Retrocomputing: Why Bother? Special: Fun with the Commodore 1084 Monitor! Duo Style!

As we have seen in previous posts, the Commodore 1084 is a lovely piece of kit that is excellent for making your computer's video output be nice and wonderful.

Since I am lazy here is that information on my blog so one can catch up:  http://wargamedork.blogspot.com/2013/05/more-fun-with-commodore-1084-monitor.html
Also it itself has links to more info I have on it.

With all the lovely knobs and dials you can even tweak color and brightness back in the days where the games themselves gave no damns.

(Please click for bigger if you would like.)

 You can turn MEH.

Into: Not as meh!

Meh!

A hell of a lot LESS meh, eh?

 Or those funny black buttons on the front and back and just go full black and white without messing with color settings.

(If I haven't mentioned these are screencaps from an actual monitor taken with a camera and then given a light edit with Sony Playmemories.  Which kind of sucks but it is free till I get an iPad Air with iPhoto and that photo dongle thingie.)

Of course based on the color choices done by developer, some games like this RPG based on Ali Baba (with a Greek mythology game on the other side!) where you can have multiple players with their own character are only going to look so good...

But.. there is another handy thing this little wonder monitor can do as one of my links mentioned:

RUN YO CONSOLE GAMES.

Given how most modern HDTVs don't even bother having S Video inputs which is really the other best choice for retro gaming, and even then it only does so much depending on system and console:

32" 1080 HDTV.  SNES.  S Video with "smart" fullscreening.  Some softening of pixels and a very light color bleed visible even to the naked eye and not just this 14.1 megapixel camera.

And Chuckles.  

Always must you hound me Bueche?  

Game Boy Color games with original GB capability and preset Super Game Boy palettes. From a sub 3 inch screen (diagonal) to the better part of  24 out of the HDTV's 32 as is the Super Game Boy's wont.  I AM DOING IT WRONG.

Or am I doing it very very RIGHT?  I shall have to test my Game Boy Player on my Gamecube with various video output solutions to be sure.  And plug the Commodore 1084 back in and try composite mode for both GB solutions.  Game sounds FANTASTIC coming out of 5.1 speaker setup though.  Even if the composer does deny his nation's WW2 atrocities.  :(

But the main point here is to show a good friend that SA forums and IRC bros (irc.synirc.net #retrochat) Vkeios and Acid Police inspired me to do.  Kind of.  

To take out my long traveled and much abused pal, the Turbo Duo.  One of the best looking pieces of game electronics ever made, especially in its' Japanese form where it has some blue and violet buttons, and even glorious white and off white models.

An upgraded Turbografx 16 which I have showed in my epic Let's Play of Dungeons & Dragons: Order of the Griffon this one included the nearly 200K ram booster that the earlier PC Engine US model the Tg16 is did not have built in.  The Duo ran about what a Sega CD unit ran at the time and came with a buttload of amazing games making it a no brainer to get new games and to jump on the CD game and music revolution!

(My first music CD?  Tribute.  Ozzy.  Randy.  Live.  Hell yeah!)

My Duo has been on multiple airline trips.  Shipped multiple states in the mail.  Had stupid anime stickers up over the white military stencil marker I used to ensure no effective theft of my machine would happen.  (People in the Navy would steal your damn sweat covered ball cap if they needed one themselves for work!  Hell, they stole E7 rating hats!)

One of these days I will use some Goo Gone and Simple Green and bring this sucker back to its shiniest possible, removing all Naval influence.  You can see right next to the main unit is the 5 player adaptor.  Because the Turbo consoles only had a single built in controller port.  I guess it kept the price down and the inherent looks nice but it does add a giant dongle in the front if you want to go multiplayer.

 And what I will be using to play this puppy today!  The enormous power brick that takes up like 3 spaces on a power strip in spite of not even being a polarity two prong plug, the Turbostick joystick controller I got a pair of for 10 dollars each when you could still buy some Turbografx products from the company behind the Duo and the last gasp at saving the Turbo in the US from NEC's own incompetence, and the composite cables that are standard on the Duo. (These were not standard on the Turbografx or the original PC Engine model.)

And the dongle that was like five dollars which STILL made the Turbosticks cheaper than getting more official control pads. 

Well let's plug it all in and get to gaming!

We shall start with the game in the unit, probably having been there for the years it has been since I last played this machine which was all covered with dust.  (I felt bad because it was super dusty and gave it a dusting with one of those tickler dusty thingies, then a wipedown with a slightly moist paper towel, then a dry with another one.)

 I use this legendary classic known as Splatterhouse to get the turbo settings juuust right and to get used to the controller.  Look at the crisp pixels and lines on this monitor.  While the stock settings of the 1084 obviously aren't perfect with some overscan issues and a bit of color bleed to have things vivid enough it looks VERY good!

 I sadly failed the shotgun drop trick via having said gun fall into a pit.  I still owned this guy.

 My second least favorite boss in the game.  Note I have the Golden Cleaver.  I was once gonna dress up as TG 16 Rick for Halloween, spraypainting a glow in the dark cleaver while leaving the soft edge glowy.  Sadly I was unhappy with how my mask was turning out and scrapped that plan.

 HELP MEEEEE!!!

 The manual says you are fighting through the Birth Canal.  Rick is in a giant hoo hoo punching giant bubble floating fetus monsters.  There is.. something off here...

I am totally blaming the controller for me dying on the final boss.  But not bad for a no continue run if I do say so myself.  While I am no Caitlin of the SA forums and Splatterhouse/making Famicoms look GOOD fame, I do alright for myself.  (Protip: Don't turn turbo to maximum.  It makes it so you don't always attack PERIOD.)

(I should probably compare it to the Wii Virtual Console release of this same game on said system using Component cables or the PS3's arcade original emulated as a bonus on the game of the same name.  Eh.  Maybe later or in another post.)

 My Little Working Designs: Victor Weeabooland is.. well not Magic but he is something.  (This is Parasol Stars.  It kicks ass.)

 World Court Tennis! It has no pause in game so I cannot show you how short the women's skirts are.  Panty shots would never been seen on a Nintendo game.  We shouldn't see them PERIOD but sadly Japan will be Japan.

 The real reason I bought this game.

 IT HAS AN RPG MODE WHERE YOU PLAY TENNIS FOR YOUR COMBATS.  This is so brilliantly stupid I can't help but adore it.

Let's bring a little SUPER CD-ROM(2) into this shizzy.  Will the 1x CD drive still work?  

 Crispy animu hero face shows up!

 What are we buying this stuff for?

 The music starts rocking with hard guitar stuff.  It can mean only one thing:

 LORDS 

OF

THUNDER

 My only regret is that my 1084 isn't the later S model with stereo sound.

Let's do one more game and call it a day shall we?

 OH GOD ITS MINMEI!  RUN! RUUUUUUUNNNN!!!

 Macross 2036!  Gotten relatively cheaply at like 25 bucks or so.  I have seen this game going for Rondo of Blood prices before which is fricking stupid.  Hell it is stupid for said Castlevania game!  Or any game really.

 Some more animu so we can see our alternate history Macross Valkyrie being all Macross.. Valkyrie.

 Transforming seems to just happen when they tell you it will.  I can't read Japanese so no idea if I can go to Gerwalk (Guardian if you are Robotech) mode or not.  It's pretty fun but I have it on Easy and Slow bullets.  Because this game is a ONE HIT AND DIE SHMUP otherwise.  Thankfully not too power up dependent and your extra lives access right then and there.  No Gradius checkpoint crap.

A quick trio of in game shots from an emulator for comparison:
(Magic Engine Emulator and uploaded to Facebook.)

This folks, is Magic Engine's screencaps at the normal TurboDuo resolution.

 This uses the Macross movie as canon and thus all the looks and designs are meant as a sequel of sorts to that movie.  (The anime Macross 2 takes place like 35 or so years after this.  So its part of an alternate continuity.)

Yes friends, emulation or game consoles with no region lock out (at least for CDROM games.  In the Duo's case I would need a converter card to play HuCard games.  Though what those things go for these days (about a hundo) I might as well just buy one of the later PC Engine models for Japanese HuCard titles.  It would be about the same price.  Sadly the nicest looking PC Engine is only RF output without the CD Dock.  And the two cooler options are VERY expensive. (Supergrafx and PC Engine Shuttle) Or you know.. I could just buy the cards and play in an emulator.  Not as authentic but.. it does well.  Save States and being able to take PC screenshots and do Let's Plays has some advantages even if this is more legit.

But sadly this being a Japanese game and on the NEC PC Engine family we have to have some serious character development of our main heroine:

(NSFW probably.)


Don't tell Harmony Gold.

Especially don't tell them I also own Macross games on the Dreamcast, Saturn, and Playstation Portable and am thinking about seeing if I can eventually collect a complete Macross/Robotech game collection.


They will get mad.  These are people who sent lawyers after Bandai and Hasbro.  Companies who make more money in a week than Harmony Gold probably does in a YEAR.

(Seriously this might be NSFW so take this as a friendly warning.)

Oh Japan.  Oh PC Engine and your T&A games.  Their failure of a follow up console was apparently nothing but this.  If not more hardcore.

(I guess it IS less revealing than many of the outfits or going ons in many recent Tecmo games or the Rumble Roses games.  Or many Soul Calibur character outfits.  This isn't saying much.  Japan please join us here in the 21st century please.  Also switch to English so I can more easily play your turn based wargames and RPGs.)

So there we go!  Another great use of a good composite monitor!  Not just playing your classic computer games at their historical best, but your console titles too.

While I am primarily a computer gamer there are dozens and dozens of console titles I love as well.

More Let's Play is Coming.

But this newest update is friggin HUGE so its taking some time.  Plus I am sort of looking over new goodies and distractions:

The PS3 game "Splatterhouse" is taking up a bit of my time.  Its a 3d brawler with Quick Time Events (Think Dragon's Lair/Space Ace type PRESS X AND LEFT NOW sort of gameplay) for boss/"Splatter Kills", and 2d with 3d graphics gameplay sections.  2 College students go to the mansion of Professor West who has nefarious things in mind, capturing Jennifer, and leaving her boyfriend Rick to die.  Yet an ancient mask makes a deal to save Rick.  All he has to do is put the Terror Mask on and power will be his..)

And considering this is his girlfriend I can completely understand our hero Rick willing to put his very soul on the line to save her, even if the Terror Mask takes great glee in reading his mind and egging his dark side to take control, killing and slaughtering monsters in massively horrific and bloody ways..

While playing the game in story and survival modes you find picture fragments, many of which I am unable to show on my blog as they are very R rated.  This one even comes close to being too risque.  I had to play one Survival mode arena like 3-4 times to get all the fragments for this one.  But when you complete it, you get more information on Rick & Jennifer's relationship so its possibly the first time in my 3 decades of videogame playing where I am actively trying to unlock everything even fanservice pictures.  Just so I can know more about them.

You also unlock journal entries of the Bad Doctor, excellently voiced over in case you can't read the cursive script.  It even makes him a bit of a sympathetic villain, describing what turned him into the vile killer that he is.

You also unlock 3 of the 4 previous Splatterhouse games!  The arcade original which had a port on the Turbografx and one of my favorite videogames of all time and the reason I bought this disk, and the 2 Genesis sequels.  (This game is basically a remake of the first, but far more graphic.)

The emulation seems pretty good.  If its got a filter on the graphics I can't seriously tell.  I think it does but its done in a way to not be blatant.  It doesn't look like the games have Vaseline smeared all over the screen.  Its not widescreen so there are black bars to the left and right sides.  But the picture takes up most of the screen so you shouldn't notice it.  This is from Splatterhouse 3 which turned the side scrolling platform gameplay of 1 and 2 into a TIMED Double Dragon/Final Fight/TMNT styled brawler with multiple cutscenes and endings based on your performance.

And the 30-45 minutes or so Survival mode in action.  20 waves of enemy monsters, a picture to collect in each of the 6 arenas you unlock through the story mode, and even a ranking for completing it.  The purple bar is your life, the red your blood meter which charges as you kill things.  It can be used to cause super kills, regenerate life, or go into a powered up super mode which even kills lower level bosses fast and without the need for the Quick Time Event kills you normally need to do.  At least when the game doesn't bug out.  Which it does from time to time sadly.  Not often but now and then.  Not too bad in story mode which saves you at checkpoints every 5-10 minutes or so, but when you play in Survival for 40 minutes having it bug out REALLY SUCKS.   Yes I am a sad dork for wanting all the pictures but.. I need to hear everything about Rick & Jen's relationship.  Its just.. half of them are R rated ones.  Though my favorite is one with her fully dressed hugging a stuffed mascot dog.  Rick is such a dork.   A dork with a Mastodon Tee shirt.  (The game has music by them and Five Finger Death Punch among other modern metal bands.  The kinds some of the local 40K crowd listen to.  Who say nothing is music unless it has "Breakdowns" whatever the hell that means...)

In story mode once you complete the first level and if you survive a Survival mode arena you can use your score to buy improved powers for Rick.  More life, new combos and attack moves, extended weapons use, ect.  In story after level 1 you can hit Select and upgrade at any time, your points constantly upgrading.  Sadly Survival only gives you points or allows upgrading AFTER finishing the arena.  You probably won't be getting far in any of the arenas without Health, Mask, and Weapons charged way up.  Roughly around the 3-5th story mode level.  A nice thing though is your points accrue in story even when you die so it does help make things easier.  Which is good because I died a LOT on Level 1 till I understood the mechanics and the game introduced me to how to regenerate health.

And my birthday gift to myself.  From 3 different hopefully not radioactive (donate to disaster relief charities of your choices folks.  Between the stuff going on in Japan, New Zealand & Australia, Mass, and the midwest there are a LOT of communities that could use a helping hand!) places in Japan I got a model kit of Phantasy Star Online's  favorite maid/tutorialbot (what is it with Japan and maids anyhow?  I guess it beats a schoolgirl outfit at least..) Elenor since I am a total whore for anything Phantasy Star.

And 2 TurboDuo/Pc Engine CDROM games.  The 4th or 5th remake of Valis, and the PC Engine version of Valis 4.  Both of which are apparently the best versions of these platforming action games where you take a Japanese schoolgirl and kill demons in a fantasy land.  I chose the third game (Valis 3 DUH), and Star Control as my birthday game choices when I was 16 waaaay back in the early 90s and it just seemed appropriate to finish up the series collection.  Though I do need the superdeformed remake of part 2.  (There is also a Japan only cellphone game and thus unobtainable.  And sadly a computer game that does what Japan normally does with high school girls and demons in it.  Turbografx and Valis fans don't like talking about it.  Thankfully it went away quickly as such disgusting garbage should.   Way to go Japan.  Sicko stuff is why their entertainment industries are taking a pounding on the world stage.  Make stuff for creepy perverts and normal people run away screaming.)

Whenever I finish my Order of the Griffon Let's Play I might cover either the model kit or the Valis series as my next project.  

You know, provided I quit playing the "Good" but flawed Splatterhouse.   If you can find this game for 20 its worth it, though the bugs and minor gameplay irritations might be a factor.  But I loved the original on the Turbografx and enjoyed to varying levels the 2 Genesis sequels so I have some nostalgia for the property.  Mainstream sites were REALLY hard on it, but fans seemed to enjoy it. 

I'm easily distracted AND work has me busier this last year than I have been in close to a decade.  But the next LP installment is already 8 pages long and only about 2/3rds done.  So work is progressing.