VideoGame_Discussion

You have 19 days to develop an arcade port.

I'm on my way to the airport, so I have to wait to try this, but it's great news to wake up to:

https://www.dsogaming.com/news/wipeout-gets-unoffi...

Psygnosis has some great source ports and post-sunset dev patches. I'm happy to see one of the OGs get the same treatment. Looking forward to losing on Silverstream on modern hardware.

For those that missed it, Limited Run Games is porting the Gex trilogy to modern consoles. Destructoid responded with a pretty... unique interpretation of the original game.

https://www.destructoid.com/ive-wildly-misundersto...

I grinded through this game on PlayStation back in the day, scribbling down passwords as I went. I remember liking the voice work, wishing they had picked different zone themes (I hate ghost/spooky levels...), and finding everything crazy hard.

I'm just interested if it will be a bit of a remake because they mention bringing it to an "engine". If it's just a port with slightly sharper resolution I'll keep my PS1 games.

ErickRPG wrote:

The Carbon Engine is Limited Run Games' emulation / improvement platform. It's essentially an emulator that lets them add additional content, like videos, text overlays (for translations), video filters and achievements.

https://limitedrungames.com/pages/carbon-engine

There are two games that use it right now: Shantae (the original GBC game that was released for Switch) and River City Girls Zero (A localized version of Shin Nekketsu Kouha: Kunio Tachi no Banka that added cutscenes to shove it into the RCG series ).

So Gex is likely going to run on this emulator. It's pretty likely they'll add modern filters but there's bound to be an original video mode too.

That said, they're gonna have to add a lot of disclaimers due to how... badly a bunch of things from that series have aged.

thanks for the info. Yeah kinda how they did that river city game that never came to america, and added an anime intro, and voice acting?

I def would be interested in this if there were new dana gould lines. But if it's not got really much new at all, I'll skip it since I have both gex 2 and 3 on the PS1 that I collected in near mint condition. and any modern collector would know, it takes time to run accross a near mint copy being sold on ebay for a reasonable price. So getting those 2 games in that condition for about market price was an accomplishment in itself.

That's cool. They'll probably release it physically too, but it's LRG, so...you know. :p

it's awesome for those that don't have a PS1. I recommend them totally. But I already own the 2 games in the series I like.

If they want to go for the three-pointer, they'd record new voice lines with Dana Gould that references modern pop culture, and then let you toggle either that or the original VO.

I'm 99% certain that won't happen, despite it being Dana Gould's biggest gig since the Clinton Administration, but it's nice to dream.

Renaissance2K wrote:

Well, when Gex showed up on the trailer. It really didn't sound like young Dana Gould. So I do have some hope he will record new lines. That would be a huge reason for me to double dip.

Okay, this has been bumped for two weeks now, but I've added badges for the the two other flavors of Bionic Commando, including the version most of us have pla... er, subjected ourselves to.

{imgt}https://i.imgur.com/99gx3Ec.gif 160 96{imgt}

{imgt}https://i.imgur.com/z0v9Myh.gif 133 80{imgt}

I would have loved to do these on a transparent background like the NES variant, but I couldn't find any prior art, and the sprites for Joe/Rad are actually really complicated. In addition to the different poses for his body, the bionic arm is actually multiple different sprites at different rotations.

I'll update the OP this evening.

I'm in the next to last level in BC: Rearmed and I just can't beat it.

Nope, I'm throwing in the towel on the last level of BC:R. There's a section near the end which is full of platforms that collapse every so often, or that do so when you touch them, and it is -impossible- to see far enough to try to plan a route through it. And to top it off, your lifebar blocks your view too.

And if you lose all your lives there, you have to play the rest of the level again... all 15 minutes of it.

It's a shame, because the rest of the game worked very well and had some great inspiration behind it. They adapted the final stage of the original game, but tacked on that completely unnecessary bullcrap area and welp I'm not going to bother anymore.

Just as July started to get in full swing, it seems like it's already starting to wrap up. Let's take a look at what badges we've earned this month:

BleedingViolet {imgt}https://i.imgur.com/99gx3Ec.gif 160 96{imgt} BloodPuppetX {imgt}https://i.imgur.com/99gx3Ec.gif 160 96{imgt} Renaissance2K {imgt}https://i.imgur.com/99gx3Ec.gif 160 96{imgt} {imgt}https://i.imgur.com/fnBW63H.gif 132 75{imgt}

If the arcade release still leaves a bad taste in your mouth, don't be scared to try out one of the later ports, which now have their own badges. In the meantime, thanks to all the poor souls who subjected themselves to such madness.

Next month is Arcade August. Nominate some of your favorite arcade games, and we'll use them to assemble our own virtual arcade; sticky floors and creepy quarter guy not included. Beat (or finish one loop of) a game to earn a unique badge. Hold the high score at the end of the month to earn a medal.

We'll start voting on July 26. The ten most wanted games will get prime real estate on our arcade's main floor, far from the broken bathrooms and vending machine.

Start listing some games!

I’ll nominate

The Simpsons

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Arcade Game

Mortal Kombat 2

Marble Madness

I figure those are all decent and or great!

Three of them have playable ports everywhere and I’m pretty sure The Simpsons is available digitally somewhere too. There’s so many great arcade games out there I had like 5 more I wanted to nominate but that’s too many 😉

I nominate:
Fantasy Zone
Fantasy Zone II: The Tears of Opa-Opa Arcade version (sorry, Master System OG)
Bonanza Bros.
Crazy Taxi
Donkey Kong 3
Bosconian

PixelFX's big announcement was a "universal" internal HDMI modfor retro consoles. It's called the Retro Gem, and it will support N64, Dreamcast, PS1, and PS2 at launch. It will cost $99, and is going on sale tomorrow at 10am EDT.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWmyPw6gh4U

There's an option to digitally-upgrade each unit for an additional $80 to add 1440p support, motion adaptive deinterlacing, and some other stuff. Obvious joke: they figured out how to add paid transaction to retro games.

They also teased that Wii and Xbox support is in development.

I nominate TRON.

And the three vector graphics Star Wars Arcade games.

Hmm, here's more info from Bob.

https://www.retrorgb.com/pixelfx-retro-gem-playsta...

I guess I'll try one? There's alot of unanswered questions though. Like if this is easy enough to install and can be user installed without sending to a modder. Will analog out be intact? Is it $80 per PCB to upgrade?(Would make it alot easier to swallow the upgrade fee if it's a one time upgrade fee for multiple PCBs)

I've got my retrotink 5x pro and it's good for my Wii, PS2, and I'm even thinking of getting an N64 and Saturn again just because of how great it's making those games look and I want to experience more systems with it!

We're up to 12 arcade nominations so far. Let's keep them coming!

Lunar wrote:

It's a common PCB with a custom flex cable for each platform, so you'll almost certainly need to send it to a modder if you don't have adequate soldering skills yourself. Most of their installs have been Intermediate+ so far.

All their previous solutions preserve - or add - analog video support, so I'd be shocked if this changed now. They even said in the video that the Gem supports the full existing XXXDigital feature set, plus more, which wouldn't be true if they dropped analog video.

I'd also think it's $80 per digital upgrade, not $80 per "account" as it were. They don't have account functionality now, they've spoken out against TerraOnion's practice of locking hardware to accounts, and it'd be hard to implement a household-wide upgrade without such a system if you don't also open the floodgates to abuse.

I don't think it's worth upgrading my existing HDMI-modded consoles - the big get would be 1440p support, and I still haven't found an HDMI switch that works with 1440p capture reliably - but I'm stoked about adding this to my PS2s, and their Wii kit is overdue for an upgrade.

I'll nominate Three Wonders

Lunar wrote:

Seconded, this is actually three games too

I’ll also nominate Sky Skipper, even if it breaks the illusion of this being an actual arcade.

SupremeSarna wrote:

Hey, it's still an arcade game, technically.

Last day for nominations. I'm going to throw my hat in the ring and nominate three games that were important to me in my younger years: Galaga, Burgertime, and Raiden.

If you've already nominated some games and thought of a few more after the fact, feel free to make another post. We want to end up with ten games in our list, so the more the merrier.

Ill nominate some more.



Star Wars Pod Racer

Mace the Dark Age

Primal Rage

Ms Pac-Man

Saturday Night Slam Masters

…

Tattoo Assassins


Idk if Ms Pac-Man ever ends and Tattoo Assassins would be very hard to find and play.

LET'S BUILD AN ARCADE, FOLKS! We collectively nominated 25 classic arcade games for next month's arcade bonanza. Here are all the nominees, along with Wikipedia pages to help with research:

Nominees
Bonanza Bros.
Bosconian
Burgertime
Crazy Taxi
Donkey Kong 3
Fantasy Zone
Fantasy Zone II: The Tears of Opa-Opa
Galaga
Mace: The Dark Age
Marble Madness
Mortal Kombat II
Ms. Pac-Man
Primal Rage
Raiden
Saturday Night Slam Masters
The Simpsons
Sky Skipper
Star Wars
Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back
Star Wars: Return of the Jedi
Star Wars: Racer Arcade
Tattoo Assassins
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Three Wonders
Tron

Either publicly in this thread or privately in a PM to me, give each nominee 0-5 points. Omitting a nominee is equivalent to giving it a vote of 0. The ten games with the highest score at the end of the month will make up the showroom of Arcade August 2023.

Here are my votes:

Bonanza Bros. - 3 Bosconian - 3 Burgertime - 5 Crazy Taxi - 5 Donkey Kong 3 - 4 Fantasy Zone - 4 Fantasy Zone II: The Tears of Opa-Opa - 1 Galaga - 4 Mace: The Dark Age - 4 Marble Madness - 4 Mortal Kombat II - 5 Ms. Pac-Man - 4 Primal Rage - 5 Raiden - 5 Saturday Night Slam Masters - 3 The Simpsons - 5 Sky Skipper - 3 Star Wars - 4 Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back - 1 Star Wars: Return of the Jedi - 1 Star Wars: Pod Racer - 3 Tattoo Assassins - 2 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - 5 Three Wonders - 5 Tron - 3

It's the biggest ballot in this thread's history, but I know you folks can handle it. Let's see what's going to be eating our virtual quarters next month.

TMNT 5
Three Wonders 5

My vote

Bonanza Bros. - 5
Bosconian - 5
Burgertime - 4
Crazy Taxi - 5
Donkey Kong 3 - 5
Fantasy Zone - 5
Fantasy Zone II: The Tears of Opa-Opa - 5
Galaga - 3
Ms. Pac-Man - 3
The Simpsons - 4
Sky Skipper - 3
Star Wars - 2
Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back - 2
Star Wars: Return of the Jedi - 2
Star Wars: Pod Racer - 5
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - 3

Three Wonders 5
Simpsons 5
Raiden 5

Rounding out our Bionic Commando month, I finished Re-armed for the PlayStation 3 a few nights back.

https://twitter.com/Renaissance2K/status/168479119...

I first played through it shortly after release on the 360, having not played the NES original and assuming it was a pixel-for-pixel remake of it. Now that I've played the NES game, I can see substantial amount of content that was added or changed.

I had a much easier time this run, as well. My original 360 run was just a matter of brute forcing myself to the finish line, but this time, I sought out all the optional upgrades and hamachis. Those routes were usually pretty brutal, but the base game itself was much easier than I remember.

Fabricator 2 is a jerk, though.

Is anyone else gonna vote for arcade games?

Nope

a good opportunity to use my mame cabinet I haven't used in months. .

5 - Bosconian
5 - Mortal Kombat II
5 - Saturday Night Slam Masters
5 - Tron

Burgertime - 5
Crazy Taxi - 5
Fantasy Zone - 5
Galaga - 5
Mace: The Dark Age - 5
Marble Madness - 5
Mortal Kombat II - 5
Ms. Pac-Man - 5
Primal Rage - 5
Saturday Night Slam Masters - 5
The Simpsons - 5
Star Wars: Pod Racer - 5
Tattoo Assassins - 5
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - 5
Three Wonders - 5

I normally do the math to see which games are in the lead, but I’m not bothering this time, lol. Hope you’re keeping a running tally, @Renaissance2K .

SupremeSarna wrote:

I have a spreadsheet that updates every time somebody nominates or votes. It's been stealthily linked within every "Start of Month" post I do.

I thought I was done, but I couldn't let Bionic Commando month fade away without playing through my personal favorite of the series, so I knocked out the Game Boy version over the weekend.

https://twitter.com/Renaissance2K/status/168577649...

I also finished a playthrough of Bionic Commando: Elite Forces for Game Boy Color, which I hadn't ever touched until now. It has some great character animations and swinging mechanics, but it's zoomed in way too much and requires an uncomfortable amount of blind swinging to get anywhere. I'll stick with the originals.

LAST HOURS OF ARCADE VOTING! Start shining your quarters!

Bionic Commando has swung its way home. Here are all the badges we earned this month:

BleedingViolet {imgt}https://i.imgur.com/99gx3Ec.gif 160 96{imgt} BloodPuppetX {imgt}https://i.imgur.com/99gx3Ec.gif 160 96{imgt} Renaissance2K {imgt}https://i.imgur.com/99gx3Ec.gif 160 96{imgt} {imgt}https://i.imgur.com/fnBW63H.gif 132 75{imgt} {imgt}https://i.imgur.com/z0v9Myh.gif 133 80{imgt}

Many thanks to you who played this month, with a special salute to those who played the atrocious arcade version. We should all be ashamed of ourselves for letting such a turd grace our ranks. The guy in charge should really be taken out back and flogged with a bionic arm or two.

Anyway...

The August Arcade is open! Brace yourselves for a massive info dump!

While we were originally targeting a docket of ten games, a massive five-way tie for tenth place means the cutoff for our Front Room is nine games, but if it makes you feel better, Three Wonders is actually a bundle of three tiles, each of which will be tracked separately. Here's a look at the final vote, including the winners:

1. The Simpsons - 23 points
1. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - 23 points
1. Three Wonders - 23 points
4. Crazy Taxi - 19 points
5. Burgertime - 17 points
6. Mortal Kombat II - 15 points
6. Ms. Pac-Man - 15 points
8. Fantasy Zone - 14 points
9. Galaga - 14 points
10. Bosconian - 13 points
10. Raiden - 13 points
10. Saturday Night Slam Masters - 13 points
10. Star Wars: Pod Racer - 13 points
10. Tron - 13 points
15. Marble Madness - 11 points
15. Star Wars - 11 points
17. Primal Rage - 10 points
18. Donkey Kong 3 - 9 points
18. Mace: The Dark Age - 9 points
20. Bonanza Bros. - 8 points
20. Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back - 8 points
20. Star Wars: Return of the Jedi - 8 points
23. Tattoo Assassins - 7 points
24. Fantasy Zone II - 6 points
24. Sky Skipper - 6 points

Some of these games have a definite ending where the credits roll. Some of them loop until you run out of quarters or the machine runs out of memory. We'll figure things out as we go, but here's the general plan:

Beat any of the Front Room arcade games (or complete one loop, where appropriate) or one of their home ports to earn the game's Front Room Arcade Machine badge: image image image image image image image image If you play the original arcade release or a direct port, feel free to submit your high score. The holders of the high scores at the end of the month will get bronze, silver, and bronze medal badges for each game.

I was hoping to have more badges ready to go by tonight, but the template I'm using took a bit longer than expected to put together. Hopefully, it was worth it. More badges will be posted in the coming days.

So, that's the Front Room. Does that mean there's a Back Room? Folks, since Lunar began archiving the Games of the Month back in 2018, we've played through a whopping 22 games that began their humble lives in the arcade. Here's the full list, along with when we played them:

Galactic Attack (March 2018)
The Astyanax (April 2018)
Outrun (December 2018)
Ninja Gaiden (September 2019)
Final Fight (November 2019)
Altered Beast (December 2019)
Sunset Riders (January 2020)
Strikers 1945 (February 2020)
Super Dodge Ball (April 2020)
Metal Slug (May 2020)
Renegade (June 2020)
Jackal (January 2021)
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time (March 2021)
Metal Slug X (April 2021)
Strider (May 2021)
Vampire Savior: The Lord of Vampire (June 2021)
Splatterhouse (October 2021)
NBA Jam (March 2022)
Dynamite Cop (September 2022)
Virtua Fighter (March 2023)
Daytona USA (June 2023)
Bionic Commando (July 2023)

Since we're diving into the arcade this month, why not take that as an opportunity to dust off some of the coin-op classics that we've visited before?

Beat any of the Back Room arcade games or one of their home ports to earn the game's Back Room Arcade Machine badge. {imgt}https://i.imgur.com/tNByof5.gif 84 176{imgt} {imgt}https://i.imgur.com/RZpK7gj.gif 84 176{imgt} {imgt}https://i.imgur.com/z4ZSnUm.gif 84 176{imgt}

I won't be tracking high scores for Back Room games; this month is already going to be bonkers, and I have to draw the line somewhere. Also, because I'm not a monster and don't want to see anyone else throwing themselves at that awful Bionic Commando arcade game, folks that have already played the 2023 arcade games this year will have their badges added to the leaderboard once they're created.**

There's a lot going on, a lot of badges to earn, and hopefully, a lot of fun games to be had. I hope everyone finds a game (or three) worth picking up this month. Have fun!

I guess I'm kicking things off with a playthrough of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles!

{imgt}https://i.imgur.com/b3LcJA0.gif 84 176{imgt}

I got a score of *283*. I think pumping this one is going to depend on your stamina when it comes to the handful of enemies that regenerate endlessly. Baxter's Mousers is probably the easier of the two.

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