PAL vs NTSC for a new collector in America

[ProxyCell]

I am starting to look at collecting old games but I'm not which is best: PAL or NTSC

There will be no display or power issues on my end, I promise you that I know what I am doing there. The issue lies with the games themselves to me. I have read that PAL games are of a higher resolution, is this true?

The other reason I want to focus more on PAL games is because they are often multilingual instead of just having English.

Does anyone here have advice for me on getting PAL games? Other than language selections, is there ANY different between them and their NTSC counterparts in terms of display?

Thank you!

[isiolia]

PAL has a lower refresh rate, and with how closely tied to that games tend to be, PAL versions often run slower. As I understand, poorly adapted ones will simply run slower across the board, with slowed down music as well.

Japan uses NTSC as well, so if you're looking at what most games would have been designed around, and where most "must import" games would come from, NTSC makes more sense in my mind.

[emwearz]

As said above PAL games on PAL hardware suck. Most systems you can mod to run at 60hz, but then there are about 10% of games that become broken by doing this and must be run at 50hz.

The other issue is PAL versions of games (other than odd exceptions) cost far more than there NTSC / NTSCJ counterparts.

[Erik_Twice]

Generally, the PAL versions of any desktop console game released before the PS2 came around are not optimized to run at the proper speed and are basically either unplayable or horribly inferior without modding. And those that are optimized tend to be rare and really expensive.

Some more specific thoughts:

- There's no reason to own a PAL NES. It's not moddable (The 50Hz chip is different from the 60Hz one), many of the classics weren't released in Europe and most are unoptimized. Many of the games you'll want for it are rare and expensive, you could buy the entire Castlevania series boxed for the price of a Castlevania III German Cartridge.

- SNES and MD had a lot of unoptimized games, including many of the classics (Sonic 1 is a particularly grating example) but modding them to run them at the correct speed is very simple and European games are as cheap as the American equivalents so owning these consoles in their PAL version is worthwhile if you are in Europe and you want to search for local deals.

Still, if you are in the US, there's no reason whatsoever to ever own a PAL games or PAL console at all.

[Hobie-wan]

There are older games that simply end up looking squashed if they were poorly converted to PAL because of the resolution difference. That's on top of running slower due to the 50 Hz timing.

[Nemoide]

The one console I know of with a really appealing library of European games is the Sega Master System.
It's a bit tangential, but I know the European titles I have (Bubble Bobble and Ultima IV) seem to run with no problems... are there actually PAL games that run poorly for that system?

[Hobie-wan]

The one console I know of with a really appealing library of European games is the Sega Master System.
It's a bit tangential, but I know the European titles I have (Bubble Bobble and Ultima IV) seem to run with no problems... are there actually PAL games that run poorly for that system?

I'm not aware of any SMS games that won't work wherever. The 5 PAL games I have work just fine. I've stated many times elsewhere, but I know for certain that the US and EU Power Strike releases have the exact same cart inside all the way down to the board and chips. I don't know if any of the games check and adjust speed though.

[theclaw]

It goes without saying systems like NES, SNES, Saturn, etc, are NTSC at heart.

Master System overall is pretty good by mixing US hardware and Europe software.
PAL had more releases and larger print runs, but luckily most accept 60hz. In part because Brazil uses it.

Genesis, PS1, or PS2 were popular enough in Europe to get a few interesting looking 50hz games I'm not familiar with.
If you end up getting one PAL system it'll likely be PS2. Or maybe PS3 for the bluray/DVD region exclusives.

PAL Gamecube and Xbox are decent other than lack of official 480p support.
They're worse on HDTVs without hacks.

Wii has its ups and downs.
Retail Wii disc games are often better PAL thanks to added languages, some went 50hz-only for no good reason (usually clunkers like Mario Party 8 you won't miss).
Virtual Console suffers from old 50hz versions too.

[BoneSnapDeez]

I can't find any conceivable reason to buy PAL versions of systems/games if you live in America. You'll have issues with power adapters and hook ups, not to mention the fact that nearly everything will have to be purchased online. The one big exception is the SMS, where PAL games are plentiful, cheap, and run well on a NTSC machine.

[CRTGAMER]

I prefer NTSC games since I live in the US. Then there are the Japan games which fortunately are also NTSC. However, PAL games are also worth looking into for the exclusive games and also titles that have unique features. Games such as Dreamcast Shenmue 2 with Japanese voices with English subtitles and PS2 ICO which has extra features in the game that did not get a US cut.

PAL games can be converted to display on NTSC, many even have a 60hz option that defaults once the game has a save file in the memory card.