What game led you to buy a Turbo Grafx 16?

[Bardoly]

Cadash

[pulstar]

I remember seeing a bunch of PC engine games at the same time in a magazine. I remember Bonk, Drunken Master (The Kung Fu) and R-Type being among them. R-Type was the one that really made me want one, back at a time when arcade perfect was something to strive for not something that just happened.

[roflmao]

For me it was R-Type. I loved the SMS version and one day my friend brought over his TG16 and R-Type and it blew me away. I got my own shortly after that.

[Groover]

I grew up with my friend having one. We played games like Bonk, Splatterhouse, Bloody Wold and Blazing Lazers. I always felt the duo is one of the best looking and it was the one that got away. The Library always felt like here are some very unique games that are only on this system. There is some charm to the System. Also being the first with a CD-ROM.

[syphic]

Vigilante and Galaga 90 on the kiosk they had at Montgomery Wards. Loved playing them both when my pops would take me with him to make his monthly payment, I knew I had to get a Turbo at the time.

[jelloslug]

I remember seeing how cool and different the PC Engine system and games looked in the magazines before the Turbo came out.  Once the Turbo came out there was a department store near me (Brendle's if you lived in the south and remember that) that carried NEC audio and video equipment.  Needless to say they were the first store that I remember that had the Turbo.  They had a Turbo hooded up to a big (at the time) NEC rear projection TV with R-Type in the system.  I was hooked from right then.

[johnnykonami]

Keith Courage.  From the TV spots when the system came out.  Sad but true!  I fell for the mecha sequences hook, line and sinker.  I think they showed Legendary Axe, also - specifically that last boss that takes up most of the screen.  That helped too.

[schweaty]

For me, this thread should be titled "What game led you to harass you parents non-stop until you broke them like Theon Greyjoy?"  The answer is:  Splatterhouse.

[geise]

Blazing Lazers.  Ys Book I&II led me to getting the CD add on.  My neighbor had the cd unit.  My father saw it as well.   He ended up getting us a CD Unit after that.  He is one of those dads' that always had to have the latest in technology.

[synbiosfan]

Growing up with arcades everywhere, I largely ignored consoles until 1990ish. I'd play a random system at a friend's house from time to time before we went to the arcades. Arcades were awesome! They were full of friends and girls and the place to be.

One of the games I was really interested in was Splatterhouse. The local arcades wouldn't buy it but only a half hour away was a bar that had it. The regulars were awesome at it so there was always a line. I only ended up playing it $10-15 worth.

I'm not sure when but I ended up randomly searching eBay for Splatterhouse, saw it was on the TG-16 and remembered the Bonk commercials. I asked friends if they had one but no one did and few even remembered the system. I checked the local resale shops but no luck.

I bought a TG-16 lot with Splatterhouse, Alien Crush, Blazing Lasers, etc and I was hooked.

So to make a short story long , it was Splatterhouse.

[MrFulci]

Growing up with arcades everywhere, I largely ignored consoles until 1990ish. I'd play a random system at a friend's house from time to time before we went to the arcades. Arcades were awesome! They were full of friends and girls and the place to be.

One of the games I was really interested in was Splatterhouse. The local arcades wouldn't buy it but only a half hour away was a bar that had it. The regulars were awesome at it so there was always a line. I only ended up playing it $10-15 worth.

I'm not sure when but I ended up randomly searching eBay for Splatterhouse, saw it was on the TG-16 and remembered the Bonk commercials. I asked friends if they had one but no one did and few even remembered the system. I checked the local resale shops but no luck.

I bought a TG-16 lot with Splatterhouse, Alien Crush, Blazing Lasers, etc and I was hooked.

So to make a short story long , it was Splatterhouse.

Interesting you ignored console systems due to arcades. I started to ignore them due to the PC. Only the "New" systems though, from Playstation (1995?) onward.

I would go to arcades here and there, but I wouldn't spend as much time in there as some other people. It was fun, but sometimes I didn't have the time to play through a game start-to-finish. I usually would sue them to kill a bit of time with some people before a movie, waiting for a ride, something similar to that. That way if I had to walk away from the game, no big deal.

I liked the Atari 2600. For 8-bit, NES. The 16-bit game systems, I enjoyed Genesis, SNES, and TG-16. Neo Geo was during that time also, but I won't group that with the 16-bit stuff. It was during that time I moved more into PC games as there was much more to them, more free content, customizability, etc. Why would I play Wolfenstein 3D on an SNES, when I could play it on the PC? Why play DOOM on a console, when I could play it on the PC, with endless maps, sound mods, graphics mods, etc.. 3D cards on the PC were taking off by that time, with 3DFX, GLQuake, etc. Why would I play Theme Park on a console, when it played so much easier on a PC?

[jordan_hillman]

I found out about the PCE Double Dragon II port on a site called Double Dragon Dojo, and after that I knew I needed to pick up a PCE of TGCD to play that bad boy.

[bonq]

Hi All,

I do remember bonk and blazing lazers having an impact on me getting a turbo.
I got the CD attachment because I would be able to save games like Neutopia, which I loved to play.
I really wanted to play fighting street, what a dud that turned out to be, and I was let down up until I got a video mailed to me about Lords of Thunder. I watched that VHS tape over and over. I was intrigued by the sound and graphics. I had to have that. So I decided to buy a TurboDuo and get Lords of Thunder.

So after feeling burnt out a little, I was encouraged to get back into the turbo scene because of Lords of Thunder.

-bonq

[esteban]

Hi All,

I do remember bonk and blazing lazers having an impact on me getting a turbo.
I got the CD attachment because I would be able to save games like Neutopia, which I loved to play.
I really wanted to play fighting street, what a dud that turned out to be, and I was let down up until I got a video mailed to me about Lords of Thunder. I watched that VHS tape over and over. I was intrigued by the sound and graphics. I had to have that. So I decided to buy a TurboDuo and get Lords of Thunder.

So after feeling burnt out a little, I was encouraged to get back into the turbo scene because of Lords of Thunder.

-bonq

My brothers and I watched that tape over and over, too.

Good times. 

[HailingTheThings]

For me it wasn't a game. I first heard about the system back in late 2013 on a collecting forum.  I've always been a fan of collecting for the NES and the inferior SMS, but learned that there was a third 8-bit system with capabilities that fell somewhere between the NES and SMS that was popular in Japan and had actually been released in the US in the late 80's at the tail end of the 8-bit era.  I was intrigued to say the least!  I immediately tapped into my trust fund and got a great deal on the fullset over the course of a week by buying the lowest BINs I could find on Ebay.

While the box art was incredible, the games were underwhelming.  Graphically and sonically, they were almost equal to the NES (but the sound was scratchy and there weren't many colors).  Where they really fell short was gameplay.  And this was at the END of the 8-bit era... what were they thinking?!  Had the Turbo Garphx been released to compete with the Atari 2600 or Intellivision, it may have stood a chance.  But being released as an 8-bit console at the dawn of the 16-bit console era, this thing was doomed from the start in North America where gamers had more sophisticated taste and higher standards.  When Nintendo of America released the SNES in Japan as the "Super Famicom (the JP word for Nintendo)", it was game over.

I like your stories.