PC Engine Gaming: Golden Axe

[bogercs]

people wanted silver when there's Golden Axe!

[123doomdoom]

music sounds like the ys 1 field music. 

[AshPeace]

Dude this si not what Golden Axe looks no the Pc... what console is this on actually? Ive just played it on DosBox and this looks horrible --_-- compared to what I have.

[RyuFalchionX]

@AshPeace

Not that PC. The PC Engine is the original Japanese name for the Turbografx-16 game console. This is on the CD add on.

[andyflange]

ouch.... awful looking game! looks graphically like the master system version with a few more colours... pathetic when you consider some of the other games and their graphics on this system (think street fighter 2!)

[921144666]

Too much win!

[johnwx777]

Nice backdrops ,but the animation is sorely lacking in this version.

[Kwiefbuckle]

looks better on the amiga, plays better on the sms!

[gamecarde]

Fail

[Guitarsthatkill]

Euuuuurgh.

Although I love and respect the PC engine, for real.....its definitely 16 bit versions FTW here.

Terrible looking version.

[bigolebadassbob]

How could they make such a poor excuse of a port like this one on a system which is capable of near arcade-perfect ports of SNK fighters???

[godoftakedown]

what the fuck are you talking about. You call those bad conversions of SNK fighters on the PC engine arcade perfect? Have you ever played the original versions? the PCengine versions don't come even close to the snes versions and they were already lacking A LOT of everything (graphics, sound, controls, features). As good as the PCengine was, it was inferior to the snes, the Mega Drive and the Neo Geo. A cool system, no doubt, but don't overrate the capabilities of this 8-bit console.

[bigolebadassbob]

Let's compare Fatal Fury series for the SNES and the PCE then.

SNES ver: The intros are gone, the characters are puny and are missing half of the animation frames, backgrounds are all letter-boxed, all the intro stage effects are missing (i.e. Geese, Tung, and Krausers ' stages)

PCE ver: The intros are intact, The characters are vertically the same size as the original (a tad resized horizontally) and all animation frames are intact, the stages aren't letter-boxed, all stage effects are intact

[bigolebadassbob]

I also remember characters scaling when jumping accross the planes on the PCE ver, which was dropped for the SNES versions.

I could also execute chain combos on the PCE versions just like in the arcade, which I couldn't on the SNES versions.

[godoftakedown]

most of the stuff in the pce version is streamed off the cd. and it is loading quite a while. a LOT of detail and animation is missing from the original aes version. FF special is really slow and has some technical issues with flickering sprites. the scaling in AoF in the pce version is pathetic and worse than in the already not so good snes version. if i am right you also need an arcade card to play those games on pce. and a cd rom. and those were the earliest Neo geo games with few megs.

[bigolebadassbob]

PCE port of AOF had much larger sprites than the SNES one (though not as large as the original) and all animation frames were intact from the original. All in-game cinemas were also intact, unlike the SNES one which was missing the sequence with Ryo on a bike. I agree with you about the scaling effects and loading times.

PCE ports of Fatal Fury series DO have all animation frames intact from the AES, the loading times weren't so bad, and flickers weren't that evident.

[godoftakedown]

Honestly, have you ever played the PCe and NG versions side by side on the original systems? in the PCe versions are NOT all animation frames and background details and colors are also missing. And it's funny that "flickers weren't that evident" does not bother you. when i played it i started to laugh that entire fireballs disappeared and the shadows randomly had flashing squares.

[bigolebadassbob]

Yes, the PCE ports DO have all animation frames intact, and the characters are big unlike the SNES ones.

It's odd how you don't mind the SNES Fatal Fury ports' tiny-ass characters (that are missing half of the animation frames), plus that cropped screen aspect ratio. They're also missing the intros and stage effects (i.e. scrolling doors of Geese's stage, scroll downs for Tung and Krausers' stages), and the characters don't scale when jumping across the planes. The PCE ports keeps them intact .

[bigolebadassbob]

It's true that the backgrounds are a tad simplified on the PCE ones in some areas, but at least they kept the backgrounds fullscreen unlike the SNES ones.

In fact, more things are missing on the SNES FFS than the PCE one. I'll list a few.

Kim's stage: No bikes are running, no ones by the fountain

Terry, Andy, Joe and Bears' stages: Breakable objects got removed

Mai's stage: No surfing ninja

Geese, Tung, and Krauzers' stages: as I've mentioned earlier

I could go on and on...

[cLaRkDamn]

snk is a bit mountain of crap

[cLaRkDamn]

i mean big, omg.. capcom wannabes

[segamon]

Wow, I didn't think that this conversion would look THIS awful! Whoa. lol

[babejunky]

Also be sure to check out the SuperGrafx console, Ghouls n' Ghosts is a perfect conversion of the arcade classic, 1943 is amazing and Aldynes is a great shooter.

Also check out the PC-FX for Chip-Chan Kick!, Zeorigar and Zenki, some of the rarest games ever!

[babejunky]

The PC-Engine pisses all over the SNES and the Megadrive.

I loved my Megadrive at the time but since then I discovered the magic of the PC-Engine which I think is the best video game console of all time.

Anyway Golden Axe was good on the Commodore AMIGA, excellent on the Megadrive and bloody awful on the PC-Engine, Telenet screwed up big time.

However check out Lords of Thunder, Rayxanber III, Ai Cho Aniki, Saphire and Castlevania Dracula X to see what this baby was capable of.

[chojnak]

What a POOR VERSION !

Amiga 500 one a a much, much better in gfx and msx !

[Ahle2]

The PSG in the PC engine is actually WAY inferior to both the Genesis and the SNES. CD games plays the music directly from the CD. I Know this for a fact because i´m currently developing a new PC engine emulator. Currently it only plays HuCard games, but CD and SuperGrafx games will be supported when the first public beta version is ready.

[ChryslerCruiser]

The PC Engine actually sounded good if the PSG was programmed. Its PSG is more advanced than what you would find in the NES, Sega Master System, or Gameboy/Gameboy. It has 6 sound channels, and they all have stereo capabilities. Unlike those other systems, the PC Engine's PSG is not limited to square or triangle waves. U can create your own waveforms.

Also, u can stream digital samples through any of the 6 PSG channels. The NES, OTOH, has this low quality 1-bit delta (DPCM) compression format.

[ChryslerCruiser]

*programmed well, that is.

[Ahle2]

The NES can actually output uncompressed samples too by writing timed values the ADPCM channel (almost never used though)

Too bad the PCe can´t alter sound data while playing (PWM and other nice effects) :(

BTW, I´m coding a new platform independent PCe/TG16 emulator as we speak :)

[ChryslerCruiser]

Yes. The NES has the ability as well to play raw PCM. I think it can play it at a bit-depth of 7-bits.

I think the main reason why it wasn't used much was because playing samples this way takes up more CPU/memory resources, and therefore, it wasn't feasible to do it during gameplay. So, almost all games just use the DPCM method for samples.

I hadn't mentioned about this in other comment because I ran out of room.

The sample rates for NES samples range from 4.2 to 33.5 khz.

[Ahle2]

Most PCe games that utilitizes samples uses the timer interupt with the lowest possible time value (1024 cycles).

Then within the interupt routine updates up to 6 channels at the same time to generate PCM audio.

However, 1024 cycles per interupt at 7Mhz = 7Khz sample rate, which is quite low.

Thanks to the much more powerful CPU in the PCe, this is possible while still having everything else running at full speed.

[mogul1265]

Good luck with it. I love TG16. A streamlined way to load ISOs would be awesome. What website is it going to be posted on?

[Ahle2]

Thanks.... the problem is that i have five projects going on at the same time. For the moment i don't have the time to continuing coding on it. The current status is: - Loads 99% of all HuCard games - Save state support - Movie support - Fast upscaling with antialiasing - Sound playback at up to 192Khz - The fastest PCE emulator around ( runs perfect on a P133 or iPhone ) It lacks: - A name - CD support - Multi tap support - SuperGrafx support

[Alianger]

It's basically an upgraded nes imo, some like it and some don't. I think it sounds great here but it lacks that ominous and melancholic atmosphere of the genesis and arcade versions..

[Ahle2]

Believe it or not, but the 8bit HuC6280 (derived from the MOS6502) processor is actually pretty fast and has a built in memory management unit to handle large cartridges. It outperforms the 8Mhz MC68000 processor in the Genesis for almost everything but ALU instructions (math)

The PC engine also has a more advanced sprite engine than the Genesis (Larger sprite / More sprites per scanline / More colors)

The main disadvantage is the lack of more than one background layer and the simple PSG.

[Alianger]

I can believe that (too), I've played some of the shooters for the system and they're really fast and smooth with lots going on on-sreen.

[Alianger]

still, I don't if it could handle something like the sonic series, batman & robin, red zone etc. And I much prefer the genesis palette (or the use of it) because TG16 games tend to have very saturated colors and the sprites shaded without hue shifts, making for a sort of "kids coloring book" look. It's made worse also by the lower resolution. There are some exceptions of course like image fight, mesopotamia, ninja spirit, soldier blade so maybe it was just down to the artists skills.

[Ahle2]

You are right about the pallette thing. Sonic could have been done with the same speed, color and amount of sprites, but without the second layer.

Actually the PC engine has a very flexible GPU, and can output higher resolutions than the Genesis. Very few games used a higher resolution than 256x242 though (some exceptions, R-Type, Battle Royale, Ghost Manor, Legend of hero tonma)

BTW, Golden Axe is such a POOOOOOR port on the PC engine.

[Ahle2]

BTW, have a look at Castlevania, Street Fighter II, Ai Choaniki, R-type, Lords of thunder, Forgotten Worlds, if you want to see what the PC engine REALLY was capable of.

[BadLadJon]

i used to play this on my sega =[ good times

BUT i downloaded for my PC! YAAAY

[richardh754]

Is that the actual sound?

[Zeo1234]

Enhanced, but original theme.

[bisexualbuffthug]

Love the music. Good graphics if not superrior graphics to super nes.

[TheUniqueMaster]

The music for me looks like SNES.

[ChryslerCruiser]

If this was the PC Engine Hu-Card PSG music, then it would be nowhere near SNES quality.

Some people assume that the CD music in CD-based PCE games is what PC Engine music is actually like overall.

[XTIRP8]

man retro games have the best video game music

[Uberdude25]

Amiga version looks and sounds much better!

[bisexualbuffthug]

But it is does not have a yamaha keyboard processor to sound as awesome as the sega genesis version.

[Ahle2]

What the fuck....

The Amiga had no limitation in sound viarity like the "Synth" based counter parts. The Amiga had sample based sound hardware, and wasn't limited to FM sounds or square waves like most machines in those days (except SNES).

Search for nTz5iwmtkrs and listen to the wonderful quality of Amiga music (The sound processor is from 1985, light years ahead)

[bisexualbuffthug]

As soon as i find the clip that shows crappy music sound emulated on amiga you think different.....

[BurtWilson1]

I agree with you completely. The Amiga had the most awesome sound of any computer/console in the 80's and early 90's.

[REALSlutHunter]

Amiga don´t need that Shit Crapy DSP from Genesis.

Look for Turrican 1 or 2 Intro on Amiga an you will see what a Amiga do whit that crapy Genesis Chip *LOL*

[3dwardXP]

i agree, amiga had better sound in general.

[IsOled]

Oh the humanity.......

Great game though,can you please upload the anime intro?

[ktchong]

The correct translation should have been "Battle Axe" or "War Axe".

[Shrapnoid]

Is there a way to reload this video. My connection broke during the loading and now I can only view the first 9 seconds. I really want to see this video very badly.

[wetandwild123]

any has arcade version golden axe help me

[rasj1983]

nice music!!!!

[stringanime]

This is Turbo Graghics???More like Sloth-Slow Graghics!

[Spitty45]

classic old game, classic

[n00bje]

Reminds me of the power rangers game on the snes

[WhitetheDark]

hahahahhaha great ! XD

[leslielove]

and they dont trunto stone ween tehy die

[RyuHayabusa06]

This is a terrible port of Golden Axe. Graphically, it looks like it could've been done of the Master System. It's a shame considering how good some other ports were.

[fraserfraserfraser]

Even when they sit on the creatues ,they use the characters normal standing frame of animation but just chop off their legs.

Terrible!

[fraserfraserfraser]

First thing i thought on seeing this was ,god this can't be on a pc engine as it looks terrible.

I've moaned about Shinobi missing his close range attacks & stages but at least it was nigh on identicle to the coin op compared to this horror.

At least it's a better conversion than the ps2 sega ages trash.

[chadballew]

could've been SOOOO GREAT! This is the biggest steaming pile of poo game ever. Why did they mess it up so bad? HOW?! Great music and cutscenes do not a great game make!

[molondrongo]

Never tried this version, but I bet the Golden Axe remake made for the Sega Ages series for PS2 is much worse.

[chadballew]

that one is bad....but seriously...this one takes the cake

[sunteam]

If NEC Avenue had converted this it would have been pretty special, but Telenet aren't the best developers in the world...

[MysticArksRevenge]

@sunteam They are to me when it comes to making games on the Sega Genesis.

[CDProductions66]

@sunteam Even though Telenet did an awesome job with the music (The music was so awesome that I played the Sega CD version of Golden Axe with Telenet's music replacing the music for that version)

[ssestakhch]

@chadballew Being the most inferior version does not automatically make a game bad anyway.

[MysticArksRevenge]

@ssestakhch Exactly, dude.

[majesticlizard]

@chadballew: I think the sprites were drawn in one afternoon. They could have simply lifted the sprites off of the Atari ST version or even the Master System version. This game makes no sense. The Turbo Duo could easily have done a great Golden Axe.