Great to have Extra confirmed!
Glad I'm not the only one who instantly thought of Hissatsu Buraiken, haha.
I wonder if the music will be in tact? I'm guessing they didn't have a license for Somewhere Over the Rainbow (80s games are full of that sort of thing) and the PS1 and PS2 versions both had modified tunes. The recent Egret release does have the original music though, so that's perhaps a good sign.
An earlier post mentioned that some of the music was replaced with music from the NES version. Some of the music was changed in Rainbow Islands Extra on the Egret II mini. There's a disclaimer that the game was censored from the original.StrzxgvNuvWvfld wrote: ↑Sat Jan 06, 2024 5:49 pm I wonder if the music will be in tact? I'm guessing they didn't have a license for Somewhere Over the Rainbow (80s games are full of that sort of thing) and the PS1 and PS2 versions both had modified tunes. The recent Egret release does have the original music though, so that's perhaps a good sign.
I mean this one: Bubble Bobble also featuring Rainbow Islands PS1 in particular. I had this.StrzxgvNuvWvfld wrote: ↑Sat Jan 06, 2024 5:49 pmI wonder if the music will be in tact? I'm guessing they didn't have a license for Somewhere Over the Rainbow (80s games are full of that sort of thing) and the PS1 and PS2 versions both had modified tunes. The recent Egret release does have the original music though, so that's perhaps a good sign.
Great news this is finally on its way!
I worked at Probe at the time they were preparing Bubble Bobble/Rainbow Islands pack on PC and consoles. Probe's producers were aware of all the missing elements when I brought out this issue to them (they had the arcade games at the office, we played them every day though I wasn't involved with the conversion work myself, I was working on another game) and they actually wanted to make arcade perfect conversion, but Acclaim butted in and said no, use the code from the 16-bit ports (Amiga/ST) instead. So they did that, and instead wasted money on "updating" the graphics with totally unnecessary extra colors and adding horrible CGI intros to them. I think only things that were taken from PCB board were the graphics, for "updating".Bloodreign wrote: ↑Sun Jan 07, 2024 10:46 am Other than Over the Rainbow being changed for the Taito Memories release (unlike Taito Legends which just mutes the high notes, making the song a mess), I suppose for me that is still the best way to play both vanilla and Extra Rainbow Islands. I mean Empire Interactive around the time of the Legends releases put out a double pack on PC of Bubble Bobble and Rainbow Islands, and literally did NOT alter any music in it. I was shocked when I installed the thing on my PC (it was a PAL land only release that someone in the US was selling for a good price on Ebay, got it still around, just not installed on this PC), half expecting the main theme to be neutered, surprise, surprise, it wasn't.
It also shouldn't be confused with the earlier release Acclaim Bubble Bobble/Rainbow Islands pack on PC, and 32 bit consoles, that absolutely sucked, was missing the extra 3 hidden islands, and had it's music neutered all to hell and back.
The NES music is fine, but will feel extremely out of place on this release.
How the music sounded on Taito Memories (Yes, it's from the DS game, but better than being flat and lifeless):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCK-wAumY-U
Wow! Just goes to show how well thought out the game is. Is there any chance at all that document still exists anywhere??MJR wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 4:16 pm They even had a photocopy a design document supplemented for Taito, I assume the document was made to make porting work easier, it was same copy that Craftgold received to make the porting to 16-bit computers. But no one knew how to read japanese so it was useless. I did browse through it, and was amazed at the meticulous detail on how all the character movements and even smallest details on all elements of the gameplay were carefully explained.
I wonder why on Earth would they want them to do that. Acclaim had nothing to do with the old Graftgolds ports. But even if that were the case.
To save money, Acclaim demanded that they used source code from 16-bit ports. It was always all about money. Acclaim never gave a shit about anything else.Bassa-Bassa wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 6:20 pm Sadly enemy behaviour was not the only thing skimmed for the Bubble Bobble ports - many items subsystems were changed as well. Like if they weren't using the source code either, actually.
I wonder why on Earth would they want them to do that. Acclaim had nothing to do with the old Graftgolds ports. But even if that were the case.
Whoa, thanks!BIL wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 6:41 pm MJR you are one of our most #1 shumps bros dude ;-;7 Amazing to hear from someone on the inside BITD, with all the foibles of Acclaim et al. Godless penny-pinching fucks! Absolutely astonishing that those ol' shitbirds somehow got AI System Tokyo's Saturn Darius Gaiden, and VING's Saturn Rayforce to Western shores, BITD! I've been delinquent on your comic, gonna have to fix that soon.
For Switch, it's region dependent.
So I guess I'm out of luck in Europe >_>hamfighterx wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 10:36 pmFor Switch, it's region dependent.
* In North America, they drop with the Thursday weekly eShop update at 1700 UTC (noon Eastern/9am Pacific). I typically buy mine while in a recurring weekly work meeting on Thursday mornings
* Japan (UTC+9) does release earlier than the US eshop, but I'm not sure exactly what time the Japanese eShop updates happen (now I'm curious and want to pay more attention)
* New Zealand/Australia *might* be first in the world if you want to get in absolutely as soon as possible. They are generally first any time there's a game that releases digitally at midnight in local time zones. UTC+11~13 depending on time zone, but I'm not sure when the ANZ shop/shops open.
I'm less familiar with PSN update schedule, but would note that I regularly see people posting here that a game is already up on the Japan PSN store on Wednesday evening (Thursday local time), while I await it showing up on Switch on Thursday morning on the west coast of the US.
That's fantastic, love hearing that story!AGermanArtist wrote: ↑Mon Jan 08, 2024 11:10 pm When I was a kid there was two places with arcade games within walking distance that my friends and I would hang out in - a pool/snooker hall called Leisureway and a store called Chada's. Both were serviced by the same video game rental company. Leisureway would get all their top-tier Taito/Konami/Capcom/Sega/Namco stuff and Chada's would get cheaper games from the likes of Jaleco and Nichibutsu - so we got exposed to lots of b-tier games we might not have, otherwise. Games like Valtric, Argus, Terra Cresta, Terra Force, Cop 01, Galivan, Dangar UFO Robo and Mag Max are classics to me and have a certain charm to them, despite not being as flash or competent as the games from the bigger companies.
Looks like you've got that right.
Yes, they just reskinned it.
The most notable thing about this release to me is that it's the first Arcade Archives release from Namco's NA-1 hardware, the 1992-1993 successor to the venerable System 2! That means we're a step closer to one release that I was hoping for in 2024, F/A Fighter & Attacker.Sturmvogel Prime wrote: ↑Wed Jan 10, 2024 8:04 amThis week's gonna be a title from Namco: Arcade Archives Cosmo Gang The Puzzle
I kinda feel like this was one of the works that helped open the door for lots of the legendary electronic/dance infused OSTs of the next decade in STGs and beyond. I mean, shortly after F/A, Hosoe did RIDGE RACER, and It feels to me like there's a direct line from F/A's techno score to some of the legendary 90s STG OSTs like Garegga, Batsugun, Rayforce, and Namiki's Cave output. The game itself is... fine? But yeah, the music is a big part of its legacy.PC Engine Fan X! wrote: ↑Wed Jan 10, 2024 10:58 pmThe cool techno soundtrack really draws you in, indeed
