PCE, SNES and Genesis Screen Comparison.

[bob]

operation wolf

arcade

pce


arcade

pce


arcade

pce

so i never knew until recently that operation wolf is NOT a light gun game in the arcade.
the machine gun is just a joystick that moves the reticle around the screen.
not sure why, but i thought that was interesting.

[esteban]

operation wolf

arcade

pce


arcade

pce


arcade

pce

so i never knew until recently that operation wolf is NOT a light gun game in the arcade.
the machine gun is just a joystick that moves the reticle around the screen.
not sure why, but i thought that was interesting.

I loved Operation Wolf and Cabal. The local skating rink had them BITD. Lots of fun for a few quarters. 

[Digi.k]

gonna be slightly off here but can I add an audio comparison?

Shin Megami Tensei

SNES audio - boss

pc engine audio - boss

SNES audio - battle

pc engine audio - battle

SNES audio - neutral

pc engine audio - neutral

[Digi.k]

more audio comparisons

DragonSlayer legend of Heroes

SNES - March of Heroes

pc engine - March of Heroes

Megadrive - March of Heroes

SNES - Town

pc engine - Town

Megadrive - Town

SNES - Battle

pc engine - Battle

megadrive - Battle

[Mathius]

AWE...SOME! Thankyouthankyouthankyou! 

[esteban]

Looks like I will have to make a page for audio comparisons.

[Mathius]

Looks like I will have to make a page for audio comparisons.

You better! 

[Artabasdos]

Bomberman 94

megadrive

pc engine


megadrive

pc engine


megadrive

pc engine

How did you capture those screenshots? I have Mega Bomberman in my MD II right now hooked up via RGB SCART, and it's WAY brighter than those screen. Anyway, the PCE version looks better colour wise from what I've seen.

[Artabasdos]

They're just clips from youtube videos turned into gifs.

Mega Bomberman is still very dark on real hardware, especially compared to the original. It's also missing some special effects, lots of animation and various assets and suffers from major slowdown that isn't in '94.

It was a quick, low effort by Westone, but the music is great and the gameplay is still good. Much more enjoyable than the Super Bomberman games.

Fair enough, but those screens aren't a fair representation tbh.

I love Super Bomberman!

[Mathius]

I actually just finished my annual re-reading of this thread and was going to post a question but then forgot about it. So thanks for the bump.

Is there any known method to take what Digi.K started and apply it in a way where the animations would better approximate what we would see animating on our screens? Like the quality of the earlier stills into fully smoothly animated clips with at least fairly accurate colors and resolutions?

[ccovell]

Like the quality of the earlier stills into fully smoothly animated clips with at least fairly accurate colors and resolutions?

Find animgif software with dynamic palettes and no dithering?

[Digi.k]

How did you capture those screenshots? I have Mega Bomberman in my MD II right now hooked up via RGB SCART, and it's WAY brighter than those screen. Anyway, the PCE version looks better colour wise from what I've seen.

I think the genny version was taken from a youtuber called Anto RetroGamer

[Artabasdos]

How did you capture those screenshots? I have Mega Bomberman in my MD II right now hooked up via RGB SCART, and it's WAY brighter than those screen. Anyway, the PCE version looks better colour wise from what I've seen.

I think the genny version was taken from a youtuber called Anto RetroGamer

Fair enough, but YouTube footage is a poor choice. I've uploaded captured Dreamcast footage before, and the colour was f***** up by Google's crappy encoding. Glad I stopped using Google's services tbh.

[Mathius]

Like the quality of the earlier stills into fully smoothly animated clips with at least fairly accurate colors and resolutions?

Find animgif software with dynamic palettes and no dithering?

I'm not sure what this question means, but, yes?

[Artabasdos]

They're just clips from youtube videos turned into gifs.

Mega Bomberman is still very dark on real hardware, especially compared to the original. It's also missing some special effects, lots of animation and various assets and suffers from major slowdown that isn't in '94.

It was a quick, low effort by Westone, but the music is great and the gameplay is still good. Much more enjoyable than the Super Bomberman games.

Fair enough, but those screens aren't a fair representation tbh.

I love Super Bomberman!

There's about 80 pages of screenshot comparisons, including Mega Bomberman/'94. Digi.k is now just posting video clips that compare aspects like (missing) effects, animation, assets, etc. It would be better for these to have a dedicated thread, along with a sound comparison thread, but this is just how it's going.

Mega Bomberman actually looks much worse with clear screenshots or on TV through RGB, as you can see that most of the shades and detail is missing. Those converted video clips create the illusion of shading which isn't actually there, while at the same time making it harder to make out all of the shading in '94.

https://www.myabandonware.com/game/mega-bomberman-88b
PC Engine versus Genesis

In no way am I debating that Mega Bomberman looks better than Bomberman '94. The PCE is so much more colourful. The MD port uses odd choices for colours (happens on quite a few MD games).

Talking of sound, I'm still surprised how much clear the voices in Street Fighter II on PCE are. Way better than on the Megadrive (though this is because the driver used on the MD port is crap). It has been fixed now, and sounds as good as the PCE version!

[Digi.k]

Wonderboy III Monster Lair

Megadrive

arcade

pc engine



megadrive

arcade

pc engine



megadrive

arcade

pc engine

[Digi.k]

Gradius aka Nemesis (I think the gamma might be off on this arcade vid)

arcade

pc engine


arcade

pc engine


arcade

pc engine

[Digi.k]

Street Fighter aka Fighting Street

pc engine

arcade

amiga ---- well..... I couldn't find this game on any other console



pc engine

arcade

amiga


pc engine

arcade

amiga



pc engine

arcade

amiga

[Michirin9801]

I'm unsure about this, but I think the Atari ST version of Street Fighter was better than the Amiga one, I mean, it still had the parallax scrolling (although it was tile-based) which the Amiga lacks, and I also think it ran a little faster?
Well, maybe the Amiga has better music to make up for that, either way, the port was rubbish, so that's not even remotely fair of a comparison...

[RNSpeed]

Street Fighter brings back good memories. Love that game

[esteban]

Street Fighter brings back good memories. Love that game

Yes, I have fond memories of Fighting Street...

Just kidding

Although, I am going to listen to the soundtrack now...

[Digi.k]

Gokuraku chuka taisen VS chuka taisen


Master System

arcade

pc engine

NES


Master System

arcade

pc engine

NES


Master System

arcade

pc engine

NES


Master System

arcade

pc engine

NES

[Mathius]

I had no idea Cloud Master had so much parallax! Guess I'll have to put it on my wish list finally. 

[Digi.k]

Tokimeki Memorial

pc engine

super famicom


pc engine

super famicom


pc engine

super famicom



pc engine

super famicom

[esteban]

SMOKING BUDDHA.

'nuff said.

[gilbert]

Though this thread is more for comparison among the "16-bit" consoles, I think it'd be fun to have comparisons shots from the Famicom and SMS versions of Chuunka Taisen also. (Currently it's only compared against the Arcade version anyway, since there is no other 16-bit console counterpart.)
IMO the Famicom and SMS are good conversions in their only rights considering the limitations of the platforms.

[esteban]

Though this thread is more for comparison among the "16-bit" consoles, I think it'd be fun to have comparisons shots from the Famicom and SMS versions of Chuunka Taisen also. (Currently it's only compared against the Arcade version anyway, since there is no other 16-bit console counterpart.)
IMO the Famicom and SMS are good conversions in their only rights considering the limitations of the platforms.

Absolutely.

We have made mention of SMS (and maybe Famicom?) in the past... I would love for Amiga, MSX, PC-88/PC-98, FM-Towns, X68, etc. etc. to be added, too, at some point in the future.

*far future*

But it would be nice.

Darius II had a SMS port that I didn't know about until this thread, for example:

https://www.tg-16.com/screenshot_comparisons_shmups.htm#Darius_2


But we still need someone to finish the final column (SMS) for this:

https://www.tg-16.com/screenshot_comparisons_rpg.htm#Dynastic_Hero

*one day*
*it will happen*

[Digi.k]

Cloud Master Chuka Taisen got an update

[gilbert]

Great!

It's interesting that even though the SMS version is slightly more colourful, the Famicom looks closer to the Arcade version than the SMS one. The PCE version is made intentionally different from the Arcade version, though not showing the score in a status bar may upset someone.

[Michirin9801]

The SMS and NES versions of Chuka Taisen look closer to the arcade, but I think the PC engine version looks even better than the arcade...

[gilbert]

but I think the PC engine version looks even better than the arcade...

The PCE version was supposed to be an enhanced conversion, similar to Hot B's another game Insector X, where the arcade version featured cute deformed characters, while the Mega Drive port had realistic mecha bugs, though this port was considered horrible by many, and not as good as the Famicom version. Another game I have in mind that enhanced the arcade version a lot was the Mega Drive version of Chelnov/Atomic Runner.

I think most of the graphics in the PCE version of Chuunka Taisen look better, at least more consistent in style. IMO the dragon boss in the arcade version looks really bad and out of place, and surprisingly even the Famicom and SMS versions of it look better. I couldn't make up my mind on the animated backgrounds in the boss sections of the PCE version, though, as they now look much more dynamic, but become repetitive and lose some of the charms of the original backgrounds.
(Because of these clouds, I once thought this game shared some staff with Coryoon and PC Denjin, but it doesn't seem to be correct.)

[esteban]

but I think the PC engine version looks even better than the arcade...

The PCE version was supposed to be an enhanced conversion, similar to Hot B's another game Insector X, where the arcade version featured cute deformed characters, while the Mega Drive port had realistic mecha bugs, though this port was considered horrible by many, and not as good as the Famicom version. Another game I have in mind that enhanced the arcade version a lot was the Mega Drive version of Chelnov/Atomic Runner.

I think most of the graphics in the PCE version of Chuunka Taisen look better, at least more consistent in style. IMO the dragon boss in the arcade version looks really bad and out of place, and surprisingly even the Famicom and SMS versions of it look better. I couldn't make up my mind on the animated backgrounds in the boss sections of the PCE version, though, as they now look much more dynamic, but become repetitive and lose some of the charms of the original backgrounds.
(Because of these clouds, I once thought this game shared some staff with Coryoon and PC Denjin, but it doesn't seem to be correct.)

I love Chelnov/Atomic Runner...but I mostly played the arcade version. I need to spend time with the MegaDrive port, I remember reading a positive review of it years ago.

ASIDE: I think it is amusing that mobile gaming resuscitated genres like the "forced scrolling platform/run-n-gun"....I never saw that coming. I guess these games are passé now in the mobile market, but they were very popular for a few years (first few years of iPhone). Of course, mobile gaming rejuvenated a bunch of "dead" genres...but I never thought I'd see my kids playing modern games that were even *marginally* similar to Chelnov.

BACK ON TOPIC: Dragon Boss...

[Ashevent]

I don't have anything credible to add. Just wanted to say this thread is amazing. ..lol.

I do find the difference between the TG16/TGCD and some other systems to be less muted colors than many other systems but..what do I know?

[NightWolve]

I don't have anything credible to add. Just wanted to say this thread is amazing. ..lol.

I do find the difference between the TG16/TGCD and some other systems to be less muted colors than many other systems but..what do I know?

Glad you appreciate it!

I did a lot of grunt work to bring it into the modern era:
1) Built custom post buttons to speed up the process of adding "width=49%" dynamic image resizing for the 2 side-by-side image shots that awack did, I did EVERY post here!
2) awack used Photobucket which watermarks their shared images, but I made a special script to counter that, download/show a clean image AND then I returned for another idea to simply cache ALL Photobucket images shared on PCEFX so they're never lost! Over 11,000 Photobucket images are now permanently hosted here https://www.pcengine-fx.com/images/cache/ and will never be lost or watermarked now!

It's looking a lot better and the new theme already handles mobile adjustments for viewing on a phone. Still, this forum software is outdated, but I'm here, paid for the web space for 10 years, might as well research improvements to carry PCEFX legacy on as best I can.