Post your favorite underrated consoles

[xDragonWarrior]

So i'm tired of people saying,"oh the Dreamcast and the Genesis,Nes and SNES are real good but leave out the other underrated but still good consoles.This is to help people find other good consoles instead of the ones mentioned above so tell why you like it and why you think it's underrated.

 

1. Turbografx-16.A good library of shooters(Blazing Lazers)and decent platforming games(Bonks Adventure) is why i believe the Turbografx-16 is an underrated console

 

2.Master System.The Nes seems to get loved but what about the Master System.It had some great games(Alex Kidd,Golden Axe Warrior,etc) and great graphics.

[LidLikesIntellivision]

We are currently playing some Turbografx in the HSC forum! It's a good time to try it! http://atariage.com/...st-parodius-da/

 

I don't think Master System is really underrated. It was not the first system but, at least in Brazil, a lot of people bought it. For this generation, the Atari 7800 is a great but underrated system.

 

I would also mention the Intellivision.

[Ska_music_fan83]

The Nintendo Gamecube!!

[OldSchoolRetroGamer]

I know some would kick me for this but Imma say 3DO! Hey what can I say? I love me some cheesy FMV and it looks great on it! Also ROAD RASH and graphicly it was damn cool for it's time.

[Taskmaster99]

I'll go with the Turbografx. Great system....good games....would have been better if all the shmups that were released in Japan came to the U.S. Could have helped this system alot.

[xDragonWarrior]

The Sega CD also.Call me dumb but Sonic CD,Batman,Snatcher,Robo Aleste,Another World/Out of This World and other are real good games,Shame there were lots of shitty FMV games that overshadowed the better games(the reason people say it's a bad console without even playing it)

Edited May 27, 2013 by xDragonWarrior

[CatPix]

2.Master System.The Nes seems to get loved but what about the Master System.It had some great games(Alex Kidd,Golden Axe Warrior,etc) and great graphics.

Really funny to read that...

In Europe, the Master System was and still is considered a serious opponent to the NES, and it's a classic game system here, with systems and games being sold and even programmed as late as 1996.

 

So for underated game systems, I'll go with :

 

- The PC engine.

Which was never oficially released in Europe but enjoyed a great success on the gray market/import, with national-wide companies such as Telegames in UK or Sodipeng in France. Still, today, it's a rare beast and not much people know much about it.

 

- The 3DO.

The idea, the concept, the power of the machine... IMO, the 3DO influenced the Playstation licensing model but fixed all the mistakes the 3DO did.

With many fabulous games, (and amazingly bad games, worse than the CD-i one for some) it's a very special system I really like to have in my collection and play games sometime.

 

- The Atari 8 bits.

Alright, it's a computer, but in Europe, during all the 80's, gaming was on computer. The Atari 2600, the Intellivison, the Colecovision went on and off, almost not noticed (alright, I might be forcing it a bit) until the war grew between the Master System and the NES, both released fully and gaining success by the very late 80's (and even there, most gamers would prefer to save money for an Atari ST and an Amiga rather than buying 8 bits sytems) and at the time, if the war was high between the Commodore 64, the Amstrad CPC and the ZX Spectrum, the Atari 8 bits line was badly promoted, games released were either slow or mediocre ports of Spectrum or Amstrad versions.

So, it should have gained success, but didn't, and I find it being so bad it need a little reminder.

[bomberpunk]

the Adventure Vision, Virtual Boy, and Tiger R-Zone... hmm... maybe red is actually my favorite color after all these years thinking it was green.

[Algus]

If it counts as a system, the 32X. Everyone is so obsessed with how much a waste of money it was at the time that they miss the fact that most of its library is excellent and the unit itself is dirt cheap now.

[gorfcadet]

I'll vote for the Turbografx 16. Love Blazing Lasers, Alien Crush, and Pac Land. Not a huge US library, but a stack of great games to be sure. Even the oddballs have charm like JJ and Jeff and Air Zonk.

 

The 32X is still my preferred way to play Mortal Kombat II and NBA Jam TE. The AfterBurner and Space Harrier conversions alone were worth the price of admission to me. Virtua Racing, Virtua Fighter, Star Wars Arcade, and Chaotix get a lot of play in my game room as well. It died too soon. I even pull out Night Trap 32XCD to get my friends to roll their eyes.

 

Finally, the Saturn hits my list. Guardian Heroes, X-Men Vs Street Fighter (import), Mega man X4, Daytona, Sega Rally, and Fighter's Megamix made my inner game nerd super happy. Didn't have a PS and that was ok with me!

Edited May 27, 2013 by gorfcadet

[DaytonaUSA]

To be fair, the DC is the most underrated system, simply because it's considered to be one of the best machines with some of the best games, and yet died an extremely early death.

 

I'd add the Saturn, as I love that system. I'd also add the GameGear, Neo Geo Pocket Color, and GameCube.

[8th lutz]

Here are my underrated Systems:

 

1.) Tg-16. A good game library in the United States despite the small game library. I think if the United States got half of the pc engines game library, I don't the system would be overlooked as much.

 

2.) Sega Master System. It has nice games in the game library in the United States game library in an era that Nintendo had a monopoly on third party developers and publishers. I don't think the system would be considered as underrated if the US game library had the games Europe had.

 

3.) Sega Saturn. awesome system. It has a good North American game library that get overlooked due to the Japanese game Library.

 

4.) Atari 7800. This system is underrated based on what the system can do. It is great at arcade ports. If the National release was in 1984, I think more potential of the system would have have been shown based on the homebrew game library proved. Jack Tramiel not having the coin up division of Atari hurt the system as well besides the 3rd party monopoly.

 

Not a lot of people that aren't board members on this site have no idea what the 7800 is capable of based based on the homebrew game library the Atari 7800 has. If the 7800 back in the day had the homebrew authors as programmers, there would have a lot more would have been out of the system. What the homebrew 7800 games does is giving a peak on what the 7800 can do and the homebrew games actually improve the game quality of the game library.

 

Beantly Bear: Crystal Quest outside of sound actually isn't an Atari 7800 expansion module game despite how good the game looks. Bob himself even said the game can be played on a 7800 without an expansion module with the only difference being no sound.

[Osgeld]

eh add enough external hardware a 2600 could play quake, so what is a game with no sound in the mid 80's

 

not much

[bomberpunk]

how the hell is the Gamecube underrated? it was huge.

[Rhomaios]

If it counts as a system, the 32X. Everyone is so obsessed with how much a waste of money it was at the time that they miss the fact that most of its library is excellent and the unit itself is dirt cheap now.

The library is excellent? Not even a little bit. Kolibri is good, Star Wars is overrated, Knuckles Chaotix is vastly inferior to the other 16 bit Sonics, Doom is a crappy port. Virtua Fighter is severely date, though Virtua Racer Deluxe is still not bad. Metal Head was terrible, Motocross Champion was unfinished, Mortal Kombat II was so ubiquitous a title that it hardly counts, Spiderman is way too expensive to try, and Space Harrier and After Burner are the same damn game that came out for the Genesis and Master System. To be fair, I haven't played Tempo, Blackthorne, or Zaxxon, but we're not left with much.

 

As far as underrated, the Saturn deserves a spot. I'd say the Saturn's library beats the Dreamcast's any day.

Edited May 27, 2013 by ὁ Ῥωμαῖος Νέος

[gorfcadet]

AfterBurner and Space Harrier were not the same as the Genesis and Master System port. The scaling and gameplay were perfect reproducts of the arcade games. I thought this was to post your favorite underrated systems, not crap on someone else's.

It is easy to bash a system like this now, but I still remember the wow factor of hearing the Star Wars theme on my Sega and how smooth the play was on Virtua Racing. Hate if you will, but my first year in college everyone was in my dorm room playing on the 32X. For a few short months before the Saturn and PSX it had some really great experiences.

Cut it some slack... its not as bad as a CD-i!

[madmax2069]

I have to vote for the 32x, to this day it still has the best ports of space Harrier and afterburner, metal head is a great game, star wars arcade although suffered from control issues and repetitive game play is quite good, but not as good as shadow squadron. To me cosmic carnage was a good fighting game. Virtua fighter is epic, if you ask me it holds up quite well today.

 

The 32x has to be one of the most underrated systems.

Edited May 27, 2013 by madmax2069

[Seob]

The cd-i isn't a bad system either. It deserves more credit. Most just talk trash about the cd-I because of the nintendo game that where released for it.

But there are good games for the system. If you are a big fan of laseractive shooters, the cd-i has some of the best ports for it.

The aprentice, lucky luke, christmas crisis, burn:cycle, atlantis, dimo's quest, flashback, myst, the 7th guest , secret mission, tetsuo gaiden are all good games.

[Rex Dart]

[high voltage]

Really funny to read that...

In Europe, the Master System was and still is considered a serious opponent to the NES, and it's a classic game system here, with systems and games being sold and even programmed as late as 1996.

 

So for underated game systems, I'll go with :

 

- The PC engine.

Which was never oficially released in Europe but enjoyed a great success on the gray market/import, with national-wide companies such as Telegames in UK or Sodipeng in France. Still, today, it's a rare beast and not much people know much about it.

 

- The 3DO.

The idea, the concept, the power of the machine... IMO, the 3DO influenced the Playstation licensing model but fixed all the mistakes the 3DO did.

With many fabulous games, (and amazingly bad games, worse than the CD-i one for some) it's a very special system I really like to have in my collection and play games sometime.

 

- The Atari 8 bits.

Alright, it's a computer, but in Europe, during all the 80's, gaming was on computer. The Atari 2600, the Intellivison, the Colecovision went on and off, almost not noticed (alright, I might be forcing it a bit) until the war grew between the Master System and the NES, both released fully and gaining success by the very late 80's (and even there, most gamers would prefer to save money for an Atari ST and an Amiga rather than buying 8 bits sytems) and at the time, if the war was high between the Commodore 64, the Amstrad CPC and the ZX Spectrum, the Atari 8 bits line was badly promoted, games released were either slow or mediocre ports of Spectrum or Amstrad versions.

So, it should have gained success, but didn't, and I find it being so bad it need a little reminder.

 

The Atari 8-bit was the second best selling computer in Germany (behind C64) (source Happy Computer) and the second best selling import computer in UK (again, behind C64).

[Lentzquest]

I'll throw in another vote for the Virtual Boy. It may have a tiny library, but what's there is pretty good. Something I love about systems like the Vectrex and Virtual Boy, is that nothing can really quite replace the experience. No emulation can come close to fully playing on those two systems in-person.

[Ska_music_fan83]

how the hell is the Gamecube underrated? it was huge.

 

The Playstation 2 sales would say otherwise...

[Seob]

It all depends on where you lived in Europe. In the Netherlands, the C64 was the biggest selling system, followed by the msx. The cpc-464 lines was less populair here then in Germany, guess that the sinclair had greater sales back then.

[madmax2069]

 

 

The Playstation 2 sales would say otherwise...

 

That's only because how long after GC and Xbox got dropped did Sony still support the PS2

 

What's the total sales of the PS2 when the PS3 dropped. I know the gamecube had around 21 million worldwide.

[Ska_music_fan83]

Gamecube sales: http://vgsales.wikia.com/wiki/GameCube

 

Playstation 2 sales: http://vgsales.wikia.com/wiki/PlayStation_2

 

By the end of the Gamecube's lifespan, 2007/2008, PS2 had sold 117 million (or 131 million) to Gamecube's 21 million. That's at least 5 (or 6) times as much. The PS2 then proceeded to make at least another 20 million during the remaining years while the PS3 was around...