Turbografx-16. Is it worth collecting/playing?

[snes_collector | 56]

It may not be worth it to collect for, but it is definitely worth it to play. Buy a CoreGrafx and a SD System 3 and you will be good for a lifetime

[Sumez | 2,930]

10 hours ago, asmikace said:

Problem is if you haven't started collecting early or have a six figure salary its too pricey to collect.

That's not true. Prices have gone up a lot, but it's not worse off than say the SNES which has experienced the same hike.

There are a few super pricey titles, but that's true for any platform. A bunch of those aren't really worth bothering with either.

Hell one of the major must-own titles for the system, Dracula X: Rondo of Blood, has practically not increased at all since I bought my copy 17 years ago!

Edited December 13, 2019 by Sumez

[hyrulevyse | 151]

7 hours ago, Sumez said:

That's not true. Prices have gone up a lot, but it's not worse off than say the SNES which has experienced the same hike.

There are a few super pricey titles, but that's true for any platform. A bunch of those aren't really worth bothering with either.

Hell one of the major must-own titles for the system, Dracula X: Rondo of Blood, has practically not increased at all since I bought my copy 17 years ago!

Yeah it's funny how this one has always been around $150.  Back in the day Rondo and Radiant Silvergun were the two most expensive imports and neither one has increased that much.

[Tanooki | 4,929]

17 hours ago, Sumez said:

That's not true. Prices have gone up a lot, but it's not worse off than say the SNES which has experienced the same hike.

There are a few super pricey titles, but that's true for any platform. A bunch of those aren't really worth bothering with either.

Hell one of the major must-own titles for the system, Dracula X: Rondo of Blood, has practically not increased at all since I bought my copy 17 years ago!

I kind of want to like this post, and you're right as strange as it is about Dracula X as it's true and strangely another that has been flat and also is a konami game is Gradius II.  But so much more at least on the Japanese side has gotten at varying exponential levels quite bad.  I started to poke around looking at some titles I used to own mostly JP, a few US, and the prices are just sick compared to before the TG16 craze set in and then the PCE side as the Japanese figure out what was up with importers.  There used to be a lot of basic pack-in titles or cheap in general $10 type stuff that is anything but now.  Off the radar shooters like Rayxanber2 and 3 are like 5x their old price, Cotton is up like 3x over retail and notably more over used as is Godzilla.  A weird one would be the Gate of THunder/Bonk(Genjin) multi-game disc that used to be anything from $5-20 depending how nice, now it's like a $100 game.  I know I'm randomly shaking a stick at stuff as there are quite a few cheap enough (say $10-30) games still, but I think it got worse than the SNES and NES ever did.

[Sumez | 2,930]

  

On 12/14/2019 at 3:08 AM, Tanooki said:

and strangely another that has been flat and also is a konami game is Gradius II

In general, for a genre that typically tends to attract the worst price inflations, Konami shooters have been pretty good at dodging that bullet, the same goes on Saturn.

Salamander, Detana Twinbee and Gradius are all very affordable, and the PC Engine version of each of them are some of the best conversions of each game - if not better than the arcade.

On 12/14/2019 at 3:08 AM, Tanooki said:

A weird one would be the Gate of THunder/Bonk(Genjin) multi-game disc that used to be anything from $5-20 depending how nice, now it's like a $100 game.

Whoa, that really caught me off guard! Yeah, I think I paid like $5 for that one. Definitely weird!

I'm not saying there haven't been a few awful price hikes - there are plenty. But like I said this goes for most popular retro platforms over the past 5+ years, with Nintendo platforms, Saturn and arcade probably having taken the worst hit.

But still, if I were to pick my top 30 or so games for the PC Engine, at least half of them should still be at least as affordable as most major SNES or NES titles. Meanwhile I wouldn't recommend anyone get into Saturn at this point.

[AstralSoul | 502]

TG16 - worth playing? Absolutely. While it might not be as iconic or have as diverse a library as Genesis or SNES, it's got some great games on it and it plays pretty well overall.

Worth collecting? Hmm, well that's up to the individual. It seems to be generally more pricey than SNES or Genesis, especially the systems themselves. The library is much smaller than either of those so with that comes the positives of not having to worry about as many games while the negative of having less to choose from. Personally, for me, it's not worth the price to collect for but I think a certain niche of collectors will absolutely love the system. 

[tbone3969 | 304]

Wait for the Turbo Mini to come out and scoop up all the cheap original games when they drop in price.

[TDIRunner | 2,721]

I'm probably repeating a lot, but I didn't read through the entire thread first.  

I love the PC Engine, but I have no desire to collect for it.  I originally bought a Core Grafx and a Turbo Everdrive which allowed me to play all Hu Card based games.  I eventually upgraded to a PC Engine Duo R with a component mod and an Arcade Card.  Now I can play the same Hu Card games from before, plus all CD based games including the Arcade games.  Since I have the Everdrive and a CD burner, I can play just about anything without having to buy games.  I love playing them, but I don't have enough nostalgia for the system to justify paying the going prices for the games. 

My suggestion would be to do something similar to what I did.  The PC Engine stuff is a lot cheaper and easier to find.  Buy the Japanese hardware and then go with one of the many ways to play ROMs and ISOs, or just play them on the Raspberry Pie.   

[Tanooki | 4,929]

15 hours ago, TDIRunner said:

I'm probably repeating a lot, but I didn't read through the entire thread first.  

I love the PC Engine, but I have no desire to collect for it.  I originally bought a Core Grafx and a Turbo Everdrive which allowed me to play all Hu Card based games.  I eventually upgraded to a PC Engine Duo R with a component mod and an Arcade Card.  Now I can play the same Hu Card games from before, plus all CD based games including the Arcade games.  Since I have the Everdrive and a CD burner, I can play just about anything without having to buy games.  I love playing them, but I don't have enough nostalgia for the system to justify paying the going prices for the games. 

My suggestion would be to do something similar to what I did.  The PC Engine stuff is a lot cheaper and easier to find.  Buy the Japanese hardware and then go with one of the many ways to play ROMs and ISOs, or just play them on the Raspberry Pie.   

We think alike, a lot.  Over two years ago returned to NEC with a CG2, then weeks ago I got a heavily modded Turbo Duo.  I grabbed a PCEverdrive a little over a year ago as well, and now I can run CDs/SCDs and burns, see no good reason to grab for my interests the arcade card.  While the TG16 library was borderline meh, the PCE library would put the Genesis in its place, third, behind it and Nintendo at the time, just as it very well did in Japan.  The system is fantastic, underground fantastic outside Japan even if you knew the TG16 well given the quite diverse and far bigger library we got left out in the cold over.

[TDIRunner | 2,721]

10 hours ago, Tanooki said:

We think alike, a lot.  Over two years ago returned to NEC with a CG2, then weeks ago I got a heavily modded Turbo Duo.  I grabbed a PCEverdrive a little over a year ago as well, and now I can run CDs/SCDs and burns, see no good reason to grab for my interests the arcade card.  While the TG16 library was borderline meh, the PCE library would put the Genesis in its place, third, behind it and Nintendo at the time, just as it very well did in Japan.  The system is fantastic, underground fantastic outside Japan even if you knew the TG16 well given the quite diverse and far bigger library we got left out in the cold over.

I would agree on the part about the Arcade Card except for the fact that I basically got mine for free.  When I bought my Duo R, I paid the going rate at the time, but I was also able to get an Arcade Card (CIB), multi-tap, 6 button pad and 2 button pad thrown in for the price.  Overall, I did pretty well.  

Since I kept my Core Grafx, if I ever get around to getting a Super SD System 3 or similar, I might be able to sell my Duo R, Arcade Card and Everdrive since they would be covered by the Super SD System 3.  I just haven't decided to pull the trigger on that yet.  

[Tanooki | 4,929]

10 hours ago, TDIRunner said:

I would agree on the part about the Arcade Card except for the fact that I basically got mine for free.  When I bought my Duo R, I paid the going rate at the time, but I was also able to get an Arcade Card (CIB), multi-tap, 6 button pad and 2 button pad thrown in for the price.  Overall, I did pretty well.  

Since I kept my Core Grafx, if I ever get around to getting a Super SD System 3 or similar, I might be able to sell my Duo R, Arcade Card and Everdrive since they would be covered by the Super SD System 3.  I just haven't decided to pull the trigger on that yet.  

Fair enough, my issue isn't so much the price of the card (or Sapphire as I'd burn that in protest)   My problem is the most interesting stuff is Neo-Geo and I've got those for real or the 161in1 cart for my cabinet and that's far better than the port.  I've still got the CG2 too put into a drawer, but I'm probably just going to sell it because either way the Duo has all those added mods to it while the CG is bare bones.  I'll never buy the SSD3 device given the trouble they caused, problems it had, and honestly given it's not making a real improvement and just simulating discs (which I can burn anyway) it's a waste of money.  If someone can pop out a sub $300 unit that runs HDMI and optical simulated, then I'd make a move, though if someone made a POUND like cable I could pop into the Duo that gave it a sharp clean image over HDMI I'd take that first (cheaper, no loss of hardware.)

[TDIRunner | 2,721]

1 hour ago, Tanooki said:

Fair enough, my issue isn't so much the price of the card (or Sapphire as I'd burn that in protest)   My problem is the most interesting stuff is Neo-Geo and I've got those for real or the 161in1 cart for my cabinet and that's far better than the port.  I've still got the CG2 too put into a drawer, but I'm probably just going to sell it because either way the Duo has all those added mods to it while the CG is bare bones.  I'll never buy the SSD3 device given the trouble they caused, problems it had, and honestly given it's not making a real improvement and just simulating discs (which I can burn anyway) it's a waste of money.  If someone can pop out a sub $300 unit that runs HDMI and optical simulated, then I'd make a move, though if someone made a POUND like cable I could pop into the Duo that gave it a sharp clean image over HDMI I'd take that first (cheaper, no loss of hardware.)

The biggest thing for me with the SSD3 is the ability to play CD based games without the moving parts of the CD drive.  The Core Grafx is way more reliable long term, plus I don't have to worry about keeping my CD burner going either since those are also starting to get more difficult to find.  Although, with that said, if I'm truly looking really long term, I'll probably eventually just switch over to emulation on a raspberry pie.  There will eventually be a point where it's too expensive to keep the original hardware going to justify it.  Like I said before, I don't have the nostalgia for the PC Engine, so going with emulation isn't nearly as big of a deal as it would be for NES/SNES ect.  

[Tanooki | 4,929]

23 hours ago, TDIRunner said:

The biggest thing for me with the SSD3 is the ability to play CD based games without the moving parts of the CD drive.  The Core Grafx is way more reliable long term, plus I don't have to worry about keeping my CD burner going either since those are also starting to get more difficult to find.  Although, with that said, if I'm truly looking really long term, I'll probably eventually just switch over to emulation on a raspberry pie.  There will eventually be a point where it's too expensive to keep the original hardware going to justify it.  Like I said before, I don't have the nostalgia for the PC Engine, so going with emulation isn't nearly as big of a deal as it would be for NES/SNES ect.  

I probably shouldn't I suppose, I didn't get in with the TG when it dropped at the end of the 80s, I got in around I think 1997-98 when I got a Duo.  I do agree on the moving parts issue, had a hell of a time with the Duo when it arrived due to improper packing/handling that damaged it.  I can see the fear of that failing again but I can work on them if need be, and if the price gets too nasty I can burn CDs just fine and I have an everdrive to bypass hucard BIN trolls too.  Eventually if it just fail fails, oh well, as long as I have a PC with an optical drive my discs are good and ROMs are ROMs so it's all good if need be.

[Mogg | 4]

The TG16 is definitely worth playing, I have a coregrafx with super system sd 3 and a few games. Since I do not feel nostagic for the system whatsoever I doubt I'll be seriously collecting for the system like I did with most of the nintendo consoles I had when growing up.