Was it nostalgia or curiousity

VestCunt · 03/21/2014, 03:41 PM

R-Type would have been a terrible pack-in. It's was IREM's new flagship game and they were busy licensing it to anyone and everyone. American gamers had seen it on the SMS the year previous and it was soon heading for the SFC in Japan. Between licensing and the large chip memory, it would have been a very expensive pack-in for NEC. Altered Beast had also seen an 8-bit home release, but it was still a Sega exclusive.

Successful pack-ins need to: 1) be impressive, 2) offer gamers something new and exclusive 3) appeal to a wide audience. R-type would have only fulfilled the first category. As adult men on a TG16 forum, it's easy to forget that shooters don't appeal to everyone. A lot of girls, kids, and casual gamers don't like them as much as platformers. Nintendo realized this and it made them industry leaders.

Paddyfitz18 · 03/21/2014, 04:43 PM

^OK I see your point. Still, I guess can't understand more generally how a pack-in can influence buying decisions so much. It does apparently, but really I don't get it. It's just one game, after all.

The exception is perhaps Super Mario Brothers for the NES. Just because that was totally revolutionary compared with anything else available at the time. That game was just a whole different deal than anything else around at the time.

And you are totally right about Nintendo drawing the casual gamer. Irony would be if it now leads to their collapse, since those casual gamers are now leaving them, in droves, for phones, tablets and what have you. They are under a lot of pressure to license their products on to those devices.

dallaspattern · 03/21/2014, 11:20 PM

I thought KC was pretty badass when I was a kid

YANDMAN · 03/24/2014, 04:07 AM

I fell in love with it from a picture in a comic book, The name alone filled my young mind with endless visions of Turbo powered games, TG16, Turbo-Grafx 16 just sounds so cool.

tg16manaic · 03/25/2014, 12:25 AM

I bought one back in early 1990 i believe, shorty after it came out. It came out on my 11th birthday in '89, but i didn't buy it until the spring of '90. I picked up a used one with splatterhouse for something like 60 bucks. It was like new with the box and everything, and i still have it

and i kept it in mint shape like a prized possession. I remember wanting it so much lol. After seeing the awesome graphics i just had to have it lol. When i got it, none of my friends had it, i remember them all saying "wow u have turbo grafx 16?" they were all amazed, yet none of them ever bought one, i was the only one that had it out of all my friends and classmates, and i'm sure they were envious lol.

TurboHuC6280 · 03/25/2014, 07:18 PM

I was in grade school. Before the console was released, my friend was obsessed with the Turbo. He'd go on and on about Bonk and Bomberman and Turbo ads in the gaming magazines of the time. He finally got a Turbo Express and I remember playing Bonk and Legendary Axe when he brought it over for a party.

I was hooked, but I didn't have the money for a system. Ultimately I was able to trade some of my prized NES games (One of which was Dragon Warrior III, a favorite at the time) for a used machine and a few games at one of the few gaming stores that had a used system in stock. My first two games were Bonk and Neutopia.

For some reason, I later sold my Turbo stuff. I had regretted it ever since. I think that it was for some SNES game at the time (in 1994) and the Turbo was ready to check out after the PCFX release. Ultimately, I made it a goal to replace it and picked up a CD system and an Express within a few years. Later, a PC Engine. I collect more Japanese games these days than US releases.

Still one of my all-time favorite game machines.

A Black Falcon · 03/25/2014, 10:04 PM

Quote from: guest on 03/21/2014, 03:41 PMR-Type would have been a terrible pack-in. It's was IREM's new flagship game and they were busy licensing it to anyone and everyone. American gamers had seen it on the SMS the year previous and it was soon heading for the SFC in Japan. Between licensing and the large chip memory, it would have been a very expensive pack-in for NEC. Altered Beast had also seen an 8-bit home release, but it was still a Sega exclusive.

Successful pack-ins need to: 1) be impressive, 2) offer gamers something new and exclusive 3) appeal to a wide audience. R-type would have only fulfilled the first category. As adult men on a TG16 forum, it's easy to forget that shooters don't appeal to everyone. A lot of girls, kids, and casual gamers don't like them as much as platformers. Nintendo realized this and it made them industry leaders.

I disagree. Sure R-Type was on the Master System, but very few people in the US had Master Systems. Sure it was popular in Europe, but that would only have mattered if NEC hadn't been so unbelievably stupid as to not release the TG16 there.

Of course the TG16 didn't end up selling here at all either, and in fact even the SMS did better, but at launch that outcome had not yet been determined. I think that Keith Courage is a fun game and I like it, but yeah, it wasn't their best pack-in choice. I think R-Type would have been a fine choice for a packin -- it was a great port of a well-known game which was not on the popular system of the time (the NES). There was a later Game Boy version of R-Type, but that didn't release until 1991.

Alternately, the other top choice of course would be Blazing Lazers... I'm not sure if it was ready at launch, but that game has great graphics and great gameplay. The name wasn't known quite as well, which is one plus R-Type has, but the game is just as good. (I know many people think it should have been Legendary Axe, but I've never liked that game all that much myself...)

ToyMachine78 · 03/25/2014, 10:33 PM

I agree with falcon. RType was a huge name in the arcades. Blazing Lazers is a great game, but the name is so generic it would not have drawn as much attention as RType. I remember going from rtype, to double dragon, to dragon slayer dropping many quarters. Oh yeah Black Knight and Kiss pinball too

waynedoodle · 03/25/2014, 10:49 PM

I don't remember what it was for me wanting a Turbografx. 1991 and a freshman in high school with my twin brother made some cash running a haunted house. I guess it was Splatterhouse expectations which would later lead to a Christmas gift Turbo-CD. We used the CD thtu our Freshman year in college wearing out the gears in the process. Someday I hope to get it repaird. Loved the turbografx!