[Hardware] Hardware: The Taito Egret II Mini Is A Doorway Into True Gaming History

[FazzNoth]

 

Taito is a company with a rich history in the world of video gaming, and it's fair to say that if the Japanese veteran hadn't existed, the gaming landscape would look rather different today. Space Invaders arguably transformed interactive entertainment from a casual pastime into a global pop culture phenomenon, conquering not just its native Japan but the rest of the world, too. While Tomohiro Nishikado's seminal shooter is perhaps Taito's most famous accomplishment, its list of other classic titles is truly enviable. Bubble Bobble, Elevator Action, Darius, RayStorm, Qix, Rainbow Islands, Puzzle Bobble, Rastan, Chase H.Q., The Ninja Warriors… this is just a handful of the titles Taito has contributed to the medium over the decades and is barely scratching the surface.

While Taito has been a subsidiary of Square Enix since 2005 and it's reasonable to say that the glory days of the firm have long since passed, the Taito name retains a considerable degree of cachet, even with modern players. It's fitting, then, that the latest in the recent line of 'mini cabinets' – which includes the Neo Geo Mini and Sega Astro City Mini – should be focused on Taito's arcade output. Based on the company's iconic arcade system, the Egret II Mini is a tabletop console that features its own screen and controls but requires external power (via USB-C) to function. It offers HDMI-out functionality and boasts a robust micro-switched joystick and responsive buttons.

Now, as we've just briefly mentioned, Taito isn't the first to produce such a device. SNK's Neo Geo Mini arrived in 2018 and wasn't bad for starters, while Sega's more recent Astro City Mini offered a much-improved experience by including better controls and superior TV-out image quality. The Egret II Mini has a few neat surprises of its own, the most notable of which is the fact that the display has a mechanism that allows it to be manually rotated 90 degrees to accommodate the arcade titles that used 'TATE' setups in their original form (Sega's upcoming Astro City Mini V will also boast a vertical screen, but not one that can be manually changed to a horizontal setup).

 

The mechanism is incredibly satisfying to use and merely involves pushing the screen inwards with two fingers and then turning it before giving it a second push to lock it into position. The on-screen visuals rotate automatically, so there's no chance of you playing with the wrong orientation. It's an ingenious engineering solution to the issue of arcade titles using different screens, and we'd imagine it accounts for the Egret II Mini's rather steep cost when compared to its direct rivals. Even so, we feel that the extra expense is ultimately worth it, as the only other option would have been to play TATE mode games with black borders down the sides of the screen.

The Egret II Mini's other party trick is that it has an SD card slot which allows you to load up extra games. The only way to use this at present is to shell out more cash for the paddle and trackball controller, which plugs into one of the USB ports on the back of the machine. When you have both the SD card and controller connected, you gain access to 10 additional titles, all of which make use of one of these analogue control options.

More Info: https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2022/02/hardware-the-taito-egret-ii-mini-is-a-doorway-into-true-gaming-history