PC Engine (TurboGrafx-16) emulators

PC Engine (TurboGrafx-16)

Above: The PC Engine. Middle: The TurboGrafx-16. Below: The SuperGrafx.
Developer	NEC, Hudson
Type	Home video game console, Handheld game console
Generation	Fourth generation
Release date	1987 (PC Engine) 1989 (TurboGrafx-16, SuperGrafx) 1990 (PC Engine GT / TurboExpress)
Discontinued	1994
Introductory price	$199.99 $399.99 (CD Add-On)
Successor	PC Engine SuperGrafx, PC-FX
Emulated	✓

For emulators that run on the PC Engine, see Emulators on PC Engine.

The PC Engine (PCE) was a 16-bit system released jointly by NEC and Hudson Soft in Japan on October 30, 1987 and in the US on August 29, 1989. It had a Hudson Soft HuC6280 8-bit CPU at 7.16 MHz and 1.79 MHz with 8KB of RAM and 64KB of VRAM. The CPU was teamed up with a 16-bit graphics processor and 16-bit video color encoder chip, both built by Hudson Soft. When it came time to seek other potential markets, the two companies eventually caved to a limited American release in 1989 under a completely different model and name: the TurboGrafx-16. The European versions varied throughout the countries, being the western version in Spain and United Kingdom and Japanese models in Benelux regions.

The joint venture, formed in North America as TTI, made an add-on called the PC Engine CD (PCE-CD) / TurboGrafx-CD (TG-CD) that loaded games from discs instead, much like the Sega CD but better supported. The PC Engine Duo / Turbo-Duo combined the add-on into the unit with more RAM as yet another failed attempt to relaunch the failing console in the West.

When it first launched in North America, the TurboGrafx-16 was largely seen as a failure blamed on poor marketing by the manufacturers. The PC Engine, on the other hand, was a whole different story, beating out the Famicom when it first came out long enough to compete against its rival's own successor and gave little focus for the Mega Drive who was instead posing more of a threat to Nintendo in North America.

NEC planned to enhance the system further, announcing the "PC Engine 2" that would later become the PC Engine SuperGrafx. However, it was rushed to a 1989 market in Japan lacking much of its promised features with only seven titles exclusively made for it, ending up a commercial failure to be binned and discontinued not long after. The PC Engine GT / Turbo-Express was a very rare handheld model of the original hardware, in the same vein as the Sega Nomad (a portable Sega Genesis / Mega Drive). It did include some exclusive features like the TurboLink multiplayer feature (used in games such as the flight sim called Falcon and Bomberman 93) but wasn't widely supported.

Contents

Emulators

Name	Platform(s)	Latest Version	PCE2 (SG)	Hardware features and peripherals	Enhancements	Accuracy	FLOSS	Active	Recommended
PC / x86
Mednafen mednafen_supergrafx_libretro mednafen_pce_libretro mednafen_pce_fast_libretro		1.32.1 libretro cores	✓	✓	~	Cycle	✓	✓	✓
ares		git Artifacts v138	✓	~	~	Cycle	✓	✓	✓
Mesen		Development Builds	✓	~	?	High	✓	✓	✓
BizHawk		2.9.1	✓	~	~	Cycle	✓	✓	~
higan (火眼) byuu (謬/view)		v110	✓	~	?	Cycle	✓	✗	✗
Turbo Engine		0.32	✓	?	?	High	✗	✗	✗
MagicEngine		1.1.3	✓	?	?	Mid	✗	✗	✗
Ootake (大竹)		3.04	✓	?	?	Mid	✓	✓	✗
pcejin (Mednafen 0.8.x)		git	✓	?	?	Mid	✓	✗	✗
DarcNES		9b0401/9b0313	✗	?	?	Low	✓	✗	✗
Neco		0.11	✗	?	?	Low	?	✗	✗
ePCEngine		12/21/2020	✓	?	?	?	✗	✓	✗
FinalBurn Neo		libretro core nightly stable	✓	?	?	?	NC	✓	✗
FinalBurn Alpha		0.2.97.43	✓	?	?	?	NC	✗	✗
Hu-Go!		2.12	?	?	?	?	✓	✗	✗
Mobile / ARM
Mednafen mednafen_supergrafx_libretro mednafen_pce_libretro mednafen_pce_fast_libretro		libretro cores	✓	✓	~	Cycle	✓	✓	✓
PCE.emu		1.5.77 1.5.46.02 Pyra git	✓	?	?	Mid	✓	✓	✓
WonderDroid Ultra		5.5git	✓	?	?	?	✓	✓	✓
Console
Mednafen mednafen_supergrafx_libretro mednafen_pce_libretro mednafen_pce_fast_libretro		libretro	✓	✓	~	Cycle	✓	✓	✓
Virtual Console		N/A	✓	?	?	High	✗	✗	✓
TemperPCE 3DS		git	✓	?	?	Mid	✓	✗	✓
HuGo! GX Unofficial		2.12.1	✓	?	?	Mid	✓	✗	✓
PCECast		06/01/07	?	?	?	Mid	✗	✗	✓
HuE		0.70	~	?	?	Mid	✓	✗	~
NitroGrafx		0.7git	✗	?	?	?	✓	✗	~

Comparisons

Mednafen

Much like its other original cores, it does very well, even having two profiles: "PCE-Accurate" and "PCE-Fast". Despite being CLI-based, a fork of an older version that has a GUI has emerged called pcejin. RetroArch uses the PCE-Accurate and PCE-Fast cores for its beetle fork.

Mesen

After a discontinuation of both Mesen and Mesen S, SourMesen resumed developement of both in 2023 and combines them into a single Mesen. The re-release of Mesen also brought emulation of PC-Engine, SuperGrafx and CD-ROM²/TG-CD

BizHawk

Uses "Nymashock" core for PCE emulation (ported from mednafen to Bizhawk by zeromus) and an original core PCEHawk.

Ootake

It's okay for general purposes.

MAME

Has a pce driver (and a child driver called tg16). In all revisions it emulates, MAME reports it as working and the graphics as okay, but the sound is imperfect.

MagicEngine

Unfortunately trialware that costs €15 euro. There are better options available for free.

NitroGrafx

Is a DS TurboGrafx emulator for Nintendo DS. It is included with TWiLight Menu++.

Hardware features and peripherals

Name	Mednafen	ares	Mesen	BizHawk	Higan
NEC CD	✓	✓	✓	✓	~
GE CD	✓	✓	✗	?	✗
Arcade Card	✓	?	?	?	?
6 button	✓
Mouse	✓
Multitap	✓
Turbo	✓
Pachinko Controller	✗
Horizontal Overscan	✓
Ten no Koe, Ten no Koe 2
Save Kun
Tsushin Booster Keyboard	✓
Backup Booster, Backup Booster II
AV Booster	✓
Illust Booster
Print Booster

PCE-CD

TurboGrafx-CD/CD-ROM² and Super CD-ROM²

SuperGrafx is also compatible with the CD-ROM² and Super CD-ROM² System add-ons, allowing it to play any CD-ROM² format game with the required System Card. No SuperGrafx-specific CD-ROM² titles were produced. The addition of the CD-ROM peripheral adds CD-DA sound (Audio CDs), and a single ADPCM channel to the existing sound capabilities of the PC Engine.[1]

• See this dedicated page for more information about home media playback support for emulation softwares.
• See Ripping_games.

GE-CD

Games Express CD Card, Bootleg System Card. This was released by Hacker International for play of unlicensed Games Express CD games. The GECD Card is essentially a dongle; a BIOS v3.00 based machine (like a Duo or a Super CD-ROM²) is required for running those games.

Arcade Card

On March 12, 1994, NEC introduced a third upgrade known as the Arcade Card, which increases the amount of onboard RAM of the Super CD-ROM² System to 2MB. This upgrade was released in two models: the Arcade Card Duo, designed for PC Engine consoles already equipped with the Super CD-ROM² System, and the Arcade Card Pro, a model for the original CD-ROM² System that combines the functionalities of the Super System Card and Arcade Card Duo into one.[2]

Horizontal Overscan

Other console emulators will just let you crop it, like the FC emulators, but this is necessary for PCE. To give a negative example, there is a Darius CD game that displays ZONE A as ZON A in PCE.emu. Even though someone submitted this bug very early, it has not been fixed. Mednafen allows you to modify this value and the displayed picture is complete

Enhancements

Name		Mednafen	ares	Mesen	BizHawk	Higan
Overclock	Extra Scanlines?
Graphics	High-Resolution Affine Transformations
	Sprite Replacement
	Widescreen hacks
	Resizable Internal Resolution	For emulation of 2D systems, the resolution can only be upscaled, making the pixels more apparent.
Audio	Alternative audio interpolation methods
	Higher sample rates
Input	Run-ahead
	Preemptive Frames	~
TAS features	Macros/Scripts/Lua
	Rewind
	Fast-Forward/Turbo Speed
	Savestates
	Movie recording/playback
Quality of life	Built-in Cheat Manager
	Streamable compression format
	Built-in Custom resolution/CRTSwitchRes For using this on Windows OS you need CRT Emudriver. Another option is using EDID editor tool such as "Custom Resolution Utility".	Exclusive to libretro cores and GroovyMAME at the moment. Also there is a project for achieving software emulators like libretro cores and GroovyMAME send the raw RGB data over a network to a core running on MiSTer, it basically turns the MiSTer into a GPU for the emulator allowing for easy setup and use with CRT TVs/Arcade monitors.
	Per-Game Profiles
	Command Line Options
	Big Picture Mode
Post-Processing	Filters	✓	✓
	AI-powered filter compatible (Freestyle)
	Shader Chain	~	✓	~	~
	Inverse tone mapping compatible
Misc	Netplay
	EmuVR support	Exclusive to libretro cores at the moment.
	Retro Achievements PC Engine, PCE-CD	~		~	~
	Debug features

Emulation issues

Color palette

An example of the color inaccuracy with the regular RGB color palette when compared to the Composite palette. Take note of the second blue gradient in the sky in both images.

The color palettes generated by the PC Engine for Composite and RGB actually differ due to its own color tables being non-linear. This can result in colors ending up looking wrong or blended when the system is emulated or played in RGB. A composite palette was eventually made mathematically and with some extra tweaks from the PC Engine's RGB to YUV lookup table after its HuC6270 video chip had been decapped. This palette is used by default in the PC Engine core for the MiSTer. It can be downloaded for use in other emulators and devices.