Wonderboy 3 / Dragon’s Curse / Adventure Island
System(s): Sega Master System, PC Engine / TG16
Released 1989, 1991
By Sega / Hudsonsoft
You’re probably looking at the top of the page & thinking “what?” Well allow me to explain. The Wonderboy / Adventure Island series have had a close relationship over the years, with Sega releasing Wonderboy & Hudonsoft releasing the “identical other then the new protagonist” Adventure Island series. The story has been covered in detail in Retrogamer magazine but we’ll try to briefly cover it here as we go along.
Now, why 3 different names? Well, let’s cover them:
Wonderboy 3: The Dragon’s Trap - is the Sega Master System version.
Adventure Island - The PC Engine version of the game
Dragon’s Curse - The Turbografx 16 version of the game. Identical to the PC Engine
For those who were not aware, the PC Engine & Turbografx 16 are the same console. The PC Engine is the Japanese name for it & the Turbografx 16 is the US name for it. The PC Engine / TG16 got the game 2 years after the Master System.
One more bit of confusion. The game is a direct sequel to Wonderboy in Monster Land for the Sega Master System, otherwise known as Bikkuriman World on the PC Engine (changed so it appears to be based on an anime of the same name). I almost forgot to mention the Brazil release which had it’s sprites changed to resemble a comic series called Monica’s Gang, something which was also done to Wonderboy 2 for consistency. Before you get worried, no we will not be covering that version, so you can all take a breath now.
I think that’s all… basically Westone developed the game for Sega & Hudsonsoft obtained the rights to it under the proviso they disassociated it from the Wonderboy series. That’s a VERY simple explanation. Rather than get bogged down in that, let’s have a look at the game.
As mentioned earlier, the game takes place at the end of Wonderboy 2 (we’ll refer to the series as Wonderboy just to make things easy) where you battle the Mecha Dragon, who upon defeat curses you turning you into a dragon yourself. Though the character is called “Lizard Man” he breathes fire. You can call him what you want really. I like Cecil, but that’s just me…
The game is a platformer, that like Ufouria is just one big world for you to explore. You find yourself restricted to where you can go in your lizard/dragon form, but that’s because there are other transformations the game will bestow upon you.
The 6 forms are:
Hu-Man - Nothing special but has the highest attack & defense
Lizard Man - Breathes fire & can walk through lava
Mouse Man - Can crawl up walls & on ceilings, but only on special bricks
Piranha Man - Can swim
Lion Man/Tiger Man - Swings his sword enabling you to hit blocks overhead or under your feet that would otherwise be out of reach
Hawk Man - Can fly
Each of the 6 forms must use their abilities to locate & destroy the dragons. Each dragon you destroy will turn you into something else. Eventually you will get the ability to change into different characters at will. You’ll notice that Lion Man & Tiger man are listed together. Well he becomes Lion Man in the Sega Master System version & Tiger Man in the PC Engine/TG16 version. Why? I dunno…
During your quest to become human again you can find or purchase sword, shield & armour upgrades. These will sometimes behave differently depending on the form you take at the time, so try to learn which item does what with which form.
At this point I need to discuss one thing that bothers me about the Sega Master System version, & that’s the green hair. Who has green hair? Your character didn’t have green hair in Wonderboy 2, & if this is a sequel you would think they would keep this the same right? WRONG. The PC Engine on the other hand has no such problems & your character has blonde hair, as he should have. I have no doubts this is due to the limitations of the Master System colour pallette, but it is annoying none the less.
Gameplay wise everything feels just right in this game. There is a reason this game is a favourite with Master System owners. For some reason PC Engine / TG16 owners don’t rave about it as much… not sure why. This game controls really well though. Nothing feels impossible about the game & while you might find parts tricky, you always know you can get through it the next time. I have to say I did prefer the more precise PC Engine controller, but then again I have a 3rd party controller I can use on the SMS that is identical to a PC Engine controller, so it’s not a big issue.
The game features a password option that lets you save your position at any time. As the game is quite long this is a welcome addition, but as well as that the password system features some little secrets all its own. Both the PCE / TG16 & SMS versions have special codes to allow you to start as Hu-Man, start the game with everything & even disable the door noise.
The music in both games does the job, though obviously the PC Engine / TG16 is far superior. That’s not a criticism of the SMS version & is expected, as the PCE / TG16 was released a few years after the SMS. Each part of the game features different music, & while this music does loop throughout the game, I didn’t find it particularly annoying.
This has been my second favourite game for a very long time. Mario World is number 1 incase anyone was interested. As for Wonderboy 3, the gameplay is fantastic, the controls precise & it’s just a lot of fun. I give this 94%
Street Fighter 2: Champion Edition
System: PC Engine
Released: 1993
By Capcom
We’re about to review Street Fighter 2 on an 8-bit system. WAIT, don’t go yet, give it a chance. I’m sure a lot of you will have seen the Sega Master System version made by Tectoy in all its ugh… I can’t even joke about that abomination. Even some of the 16-bit systems fared poorly with Street Fighter 2, take a look at the Amiga. The PC Engine is different & that can be attributed to the onboard hardware.
Yes the PC Engine is an 8-bit machine but it uses a 16-bit graphics processor which, while not as powerful as that of the SNES or Megadrive is capable of displaying a potential 512 colours, though not all at once. I won’t make this a boring technical review, we’ll save that for another day. I just wanted to point out some of the technical aspects that help to make this is such a good release.
Street Fighter 2… what can I say? It’s one of the most famous video games of all time. It’s a simple concept: choose a character out of the 8 (later versions would expand this to a maximum of 16), beat the other 7 in a one on one fight & then defeat the 4 bosses. It’s a style of gameplay that has been around since the times of “Way of the Exploding Fist”, but Street Fighter 2 includes special moves & fluid gameplay. I remember reading a review for the arcade version in C+VG before the game became well known & thinking how great it looked. I remember it being the March 1991 issue which featured Chun Li on the cover & it received a 3 page review which covered all the characters. This was my first exposure to the game, with the next being when I played it at the local video store.
I remained ignorant of the PC Engine version until I got the Internet & started researching video game systems I never owned. It would be another 10 years until I actually got a PC Engine, but when I read a review of Street Fighter 2 I was stunned. Yes the world had well & truly moved on from Street Fighter 2 when I discovered this, but the fact that an 8-bit system could pull off this classic fighter is nothing short of outstanding.
The first thing you’ll notice off the bat is that it looks very similar to the SNES version & that’s because this version of the game was rumoured to be modelled on it. The colours are used really well here & watching them side by side you’d be hard pressed to tell the difference. Let’s have a look. First the SNES:
(Excuse the squashed image) Then the same (as close as I could get) shot on the PC Engine:
If you were a casual gamer off the street you wouldn’t pick it, it’s that close. For those scrutinising the pictures, yes there are differences but they’re nothing you’re going to lose sleep over. Even the backgrounds & the floor scrolls. I would even rather controversially suggest this is even better than the Megadrive version. No offense to the machine itself, but I always felt they could have done a better job with it.
The game is supposed to be using fewer frames per sprite than the SNES version, but I didn’t notice it all that much. Sure some moves suffer from it slightly, but it doesn’t impact the gameplay. The game basically looks & feels like the SNES version when you’re playing it. The only problem with this game are the controls. Let’s look at the standard PC Engine Core Grafx 2 controller:
As you can see it has a “1” button, a “2” button & not a lot else other than “Run” & “Select”. Here’s how it works: “Run”, “2” & “1” are your light, medium & high attacks, while “Select” changes whether you’re going to kick or punch. Pretty bad setup I have to say. I would have preferred using “1” for punch, “2” for kick & either using the turbo controls to determine which power level you wanted or holding the button down. There was a controller released for the PC Engine to be used with Street Fighter 2 called the Avenue controller:
As you can see it has 6 buttons & has a few more curves than the standard controller. It’s very comfortable to use & gives you a very authentic Street Fighter 2 experience.
As I mentioned you can barely tell the difference between this & the SNES version which was considered to be the penultimate version of the game (with the arcade being the ultimate) back in the day. As such, providing you use an Avenue controller the game feels exactly like the SNES version as well. Every hit you make feels like it’s making contact & special moves are as easy to pull off as the SNES version. All in all it feels like a very satisfying version of the game.
The sound is where the game takes some cuts, but given the option I’d rather they took it from the sound than the graphics. All the characters main themes are present, but they sound very tinny. Added to that, some of the voice samples are missing.
It is unusual that this never came out for the US PC Engine variation the Turbografx16, as this may have really helped the console get more of a foothold in the English speaking market. It came out about 6 months before the Megadrive version which was a real plus & could have easily sold a few more TG16 units. That’s my theory anyway, but we’ll never know if I was right. This is a very nice release that sits somewhere in the middle of the SNES & MD versions. The SNES is still the best home release, but the PC Engine comes close.
A couple of final things I want to point out: First is the thickness of the HuCard (please excuse the blurriness of the pic above). Your typical game is just a flat card, but Street Fighter 2 is quite large to presumably house the 16Mbits of goodness that lies within. The only other game I know of that has a HuCard this thick is Populous. As well as that the case is a double thick PC engine case which is odd as the game is only on 1 Hucard (again, the same for Populous). Even more confusing is that Street Fighter 1 was released on PC Engine CD. Why? Was that really neccessary? If SF2 fits on a HuCard then surely SF1 will as well. Let’s face it, SF1 was a pretty ordinary game, not really worthy of a CD release. Oddly enough, SF1 was called Fighting Street on the PC Engine for what reason I do not know…
Overall I give this 96%. It’s not the best version of SF2 out there, but it’s pretty damned close, & it’s as good as you’re going to get on a PC Engine.
