Magic Engine for AmigaOS?

[Kaminari]

Steffen Haeuser (Hyperion Entertainment) has recently talked about the possibility of ME to be ported over the AmigaOS, provided that enough requests are mailed directly to the author, David Michel.

"If you want the best PC-Engine Emulation Package ported to AmigaOS, write the author. I have been in discussion with the author of "Magic Engine" about an Amiga-Port. If enough people would request an Amiga Version he would port it to AmigaOS, he told me, "but up to now I did not get more than about a dozen requests". If you are interested in PC Engine Emulation on the Amiga email to: dmichel@easynet.fr. If you write him, "be nice" "

http://magicengine.com/

Thanks to Sinan Gurkan from Amigart for the news.

[Orgin]

Steffen posted this on Ann:

" The PC-Engine was a game-console introduced to the market in 1987 (with new games appearing till 1997 actually). At the launch it was the direct competitor of the NES, but of course the NES had absolutely no chance against the superior graphics of the PC-Engine. Still it was never really successful outside Japan.
Some technical Data:
CPU = HU6280 7.16 MHz
Video RAM = 64 KB
Graphics Resolution = 256x216 (320x256 for TurboGraphX 16)
Colors: 256 of 4096 (Sprites and Background could choose independent
colors, bigger-than-screen Sprites were possible and often used actually)
Sound: 6 Channels
CD-ROM Support: CD-ROM Expansion released in 1988
Technically it could easily beat the MegaDrive, but had some trouble with
coping with the SNES once this was released (due to the custom chips of the SNES).
Most famous title is probably R-Type/R-Type 2 (the Amiga versions of these
titles are only ports from the PC-Engine versions, no "original" Amiga games, though many people think this).
The PCE was especially good as to 2D-Shooters, and later on (japanese-language, so uninteresting for Europeans) RPGs.
On Amiga right now it is only supported by DarcNES (and DarcNES has
no Sound-Support for PCE, also it only supports the "base" PC-Engine,
no support for TG16 and for CD-ROM-titles).
This Magic Engine at the earlier mentioned URL is the best Emulator
available for PCE (available on Windows, Linux and MacOS currently).
Steffen Haeuser"

[Bezzen]

Most famous title is probably R-Type/R-Type 2 (the Amiga versions of these titles are only ports from the PC-Engine versions, no "original" Amiga games

And my guess would be that the PC-Engine versions are just ports of the coin-ops.  :-D

[Legerdemain]

I never even considered this being possible...

So, now, when I realised it was possible I sent away a mail to the guy doing the emulator at once. I will register right away, even the Windows version, as long as I then will get the (if it ever will be ported) AMiGA-version for free.

Just thinking about playing Ys Book 1 & 2, Ys 3 and Ys 4 - The Dawn Of Ys on my AMiGA makes my leg weak. Those are trendsetters for modern actionoriented RPG:s! Actually one of my all time favourite RPG-series, along with Final Fantasy (which are at the moment on a low) and Phantasy Star.

[System]

Heh - this is funny. I have had a working (fully, except for sound) working Magic Engine-for-PPC on my harddisk for probably as long as three years.

I've never actually released it for a couple of reasons:
- It crashed with a certain regularity. Could be because of bug in Cyberstorm/233 board, or because of bug in David's code.
- It didn't have sound yet.
- Programming the PPC is a bitch, just no fun at all.

I didn't realize anybody except me knew what PC-Engine was, otherwise this might have existed years earlier...

[System]

You can play Ys 1..3 on your Amiga without any problem whatsoever, using fMSX Amiga. And if you are using the MSX version you can even get English (community-translated) versions.

Damn, I'm doing it again. After doing nothing but lurking for two years my second post is about fMSX Amiga ;-)

[game_fan]

Whether this interests anyone or not,

My friends got together and bought a PC Engine on import (yes I kow it`s old) for their flat (their gaming nuts).

It`s a great little system and they bought it brand new for under £50.

[MagicSN]

>Heh - this is funny. I have had a >working(fully, except for sound) working >Magic Engine-for-PPC on my harddisk for
How that ? When I was talking with him he had
the opinion "if, then I will do it myselves. Nobody else will see my code". How could you convince him to get a look at the source code ? If you are not doing anything with it, maybe you could convince him that I can continue your port ?

>probably as long as three years.
>I've never actually released it for a couple >of reasons:
>- It crashed with a certain regularity. >Could be because of bug in Cyberstorm/233 >board, or because of bug in David's code.

Did you try sushi-debugging ? Which compiler did you use ?

>- Programming the PPC is a bitch, just no >fun at all.



Steffen

[Aegis]

How were the Amiga versions of R-Type PC Engine ports?

R-Type 1 was made by Factor 5 using their Katakis/Denaris engine - Factor 5 wanted to release Katakis (a direct rip-off of R-Type) but Activision had the rights to R-Type and didn't allow them to release it, instead they gave Factor 5 the conversion job.

The team turned out a very playable version of R-Type but graphically it was significantly reworked from the arcade original (different aspect ratios, no backgrounds etc.) It was also a more complete port of R-Type than the PC Engine version (which only had half the levels of the arcade version - hence the PC Engine's R-Type 2 years before the offical Irem sequel).  Later Factor 5  re-worked the graphics for Katakis and released it as Denaris.

R-Type 2 was handled by a different team (can't remember who) and was technically far inferior to the Factor 5 conversion (although it got a lot of good reviews).

Generally, the PC-Engine version of R-Type(1+2) was considered to be the most accurate conversion available... well, until MAME came along  ;-)

[MagicSN]

Hmmm, maybe I was wrong... I was always assuming they were ports of the PC Engine version (R-Type, not Katakis). I was always wondering what the story behind Katakis was, thanks for clearing that up

Steffen

[Kaminari]

Some corrections about the graphic capabilities of the PC Engine consoles from NEC... The CoreGrafx, SuperGrafx and TurboGrafx (US CoreGrafx) share the very same resolutions: 256x224, 336x224 and 512x224. The CoreGrafx and the TurboGrafx can display upto 512 colors out of 512; the SuperGrafx, 512 colors out of 4096. Those 512 colors are divided into 256 colors for the background, 256 colors for the sprites. Oh, and the Video RAM is actually 8 KB out of 64 KB RAM available to the console, with or without CD-ROM (8 KB out of 256 KB with a Super CD-ROM).

Aegis> R-Type on PC Engine was a nearly direct port of the arcade version. Hudson Soft released it on two HuCards (March and June 1988) for a very practical reason: the first HuCards available had a standard capacity of 256 KB (2 megabits), but the full game needed 512 KB. The two "half-games" were not labelled R-Type 1 and R-Type 2 (common misconception) but simply R-Type Part I and Part II. Later on, for the US market, the two parts were released on one single 4 Mb cartridge directly under the Irem label.



HansG> You got me interested. How did you get access to the source, since Magic Engine is shareware and David Michel (as an Amiga enthusiast) would preferably port it himself? As for Ys, the MSX versions just can't stand the comparison with the PC Engine ones (and yes, they're available in English too) :-)

[Opi-Poi]

I've sent an email off.:-D

How will the Magic Engine/games be distributed?
Download or CD?

Would love to play a real Bomberman on AmigaOS....
and Puyo Puyo <>.

Gonna look through old EGM magazines to see some of
the games that were released.

[AmigaMac]

Yup... I owned a TG-16 (with TurboCD) myself!  I always thought it was the best game console in its day.  The games were awesome and the game play was even better, but the lack of big game titles was a problem and like someone said here, it never got popular beyond Japan!

[Kaminari]

Yes indeed, it was a shame that TTi had such a poor game library, whereas the Japanese market was alive and kicking with some terrific RPG and adventure games...

I've opened a new thread on the emulation forum with a small gallery of screenshots, for those who'd be interested.

Go here.

[System]

I would love to see this for AmigaOS4.

With regard  to Katakis, Manfred Trenz (Who also did the c64 Denaris port together with Andreas Eschner) created an excellent clone called Enforcer for the good old c64, worth checking out IMO!

If only we could bring these guys, including Chris Huelsbeck back together again, and develop for AmigaDE and AmigaOS4, that would certainly make my day.

I am still hoping for a good 2D turrican clone for the AmigaDE, and I would love to see Turrican3D for AmigaOS4 systems as well.