PC Engine Cards!

[jsiucho]

Am a little confused maybe someone can help me here. What are all these cards like 3.0, arcade, Duo, Pro. Its all confusing, I recently got a N1 pack for my Laseractive, what type of cards do I need in order to play some of the later games? Is there a card that does it all? Ok pros give some light plz


Thanks

JS

[importaku]

The system cards are only used when playing cd games.

For the oldest cd rom games you only needed a system card ver 2.0 or 2.1

Then there were the super cd rom games they needed the system card version 3.0

Then there were the arcade cd games that needed the arcade card duo or pro.

the pro version was used for the old briefcase setup & the duo version was used for the pc engine duo wgich has both built in together.

They are backward compatible with the older games so getting the highest one would let you play all the cd games.

[lkermel]

The card that 'does it all' is the arcade card. It contains the System 3.0 bios(that plays CDrom2 and Super CDRom2) and the extra Ram to play the Arcade CD games.
However, I'm not sure how all this stuff works on the LaserActive, if the pack is only designed to play HuCards or if it is capable to also play CDRoms with a System Card...

If you happen to go for a System Card, my guess is that only japanese System cards will work on a Laser Active.

importaku is also right. A system card is only used to play CDRom games. Every HuCard game (except the ones for the SuperGrafx) should work fine.

[lkermel]

I did more reseach and it looks like the System 3.0 bios is already integrated in the Laser Active Pack !! If this is true, you can play any PC Engine CDRoms except the Arcade games. However, if you want to play those, you only need a Duo Cards (which has the extra Memory) or the Arcade Cards (Which has system 3.0 + memory). The Duo is much cheaper. But keep in mind there is only a handful of Arcade games...

I also found that there are US and Japanese versions of the Laser Active... which one do you have ?...

[klausien]

There is another obscure wrinkle to the card situation that may or may not be a concern.

There exists a System Card 1.0 that is only necessary for playing the CD version of Altered Beast (Juuouki). If you play the game on 2.0 or greater, it will crash at the end of level one.

It is a truly craptacular port though with no two player mode, no parallax, missing enemies and animation, PCM sound, and mid level loading freezes. Up functions as the jump button, which isn't as bad as it could be. It truly sucks.

[CosmicMonkey]

If you boot Dracula X with a 2.x or lower system card you'll get a hidden 'Stage X' mini level with very odd SuperDeformed styled characters. When you get to the end it tells you you need a 3.0 system card.

[jsiucho]

I did more reseach and it looks like the System 3.0 bios is already integrated in the Laser Active Pack !! If this is true, you can play any PC Engine CDRoms except the Arcade games. However, if you want to play those, you only need a Duo Cards (which has the extra Memory) or the Arcade Cards (Which has system 3.0 + memory). The Duo is much cheaper. But keep in mind there is only a handful of Arcade games...

I also found that there are US and Japanese versions of the Laser Active... which one do you have ?...

Thanks for the replies,, I got the Japanese Pack N1, am so glad the Laseractive comes with the 3.0 internally. I will pick up the Aracade Duo card soon. I want make sure I can play all the games when the time comes.

Thanks youall

JS