Sega Genesis

[MottZilla]

The worst thing is Sega experienced success with the Genesis on North America and I think did well in Europe too. Atleast for a time, atleast 1992, Genesis was leading the SNES. But Sega managed to fuck it all up with consumer base division and confusion. They had way too many platforms at once. Genesis, Game Gear, Sega Saturn, Sega CD, Sega 32X were all doing something at the same time while Nintendo had just NES their old beast on its way out, SNES, and Gameboy. Not that the addons weren't cool devices but it fucked up their consumer relations and in general turned out poorly.

 

It is a good point that back then games were alot more expensive both in list price but also cause of the change of the value of currency. I never had that many games as a kid, renting games was a big thing then. I'd never have played as many games without cheap rentals.

[Mister Jack]

Nah, those add-ons were still shit.

[MottZilla]

The concept of improving the existing system is a nice one though in theory. But they were executed terribly. The only successful major add-on for a console was the PC-Engine's CD-ROM. While only a success in Japan it definitely did better than Sega CD or Sega 32X. Hell even the american version the TurboGrafx 16 CD-ROM if you count the Turbo DUO probably didn't do that bad compared to Sega CD, definitely better than Sega 32X.

[Mister Jack]

It sounds neat on paper, I'll give you that, but from a consumer standpoint it just doesn't make sense unless you're a hardcore gamer, and let's face it, most hardcore gamers back then were depending on their parents to buy their games. Putting out an add-on that requires the other system to run? If you didn't already own it, imagine trying to sell that pitch to your parents. It was almost impossible.

 

"Can I have this one system so I can play this other system that has different games from the first one?"

[MottZilla]

Which actually makes it seem like the idea of an add-on was more limited by the nature of the consumers of the time and not so much the idea. If you had a more savvy gaming consumer that had their own money to spend it might have actually been much more practical for a device like Sega CD, Sega 32X, or a SNES CD to do well. One thing that definitely helps that NEC figured out what cutting costs by releasing a new version of the console with the add-on built in, as well as reducing the confusion of hooking up an add-on that happens like with the Sega 32X. The Turbo DUO/PC Engine DUO certainly helped the popularity of the CD-ROM add-on to a large degree.

[Mister Jack]

HD-DVD player for the 360 says hi.

[Commander Shepard]

Though, one of the big killers for the Sega CD and 32X was the fact that the Sega Saturn was being released in Japan and soon crossing the bridge to the United States. The life span for these behemoth attachments did not even last an entire year. Gamers that followed news knew not to throw away their money on these expensive peripherals in favor of the new console, as well as news from Sega on the Neptune, which was the 32X being it's own console (rather than feeding off the body and soul of the Genesis), though this console was scrapped.

[Mister Jack]

Of course, even after the Saturn came out all kinds of problems still kept it from achieving much success. Sega pretty much peaked at the Genesis, and it went downhill from there.

[Commander Shepard]

Of course, even after the Saturn came out all kinds of problems still kept it from achieving much success. Sega pretty much peaked at the Genesis, and it went downhill from there.

Whoa whoa whoa, they had a second peak with the Dreamcast, though a short peak, but a peak nonetheless! One of these days I need to dig my Genesis out of the garage and replay Sonic 3+Knuckles, Rocket Knight Adventures, and Desert Strike.

[Mister Jack]

Yeah that's why they dropped out of the console biz entirely.

[MottZilla]

Though, one of the big killers for the Sega CD and 32X was the fact that the Sega Saturn was being released in Japan and soon crossing the bridge to the United States. The life span for these behemoth attachments did not even last an entire year. Gamers that followed news knew not to throw away their money on these expensive peripherals in favor of the new console, as well as news from Sega on the Neptune, which was the 32X being it's own console (rather than feeding off the body and soul of the Genesis), though this console was scrapped.

 

You can leave Sega CD out of that. Sega CD was well before the Sega Saturn. Sega 32X was the one that people were scratching their heads over when they new the Saturn was coming. To be fair what really killed the Sega 32X was the high cost and low number of titles for it. Or in short the value of it. If the Sega 32X idea, to upgrade the aging Genesis, had been much cheaper and more games took advantage of it then it may have been a successful product. You have to remember that SNES managed to push itself really late into the 90s because of the N64 delays it was critical. But the Genesis was still around after all support for Sega CD and 32X were gone. So if they had come up with a simple, cheap, yet powerful enough upgrade to throw into a new model of Genesis console as well as provide a cheap upgrade for existing ones it might have worked. The problem is 150$ was not cheap at all. If they could have worked the cost down to something more like the cost of 1 brand new game it may have had a chance. But what they wanted was a "32bit upgrade" to do 3D graphics which plainly was just too expensive the way they did it.

 

The Sega 32X contained not one but 2 SH-2 CPUs, the Sega Saturn has 2 of these as well. However the Saturn had a dedicated chip for 3d graphics rendering while the 32X was left with software rendering by the SH-2s. I think given the sad state of early 3D to begin with they should have dropped the idea of a so called 32bit console upgrade and instead just improved on the Genesis' weak points. Sound and Graphics. Genesis definitely needed an upgrade in those departments by the time 32X was being cooked up. Even before then it could have used one. The problem is Sega wanted to do too much with their upgrades. The Sega CD might have been decent if they hadn't tried to add so much crazy bullshit making it insanely expensive.

 

Genesis needed a VDP (graphics) upgrade simply to put it on better footing to match the SNES and TG16 atleast in color depth. But at the same time maybe they could have added more sprite capabilities allowing for more objects with less sprite drop. Maybe added useful effects like manipulations of sprites and backgrounds like other systems had such as color blending for translucent layers or scaling and rotation. Then they could have used a sound upgrade using samples sort of like SNES or Capcom CPS or NeoGeo. Mixing that with the existing synthesis audio would have helped alot. But just those relatively simple upgrades if provided cheap enough would have kept Sega competing strongly in the 16bit arena while the 32bit arena was still something many gamers hadn't invested in yet. I mean come on if you owned a SNES chances are you were still playing it while others were playing early Saturn and PS1 games.

 

And one more thing. Sega Saturn was pretty successful in Japan. While it didn't fair very well elsewhere you can't deny Saturn got great Japanese releases. While we thought Sega was basically dead they were doing well enough in Japan. Which is totally opposite the 16bit era where the Megadrive didn't do that great in Japan but was doing well in Europe and very well in the US atleast early on.

[C. Harp]

 

I never owned a SNES but I loved my (second-hand) Mega Drive. First played one round a friend's when I was around 9-10. We used to spend ages playing Sonic 2, with me taking 'control' of Tails. It was cool being able to collect rings and attack baddies without the risk of actually 'dying' (because I was rubbish); even if you had to make sure to keep up with Sonic. It probably goes a way towards explaining why I've always been quite drawn to co-op games/modes.

 

This sounds just like me except as the eldest sibling, I always forced my younger brother to be Tails and beat the bosses for me while I stayed safe and out of the way. I pretty much only played Sonic 2 (Labyrinth Zone in Sonic 1 was impossible, and we never got 3 or 'and Knuckles'... I remember proudly beating the final boss when I was only 5, which actually was kind of impressive.

 

A few years later, my cat peed on the console and we threw it away. (Many of my stories end this way )

[Mister Jack]

Your cat must have been a Nintendo fanboy.

[Hot Heart]

This sounds just like me except as the eldest sibling, I always forced my younger brother to be Tails and beat the bosses for me while I stayed safe and out of the way.

 

Hehe. I was replaying Sonic 2 and 3 recently and it reminded me that we did this too. I seem to recall being completely reckless and falling into the water while fighting Robotnik in Chemical Plant Zone in 2, and in Angel Island Zone in 3.

 

I like that Marble Garden Zone in 3 made good use of co-op, as Tails actually has to fly Sonic towards Robotnik, hammering away at the jump button to do so.

 

 

A few years later, my cat peed on the console and we threw it away. (Many of my stories end this way )

 

Lol. You must relay more of these stories...

[C. Harp]

I am certain that the stories will all be told in time...

 

Additionally, screw chemical plant zone. Dying AFTER beating Dr. Robotnik was the worst.

 

(p.s. can someone remind me why he's "Eggman" now? I hate it.)

[Mister Jack]

I think he was always Eggman in Japan but the states changed it to Robotnick. At some point I suppose they didn't want to keep using the name, maybe when voice acting and lip-synching became involved, but that's just a total guess from me.

[C. Harp]

Hmm, yeah, that seems to be about right. I can't help getting irrationally pissed off about it though, even though it clearly doesn't matter.

[Mister Jack]

I agree with you about Eggman being a stupid name, just to set the record straight.

[MottZilla]

It sounds better when you're Japanese and have little to no understanding of English.

[Mister Jack]

Granted, but it's just so unoriginal. "Oh hey, he looks like an egg so let's call him Eggman". Bleh.

 

Anyway, back to more positive reminiscence. I played this game---DON'T LAUGH! It was made by the Gunstar Heroes team so it turned out to actually be pretty decent, if a bit on the easy side.

 

[Yantelope]

Yeah, it was always Eggman in Japan just like Toadstool was always Peach in Japan. It wasn't until gamers in America were becoming more aware of the Japanese culture that they had to try to reconcile it.

[Battra92]

I think the biggest thing to remember is that being a gamer was a lot more expensive back then than it is now. Today we spend $60 for a major title at launch. Back then, major releases started at $60 and averaged at $80. That was in 1990 USD too -- not 2010 USD. So, unless you were from a middleclass household, your parents probably weren't going to get you more than one console, or invest in any meaningful library for both consoles.

 

A lot of people, like my household, owned no videogames because they were so damn expensive. $80 in 1990 dollars is $129.66 in 2009 dollars according to this Inflation calculator. I only paid $100 for my brand new 360 Arcade a few months ago!

 

I made up for it on the used market, though. One thing I did notice was that SNES games were hard to come by at yard sales while Genesis games were a dime a dozen (I'm talking late 90s era here.) So while the Genesis had some awesome games, people didn't hold onto them as strongly as the SNES ones.

 

On the other hand there are some games that make a Genesis a must own console:

Ms Pac-Man (IMO the best version of the game)

Aladdin

The Lion King

Cool Spot

 

and probably a few others I'm forgetting. Most of the great Sega games are on a million collections but Disney needs to get on the ball and just start rereleasing the old classics. No luck for Cool Spot, though. :-(

[slithy toves]

i loved the aladdin game on the genesis. that was good times.

[Mister Jack]

I had that one too! I liked it better than the SNES one, even.

[Battra92]

i loved the aladdin game on the genesis. that was good times.

 

I remember playing it in Sears on the demo units (one of the few times I got to play current video games as a kid)

 

On the other hand, Toy Story on the Genesis is an abomination that should have all copies destroyed in a fiery pit of flames!