Ghouls 'n Ghosts on the NEC SuperGrafx vs The CPS Arcade Original

[JB]

Which games had less flicker, aside from the Dariuses? The extra graphics hardware shouldn't matter to anything other than SuperGrafx games because regular PCEngine and SuperCDROM games are unaware of the extra hardware and thus can't address it.

 

that's what I was thinking too. but apparently the two hybrid Darius games were programmed to take advantage of some of the SuperGrafx hardware and ran without flicker or slowdown when played on the SuperGrafx, even though they could also run on a standard PC-Engine

Your phrasing implied it affected other games as well.

The Darius games had 2 branches for the rendering code, one of which used SG hardware.

 

 

Less powerful is debatable. While the second graphics chip wasn't present, resulting in half the sprites and background layers, there WAS a 16-bit processor onboard the CD-ROM expansion, making the system far mroe powerful processing-wise(the equivalent of an SNES).

 

I think you're thinking of the Sega MegaCD / SegaCD.

 

the PC-Engine CD-ROM2, Super CD-ROM2 / PC-Engine Duo and any other variation of the PC-Engine CD-ROM, did not have a 16-bit CPU onboard. the Sega CD/MegaCD did, it had its own 68000 processor plus a scaling & rotation chip.

 

the only upgrade the PC-Engine CD-ROM systems offered was more RAM. it did not increase the processing power.

The Genny was ALREADY more powerful than the SNES, though.

 

I've seen the PCEngine CD-ROM listed as having a ... damn, I can't remember the part number. It was a 65816 with an 8-bit data bus. Pin-compatible with the 6502, so it was a drop-in replacement.

*looks it up*

65802 was the part. And I was mistaken.

The CD-ROM processor was clocked at 16MHz, making it MORE processor than the SNES, not the equivalent.

[airraid]

Which games had less flicker, aside from the Dariuses? The extra graphics hardware shouldn't matter to anything other than SuperGrafx games because regular PCEngine and SuperCDROM games are unaware of the extra hardware and thus can't address it.

 

that's what I was thinking too. but apparently the two hybrid Darius games were programmed to take advantage of some of the SuperGrafx hardware and ran without flicker or slowdown when played on the SuperGrafx, even though they could also run on a standard PC-Engine

Your phrasing implied it affected other games as well.

The Darius games had 2 branches for the rendering code, one of which used SG hardware.

 

 

Less powerful is debatable. While the second graphics chip wasn't present, resulting in half the sprites and background layers, there WAS a 16-bit processor onboard the CD-ROM expansion, making the system far mroe powerful processing-wise(the equivalent of an SNES).

 

I think you're thinking of the Sega MegaCD / SegaCD.

 

the PC-Engine CD-ROM2, Super CD-ROM2 / PC-Engine Duo and any other variation of the PC-Engine CD-ROM, did not have a 16-bit CPU onboard. the Sega CD/MegaCD did, it had its own 68000 processor plus a scaling & rotation chip.

 

the only upgrade the PC-Engine CD-ROM systems offered was more RAM. it did not increase the processing power.

The Genny was ALREADY more powerful than the SNES, though.

 

I've seen the PCEngine CD-ROM listed as having a ... damn, I can't remember the part number. It was a 65816 with an 8-bit data bus. Pin-compatible with the 6502, so it was a drop-in replacement.

*looks it up*

65802 was the part. And I was mistaken.

The CD-ROM processor was clocked at 16MHz, making it MORE processor than the SNES, not the equivalent.

 

 

wow. first time I've ever heard of it then. I'll have to do some research. maybe it was a CD-ROM control chip and not used as CPU? I never heard about the PC-Engine CD-ROM having an extra CPU that boosts processing power to SNES level or beyond. well, the CPU in the basic PC-Engine of 1987 which was in every version of the hardware including the SG, was already clocked about twice as fast as the SNES.

[JB]

wow. first time I've ever heard of it then. I'll have to do some research. maybe it was a CD-ROM control chip and not used as CPU?

A bit powerful for the task, but possible.

 

I never heard about the PC-Engine CD-ROM having an extra CPU that boosts processing power to SNES level or beyond.

Well, it's the same processor as in the SNES, and 4x the speed...

The system bus is gonna bottleneck it, so real-world performance is arguable. But TECHNICALLY...

 

Kinda wish I had a TGCD to open up now, just to look.

 

well, the CPU in the basic PC-Engine of 1987 which was in every version of the hardware including the SG, was already clocked about twice as fast as the SNES.

*nods*

Was also a parallel 6502 upgrade instead of a 65816 variant. Diffrent instruction set, and arguably a less evolved design.

[Trip_Cannon]

So which PCE system would be considered more powerful? A Turboduo or SuperGrafx?

[airraid]

So which PCE system would be considered more powerful? A Turboduo or SuperGrafx?

 

 

well I up until yesterday I would've said SuperGrafx for certain. but now I'm not entirely sure.

 

still, SuperGrafx definitally has more graphics muscle.

[Jetboot Jack]

Clearly the SG is more powerful than the TG16

 

Since an SG can have a Super CD Rom added to it - making it the 100% TG16 PLUS the SG hardware bonus. Then add in the arcade card and woo hoo - best system of its generation period!!!

 

sTeVE

[airraid]

Clearly the SG is more powerful than the TG16

 

Since an SG can have a Super CD Rom added to it - making it the 100% TG16 PLUS the SG hardware bonus. Then add in the arcade card and woo hoo - best system of its generation period!!!

 

sTeVE

 

 

best system of its generation, heh that's a matter of opinion.

 

It's too bad that no games were written to take advantage of both the SuperGrafx and the CD-ROM. more specifically, SuperGrafx and Arcade Card CD.

[JB]

Clearly the SG is more powerful than the TG16

 

Since an SG can have a Super CD Rom added to it - making it the 100% TG16 PLUS the SG hardware bonus. Then add in the arcade card and woo hoo - best system of its generation period!!!

 

sTeVE

 

 

best system of its generation, heh that's a matter of opinion.

 

It's too bad that no games were written to take advantage of both the SuperGrafx and the CD-ROM. more specifically, SuperGrafx and Arcade Card CD.

*drools*

That would've been awesome to the max.

[Jetboot Jack]

Perhaps I should qualify "best system of it's generation" - until the SNES, the PCE/SG was king...

 

sTeVE

[airraid]

I've got a bunch of videos comparing Ghouls 'n Ghosts on SuperGrafx, Arcade, Genesis and a few of Saturn.

 

http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=AirRaidX

 

these videos were taken with a 3.1 megapixel digital camera, they're not direct captures or even highres, high-framerate videos from a good camcorder. therefore, these do not represent the true 60fps framerate of the games, or give you ALL the fine details. however, they're enough so that you can easily tell the difference between the versions (hopefully).

[Jetboot Jack]

airraid - indeed the videos show LOTS of differences between the versions!

 

Sure the PS/Saturn and Arcade versions should BLOW the MD and SG versions out of the water. They have HUGE memory footprints compared to the cart/card versions. Simple fact is that the SG and MD versions simply don't have the capacity to show all the graphic variation. And the aim of the conversions is to get the GAMEPLAY across as well as possible albeit with many visual compromises.

 

At the time of release I remember being very very taken with the SG version, and just how much better it looked and played than the MD version.

 

sTeVE

[airraid]

Steve - cool, I'm glad you were able to see the differences in my low-quality vids.

 

It's true that the MD-Gen cart and SuperGrafx card did not have the rom capacity to hold all of the details of the arcade. the Sega version used just 5 megabits, the NEC version used 8-megabits. whereas the arcade was at least 16 megabits.

 

however even if the MD-Gen cart and SuperGrafx card had been given as large a capacity as the arcade version, 16-megabits (maybe more i'm not entirely certain, maybe 32-megabits) the Sega and NEC consoles would still not have enough graphics power to reproduce the arcade.

 

Now imagine if Ghouls 'N Ghosts had been translated a second time on both MD-Gen and SuperGrafx in 1992-1994, using 16-megabits or more, and taking advantage of developers being more used to both platforms and able to do more things with each hardware. I'll bet we could've seen really nice translations that came even closer to the arcade, even though it would still be completely impossible to match the arcades very standards.

 

even Sega CD couldn't rival the arcade, even given its second faster 68000 CPU and storage capacity, as seen in Final Fight CD which, although has all the arcade features, is still a huge step down in color and noticable step down in graphic detail, because Sega CD did not upgrade Genesis' capabilities in sprites, colors or backgrounds. IIRC, the chip that would've done this was cut from the final Sega CD system, though I don't know any details.

 

I am glad the NEC SuperGrafx version exists, even as it is. It's fun to compare it to the older MD-Gen version and newer X68000 and console versions. Had SuperGrafx been able to reproduce CPS games 100%, it would've been, in retrospect, almost 'boring' to have a carbon-copy of the arcade (as we have near carbon-copies on the more recent consoles). The SuperGrafx version as it is, is almost like a 'bridge' from the MD-Gen version to the more recent near-identical versions. I kinda wish now I hadn't given up mine some years ago when I sold it on ebay.

Edited March 20, 2006 by airraid

[JB]

even Sega CD couldn't rival the arcade, even given its second faster 68000 CPU and storage capacity, as seen in Final Fight CD which, although has all the arcade features, is still a huge step down in color and noticable step down in graphic detail, because Sega CD did not upgrade Genesis' capabilities in sprites, colors or backgrounds. IIRC, the chip that would've done this was cut from the final Sega CD system, though I don't know any details.

The only "details" I've ever heard are that they discussed doing it, but decided it would be too expensive.

 

Based on what I know of the Genesis pinouts, and the 32x's approach, it would've required a passthrough cable, and htey probably didn't want the mess of wires that entailed(though they did it with the 32x, which was ill-conceived from the start).

The Genesis sadly didn't have provisions for sending video information to or from the main console outside of the AV out connectors on the back.

[Seob]

The only question i have is: does arcade perfect or nearly arcade perfect refer to graphics or gameplay?

Sure the graphic cabilities of a 1990 game console never can match a arcade. But if one means with: arcade perfect or nearly arcade perfect the gameplay how does the game compare then? Is the level design the same? Seeing the pictures the level design is the same, since you can make an image of every screen on both the arcade and the sg.

So if i have to say is the sg G'nG arcade perfect or nearly arcade perfect my answer is yes.

[JB]

The only question i have is: does arcade perfect or nearly arcade perfect refer to graphics or gameplay?

Sure the graphic cabilities of a 1990 game console never can match a arcade. But if one means with: arcade perfect or nearly arcade perfect the gameplay how does the game compare then? Is the level design the same? Seeing the pictures the level design is the same, since you can make an image of every screen on both the arcade and the sg.

So if i have to say is the sg G'nG arcade perfect or nearly arcade perfect my answer is yes.

I'd argue there's 3 levels of "perfection."

 

Gameplay-perfect = what it says.

Pixel-perfect = visually identical, or close enough to fool most people without a side-by-side comparison.

Arcade-perfect = everything is identical. This includes bugs and quirks.

[airraid]

The only question i have is: does arcade perfect or nearly arcade perfect refer to graphics or gameplay?

Sure the graphic cabilities of a 1990 game console never can match a arcade. But if one means with: arcade perfect or nearly arcade perfect the gameplay how does the game compare then? Is the level design the same? Seeing the pictures the level design is the same, since you can make an image of every screen on both the arcade and the sg.

So if i have to say is the sg G'nG arcade perfect or nearly arcade perfect my answer is yes.

 

 

first of all, I don't like the term or phrase 'arcade perfect' as I think I've tried to point out. however if people insist on using it, I will say, that in my book, it means gameplay, graphics, audio, *Everything*.

 

I prefer to use terms such as, it is or isn't an 'carbon-copy', 'arcade-exact', 'arcade-identical'.

 

does SuperGrafx Ghouls 'N Ghosts have the same level design? yes. does it have the same gameplay? yes.

 

but so did the Genesis version, and neither version is arcade perfect, IMHO.

 

and as a fact, not identical to the arcade, not even close.

Edited March 25, 2006 by airraid

[airraid]

 

here's most of ending for Daimakaimura ~ Ghouls 'n Ghosts on Saturn Capcom Generation volume 2 where they have dramtically changed the way the ending music sounds, for the worse IMO.

[airraid]

I've uploaded the Ghouls N Ghosts ~ Daimakaimura ending music from the SATURN version from Capcom Generation vol 2, as well as the Arcade, Genesis, SuperGrafx and Xbox versions.

 

 

 

 

in my honest opinion, they REALLY screwed up the ending music in the Saturn version -- whatever they did to it -- call it a remix, an arrangement, or what have you. I strongly dislike it. It's highly irritating.

even if it is technically advanced ( i'm not saying it is) I still really dislike this rendition...

 

I think the Genesis version of the ending music is FAR, FAR better as it reproduces the arcade much more nicely. The SuperGrafx version, well they kinda tried, concidering the limitations of the audio chip... it's not as good as the Genesis version. but these all make for an interesting comparison. I'll try to upload the Playstation / Xbox versions later.

Edited March 29, 2006 by airraid

[colbyski]

On 3/13/2006 at 2:19 PM, airraid said:

 

wow awesome

 

because the gameplay is so extremely similar between ARC-GEN-SGX, your skills on one ver are indeed complete transferable, I was just playing each one just to be sure. these three and the four more recent ports, SAT, PS1, PS2, Xbox all have the same bug too, if you get to the second ladder on the first stage, jump above it and keep pressing up you will continue to 'climb' up even though there's no visible ladder. very amusing

Oh man, the SGX version is much harder than the Genesis version.  I'm not 100% sure about the arcade version, but I'm pretty sure I had no trouble with it using MAME.  Try it out with Magic Engine and see for yourself, it's much faster paced.

[+GoldenWheels]

I have some fairly useless PC-E stuff just cuz I like PC-E, but have been able to resist a Supergrafx due to the cost+this game being the only "exclusive" I would care to play.

 

Maybe someday.

[elmer]

Wow ... this is one heck of a necrobump for this thread!

 

It's sad to see so much incorrect information about the PCE CD being thrown around.  I hope that @JB has found out the true facts about the hardware in the last 13 years.

[Austin]

Yeah, that was quite the necro bump. Though I suppose it's somewhat fitting seeing as this version of the game will be included in the upcoming PC Engine/Turbo Grafx Mini.

 

It's a great port of the game. Not perfect, but easily the best console version of its time. Seeing some of the older posts, the difficulty is about on par with the arcade version (unlike the Genesis/MD game that was made significantly easier).

 

It's a shame NEC didn't do more with the Super Grafx. It was certainly capable of some good stuff. I have occasionally wondered why they just didn't make it a replacement for the stock PCE and have that be the base system from then on out. Cost perhaps? Who knows.

[ParallaxUltra]

Yeah it's pretty wild that we're getting two SuperGrafx games with the TurboGrafx-16 / PC-Engine Mini.

 

 

 

5 hours ago, Austin said:

It's a great port of the game. Not perfect, but easily the best console version of its time. Seeing some of the older posts, the difficulty is about on par with the arcade version (unlike the Genesis/MD game that was made significantly easier).

 

 

 

 

I'd love to see what could be done with newly programmed versions on Genesis and SuperGrafx hardware, with their inherent limitations, except with 16 megabit roms.

[CatPix]

On 3/13/2006 at 3:12 AM, Vic George 2K3 said:

I just find it odd that NEC called its PC Engine "semi-sequel" the SuperGrafx in Japan. Rather inconsistent.

 

On 3/13/2006 at 4:16 AM, airraid said:

 

 

Yes, it made it sound like an American NEC game system. even EGM mentioned that

 

It mays seems so, but it isn't related to the Turbografx.

Nec upgraded the white PC-Engine by ditching the RF out for an A/V port, and named that version "Coregrafx".

Both the Coregrafx and Turbografx were released the same year, so my best guess is that NEC USA though that "Turbografx" sounded better than "Coregrafx".

The Supergrafx name make sense in the Japanese context; there was the Famicom and Super Famicom, and there was the Coregrafx and the Supergrafx.

[turboxray]

On 12/18/2019 at 12:48 AM, ParallaxUltra said:

Yeah it's pretty wild that we're getting two SuperGrafx games with the TurboGrafx-16 / PC-Engine Mini.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'd love to see what could be done with newly programmed versions on Genesis and SuperGrafx hardware, with their inherent limitations, except with 16 megabit roms.

Airraid is your old account haha.