PC Engine mini THELEGEND RETURNS

FOR MANY YEARS, THE PC ENGINE HAS BEEN THE BEST CONSOLE NEVER TO GET AN OFFICIAL UK RELEASE, BUT KONAMI IS FINALLY BRINGING IT HERE, COMPLETE WITH DOZENS OF GAMES. WE’VE TRIED IT - AND HERE’S WHY WE THINK YOU SHOULD BE EXCITED ABOUT IT

The PC Engine Mini is by far the most fascinating of the recent wave of plug-and-play retro systems. Now, we’d imagine that some of you are probably thinking, “Blimey, that’s a bold opening statement,” after having read that, but it’s true for one simple reason – Konami has chosen to sell the PC Engine Mini in Europe. Although the console was popular with UK importers thanks to coverage in Mean Machines and achieved popularity in France via the Guillemot subsidiary Sodipeng, it never actually had a proper official release in the territory, and won’t benefit from the nostalgia that has driven sales of the SNES, Mega Drive and C64 minis. But we don’t think that’s a disadvantage – in fact, we think it’s an opportunity.

You see, the PC Engine has always been a relatively difficult system to get into. Its import-only nature means that it rarely turns up in the wild for impulse purchasing, and the various combinations of different models and add-ons can be intimidating to an inexperienced collector. There has never been a PC Engine compilation on modern consoles, and even the pretty decent Virtual Console line-ups missed things like the Supergrafx and Arcade CD-ROM games. Though many gamers will have been aware of the PC Engine thanks to import coverage in magazines like C&VG, these factors have ensured that the console has remained accessible only to the more adventurous retro gamer. So, yes, the PC Engine

Mini represents an opportunity. For the first time there is a convenient and affordable way to get an introduction to this console, arguably the greatest never to be released in this region, complete with a curated selection of games. Plenty of our readers should be interested in this. If you remember those screenshots in the magazines of the late Eighties but never got a chance to try the games, you should be interested. If you already know and like the PC Engine but don’t fancy paying through the nose for a copy of Sapphire, you should be interested. If you don’t know anything about the PC Engine but love games from the era when 2D was king and want to find new favourites, you should be interested.

To find out more about the console, we visited Konami to try out the European version of the machine, the PC Engine Coregrafx Mini. We also spoke to Richard Jones, senior brand manager at Konami, who explained why the company decided to create the machine. “We first considered bringing the PC Engine back in 2018. The west had limited access to the console before this, but we knew that many of our fans were passionate about seeing it make a comeback. Our fans are our top priority, and we wanted to give them something they had been asking for as well as give a new generation the opportunity to experience the console and its classic games for the first time.” But how does Konami see the appeal for players who might not hold any nostalgia for the system?

“PC Engine Mini has a huge collection of brilliant games to revisit, plus weird and wonderful games that many will have never played before (looking at you, Appare! Gateball). It’s a unique time capsule of a point in console history that Europe largely missed and a great introduction to a little console that broke ground in many ways,” says Richard, explaining the appeal. “For me personally, the chance to play Castlevania (Akumajou Dracula X: Chi No Rondo) on a PC Engine controller brings an unbeatable level of authenticity to the experience that I would encourage everyone to try. Plus, Bonk climbs walls with his teeth – amazing.”

We were curious as to how

Konami has handled the hardware side of things, given that the company isn’t traditionally thought of as a hardware business. “Konami has a long history of innovating in hardware development, however, as you say, this was new ground for Konami

Digital Entertainment,” says Richard, reminding us of the company’s history in both peripheral development and the arcade business. “For PC Engine Mini, we partnered with the wellknown hardware manufacturer, Hori to utilise their expertise in the field. They handled all development and production of the hardware elements with close involvement from our teams in Japan.” Japanese players will get the original style white PC Engine and North American audiences get a miniaturised Turbografx-16, but Europe didn’t have an obvious hardware model to use. Because this represents the first proper European release of a PC Engine product, with the aborted PAL Turbografx launch being officially unacknowledged, there’s no historical model to draw from. As a result, we get a system modelled after the Coregrafx model. “By utilising the PC Engine Coregrafx design for Europe, we thought it would be a great opportunity to highlight some of the various hardware iterations in its history. Our hope is to provide this community with something unique, something that we were not able to provide in 1987,” Richard explains.

While some might lament the choice of style, the physical product is pleasing. Like other mini consoles, the PC Engine Coregrafx Mini is a faithful replica of the original machine – though since the PC Engine was already small, the Mini isn’t a huge size reduction and is ironically a bit bigger than the other mini consoles out there. There are a couple of notable changes – power and HDMI connections are on the back of the machine instead of the sides, and two USB controller ports are present instead of the single port of the original. One controller is included in the package, and it is an authentic pad with turbo fire switches for each of the buttons, just like those packaged with the original Coregrafx. Extra controllers are available separately and if you want to play with more than two players in games like Bomberman 94 or Dungeon Explorer, up to five players are supported via the multitap, which is also sold separately.

The software side has been handled by M2, which also developed the software for Sega’s well-received Mega Drive Mini. “M2 has a great reputation and history of developing authentic emulation experiences for some of gaming’s most beloved titles. Konami has worked extensively with M2 in the past and so from the beginning it was clear that M2 would be able to handle the challenge of bringing PC Engine and its greatest titles to a modern audience,” says Richard.

“We are thrilled with the attention to detail shown in the UI design, including creative touches that add an extra layer of charm to the console.” The menu is indeed functional and fun, with some neat little touches that we’ve detailed elsewhere. Display options are 4:3, pixel perfect, stretched 16:9 widescreen, each with an optional CRT filter and a selection of wallpapers. The fourth option is really just there for fun, as it’s a PC Engine Gt/turboexpress mode complete with a filter for that authentic dodgy old LCD appearance. Our initial impressions of the emulation are good, as all the games we played both looked and sounded authentic.

Emulation is nothing without games though, and Konami’s game selection process was designed to highlight the PC Engine’s unique appeal. “With such a rich library of games, many of which are relatively unknown to Western audiences, the decision was a difficult one,” says Richard. “We started by considering all PC Engine titles as candidates but wanted to ensure that we struck a fair balance between games that are now well-known while offering a chance for gamers to discover unique titles that only appeared on this system. In doing so, we hope to please fans new and old with our selection.” That may sound pretty standard, but Konami’s console differs from the other retro mini consoles on the market due to its global approach to game inclusion – no matter which model you buy, you’ll get both Japanese and North American games. “PC Engine has a notable history in Japan and North America, where it was known as Turbografx-16. Without including both PC Engine and Turbografx-16 titles, we didn’t feel that we were making PC Engine mini truly accessible for all users,” explains Richard. “Particularly with the text-heavy Japanese RPGS such as Ys Book I & II, Dungeon Explorer and Neutopia, they would have been impenetrable without the TG-16 versions. Unfortunately, this wasn’t possible for all titles – Snatcher and Akumajou Dracula X: Chi No Rondo [Castlevania: Rondo Of Blood], for example, never saw release on TG-16.”

Though this approach isn’t common, we feel that it’s one that works well for the PC Engine. We contacted the owner of the PC Engine Software Bible (www.pcengine.co.uk), Paul Weller, for a second opinion and he came to a similar same conclusion. “For us in the UK at least, most of our PC Engine collections started with Japanese games. I personally only purchased US localised CD games when they were RPGS or the Japanese versions were unavailable/expensive,” says

Paul. “Many users in the US were denied some fantastic games on the Turbografx-16, so this will allow them to get a glimpse of what they were missing, from crazy titles like Cho Aniki to fun action games like The Legend

“WITHOUT INCLUDING BOTH PC ENGINE AND TURBOGRAFX-16 TITLES, WE DIDN’T FEEL THAT WE WERE MAKING PC ENGINE MINI TRULY ACCESSIBLE FOR ALL USERS” RICHARD JONES