BEST PCE ARCADE PORT POLL

[Sinistron]

Now that we're back on track-
I never got a chance to explain my own picks.

Gradius: Back in the NES days for me, it was always the Konami games to watch out for first.  They obviously had some of the best and biggest selling titles.  For the Turbografx- we were flat out robbed of that.  When I finally got my diving board converter this system finally opened up in all the right ways- and Gradius was the first Konami title I bought.  It's an incredible little hucard and it represents for me a big part of my love for the PCE- getting to see all of the classic titles that Nintendo robbed us of in America.

Rainbow Islands: I'm torn between liking Parasol Stars or Rainbow Islands more- Probably would have voted for Parasol Stars since it's a greater use of a hucard than Rainbow Islands is of a CD- but since Parasol Stars is no longer on the list and probably shouldn't have been listed in the first place- Rainbow Islands it is.  These Bubble Bobble games are some of the best fun to be had on the system- even if Rainbow Islands is unfortunately only a one player game.

R-Type: Back in the day I'd religiously be at a neighborhood pizzeria- hypnotized by the R-Type arcade game.  I sucked at it then- even suck at it now- but it didn't matter.  the music, the enemies, the backgrounds, the power-ups- it all pulled me in.  I can honestly say that I do not want to beat this game, I don't want to memorize the patterns or anything.  I want to always view it as this mythic ironclad monster that is bigger than life- that will squash me like a grape while I stare up at it in awe.  That said- the port is excellent.

[spenoza]

The screenshots I've seen labeled arcade are usually not large enough for me to distinguish whether they are actually any different from PC engine screen shots. I mean, we all remember the SuperGrafx shots of Strider from EGM, right?

I think what frustrates me most is that the following claim from the Wikipedia article HAS NO SOURCES! I want to know the source so I can find out more.

"There are rumors about prototypes for an arcade version, which appear to be false; Taito has officially stated that an arcade game was never produced. Mick West (who was the programmer of the Amiga and Atari ST versions) stated that they ported the game directly from the PC Engine and that "no coin-op of the game exists". Apparently, Taito just sent Ocean Software some artwork to work with."

I also found the following blurb near the bottom of http://unmamed.mame.net/non_taito.html.

"Parasol Stars (Taito [ever finished/released?], 89)
This game was simply the PC-Engine / Turbografx version in an arcade cabinet. I remember myself around the time of the system's US launch that a local arcade had Victory Run and Galaga '90 - both in a cabinet advertising the Turbografx-16 system. So the same must have been true of Parasol Stars.
Just for curiosity's sake, I was sent this page in Spanish which seems to say that a picture of the arcade version was found on Bubble Bobble HQ. Thanks to Pedro for the English translation.
More information from Sixtoe and R. Belmont:
[sixtoe] We know for sure that there was never a parasol stars arcade pcb now, it was a console in a cab used for location testing, this came from the programmers themselves.
[rbelmont] From the actual Taito programmers, incidentally, so that's 100% official info.
Info from Andy:
I remember seeing this game in Morcam, Lancashire, England a seaside resort in one of its many arcades. I know this does not help much. But it does prove it has been seen out there by at least one other person.."

While I'm fairly sure at least a prototype arcade version of BB3 existed, spenoza is probably right in that the Turbo version came first.

There are screenshots of the arcade version floating around out there if you look hard enough.