I swear every one of these mini-consoles includes the same promotional image of a hand holding it, palm spread. I get the connotation – it’s to emphasise size. But since the NES Mini, they’ve all been exactly the same. I’m surprised Nintendo hasn’t unleashed the hounds (lawyers on retainers) yet – but I guess time will tell.
Back to the story at hand; as the title would suggest, Konami, who are now overlords of the TurboGrafx-16 IP, announced at this year’s E3 their intention to release yet another mini-console. Since the console had a convoluted naming strategy originally, it’s no surprise that the mini variants follow the lead. While called the TurboGrafx-16 Mini in the US, it will be the PC Engine Mini to the Japanese and… wait for this: The PC Engine CoreGrafx Mini for Europe. Nice one, Konami.
They will also differ in appearance over the regions resembling their larger, original counterparts. The US version is actually a bit larger than the other two – so sadly, they were not able to achieve the open palm money shot.
So far, five games have been proclaimed. It looks like the American and European consoles will both come bundled with Alien Crush, Dungeon Explorer, New Adventure Island, Ninja Spirit, R-Type and Ys Book I & II. The Japanese variant is a little different; that will include Bonk, Castlevania: Rondo of Blood, China Warrior, Dungeon Explorer, Super Star Soldier and Ys Book I & II.
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As well as including a sole controller, they will comprise of all the features you’d expect from a mini-console by now like alternative video modes that include fake scanlines and such, as well as a quick save feature. It can, however, also support up to four more controllers using a multi-tap adaptor – so that’s a bit different.
If you’re a bit out of the loop as to my Konami is spearheading this, it’s because they bought a majority share in Hudson Soft in 2005, eventually absorbing it completely by 2012. There’s no price yet, let alone a release date but there is this website. Stay tuned for more info.
Growing up while the fifth generation of consoles reigned supreme meant that Brendan missed out on much of the 80’s and early 90’s of gaming the first time around. He either lacked the cognitive ability to play them, as naturally, he was a baby - or he simply didn’t exist yet. Undeterred, Brendan started a blog called Retro Game On in 2011. This followed his exploits as he collected and played everything he could get his hands on no matter what the release date. While RGO is mainly YouTube focused these days concentrating on video reviews and historical features, the itch to do some old fashion writing never went away. More recently, Brendan has been a staff writer for the gaming website, GameCloud, mostly focusing on the indie gaming scene in his locale of Perth, Australia.
