cool!, full speed, prog scan SNES games.

Playing all those Nintendo games in full speed is enough for me... bit of a PALtard until recently.

How is it on the various controllers?

I only tried the classic controller, which is great. I played a couple of hours worth of F-Zero

I'm not really sure how much I'll use this to be honest. Most of the games on there at present I already have in one format or another. If the library gets bigger I can see myself downloading games I really love and multiplayer games purely for convenience I suppose.

I'd pay for full speed N64 stuff as I don't have any non-PAL N64 titles

"One console to rule them all" some fellow once said

I demand Starfox screenshot!

_____________________________

"And I'm Barry Hercules, Doc"

I challenge all of you to a Starfox64 score attack as soon as it hits!

Remember Fox is for life, not just for Christmas. He's the Lylat System's answer to David Hasselhoff, infact he's better at some things; The Hoff can only boost once per episode in Knightrider, Foxy's boost button is stuck down with a bit of Blu Tack!

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"www.cillitbangremix.com" -

Fox will be downloaded for certain. He's a big hole in my gaming soul that has to be filled.

Broke my Super Smash Brothers Melee virginity yesterday, which was cool. Only managed to scratch around at the surface of the gameplay, but it was excellent fun.

Must finish Metroid Prime...

Smash is so good it's almost offensive - I must get back on it myself to brush up before they drop the Wii version (and dont you dare use Fox - I claimed full Bredrin Rights ages ago). The Smash matches on Youtube are scary in the way these guys can move the characters. It's like the short-jump and roll/evade mixups of KOF combined with a bit of VF2 frame cancel science. That's what's so class about that game, novices can get into it quickly as the commands are so simple, but the system is so deep you can take the character movement to ridiculously sick levels.

I'd love a bit of original F Zero love too - I got back onto F Zero GX last night, man that game is so SO SO sick! From the second it loads the production values and attention to detail are shocking - what other game has an intro lap in time to the music and individual character CGI endings, profiles...they even have a completely individual theme song! O_O

To top it all off it plays like Romance-Sexytime! - and I can even love the guitar wailing, if I imagine it's Dante! XD

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"www.cillitbangremix.com" -

There have been a few posts on other forums on a loophole that lets you buy Wii points with a non-US credit card -

Should be useful

Awesome...!

Wonder what the exchange rate is...

We were going to try a colonial island, but it said VC wasn't supported in that country.

I wonder if you get the games in Portuguese?

Unlikely.

I thought something like that might work. I tried the British Virgin Islands and Canada, but no joy. If Brazil works then wicked

I'll try this tonight to confirm.

I'd be slightly concerned about Ts&Cs and changing country post purchase myself.

However, if the financial transaction is completely boxed off to the content of the Wii, it should be fine.

I believe you have to agree to Ts&Cs on each country change y'see.

Yes you do, but you can always flip it back to USA.

Works a treat. I've downloaded Mario 64 and bomberman '93 The Turbografix stuff is very nice and Mario is spot on. Each game comes with instructions too, which is a nice feature.

Yeah cool, worked for me too!

I did Bomberman '93, Donkey Kong and Sonic. One from each system because I'm an emulation nerd

So, what are you buying the Wii Points in?

I was too busy Wii'ing.

The N64 emulation is awesome, 640x480 madness. Star Fox 64 and other classics will look incredible!

Also Bomberman 93 supports upto 5 players, so I guess you can have a combination of Wii Remote and GameCube controllers to fill up the players... I haven't experimented.

Interested to hear your opinion on the emulation of each system. I'm a whore for original versions, but if the emulation is exceptional then I'm happy to throw my principles away

I think I'll purchase some more points tonight and dl some more titles. Probably go for Sonic, F-Zero and something on the NES that I've not played before. A couple of extra games got added yesterday . I want the Internet Channel BADLY!!! Surfing with the remote on me tele should be pretty nifty and keep the wife happy when I'm hogging the computer upstairs.

Hooked up the CC... works perfectly, you still buy in US Dollars, which is a bonus.

So I bought Donkey Kong, awesome, not got as far as I did ever! Since I don't remember playing the NES version at all, only the BBC B knock off... which I think had more level variations, but I do get that confused with Chuckie Egg in my pea like brain.

Also hooked up with Sonic and Altered Beast, the latter on the behest of my housemate... the three buttons don't really work on the Wii Remote, use of the A button is optimistic, as you can't really A and move on the dpad, so its Classic Controller or GameCube Pad. Sonic... I've never owned a Mega Drive / Genesis so I think I am going to be royally plucked for all the games I've missed... flippin' Golden Axe and Ecco the Dolphin were released today too!

I'm also thinking all PC Engine games are worth getting so far, Super Star Soldier was there to buy, but I wasn't sure....

I've already got a fair heft of games filling up me Wii Menu... I need to instigate a rule about these Classic games, like I should complete Sonic before anything... ahh its so refreshing to have a game just start, no flannel, Sonic shocked me on that one.

I vaguely corrolated that all the VC launch games were the launch games for the respective consoles... unsure about Turbo Grafx16, but I thought that was a nice touch.

In short... I'm Nintendo's Virtual Console slave.

Super Star Soldier is aces. I dl'd that last night. I'm fast becoming a VC whore. I have

Mario 64
FZero
Sonic
Wario Woods
Super Star Soldier
Bomberman 64

It's stupid, because I already have a couple of those on their native hardware, but the VC is so accessible it makes dipping in and out of them that much easier. I have a feeling that Bomberman is the only one i've downloaded so far that will get absolutely rinsed

Another thing the release rate is just so nice at the moment. They're drip feeding out a few releases a day. If they keep this up (and there's no reason they shouldn't as it's essentially emulation) then there's going to be a really comprehensive library of titles available at the touch of a button.

Is there a way of moving the games from the Wii memory onto an SD card for archiving? I'm guessing there isn't otherwise hackers will have them cracked within seconds.

Yeah, it is a little nuts. I went out of my way to get a Bomberman '93 PC Engine setup, but I still bought that on VC.

Still... my little PC Engine can't manage 480p component, no matter how hard it tries.

Emulation-wise, everything I've seen is basically perfect. All the little problems you sometimes see with F-Zero on the SNES just aren't there - problems with transparencies, slightly off mode 7 scaling, horizon misplaced by a pixel or two, garbage pixels drawn at the horizon, etc. etc.

Everything except Super Mario 64 of course, which is tweaked to hell to run at a higher resolution with completely different image filtering. This is the same approach as stuff like UltraHLE, which cheats by catching API calls and so on rather than emulating low level hardware. Which is cool, if all you want to do is run a certain game... It looks like the same emulator than did Ocarina of Time on the Cube in fact.

Saurian should be pleased too, that common Xbox blur-everything-to-hell filter is not here; we have big, fat, sharp pixels for the 8 and 16 bit stuff. Some sort of visual filtering must be happening though - Nintendo have just done it tastefully.

Another thing that pleased me is that they haven't hacked up each title screen to add a big ugly '(C) 2006' to anything - to all intents and purposes you get the original game as published at the time - nice.

I'm wondering who wrote these emulators. The 16 bit stuff is so good, I'm beginning to think they have bought them off other people, rather than developed them from scratch.

Well... this is Nintendo. It looks to me as if they are play testing each release, and preparing the online manual, and setting up correct save state support for each non-N64 game. I reckon thats why there is a drip feed. I can see them holding off on some Zeldas until Twilight Princess has sold a shit-load too. There must be all sorts of decisions like that to be made.

You can copy them to SD, so you can free up Wii space but copy them back when you want, but my understanding they are locked to the Wii they were purchased on. Not too hot for importers - your Wii dies, and you lose all your VC games.

Alot more action in Japan, but we haven't got a definitive list like this.

Looks like N64 releases will take longer to appear, as you suggest, they've completely rejuiced that Nintendo 64, but the ROM might be the last version they produced... or might be tweaked... but then maybe the copyright might be changed... in a really geekkoid way it'd be interesting if there are any bugs in Mario 64 and if they exist in the Virtual Console one.

Wouldn't mind a Master System either, get some Alex Kidd going, but I don't know how much the MegaGenesis replicated the catalogue over the years, like Sonic and such.

Don't know who developed the emus, but Sega had one for the dreamcast that was OK, so it's possible that the Genesis emulator is a Sega in house effort. It's easy money recycling back catalogue in this fashion and online distribution cuts out a lot of the hassle and cost.

I can see the list of VC games getting very very long.

I might be wrong, but I thought I'd read that the DC Mega Drive emu was DGEN.

really, because I thought it was the otherway around. I.e. Sega developed the emu and then it was basically ripped off to make DGen (or whatever). You're closer to the scene than me though, so I'll bow to your superior knowledge.

I would like to think Nintendo did their system emulators. It seems Internet thinks they buy these things but may be as they develop the hardware they have all documentation it is easy for them to do it. Did not Gamecube has some level of Nintendo 64-compatibility? I do not remember correctly although it does not matter if it is that good then player can just get on with playing games \o/

Arghg! Too long to wait until release day! It is unfair as I think it is being taken away from me for Christmas too. OH NOEOS! I play more back catalogue while crying.

_____________________________

"And I'm Barry Hercules, Doc"

Tough breaks there Sebastian. I convinced the wife to let me have the Wii as an early Christmas present

There's no reason why the VC shouldn't have Master System emulation. Not sure why it isn't there already. Basically any cartridge based system from N64 backwards must be fair game.

Man this Virtual Console sounds too good to be true! Well glad you get the games as they're meant to look and not all filtered to fuckries. What I'm proper gagging for the most is Starfox64 and Gunhed!

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"www.cillitbangremix.com" -

It gets confusing, and my memory isn't great.

In Japan I think Sega had Mega Drive downloads (with payments) for some versions of the browser (3.0? 3.5?).

I don't know if this was the same emulator as in the Smash Pack. Thats the one I read was a ported DGEN. I think people hacked that game to stick different roms and loaders onto the disk image, which might be what you heard about.

Yeah, that sounds like it. It (Dreamcast Smash Pack) wasn't that hot anyway. Would be interested to know who's developed the emus for Wii as they are very very good, as you have mentioned above.

I still want to get an NTSC N64 at some point in the future though. There's still a draw for having and holding the real deal even when the emulation is perfect (or better than perfect).

I think if Castlevania: Rondo Of Blood found its way onto the VC I'd have to give a 21 spunk salute.

It seems like it's going to be worth owning an Eastern & Western Wii in order to take full advantage of the VC.

Ed-209 after having been told that his Wii hasn't been delivered.

So I get home and what's being played by my housemates... Altered Beast... I mentioned that Golden Axe had just been released, so that got bought immediately and moderated pwned.

I think the immediacy of access to the emulation is the killer app on this gig... finding a disc, waiting for it to load... its all too normal... whacking a game on from the Wii Menu and having it playable in seconds is great. After a monster Excite Truck sesh, I went back to the Wii menu to see the play times, and ended up Sonicing (I STILL don't get it).

What exactly don't you get? It's a platformer that's it. A very fast well designed platform game.

Sonic, its not that game I thought it was meant to be, at all.

Green Hill Zone you have the multiple tiers and fast enemy killing combos and secrets and so forth.

Then Marble Zone turns into intricate instadeath platforming, with the lava, preset block movements and interesting timing. Nothing like what I was expecting at all.

Spring Yard starts with the pinball theme and is less gitastic than Marble zone, with a crazy risk reward half pipe usage vs giant spikey balls and animating moving blocks stuff.

Thats as far as I got, but I am diggin' it a bit more now, conceptually. Need to be less cab handed and work out the points system of time vs rings and so forth.

Don't think, feeel.

Indeed. The real Biatch about Sonic is you can play through the entire game and still not finish it. It's all about the emeralds and bonus zones you see. You have to get into the bonus warps and complete each one to get the emeralds.

I'm feelin' it now. No idea how to get to bonus land though.

And what's with the giant ring at the end some times?

Such a n00b.

From memory you need 50 rings when you pass the red point. A warp then opens up above the red point which you can jump into. Or that might be Sonic 2, can't remember...

Obviously this makes more sense of the ring collection aspect of the game.

That is Sonic 2

The giant ring is the bonus zone. You need to jump into it or collect it. Your gamer instinct should have figured that out all ready though seeing giant ring you should know to pick it up

_____________________________

"And I'm Barry Hercules, Doc"

I guess you have to go through the middle middle of it?

Is there one per act? or a ubiquitous one per zone?

I have yet to see the "bonus zone".

Ah thanks Sebastian, yes Sonic 2 silly silly Madbury...

The giant ring only appears if you have sufficient rings though doesn't it? You have to jump through it Jib to get into the warp. There's seven emeralds so one per zone.

It's a bastard really because if you miss an emerald you is fucked in terms of properly completing the game (something I've never actually done ).

I'm starting to get a flavour for the level design, the ethos of bits and bobs, hidden jumps, breakable walls, and how they try and kinda guide them you to them but don't.

So I guess by having the big ring there at the end of each act, you get three bites at it? Or at least two as the last act has Robotnik or whatever he's called.

I'm going to be very poor. for a very long time.

Wooo Sonic!

Man, what the hell is that all about!

It really is GREAT!

Not much exposition to get there though. Trying to keep 50 rings to the end to get to trippy, crazy, Cameltry land bonus zone, which is an arse to navigate and not obvious where to go.

Basically need practice.

Still unsure if there is a Chaos Emerald in either Bonus zone...

Ah the spinny bonus levels that were at the time technically impressive. Sonic really did suck the marrow out of the MD hardware

The emeralds are in there you just need to find them without falling into the exit first. Frustratingly tricky.

what's confusing the issue is that I played the Master System version of Sonic... so playing the "propa" Sonic is really wierd... like watching Hollywood "The Ring" and then watching the orignal afterwards.

I swear the Chaos Emeralds just kinda were about in each Zone somewhere like extra lives.

Probably. The MD 'couldn't do' the rotating bonus stages, so they certainly won't be in the Master System version. There will be some other mechanic for collecting the emeralds.

Sure! If you are good you can get two emeralds in a zone

Master System had emerald hidden in stages like has been said. I remember not being able to find last emerald for ages on the airship stage? I could see it later in stage behind a wall or chain but not figure out how to get there. It was a floating platform LEFT of the start which could only see when Sonic looked down and leap of faith from starting platform and took a different route through stage. Yes it was good finding that one eventually.

Sonic CD was GRIME for collecting emeralds too! - I love the way you do it though, it's my favourite Sonic game by far (the soundtrack alone is legend!)

In Sonic CD you can go back and forward in time by passing a "Past" or "Future" checkpoint/signpost. Once you pass it Sonic gets sparks coming off him, if you keep him running at full blast long enough you'll time-travel. So the trick now is to find the signpost to get back to the past, change the past by destroying the machine that fucks the stage up - then stay/warp as needed for your 50 rings > jump into the bonus stage ring business.

Then the bonus stage is a bastardly 3D stage where you have to smash UFOs - smash them all and you get the emerald. You really cannot afford to miss any until you have them all, proper gets you to memorise the stage layouts so you know how and where you can get enough speed to warp.

AND HE DOESNT TALK! - Ever since he opened his gob it's ruined it for me! T_T

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"www.cillitbangremix.com" -