PCE, SNES and Genesis Screen Comparison.

[Ceti Alpha]

Wow. GameFan really were scroll fanatics.

SCROLL or DIE!!

Seriously though, those constant terrible reviews for the PCE/TG drove me absolutely crazy bitd. 

[TurboXray]

 You can see that they just directly used the tiles from the arcade version. The aspect ratio between the CPS1 res (another other arcade systems with similar res) is really close, if not exactly, identical to the PCE's mid res mode. Guess they figured it was easier just transplant the tiles over (makes it so you don't have to re-write the X/Y position logic).

pcedev.net/pics/comparison/FW/pce.png <- PCE
pcedev.net/pics/comparison/FW/ac_pce_pal.png <- Arcade with PCE pal
pcedev.net/pics/comparison/FW/ac_org_pal.png <- Arcade with original pal

[awack]

Man, that gamefan article is great, its not all that bad of a mag really, i have a few of em, in one of the grave yard articles the reviewer says about grandzort (still the best action game ever released on a nec system) the year was 1993.

They would state that line scrolling floors were essential for a good fighter and gave flash hiders for the pce the 2nd best fighter ever behind street fighter 2( the main reviewer e-storm) the year DEC 93/Jan 94.

You know they loved super air zonk


I had no idea they used the exact same tiles in that part, i thought they were slightly different.

[guyjin]

I agree that the PCE version is better graphically, but a lot of it looks.. greyed out. it's most noticable in PCE pics 2, 3, 14, and 16 thru 18.

[awack]

I just checked out game pro's Forgotten Worlds review and it was the total opposite, calling the genesis version forgettable and the pce graphically spectacular.. i just dont know who to believe.

[Keranu]

Wow, I always remember the TG16 Aero Blasters looking a little better than the Genesis, but these screenshots are making me think the opposite.

Tom, those Forgotten World screenshots are very interesting. I think the converted PCE pal screenshot has nicer shading than the arcade!

[Joe Redifer]

The Genesis version of Aero Blasters does look better graphically in pretty much all areas, but the TG-16 version is still the version I'd rather play.  It doesn't have the pseudo-loading screen and just seems to have smoother control.  Oh, and the music is better.

Here is my official comparison for Sega-16

[TurboXray]

Wow, I always remember the TG16 Aero Blasters looking a little better than the Genesis, but these screenshots are making me think the opposite.

I did a compare a long time ago. The TG16 version has more colors, mostly on the sprites, but in the over all of things you really can't tell. This is one port that looked great on the Genesis. I had played the Genesis version tons before picking up the hucard a year later.

[lkermel]

The Genesis version of Aero Blasters does look better graphically in pretty much all areas, but the TG-16 version is still the version I'd rather play.  It doesn't have the pseudo-loading screen and just seems to have smoother control.  Oh, and the music is better.

Same here, I find the whole game a lot smoother on the PCE... the Genesis version has a nice parallax scrolling though, If I remember well.

About Forgotten Worlds, I remember playing the PCE version and the Arcade simultaneously (while I was testing it for my site) and I was gob smacked by how good Nec Avenues's conversion was. I only wish Nec had done a sinmilar job with Strider Hiryu...

[ParanoiaDragon]

As for Raiden, the SNES version looks like crap compared to the SNES version, & I mean that!

Now who can argue with such flawless logic?  It's so damn shitty, comparisons are entirely unnecessary. 

That's awesome, was I tired when I wrote that?  I ain't changin' it, I stand by my opinion!

[Ceti Alpha]

As for Raiden, the SNES version looks like crap compared to the SNES version, & I mean that!

Now who can argue with such flawless logic?  It's so damn shitty, comparisons are entirely unnecessary. 

That's awesome, was I tired when I wrote that?  I ain't changin' it, I stand by my opinion!

I can appreciate conviction! 

[termis]

I just checked out game pro's Forgotten Worlds review and it was the total opposite, calling the genesis version forgettable and the pce graphically spectacular.. i just dont know who to believe.

Anyone who thinks the Genesis version of Forgotten Worlds looks better is gotta be blind!

But real(!) two-player co-op play -- that's was a huge loss for the PCE version.

On a sidenote, I still did enjoy the Genesis version.  I think it was the 2nd or 3rd game Genesis game I bought.  Subsequently someone swiped it when I accidentally left it sitting on top of an arcade cabinet (while I was playing another arcade game) at a local donut shop. 

[Ceti Alpha]

I just checked out game pro's Forgotten Worlds review and it was the total opposite, calling the genesis version forgettable and the pce graphically spectacular.. i just dont know who to believe.

Anyone who thinks the Genesis version of Forgotten Worlds looks better is gotta be blind!

But real(!) two-player co-op play -- that's was a huge loss for the PCE version.

On a sidenote, I still did enjoy the Genesis version.  I think it was the 2nd or 3rd game Genesis game I bought.  Subsequently someone swiped it when I accidentally left it sitting on top of an arcade cabinet (while I was playing another arcade game) at a local donut shop. 

 

[Tatsujin]

Here's what GameFan had to say about Forgotten Worlds (from issue 2):

'Genesis version came closer' to being arcade perfect.  Only if you don't look at the backgrounds and sprites, ya bunch of worthless meat sacks. 

muahahaha..if those suckers wheren't the biggest morrons on earth, then who else?

[esteban]

The Genesis version of Aero Blasters does look better graphically in pretty much all areas, but the TG-16 version is still the version I'd rather play.  It doesn't have the pseudo-loading screen and just seems to have smoother control.  Oh, and the music is better.

Here is my official comparison for Sega-16

Hey, that was fun to (re)read. I must have read it back in the day, but surely I would have remembered Kaneko's "FREE GLOVE" offer? That is awesome... do you know if gloves were promoted with any other games (outside of Kaneko)? I don't remember seeing any...

Now I'll listen to the Genny's tunes...

[awack]

Darius 2.
       
                pce                                               genesis

[awack]

I haven't played the master system version, i heard its pretty good.

Its hard to match these up since the pce port has slightly more varied levels.



Compare to screenshot above
              pce                                               genesis

[awack]

The difference in the bosses are extreme.

                 pce                                          genesis

[Tatsujin]

altough SD2 is a graphical eye candy of the very high class, i remember that it had some tremendous flickers on the big bosses, also it was kinda frowsy developed here and there. have to give it a shot soon again. i didn't play it for years now.

[nectarsis]

SD2 does have some AWFUL boss flicker

[Tatsujin]

awack. can you make a hellfire comparison next please?

[awack]

awack. can you make a hellfire comparison next please?

Yes, that will be next, should be a good one.

Golden Axe.

             pce                                                      genesis

[Ceti Alpha]

Wow, Telenet really crapped the bed on this one. Too bad. It would've been nice to have a quality port of Golden Axe on the Turbo/PCE.

[Joe Redifer]

Why is so much of the screen black?  I see no reason for this!  I haven't played the PCE version (yet), but hopefully it isn't as choppy as the SMS version.

[shubibiman]

hopefully it isn't as choppy as the SMS version.

Actually, it is much choppier than the SMS version.

[Tatsujin]

hella yeas, the pce golden axe is an unpleasant joke.

[awack]

What the screen shots don't show much of, is how the average enemy sprites are 2 - 4 times bigger on PCE

Yea, i was focusing on the bg, here is an example of the sprites and one more mid boss.
                 pce                                                  genesis





Hellfire

              pce                                                                   genesis

[esteban]

To get back to the Darius screenshots... I am really surprised... I never realized the differences were so stark. I've played all the ports of the Darius games, but the side-by-side comparisons reveal the cold, hard truth: pce owners prefer billboard-sized score counters.



Have we done Wonderboy III: Monster Lair yet? ;)

[Joe Redifer]

Going by the still pictures alone, I think the Mega Drive Dragon Slayer looks best with the PCE a close second (I like the character design in the PCE version more, though).  The SNES is a far, far, far third.  If the MD version scrolls choppily then it is probably the most annoying to play, though.

[TurboXray]

If you play through the Megadrive one of DS:LOH, you'll notice the lack of colors... or I should say the whole 16 colors they decided to use (and dither).

[Tatsujin]

Have we done Wonderboy III: Monster Lair yet? ;)

no, but the winner is allready decided by a landslide (unless some Game Fan morrons comming over and dizz the game to no end again, b'coz its missing 2nd layer).

[ParanoiaDragon]

It seems like the Turbo version (of Legend of Heroes)still could've looked better then it does, no doubt, however, I'm thinking they didn't make it better, maybe because it loads the entire map of the game(Tom, do you know if it does this?).  Or perhaps, they just wanted to make it basically a port of the original, kinda like what was done with Popful Mail.  Speaking of which, someone should do a comparison of the MD & PCE Sorcerian's.

[Tatsujin]

Wow, I didn't realize that the PCE & MD Hellfires were so different. I thought that they were both fairly straight ports from the arcade. I prefer different versions for each shot. I don't remember how much extra variety, animation, etc the PCE version has, but if I were to judge them strictly by these screens and taking into account that (I believe) the MD version has some parallax and the PCE doesn't, I'd say that the MD version looks better overall.

SD2 does have some AWFUL boss flicker

Really? I never experienced this. I only got the game recently and made the equivalent of two runs through each on real hardware and Magic Engine. It really stood out to me how little flicker there was considering the size of the bosses and when it was obvious they were sprites and not tiles. Even a boss like this didn't flicker for me-



Of course, I don't view flicker/break up as an unacceptable or bad thing, only when it affects the gameplay. If the price for getting a screen filling boss is the occasional thin horizontal stripe cutting out or appearing transparent for a fraction of a second, it's fine with me and I'd gladly take that over a flicker-free SNES game with tiny sprites to avoid slowdown.

The only other explanation I can think of is that maybe I just happened to play some flicker-light routes on real hardware and the game has unadvertised SuperGrafx support like Super Darius 1 that automatically kicked in on Magic Engine.

i remember that the stong flickers appeared more in the big long fossils, which almost covers the whole horizontal screen. of course, concidered of how big those bosses are, and mostly done by using pure sprites, it is damn impressive of what we got with SD2 on our PCE

anyway, will give it another try soon, to make a better statement. it's been just way too long since

[guyjin]

What the hell is up with the SNES version of dragon slayer? It's like they weren't even trying. 

[Tatsujin]

What the hell is up with the SNES version of dragon slayer? It's like they weren't even trying. 

it's like a direct PC-88 port

[ParanoiaDragon]

I like the slimes in the MD version.


Somebody compare the 2 console Sorcerian's!

[FraGMarE]

First off, those pics of Afterburner look FAR too dim.  They look much brighter on a real TV so I don't think that is a good way to display them.

Welp, it's about as good as you're going to get with trying to fake aspect corrected NTSC scanlined screenshots on a computer screen.  Emulators basically do the same thing.  they blur/interpolate the screen, sometimes add the NTSC artifacting, then they just add in a black line every other line with a preset transparency and then some emulators adjust the final brightness/gamme up a little bit.  That's basically what I've done with the Afterburner images.

[awack]

Somebody compare the 2 console Sorcerian's!

I'm only doing games i own, which means I'm not going to be able to do other games such as Popful mail, since i don't own the sega cd version, maybe some one else can do it, i would like to see that one myself.

Well, thats it for capcom games as far as i know, and as for Konami, i think there is only Snatcher left.


OK, lords of thunder, i tried to show that the lack of color and added scrolls are not the only differences in the sega cd port, which are apparent in some of the screens, like the missing scarab, bg tile etc.

Good looking game here.           

           pce                                               genesis

[guyjin]

I think we've been over this one before (but not in this thread, and without as many screenshots.)

I think they're actually pretty close; the biggest differences are the dithering and the absence of water in #12. A good effort on the Genny, but it just can't keep up with the turbo 

[esteban]

I think we've been over this one before (but not in this thread, and without as many screenshots.)

I think they're actually pretty close; the biggest differences are the dithering and the absence of water in #12. A good effort on the Genny, but it just can't keep up with the turbo 

I agree, the Genny version is a noble attempt and really does a nice job... it's only when you look at the finishing touches that you notice the differences. As far as I'm concerned, the SOUND EFFECTS are where it's at.



Can we start a new thread that compares the sfx of various versions of the same game?

[esteban]

Here's a sample of Tatsujin to highlight the background tiles used compared to the arcade.

Thanks for making this comparison, you aligned the screens nicely to allow for comparisons...

Unfortunately, my brain is slow and I have a hard time keeping track of what I'm seeing. Could you put a longer delay on each frame?

Tatsujin is one of those expensive HuCards, isn't it? I don't own it. I wish I did. I have MUSHA for genny, though.

[guyjin]

Here's a sample of Tatsujin to highlight the background tiles used compared to the arcade.

The Genesis version looks aesthetically closer to the arcade... the PCE version is a bit too colorful.

[Ceti Alpha]

Yeah, the MD port is definitely more true to the original, though the PCE port still looks good.

[Joe Redifer]

Why did you slow it down?  Pffft,  each screen should have only 1/60th of a second! 

Actually, thank you very much for slowing that down.  Side-by-sides would still probably be better.

[awack]

Its hard to tell from the small shots but the sega cd  port of lords of thunder uses more dithering than just about any game Ive seen but thats not the only difference, take the 3rd picture down, the columns in the BG look different in the sega cd version( top and bottom), the missing water of course, the 8th picture down, in the sega port the BG disappears before the foreground starts to close inn(I find that strange) and the 14th picture down, once again missing BG tiles where the giant spiked balls swing back and forth.

Hudson really tried to make the game as colorfull as they could(the pce version some times uses more than two and a half times the colors), enemy sprites would use the same colors as were in the BG, those same sprites would use a different palette for a different BG(level) and of course lots dithering.

Tatsujin was one of the first games i was thinking about doing, but hate the idea of playing through that game twice.

[esteban]

Unfortunately, my brain is slow and I have a hard time keeping track of what I'm seeing. Could you put a longer delay on each frame?

Here's a slower one for you grandpa 



The PC Engine is quite a way out on colour, but some of the tile alignment is a bit more accurate than the MD version, especially on the left and right. I wonder why the beacon things were changed so radically.

Thank you

[Tatsujin]

Yeah, the MD port is definitely more true to the original, though the PCE port still looks good.

this just seems to be so on those screenshots. if you play the games fo'real, you will find out that it's quite the contrary

[Tatsujin]

but the sega cd  port of lords of thunder uses more dithering than just about any game Ive seen

that you can say very loud!!

[awack]

Tatsujin.

                  pce                                             genesis

[termis]

This one's a toss-up.  PCE version is certainly more colorful, but the Genny version's colors seem more appropriate in some places.  (And the PCE bomb is weak-ass!)