General Retro Discussion

[Dcubed]

2 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

I've been enjoying what little PS1/PSP scraps Sony have thrown our way on PS+. I was excited when the service as first announced but, like all of these online services, the offerings have been few and far between. There are loads of games I would like to play but with publishers wanting to release their own collections or just not wanting to play ball at all, it's pretty clear that I'm never going to get the games I want on these types of services. That being the case...

I picked up some JRPGs that I never played back in the day. I dabbled with Grandia on the Vita but that's about it. 

Very happy with the condition they are in, especially Alundra. That came with the hints and tips book and the map.

Also picked up Spider-Man 2. It wasn't high on my list but there were no bids on it and it was pretty cheap for the condition it was in.

The PS1 cases are a bit of a nightmare to find in decent condition. I have found some brand new replacements on ebay that I may purchase and give a try. It's been a while since I've been down the Retro rabbit hole but I figure I best pick up some of these games that I want now before they get even further out of reach. Thankfully, a lot of games on my list aren't that expensive. 

 

What a shame they’re all crappy PAL copies…

Seriously though, nice haul.  Alundra is a good time

[Hero-of-Time]

34 minutes ago, Dcubed said:

What a shame they’re all crappy PAL copies…

Your hatred for old PAL games knows no bounds.

[CrowingJoe79]

Is this guy a copy of Bolo Yeung? 

 

[Hero-of-Time]

Another amazing video by Splash Wave/Strafefox.

I should really try and play Secret of Mana again. I've tried a couple of times but couldn't get on with the menus and battle system.

[Hero-of-Time]

 

Happy 25th anniversary to one of the all time greats.

What a console.  I have so many great memories of it.

 

 

All of these openings give me goosebumps every time I watch them. 

@Julius with you being so young, did you ever get to experience the Dreamcast? Given your love of JRPGs I would imagine you would have really enjoyed Skies of Arcadia.

[Julius]

3 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

@Julius with you being so young, did you ever get to experience the Dreamcast? 

...what's a Dreamcast? 

I jest, of course, but no, unfortunately not  being born when I was, my experience with SEGA growing up feels incredibly limited in retrospect to just seeing them transition their focus away from consoles: their console division was virtually dead and buried (everyone and their mother had a PS1 or PS2, a handful of people had a GameCube, and I had only one friend with a well off father with Apple stock - idk, seemed like the type - who had an Xbox), they were leaning on Sonic HARD throughout my childhood (I distinctly remember having fun with the anime; Heroes on PS2 and watching a friend play Shadow the Hedgehog; the McDonald's tie-in Game & Watch style devices for the Olympics; and so on), I think I have memories of having their logo light up my face through an arcade machine or two (which obviously veeeeeeeery quickly were introduced to me and went the way of the dodo from my POV), and maybe - maybe - a trace memory of Crazy Taxi from *somewhere*, but I couldn't tell you where for the life of me. 

Honestly, for people born around the time I was, I genuinely think the only way you end up with a SEGA console - any of them, never mind a Dreamcast! - in your house living in the UK growing up, or knowing someone who does, is from an older sibling or a parent having picked them up and it being passed on; and I only even say that after meeting someone like that back when I started my current job (his dad has always been big on games so they've got most of the SEGA consoles released over here in decent condition in their house).

No shade to SEGA, but I genuinely think that for my generation when it comes to casual gamers/the general public and knowledge of their consoles, they'll think of those "72 games built-in!" types of off-brand mini consoles and playing Flash versions of their games in computer rooms at school 

But, uh, happy birthday to the Dreamcast 

3 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Given your love of JRPGs I would imagine you would have really enjoyed Skies of Arcadia.

I reckon you're right! Definitely looks my cup of tea, and I've heard so many great things over the years about it. 

So where's that damn remaster, huh, SEGA?! 

[Happenstance]

Sega returning to the console business would be such a massive thing for me. I don't think they will or should but I find the gaming landscape, at least hardware-wise is boring these days and a return like that would be huge and something to actually celebrate. 

[Hero-of-Time]

5 minutes ago, Julius said:

Honestly, for people born around the time I was, I genuinely think the only way you end up with a SEGA console - any of them, never mind a Dreamcast! - in your house living in the UK growing up, or knowing someone who does, is from an older sibling or a parent having picked them up and it being passed on; and I only even say that after meeting someone like that back when I started my current job (his dad has always been big on games so they've got most of the SEGA consoles released over here in decent condition in their house).

Yeah, I don't think many of the Sega consoles are recognised by the younger generation. I used to work with a couple of lads who were in their early twenties and both were big gamers but they didn't have a clue what a Sega Saturn or Dreamcast were. They had heard of the Mega Drive which I suppose isn't that surprising given how successful/popular it was over here but mention the other consoles and they were like...

Annoys me that Sega are just sat on Skies of Arcadia and refuse to do anything with it. The game really needs a port to modern consoles so that people like yourself can finally try it without needing to drop a lot of cash on retro goods.

[Hero-of-Time]

1 minute ago, Happenstance said:

Sega returning to the console business would be such a massive thing for me. I don't think they will or should but I find the gaming landscape, at least hardware-wise is boring these days and a return like that would be huge and something to actually celebrate. 

Yeah, I'd love to see them return as well.

The hardware side of gaming is indeed very boring. Back then you had each of the competitors doing something differently and each of them had a distinct style. Everything feels a bit corporate and sterile now.

[Happenstance]

My favourite story about the death of the Dreamcast:

 

[Dcubed]

Happy birthday to the console that burned the brightest for the shortest time.

Dreamcast was actually the first SEGA console I personally owned.  Previously I was on the Nintendo side of the camp, where a friend of mine had the Mega Drive and I used to go round his to play, but the Dreamcast was the first time I actually went out and bought the console itself.

What a console it was! Completely blew away the competition in terms of specs and production values; literally felt like a machine from the future took a time warp to 1999! (and even more insane to think that it actually came out in 1998 in Japan, at the same time as Zelda OOT!).

For those of you in the room too young to remember, picture this...

... coming out at the same time as this...

Perhaps the biggest quantum leap in technology the industry had ever seen.  And in the span of just a hair over 2 years after the N64's release!

And while in retrospect, the Dreamcast's western launch was a bit of a cheat when you consider that it came out about 9 months after its Japanese debut, its launch lineup was the stuff of legends.  Just a massive library of heavy hitters right from day 1! 

And for fans of the arcades? The Dreamcast was literally more or less the same hardware as in the NAOMI arcade board.  Outside of the NeoGeo (which wasn't even really a commercial piece of hardware that was viable for average consumers), this was the first time that you truly got "arcade perfect" games at home.

It's crazy to think that the console only lasted a year and a half from its western debut to its official discontinuation, and yet it amassed a library of 620 officially released titles, more than double the N64!

43 minutes ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Yeah, I don't think many of the Sega consoles are recognised by the younger generation. I used to work with a couple of lads who were in their early twenties and both were big gamers but they didn't have a clue what a Sega Saturn or Dreamcast were. They had heard of the Mega Drive which I suppose isn't that surprising given how successful/popular it was over here but mention the other consoles and they were like...

Annoys me that Sega are just sat on Skies of Arcadia and refuse to do anything with it. The game really needs a port to modern consoles so that people like yourself can finally try it without needing to drop a lot of cash on retro goods.

Yeah, it's sad, and a bit of an existential crisis for us oldies; but it does make sense when you realise that SEGA has been a software only 3rd party for longer than they were a console manufacturer now

40 minutes ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Yeah, I'd love to see them return as well.

The hardware side of gaming is indeed very boring. Back then you had each of the competitors doing something differently and each of them had a distinct style. Everything feels a bit corporate and sterile now.

Nobody, for better or worse, would ever take the kinds of risks that SEGA did back in the 90 to early 2000s.  Not even Nintendo would dare to put out official fishing controllers, games played with maraccas, mushroom shaped add-ons that would only last 6 months, or online games in the late 90s.  God bless SEGA and their utter disregard for fiscal responsibility!

Edited November 27, 2023 by Dcubed

[martinist]

Still have a second hand Dreamcast in a bag in the cupboard. Was thinking about collecting for it then i relised i could just burn CDs or emmulate.

Sold my first one and all my games so me and my brother could buy a PS2. I regret everythnig.

Sonic Adventure 1 and 2, Shenmue 2, Crazy Taxi 2, Dead or Alive 2, WWF Atitude, all of my Dreamcast Magazine demo disks... gone. But thats just what I had to do as a kid when I wanted a new console I would end up having to sell the old one since I thougt the newer one would be better and i wouldn't need it. I was wrong!

 

Edited November 27, 2023 by martinist

[Hero-of-Time]

34 minutes ago, martinist said:

But thats just what I had to do as a kid when I wanted a new console I would end up having to sell the old one since I thougt the newer one would be better and i wouldn't need it. I was wrong!

 

Unless you had parents who were well off, this is just what you had to do. My friends and I all done the same, constantly trading things in to get a different console. 

[Happenstance]

I still regret trading in my original Mega Drive and all it's games.

[Helmsly]

I have such fond memories The Dreamcast, it was an incredible console.

For me it was the first non-Nintendo console that I was looking forward to and also the first time I had saved my own money to buy one. I was never a Sega fan enough to want to own their consoles but everything i had read about the Dreamcast just sounded perfect for me.

I still remember the day it came out, I left our house first thing in the morning and went to my local Gamestation to buy the console. I brought it but there was a problem: they ran out of copies of Sonic Adventure and had not stocked any VMU memory cards. I walked down to Virgin Megastore and luckily they had Sonic but unluckily they didn't have any VMU's. So next off i went to electronic boutique, they didn't want to sell me a memory card because i had purchased the console from another store (ridiculous!) but they changed their mind and let me buy it.

I remember getting home and playing the demo disc that came with it, which had a demo for a game called Toy Commander which was a lot of fun to mess around in.

I spent ages flying around this kitchen doing stupid stuff like shooting slices of toast to make them catch on fire or flying the helicopter around and using it to pick up and drop sugar cubes into a cup of coffee on the table.

That level of freedom in a 3D environment, without any pop-up textures with that amount of interactivity felt really cool (obviously its nothing to what we can do today, but at the time it was a step up from anything i had played before and also just a lot of fun)

I then played Sonic Adventure and was just amazed at how it looked. As @Dcubed mentioned in his awesome post, the jump in the visuals from what had come out in recent years was amazing. I kept replaying the first level just to see that Whale smash through the pier:

 

And I think that was one of the major things about the Dreamcast, its not just something you look back on to see how impressive it was because at the time you could tell this was a significant jump from what consoles could do before.

Games like Soul Calibur were, as far as I could tell, Arcade Perfect. You were seeing Arcade games in your home with no compromises. But what was also great about the Dreamcast was that Sega didn't just rely on arcade ports. They had new and original games like Jet Set Radio, which really was like nothing else I'd ever played.

Not only was it original with its gameplay, it had its own look and style that was so different to anything else before it. But then to add to that, it had an amazing soundtrack (which I still listen to ocassionally).  Sega had made good use of everything the console could do.

Not only was JSR original, they did as much as they could with it. You could make your own Graffiti as well as upload and download others creations in the options. If you had the space on a extra memory card, you could download a JPEG from the Dreamcasts Web Browser (DreamKey ) and use that image as a spray.

 

Then there is the online functionally. The fact that, not only could the Dreamcast do this at a time when the internet itself was in such an early stage for the average Joe, but that the modem and cable needed to do so, came with the console: Everyone that had a Dreamcast could browse the internet from it as well as play games online.

My first ever Online game was Phantasy Star Online thanks to the Dreamcast and I will never forget when I connected it all up and was loaded into a lobby. I saw other characters walking around that were clearly being controlled real people and everyone was talking to each other through word bubbles:

This was a amazing moment. I had read about what it was like to be online in reviews before hand but to actually see it in motion before my eyes was incredible. I remember having a big smile on my face just seeing a room full of people tall talking and trying to help each other get started, asking how to start up a game etc. Online gaming was something I knew about already but experiencing it really felt like I was seeing part of the future in some way. This game had a huge impact on my life in that, I played it for so long, buying the upgraded version a year later and then playing the next version on Gamecube, that I made friends that I talk to on a daily basis to this day. I was talking to one of my online friends the other day how crazy it is that we've all known each other online for two decades. All thanks to this game.

And then there was Shenmue:

I really don't know where to start with this.

I didn't know to expect from this game when I brought it other then it was supposed to be a big deal. I remember being both a amazed at the graphics as well as the level of interactively. Generally, up until that point, the better a 3D game looked, the less you could actually do in the world. But with this game, not only did it look amazing and a huge leap anything else around but you could walk into every single shop on the high street, talk to every thing NPC you saw, inspect loads of random things around the house and in the stores. Or wonder to the local arcade and play older Sega Arcade games:

Every character you saw walking around, wasn't a random NPC the game had just spawned before you walked around the corner. They had individual models, names, a home and a full daily routine you could watch if you wanted to (that would change on weekends). They changed what they said depending on what they were doing and what time of the day it was as well as say different things as Ryo learned more about what was going on and the story progressed.

Just being aware of the amount of dialog they must have recorded in this game, as bad as the voice acting is, was crazy.

The changing weather, the fact that every store had its own unique music playing inside it, the streets had different music depending on what time of the day it was... I just could not get my head around the level work that must have gone into making this game. It was incredible.

But I was also very much aware of its faults. The voice acting for one, the controls are a little stiff and I don't think the real time fighting ever truly felt good. It's certainly a flawed game but I think what they were trying to do at this time, is so impressive that I have always been able to overlook the not-so-good stuff and value the things it did so well.

Also, I will never forget the routine I had in real life at that time, working overnights in real life then coming home and working as a Forklift driver in Shenmue to help him learn who killed his father lol. This game has stuck with me more as an experience because it was doing so much and was just fascinating to be a part of when it came out.

 

I could go on but what I am getting at is that I just loved this console so much. In its short life it gave me so many great fun memories, from the games I mentioned to all the multiplayer fun I had with my friends in games like Marvel vs Capcom 2 and Power Stone 2, to playing online games, that it's always been my favorite console for just how much it did right. It's such a shame it didn't get a full life but it stands to something that all these years later it is still talked about it gets mentioned on the anniversary of its release. It really was such a great machine.

Sadly, my Dreamcast broke down in 2002 (the cd drives are prone to wear out pretty quickly on them) and I have had to buy a replacement but I still have my original day one Dreamcast in my cupboard, back in its box and I'm never getting rid of it because I'm sentimental about it.

It came out the same year I turned 18, later that year I got my first job and was spending my first pay check on games for it. Later on in 2001, I moved out into my own flat it, it was the first thing i set up when I moved in and sat among all my moving-in boxes playing Marvel Vs Capcom 2 lol

 

And one last thing: During the 3DS's lifetime they released a Dreamcast background theme for it. It'd designed so the background resembles the Dreamcasts menu complete with the same navigation sounds. It also plays the Lobby music from Phantasy Star Online, which was just perfect!

It even plays the whirring sound of the Dreamcasts fan and the high pitch beep the VMU's made when you turned the console on. Around the time this theme came out Sega posted this on their twitter to show how they achieved that lol:

If they ever had something like this on the Switch 2, i'd get it right away.

On 11/27/2023 at 10:29 AM, Dcubed said:

Nobody, for better or worse, would ever take the kinds of risks that SEGA did back in the 90 to early 2000s.  Not even Nintendo would dare to put out official fishing controllers, games played with maraccas, mushroom shaped add-ons that would only last 6 months, or online games in the late 90s.  God bless SEGA and their utter disregard for fiscal responsibility!

Well Said

Edited November 22 by Helmsly

[Julius]

Concept art and a model for Wapeach from  Mario Power Tennis has turned up, courtesy of Waluigi's creator:

Is...is that an axe? 

Anyways, the degenerates are going to have a field day with this one 

[Glen-i]

Yeah, I don't think it fits with the whole "ugly, twisted, exaggerated proportion version of Mario character" that Wario and Waluigi do so well.

It looks too much like Peach, you know? A bit pointless, seeing as Daisy serves as Peach's doubles partner just fine. Probably why it got rejected.

Edited December 1, 2023 by Glen-i

[Julius]

Went to Birmingham Comic Con with some mates yesterday; brought a bit of cash with me, but didn't really expect that I'd come across anything I'd be genuinely interested in (as I'm still living in an apartment and like not feeling overwhelmed by hoards of stuff ).

Naturally, the very first stall we hit up ended up being a big retro games stall, with probably a few hundred retro games, and it was very busy (turned out to be the only big gaming stall there). It was set out with two rows consisting of big chunky boxes filled with games on tables, but because of the layout, you could barely make out/reach the back boxes, and with it being so busy too, shuffling around was a bit awkward. 

Working from the right of the store to the left (where the checkout was), I started scanning over the PS2 games, and nothing with an English title was really catching my eye; there were some okay games, but nothing that had me really getting excited. 

Then, I started to flick through the Japanese PS2 titles they had, which was probably ¾ of the size of their English PS2 offerings. Flicked through the first box of Japanese games, and well: 

I picked out Shadow of the Colossus, and well, even if I can't play it, it just seemed right to have it in Japanese and a great way to commemorate a game I love (also I've been thinking about buying the Japanese art book for the game, so this happening felt like fate ). The box looks awesome, it's one of my favourite games, it wasn't too pricey: absolutely getting that. And the game next to it in the box? Not one but two copies of ICO, in really nice condition! It was a bit pricier compared to some of the other games they were selling (which makes sense) but by no means an unfair amount to ask for, so I copped one of those, too  don't have the same level of attachment to it as I do Shadow, but it's still a damn fine game. A quick flick through had me find Japanese copies of Dragon Quest VIII and the PS2 version of Dragon Quest V, so there were definitely some pretty nice Japanese copies here! 

Following this we flicked through and shuffled past the English PS1 titles, which weren't anything crazy or noteworthy, and then it was past the Xbox 360 titles and onto the PS3 ones, which were overwhelmingly Japanese copies. Started to flick through these but nothing was really catching my eye, and then one of my mates pointed out Dark Souls II – while it has really nice cover art, I've not played the game and the attachment isn't there to own a Japanese copy of it, so I'll pass.

What came to mind instantly, though, was if they would have a Japanese version of Dark Souls, which I think has one of the finest examples of modern box art, and I've seen thrown around in favourite box art lists online for years. But how would I find it? All of these games were in boxes filled chock-a-block and with only their spines with Japanese text showing...so I grabbed the Dark Souls II and studied it's spine: black, what I imagine is 'Dark Souls' or something to that effect in Japanese, and then a '2'.

Okay, well, I don't speak Japanese, but I can match two patterns well enough, so I just need to find this text on a spine, and I imagine there's a good chance the spine is black (which would help it stand out as so many of these other spines were white). I must've looked a bit off, like a video game collecting version of Indiana Jones, as I started holding up the copy of Dark Souls II at eye level and flashing glances at the games lined up.

Nothing in this box, nothing in that box...how about that black spined game at the back, well out of reach? The text...it matches up! 

And sure enough, that was a Japanese copy of Dark Souls, and the only one they had  after retrieving it some guy walking past over my shoulder went and commented on the Japanese copy of Dark Souls II, before I showed him what I'd just grabbed, and he smiled and laughed as if to say "you lucky SOB" 

After that pretty epic find, I continued to flick through the PS3 games, but I don't think anything was going to be more interesting to me than finding that copy of Dark Souls. While doing this, though - shoulder-to-shoulder with other game collectors - out of the corner of my eye to my left and in the boxes of Japanese PS1 games, a guy is flicking through when suddenly a very familiar cover - for the teeniest fraction of a second - flashes through my periphery. 

Out loud: wait...was that Suikoden? 

We slowly shuffle away over as more people leave the scene, and I'm trying to keep quiet about spotting Suikoden so no-one else picks it up, and sure enough, it was!

Yeah, sure, I'd prefer an English copy, but they're stupidly expensive and I already own the game digitally, so this is a nice way to just appreciate the game and have it take up some space on my shelf, which is fully deserved. Suikoden got picked up. 

Continued to flick through their Japanese PS1 games, unfortunately they didn't have a copy of Suikoden II I could pair it with, but still, they had a really nice selection of Japanese PS1 games, which were overwhelmingly JRPGs! I got so close to picking up JP copies of Final Fantasy IX and Tactics, but talked myself down, but damn did they look so clean. 

These were all in thin plastic sleeves, so when I got back I started opening them up, and found that I absolutely adored the disc art for ICO and Shadow of the Colossus: 

While I had a great time at the Con in general, this being the first stall just meant everything else was a comedown from that point on. Outside of things like CeX, this is the first time I've flicked through retro games in this way, I think, ever? I've ordered all of my other purchases in this thread online. Everything was in decent condition, I forgot how much I missed the weightiness of these boxes being packed with manuals and the like, it was nice to just exchange small talk with other JRPG and/or PS1 fans (a guy came over and specifically was like "yo, where your PS1 JRPGs at?" ). The haul of Japanese copies of these awesome games came to the grand total of..! £60! 

The entire experience has got me considering picking up more retro games - it was really fun and exciting, I had an absolute blast just looking through - and if I do so, I think I'll be making a concerted effort to do so in-person when and where I can; as it turns out, a very highly rated retro games store is only around 20 minutes from where I live and it's one I actually passed hundreds of times on my way to college, so I think I'll need to make a point drop by in the next few weeks. I'm still going to figure out the intricacies of what I would and wouldn't want to pick up for the sake of my wallet, especially with so many games being remastered and on modern consoles these days, but yeah, I think it'll be time to pick up an HDMI adapter soon and break out the PS2, too, because the whole thing certainly put me in the mood 

[Happenstance]

I hadn't realised MCM was in this weekend. I was in Birmingham with Goafer yesterday for the Christmas Market so could have gone up to the NEC first. Don't think I've been to an MCM Comic Con since around 2018. 

[Hero-of-Time]

Lovely purchases, @Julius.

18 minutes ago, Happenstance said:

I hadn't realised MCM was in this weekend. I was in Birmingham with Goafer yesterday for the Christmas Market so could have gone up to the NEC first. Don't think I've been to an MCM Comic Con since around 2018. 

Did Goafer ever get around to buying Shining Force 3?

[Happenstance]

21 minutes ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Lovely purchases, @Julius.

Did Goafer ever get around to buying Shining Force 3?

😆 No I don't think he ever did. 

[Julius]

Got a couple of questions now that I'm thinking of breaking out the PS2 and picking up some PS1 games; aware that I could Google some of this stuff, but so many threads end up devolving into pumping out lists of technical terms and acronyms, so figured I'd ask here to hopefully cut through some of that stuff:

• for a PS2 to HDMI adapter, is something like Kaico's PS2 to HDMI best? Or is there another adapter that would be recommended over that one? 

• for playing PS1 games, I imagine the general consensus is going to be that it plays best on the original hardware – but, while I do still have my old PS1 kicking around at my parents' house, I'd like to keep the number of consoles in my TV console (heh) down. So, would it be recommended that I play PS1 games on PS2 or on PS3? I have one of those old fat PS2s, for reference, and I can't remember having any issues playing any of my PS1 games on it back in the day. 

Appreciate any thoughts and direction with this!  really looking forward to seeing my PS2 again, it's been a while 

[Hero-of-Time]

@Julius, that's the adapter I use and it works fine. It does the job and doesnt break the bank. 

If you want something a little more high end then take a look at the Rad2x. Retro Gaming Cables get them in stock periodically so if you do want one it's best to sign up for their newsletter. Sadly, you just missed out on the last batch as they just shipped at the end of October.

[Ike]

I definitely second Retro Gaming Cables's Rad2x cables, they're great.

[Dcubed]

As a happy owner of the Retrotink 2x? (Which is essentially the same thing as the Rad2x, but just not console specific), I can third that it’s a solid piece of kit.

Decent image quality, with no input lag, that doesn’t break the piggy bank