catching up again with the SEGA Genesis library

[Austin]

I still thoroughly enjoy OutRun on the Genesis. It's not arcade perfect (obviously), but it's still a nice game and perfectly playable.

[Cobra Kai]

Not trying to stray too far off topic, but did anyone other than me have the pleasure of playing OutRun environmental in the arcade? I remember the cab leaning side to side when turning the wheel. One of the first motorized cabs I played, and I luckily got to play Afterburner and G-Loc environmentals back when they originally came out too. Ahh...good times.

[Austin]

You mean the one where you get to sit in a faux Ferrari, and it bobbed and tilted? I got to play one at the nearby King's Dominion amusement park, yeeeaaaaars ago (probably in the mid '90s). I remember it being quite awesome.

[+FujiSkunk]

I remember the cockpit Sega games when the nearest mall arcade had them. I believe they had them all at one time or another, except for Galaxy Force. They had OutRun, Space Harrier, Thunder Blade and After Burner II. I remember noticing Sega "cheated" a bit with Thunder Blade using a simple mechanical system in place of the electronics and hydraulics; the joystick doubled as a lever which moved the game chair. Of course that also meant you could sample what it felt like without actually playing the game.

 

Those machines were fun, but at 75 cents to a dollar a play, they were ex-pens-ive, especially to a money-strapped kid who was still getting used to games costing two quarters instead of one.

[Atariboy]

I still thoroughly enjoy OutRun on the Genesis. It's not arcade perfect (obviously), but it's still a nice game and perfectly playable.

 

It's a nice effort no doubt. Especially compared to most every other classic era port of Outrun (There were no shortage of awful attempts back then at bringing this game home), I'm sure it almost felt arcade perfect 20 years ago.

Edited March 15, 2012 by Atariboy

[+Cafeman]

Not trying to stray too far off topic, but did anyone other than me have the pleasure of playing OutRun environmental in the arcade? I remember the cab leaning side to side when turning the wheel. One of the first motorized cabs I played, and I luckily got to play Afterburner and G-Loc environmentals back when they originally came out too. Ahh...good times.

 

I would only play it 1 or 2 times each visit due to the cost and the difficulty. But yes, I remember playing sit-down deluxe versions of Outrun, Afterburner, Space Harrier, G-Loc, Hang On. SEGA always did great coin-ops.

Edited March 15, 2012 by Cafeman

[+Cafeman]

I picked up Bubba n' Stix, boxed, for $5. This well-animated Core-programmed game is well worth trying out for fans of 2D platformers with puzzle aspects. Perhaps you could compare it to the idea behind a Boy and his Blob - blonde dude Bubba can pull out an alien stick and must use it to traverse levels and figure out solutions. Google tells me BnS was an Amiga game ported to Genesis. The game is full of plenty of things to see, music to tap your foot too, and screen-halting PUZZLES! Level 2 consists of 5 floors of an alien's spaceship where you are imprisoned. I kept staring at the abstract signs and graphics and kept trying to interact with things. You have step on 5 triggers to open 5 doors, and finding them and reaching them is the trick. It took me an hour or two to figure out how to beat this level. It doesn't hold your hand, but the clues are all there. I recommend trying this one out - it's quite different from the usual Genny platformer and is very well programmed.

 

I also got in a Jurassic Park mood so I dug out Appaloosa's JP: The Lost World, which I hadn't given much time to when I bought it last year. Top-down adventure game with multiple weapons, health & ammo pickups, you shoot dino's and hunters while traversing a large map. I've always felt the the graphics on this game are very well done, very colorful, quite similar to that SNES Jurassic Park game in looks, except this one is less cartoonish in appearance. There are 3 maps to beat from the first Isla Sorna location and I beat them all - cage-up 3 Stego's (they will trample you if not careful); activate scanners by traversing the huge complex map, travelling on foot, by hydrocraft over the water & straights, or in a jeep rover (this one took me the longest of the 3); and then finally a cave rescue (raptors, fire, falling boulders). You can play these in any order. Once I beat these 3, the route to "Bike Race" opened up. It is a 3D perspective, forward-scrolling, scaling race thru the jungle, shooting and wearing down a fleeing raptor and also shooting hunters on other motorcycles. Don't hit the trees. This was a nice surprise, I never saw anything like it on Genesis!

 

I recorded my passwords, and then I was at Isla Sorna location #2. Three more maps to beat. One is caging Trike's. One is protecting a transport as it drives down the road west-to-east (shoot enemies, remove obstructions, etc). I'll mess with these later on when I have time again. End of report , for today.

[+Cafeman]

I recorded my passwords, and then I was at Isla Sorna location #2. Three more maps to beat. One is caging Trike's. One is protecting a transport as it drives down the road west-to-east (shoot enemies, remove obstructions, etc). I'll mess with these later on when I have time again.

Nope, it isn't caging Trikes, it iinvolves tranquilizing 2 Trikes, then using gas bombs to keep predators away from the sleeping dino. Not too hard. But the next mission I couldn't beat on my first attempt - search and destroy 10 raptor nests, featuring the same cave / boulders / fire graphics of the earlier "Cave Rescue" map. I destroyed 9/10 raptor nests. It took a while because you need to go to the far upper right to destroy some force-field generators, in order to reach some of the map over on the left/center side. So after I did all that, I ended up at a final raptor nest protecte by a force-field gate. I ended up dying. I have no idea what I missed (evidently a generator somewhere). You get checkpoints but I was not about to tramp through have the map again from my last checkpoint so I gave up for the night.

 

As a Jurassic Park fan, I am truly enjoying this game! The devs were obviously fans of Crichton's books because several scenes that never made it to the films are in this game - the motorcycle/raptor chase scene, the search-and-destroy of raptor nests, even the juvenile T-rex from the first book shows up and is tougher to take down (he's only about twice as big as a raptor). The graphics are high-resolution and detailed; the difficulty, location of checkpoints, and fairly abundant health/ammo pickups are very fair - this isn't as mercilessly hard as some other earlier JP games Plus you can open a menu and scan the entire known map for types of dinosaurs, or hunters, or the generators, or the raptor nests , so you aren't running blind all the time. If only the music had been true JP music and not videogamey tunes.

[Austin]

Interesting, I wasn't aware of a Genesis Lost World game. I thought there was only JP, then JP: Rampage Edition by Sega.

[+thegoldenband]

Interesting, I wasn't aware of a Genesis Lost World game. I thought there was only JP, then JP: Rampage Edition by Sega.

 

It's a late release, slightly on the rare side, and looks pretty good. I haven't really played it, but I've actually owned two copies of it, both acquired at yard sales/flea markets. The first (which I've since given to my little brother) was a mystery cart with no label that my girlfriend took a chance on. I was very pleased that it turned out not to be another copy of Aladdin or World Series Baseball!

 

Anyway, a new recommendation for this thread: Jewel Master. Terrific action-platformer that's related to games like Castlevania and ActRaiser, but with a flavor all its own. Great control, well-composed music, and a solid challenge that lets you get just a little further each time you play.

[Austin]

Jewel Master. Terrific action-platformer that's related to games like Castlevania and ActRaiser, but with a flavor all its own. Great control, well-composed music, and a solid challenge that lets you get just a little further each time you play.

 

I can second that! Played this one quite a bit in the '90s. Would like to track it down again and actually finish it, something I couldn't do way-back-when.

[+thegoldenband]

Jewel Master. Terrific action-platformer that's related to games like Castlevania and ActRaiser, but with a flavor all its own. Great control, well-composed music, and a solid challenge that lets you get just a little further each time you play.

 

I can second that! Played this one quite a bit in the '90s. Would like to track it down again and actually finish it, something I couldn't do way-back-when.

 

Nice one! I beat it for the first time on Easy last night, then on Normal and Hard today. Once you get the hang of it, it's mostly straightforward, but the last stage definitely requires accuracy, especially on Hard where the minibosses and final boss can do quite a bit of damage if you're unshielded.

[+Cafeman]

LOL, I found the 2nd "3D-ish boss stage" to be pretty fun! "T-Rex Escape" I think is it's title.

 

Anyway, now I'm on Isla Sorna section 3. You have to go through the "cave maze" to get there, after defeating the T-rex escape round. Actually, if you are slightly careful, this game isn't too difficult. It's not hard to shoot down hunters or even raptors. Mostly you just explore and try to find the stuff you need to find, and shoot whatever comes on-screen. I didn't get far in the Section 3 stage "T-Rex Chase", a side-scrolling round where the Rex chases your jeep. Gonna need some memorization to beat that.

Edited March 28, 2012 by Cafeman

[Austin]

Holy crap, that looks nuts for a Genesis game. I might have to slap it on the Everdrive later just to try it myself!

[A2600]

Traded my micro for a genesis looking to redo my collection:

 

1. Streets of Rage
   
2. Streets of Rage 2
   
3. Streets of Rage 3
   
4. Golden Axe
   
5. Golden Axe II
   
6. Sonic The Hedgehog
   
7. Sonic The Hedgehog 2
   
8. Sonic The Hedgehog 3
   
9. Sonic 3D Blast
   
10. Sonic & Knuckles
    
11. Super Monaco GP
    
12. Super Hang On
    
13. Twin Cobra
    
14. TMNT Hiperstone Hiest
    
15. Castlevania Bloodlines
    
16. Quackshot
    
17. Alien Soldier
    
18. Valis: The Fantasm Soldier
    
19. Syd of Valis
    
20. Valis III
    
21. Kid Chamaleon
    
22. Gley Lancer
    
23. Strider
    
24. Pulseman
    
25. Contra Hard Corps
    
26. Gunstar Heroes
    
27. The Revenge of Shinobi
    
28. Shadow Dancer
    
29. Shinobi III
    
30. Garaies
    
31. MUSHA
    
32. Thunder Force II
    
33. Thunder Force III
    
34. Lightening Force
    
35. Wonder Boy In Monster World
    
36. Outrun
    
37. Zero Wing (PAL)
    
38. Super Fantasy Zone (PAL)
    
39. Wonder Boy III In Monster Land (PAL)
    
40. Crusader of Centi
    

[Atariboy]

I complained a while back in this topic about the Genesis version of Super Hang-On so I thought this was relevant.

 

Apparantly Sega is finally set to rerelease the excellent arcade original along with two other classics Alex Kid in Miracle World which is a SMS game and Revenge of Shinobi, a Genesis game) on PSN and XBLA.for $10 in the next few weeks. Also a three pack of Monster World games. Reviving the Sega Ages name for these two mini digital compilations.

 

Didn't think we'd see this since we've known about these for over a year now and they've been rated by the ESRB for a long time. But apparantly it's indeed happening finally.

[+Cafeman]

Because Spring is here, I'm putting my Genny and its recently-organized-and-cleaned 116 carts back into the closet for a while.

 

Recently I took some time to play some movie-themed platformers - Batman Returns and Jurassic Park (the original cart, not Lost World). I think my BR cart is messed up - in parts of level 1, the music kind of stops and restarts, triggered by jumping Batman around. Its like it is loading something and interrupting the music. I don't recall if it was always that way or not. Strange.

 

I played BR for a while, but was reminded of the unfair difficulty of this game. If you use all your weapons and still die from a boss, your next life starts there but you're screwed, doomed to die again and again and using all your lives up, since without weapons some of the bosses are near impossible to beat. After losing all my lives to the bald muscle boss in the 2nd stage, and then losing several lives falling in the circus gang level as I fell repeatedly into a hole, I quit. If the game respawned you with some batarangs, would that be too much to ask?

 

JP is a glitchy little game too. I've beaten it before, but you have to tread carefully, lest you step onto the wrong edge of a walkable platform and fall down the tree / into the water/ etc. I have to say, the big T-Rex head startled me when I saw it again. He is drawn very well and they got his roar just right. Always loved how Rex says "SEG-GAAHHHH" on boot-up.

[+Cafeman]

Interesting, I wasn't aware of a Genesis Lost World game. I thought there was only JP, then JP: Rampage Edition by Sega.

 

It came out too late to attract much attention or sales, no doubt. I found very little information about the game as I Googled around. You-tube has videos of the cool 3D boss stages. I think this game is overal more playable and better than the fancier Saturn/Playstation game called "The Lost World" (in which you play as little, boring dinosaurs for the first half of the game, with awful controls - yet it has great John Williams music and good visuals).

 

My favorite console JP game is Sega Genesis Jurassic Park, flaws and all. In 2nd place is Sega CD Jurassic Park, even though its more of a point-and-click game. 3rd place goes to my newly discovered Genesis The Lost World: Jurassic Park which I've mentioned above a few times.

 

The other JP games I own are really no fun to me - Genesis JP Rampage Edition (I hate that they made it into a highly difficult run-n-gun style of game), SNES JP (too long and hard and ... boring to me), and the Saturn/PSX Lost World game which is too frustrating and glitchy.

[+Cafeman]

*** 19-month BUMP ***

 

I picked up some Genesis carts about 2 months ago, and finally had time to hook up my Genesis, Goo-Gone the carts to remove those blasted price stickers, clean them and try 'em out.

 

The most exciting find for me was a Version 1.00 (REV00) cart of Revenge of Shinobi. I bought the $5 cart just on the chance I might get this version, and today I was rather excited to fight unlicensed Spider-Man, Batman, Rambo, and Godzilla instead of the alterations in Versions 1.01/ 1.02 / 1.03 / 1.04! The link below shows the differences in sprites that were changed. Ugh, the Version 1.04 pink Spidey is sad-sad-sad. Godzilla fried me good. and I was playing on Easy. (not easy, it just gives you more lives!)

 

http://tcrf.net/The_Revenge_of_Shinobi

 

 

I also played Quackshot for the first time. I played it for at least an hour and a half before giving up trying to defeat the maharaja's Tiger (it took a long enough time to figure out the puzzles and get that far). I've heard about this game many times and finally got to play it.

 

Also tried out Tiny Toons Adventures - Buster's Hidden Treasure. This is a more simplistic straight-forward Sonic-style game. The visuals and sounds are high quality, but I found the level designs predicatable and (again) pretty simplistic. Collect Carrots, butt-bounce on the enemies, don't hit the Sonic Spikes when you fall in a pit. I never watched the cartoon so I don't even have nostalgia going for me.

 

Finally, also got 32X Cosmic Carnage. I never found it all that good, but it does have cool-looking scaling effects on the combatant's limbs as they swing, making the creatures' arms and legs kind of pop-out of the screen. It has the level-scaling common in SNK games , which was pretty exciting stuff back when 32X was in-stores during those 9 months or so. It's a pixelated mess though, especially blown-up on a 42" plasma.

 

(_)3

[Flojomojo]

I actually thought Outrun reproduced the music pretty well. It's one of the best parts of the release (And there is a nice original song added in as well that fits in well). But maybe I just don't have the ear to pick out the flaws in it.

 

I won't say what it is (We'll see how quick Cafeman notices it), but the sound effects are a far worse area for me (Something basic isn't there that should be there ). And the choppy scrolling hurts it significantly in the gameplay department.

I don't mind the Genesis version of Outrun that much, but without the engine noises, it seems a little too quiet. I'm really looking forward to the M2 treatment of the arcade game on 3DS.

 

I've really enjoyed Cafeman's random Genesis findings and impressions, even if they're from 3 years ago (the machine itself is way older than that). Please don't stop!

[+Cafeman]

On 5/7/2014 at 9:45 AM, Flojomojo said:

I've really enjoyed Cafeman's random Genesis findings and impressions, even if they're from 3 years ago (the machine itself is way older than that). Please don't stop!

I guess I stopped.

[Rhomaios]

23 hours ago, Cafeman said:

I guess I stopped.

Guess you got that 7 year itch.