don't you love a bargain?

[sjewkestheloon]

ray crisis in perfect condition for £2.99, and xenon 2 complete for the same price

been looking for both for a long time and then they both pop up for dirt cheap in the same shop lol

off to play.....

[Turrican]

Xenon 2 = I hope for you you're talking any version except the MD one.

[sjewkestheloon]

oh dear lol is the megadrive version that bad? cause it is that version indeed. not got my megadrive with me at the min so can't even play it for a few days. what are it's problems?

[theevilfunkster]

Yeah Xenon 2 on the Megadive is that bad. Not a bad price for ray Crisis though.

Speaking of bargins, im getting a PAL Saturn with 5 games off a mate for £5.

[Herr Schatten]

oh dear lol is the megadrive version that bad? cause it is that version indeed. not got my megadrive with me at the min so can't even play it for a few days. what are it's problems?

Less colours than the Atari ST version, although the Mega Drive can display four times as much. Fewer animations. Dumbed-down sound. Choppiness. Questionable hit-detection and sluggish controls.

I think that's about it. The Sega Master System version is equally awful, btw. (The Amiga/Atari ST versions are decent and enjoyable.)

[sjewkestheloon]

thing is i've probably already got the game in some form on my amiga 600 but never actually played it. i own about 6 shoe boxes of game for it, donated years ago by my uncle and i never got through them all...

i'll give xenon a go on the megadrive to see if i can stomach it at all. if i can find it i'll set it up on my amiga. if not, it was only 3 quid lol

ray crisis seems pretty sweet so far if a bit wierd. really not keen on the perspective in this sort of game though. kind of like silpheed, where it's really hard to judge certain angles as everything seems to move to a point in the top centre of the screen. bring back 2d.....

also demonstrated to myself howmuch i suck. 100% stat by level 3 on first playthrough cred feeding and got slapped silly by the pre-emptive end boss. e-grade too lol

nice score on the saturn btw. very nice price. can he get me one too?

[Diabollokus]

£5????? We better find him and tell him to charge more!

[theevilfunkster]

£5????? We better find him and tell him to charge more!

No way! I need that saturn, iv'e just blown one of mine up trying to mod it. It comes with Virtua Fighter 1+2, Sega Rally, Myst and Daytona. I might give him a bit more money if im feeling generous.

[Super Laydock]

Xenon 2 = I hope for you you're talking any version except the MD one.

You obvious never have played the PC version...
I got it last yaer for just a few bucks but it was a waste nonetheless...
You get Bomb the Bass through internal speakers!

The Amiga version is ok, with the best feature (the soundtrack) intact.

[Turrican]

Less colours than the Atari ST version, although the Mega Drive can display four times as much. Fewer animations. Dumbed-down sound. Choppiness. Questionable hit-detection and sluggish controls.

I think that's about it.

Not at all, you're forgetting the really bad part. The Megadrive version completely lacks the last stage. THE FINAL STAGE IS MISSING!

And, It doesn't stop there. The last shop available was at the middle of the last stage. You're getting lots of credits near the end of the game, so that shop was the only one where actually was possible to spend a lot of cash on great items (that won't show earlier).

Without the last stage, you miss the last shop. And with that, gone are a lot of cool weapons to try. THE MD VERSIONS LACKS WEAPONS AND STUFF.

If only the port was complete, I would have not found it terrible, besides all Herr Schatten's remarks being true.

The Sega Master System version is equally awful, btw. (The Amiga/Atari ST versions are decent and enjoyable.)

Well, maybe as a game that one is terrible too. But at least it's a technical wonder and you're left O_o amazed by how they squeezed the SMS in terms of graphics. I sadly have not found anyone who could confirm if the SMS version misses the last stage too. If it doesn't, it's clearly superior; but, I prefer it anyway to the MD version for the abovementioned reason (think "Sagaia syndrome" here).

You obvious never have played the PC version...
I got it last yaer for just a few bucks but it was a waste nonetheless...
You get Bomb the Bass through internal speakers!

The Amiga version is ok, with the best feature (the soundtrack) intact.

The amiga version ok? I thought It was the best one. I also thought it was the original version, while Atari ST getting a conversion.

And you're right, I haven't tried the PC version. Must be a nightmare, huh


I own a CDTV Xenon 2. How is it you say? Who knows, I'm not getting a CDTV to find out As an audio CD however, is a huge disappointment, as it has several hard rock tracks but none from the game (the game should play the original soundtrack, but it is not redbook audio unfortunately).

[BIG]

I love bargains.

I got my Raycrisis for free,so mEh.

B-

[qatmix]

Xenon 2 was originally an Amiga game. The best actual version is the CDTV version as they fixed some slowdown bugs, and tweaked the playablility a little bit. Obviously it has the best music as well, you can also select from a wide range of the rthymn King Back catalogue to play in the game.

[Herr Schatten]

Less colours than the Atari ST version, although the Mega Drive can display four times as much. Fewer animations. Dumbed-down sound. Choppiness. Questionable hit-detection and sluggish controls.

I think that's about it.

Not at all, you're forgetting the really bad part. The Megadrive version completely lacks the last stage. THE FINAL STAGE IS MISSING!

Wow, I didn't know that. I was so disgusted by the MD version that I never played it beyond stage 2.

The amiga version ok? I thought It was the best one. I also thought it was the original version, while Atari ST getting a conversion.

IIRC, the Bitmap Brothers made all their games originally for the Atari ST. The Amiga versions are straight ports (with sometimes improved music). That's while the graphics in the Amiga versions usually have only 16 colours, half of what the Amiga could handle. I might be imagining this, but I think the Bitmap Brothers put some extra colours in the score displays, etc. for the Amiga versions, but they definitely didn't ever change a thing about the ingame graphics (which are stunningly beautiful nonetheless).

And you're right, I haven't tried the PC version. Must be a nightmare, huh

If you're referring to the CGA version, yes. The EGA version suffers from the bad colour palette, but is okayish and the vGA version does at least look as good as the Amiga/ST versions. I don't remember it exactly, but I think all the PC versions only supported the internal speakers for sound.

Btw, do modern PCs still HAVE internal speakers?

[qatmix]

Mate. the bitmap brothers would lead with the Amiga, not the ST. I know as I worked with them on occasions.

There were very few Devteams that would lead with the Atari St version as it had the smaller market share etc.

[Turrican]

Mate. the bitmap brothers would lead with the Amiga, not the ST. I know as I worked with them on occasions.

There were very few Devteams that would lead with the Atari St version as it had the smaller market share etc.

Makes perfectly sense. 1986 was the last year head to head for Amiga & ST. When Dungeon Master came to Amiga, the ST went downhill.

Since Xenon is their first game and it's 1988, they clearly focused on Amiga.

Xenon 2 was originally an Amiga game. The best actual version is the CDTV version as they fixed some slowdown bugs, and tweaked the playablility a little bit. Obviously it has the best music as well, you can also select from a wide range of the rthymn King Back catalogue to play in the game.

Is that so? Neat. So, anyone knows of a CDTV/CD32 emulator? I don't own both systems, but would like to give Xenon 2 a try.

[Herr Schatten]

I stand corrected.

I just assumed they were developing on the ST because I always read reviews of the ST versions first and I clearly recall a preview of Cadaver in a games mag where they stated that the graphics were developed with Degas Elite on the ST. Maybe it was just a wrong information from the mag.

But I know for sure that the Amiga and ST versions of their games are absolutely identical graphic-wise. No Amiga screen has more than 16 colours in it (not counting copperlists). If they developed on the Amiga this doesn't really make sense, does it?

[Turrican]

Don't laugh at me, but that could be a design decision. Their metallic style is very recognizable and doesn't require many colors. They were years ahead of Metal Gear Solid in understanding that a selected palette can achieve more personality than "let's use ALL the colors we can".

Have a look at Core's Wolfchild or Chaos Engine in their SNES versions: these ports tried to use more colors than the original had, and the results are inferior imho.

[Herr Schatten]

Don't laugh at me, but that could be a design decision. Their metallic style is very recognizable and doesn't require many colors. They were years ahead of Metal Gear Solid in understanding that a selected palette can achieve more personality than "let's use ALL the colors we can".

Have a look at Core's Wolfchild or Chaos Engine in their SNES versions: these ports tried to use more colors than the original had, and the results are inferior imho.

You are probably right. I didn't think of that. Another explanation could be that the graphic artists really used Degas Elite for development. Maybe they just liked it better than DPaint. Who knows?

[sjewkestheloon]

the main reason i'm disappointed with xenon 2 port being apparently terrible is that i adore my speedball 2 and chaos engine ports. i broke an infinate amount of zip sticks on the amiga 600 version of speedball 2 and now i'm working at killing a few d-pads to the cause.

ray crisis seems pretty good, and i've managed to 1 cred it up until the 3rd stage, but i've not developed any sort of stage selection strategy. but again a woefully inadequate instruction booklet which 'explains' the lock-on shot combo process in fantastic engrish.

btw how do you gain credits in the special mode? i seem to have randomly gained one but didn't see if it was a simple extend at a points value or a collectable.

[Turrican]

the main reason i'm disappointed with xenon 2 port being apparently terrible is that i adore my speedball 2 and chaos engine ports.

True. Speedball 2 and Chaos Engine on MD are very good ports!
Unfortunately, Gods and Xenon 2 aren't of the same quality.

[FRO]

ray crisis seems pretty sweet so far if a bit wierd. really not keen on the perspective in this sort of game though. kind of like silpheed, where it's really hard to judge certain angles as everything seems to move to a point in the top centre of the screen. bring back 2d.....

I think that's partially because the levels in RayCrisis are so much more abstract and it gets quite difficult to see things. If you haven't tried it already, find a copy of Raystorm (the game released before RayCrisis) and give that a go--I think you'll find the perspective isn't as much of an issue when you're dealing with more concrete backgrounds that are more easily discernable.

[BrianC]

the main reason i'm disappointed with xenon 2 port being apparently terrible is that i adore my speedball 2 and chaos engine ports.

True. Speedball 2 and Chaos Engine on MD are very good ports!
Unfortunately, Gods and Xenon 2 aren't of the same quality.

Slightly OT, but how are the SNES ports of Gods and Chaos Engine/Soldiers of Fortune, the GB Xenon 2, and the GB Speedball 2?

I tried the PC Xenon 2000 and I thought it was pretty decent. It's only one level, though. Bitmap made a pretty good update to Speedball 2 for PSX. It's a budget game, so it should be easy to find for cheap.

[dave4shmups]

Mate. the bitmap brothers would lead with the Amiga, not the ST. I know as I worked with them on occasions.

There were very few Devteams that would lead with the Atari St version as it had the smaller market share etc.

Makes perfectly sense. 1986 was the last year head to head for Amiga & ST. When Dungeon Master came to Amiga, the ST went downhill.

Since Xenon is their first game and it's 1988, they clearly focused on Amiga.

Xenon 2 was originally an Amiga game. The best actual version is the CDTV version as they fixed some slowdown bugs, and tweaked the playablility a little bit. Obviously it has the best music as well, you can also select from a wide range of the rthymn King Back catalogue to play in the game.

Is that so? Neat. So, anyone knows of a CDTV/CD32 emulator? I don't own both systems, but would like to give Xenon 2 a try.

Don't know of any emulator's but you can play CDTV games on a CD32; and you'd be better off getting a CD32 since it has more games; including some great shmups like Project X.

[Herr Schatten]

True. Speedball 2 and Chaos Engine on MD are very good ports!
Unfortunately, Gods and Xenon 2 aren't of the same quality.

What's wrong with Gods on MD? I really liked it. It feels a tad bit slower than the original, but once you got accustomed to the controls it's enjoyable nonetheless. The puzzles are all there. Only the music took a big step backwards.

IMO, it's nowhere near the mess Xenon II MD is.

[Turrican]

What's wrong with Gods on MD? I really liked it. It feels a tad bit slower than the original, but once you got accustomed to the controls it's enjoyable nonetheless. The puzzles are all there. Only the music took a big step backwards.

IMO, it's nowhere near the mess Xenon II MD is.

Of course, it's nowhere a mess like Xenon 2. At least it's complete. But you said it: the music. The music there is horrible. Music plays a great role in my gaming experience, so I felt disappointed. True, the MD cannot match Paula, but Chaos Engine didn't sound like complete rubbish as Gods does. But if you turn the speakers off, it's a good conversion.

But it DOESN'T feel slower than the original! It is A LOT FASTER.

http://www.gods-country.de/gods/gods_versions_eng.htm

(^ this guy above is wrong when he says that the Snes version sounds like the MD version. It sounds a lot better. But overall he's right, the MD port is better in every other regard)

It feels faster even running on a 50hz megadrive. on a 60hz genesis it feels almost unplayable.

Slightly OT, but how are the SNES ports of Gods and Chaos Engine/Soldiers of Fortune, the GB Xenon 2, and the GB Speedball 2?

GB Speedball 2 was praised at times. Nowadays, I really don't know why you should play the game in four shades of grey. Maybe you were asking about the GBA version?

GB Xenon 2, is quite awful, iirc.

Snes GODS, see the link above. I have it, and I must say, I prefer the MD version overall. But the Snes version sounds a lot better. But since both miss the intro song "Into the Wonderful", the game should really be experienced on amiga.

Oh, and the MD version offers a nice invincibility cheat, the Snes one doesn't.

Snes Chaos Engine / Soldiers of Fortune: again, another case where the MD version feels closer to the original and better overall. The Snes one is "over colored" badly, just like that guy says about Gods.

[sjewkestheloon]

yeah i own gods on the md and amiga, and although the amiga version is good for music, i prefer the md version due to the controls. the same for most amiga stuff though. even back in the day, i bought many expensive joysticks for the amiga that were either cumbersom or broke extremely quickly. my keyboard isa little unresponsive too. i know i can use my megadrive pad on the amiga but the button configuration is regularly stupid and unchangable. the only thing that i love my amiga for infinately more than any console is the fantastic cannon fodder and the 10-20 lemmings games, sequels, tcs and hacks that can only be accurately controlled by the mouse.

slowely getting used to ray crisis now. i've been playing with stage selection of the same stage 3 times to learn the patterns and discover what would be a beneficial stage order. i also feel that a 1cc is very possible with this game. tried credit feeding on my first playthrough but the percentage thing is really good as a deterent to bad playing. i didn't know any of the stages and wasn't good at combos so the score rocketed and i faced off against the final boss in the middle of satge two lol. playing with only 1 cred however has allowed me to make constant improvement. scores are rocketing and i'm slowely advancing to the last stage

[Herr Schatten]

But it DOESN'T feel slower than the original! It is A LOT FASTER.

Oops! I meant to type "faster". How did that "slower" sneak into my sentence?

[BrianC]

GB Speedball 2 was praised at times. Nowadays, I really don't know why you should play the game in four shades of grey. Maybe you were asking about the GBA version?

I still play older GB games. Also, I don't play in four shades of grey, I play in four shades of some other colors. I play games because they are fun and some b/w GB games actually look pretty good. Also, the GB is portable. I also heard that the GBA version of speedball 2 isn't very good. Anyway, instead of questioning why I would want to play a b/w GB game, would you mind telling me some actual info about the game?

Those Genesis ports of Bitmap Brothers games sound great. I'll try and see if ebgames has them.

[Turrican]

I still play older GB games. Also, I don't play in four shades of grey, I play in four shades of some other colors. I play games because they are fun and some b/w GB games actually look pretty good. Also, the GB is portable. I also heard that the GBA version of speedball 2 isn't very good. Anyway, instead of questioning why I would want to play a b/w GB game, would you mind telling me some actual info about the game?

Hey BrianC! ^_^

Let me point out a couple of things. I own 45 black & white GB games and I think it's one of the most sadly forgotten hardware. You hardly find reviews or webpages dedicated to these classics, and GBA made all worse starting to clone Snes games instead of giving us good remakes of the GB ones. I still play them very often and they actually are the best part of my NGC library of games, thanks to GB Player.

There was no GB racism in my previous comment.

That said, some genres and some developers that really didn't mixed up well with GB. Shmups: it says a lot that I only have Konami ones and Solarstriker. Fighting Games: they weren't that good.

Now, you ask me why I don't go more in detail with GB Speedball 2. Quite a simple answer: I've never owned that, so I really don't know. I only have a magazine that reviewed it back then, rating it 92% iirc.

However, if I go by logic Speedball 2 is a frenetic game with a lot of action on screen. I sometimes have problems understaing what the hell is going on playing it on MD. I just figure that on GB, things aren't going to improve.

I've seen 8bit classic doing really well on GB. GB has the best Zelda ever. Seiken Densetsu is awesome. Bionic Commando is fantastic. Castlevanias are good. Even the often badmouthed Ninja Gaiden Shadow rocks imho.

Unfortunately, I don't really think Bitmap Brothers are natural born GB developers. These games got a GB port, because that's how the market works, there had to be. But seriously. Xenon 2 is built more on amazing graphics and a great tune than around gameplay.
Remove from it the hypnotic metallic look, the pulsing backgrounds, the music... and what is left is hardly worth playing.

Speedball 2 actually has more gameplay value than Xenon 2, but even then, I don't think a GB port is something to look for in AD 2005. Not only because you'd probably need two carts and a link cable to enjoy it with a friend...

I'm sorry I cannot be more helpful than this. I guess it may be a competent job, but I must admit I'm hardly excited to find out. I guess I'm resigned to the idea of playing Speedball at home.

[BrianC]

I still play older GB games. Also, I don't play in four shades of grey, I play in four shades of some other colors. I play games because they are fun and some b/w GB games actually look pretty good. Also, the GB is portable. I also heard that the GBA version of speedball 2 isn't very good. Anyway, instead of questioning why I would want to play a b/w GB game, would you mind telling me some actual info about the game?

Hey BrianC! ^_^

Let me point out a couple of things. I own 45 black & white GB games and I think it's one of the most sadly forgotten hardware. You hardly find reviews or webpages dedicated to these classics, and GBA made all worse starting to clone Snes games instead of giving us good remakes of the GB ones. I still play them very often and they actually are the best part of my NGC library of games, thanks to GB Player.

There was no GB racism in my previous comment.

That said, some genres and some developers that really didn't mixed up well with GB. Shmups: it says a lot that I only have Konami ones and Solarstriker. Fighting Games: they weren't that good.

Now, you ask me why I don't go more in detail with GB Speedball 2. Quite a simple answer: I've never owned that, so I really don't know. I only have a magazine that reviewed it back then, rating it 92% iirc.

However, if I go by logic Speedball 2 is a frenetic game with a lot of action on screen. I sometimes have problems understaing what the hell is going on playing it on MD. I just figure that on GB, things aren't going to improve.

I've seen 8bit classic doing really well on GB. GB has the best Zelda ever. Seiken Densetsu is awesome. Bionic Commando is fantastic. Castlevanias are good. Even the often badmouthed Ninja Gaiden Shadow rocks imho.

Unfortunately, I don't really think Bitmap Brothers are natural born GB developers. These games got a GB port, because that's how the market works, there had to be. But seriously. Xenon 2 is built more on amazing graphics and a great tune than around gameplay.
Remove from it the hypnotic metallic look, the pulsing backgrounds, the music... and what is left is hardly worth playing.

Speedball 2 actually has more gameplay value than Xenon 2, but even then, I don't think a GB port is something to look for in AD 2005. Not only because you'd probably need two carts and a link cable to enjoy it with a friend...

I'm sorry I cannot be more helpful than this. I guess it may be a competent job, but I must admit I'm hardly excited to find out. I guess I'm resigned to the idea of playing Speedball at home.

oh ok. I understand. I'm sorry I took your comment the wrong way.

I think Takara did a very good job on the GB Samurai Shodown. It's amazing how they got the control, moves, items, and every single character intact. I actually like how it's SD too. Also, it can be played two players on Super Game Boy, a very nifty feature. I actually like the GB version better than the SNES version in some ways. MK and Street Fighter 2 didn't fare as well, though I think the GB SF2 is decent (though not great). Rare's Killer Instinct also got a decent port to the GB, though the combos are too simple to pull off in it. The GB may not be the best system for fighters, but it certaintly fared better than the Game Gear.

I know what you mean, though I find some games much easier to play on the GBC and GBA than on the original GB. Unfortunetly, T2: The Arcade Game was not one of those games. Neither was NBA Jam TE. I hate it when developers don't put enough effort in making the game easy to see. It's especially annoying how some non-GBC only games have a half-hearted non-color version of the game. What was the point of making it backwards compatible if the GB b/w version looks terrible? Also, some games that sound like wouldn't work like Puyo Puyo Tsu and Dr. Mario actually have excellent GB ports (Puyo Puyo 1 GB is terrible, though. Slow gameplay and hard to tell apart shades are a horrible mix).

I tried Speedball 2 out on a rom. It seems like a good port, though the action can be hard to keep up with. I might pick it up for cheap or at a yardsale, but I'll go for the Genesis one first.