Konami Anniversary Collection

[Tokyo-J]

Did not see a thread for this so made one.

Came out April 18th originally.

Includes the following titles

Haunted Castle
A-Jax (aka Typhoon)
Gradius
Gradius 2
Life Force
Thunder Cross
Scramble
TwinBee


Just thought everyone should know that Konami has released a Patch that adds TATE mode.

Version 1.0.2 adds TATE mode support to A-JAX, Scramble and TwinBee.

[clippa]

Also available on PS4, Xbox One and PC, unless this is a thread specifically for the switch version.

[Tokyo-J]

Also available on PS4, Xbox One and PC, unless this is a thread specifically for the switch version.

Fixed

[Ajora]

Why on Earth did they decide to include Haunted Castle? Playing that game is torturous. And why are the PC system requirements as high as they are?

[Tokyo-J]

Why on Earth did they decide to include Haunted Castle? Playing that game is torturous. And why are the PC system requirements as high as they are?

I know right I can play these no issues on my OG Xbox.

[EmperorIng]

I'm glad they also patched in the ability to play Japanese ROMs, but the fact they didn't think of that first-hand is pretty worrisome. Who was in charge of these ports?

[BrianC]

I'm glad they also patched in the ability to play Japanese ROMs, but the fact they didn't think of that first-hand is pretty worrisome. Who was in charge of these ports?

They did? I have the JP version and the updated version with tate doesn't have the US ROMs, only the JP versions.

[EmperorIng]

Ha ha ha, consider yourself lucky??

As I understand, it was something specifically requested for the western release, because the western versions of Thunder Cross and Ajax are dogshit.

[BrianC]

Ha ha ha, consider yourself lucky??

As I understand, it was something specifically requested for the western release, because the western versions of Thunder Cross and Ajax are dogshit.

oh ok. I wasn't sure if they added the JP versions to the US version yet or if they just added tate for now (Nintendolife only announced that tate was added to the western release).

[Marc]

Ha ha ha, consider yourself lucky??

As I understand, it was something specifically requested for the western release, because the western versions of Thunder Cross and Ajax are dogshit.

Ajax is pretty ropey anyway, but the US version... fuck who on earth signed off on those changes?

[clippa]

why are the PC system requirements as high as they are?

They posted a message on the steam page

The necessary system requirements were previously listed incorrectly. This error has been fixed, so please be sure to check the actual system requirements which are now displayed. We apologize for any inconvenience this has caused.

The minimum is now

OS: Windows 10 - 64bit
Processor: Intel Core-i3 4160
Memory: 4 GB RAM
Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 4400 (VRAM 128MB)
DirectX: Version 11
Storage: 300 MB available space
Sound Card: DirectX 11 compatible
Additional Notes: 1280 x 720 monitor resolution

Unless that's what you were referring to.
I can't think of any reason to install windows 10. I'd just stick to mame if you're wanting to play these on pc.

[StrzxgvNuvWvfld]

Before I buy this, can anybody confirm the EU Switch version was patched to play the Japanese versions? I've been googling with no luck!

[Stanshall]

Not yet but I understand that it's coming.

[StrzxgvNuvWvfld]

Not yet but I understand that it's coming.

Thanks, I may just buy the Japanese version then!

[PepsimanVsJoe]

I'm way late on this, but here's my review:

http://www.cubed3.com/review/5497/1/kon ... witch.html

It's a huge write-up, but covers all 8 games with some detail.

Personally, I'd advise holding off on this set until the region-select patch arrives.

[awbacon]

Would it kill Konami to let someone like M2 remake or port Tobe! Polystars to a modern system. Such a fun shmup that is locked down to rare and expensive hardware

[StrzxgvNuvWvfld]

I'm way late on this, but here's my review:

http://www.cubed3.com/review/5497/1/kon ... witch.html

It's a huge write-up, but covers all 8 games with some detail.

Personally, I'd advise holding off on this set until the region-select patch arrives.

About the Life Force stage 4 boss, Salamander (which was also released in Europe) has the same issue. There are actually a couple of safe spots so you can just let the boss time out. Once you've passed it once, it barely shoots at all the next time you reach it and so it becomes incredibly easy. I loved Salamander as a kid (stages 1 and 3 were so amazing at the time, like nothing I'd seen before), so I have a real soft spot for it. Sadly it does have a number of quirks though which is a real shame.

Also, rather than the NES as an alternative, take a look at the PC Engine version. It's quite close to the arcade in many ways, but fixes a lot of the irritations.

[Jonny2x4]

I was under the impression the omission of regional variants for each game was a deliberate design in order to force you into buying the stand-alone Arcade Archive releases of each game.

Ajax is pretty ropey anyway, but the US version... fuck who on earth signed off on those changes?

I'm not sure if it was conscious decision by the original Japanese developers or something Konami of America's marketing people imposed with their meddling, but Konami had a habit of buffing the difficulty of their games for their U.S. variants of their game. Some people assumed it was because of the difference in arcade culture between Japanese and American players, but they even did this in some of their console games like Bayou Billy and Castlevania III, which received ridiculous difficulty buffs.

The most interesting example of this was Dark Adventure, a sort-of cross between Contra and Gauntlet which seems to had been made primarily for the U.S. market in mind. You get tons of power-ups in that game, but you never get much of an opportunity to use them since your health bar decreases just like Gauntlet, but at a ridiculous fast rate and since that game has lives instead of accumulative hit points, you quickly revert back to your default melee weapon. The Japanese and World revisions, Majū no Ōkoku and Devil World respectively, reduce the rate of the health drain and gave every character a range weapon instead, but they also took out some of the more interesting features of the U.S. version like the free-roaming levels and the Player 3 character.

[BurlyHeart]

I had read the rental market was big factor for increasing the difficulty in the US.

[Tokyo-J]

The game has been patched in the USA to include Japanese versions in this and the Contra and Castlevania collections. Button Remapping feature also included for Castlevania and Contra Collections

[BrianC]

The game has been patched in the USA to include Japanese versions in this and the Contra and Castlevania collections. Button Remapping feature also included for Castlevania and Contra Collections

I assume the US/EU arcade collection was also updated? Japanese Arcade collection was also updated to include the western versions. AFAIK, JP Life Force isn't included.

[Jonpachi]

Playing the Japanese version of Contra: Hard Corp after the update. Never knew it had a lifebar or I would have picked up the import years ago. It suddenly becomes easy-breezy "casual" Contra. I feel lazy even playing it, but it's fun!

[Krimzon Kitzune]

I don't own the game yet on Steam, but it would appear there are issues with it crashing in offline mode (going by the steam forums for Arcade Anniversary). For those of you concerned with that sorta thing, might be best to wait and see if they patch it up.

[Master O]

Can I assume this collection will never make it to GOG?

[evil_ash_xero]

How's the lag on this? What kind of video options does it have? Filters? Scanlines?
From what I have read, this was done by Hamster. I'm not nuts about the lag in some of the games on the Switch. But the Switch and lag go like peanut butter and jelly. Maybe they
just didn't have the skillz needed to figure it out.

I would really like to play Xexex on a console, rather than a handheld.

[BrianC]

I don't own the game yet on Steam, but it would appear there are issues with it crashing in offline mode (going by the steam forums for Arcade Anniversary). For those of you concerned with that sorta thing, might be best to wait and see if they patch it up.

I ended up getting a refund because the steam version of the Arcade Collection gave me a black screen whenever I tried to run a game in the collection. This was in online mode and, telling from the forums, it sounds like others had similar issues running the game.

[bcass]

I've noticed that the horizontal ship movement in Gradius in this collection seems slightly jerky:

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

It's more prominent after selecting a speed-up. I'm playing the Steam release. I don't remember the arcade version having this jerky movement. Has anyone else noticed this issue in this collection? Thunder Cross also seems slightly jerky as well.

[BIL]

On consoles, that's usually the result of a 60hz machine (like a PS4) emulating a non-60hz game at hardware-accurate speed. The further from 60hz the emulated hardware's refresh rate gets, the more noticeable the chop on moving sprites/backgrounds.

Unfortunately, I don't have a 60hz capture setup. I just recorded some clips of ACA Gradius, ShotTriggers Dangun, and ACA X-Multiply to illustrate, but between the 30fps PS4 capture and Youtube, they ended up looking near-identical. Past time I stopped slumming it, tbh. Suffice to say, in person: Gradius (60hz board)'s ship movement is near-seamless. Dangun (57.5hz) chops a bit. X-Multiply (55hz) is by far the most affected. There's also ACA Super Cobra, which lets you run at board speed (60.6hz) for a bit of chop, or 60hz for none. Spoilered below, FWIW.

Spoiler

Arcade Archives: Gradius (PS4) - Next to no visible chop during horizontal ship movement. MAME lists PCB refresh rate @ 60hz.

ShotTriggers: Dangun Feveron (PS4) - Fairly noticeable. MAME lists PCB @ 57.5hz

ACA: X-Multiply (PS4) - Very noticeable chop. MAME lists PCB @ 55hz.

There's also Super Cobra, which MAME puts at 60.6hz. The Arcade Archives version includes a Preference Option to run the game at board-accurate speed, which causes the landscape to chop noticeably, or sync to 60hz, which eliminates it.

ACA: Super Cobra (PS4) (PCB sync) vs (60hz sync)

The console stuff drove me mental at first, but once I got stuck in I was surprised at how quickly I forgot about it. It also reminded me that back on 360, even though Gulti's superlative Raiden Fighters Aces allowed for 60hz speed, I'd always go with the SPI speed despite the noticeable chop. Hardcore action gaming is felt as much as seen, imo.

Being on PC, I'd guess you might have more options for forcing either your display or the applications to run at synchronised rates.

[bcass]

I'm aware of the issue you describe when there's a disparity between original coin-op framerate and the framerate of the user's monitor when emulated. However, my PC is set to run at 60Hz, the same rate that the Gradius coin-op ran at. I tested on MAME, and the ship movement is smooth, although I'm getting occasional music stuttering, possibly due to the older version of MAME I'm using (0.213). Is there a recommended ROM set for shmups on MAME, or is everyone using ShmupArch these days?

[trap15]

MAME even says Gradius is 60.606060...Hz refresh, not 60. That's the cause. If it's not jerking at all on your setup, it's probably because you have MAME set to adjust game refresh rate to display refresh rate.