Once upon a time, there was a magazine called TurboPlay. It was a bi-monthly publication that lasted a respectable length of time (from June/July 1990 to August/September 1992). It focused exclusively on the console creations of NEC, specifically the TurboGrafx-16 (PC Engine), TurboGrafx-CD, Turbo Duo, and the TurboExpress (PC Engine GT). The magazine was also a spin-off of the well known VideoGames and Computer Entertainment (which, under that name, lasted from 1988 to 1993).
After TurboPlay went away, a few short-lived publications cropped up, mostly to promote the Turbo Duo console. The first of these was TurboForce. And I can say, with utmost certainty, that it had better covers than the early Game Player’s issues. Well, at least this one did.
By the way, both TurboPlay and TurboForce didn’t have as many pages as its 100+ page peers. You got32 pages instead. But let’s see what those pages contain!
Oh, God. They use that Turbo shtick tokingdom come. Turbo this, Turbo that…oh, God, Johnny Turbo?! Ohman…
…wait a minute! Wait just a second. I think I see something…
…yeah! Why is “Coming Attractions” not “TurboAttractions”? Missed opportunity, you shmucks!
TurboNews: COMDEX: “Scuzzy,” huh? COMDEX, by the way, is no more. Its last show was in 2003, according to Wikipedia, “effectively making the Consumer Electronics Show as its replacement in Las Vegas.” Perhaps 1992 was COMDEX’s best year?
Anyhow, the Scuzzy thing: “The Intelligent Link will be about the same size as a TTI chip-based game (the size of a credit card), but there will be a cable extending from the exposed end of the card. This is called a SCSI (pronounced scuzzy) cable…” Interesting. “And for the price of the player ($299) and the Intelligent Link, you get all this: the world’s first integrated chip/CD-ROM based game system, more than $250 worth of games and discount coupons, and an all-purpose CD-ROM drive for your computer.” By the way, TTI despised Sega, judging from their Johnny Turbo comics…
…which were REALLY something.
But what good is a system without good games? Shadow of the Beast is a classic game that seemed to be on every game system in the early 90s, and Shape Shifter…didn’t I see that one in a GameFan issue? I’m pretty sure I did! I’ve never heard of Loom, but Dragon Slayer is a familiar sounding game title.
Hm. The Turbo Bonus Club “marks the first time a game company in the U.S. has given customers a chance to earn gifts just by buying their games, a move TTI should be applauded for!” I read these sentences over and over, and feel a pang of sadness. TTI tried SO HARD to market their “TurboGrafx-16 And Friends” in North America, and it just didn’t work out…probably because Nintendo and their “buy our $199 console and our pack-in Mario game” was a more appealing and more eye-catching deal.
TurboPreview: Five Player Mania: Sadly, of the games listed on this page, Battle Lode Runner did not make it to the West in the 90s, so North American gamers could not check that one out. Bomberman ‘93 and World Sports Competition, however, did make it to North America. Bomberman was much loved, of course, while World Sports Competition…wasn’t as much. Battle Lode Runner DID make it to North America and Europe in 2007 on the Wii Virtual Console, but…yeah, it probably didn’t seem impressive anymore.
Sim Earth looks like a decent idea…but it apparently wasn’t a great game. Super disappointing! I hate it when interesting ideas turn out mediocre or worse…
Camp California, meanwhile…
…
. . .
Lords of Thunder: Here’s the guy that was on the cover! The game itself came to North America and was well received, especially since it had a rad heavy metal soundtrack. The Sega CD also got a port of this game, which wasn’t as good as the Turbo version, but was still serviceable.
It may sound like a good deal, but there was only one more issue after this one.
Dungeon Explorer II: Fun facts! Did you know that the TurboGrafx-CD only had 45 games localized for North America? It might seem like a decent number, but there were over 400 games for the system. Luckily, Dungeon Explorer II was one of the ones to make it to the West. And even if it hadn’t, CDs from any region could work on any TurboGrafx-CD, so import gamers probably had a lot of fun with this system anyhow.
Exile: Also making it to North America was Exile, from Working Designs! WD would go on to produce some rad Sega CD games, like Lunar and Vay.
Nice graphics, of course, but TurboForce stresses the importance of the story.
TurboSpotlight: Dragon Slayer. Or, to be specific: Dragon Slayer: The Legend of…Heros? That’s how they wrote it!
Oh my God, the “sixteenth birthday” cliché. It may have been less of one back then, but still…also, that dragon is pretty adorable. I don’t want to kill dragons. They’re cool.
TurboForce gives this role-playing game A LOT of pages, and the game certainly looks enjoyable and interesting. Just because a game is full of cliches doesn’t mean that the game play won’t rock. Something I’m a little less happy about is that they show pictures of the ending. Come on, dudes! Let people experience the game for themselves! I mean, I can understand spoiling the ending of a game or movie if it sucks and you don’t want people to go through the pain you did, but put something else in for space, like strategy tips on especially hard bosses.
I can’t say I’m intimidated by our protagonist, Prince Logan…but I still think one of the worst names ever for a hero was Phantasy Star IV’s Chaz. He was called (the much better) Rudy in Japan, and they should have kept his name the same here.
TurboStyles: And now, a bunch of stuff that has little to nothing to do with “TurboGrafx-16 and Friends”.
Anime!: Those helmets look weird when seen from the side…anyhow, Bubblegum Crisis has ass-kicking dames called the Knight Sabers, who have to stop the android-like Boomers from causing trouble in Mega Tokyo.
Movies!: …what.
…what?!
…who’s THIS douchebag?!
Music!: I will take the Black Crow(e)s over Dr. Butcher M.D., thank you!
Technology!: The eventual DVD format sits on the corpses of its failed predecessors…
The year is 1993. Everyone is madly in love with the idea of virtual reality.
…the year is 2015. Everyone is still madly in love with the idea of virtual reality. I think.
When virtual reality really, truly becomes a common, everyday thing…I wonder how much the world will change?…
(gets a little sad)
Fanzines!: Oh FUCK YES FORGET BEING SAD LET’S READ SOME FANZINE SHIT
For those of you who don’t know what fanzines are, they are basically like home-made magazines that passionate kids make…or, rather, made. They aren’t all that common anymore. In fact, they are pretty much dead as hell because we have blogs and the Internet now. I mean, if the magazine industry is having problems, do you really expect the fanzine scene to be doing super great either?
TurboForce gives us two big reasons why fanzines are, like, totally radical and why they should be read and bought and not forgotten about:
-There are no ads.
-The writing is uncensored.
Wow, TurboForce is super serious about people reading fanzines! In fact, they interview one scruffy youngster with a fanzine of his own, Mr–
…those Turtles are out for blood. Maybe they saw Game Player’s mediocre covers.
Anyhow, uh…the fanzine kid! I like to write too, Casey. In fact, that’s why I love writing these magazine write-ups: because it’s fun. Stupid, sure, but it’s also fun. And what kind of ambitions does this kid have?
…
!!!
DAMN! This kid’s got willpower, making his dreams come true! Let’s take a closer look at this magazine.
Man, this guy made shit happen. And look at that opening page! I can’t believe he actually, in under the span of two years, made his fanzine a-
…wait a moment.
…none of these people are Casey Loe (although it’s nice to see Jeff and Chris again). What…happened? Did Casey get overthrown shortly after starting his magazine? Did Neil West backstab him and leave him for dead? Did Casey…have to go into hiding and write for a different magazine while he plotted his revenge?
Or maybe the magazine just happened to have the same name as his fanzine. Yeah. That’s probably it.
…I like my theory better!
Anyhow, back to this fanzine interview.
What kind of prodigy is this kid? A high schooler with “a high quality, underground publication”? And his voice was unspeakably masculine, it seems. Did puberty hit this guy like a burning train? Also, how did he score an interview with TurboForce? Was he a diehard Turbo fan? Was his love for Dragon Slayer as intense as society’s fascination with virtual reality?
I’m probably most impressed, however, by the fact that this interview was done on the phone. I had a crippling fear of phones until I was…actually, it was around the time that I was a senior in high school that I got over it. Hm.
Anyhow, HERE ARE SOME FANZINES:
Oddly, Digital Press isn’t among them. Maybe it premiered later on…but of all these fanzines, I believe that Paradox is the only one with any extensive documentation on the Internet. Depressing! All of that hard work that people did on their fanzines…lost forever! That’s…just shameful. Shame on you all for not saving and scanning your fanzines. It can’t be any harder than scanning a magazine, which are bulky. You have to tear the magazines apart, too, if you want really good scans…but I think you can scan most fanzines without damaging them too badly. I think.
Coming Attractions: The last non-ad page for this magazine lists all the upcoming Turbo games.
Most of them did come out in North America in some way. The ones that did not:
-Super Battle Lode Runner (or just Battle Lode Runner). Already discussed.
-Blood Gear was only released in Japan, and not until October of 1994.
-Cosmic Fantasy 3 was a Working Designs title, but only came out in Japan (in 1992; apparently a translation was planned but never finished).
-Dangerous Journey must have been the planned English name of an unknown Japanese game. If it came out here, it was under a completely different name.
-Military Madness 2 was called Neo Nectaris in Japan. In fact, the Nectaris series (which consists of sci-fi strategy games) was very popular in Japan…not so much here, though.
-Power Golf 2 never came out here, but it came out in Japan around March of 1994.
And that…was TurboForce Issue 3! Are you still curious about NEC’s consoles? http://www.pcengine.co.uk/ is called The PC Engine Software Bible for a reason. Also, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lu7en-ogwTs is a nice video showcasing 100 PC Engine games that didn’t come to North America.
I may return to TurboForce sometime, or maybe I’ll read through a TurboPlay issue. Whether I do or not, though, I have newfound respect for PC Engine games.
…not so much for Johnny Turbo, though.