GamePro Magazine blurb

[sirhcman]

Sorry if this was posted before, I did a few quick searches but turned up nothing. I was going through one of my old game magazines and stumbled upon this brief mention of the PC-FX system in a July 1994 edition of GamePro magazine here in the States

[elmer]

Thanks for these! 

For all the complaints about clueless YouTube "stars" giving their opinions on "retro" machines ... it's good to remember that "professional" game magazine journalists back in the day didn't have much of a clue, either.

Both articles look like they're a rehash of NEC's promotional materials, together with an ignorance for any of the technical details of what they're talking about.

It was interesting to see that "Software support is muddy, but game development seems to be moving forward with 170 developers".

It shows, once again, that there's a huge difference between talking to developers, and possibly even sending out 170 development kits ... to then actually getting games finished and released and onto store shelves.

[SamIAm]

In the December 1994 issue of PC Engine Fan magazine, there's a list of all the games that have been "officially announced". The total is 15, including games that weren't released, from nine developers, including Hudson.

There might be a more interesting list in an earlier issue. I'll have to check.

[NecroPhile]

They seemed pretty excited about it in the November 94 issue, too.

I bet that mirrored pic had some people wondering. 

For all the complaints about clueless YouTube "stars" giving their opinions on "retro" machines ... it's good to remember that "professional" game magazine journalists back in the day didn't have much of a clue, either.

At least they had a good excuse: the system wasn't out yet and they could only go by press releases and educated guesses.

[deubeul]

Loved the "crystal clear CD sound", talking about Battle Heat.

[elmer]

At least they had a good excuse: the system wasn't out yet and they could only go by press releases and educated guesses.

I can certainly forgive the journalists for things like "The unit will refine its eye-catching display with built-in JPEG compression, a graphics processing technique that saps some overall processing speed to put more punch into animation".

They had no way to know back then that the PC-FX handles the M-JPEG in a custom chip, and that it doesn't cost any significant CPU time at all.

Things like TV cartoon quality being 30 frames-per-second ... or that "Without getting techie, that should mean higher-quality pictures for more lifelike graphics but less animation" ... sorry, but IMHO, that's just the lazy spreading of uninformed B.S.

[SuperGrafx]

I remember that article.
I was sort of surprised to see Hudson going in this direction, considering their success with the PC Engine and its many variants.