the reasons Nintendo didn't want to switch over (loading times, mechanical hardware failure, fragile media, etc) were all very valid at the time and occurred often on the PSX especially at the beginning.

 

[Dave Long]

I mean yeah the PSX was capable of these same things AND had a CDROM, but let's not forget that many of the reasons Nintendo didn't want to switch over (loading times, mechanical hardware failure, fragile media, etc) were all very valid at the time and occurred often on the PSX especially at the beginning.

I still prefer games on cartridge to disc media. The Gamecube and Wii are about as much loading as I can stand lately. I'm just so sick of waiting.

CDs/DVDs/Blu-ray... these have all been nice from a sheer volume of content standpoint, but they all still do their best to pull you out of the game with a Now Loading... screen.

 

[Mr. Wonderful]

I never said that you said that you disliked it. I merely said that Ys I&II were never games fit for everyone, and that's certainly truer today, 20 years after the fact. I did judge (accurately, it seems) your predisposition towards the games to be a vaguely negative one, and state that you'd be better off saving your money.

Kee's a good guy, with very reasonable tastes in gaming. You don't have to worry about him bearing any prejudice.

Personally, I had played the cell phone release two years ago or so, and while I did find it fun, 8-bit RPGs aren't my thing.

 

[Mejilan]

Not liking or being interested in Ys games is not something I judge a person by. :lol
And you certainly don't need to defend him to me!

 

[Somnid]

Commodore has said they're looking into releasing C64 games elsewhere, but there's certain issues at the moment.

That's good news to hear. I also hope that someday we'll get MSX support in the US.

 

[Iam Canadian]

That image isn't seriously real... is it?

I think it says something that I honestly wouldn't be surprised if it was.

 

[A Black Falcon]

I still prefer games on cartridge to disc media. The Gamecube and Wii are about as much loading as I can stand lately. I'm just so sick of waiting.

CDs/DVDs/Blu-ray... these have all been nice from a sheer volume of content standpoint, but they all still do their best to pull you out of the game with a Now Loading... screen.

Indeed, from a gamer's perspective, I think that sticking with carts for the N64 was one of the best decisions Nintendo ever made... (probably an exaggeration, but it is true.)

Of course from a business standpoint it was almost certainly a bad move, but from the perspective of someone actually wanting to play games on the system? It was fantastic to have a console with no load times and instant access to the entire game data at any time. The N64 with CDs would be a worse console.

 

[nincompoop]

Indeed, from a gamer's perspective, I think that sticking with carts for the N64 was one of the best decisions Nintendo ever made... (probably an exaggeration, but it is true.)

Of course from a business standpoint it was almost certainly a bad move, but from the perspective of someone actually wanting to play games on the system? It was fantastic to have a console with no load times and instant access to the entire game data at any time. The N64 with CDs would be a worse console.

The N64 with CDs may have actually had a shot at getting some halfway decent 3rd party support. *cue ABF post defending the N64's meager 3rd party offerings*

 

[mollipen]

Indeed, from a gamer's perspective, I think that sticking with carts for the N64 was one of the best decisions Nintendo ever made... (probably an exaggeration, but it is true.)

From a gamer's perspective, Nintendo sticking with carts meant they ended up getting far less games, which is shitty for me, the gamer.

 

[mr jones]

Man, what's up with the lack of love for Samurai Shodown II up in here? Did ANY of y'all play it in the arcade? The music in Nicotine's stage? The animation? The final super-overpowered boss? The referee fighting (slaughtering) you? That game is the hotness.

 

[A Black Falcon]

From a gamer's perspective, Nintendo sticking with carts meant they ended up getting far less games, which is shitty for me, the gamer.

Well sure, that is the question... more games, or games that are more fun to play?

Both are good... but even with its problems (particularly in the Japanese market), I think I'll take "better" over "more".

The N64 with CDs may have actually had a shot at getting some halfway decent 3rd party support. *cue ABF post defending the N64's meager 3rd party offerings*

Hah...

It just depends on which kinds of third party games you want to play...

The third party certainly was small, but it wasn't low quality. What was there was often pretty good. As amazing as they are, I couldn't call the N64 probably my favorite console ever if I only liked the first and second party games and not the third party ones too. Would there have been more if it had had CDs? Of course... but with all those load times and CD access restrictions, the system would have been so much less fun to play... and I like carts. I honestly wouldn't change that decision... though I certainly can see why many people would, particularly if you like genres that were largely absent on the system and think that that would have been different if the system had had CDs.

Man, what's up with the lack of love for Samurai Shodown II up in here? Did ANY of y'all play it in the arcade? The music in Nicotine's stage? The animation? The final super-overpowered boss? The referee fighting (slaughtering) you? That game is the hotness.

Very good point, Samurai Shodown II is a fantastic game.

As I said several pages ago I do like SSIV best of the Samurai Shodown series, but SSII is a great, great game... but at GAF, RPGs are a lot more popular than fighting games. That explains it, pretty much, I think.

 

[Jammy]

Man, what's up with the lack of love for Samurai Shodown II up in here? Did ANY of y'all play it in the arcade? The music in Nicotine's stage? The animation? The final super-overpowered boss? The referee fighting (slaughtering) you? That game is the hotness.

Had Ys not come out, the game would have got a LOT more attention. Still, there's a reason why this has been a great week for downloads on the Wii. All three games are pretty solid, and the VC games are both easily 5 star material.

 

[mollipen]

Well sure, that is the question... more games, or games that are more fun to play?

Both are good... but even with its problems (particularly in the Japanese market), I think I'll take "better" over "more".

I could probably count on one hand the games that I've played in my lifetime that have been "less fun to play" because of loading. Annoying? Sure. But unless the loading is game-breaking, that's being overly dramatic.

 

[Dreamwriter]

I could probably count on one hand the games that I've played in my lifetime that have been "less fun to play" because of loading. Annoying? Sure. But unless the loading is game-breaking, that's being overly dramatic.

Chrono Trigger, PSX. 30 second load times...just to bring up the pause menu! Long-ass loading times for combat...when one of the big features of the original game were the instant combats with no transition. This was a game that killed the fun with loading times.

But you're right, I've never really cared about loading times in any other game. I think Nintendo just thought it would sound good to blame load times for their horrible decision.

 

[mollipen]

Chrono Trigger, PSX. 30 second load times...just to bring up the pause menu! Long-ass loading times for combat...when one of the big features of the original game were the instant combats with no transition. This was a game that killed the fun with loading times.

Sure, but in that case, you've got a game that was originally on a cart-based system being stuffed into a CD-based system, probably through a less than perfect emulator to boot. (Hell, Chrono Trigger ROM looks to be about 2.9MB, and the PS1 had 2MB of RAM. Though I'm not emulation expert, seems to me they could have just tossed decent chunks of the game into RAM and been good to go.)

 

[Capndrake]

Super Mario RPG still has the best Mario soundtrack ever. (Yes, I like it more than Galaxy)

 

[Man God]

Because it honestly has so few third party ports the N64 has the best great game to crap ratio of any mainstream system.

In fact besides Majora's Mask the only N64 games I'm waiting for are 3rd party.

 

[borghe]

The N64 with CDs may have actually had a shot at getting some halfway decent 3rd party support. *cue ABF post defending the N64's meager 3rd party offerings*

From a gamer's perspective, Nintendo sticking with carts meant they ended up getting far less games, which is shitty for me, the gamer.

quantity != quality

The N64 still ended up getting some of the greatest games of the generation, and still got a lot of excellent 3rd party support (THQ Wrasslin, LucasArts/Factor 5, Midway, Capcom, EA, etc). Sure you would have missed out on a lot of great games if you only had an N64, but there is no way in hell you would have ever been without a consistently great library of games to play on the system.

 

[EvilMario]

I thought this was the Virtual Console thread, but I see it's actual a rift in the space-time continuum, teleporting us to back into the middle of the epic fanboy wars of 199x.

 

[JoshuaJSlone]

I thought this was the Virtual Console thread, but I see it's actual a rift in the space-time continuum, teleporting us to back into the middle of the epic fanboy wars of 199x.

! ... This means I can fight me!

 

[borghe]

I thought this was the Virtual Console thread, but I see it's actual a rift in the space-time continuum, teleporting us to back into the middle of the epic fanboy wars of 199x.

right, because you can't have a reasonable discussion on thoughts on the past (related directly to this thread) without it somehow being fanboys arguing. Has gaming fandom really become that jaded that ANY discussion on the pros and cons of something instantly cause a cry of fanboy by those supposedly above it all? Guess not.

Besides, the big new release of this week already got it's own freaking thread. What more do you want?

 

[bionic77]

Man, what's up with the lack of love for Samurai Shodown II up in here? Did ANY of y'all play it in the arcade? The music in Nicotine's stage? The animation? The final super-overpowered boss? The referee fighting (slaughtering) you? That game is the hotness.

I don't get this either. It is a the Neo Geo version (not the watered down 16 bit ports) of an arcade classic. Neo Geo games often still look gorgeous even today.

 

[EvilMario]

right, because you can't have a reasonable discussion on thoughts on the past (related directly to this thread) without it somehow being fanboys arguing. Has gaming fandom really become that jaded that ANY discussion on the pros and cons of something instantly cause a cry of fanboy by those supposedly above it all? Guess not.

Besides, the big new release of this week already got it's own freaking thread. What more do you want?

Hey, I'm not saying stop. Personally, I love the arguements and people theorizing about what might have been. Just expect me to make snide comments.

Spoiler

And yes, I am horribly jaded.

 

[Dave Long]

I don't get this either. It is a the Neo Geo version (not the watered down 16 bit ports) of an arcade classic. Neo Geo games often still look gorgeous even today.

I'd be talking about it if I didn't have the AES version. Samurai Shodown II really wasn't dethroned as the greatest 2D weapons fighter until Samurai Shodown V and The Last Blade came along.

Anyone with even a mild interest in fighters should definitely consider getting it.

 

[Dash Kappei]

I don't get this either. It is a the Neo Geo version (not the watered down 16 bit ports) of an arcade classic. Neo Geo games often still look gorgeous even today.

I've talked about it quite a lot even in the pst weeks: Again, I'm damn pissed.
I love the game, always have, and it's a damn shitty 50Hz slow as fuck black bordered version.

I've wasted 9€, no hyperbole here, but it's not just that, even worse is that I will never get a shot again at playing this game for the VC as it was intended to be played
...and that saddens me.

 

[A Black Falcon]

I don't get this either. It is a the Neo Geo version (not the watered down 16 bit ports) of an arcade classic. Neo Geo games often still look gorgeous even today.

Just a note, there actually were no 16-bit versions of Samurai Shodown II. Samurai Shodown 1 was the only game in the series that got 16-bit ports (in addition to the Neo-Geo AES, MVS, and Neo-Geo CD releases, it was ported to the SNES, Genesis, Sega CD, Game Boy, Game Gear and 3DO). Samurai Shodown II was only ported to the PC, in addition to the original Neo-Geo releases (AES, MVS, and NGCD).

Both SS1 and SS2 were included in a Japan-only collection for the Playstation, but that wasn't 'watered-down', of course.

The N64 with CDs may have actually had a shot at getting some halfway decent 3rd party support. *cue ABF post defending the N64's meager 3rd party offerings*

Oh yeah, and the N64's third-party offerings weren't "meager". That word should never be used for such a variety of high-quality titles.

Because it honestly has so few third party ports the N64 has the best great game to crap ratio of any mainstream system.

In fact besides Majora's Mask the only N64 games I'm waiting for are 3rd party.

Indeed... compared to most other major platforms of the last few generations, the N64 has very, very few ports from other systems, and that absolutely is one of its greatest strengths. The N64 has a quite significant number of third-party exclusives, considering the number of games on the system. This is a very good thing... exclusives often get more development attention than ports.

quantity != quality

The N64 still ended up getting some of the greatest games of the generation, and still got a lot of excellent 3rd party support (THQ Wrasslin, LucasArts/Factor 5, Midway, Capcom, EA, etc). Sure you would have missed out on a lot of great games if you only had an N64, but there is no way in hell you would have ever been without a consistently great library of games to play on the system.

Indeed... though I'd have definitely listed Acclaim there. Turok, Extreme-G... Acclaim was pretty great on the N64. Absolutely agreed about Midway and Lucasarts/Factor 5, though. Midway (so many... too many to quickly list. Midway was one of the top publishers on the platform, really -- SF Rush, etc... SF Rush, Rush 2049, Hydro Thunder, and Gauntlet Legends are some of my favorite N64 games. Yes, those four games all did have versions on other consoles, but the N64 versions were just as good to better.), Lucasarts (Factor 5's three games, Ep.1 Racer, Shadows of the Empire), and Acclaim made most of my favorite third-party N64 games, I think... I never liked wrestling games at all so THQ never meant anything to me, but I do know that the general opinion among wrestling game fans was that the N64 games (particularly Aki's) were by far superior to the PSX ones.

However, EA and Capcom are questionable companies to list. EA pretty much did only sports games (Paradigm developed Beetle Adventure Racing, and Paradigm was an N64-focused developer through that generation and had been on the Dream Team), and Capcom released all of THREE games on the system... all PSX ports. And the best known of the three, Resident Evil 2, was developed by Angel Studios, another N64 supporter developer who had also been on the Dream Team. That leaves only Mickey's Tetris Challenge and Mega Man 64 (MM Legends 1). The fact that, at the very end, they finally started developing a N64 exlusive (RE Zero) that was then moved to the GC absolutely does not make up for their years of no appreciable support.

 

[Capndrake]

First week in Europe since the launch of WiiWare that isn't JUST VC or JUST WiiWare, there's two of each this time:

-Bio Miracle Bokutte Upa (NES)
-Dig Dug (NES)
-Critter Round-Up (WiiWare)
-MaBoShi: The Three-Shape Arcade (WiiWare)

 

[Capndrake]

Upcoming TurboGrafx-16/Turbografx/PC Engine games in September:

US:
-Cho Aniki (No specific date)
-Final Soldier (No specific date)

EU/AU:
-Chase H.Q. (Sep 5th)
-Ys Book I & II (Sep 5th)

JP:
-The Ninja Warriors
-Nekketsu Kōkō Dodgeball Bu: PC Bangai Hen (The Kunio dodgeball game, which Japan also already has on NES)
-Final Blaster
-Mizubaku Adventure

The rest of the Japanese games in September are:

Famicom:
-Tantei Jinguuji Saburo: Yokohama Minato Renzoku Satsujin Jiken
-Wagyan Land

Super Famicom:
-Seiken Densetsu 2 (Secret of Mana)
-Space Invaders

N64:
-Mario Golf

Mega Drive:
-Sorcerian
-Forgotten Worlds
-Hokuto no Ken

 

[SovanJedi]

Ooh, Actraiser 2 and Mario Golf are (eventually) going to make VC? That's cool to hear.

This week's VC releases seem a bit meh to be honest, though I don't really know the names so that's just ignorance on my behalf. What's that Three-Shape Arcade about?

EDIT: Wait what? Secret of Mana?! Sweet lord a-mercy, that's even better!