Silpheed - The Original Version of Game Arts' Classic Shooter on the NEC PC-88 (PC-88 Paradise)

[@CorporalDanLives]

This just dropped on the eShop for switch, get it!

[@cinedelasestrellas]

Ok I’m sure some of you know this already, but at 4:03, “Yggdrasil” is mentioned. In Norse mythology, Yggdrasil was a tree that represents the universe. At 19:34, some explanation on when you hear “Welcome home Silpheed, you’re right on the glide slope.” Glide slope is a real aviation term. When flying an aircraft using instruments for navigation (especially when there are low clouds and/or low visibility), certain airports are equipped with an instrument landing system, or “ILS.” The ILS is a pair of radio antennas that transmit two beams out to the aircraft: one is called the localizer, which provides horizontal guidance to the aircraft that directs the pilot onto a path aligned with the runway. The other is the, you guessed it, glide slope. The glide slope provides vertical guidance to direct the pilot to follow a vertical path, shaped like a ramp or slope, usually starting at an altitude of around 2000 feet when the aircraft is about six miles or so from the runway, down to around 200 feet (or lower depending on the type of equipment on the aircraft) about a half mile or less from the runway end. It seems a bit odd to have a glide slope in space where there are no low clouds or fog, but the bases do have features resembling runways, so I guess it could happen!

[@purwantiallan5089]

It also appears in Silpheed ending credits.

[@Dreamshadow1977]

The music for this game has lived in my head since I was ten.

[@purwantiallan5089]

The musics in Power Strike (Aleste) also is epic.

[@cyruslab2005]

Back when I was a boy, I loved the opening music of this game so much I didn't play the game and just listened to the opening music over and over again with my pc xt and roland scc-1 card!

[@purwantiallan5089]

Silpheed Alternative should've been released on PS3 and not just Android phone only.

[@JohnBeaversYT]

3:48 French guy here. Your pronunciation of "Gloire" was very good actually. 👍

[@HornHeaDD]

I remember playing Silpheed on a Tandy 1000 at my friends house as a kid. We didnt know how to pronounce it, we called it "Silp Heed." :D

[@purwantiallan5089]

Project Silpheed on Xbox 360 also is a good game.

[@retro-rock3067]

Ya Silpheed got an Nec Pc-8801 release but it also got a Fujitsu Micro-7 release as well and by the way Game Arts is the same company who made Thexder

[@RapideWombaticus]

Watching your videos makes me want a PC-8801 something terrible... Man... Some cool games! 😮

[@Squirrelsquid]

"The Satellite" in the third easter egg seems to be the "Discovery One" from 2001 A Space Odyssey, actually. :) that's why the monolyth makes sense too.

[@shdon]

That would make the cheat code make sense, "SDI" should probably be "DIS" instead.

[@purwantiallan5089]

​@@shdonor perhaps a "DSI" code.

[@sdolcy]

Completely awesome game; I played Silpheed on my Tandy 1000 SL with glorious 3-voice audio! Loved the Moonlight Sonata credits track ;)

[@JohnSmith-vs6yy]

Moonlight Sonata was in Thexder, not Silpheed.

[@Choops6969]

crazy you made this. I've been vibing to this soundtrack for the past month now.

[@nathanc6516]

13:29: He said, "This is Gamma-Alpha control command. Approach SPACE runway. Well MET." I have magic ears so I can hear it.

[@zanrek5021]

One of my favorites Mega / sega CD titles. Nice video... and by the way nice channel wich I also discover!

[@SNKev411]

I’m gonna play these games on my FPGA, Mr.

[@Dreamshadow1977]

Spent many hours playing this on my Tandy 1000. Loved it.

[@RyuHayabusa06]

Great episode. Silpheed was always impressive considering the hardware. Game Arts is one of my favorite old school Japanese game companies.

[@balancejustice10]

It's a nostalgic game. I played when I was a student. I had a PC-88mkⅡSR and a PC-88MA, so I played with both, but 8Mhz was faster than 4Mhz. However, the difficulty level went up because it was early at 8Mhz.

[@BasementBrothers]

Yep. Exactly! Not sure why I seemed to mostly do better on 8mhz (except the final boss). It was probably just luck. Thanks for watching!

[@mikef5386]

Really interesting video, and kudos for getting the original hardware and software [some of that can be a pretty penny these days]. But one point to mention, the text in the intro ("How many ages hence...") isn't just words, it's Shakespeare! Pretty high-brow stuff for a mid-80s PC game. The first video game to quote Shakespeare? Possibly!

[@BasementBrothers]

Good call. You're right. It seems to be a quote from Julius Caesar. Out of context, it was really hard to make any sense of it, not knowing it was a Shakespeare quote. The story that comes later in the opening is definitely just pure Engrish though. Thanks for the heads up.

[@murasamex]

I used to play this game with my older brother’s PC-88mk2FR. It was good time.

[@BasementBrothers]

Hey, that's awesome! Like most people back then, you had to play it in 4MHz mode. It's tons of fun at either speed.

[@lagresomadsl]

The first game I ever played on a 286 IBM with 30mb harddrive Never finished Gloire

[@Dreamshadow1977]

You mentioned a Tandy Color Computer version, but I think there was another version for the Color Computer 2 and 3. It looked very much like the PC Dos version, but the graphics were less animated.

[@BasementBrothers]

If they exist, then wikipedia doesn't know about them!

[@Dreamshadow1977]

@@BasementBrothers sweet! That is something in my power to correct.

[@flumphflumph6021]

Oh. I didn't know there other Silpheed games. My only exposure to the series was the 360 game.

[@devilsoffspring5519]

I played Silpheed on a DOS PC (286) in 1989-1990 or thereabouts. Best part of the game was the tunes :)

[@The_Wandering_Nerd]

I'm really impressed by the PC-88 and all the hard work game designers took to put fast action games on a system with a then-archaic 8-bit architecture and a graphics chip designed for kanji rather than fast action.

[@LunaPrincessNinjato]

This is awesome!!!! Whoa Treasure and Gungho? Neat history lesson

[@oOGambitOo]

Honestly; Thanks, Man!

[@hdufort]

If I remember, for the Tandy Colors Computer, they included both a low resolution (Coco 1/2) and higher resolution (Coco 3) version on the same cartridge. This resulted in a very limited game, very underwhelming.

[@SaldoEras]

I played this on my family’s Apple IIGS and I had a devil of a time remembering what it was called until not long ago. Man I feel old. It’s funny that a game could inspire this many follow-ups yet hardly anyone is familiar with the original.

[@hicknopunk]

There is an apple 2 port? Wild!

[@CorporalDanLives]

Yeah, it was exclusive to the 16-bit IIGS. Thexder came out on the IIGS and ALSO on the 8-bit Apple IIe and it's insane how good it is

[@Michirin9801]

I played this one... It's one of the better PC-88 games for those who don't understand Japanese

[@BasementBrothers]

Yeah. My thumbnail is inevitably going to be a lie for some of you. Glad to hear it! Thanks for watching.

[@rockettaco]

It’s one of my favorites on the PC-88 for that reason.

[@shdon]

Very nice review with cool background info. I'm especially impressed and pleased that you mention the updated DOS version with properly intelligible voice samples.

[@matthewwachter9070]

Great video. I have fond memories of the Sega CD version and still play it occasionally on the Mega Everdrive Pro.

[@StitchJones]

Loved this game so much back in the day. Wild to see a different version.

[@tonechild5929]

OMG I played this as a kid on the PC

[@quincylarsonmusic]

I remembered this game by its memorable name, but had never seen gameplay of it before I watched this. I love how you managed to find different versions of the speech audio. Thanks for keeping memory of these games and their art + music alive through your mini documentaries.

[@Sarato]

I can't believe I've never heard of this channel before. This is stuff that I want to binge watch everything of. Thank you for the PC-88 Paradise episodes!

[@arioca]

Very interesting video. I have Silpheed for the Sega CD, the PS2 sequel, and the X360 spiritual successor.

[@odigem]

Another great video :) It's always Christmas time whenever I see a new video from your channel! In France, we had glimpses of those PC-88/98 games sometimes in the magazines from the late 80ies/90ies, but it was usually very short (in articles about 'those strange game systems/PC from Japan you'll never get here'). It's pretty incredible to have a channel like this to fully disscet and discover those games and this hardware, thanks a lot for the hard work! 'Gloire à Basement Brothers' :)

[@joshyoder871]

I grew up with the old DOS version! Probably the first SHMUP I ever played. I still have The Lost Planet for my PS2, it was a great game!

[@Salcade]

Great video! Probably my favorite video you've done so far

[@patcat8950]

Maybe I'm misremembering things, but I recall the DOS version having a red-and-blue-glasses 3D mode.

[@germainetaylor1757]

I had the Sega CD version of Silpheed

[@modslot1347]

Look! Dino bones! haha love it

[@AdamSommer70]

Great episode, thanks for posting!

[@VulpisFoxfire]

2:58 just as a technical thing...that's a wireframe, not 'vector graphics'. Vector graphics is a whole different thing.

[@golvellius6855]

Dude I love all yours videos thanks you

[@Dr.maxnguyen]

Nice video

[@radwolf76]

So the SDI Easter Egg might be meant to be Spaceship Discovery I. (That's one in Roman Numerals.)

[@biffrapper]

One of the greatest shmups of all time!

[@marsMayflower]

how did I miss Silpheed (or whatever version of it) on my CoCo 2?

[@lonewolffang]

I have the ps2 and Xbox 360 version but I never knew it dated farther than that. Interesting.

[@ThePageofRage]

I won't lie, the only Game Arts game series I enjoy is Grandia.

[@BasementBrothers]

Not even Lunar?!

[@JuanGomez-ke5py]

The title in the thumbnail is like wine

[@BasementBrothers]

Well, you may have played it now, but did you in the 80s?! I think not! ;)

[@JuanGomez-ke5py]

@@BasementBrothersI'm born in the era of window 95 to 98

[@kapparomeo]

I know this is an older video, but please have better lighting for the packaging showcase in newer ones!

[@solosureshot]

That "satellite" was the ship from 2001 A Space Odyssey

[@maboroshi1986]

the opening text isn't engrish. it's a quote from julius caesar by shakespeare. the senators have just assassinated caesar and to proclaim their victory the cover themselves in his blood. the quote is one of them believing that their actions will be celebrated for all time and re-enacted in memory.

[@BasementBrothers]

Yeah. I figured that out after posting the video. Wish I could go back and change it. Man I am uncultured!

[@jordanw8382]

Where were these stage-skipping cheat codes when I needed them back in 1990??

[@purwantiallan5089]

The graphics on Silpheed, both on PC-88 and Sega CD, are easily classified as a PlayStation 4 level due to how amazing the graphic truly is for a game from 1990s!

[@danmakuman]

Awesome video

[@creativecatproductions]

This game looks great

[@rafaellima83]

Who said I didn't play it? I played it.

[@CorporalDanLives]

PLANETARY BUSTER MISSILES!!!!

[@PlasticCogLiquid]

Look! Dragon bones

[@MagmaMKII]

Say, do you have a copy of XZR from Telenet Japan? I'd love to see that game being covered.

[@BasementBrothers]

I only have XZRII. The first is more rare and I have been trying to obtain one for quite a while. Hopefully someday.

[@Zero081086]

Nice! thank you.

[@Евгений-м9с8к]

Супер ретро шутер в таком жанре (космоса) на Sega CD версия в тройке моих любимых игр для нее 👍 Да и первые версии,например для DOS каноничны и отличные,а музыка то какая,аж пробирает этим ощущением одиночества в космосе 👌 В общем нестареющая классика,это одна из тех немногих игр,что я хотел иметь физически (в коробке и всем положенным) При чем поиграв первый раз в DOS версию,я не ощутил того,что игра моего года рождения 😂 В плане графики да,но геймплей прост и шикарен. Советую всем поиграть в нее,кто не играл еще 🔥✌

[@jebibones4282]

I believe the shitty compressed voice lines enhances the experience lol

[@xnamkcor]

"It's completely different" "It has excellent music". Are you saying the originals' music was bad?

[@allwaizeright9705]

DAD Loved SILPHEED...

[@Tr3vor42532]

This version seems to be pretty close to the PC port. Usually when games are on both the pc-88/98 and IBM compatibles, I'd assume that the japanese computers have better music, but it seems pretty close here.

[@BasementBrothers]

Yeah, exactly. It's really surprising how close the ports are to the PC-88 version, and how well-done the music is. Perhaps that's why this game was so popular on IBM compatibles.

[@AshMcCool]

Sierra really was one of the first computer Game companies that championed the use of dedicated sound cards, so Im not that surprised. They even sold the Roland MT and the Adlib directly to their customers If I recall correctly.

[@arcadeages3917]

What’s the difference between vector and unfilled polygons?

[@Tr3vor42532]

I'd just call them unfilled polygons, when I hear vector I think of stuff like asteroids. Although I guess the edges of filled and unfilled polygons are called vectors as far as I know.

[@ChristopherBushman]

So I'm trying to install Silpheed Alternative on my Android device (I know, its probably a lost cause. Still...). I'm trying to figure out how to set up the cache files and/or not have the app try to download any updates for the app's first launch. Any advice?

[@BasementBrothers]

I don't remember how I did it, but I do recall that the game was only actually designed to run on a couple of different specific Android models in Japan, the one I showed in the video being one of them. (At the time, Android was brand new in Japan and there were only a few different models available.)

[@desktorp]

For years I thought this game was called Slipheed and so I can't get used to Silpheed.

[@GoatZilla]

thexderrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

[@silverwings21]

I have the Sega CD version.

[@arcade_signal]

looks like it's running way too fast on that MC, are you using 4mhz mode?

[@BasementBrothers]

All the footage in this video is in 8mhz unless otherwise specified. It doesn't actually run at the "wrong" speed at 8mhz. When there are 0 or only a few sprites on screen the game runs at exactly the same speed at either 4mhz or 8mhz. It's only different when there is slowdown from too many sprites. The packaging for the game also says that 8mhz is supported. I talk about the 4 vs. 8mhz issue extensively in the video though, so you should really watch the whole thing.

[@arcade_signal]

@@BasementBrothers guilty, I came on the video looking for something else and only saw the first few minutes. since I've only ever played it in 4mhz (no 8mhz machine) it seemed absurdly fast because the slowdown seems "normal". cool to know this was actually intended by GA to play on both

[@BasementBrothers]

It's cool. Thanks for watching! There's actually a pretty strong argument for 4mhz being the "correct" speed for this game. The game was originally supposed to be released before 8mhz PC-88 models existed, and even the Project EGG official emulated version emulates it at 4mhz. Most people say the game is too hard at 8mhz.

[@MagmaMKII]

Its funny to see how much inspiration Star Fox took from this game, yet SF fans think their game is super original.

[@Choops6969]

play tetra star: the fighter.

[@joseemanuelalejandrolopez2512]

IT'S SAD basement brothers THAT I CODIN'T TEST SILPHEED ALTERNATIVE ON MY NEW ANDROID.

[@BasementBrothers]

It won't work man. No way. Good luck trying though.

[@joseemanuelalejandrolopez2512]

ILL DO MY BEST TO TEST THE GAME 🎮🎮 MAYBE I SHALL ME GOOD LUCK@@BasementBrothers.

[@ChetSimpson]

You're assessment that the Color Computer III is not powerful enough to run the original game is incorrect. The reason the Color Computer version of the game sucks is a combination of Sierra's laziness and Tandy's desire for primarily cartridge based games that run in 128k.

[@BasementBrothers]

Someone should make a new fan port of the real game!

[@apollosungod2819]

When it comes to GameArts's Silpheed, if we had had a very different staffed Sega of America subsidiary branch who did not have an agenda to push down the exclusive Sega MegaDrive and MegaCD Japanese game software being made back then and had bothered to prioritize translating and marketing these games then maybe Silpheed would have been as well known as Star Fox on Super Nintendo was even though both are different styles of 3d shooting games but such is the case for the vast majority of the Japanese game software developed on Sega MegaDrive, MegaCD and especially Sega Saturn hardware that either were not prioritized, took too long (in direct comparison to how Nintendo of America handled and prioritized English translations and support for said companies including publishing and marketing duties) that ended up becoming overshadowed by a lot of the crap shovelware Sega of America's 1990s staff kept pushing on to consumers on Genesis, the entire 32X fiasco and the live action FMV fiasco. I highly suspect that eventually Game Arts was going to make a Sega Saturn version running in full 3d textured polygons or probably some custom Goraud Shading techniques but such things take time and the only subsidiary branch outside the Japanese headquarters in Japan... the only sub branch where there was truly a lack of effort in supporting these games and Sega hardware was where it hurt the finances the worst here with 90s Sega of America. That the 32X created by Sega of America was even made is pure evidence of seditious treason on the part of the subsidiary branch because that idea was borne out of greed and completely out of touch with what videogame consumers with working income (not the usually talked about children waiting for parents to buy them stuff but the not-forever twelve year old late teens and twenty plus old gamers who were either being insulted or ignored until Sony came in and changed that) wanted in next generation power. Thus the so called lifecycle of the SegaCD is often misunderstood here in the U.S. because that expansion hardware got a bad image among gamers when most of the games being marketed were live action FMV games while sprite graphics games got less marketing which got worse during Sega Saturn. As such, even though Game Arts tried to resurrect Silpheed on the Sony PlayStation 2, a much much more hyper powerfull late 90s high tech powerhouse and real arcade hardware, the problem with that version of the game is that when Silpheed was released there was just too many games to choose from so for the percentage of say the first 10 million PS2 owners by 2001, most of them simply did not know or were easily able to miss knowing that Silpheed existed at all and it's a shame... cause GameArts could have really made bigger sales to prevent their financial problems and that shamefull Xbox 360 version sent to die and be forgotten like most Xbox 360 Japanese developed games were with an audience that did not support these games back then so all we are left with are these different conversions and remakes but no experience of how things were back then that caused these games to have problems becoming major.

[@BasementBrothers]

When I got the Japanese version of Silpheed The Lost Planet there was literally almost nothing to play on PS2.

[@nathanthompson8728]

First comment 🤣 Come on we want more Neo Geo content!!!!

[@BasementBrothers]

I'm glad you're looking forward to more episodes of the Neo Geo series. The last video in the series was 6 days ago. It takes longer than a week to make new Neo Geo videos. Please enjoy this content from Mr. Jakes while I work on it. -Neo-Alec