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The absolute essential Jaguar games!


Atlantis

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If you cook it down to the absolute essential core of games:
Being around not that long, but haven't heard anything (that) bad about these games.
The big-five carts, that *everyone* consider essential (eiter: good game/and-or collector hot item):
-Tempest 2000
-Alien vs Predator
-Doom
-Super burnout
-Iron soldier
Jag CD:
-Battlemorph
-Hover strike: 2nd...
(-World tour racing)
(-Iron soldier 2)
Best platform:
-Rayman
Best shmup:
-Raiden
Best fighter:
-Ultra vortek
(Also essential racer:
-Atari Karts)
Sports:
-NBA Jam
(-Brutal sports football)
System's Holy grail:
-Battlesphere
Late release/homebrew top-notch:
-Another world
-Protector SE
Some borderliners set within: (...)

Gotta catch 'em all!
End of message. Lock thread. :D
Edited by Atlantis
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Absolute essential is tough, because that's an extremely personal thing. For me, the "no compromise" releases are Tempest 2000, Wolfenstein 3D, and Zero 5. By "no compromise," I mean the games I don't think could be done any better on the platform and don't necessarily have a superior experience available elsewhere (obviously, Wolfenstein 3D doesn't quite meet that definition, but it's still as good as I would ever expect it to be on the Jaguar, which is good enough for these purposes). Of course, there are other games that are also well done on the system and probably couldn't be done any better, like Rayman, Flashback, Another World, etc., but the first three I mentioned really stand-out for me.

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For me it would be:

-Raiden (easiest to pick up and play, good quality all around even if it doesn't seem like its pushing the jag in any respects)
-Tempest 2000 (defining game of the system, cool music, 3d graphics and effects, simple to understand gameplay)
-Wolf 3D (very fast and arcadey, nice high resolution graphics, lots of action. Easy to pick up and play)
-Skyhammer (on the list b/c I think it has some of the most impressive graphics of any Jaguar 3D game)

Haven't had a chance to play atari karts or rayman since they've been a little outside my budget, but those each seem like games with fun gameplay, good variety of graphics, good production values and exhibit the abilities of the jag as a successor to the 16 bit console era.

Edited by sirlynxalot
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Haven't had a chance to play atari karts or rayman since they've been a little outside my budget, but those each seem like games with fun gameplay, good variety of graphics, good production values and exhibit the abilities of the jag as a successor to the 16 bit console era.

 

You may want to rethink that idea for Atari Karts.

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When I was at a local gaming store I brought a Jaguar over and they were impressed to see a working Jaguar. People don't trade them in often and when they do they are broken.

 

So I showed them some of the games.

 

They knew of Bubsy, and loved the smoothness of play and the colors. They also knew that the Bubsy game on the Jaguar was one of the better versions. Difficult gameplay aside, I was drawn to the colors of Bubsy when I first started too.

 

They liked Wolfenstein and how easily that flowed with game play.

Showed Tempest 2000. They loved it.

 

Finally showed Raiden. The district manager of the store (Game Over) wanted to play that one since he has played other Raiden versions. He said he liked it, but while that was a top contender in his option the Turbo Graphics 16 version he liked more.

 

Mind you these are games that were a set from a friend's set I was borrowing. They had a cartridge without a label so I grabbed my friend's kid's jag (that I have help them build up over the last 15 years) and brought it over. The cartridge tuned out to be Cybermorph. Oh well. :D

 

But honestly for me those are the main games I would showcase. Maybe I would have showcased Doom, or Tube SE.

 

The kids love Super Burnout and can smoke me on the tracks now. :D

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From a commercial sense I think the ones that had the most appeal were Alien VS Predator, Battlemorph, Battlesphere, Doom, Iron Soldier, NBA Jam TE, Primal Rage, Rayman, Super Burnout and Worms. Improvements could deinifely be made to them but imo they are well polished mainstream kind of games that were ports of games that weren't intended for 16-bit hardware and were relatively new.

 

Those aren't my favorites though. There a recent top 5 thead here. :P

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"Absolutely essential" and Jaguar in the same sentence .... no no.

Given the short library it doesn't even matter that much, any 6 picks from the quarter set that is decent/good can be construed as "essential" one way or another, and that alone would cover almost 10% of the complete library anyway.

After having "acquired" the Jag taste then easily 1/3 to 1/2 the library can fit in due to many "exclusives", and we're still talking only 20/30 games in total ... which is surprising given the general poor perception .... but you've got to acquire the taste (or inhale some but not too much of the fumes).

 

I guess the short library in a way helps in attempting to salvage as much as possible, if there was 10 times the selection I doubt we'd be so kind in regard to some of the games .... but given that's not the case, we are a little more lenient .... same thing tend to happen with the 7800, the library is barely any larger and yet there's appreciation for quite a few more games one would expect. It's another acquired taste ... well in that case mostly an acquired audio taste.

Sometime I wonder what would have happened if the Jag had shipped with the TIA for music ;) and connectors on the cart for more advanced audio .... no I do not, my ears are bleeding from a 7800 session with Mario Bros.

 

Edited by phoenixdownita
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...

Alice's Mom's Rescue

...

You're kidding right?

 

No matter if the game is good or not, but it cannot be "essential" as it is way too recent imho.

By that token then Pier Solar is "essential" for Megadrive, and Last Hope Pink Bullets is "essential" for NeoGeo .... no way.

Edited by phoenixdownita
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You cannot in any way compare the Jaguar library to the Mega Drive library. It isn't even a contest and I'm not really the world's biggest Sega guy.

 

The Jaguar has under what, 74 games total? Considering that many come off as almost unplayable and untested I have no issues with listing Alice as a must have game because... it's a good game. I don't care how new it is, it's fun! Sad fact: The Jaguar sadly lacks fun games; Most are "okay" or "acceptable". It's just how I feel about the matter and I love Atari.

Edited by Merendino
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Top 11 Good/ Common Atari Jaguar Games

Temptest 2000

Defender 2000

Missle Command 3-D

Iron Soldier

alien Vs Predator

Rayman

Doom

NBA JAM

Super Burnout

Ultra Vortex

Power Drive Ralley

After this their is another 20 games that are descent, 20 that are ok the rest are awful...the line is drawn by how much the game cost and how complete you want a collwction of 60+retail games, you also run into issues where Soccer Kid is on several systems but an $80 game on the Jag is it woth $80, good game but

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For me, it's Tempest 2000, Raiden, Wolfenstein 3D, Iron Soldier, and Zoop (yeah, I know).

 

I used to put DOOM on that list, but I'd rather play it elsewhere in better form. Wolf 3D at least offers something new and different over other versions of it. Raiden's a little slow, but unique enough to stand on its own compared to other ports. Tempest 2000 is kind of self-explanatory, but super addictive every time I play it. Iron Soldier kicks my ass about halfway through, but it's a good showcase title and one of the more polished packages on the system. Zoop--it sounds dumb, but it's addictive. Due to it saving scores, I revisit it a lot to try to better my play. I had Super Burnout on the list first, but the fact is, I actually play Zoop more.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Finally showed Raiden. The district manager of the store (Game Over) wanted to play that one since he has played other Raiden versions. He said he liked it, but while that was a top contender in his option the Turbo Graphics 16 version he liked more.

Hmmm, that's interesting. I have the TG16 version coming in the mail, so I'm looking forward to a direct comparison. Haven't played the TG16 version in a LONG time to make a side-by-side comparison.

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Hmmm, that's interesting. I have the TG16 version coming in the mail, so I'm looking forward to a direct comparison. Haven't played the TG16 version in a LONG time to make a side-by-side comparison.

TG version plays much faster, but doesn't look nearly as good (mostly due to a washed out color pallette).

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