Question: What do the spine "Vol. #" mean?

[Kaijuboy]

Probably a stupid question for the Turbo-Vets (or anyone that knows for that matter):

A lot (but not all) of my PC Engine games have a "Vol.#" on them, but there is no rhyme or reason to them that I have discovered.  They dont seem to have anything to do with release order. Are they developer specific?  

And for that matter why do Turbo games have multicolored spines? Aesthetics?

[SignOfZeta]

The Vol numbers are a Hudson thing.

The spines indicate format, HuCard, CDROM2, Super CDROM2, etc.

[Kaijuboy]

Its not just Hudson games, my:

#1 is Jinmu Denshou by Big Club
#3 is Image Fight by Irem
#4 is Shockman by Masaya

Just to name a few.  Weird...

[ccovell]

Irem, Hudson, NCS, all had their own volume numbering scheme, all independent of each other.  Pretty meaningless for the small companies, really.

The different colours on TG game spines indicated their genre (Arcade, Shooting, Adventure, Sports, etc...)

[Kaijuboy]

Irem, Hudson, NCS, all had their own volume numbering scheme, all independent of each other.  Pretty meaningless for the small companies, really.

The different colours on TG game spines indicated their genre (Arcade, Shooting, Adventure, Sports, etc...)

So they're pretty pointless unless you sort your collection by publisher (which would be quite... Odd).

Never noticed that about the TG coloring!  Im assuming, of course, for later titles because aren't all early releases orange?

[SuperPlay]

So they're pretty pointless unless you sort your collection by publisher (which would be quite... Odd).

I guess that I am a little odd then, as I have my collection sorted by media and then by publisher/vol ;-)

[rcantor77]

So they're pretty pointless unless you sort your collection by publisher (which would be quite... Odd).

I guess that I am a little odd then, as I have my collection sorted by media and then by publisher/vol ;-)

You are not alone... that is how I order mine. Seems a lot more logical to me especially as the spines match.

[RegalSin]

Spines have extra information, and is part of the product.
The volume numbering is that of a record labeling system,
that is independent of each game company/ Originally it was
sappose to follow the first few games, from 1-XXXX but everybody
else did their own thing

[Black Tiger]

Every game get's its own code number, like TGXCD 1033 or HCD3039. The Vol numbers are more just catalog numbers for marketing games.

[SuperPlay]

back in the 90's the Vol numbers made me spend more cash!  For example if I had purchased vols 1, 3 and 4 I would end up buying Vol 2 just to fill the gap.

[esteban]

Building off of Black_Tiger's response...

Think of it this way: The Volume # was a quick, practical, shorthand means to reference a company's specific title/release.

This is really for the benefit of the company (internally and externally) to easily differentiate merchandise.

Take PC Genjin, for example. It's official catalog number is "HC89024", which is a mouthful and strikes most people as an indecipherable stream of random numerals and random letters. Its volume number, however, is a pithy "24". Hey! You might actually remember that. You won't get it confused with HC89023 or HC89025!