In your opinion, what is the most underrated video game system? (including computers!)

[juansolo]

On 2/15/2020 at 1:50 PM, Punisher5.0 said:

Probably the Xbone because it was over shadowed by the PS4 and then the Switch. The X version looks like very nice hardware and I could see myself getting one for cheap one day.

 

I've got to agree with this. Over Xmas the Xbox One X was reduced to £270 here for a few weeks so I picked one up. It's a brilliant machine. Most cross platform stuff runs better on it, and the backwards compatability library has so much good stuff in there that it's become my primary console. I ran an S for ages to this point and it was sadly lacking in grunt so it just really sat there to play Forza. The difference in performance between it and the X is really quite remarkable. Unlike the difference between the PS4 and the Pro which just isn't big enough to warrant changing. I've ended up going though my PS4 and PS3 libraries and replacing all the games that run better on the X. Some titles are staggeringly different (Digital Foundry is your friend), Final Fantasy 13 on Xbox 360 goes from being easily the worst version of the game to being the best when run on an X for example.

 

Last but not least, back compatability OG Xbox and 360 games are region free on the X. I bought a US Bloodrayne 2 to test this and yup, went straight onto my UK Xbox X no problems. Shame they never did the Japanese Cave shooters in the back compat program

 

 

[Nintendo64]

Are windows PC's apart of this discussion? If so id have to say that any PC that is able to accurately run Windows XP or better is the most underrated console of all time. I mean back in the 90s all those sega, nintendo, playstation console wars were going on, and although the Windows PC had many great games, the PC didn't really have emulators for all of those consoles. I never cared about console wars back then or today, it was just in the forefront allot more back in 90s and the only thing I cared about was if the video games were fun or not.

 

Since Windows XP, the PC has be able to emulate so many consoles. In my opinion, in many ways it has been able to emulate consoles even better than the actual consoles themselves.  Id have to say the Windows PC has to be the most underrated console of all time, with the right specs of course, because it is all the consoles of previous generations combined.

Edited February 18, 2020 by Nintendo64

[Steven Pendleton]

11 minutes ago, Nintendo64 said:

Are windows PC's apart of this discussion? If so id have to say that any PC that is able to accurately run Windows XP or better is the most underrated console of all time. I mean back in the 90s all those sega, nintendo, playstation console wars were going on, and although the Windows PC had many great games, the PC didn't really have emulators for all of those consoles. I never cared about console wars back then or today, it was just in the forefront allot more back in 90s and the only thing I cared about was if the video games were fun or not.

 

Since Windows XP, the PC has be able to emulate so many consoles. In my opinion, in many ways it has been able to emulate consoles even better than the actual consoles themselves.  Id have to say the Windows PC has to be the most underrated console of all time, with the right specs of course, because it is all the consoles of previous generations combined.

Yes, computers are a part of it. I should hope so, as I mentioned the super awesome X68000 on page 1. PC is probably the most practical way to do X68000 anyway, given that the X68000 itself is old, expensive, and most of them are falling apart now. I doubt they make the parts to repair an old computer from 1987 anymore, so you'd have to salvage parts from other old computers or even other broken X68000s.

[IntelliMission]

I think we should include PC separated by eras: 8 bits, 16 bits, 32 bits and so on. Windows or MS-DOS is cheating, they include too many hardware updates to count as a single system.

[CatPix]

1 hour ago, IntelliMission said:

I think we should include PC separated by eras: 8 bits, 16 bits, 32 bits and so on. Windows or MS-DOS is cheating, they include too many hardware updates to count as a single system.

Indeed. XT, AT and ATX would be "good enough" bounds too. We have to refine more because really 32 bits goes from 1985 (the 386) to 2000 (Pentium 4; though really 64 bits CPU were more a thing around 2005 form what I recall)

 

XT being basically 8086 based, original IBM PC tech. AT spawns the whole 286 to 486/early Pentium era (though for the sake of separating things we could say up to 486). Then after that we delve into Pentium I and II era, then Windows 95/98 then 2000 and XP.

 

 

[phoenixdownita]

13 hours ago, IntelliMission said:

I think we should include PC separated by eras: 8 bits, 16 bits, 32 bits and so on. Windows or MS-DOS is cheating, they include too many hardware updates to count as a single system.

There are no 8 bits, 8086/8088/80286 it's all 16 bits (the 286 had faster clocks and of course protected mode if you cared for Xenix or Concurrent DOS 286, and that 3 years after the CPU launch).

 

So until 386 came to the scene I have a hard time considering those "underrated for videogames", they were clunky, beeper-beeping, CGA-oh-my-eyes-based and quite expensive compared to an Amiga or Atari ST.

 

The 386 was not cheap by any means but eventually the other two (Amiga/AtariST) couldn't evolve fast enough to stay competitive with falling prices, VGA, AdLib, CD-ROM support etc...etc....

 

All in all though I believe real fun gaming did not start on DOS until the 486 with integrated FPU, and available SVGA, SoundBlaster/GUS, fast-big-and-cheap HDDs, 1024x768 monitors etc.... it still wasn't cheap but it was fun (it's during that period I bought my first PS1 and it was so much cheaper and in a way more fun to play but obviosuly in low-res).

 

 

[IntelliMission]

I believe PC should be classified by eras and tied to console generations, at least until 2005.

 

Everything until 1990 = 8 bits

1990-1995 = 16 bits

1995-2000 = 32/64 bits

2000-2005 = 128 bits

 

Games such as Half Life, released for 128 bit consoles and appeared in PC first in 1998, show that this is not perfect, and we know the bits definition is also technically incorrect, but it's a decent way to classify PC gaming. Since the year 1995, many AAA games appeared both for PC and consoles (Tomb Raider, Quake, Halo...), so this imperfect system can be a way to avoid using "MS-DOS" or "Windows": Even I, the greatest fan of a Pentium 133mhz running MS-DOS to play games from 1988 to 1998 (and even older using Spectrum/Amstrad emulators), believe that would be cheating.

 

And yeah, having a Pentium I with Windows 95 running under MS-DOS, able to play 8 bit computer emulators, VGA graphic adventures and early PS1 style games, was absolutely mind blowing in 1997, especially if you didn't know games like Doom, Tomb Raider, Duke Nukem, Wolfenstein 3D, Quake or the Coktel Vision French graphic adventures even existed until then. Being able to emulate your first gaming machine, which stopped working 5 years ago, in the pre-Internet era was also unbelievable.

 

Hmmm, I guess we can also use retro-compatibility and emulators as a valid point if we also accept it to defend systems like the PS2 or the Xbox 360.

Edited February 19, 2020 by IntelliMission

[phoenixdownita]

2 hours ago, IntelliMission said:

I believe PC should be classified by eras and tied to console generations, at least until 2005.

 

Everything until 1990 = 8 bits

1990-1995 = 16 bits

1995-2000 = 32/64 bits

2000-2005 = 128 bits

 

Games such as Half Life, released for 128 bit consoles and appeared in PC first in 1998, show that this is not perfect, and we know the bits definition is also technically incorrect, but it's a decent way to classify PC gaming. Since the year 1995, many AAA games appeared both for PC and consoles (Tomb Raider, Quake, Halo...), so this imperfect system can be a way to avoid using "MS-DOS" or "Windows": Even I, the greatest fan of a Pentium 133mhz running MS-DOS to play games from 1988 to 1998 (and even older using Spectrum/Amstrad emulators), believe that would be cheating.

 

And yeah, having a Pentium I with Windows 95 running under MS-DOS, able to play 8 bit computer emulators, VGA graphic adventures and early PS1 style games, was absolutely mind blowing in 1997, especially if you didn't know games like Doom, Tomb Raider, Duke Nukem, Wolfenstein 3D, Quake or the Coktel Vision French graphic adventures even existed until then. Being able to emulate your first gaming machine, which stopped working 5 years ago, in the pre-Internet era was also unbelievable.

 

Hmmm, I guess we can also use retro-compatibility and emulators as a valid point if we also accept it to defend systems like the PS2 or the Xbox 360.

Say what?

The Atari ST was released in 1985 (the 1040 STf in 1986) and the Amiga 500 was released in 1987.

 

Wrt the Atari 1040 STF launch even Byte magazine took note (March 1986):

https://archive.org/stream/byte-magazine-1986-03/page/n91/mode/2up

https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-1986-03/page/n93/mode/2up/

it was the first computer with 1MB for less than 1K$ and that was considered very very cheap at the time.

 

The Apple IIgs is a 1986 release, just to add to the fray.

 

So yeah 16bits (proper) started earlier than 1990 if you consider the computers part of video-gaming, for consoles the Genesis/MD was launched in 1988 in Japan and 1989 in US so a little later than the computers, and to be fair the PCEngine (1987) is already a glimpse of what could be done gfx wise with a 16bit VDP.

 

Wrt 16bit games goodness Defender of the Crown for Amiga is a 1986 release, please check out all Cinemaware releases of that period https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinemaware#Releases or some of the early Psygnosys titles like Barbarian, Obliterator or Shadow of the Beast as they all are pre 1990.

 

So 8bits pretty much "dies" at or around 1986 when 16bits takes off with a bang!!!

 

There really wasn't much competition with DOS and those other 16bits systems until sometimes early 90s (Wolfenstein 3d is a 1991 launch release, Doom is a 1993 release and they both commanded a 32bit system like 386 on up) so no I do not think that pre 1989/90 MS DOS gaming was underrated, it was barely ... rated.

It wasn't all bad mind you in DOS land, there were early and good LucasArt and Sierra games for sure but those were not underrated either, they were praised and talked about! .... and I still remember a very surprising version of Tapper on MS-DOS, so there's that too.

[IntelliMission]

Yes, I know many 16 bit systems were available before 1990, just like Half Life and the Dreamcast appeared in 1998. But I think most people were playing 8 bit games until 1989-90. In my case, I didn't have a 16 bit machine until 1992, and even then many of my early PC games were also released in the NES or multiple 8 bit computers, they belonged to the previous generation. I didn't have the NES/Master System, but I know many kids around the world played those until they bought a SNES/Genesis in the early 90s.

[phoenixdownita]

13 minutes ago, IntelliMission said:

Yes, I know many 16 bit systems were available before 1990, just like Half Life and the Dreamcast appeared in 1998. But I think most people were playing 8 bit games until 1989-90. In my case, I didn't have a 16 bit machine until 1992, and even then many of my early PC games were also released in the NES or multiple 8 bit computers, they belonged to the previous generation. I didn't have the NES/Master System, but I know many kids around the world played those until they bought a SNES/Genesis in the early 90s.

No they weren't, don't assume your experience is universally applicable, a friend of mine had a 520ST about 1987 and when he showed it to us (I had a C64, one of my friends a ZX Spectrum and another friend an MSX) our collective jaws touched the floor (the rendition of "Green Sleeves" from the game Black Lamp still sounds in my ears to these days, that's an '88 game), I could literally taste my socks, I think I bought my Amiga 500 in 88.

Specifically in Europe consoles were somewhat frowned upon until pretty much PS1/Sat era, before that though home computers ruled and past 86/87 it was Atari ST or Amiga 500 by far.

[juansolo]

PCs are an odd thing because they're just so damned variable. I've currently got four of them because the idea that old software can run on modern PCs is a fantasy. GOG definitely helps in this area to be fair, but there's a surprising amount that just won't play ball. So I've got all my games spread over the following machines:

 

My earliest is a Dell XPS-333 (freebie from a friend that I restored/upgraded) - Pentium II 333Mhz with a 3Dfx Voodoo 3 and a Soundblaster Gold running Win98. This for me covers the golden era of PC games between 1997-2000. The sheer number of utter classic PC games from this time is bonkers. Plus it's not difficult to still get DOS games running it. Why 98? Because it's got USB support and that's really bloody useful to get stuff onto the machine!

 

Next I've got a pair of Lenovo M70e (about £25 each from ebay then upgraded) - The first is a Core 2 Duo E8400 3Ghz with a AMD Radeon HD 7000 running WinXP. I tried a later/faster GPU and it ran sketchily so I grabbed what appeared to be the latest XP supported Radeon instead and this one works like a dream. The second I swapped the processor for a Core 2 Quad Q9550 2.83Ghz, dropped in a Nvidia GeForce GT 730 and 8GB memory I had lying around to make a Win7 machine.

 

Other than the Voodoo 3 card, everything was super cheap to do so it'd have been rude not to. My last machine is a 'modern' (I don't do modern), cast-off bitsa-PC from a friend that I've slapped into a nice new case and put a modern-ish GTX 1060 graphics card into. That's my Win10 machine. They're all pure games machines and I definitely recommend doing it even though getting things working right on PCs given their nature can be a pain in the butt. There's something about playing Unreal Tournament on a PII/3Dfx machine on a CRT that's just right.

[Steven Pendleton]

4 hours ago, IntelliMission said:

Everything until 1990 = 8 bits

Intellivision? X68000? Mega Drive? FM Towns? 2 of those were super expensive, though.

 

4 hours ago, IntelliMission said:

"MS-DOS" or "Windows"

Mac... *becomes sad*

2 hours ago, phoenixdownita said:

Specifically in Europe consoles were somewhat frowned upon until pretty much PS1/Sat era, before that though home computers ruled and past 86/87 it was Atari ST or Amiga 500 by far.

From what I heave heard, Europeans either had the Master System, Mega Drive, or some sort of computer (ZX Spectrum, C64, Amiga, etc.) until 5th gen made non-Sega consoles cool because someone decided to leave all of the good Saturn games in Japan.

[CatPix]

It's... difficult to sum up, probably because each country has their own story.

For example in the UK the NES went under the radar, selling shy of a million consoles.

 

 

In France, while it didn't sold wonders, Nintendo announced in 1992 having sold 3.5 millions NES.

One console that worker wonder, even surprising Nintendo themselves, was the Game Boy, that sold like hot cakes in France. Not sure about other countries.

 

The computer era in Europe pretty much died around 1990. 8-bits computers were affordable, but 16 bits weren't; and by the time they were cheaper, well it was 1990 and they were going outdated (for the ST, with too little too late efforts put in) or were going even more expensive than before (Amiga).

So there was a SNES vs Megadrive fight. Though it was probably less heated than in the US, as  the Megadrive arrived later, and Nintendo rushed the SNES to Europe (as so much as (thankfully ) using the Japanese shells for the PAL market -they didn't had enough capacity to produce US shells for the US and Europe). And since the Master System was a thing here, there was no Nintendon't ad (the fact that it only works in English doesn't help either )

 

Basically it was a rather short fight between 1991 and 1995 when the Playstation came and steamrolled over everyone. Sega didn't alienated any seller in Europe like in the US, but as you pointed out, Sega basically booted themselves out of competition by keeping expected games in Japan. European gaming magazines were featuring Japanese games which filled people with hope... and disapointment later.

[IntelliMission]

Since we are talking about a bit of everything now, I wanted to say this: I wish Sierra would have ported their early, text input graphic adventures to multiple 8 bit computers: C64, ZX Spectrum, MSX, Amstrad CPC...

 

We 8 bit computer users could have enjoyed 3 Space Quest games, 3 Larry games, 4 King Quest games, Conquests of Camelot... It would have been a refreshing change from your regular text based adventure.

 

The engines were called AGI and SCI0 and were perfectly possible in those machines... I guess. I mean, these computers were able to run decent ports of Defenders of the Crown, Prince of Persia and Budokan.

 

Back to the topic, yeah... MS-DOS gaming was not very exciting in 1990, but by the end of 1996 you could play Quake, Tomb Raider, Monkey Island and Tapper in the same machine (assuming you had some program to slow down the cycles for some old games). I don't care about generations or number of bits anymore, I just know it's a forgotten machine. I hate it that I can't even remember the external look of my dad's 486 and Pentium 133. ? MS-DOS fans, let's hug together! At least Amiga and Atari users were able to "see" their beloved computers again...

[Steven Pendleton]

1 hour ago, CatPix said:

It's... difficult to sum up, probably because each country has their own story.

For example in the UK the NES went under the radar, selling shy of a million consoles.

 

 

In France, while it didn't sold wonders, Nintendo announced in 1992 having sold 3.5 millions NES.

One console that worker wonder, even surprising Nintendo themselves, was the Game Boy, that sold like hot cakes in France. Not sure about other countries.

 

The computer era in Europe pretty much died around 1990. 8-bits computers were affordable, but 16 bits weren't; and by the time they were cheaper, well it was 1990 and they were going outdated (for the ST, with too little too late efforts put in) or were going even more expensive than before (Amiga).

So there was a SNES vs Megadrive fight. Though it was probably less heated than in the US, as  the Megadrive arrived later, and Nintendo rushed the SNES to Europe (as so much as (thankfully ) using the Japanese shells for the PAL market -they didn't had enough capacity to produce US shells for the US and Europe). And since the Master System was a thing here, there was no Nintendon't ad (the fact that it only works in English doesn't help either )

 

Basically it was a rather short fight between 1991 and 1995 when the Playstation came and steamrolled over everyone. Sega didn't alienated any seller in Europe like in the US, but as you pointed out, Sega basically booted themselves out of competition by keeping expected games in Japan. European gaming magazines were featuring Japanese games which filled people with hope... and disapointment later.

Game Boy kicked ass globally! It deserved to, though.

 

The only Sega/Nintendo console war that has ever really happened was in the USA and maybe Canada. Basically, Sonic, blast processing (which really does exist), and Genesis Does = roughly even sales for the duration of 90~94 when the Genesis hardware got scaled back greatly in favour of the Saturn but the SNES remained on the market along with the N64 in some limited capacity. It should be noted, however, that they still made Genesis games. I remember picking up The Lost World Jurassic Park, which was a 1997 release in the USA and I believe the final game released for MD in Europe.

 

PC Engine kicked the Mega Drive out of the fight in 4th gen in Japan before MD even released. So did the MD launch title Osomatsu-kun. Osomatsu-kun was so bad that it's considered to be one of the two biggest reasons the MD failed, and everyone, including the creator of Osomatsu-kun and supposedly even its own dev staff, disowned it as a pile of trash. The other reason is the PC Engine, which launched a year earlier and does basically exactly the same thing: bring a very accurate arcade experience (for 1987) to the home. It would still have failed if the Super Famicom never existed because even the Famicom, released in 83, still outsold it. The SG-1000, Mark III, and Master System all totally failed because the Famicom was so good and then the PC Engine came along and killed them for good.

 

There was no fair Nintendo/Sega fight in Europe in 3rd or 4th gen. The opposite of what happened in Japan happened in Europe, where the MD launched first and was backed by the extremely good reception of the Master System. Then since the TurboGrafx-16 had failed so badly in the US, it got a very limited release in the UK, France, and I think Spain as both the TurboGrafx in the UK (no -16, this time) and the PC Engine elsewhere, and I know there was also a very small supply of SuperGrafx shipped to France. Meanwhile, the NES didn't do as well as it did elsewhere because of the computers thing, so the SNES did very poorly in Europe. Not sure why the Master System was so popular, though.

 

I'm not European, though, so forgive me if I'm not 100% accurate. I also did all of this from memory, so maybe I got something wrong or forgot something important.

 

Forgot Brazil. Lol Master System land.

Edited February 19, 2020 by Steven Pendleton

[CatPix]

You got the general picture right, tho, the SNES did okay here. But again it's a "country by country" basis, but general figures for the Megadrive and SNES in Europe are about 7 millions (MD) to 8,5 millions (SNES) so it was far from "poorly"  globally. But some countries got it more than other. If I recall right, the Megadrive had a strong headstart in France but ultimately sales figures were 1/3 Megadrive and 2/3 SNES, so there are probably countries in Europe with the opposite figures.

Though it's likely that SNES sales picked up late; Sega cut all Megadrive supplies here in 1996 while Nintendo kept selling SNES games as late as 1998 (pretty sure to have seen a few sold under cheap blisters in 1999 or early 2000 but those may have been destocker sales).

 

[Steven Pendleton]

19 minutes ago, CatPix said:

You got the general picture right, tho, the SNES did okay here. But again it's a "country by country" basis, but general figures for the Megadrive and SNES in Europe are about 7 millions (MD) to 8,5 millions (SNES) so it was far from "poorly"  globally. But some countries got it more than other. If I recall right, the Megadrive had a strong headstart in France but ultimately sales figures were 1/3 Megadrive and 2/3 SNES, so there are probably countries in Europe with the opposite figures.

Though it's likely that SNES sales picked up late; Sega cut all Megadrive supplies here in 1996 while Nintendo kept selling SNES games as late as 1998 (pretty sure to have seen a few sold under cheap blisters in 1999 or early 2000 but those may have been destocker sales).

 

Yeah, it's definitely a country-based thing, but the figures I posted back on page 1 say MD was just under double SNES sales in western Europe. Weird stuff happens, though. I mean, France even got the SuperGrafx! Nobody else did aside from Japan.

[CatPix]

The PC-Engine sales in France were from a private importer, Sodipeng (an emanation of either UbiSoft or Guillemot (same family ? )) and had little relationship with NEC-Hudson other than them aknowledging they existed. But NEC-Hudson couldn't give any order to Sodipeng, and they were going "You're on your own, we will not provide any guarantee or support on you in any way shape or form".

 

Edited February 19, 2020 by CatPix

[Steven Pendleton]

25 minutes ago, CatPix said:

The PC-Engine sales in France were from a private importer, Sodipeng (an emanation of either UbiSoft or Guillemot (same family ? )) and had little relationship with NEC-Hudson other than them aknowledging they existed. But NEC-Hudson couldn't give any order to Sodipeng, and they were going "You're on your own, we will not provide any guarantee or support on you in any way shape or form".

 

There it is, the Sodipeng ad for the SuperGrafx! I heard those (and all other French PC Engines) got RGB modded by Sodipeng. I imagine that the French SuperGrafx are super rare and expensive now. I wanted to buy a SuperGrafx before I got my MiSTer, but I got a regular CoreGrafx instead. Then I tried the SGX games on the MiSTer and I am glad I did not waste my money on one!

Edited February 19, 2020 by Steven Pendleton

[+wongojack]

27 minutes ago, CatPix said:

The PC-Engine sales in France were from a private importer, Sodipeng (an emanation of either UbiSoft or Guillemot (same family ? )) and had little relationship with NEC-Hudson other than them aknowledging they existed. But NEC-Hudson couldn't give any order to Sodipeng, and they were going "You're on your own, we will not provide any guarantee or support on you in any way shape or form".

 

 

Wow - Is that supposed to be a Japanese kid with underpants on his head?  Or maybe he's got some kind of tonsure?  That ad would definitely not fly in the USA in 2020.  Not that it means we are any less racist really.

 

Do you think there would be a negative reaction today in France if such an ad were produced?

 

[Steven Pendleton]

13 minutes ago, wongojack said:

 

Wow - Is that supposed to be a Japanese kid with underpants on his head?  Or maybe he's got some kind of tonsure?  That ad would definitely not fly in the USA in 2020.  Not that it means we are any less racist really.

 

Do you think there would be a negative reaction today in France if such an ad were produced?

 

That is Momotarou.

[adamchevy]

I think the Bally Astrocade deserves to be on this list if it isn’t already. I think it was underrated in many ways. It was mostly underrated by Bally.

Bally had the most powerful gaming platform of its time and they squandered it through bad advertising. Most people at the time expected to get an add on module that was promised that would give it computer like functionality.

What a waste of time and advertising dollars. They could have spent more time and money making sure the unit didn’t overheat.

As it was though the games were spectacular receiving awards during its lifetime:

Danny Goodman of Creative Computing Video & Arcade Games called The Incredible Wizard for the Astrocade "an incredibly good replica" of Wizard of Wor.[5] Video magazine's 1982 Guide to Electronic Games agreed, calling it "a near-perfect translation" of the arcade original.[6]:53 It would go on to be awarded "Best Multi-Player Video Game" at the 4th annual Arkie Awards where it was described as "the finest cartridge ever produced for [the Astrocade].

[boxpressed]

Agree that the Astrocade is underrated. It has arcade-quality sound that is still impressive. Incredible Wizard is reason enough to own the console, but Solar Conqueror is just about my favorite game from the pre-NES era. However, it has to be played with the original Astrocade controller to truly be appreciated.

[Flojomojo]

Odyssey 2 gets NO LOVE. It deserves at least a little. 

[+wongojack]

4 hours ago, Steven Pendleton said:

That is Momotarou.

Thank you.  It is NOT underpants.  I found some other pics that make that obvious:

 

 

 

I thought I was missing something there because of Time and France, but it turns out it was just Japan . . . of course