The PC-Engine was basically an 8 bit machine that was released in 1987 at a time that NES, ZX-Spectrum, Master System, MSX & other consoles ruled the market.
Besides the great quality of games the PC-Engine is also known for one more reason, it was the first videogame system to use the high storage capacity of a CD for games. That is why, from then on, the CD became the standard media for videogames.
System Specs:
Custom 8bit CPU: HuC6280 (7.16MHz)
Video Processor: HuC6270
Color Processor: HuC6260
Color Pallet: 512
On screen: 512 (256 for sprites, 256 for the background.)
Screen resolution 256x216
Sound: 6 channel stereo (5-bit sampling)
Can Control 64 sprites at once (16 colors and 32x64 max size.)