15 years of SNES

[16bitter]

Looks like a nice 1-UP feature on the "16-bit King"(?!?). Could make for a good debate, I suppose. Quite original. Yep.

http://www.1up.com/do/feature?cId=3152604

"Nintendo was reluctant to abandon the incredibly successful NES, but the company created a system that wasn't simply on par with the competition -- it surpassed it."

So is that description true, or the ravings of an SNES fanboy? I'm sure Genesis fanboys have the answer. ;)

[Joe Redifer]

It definitely surpassed the Genesis... in unattractive blocky transition effects!

[j_factor]

Depends on what they mean by 'surpassed'. SNES surpassed its competition in terms of worlwide sales; that is an indisputable fact. It certainly didn't surpass it in quality.

That article seems to have several... embellishments, if not inaccuracies. Let's go down the list...

"Nintendo handily slapped down the Mega Drive and PC Engine and kept a majority market share." -- is that true? I was under the impression that PC Engine, combined with the lesser market share of the Mega Drive, had robbed Nintendo of its majority for some time, like 1989-1992.

"Nintendo overcame Sega's negative advertising and loosened its own content standards, ultimately coming out on top -- at least in America." I have heard some conflicting reports, but it's my understanding that SNES eventually was outselling Genesis, but ultimately, Genesis sold more total units. A recent article in Hardcore Gamer stated that Genesis ended up selling more.

"The final Super NES games were released in 1998" Only one SNES game, not games plural, was released in 1998 in the US, as far as I can tell. Harvest Moon, Kirby's Dreamland 3, Arkanoid, etc. were released in 1997; 1998 belonged to Frogger alone.

"just the right hardware design" There are many, many programmers of the time who'd disagree with that one.

Contrary to what it implies in the "tech glossary", PilotWings did use a DSP chip rather than relying strictly on the SNES stock hardware with Mode 7.

What a disappointing article, even those things aside. It doesn't really talk about the SNES experience at all.

[16bitter]

I agree. The article was so thin as to be worthless on the grounds of a retrospective or love letter to the system.

It doesn't delve into any the specifics of the SNES's timeline; its failures and triumphs left as vague what have yous, at best.

A striking example is how little mention there is of the war between the Genesis and SNES. From that article, would you truly have any idea as to the arguable fact that it was the most intense era of parity in the American market ever?

Instead, the long leadership of the Genesis is relegated to mere mention or implication as an illogical oddity within the market place; a nebulous mystery, then, in place of the actual hows and whys that made this particular stalemate interesting. The article therefore doesn't do justice to either system, nor the overall quality of software that sprang forth due to the vehement push and pull relationship between Sega and Nintendo at the time.

A poorly thought out, or plain lazy, ad for the SNES that's ten years too late and would have been a failure regardless.

[16bitter]

A recent article in Hardcore Gamer stated that Genesis ended up selling more.

You still read Hardcore Gamer? That magazine, to put it indelicately, sucks. Major league, hardcore, poorly trimmed (is that a forest down there? Cuz I don't see no redwood), smelly schlong.

Terrible. And laughable. But the joke's truly on whoever shells out cash for the rag.

In fact this article is still better than anything I've read in HG.

If Hardcore Gamer is supposed to be the GF of today, that's only more evidence of how steep a fall the print media for this art/hobby has taken in the new millenium.

[Elusive]

It definitely surpassed the Genesis... in unattractive blocky transition effects!

WHOAAAA DON'T GO THERE PAL *audience hoots, scattered applause*

The article is trash; an ill-disguised love letter to the Super NES.


Interminable months later -- November 1990 -- the Super Famicom hit stores in Japan with the same incredible commotion seen at the launch of the original Famicom (with the added drama of the yakuza interfering)

No, Nintendo were paranoid about Yakuza interference, so shipped every single one of their Japanese machines during the night in unmarked vans. Hence, supplies were incredibly limited at launch, comparable to the XBOX 360 of today. The same would be repeated with the N64.

Just sayin' is all.

The message board link is even funnier:


I was only allowed a Sega Genesis because my parents hated me too much to buy me an SNES


Sonic the Hedgehog, was fun, except when those rings fell out.


...seriously, 'Purple Reign'?

[108 Stars]

Oh no, I hoped never to hear this kind of discussions after both 16-Bitters were discontinued!
It just depends on ones personal preferences which console was better. I´d say they were both great machines for their time and both had pros and cons.

Back in the 90´s I chose the Mega Drive, and I have never regretted it.
Still I don´t hesistate to tell you that I bought a SNES last year as well. Such a silly debate leads nowhere, let them write all the bullshit they want!:horse:

[Sega Saturn x]

You still read Hardcore Gamer? That magazine, to put it indelicately, sucks.
Game mags suck, always have always will much like the snes ;).

[XMARLTONX]

I never owned a Super Nintendo. I had an original nintendo when if first came out, but didnt really like Mario at all. I mostly played duck hunt & pitfall.

When Genesis came out and I saw Sonic, I knew that would be a system I would own for a long time.

[GeckoYamori]

So 90% of the gaming journalist community is incredibly biased towards the SNES. What else is new?

The problem is how many of the Mega Drive's top-tier titles were underdog sleeper hits. They took some actual effort and individual thinking to find, rather than having Nintendo Power tell you what to buy and like.

[Joe Redifer]

We had Sega Visions to tell us what to buy and like, but we didn't listen because they told us to buy games like X-Men and Eternal Champions.

[GeckoYamori]

And Vectorman. If they were still around by then.

[CRV]

We had Sega Visions to tell us what to buy and like, but we didn't listen because they told us to buy games like X-Men and Eternal Champions.

Sega Visions wasn't anywhere near as popular as Nintendo Power.


I have heard some conflicting reports, but it's my understanding that SNES eventually was outselling Genesis, but ultimately, Genesis sold more total units.

I thought the Genesis initially outsold the Super NES, but by the time DKC (overrated) and whatnot came out and Sega was basically giving up on the Genesis anyway, the Super NES had finally surpassed it.

Anyway, this article was basically a circle jerk for the Super NES.

[Drixxel]

If only Sega could have successfully pulled off Sega Visions and provided the extensive monthly exposure that the Genesis library needed. Many write off Nintendo Power as nothing more than a proganda machine, but that magazine did an excellent job of making your average SNES gamer aware of all sorts of obscure titles. If only more people knew about Genesis games like Ristar and Gunstar Heroes, articles like this wouldn't be so prevalent.

[j_factor]

I thought the Genesis initially outsold the Super NES, but by the time DKC (overrated) and whatnot came out and Sega was basically giving up on the Genesis anyway, the Super NES had finally surpassed it.

I thought that SNES surpassed it in sales at that time, but in the end, Genesis sold more systems total. But I guess I could be wrong?

The only time I saw an article actually state how many units each sold overall, it was rounded off to the nearest million, and they both had the same amount.


Anyway, this article was basically a circle jerk for the Super NES.

Which would've been tolerable if it was a good circle jerk. I think it's fine to devote an article to how great a particular system was, but this article had absolutely no meat in it.

[Vyse of Arcadia]

Huh, when I read "surpassed," I was thinking in terms of specs and technical details. The SNES had hardware accelerated scaling and rotation, and could display many more colors at a time. I'm also pretty sure it had better resolution. And although playing samples takes less oomph than synthesis, I thought the SNES's sampled music sounded better than the funky tunes grinded out by the Genesis.

From a purely hardware standpoint, I'd have to say that the vanilla(that is, without any enhancements, addons, or special cartridge-mounted chips) SNES/Super Famicom did indeed surpass the vanilla Genesis/Mega Drive.

I myself owned a Genesis, and didn't get an SNES until well after the N64 had come out. As for which had better games, they all had strong games of every genre. I won't even try to decide which one had a better library.

[Joe Redifer]

The SNES had hardware accelerated scaling and rotation, and could display many more colors at a time. I'm also pretty sure it had better resolution.
The TurboGrafx-16/PC Engine could display more colors on screen simultaneously than the SNES, and the majority of SNES games ran at a wimpy 256x224 which is the same as the Genesis' low-resolution mode.

[16bitter]

The TurboGrafx-16/PC Engine could display more colors on screen simultaneously than the SNES,

But it had so few colors to choose from that this was little to no advantage at all, and usually was a weakness relatively.

The SNES had a palette of 32,000 colors. The Turbo? 512. Same number as it could display, yet the SNES was far more flexible -- and, yes, colorful -- because of the choices allowed in whatever range of 256 used in a given game.

[108 Stars]

I'm also pretty sure it had better resolution.

I think the Mega Drive had a slightly better resolution...


From a purely hardware standpoint, I'd have to say that the vanilla(that is, without any enhancements, addons, or special cartridge-mounted chips) SNES/Super Famicom did indeed surpass the vanilla Genesis/Mega Drive.

It did when it came to eye-candy and sound, but you mustn´t forget the CPU.
Even one of Factor 5´s members (programmers of Super Turrican / Mega Turrican), someone who really knows both hardwares inside out, said that the SNES´ CPU is a piece of junk. This is important to allow fast game speed and lot´s of action on screen.

[Joe Redifer]

Indeed. The Genesis rarely ever had any special chips, but the SNES had them in the majority of their games that featured Mode 7. Even Pilotwings and F-Zero had them because they knew even in the beginning that the system was crippled. There probably aren't a whole lot of "plain vanilla" SNES games, whereas 99.7% of Genesis games are "plain vanilla".

[j_factor]

In order to make a good "mode 7" game like F-Zero, a coprocessor was absolutely required. Look at Outlander for example -- the driving segments play better on Genesis.

I wouldn't say that SNES surpassed Genesis in hardware overall. It had more colors and more memory. I don't think that trumps the processor difference -- it's basically a faster Amiga versus a slower Apple IIgs.

The CEO of Treasure (who programmed for both SNES and Genesis back in the day) said in an interview, "I think the Mega Drive was easy to make action games for, when compared to other hardware. The CPU is an MC68000. It's good at multiplication which played a big role in those multi-jointed bosses. Perhaps it's because we looked at Mega Drive development after Super Famicom, but in terms of processing, we felt it was superior."

[Joe Redifer]

It had more colors and more memory.
Actually if I remember correctly, the amount of RAM in both machines is the same (64k). In terms of ROM memory, SNES wins with being the biggest game, whereas the Genesis' biggest was 40megs. The biggest US SNES game was only 32megs.

[Psy]

Actually if I remember correctly, the amount of RAM in both machines is the same (64k). In terms of ROM memory, SNES wins with being the biggest game, whereas the Genesis' biggest was 40megs. The biggest US SNES game was only 32megs.
Yhea the SNES had a better chipset but even still the chipset couldn't make up for the weak processor.

[Zebbe]

In terms of ROM memory, SNES wins with being the biggest game, whereas the Genesis' biggest was 40megs. The biggest US SNES game was only 32megs.

I've always wondered why the SNES version of Super Street Fighter 2 was 32 meg while the Genesis one was 40 meg. The only difference I know is that the Genesis version has 5 speeds, 1 more than the other version. Also the graphics are better on the SNES version. But where are those 8 meg?

[Joe Redifer]

Didn't the Genesis have the arcade intro whereas the SNES version had a pissy version of it? The extra 8 meg, of course, went to the awesome voices which sound better than real life.

[Zebbe]

In both versions, Ryu walks in the thundering night, doing his hadouken. A little different, but the voices are nearly identical, aren't they?

[108 Stars]

I once read that the intro was 4 MBit alone. Why is it 8 Megs more than the superior SNES-version? I guess for marketing reasons only. That the Sega version has got 8 MBit memory more built into the cartridge doesn´t neccessarily mean there is really data stored in there.
Or maybe Capcom had better compression-techniques for SNES...

[GeckoYamori]

Might be some more subtle things, like more animation frames. And the Sega version had more voice samples.

[j_factor]

Actually if I remember correctly, the amount of RAM in both machines is the same (64k).

Genesis has 64k of main RAM, 64k of video RAM, and 8k of sound RAM. SNES has 128k of main RAM, 64k of video RAM, and 64k of sound RAM. According to some people, the difference in main RAM is what accounts for the superiority (in graphics) of some SNES fighters. Which would make sense, if you consider how much of a difference the RAM expansions made for Saturn fighters.

However, I've been told a 65816 processor (which is what SNES has) can normally only access 64k of memory at a time. SNES has a DMA unit added to the main processor, but I don't know exactly how well, or how, it works.

Further, one of the advantages of a 68000 is that it does more work per instruction, so it'll use less RAM for the same thing. So it's not an apples-to-apples comparison.

[16bitter]

Indeed. The Genesis rarely ever had any special chips, but the SNES had them in the majority of their games that featured Mode 7. Even Pilotwings and F-Zero had them because they knew even in the beginning that the system was crippled.

How was it "crippled" when the competition didn't have the stated feature to begin with? For the system to garner that label, one would think that its rival would have a leg up in the given area rather than being devoid of the lambasted feature altogether.

The Genesis wasn't going to have chipped carts to assist in Mode 7 because it had no such ability to begin with, and thus couldn't ever be assisted through software in providing a feature that wasn't present in the hardware. Rather interesting that this can be seen as a bragging point then.

[16bitter]

I once read that the intro was 4 MBit alone. Why is it 8 Megs more than the superior SNES-version? I guess for marketing reasons only. That the Sega version has got 8 MBit memory more built into the cartridge doesn´t neccessarily mean there is really data stored in there.

There's no way at 1994 cart prices that Capcom would buy up extra chips as a marketing ploy. If it was so easy and cheap to buy up high meg carts, then we would have seen a huge glut of them on the market, as well as meg counts that likely would have gone well beyond 32 or 40.

That was the underlying problem for that generation: chip costs. The SNES died a somewhat early death (Sega killed Genesis themselves) due to this.


Or maybe Capcom had better compression-techniques for SNES...

This particular game may have been more taxing on the hardware from the Sega side, especially considering sound requirements. One can see possibly similar yet more cost effective parallel/alternative with the SNES and Genesis versions of MKII; the Genesis version has the same meg count as the SNES, but sounds (and looks) pathetic next to its 24 meg cousin. Though the fact that the superior Sculptured Software did the SNES port, while the Genesis was stuck with hubris ridden hacks at Probe, surely clouds this comparative point.

Directly, Super is almost uniformly worse on Genesis presentationally, aside from a few more voice samples (of typically inferior quality, to put it mildly), which is somewhat surprising considering how well SCE turned out when compared to Turbo -- and that was only a 4 meg difference. Which may speak to how much of a rush job Turbo was -- backgrounds that were color swapped instead of upgraded, stage SFX that was directly translated from the first cart (i.e. Dhalsim's level), so on -- instead of any type of triumph for the longer-deved SCE.

One thing Genesis games do tend to have over SNES games is animation, however (Konami's Sunset Riders ports come to mind). Sadly Capcom did not add a thing in this department to the Genesis versions of SFII. But who knows if it was even possible, especially considering evidence through chip usage of an already burdened platform.

[Fonzie]

I think each hardware is designed to have its own game... Snes more for rpg's and genny more for action and arcade.
The Snes cpu is crap, and even have to use special chips to deal with its own hardware. On sound and gfx side, the hardware is superior but harder to use.
The genesis have a stunning cpu and simple sound/display, in the run to the color/perfect picture, snes wins.
In the run to the good gameplay and game complexity, genesis wins.

And who said the genesis doesn't have the mode7? Sega just never released the documentation to use it (seems :P i couldn't resist to talk about that ?).
http://www.genny4ever.net/system_ext/downloadwork.php?file=mode7

[Joe Redifer]

16bitter, I know you are a SNES fanboy (that is obvious), but the CPU was indeed crippled. And what I mean by "crippled" is that the SNES needed extra chips to do it's own functions well. That's like the Genesis needing a special chip to have Sonic scroll so fast. Wouldn't that have been truly pathetic? The SNES had "Mode 7" (which is a proprietary term, not an actual function since no other system or computer in the world has a "Mode 7"), but in order to do Mode 7 properly it needed a special chip, like I've said twice before now. I'll say it again... in order to do what was supposedly built in, it needed help from an extra chip on the cartridge. That chip was like a crutch, since the machine was crippled. You want me to compare apples to apples. I am comparing CPUs to CPUs. The SNES needed extra help, because its main CPU was one of the most pathetic things ever created on the planet.

They would have been better off having an 8-bit CPU like the PC Engine running just as fast or faster supported by the same SNES graphics and sound chipsets. Lower cost system, faster system, better system. No, they needed to call it "16-bit" and couldn't get away with that.

[Fonzie]

Snes cpu is 8bit, not 16bit btw... All operations are 8bit inside this shit (few ones are 16). 68K have most operations in 32bit...

[j_factor]

That's a neat little demo. How does that work?

[j_factor]

Snes cpu is 8bit, not 16bit btw... All operations are 8bit inside this shit (few ones are 16). 68K have most operations in 32bit...

SNES uses a 65816, the same as an Apple IIgs. It works as either 8-bit or 16-bit.

The reason SNES uses that crippled processor is because it was designed to be backwards-compatible with NES. Instead of going the Sega route of making the old hardware part of the new hardware, they went the Apple route of using new hardware that could run in backwards-compatible mode. This comes at the cost of performance, which is why Apple IIgs was never able to hold its own against IBM, Amiga, Atari ST, and Apple's own Macintosh.

Nintendo removed backwards-compatiblity from the SNES at the last minute. Doing so reduced the cost of the unit significantly (someone at Nintendo said that keeping backwards-compatibility would've made the SNES $40 more expensive at retail than it was). That cost difference is from the necessary cartridge connectors and stuff like that. They didn't have time to redesign the hardware, so they didn't. But basically, they removed the main benefit to their hardware design. Having been 2 years later than the G/MD, they could've used the same 68k processor (which was still very current, better than the 65816, and a little cheaper than 2 years prior), and still had the same advantages in color and memory, for the same price.

[16bitter]

16bitter, I know you are a SNES fanboy (that is obvious),

Actually, you have the fanboy part backwards.

I defend the SNES when it is attacked by Genesis fanboy bullshit. Which is why we disagree so often, I'd hazard.


but the CPU was indeed crippled.

I'm not denying that the CPU was crippled, but what I was questioning is why this would be used as an example when talking about a hardware feature that the competition was completely lacking.

Only a particularly special fanboy (zealot) could look at the SNES's scaling abilities over the Genesis, and find a way to see the Genesis as the winner within that comparison. Great job.

I have no problem with complaints about the SNES's CPU, but in relation to hardware scaling, of all things, it makes little to no sense considering the system's epoch and relative competition. This has just been a thinly-veiled excuse to find a roundabout way to present the Genesis as superior even in areas where it zero ability; rather like complimenting the NES on its lack of polygon tearing compared to the Playstation.


And what I mean by "crippled" is that the SNES needed extra chips to do it's own functions well. That's like the Genesis needing a special chip to have Sonic scroll so fast. Wouldn't that have been truly pathetic?

That's a truly bizarre apples to oranges comparison.


The SNES had "Mode 7" (which is a proprietary term, not an actual function since no other system or computer in the world has a "Mode 7"),

It's both, actually. Unlike, say, blast processing (though, I'm sure that struck more of a chord with you, no matter how vacuous it was) -- which existed on no level -- Mode 7 was indeed a hardware feature that allowed the SNES to scale objects. Something the Genesis was incapabale of.

Still confused?


but in order to do Mode 7 properly it needed a special chip, like I've said twice before now. I'll say it again... in order to do what was supposedly built in,

And something the Genesis couldn't do to begin with.


it needed help from an extra chip on the cartridge. That chip was like a crutch, since the machine was crippled.

And how crippled was the competition, then, when considering it couldn't even do that much? That's the problem with your argument -- as in, it is baseless due to its central lack of logic. Emotion clouding thought.


You want me to compare apples to apples. I am comparing CPUs to CPUs.

Of course. Because that's the one area that the Genesis was outwardly superior as far as pure hardware.

Therefore it's the hub and overriding point of any and every discussion involving the SNES and Genesis -- i.e. the clock speed trumps all. As we've seen in this hilarious example.

God forbid you look at the issue as it is -- simply put, the SNES beating the crap out of the Genesis on scaling by virtua of having the feature at all. That might mean that you'd have to admit that the Genesis had plenty of flaws of its own.


The SNES needed extra help, because its main CPU was one of the most pathetic things ever created on the planet.

Speaking of pathetic, it's too bad there wasn't a chip that could help the Genesis not sound like shit so much of the time, huh? Likewise, 64 colors in 1989 was rather crippled itself. The Genesis had its own flaws out of the gate, that would later haunt it more and more.

Not that this means that I'm saying the SNES was the better system (if that were the case, I'd believe that the SMS was better than NES). That's defined by software. On that, the two systems were about equal.

At the same time, I will not cloud myself to the inferiority of the Genesis in specific areas. Such as built-in hardware scaling.

But this has been fun. I created this thread just to see you come up with dead-serious (and unintentionally hilarious) attacks on the SNES that spring from your complex over the Genesis (how often did you have to wipe the system down, anyway? Maybe I should have phrased that in the present tense). Mission accomplished. :D

[Joe Redifer]

Using a 68000 or a 68010 would have been GREAT! I think they should have planned this from the beginning. Either that or a TurboGrafx-style 8-bit processor like I said earlier. They should have not even considered backwards compatibility. They could have made a Super GameBoy-like device to play NES games (still not sure why they never did) that had an NES CPU, graphics chip and sound chip. They could have sold a ton of those. Imagine playing NES games in s-video or RGB. Oh man!

[Joe Redifer]

But this has been fun. I created this thread just to see you come up with dead-serious (and unintentionally hilarious) attacks on the SNES that spring from your complex over the Genesis (how often did you have to wipe the system down, anyway? Maybe I should have phrased that in the present tense). Mission accomplished.
So you're admitting you're a troll, looking for a flamewar?

And I don't see where I ever say that the Genesis can do scaling better than the SNES or saying that the Genesis is better because the SNES had to rely on external assistance to run many games. I'm just pointing out that the SNES CPU is crippled. THAT'S ALL! Basically what I'm saying is that the SNES could have been designed much better, but they screwed it up. And I pointed out how it could have been much better in my post above. Same goes with the Genesis, and I've even stated that on TurboGrafx forums about how displeased I am with its colors and the removal of the scaling functionality it originally had.

[16bitter]

So you're admitting you're a troll, looking for a flamewar?

I don't see how being amused with your ineptitude on the subject -- or rather only finding your posts entertaining -- makes me a troll. Nobody forced you to come up with this garbage -- you did that all by yourself.

The only "help" from me came in the form of providing you an outlet. I never controlled your actions, I merely gave you opportunity, coming in the form of a rather harmless tribute to one of the great systems.

So, arguably, you're more deserving the troll moniker than I, since you're the provider of flamebait material. And if you think merely mentioning the SNES is flamebait, then that does a striking job of underlining your zealotry on the subject; which is still a circular win for my side.

Unless there's a disclaimer on here about not upsetting the inmates with mention of that "other" 16-bit console, I don't see how I've done anything wrong. Or am I not supposed to get enjoyment out of this board or contradict statements that I find untenable? That seems to be your point when calling me a troll, and it's as empty as your earlier attack on the subject of this thread.


And I don't see where I ever say that the Genesis can do scaling better than the SNES

What you did was make the feature out to be irrelevent or sad for the SNES, meanwhile bragging about the Genesis' lack of souped up carts as a triumph over the issue of the built-in hardware features of the SNES.

The SNES has that fancy Mode 7? Bah, it needed added chips to fully pull the feature off! What a piece of crap. The Genesis didn't need such a crutch (let's just forget that it couldn't scale anything at all, and thus such chips would never have any use even if implemented).

In the end the point was quite decipherable: clock>>>>scaling and whatever else the SNES could do better. Genesis>>>>>>>>>SNES! Yeah! Smackdown!


or saying that the Genesis is better because the SNES had to rely on external assistance to run many games.

Really? So you don't even read through your own posts? Huh.

An example:

Originally Posted by Joe Redifer
Indeed. The Genesis rarely ever had any special chips, but the SNES had them in the majority of their games that featured Mode 7. Even Pilotwings and F-Zero had them because they knew even in the beginning that the system was crippled.

Is the above not a comparison of the two in which you sing the praises of the Genesis and bash the SNES? If it was only about the SNES and its abilities (and, logically, if the system had indeed existed in a vacuum on the market, it couldn't be considered crippled to begin with as it would be the alpha and omega of 16-bit consoles and thus their standards), then why bring up the Genesis and its superiority on the matter?

Further, and most incisively relevant to how we got to this point, how do you come up with the SNES as a crippled piece of hardware relative to the Genesis -- or Turbo -- when talking about hardware scaling? This is an unquestionable win for the SNES because it's the only system with that ability, yet you still find a way to attack it.

To find a flaw in the SNES is one thing, but to make a triumph into some sort failing, while doing the inverse in relation to the Genesis, only shows how biased you are against the former and in favor of the latter.

Which was and is my point. Everything is subservient to clock speed because that's convenient in your Genesis worship rituals.


I'm just pointing out that the SNES CPU is crippled. THAT'S ALL!

You called the system itself crippled. Because, after all, nothing can make up for a slow CPU.

Doing it in relation to hardware scaling -- and by implication, in relation to the competition at the time (which is always an issue, if not THE issue when considering these matters) -- is where the problem comes in. If the SNES is crippled here, then the Genesis is a multiple amputee.


Basically what I'm saying is that the SNES could have been designed much better, but they screwed it up. And I pointed out how it could have been much better in my post above.

It could have had a better CPU. Yeah. That does not mean it was crippled compared to the competition of the time overall, as you were outright stating.

Looks like this thread went perfectly. Entertainment provided, and backpedaling complete.

My work is done.


Same goes with the Genesis,

Funny, then, how you cannot bring yourself to point out the Sega unit's failings nearly as readily or consistently as you can and do on the Nintendo side. Truthfully, Genesis criticism on here appears to be null and void from you.

What you do with the Genesis, particularly in discussions involving the SNES, is find a way to make its flaws into virtues.

It doesn't have hardware scaling? Well, the SNES needed special chips to fully pull that off! The Genesis never did, or at least didn't 99.9% of the time (let's forget that it couldn't scale a thing to begin with, kay?)!

The Genesis has an inferior sound chip? No way! It's more meaty and "real", is all. The SNES has tinny sound, man. And the XBox and PS2 don't even count, cuz video game music and sound effects are supposed to sound ancient and limited! The Genesis was the zenith of this movement!!!



Ad infinitum. Fanboyism at its finest.

[ThunderForce]

It's both, actually. Unlike, say, blast processing (though, I'm sure that struck more of a chord with you, no matter how vacuous it was) -- which existed on no level -- Mode 7 was indeed a hardware feature that allowed the SNES to scale objects. Something the Genesis was incapabale of.

Not 100% true.

With great programming tricks, you're able to pull off similar Mode 7 effects. Look at some of the Treasure Games (Gunstar Heroes is a great example of this), and two of the Konami games (Castlevania: Bloodlines and Contra: Hard Crops). If you know the hardware, then you're able to pull of great effects on a system that doesn't support Mode 7 at all.

As most of us know, the Genesis was only able to show 64 colors on screen at once. Ranger X was able to get it more than 64 colors on screen (I believe it was proven Ranger X went over the 64 mark without the black and white trick).

Did you ever play Red Zone? The game had a lot of effects that the Genesis didn't even supported at all! With good programming you're able to pull great tricks on the Genesis. Oh yeah, I love the part that Red Zone didn't use any additional hardware on the cartridge (didn't need any help with the effects). Just watch the intro and see it for yourself.

All of these games can do just about the same effects as the SNES, and all of these games didn't use any additional hardware (SNES as we know require additional chips in order to do the job).

I'm supporting Joe Redifer and his comments BTW.

[16bitter]

I'm supporting Joe Redifer and his comments BTW.

Then to be coherent, you shouldn't really appreciate software-scaling, since Redifer was bitching out the SNES for software tricks on features it actually supported in hardware. We can't have software supplemented features -- that=teh cripple!!!!! :p

On point as far as quality and fidelity, the Genesis couldn't really be said to be capable of scaling -- what happened was that clever devs faked the feature, sometimes quite decently. Technically the system never truly scaled a thing, however. The SNES clearly had it bloodied and beaten here.

Anyway, it's great to know who you support, though. Every board needs cheerleaders. Almost as much as school lockers need nerds in them. :D


All of these games can do just about the same effects as the SNES, and all of these games didn't use any additional hardware (SNES as we know require additional chips in order to do the job).

Yes, built in hardware scaling -- helped by chips in some or many cases -- can't compete with what the Genesis was rockin' out through software tricks! Genesis>>>>SNES on Mode 7!!!!

Yeah. Sure.

[ThunderForce]

\Yes, built in hardware scaling -- helped by chips in some or many cases -- can't compete with what the Genesis was rockin' out through software tricks! Genesis>>>>SNES on Mode 7!!!!

Yeah. Sure.


Yeah but the deal is that the Genesis didn't support Mode 7 and developers were able to do similar effects on the Genesis for a hardware that doesn't support Mode 7 at all. You know how hard it is to do something that the hardware doesn't support? While Mode 7 is nice and all, it doesn't make a game.

[Ash]

Later games like Vectorman 1 & 2, Contra Hardcorps, RedZone & even Mickey Mania proved the Genesis was able to pull off some special effects, but it took some programmer skill and dedication to do it. And for every one Treasure, there were 5 or 6 Acclaims just shovelling crappy ports and "vanilla" titles out there, because they're lazy developers. And since the SNES had the tricks built in, it required little work to get the fancy stuff going. Unoptimization of lazy developers was tolerated by SEGA and it's SEGA's quality control that should've watched over their developers a little more closely and put higher standards in place to closer match their competition.

All this stuff has been beaten to death a thousand times over, in the early games, it wasn't a matter of hardware... it was about skill not being used, and SEGA's own QA allowed it to happen. There was no reason why when the SNES was launched, after SEGA having a 2-year lead couldn't have matched the SNES's early hardware techniques in software. And later, when it became a matter of hardware, they failed to make a line of portable and robust descrete enhancement chips to address their weaknesses, much like what Nintendo had available to address their problems.

SEGA's management dropped the ball a long time ago, is it no wonder why they're not in the hardware business anymore?

[Joe Redifer]

Jesus Christ! :bull: I'm not even gonna waste my time reading all of that. I did read some of it. Perhaps I could have worded myself more gooder, but my point was that the Genesis rarely used special chips, just about everything it did it did with existing hardware (now I assume you'll take me to task for that because I said "everything" and did not include Virtua Racing). The SNES relied on special chips often. It doesn't matter if it was to do something the Genesis could never do, my point is that the SNES apparently needed those special chips.

Am I a Sega fanboy? Hell yeah! I have never denied that and I identify myself as such on many other forums. Sega-16 is a great place for Sega fanboys. And the definition of a "troll" is one who posts stuff to start arguments, flames, disruption or the like for their own personal amusement. You have admitted to that. I must be striking some chord within you, 16bitter, or else you wouldn't take so much time to respond soley to me and do your best to insult me. Whereas my attack may be on the SNES CPU, yours is clearly on me.

[Melf]

There was no reason why when the SNES was launched, after SEGA having a 2-year lead couldn't have matched the SNES's early hardware techniques in software. And later, when it became a matter of hardware, they failed to make a line of portable and robust descrete enhancement chips to address their weaknesses, much like what Nintendo had available to address their problems.

They had a good reason not to rely on programming tricks: the Genesis library was about 4 times as large as the SNES', and more and more publishers were flocking to it. Sega managed to trump Nintendo's better hardware with just tons and tons of games. Sega ignored enhancement chips like the SVP because they felt the future was in multimedia, the buzzword of the early '90s. That's what the Sega CD was all about.

Even so, the best hardware doesn't guarantee the winner, as seen in just about every hardware generation. It's all about quantity and quality of games available.

[j_factor]

Sprite scaling through software works just fine. Ever played Jaguar XJ220? On Sega CD it uses the system's hardware scaling, but on Amiga there is no such hardware feature, and it's just as good. On Genesis, only the first crop of games really had bad scaling. Later games, even those on both Genesis and SNES, did well on Genesis. Outlander is actually smoother on Genesis than SNES.

I would say playfield rotation was a bigger issue, as that was rare to see on Genesis. Even then, Red Zone had it, and Fonzie's demo displayed it, albeit a bit primitively.


64 colors in 1989 was rather crippled itself.

I don't know where you're getting that from. In 1989, 64 simultaneous colors wasn't bad at all. The better computers, such as the Atari ST, Macintosh, etc., only had 32 simultaneous colors (older tech computers that were still around generally had 16). Even Amiga ran with 32 simultaneous colors, and could only display more with HAM, which you can't gratuitously use in games (except adventure games). 64 simultaneous colors seemed more than acceptable in 1989, only being exceeded by Turbografx.

[Joe Redifer]

I agree with you j_factor, but I would have liked to have seen at least PC Engine color-capabilities on the Genesis. As someone said over on the TurboGrafx forums, it must have been a bit enbarrassing for Sega to have only 61 colors available simulataneously when the PC Engine could do 486 or some number like that. The Genesis was to be more powerful than it ended up being, but of course features were pulled. From what I have read it was supposed to have a scaling function (no rotation) and 280,000 colors (not sure how many simultaneously). Basically it was a System 16. Obviously that didn't happen.

To this day I always think that the Neo Geo is what the Genesis should have been (spec-wise) in the first place, only without cartridges the size of Rhode Island, more durable hardware (the Neo Geo isn't very robust), and maybe half the colors and sprites to help cost come down a bit. I know I'm dreaming. The Neo Geo cost so much mainly because it was marketed as an "arcade system".

[j_factor]

Yeah, more colors would've been nice, but it's not a big deal IMO. Most of the time, 2D games don't need a huge number of simultaneous colors, unless they use a lot of gradients, or digitized images, or light sourcing effects or something.

[Joe Redifer]

I thought the Neo Geo had much less RAM than that. I thought it was something like 64KB for the 68000, 2KB for the Z80 and the Video RAM only 4kb more than the 64K that the Genesis and SNES had.

[Zebbe]

Why bother having fancy "Mode 7" if you can't use it properly without additional hardware? Then they might as well build the Mode 7 into the co-processors the games used. It's like saying you have the most beautiful girl in world - if she's given two hours in front of the mirror putting on make up etc.

[Genesisdoes]

Article aside, I liked the feature at the end about games that never made it to the US. I'd only heard about 2 of those or so.

[Fonzie]

That's a neat little demo. How does that work?

Well, its not optimised and coded very rushy... Its just because sega genesis has enought blast processing to do a mode7 in software... Top of that , it requires to convert the bitmap to tiles so it could have been even faster with a simple framebuffer...

I wonder why sega did not made a demo like that to rox a bit :D ;)
If u liked it, i'm happy :D

[16bitter]

Jesus Christ! :bull: I'm not even gonna waste my time reading all of that.

Nor reply to it directly.

How convenient.

Which begs the question of why you'd reply at all. Certainly not to progress the discussion/topic or delve into the specifics therein.


It doesn't matter if it was to do something the Genesis could never do,

It certainly does when you're acting as if you it wasn't up to the competition -- the same competition that was lacking specificly in certain areas next to the hardware you're knocking.


my point is that the SNES apparently needed those special chips.

Your point was that the SNES was crippled. Which is ridiculous.


Am I a Sega fanboy? Hell yeah! I have never denied that and I identify myself as such on many other forums. Sega-16 is a great place for Sega fanboys.

And thus you've summed up why you have such a problem with reasonable discussions about Sega and their hardware. This is why people like you rant about the subjectivity of the Genesis sound hardware versus that of the SNES, or try and make the Saturn out to be some martyred system that was never given a fair chance.

It's personal for you.

Further, by admitting this, you conncede exactly how biased your outlook is by your very own standard as, after all, your initial reply to me was to throw out the fanboy label to discredit my points -- now you admit that you're the one with that problem. Brilliant.


And the definition of a "troll" is one who posts stuff to start arguments,


Yes, I know how much you hate anybody who disagrees with you -- especially when you end up losing the given argument. What that has to do with trolling, outside your own suspect reasoning, I have no idea.

Arguments are the very basis of message boards. If you truly believe the above, then I'd suggest your real problem, over-arcing, is not with me but your own self-aggrandizing outlook clashing with the nature of this format.


flames,

And yet you're the one who started flaming me, after an initially impersonal response to one of your points from my side. So who's the troll again?


disruption or the like for their own personal amusement.

You have caused at least as much disruption on this thread as I have. Simple cause and effect, both through your hyperbole and your reactiosn to any challenge to that same ridiclousness, proves that. As in, the posts.


You have admitted to that.

I have admitted to finding your posts amusing.

As well, overly serious and emotionally foolish statements many times cause me to react and contradict.

That's not automatically trollish.

Nor is posting a simple article about the SNES hardware. Though the fact that you consider it, through your continued accusations on the subject, trollish to post such an article says a lot about you.

Starting a personal flamewar, as you have done with me, however, is trollish.

Your reactions don't define me, but they do define you. And you're obviously an overzealous fanboy (as you have admitted) who can't stand anybody pointing out the flaws in your logic. That's been the problem here, since you want to make this personal.

You also seem to lack basic understanding of what message boards are for. They certainly aren't for sheep-like agreement, otherwise what would be the point of the forum in the first place?


I must be striking some chord within you, 16bitter, or else you wouldn't take so much time

I have openly stated throughout this thread that I find your emotional fanboy outbursts amusing. Maybe you should pay more attention.

But "much time"? Which one of us has 1,500+ posts on here?

Yet more hilarity. :rofl:

But more seriously, it's quite obvious that your statements struck a chord as I wouldn't have replied to them otherwise -- duh!!! -- which then also means that this can be turned right around on you as a point (double duh!!!).


to respond soley to me and do your best to insult me.

Many times when I disagree with somebody, I reply to them. You are in no way unique in that regard as far as this board and my history on it.

Though I get the distinct feeling that you have the need to feel special in some way. Looking for that feelinfg on an internet message board is telling and thus makes for a pretty good laugh.

As far as insulting you, you're the one who had the need to call me a fanboy and troll, bringing the issues into this argument to begin with -- i.e. derailing it. And you're the one emotionally invested in the Genesis and SNES war, as your knack for bias and exagerration demonstrates.

I like arguing, which is why I come to this board. Going into detail and ripping apart other people's badly thought out statements, when I take issue with them of course, is a decent distraction when I have the time (obviously not nearly as much as you).

That's all this has been about, so far as my replies to you as far as base reason and structure, and the behaviour is not synonymous with trollishness. Unless you consider the very basis of message boards to be synonymous with that word, whch would again only indict you and be so broad in impact as to undermine your point against me anyway.


Whereas my attack may be on the SNES CPU, yours is clearly on me.

That's funny, as you're the one calling names immediately and directly in reply to me. Seems you're again confused, and in the same way as usual: projecting your own failings and problems onto me.

In the end, the one thing I was interested in was your specious point against the SNES' overall value. You've obviously given up on that -- more or less conceded it a while ago -- and would rather turn this into a flame war, as was rather clear from the start due to your personal statements and overall animus towards me.

In other words, I'm not going to help you derail this thread any further by replying to your trollish posts about how much you dislike me.

But don't feel bad, you did entertain to a certain extent. Not as much as you did on the sound chip thread, but that was a classic that anybody would find difficult to top. :D

[16bitter]

Even so, the best hardware doesn't guarantee the winner, as seen in just about every hardware generation. It's all about quantity and quality of games available.

Exactly. Saying the SNES had superior hardware does not mean that the Genesis came up short as far as overall virtues and worth.

[16bitter]

I don't know where you're getting that from. In 1989, 64 simultaneous colors wasn't bad at all.

It was only twice that of the SMS, and far below the Turbo.


The better computers, such as the Atari ST, Macintosh, etc., only had 32 simultaneous colors (older tech computers that were still around generally had 16).

And computers were relatively worthless for games at the time.


64 simultaneous colors seemed more than acceptable in 1989, only being exceeded by Turbografx.

Its main competition upon release. And a weakness that would be exploited and repeated through the arrival of the SNES.

The two biggest presentation weaknesses of the Genesis during its era were sound and color. And that arguably can be traced to either not upgrading enough from one gen to the next or literally pulling out tech pieces from the SMS and reusing them.

The latter issue is in many ways parallel to the failings of the SNES.

[Joe Redifer]

So who's the troll again?
You are. That's been established already. Deal.

Anyway looking through some other threads randomly last night I came across many other posts you have made in response to others. You are always confrontational in your responses. Well maybe not always. I'd say 98% of the time. Why do you even post here? Anyway I'm glad you enjoy my posts. Sit back and have fun. I'm done dealing with you for now.

[j_factor]

And computers were relatively worthless for games at the time.

Yeah, right. Nobody bought an Atari ST for games. :bull:

[j_factor]

I thought the Neo Geo had much less RAM than that. I thought it was something like 64KB for the 68000, 2KB for the Z80 and the Video RAM only 4kb more than the 64K that the Genesis and SNES had.

I was completely wrong on that. I must've been thinking of something else.

[16bitter]

Yeah, right. Nobody bought an Atari ST for games. :bull:

As I said:

"And computers were relatively worthless for games at the time."

I don't see any absolute wording above. Try again.

But on this specific subject, when was it released? Oh, 1985. Hm, same year as the NES.

:bull: indeed.

Not exactly an alum of the Genesis' era, and thus your insistence on bringing it up yet again only reinforces my point: that, like the SNES' processor, the Genesis' color issues were created through lacking hardware implementation, as is underlined by how much better the situation was on the Genesis' true contemporary, the TurboGrafx16.

But you're right, by 1985 standards 64 colors is mighty impressive. :rofl: :p

[Zebbe]

I think the main point of the Mega Drive was to give the gaming market a new type of games, games were power and speed came before graphics. That's why it had the legendary Motorola 68000 7.67 MHz processor and its name. I don't by the way think the graphics were really that much worse on the Mega Drive than on the SNES. People just look at numbers, but how often did the SNES use 128 sprites at the screen, with 256 colors in the standard resolution that the Mega Drive had? The processor couldn't take that, but the Mega Drive could due to its powerful processor be closer to its maximum number of sprites and colors on screen, in a higher resolution and with 4 planes (the SNES could only have 3 planes).

[Joe Redifer]

That's why I was wondering in another thread which SNES games ran in a higher resolution than 256x224, as I want to play them just out of curiosity. I also asked the same thing on a TurboGrafx forum since that can go up to 512x240 (like the SNES). On the Turbo it turns out only a few still screens in Shadow of the Beast and some still screens in a couple of other games do that. I do love the Turbo.

[108 Stars]

And computers were relatively worthless for games at the time.

I think they were more popular gaming machines than consoles in Europe at that time...

But hey, please stop that stupid war. We´re not children anymore! Argueing about which console was better leads us nowhere since a final decision can´t be made in this case...
I am not a hardware expert, but I think both consoles were about equal. Sega just made two mistakes (colours and sound) that were more obvious at first sight.
Most customers will notice graphics and sound first, while nobody sees a weak CPU like the SNES´ in before playing intensively.
That doesn´t make one better than the other technically. The MD´s flaws are exactly the SNES´strenghts, and the SNES´flaws are strong points of the MD.

Both consoles had to have some weak points, or else nobody could have afforded both machines.
I think we never had two rival consoles that equal again...

[16bitter]

But hey, please stop that stupid war. We´re not children anymore! Argueing about which console was better leads us nowhere since a final decision can´t be made in this case...
I am not a hardware expert, but I think both consoles were about equal. Sega just made two mistakes (colours and sound) that were more obvious at first sight.
Most customers will notice graphics and sound first, while nobody sees a weak CPU like the SNES´ in before playing intensively.
That doesn´t make one better than the other technically. The MD´s flaws are exactly the SNES´strenghts, and the SNES´flaws are strong points of the MD.

Both consoles had to have some weak points, or else nobody could have afforded both machines.
I think we never had two rival consoles that equal again...

Pretty much agreed.

Though some would have you believe that one of those consoles was "crippled", which is where most of the threads contentions (both on-topic and off-topic, since the personal was tied in with silicon and plastic for one side) arose.

In fact what you state is in line with my original point, insofar as my counterargument beginning on page two was dedicated to the overall equality to the two systems during their period of dominance. Neither system could be said to be unable to compete against the other, and thus to call either one "crippled" next to its competition is so hyperbolic as to be divorced from reality in its fervor.

I never was arguing that there was one system that was better than the other in this instance. Nor would I.

As I said on the first page, there never has been a hardware war before or since that was anywhere near the parity shown between these two great systems.

Fanboy biases to one side try and bedim or occlude this, but the passions shown from such limited, confined quarters/viewpoints in many ways have the opposite effect in that the emotion expresssed from that side more logically and clearly suggests something far more contentious to rile such emotions at all; anfractuous statements that do little to subvert the truth in the end, in fact only illuminating that truth further in its own circuitous way through the selfsame need to rewrite the given history.

This thread is a fine microcosm of the above as far as both the SNES/Genesis war and more expansive underlying issues of passion creating bias and thus animosity against the truth.

As far as fanboys and their arguments, you can either choose to simply laugh at them or directly challenge them to defend their already ludicruous statements against common sense and the facts (which has the added bonus of many times creating yet more humor). I do a little bit of both.

[Elusive]

I think they were more popular gaming machines than consoles in Europe at that time...

The Amiga (and previously, the Speccy Sinclair) scene was massive across Europe. That all changed once IBM PCs starting rolling out, though - at that point, you practically became either a PC gamer or a console gamer. Computers were no longer things you plugged into a spare TV set, they had seperate monitors!

I think it's cool that the NES' meteoric success in the States and Japan is almost the direct inverse of what happened across Europe: the Master System thrived! If only the States had gotten SMS fever, maybe some AAA-grade games would have been produced :/

[Joe Redifer]

On an unrelated note, I wish the NES had an RGB output. It makes me sad that it does not. Maybe this is why the SMS succeeded in Europe since they have RGB SCART all over the place. :D

[j_factor]

On an unrelated note, I wish the NES had an RGB output. It makes me sad that it does not. Maybe this is why the SMS succeeded in Europe since they have RGB SCART all over the place. :D

I think Europeans were just in love with the Z80. Everything touched by a Z80 was popular in Europe. If Sega had retained the Z80 in the Saturn design, it would've sold 20 times as many units in Europe.

[Zebbe]

I think the SMS succeeded in Europe because Nintendo couldn't violate laws as easy here and because Sega gave countries that Nintendo ignored a chance.

[108 Stars]

The Amiga (and previously, the Speccy Sinclair) scene was massive across Europe. That all changed once IBM PCs starting rolling out, though - at that point, you practically became either a PC gamer or a console gamer. Computers were no longer things you plugged into a spare TV set, they had seperate monitors!

The Spectrum was huge in GB, but not on the mainland. Kind of a british phenomenon I guess...
You must not forget the Commodore 64. That was the most popular home computer in Germany ´till the Amiga came.

[Joe Redifer]

I think Europeans were just in love with the Z80. Everything touched by a Z80 was popular in Europe. If Sega had retained the Z80 in the Saturn design, it would've sold 20 times as many units in Europe.
That made me laugh. They should of put a Z80 in there just to check the region code or something and it would have sold like hotcakes!

[ary incorparated]

How can anyone know exactly how many units have been sold, I don’t know, al made system are running trough the world so that doesn’t count but im sure that not every story does bookmarks about it and that the bookmarks appear on wikipedia how the hell can any game site or count my genesis i bought today for instance, Ill bet if Game shop twente Enschede sells like 10 genesises in a day wikipedia or other sites don’t know about that or how about the genesises i could have bought on a flee market or just in a store or ebay etc,Maybe today genesis sels better then snes and maybe tomorrow its the other way around. Sales are taste and have nothing to do with hardware, if you’ll have like 75% kids and 25% for instance a baby boom how fair would that be to say snes is better cause it sold better, You cant compare a Mario game to sonic their totally different and sell for their only public i actually think that’s very unfair, but when comparing games of same genre okay, its so damn difficult to really say which one is better like i say is, but in opinion okay, their both equally cause they both selled great and both eat Sony.

[StarMist]

We had Sega Visions to tell us what to buy and like, but we didn't listen because they told us to buy games like X-Men and Eternal Champions.
I really laughed at this despite you're wrong about EC. Holy shit does X Men blow. You'd think for a game based on a comic book that graphics would've been a priority. I swear the NES could run it w/o an unprofitable special chipset.


SNES uses a 65816, the same as an Apple IIgs. It works as either 8-bit or 16-bit.

The reason SNES uses that crippled processor is because it was designed to be backwards-compatible with NES. Instead of going the Sega route of making the old hardware part of the new hardware, they went the Apple route of using new hardware that could run in backwards-compatible mode. This comes at the cost of performance, which is why Apple IIgs was never able to hold its own against IBM, Amiga, Atari ST, and Apple's own Macintosh.

Nintendo removed backwards-compatiblity from the SNES at the last minute. Doing so reduced the cost of the unit significantly (someone at Nintendo said that keeping backwards-compatibility would've made the SNES $40 more expensive at retail than it was). That cost difference is from the necessary cartridge connectors and stuff like that. They didn't have time to redesign the hardware, so they didn't. But basically, they removed the main benefit to their hardware design. Having been 2 years later than the G/MD, they could've used the same 68k processor (which was still very current, better than the 65816, and a little cheaper than 2 years prior), and still had the same advantages in color and memory, for the same price.
This is the saddest thing I've ever heard about the SNES. It's truly depressing. Some trifling $40 difference in launch price killed off NES style gaming? That's the piss in the cut. By the SNES launch the Genny wasn't even pushing NES style gaming anymore, and it all became plodding and puddled due to some stupid cheap connectors and a dumb idea. How weird is it that both 16 bit heavyweights hoxed themselves for the same useless end?

[JDB]

N-N-N-N-N-N-NECRO BUMP!
http://cache.gizmodo.com/assets/images/gizmodo/2008/07/Zombie_Garden.jpg
http://marylandshooter.com/ar15/Funny/ani_belly-bump.gif

[JCU]

This is the saddest thing I've ever heard about the SNES. It's truly depressing. Some trifling $40 difference in launch price killed off NES style gaming? That's the piss in the cut. By the SNES launch the Genny wasn't even pushing NES style gaming anymore, and it all became plodding and puddled due to some stupid cheap connectors and a dumb idea. How weird is it that both 16 bit heavyweights hoxed themselves for the same useless end?

An additional $40.00 would have been significant on a $200.00 system back in 1991.

[evilevoix]

Wow I wasn't aware of the many “helper” chips so many SNES games had. I thought that there was only the SFX chips and their variants. You learn something new every day. I wonder how the MD would fare with additional game hardware in their carts, I mean besides Virtua Racing. As much as I like the SNES, if I play the MD and then go to the SNES, the games feel slow and unresponsive except of course the Mario games which I believe feel the same but the game works at that speed. DK Country feels especially slow to me.

[evilevoix]

WOW 2006!!!! I need to read more. Still learned something new.

[eddiespruce]

I guess now they should change the thread name to "20 years of SNES".

[Black_Tiger]

An additional $40.00 would have been significant on a $200.00 system back in 1991.

That's true, but I think that they should have eaten the cost since they showed up a generation late to the generation and Nintendo's customers had made due with Famicom games for two generations straight.

[Da_Shocker]

I don't think Nintendo has ever sold a console at a loss. Anyways i'n shocked that Nintendo used so many chips in their games. I thought the FX chip was the first chip they had but they were using tons of chips. I don't think the general media even let us on about these other chips Nintendo had. I wish Sega would've done that rather than give us the 32X.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Super_NES_enhancement_chips

[evilevoix]

I don't think Nintendo has ever sold a console at a loss. Anyways i'n shocked that Nintendo used so many chips in their games. I thought the FX chip was the first chip they had but they were using tons of chips. I don't think the general media even let us on about these other chips Nintendo had. I wish Sega would've done that rather than give us the 32X.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Super_NES_enhancement_chips

+1

[agostinhobaroners]

Uh, I don't like enhancement chips that much.
IMO Sega was right about the Sega CD. Otherwise, no Robo Aleste, no Terminator, no Final Fight CD, no SoulStar, no Lunar...

I really don't like the idea of buying a half-assed add-on every time I buy a new game. The 32X was a bad idea/decision IMO (Genesis already had an add-on and people were asking for new platforms, fully 3D capable, IMO some other SVP games would have made the trick a lot better in terms of market), but the Sega CD gave us many games that would never be possible just using enhancement chips on a cartridge.
Also, some of the enhancement chips on the SNES games were just compensating its very slow main processor.

Even Nintendo change this route for N64. The Expansion Pak was a great idea and much better than enhancement chips IMO.

[Da_Shocker]

Most of the Sega Cd games failed to even use it to it's fullest advantage. It had limited ram along with a limited color palette. Nintendo used their chips to mainly address the flaws of that slow CPU that the SNES had.

[cowboyscowboys]

Screw the Sega CD chip my games so I have all the games in one library. The Sega CD did jack **** for Sega and didn't extend the life of the Genesis at all.
I would of happily taken scaled down cart versions of any of the Sega CD games.

[Black_Tiger]

Most of the Sega Cd games failed to even use it to it's fullest advantage. It had limited ram along with a limited color palette. Nintendo used their chips to mainly address the flaws of that slow CPU that the SNES had.

It was still worth it just for the medium. Real time special fx are neat, but the best games were just great games with nice extras that came from being on CD.

[evilevoix]

Sonic CD alone is worth a Sega CD.

[Kamahl]

Screw the Sega CD chip my games so I have all the games in one library. The Sega CD did jack **** for Sega and didn't extend the life of the Genesis at all.
I would of happily taken scaled down cart versions of any of the Sega CD games.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-IkYIniJjw
Can't do this on a standard genesis... well, maybe at 2 FPS, or with a Neo Geo sized cartridge.

[agostinhobaroners]

Screw the Sega CD chip my games so I have all the games in one library. The Sega CD did jack **** for Sega and didn't extend the life of the Genesis at all.
I would of happily taken scaled down cart versions of any of the Sega CD games.
Most of the time, there were Genesis and Sega CD versions of the games, so you still can play your beloved scaled down versions with no problem.

Well, I prefer to have the option to pay and play the full package over scaled down cartridge versions, but maybe it's just me:
SNES's Dracula X or Rondo of Blood?
Genesis's Terminator or Sega CD's Terminator?
SNES's Final Fight or Final Fight CD?
Eternal Champions or Eternal Champions: Challenge from the Dark Side?
Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure with 10 or 13 levels (stereo or mono sfx, average or awesome soundtrack...)?
Ecco The Dolphin or Ecco the Dolphin CD?
Genesis's Shadow Of The Beast 2 or Sega CD's Shadow Of The Beast 2?
Mega Drive's Chiki Chiki Boys or PCE CD's Chiki Chiki Boys?
Genesis/SNES's Fatal Fury 2 or PCE CD's Garou Densetsu 2?

If you ever played any of those pairs you know that the difference is abysmal.
If you didn't, well, that makes sense.



I would happily listen to your thoughts about how to fit in cartridges games like Silpheed, Lunar, SoulStar, Snatcher, Novastorm, Microcosm...
Sometimes the presentation quality, the cutscenes, the CD music... are not optional or extras; just the game itself.

Furthermore, games like Novastorm were ports from other CD based consoles/computers like FM Towns AFAIK and, sometimes, the companies were just searching for a quick way to make some extra money. They would not want to compose a new sample/FM-synth/Wave-based soundtrack or change the content to fit into a cartridge.
The same CD soundtrack could be used in the Sega CD, FM Towns/Marty, CD32, PCE CD, 3DO... Always cutting development costs for cross-platform releases.
Also, to publish a game in cartridge format is more expensive than in CD. To publish using an enhanced cartridge is even more expensive.



Finally, who did say that Sega CD was developed to extend the Genesis life?
By the way, wasn't SoJ themselves that shutdown Genesis and Sega CD in the first place?

[StarMist]

An additional $40.00 would have been significant on a $200.00 system back in 1991.
Everybody always makes this same, wrong point. Let me begin this by saying I understand inflation better than those making this wrong point. Inflation is generally 3x higher than an economic source will tell you because there are always more taxes and other govt extortions being created year by year that aren't factored into what people earn and lose. University education, which is nearly compulsory, has also risen in cost, along with the frequency/ubiquity of random arrests and fines (particularly traffic and otherwise car related---one $200 ticket a year makes a big difference in video game console money; and even if it's only 1 every 3 years that'll hike one's insurance through the roof). So, in short, back in `91 everybody had much more money than any bullshit income/inflation graphic will ever show. Economics are pure propaganda; just think back for yourself how much more flourishing every aspect of the entertainment world was then. Why? Because everybody had more money to spend on it.
$40 back then wouldn't have meant shit. And even were I wrong, which I'm not remotely, Black Tiger's point would be valid too.

@ agostinho = Left your post between you and cc the first go through. However a couple samples must be righted. Eternal Champions MD and CD are quite separate. The music is wholly superior and apt in the former; the latter's is mostly incompetent metal guitar, though even when it fits (the African shaman's stage) it's mediocre. The fatalities are way overboard and so are the combos to the extent of being broken, albeit one must really be striving to break the game in order to so exploit them.
Secondly Pitfall's cartridge audio is well above average. Puggsy has average music. Rather few G/MD games distinguish themselves for sfx.

[zetastrike]

"You must spread some reputation around before giving it to agostinhobaroners again"

[agostinhobaroners]

@ agostinho = Left your post between you and cc the first go through. However a couple samples must be righted. Eternal Champions MD and CD are quite separate. The music is wholly superior and apt in the former; the latter's is mostly incompetent metal guitar, though even when it fits (the African shaman's stage) it's mediocre. The fatalities are way overboard and so are the combos to the extent of being broken, albeit one must really be striving to break the game in order to so exploit them.
Secondly Pitfall's cartridge audio is well above average. Puggsy has average music. Rather few G/MD games distinguish themselves for sfx.
About the EC, well, it's a matter of taste. I have already read some other opinions like yours in this board but I have to say that the majority will give a higher score to the CD game. Not a proof, by any means, but a sign of it is the user score @ Gamefaqs: Genesis version: 6.9 From 97 users (http://www.gamefaqs.com/genesis/366869-eternal-champions) | Sega CD version: 7.5 From 31 users
(http://www.gamefaqs.com/segacd/587945-eternal-champions-challenge-from-the-dark-side).
IMO the cartridge version feels like a beta, the menus are awful and the presentation quality is next to 0. The CD version corrects these aspects and gives you lots of extra content (which would not fit even in a 32Mbit cartridge). I don't love the game, I'm far from it, but I like the extra touches and the soundtrack never pleased me in any version.
However, it would be easy to replace that example with cartridge vs CD Mickey Mania (and some people would still say that the cartridge soundtrack is better, oh well...).


For the Pitfall, only the SNES and Jaguar versions have good soundtrack in the cartridge form IMO. The sfx on the SNES are also good, while in the other versions they are presented in lower quality (SNES>Jaguar>32X==Genesis).
However, in terms of audio, the Sega CD version is far superior to all of them. All samples are high quality and crystal clear; with some extra ones. The soundtrack is much better, light years richer than any cartridge version...
And you also have the whole 13 levels instead of 10 (Pitfall is a short game and those 3 levels add some fun and replay value to it). This might be related to production costs... SNES and Genesis versions use 16Mbit cartridge. To have the 13 levels you'd need a 20-24Mbit one. I bet that the CD production costs were lower than a 16Mbit cartridge and even lower than a 24Mbit like the 32X used.

Finally, the SNES's Pitfall was developed by Redline Games and not by Activision like the Genesis and Sega CD versions.
Yes, they gave a great boost to the graphics and the second level water effects are really neat.
Although, there are some new little glitches in the controls of the SNES version... Some of the hidden/hard to find items are way more difficult to reach or almost unreachable due to the modifications. Sometimes you'll loose 2-3 lives trying to reach some spots that were supposed to be reached in the first try (just a very perfect jump will work in some situations, what is frustrating). The whip is overpowered and there's almost no need to crouch in order to hit spiders and rats...
The 32X and Jaguar versions suffer from bad/buggy/choppy scrolling, what ruins those versions in comparison to the others IMO. The Jaguar also has loading times on par with the Sega CD...:daze:
For all that I said, the Sega CD is the best console version of Pitfall by a mile.

Finally, as you brought Puggsy:
the CD version has extra levels, bosses and a better soundtrack. The new CG custscenes suck pretty bad IMO though... But it also has a save feature, which brings another point to this discussion:
With a add-on like Sega CD (that provided internal RAM for saves) the addition of a save feature is just a matter of a few extra lines of code; OTOH, it would cost some extra money with hardware in the cartridge form (battery or eeprom saves).


The use of enhancement chips provided two major advantages over the add-on "route":
1)It provides a renewed/overpowered image of the console hardware capabilities to the public.
2)It provides a good anti-piracy system.
IMO such advantages are much more interesting from the company's than the gamer's point of view.

The "advantage" of "have all the games in one library" is inconsistent to me since the add-ons are more cost effective in the long run, they usually provided more features and powerful hardware upgrades than enhancement chips on cartridges, resulting in more advanced games; and new/greater variety of genres/styles of games when they introduce a new format (like Sega CD and Turbo/PCE CD units).




"You must spread some reputation around before giving it to agostinhobaroners again"
Thanks.:cool:

[ThunderForce]

I always hated the Sony sound chip for the SNES. People say it sounds amazing but honestly I always though it sounded like crap. To my ears it sounds like a terrible electric organ keep playing the say three keys over again.

[StarMist]

About the EC, well, it's a matter of taste. I have already read some other opinions like yours in this board but I have to say that the majority will give a higher score to the CD game. Not a proof, by any means, but a sign of it is the user score @ Gamefaqs: Genesis version: 6.9 From 97 users (http://www.gamefaqs.com/genesis/366869-eternal-champions) | Sega CD version: 7.5 From 31 users
(http://www.gamefaqs.com/segacd/587945-eternal-champions-challenge-from-the-dark-side). That's from casual gamers and ROMmers; remember I can actually play this game. They look the same by the way, except that the original also has better stage design.


However, it would be easy to replace that example with cartridge vs CD Mickey Mania (and some people would still say that the cartridge soundtrack is better, oh well...).In the CD game Mickey's an earsore, it's like walking about with a crying child in a jerry pack. (This is a kind of backpack for toddlers that the parent wears when he no longer loves his hearing).


Finally, as you brought Puggsy:
the CD version has extra levels
That's not a good thing.



With a add-on like Sega CD (that provided internal RAM for saves) the addition of a save feature is just a matter of a few extra lines of code; OTOH, it would cost some extra money with hardware in the cartridge form (battery or eeprom saves).
What, 12 cents? We're talking dirt cheap batteries. Nothing within a mile of the savings SOA got from skimping out on colour manuals. As I've said before every cartridge game from the NES on should've come with a battery if only for saving scores. There's no excuse not to. Even had it raised every individual game's price by some totally insane profiteering markup like $3 it would've been worth it to every gamer on the planet.


Thanks.:cool:
I see you're wearing your new Sega CD glasses. Do they block FMV?

[cowboyscowboys]

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to StarMist again. Macho Man Randy Savage voice "Oh Yeaaaahhh".

[sheath]

Every time I have bought a CR type battery it has cost anywhere from two to eight dollars.

[agostinhobaroners]

That's from casual gamers and ROMmers; remember I can actually play this game. They look the same by the way, except that the original also has better stage design.

In the CD game Mickey's an earsore, it's like walking about with a crying child in a jerry pack. (This is a kind of backpack for toddlers that the parent wears when he no longer loves his hearing).


That's not a good thing.



What, 12 cents? We're talking dirt cheap batteries. Nothing within a mile of the savings SOA got from skimping out on colour manuals. As I've said before every cartridge game from the NES on should've come with a battery if only for saving scores. There's no excuse not to. Even had it raised every individual game's price by some totally insane profiteering markup like $3 it would've been worth it to every gamer on the planet.


I see you're wearing your new Sega CD glasses. Do they block FMV?
It's easy to quote some parts and answer to them totally out of context...
Or should I thank you for giving me an answer rather then completely running from the discussion?

I could have quoted many posts in this board from several users saying that Eternal Champions: Challenge from the Dark Side is a much better, improved and bla bla bla game compared to the cartridge one, but it would take so much time and this game really does not deserve it.
And, yes, I know that you can actually play the game as I suppose that you are a human being. And, as such, you could also have wondered that I used the example mainly due to the extra content provided by the CD version and nothing else...

I just said that Puggsy had extra levels, I never juiced about it so you could have saved your sarcastic pee for another mutilated part.

If Mickey is an earsore in that game, you might also hate him in the cartoon. So, I see no reason to discuss about it. Usually, people would play the game if they like Mickey, no matter how faggot or earsore he can take to someone else.

I really don't have any charts of 1990's cartridge battery prices in my pocket and I never worked or owned a cartridge manufacture plant to know about the production details...
However, might have existed some reason, stronger than 12 cents, to not put a battery save feature in every single cartridge in those times and, unless you bring some information with sources, I'll take your words as pure speculation or a childhood wish.

Sadly, my Sega CD glasses can't protect people from the FMV dullness, nor they can make you a little more polite. They also can't make brainless people speak for themselves, sorry.;)

[StarMist]

Every time I have bought a CR type battery it has cost anywhere from two to eight dollars.
You're a consumer paying markup for a single item, not a manufacturer buying in worldwide proportion bulk. Plus many such game manufacturers would have intimate ties with battery manufacturers.



I could have quoted many posts in this board from several users saying that Eternal Champions: Challenge from the Dark Side is a much better, improved and bla bla bla game compared to the cartridge one, but it would take so much time and this game really does not deserve it.
And, yes, I know that you can actually play the game as I suppose that you are a human being. And, as such, you could also have wondered that I used the example mainly due to the extra content provided by the CD version and nothing else... No, you called the original a beta and said it looked like a 0. I'm telling you they have the exact same graphical lv: the same overdetailed 16 bit sprites and backgrounds. A style that truely should not have been attempted on a machine beneath the power of the NeoGeo. On the 32X + CD? Would've been great. On the CD alone? Nope.


I just said that Puggsy had extra levels, I never juiced about it so you could have saved your sarcastic pee for another mutilated part.
Come off it man, who cares about an enhanced version of a crappy game? Improved music quality? Not if I could hear it better. This game just sucks, it doesn't deserve to lick the MD Punisher port's boots.


If Mickey is an earsore in that game, you might also hate him in the cartoon. So, I see no reason to discuss about it. Usually, people would play the game if they like Mickey, no matter how faggot or earsore he can take to someone else.
Go skim the Pet Peeves thread, see how many members listed their annoyance with repeated dialogue. And yes I do dislike Mickey in the cartoon. Like many gamers, probably at least half, I attempt to enjoy lots of different games despite aspects of them I find distasteful. One of those is the cartoon characters that people them, as in Mickey Mania, World of Illusion (including Donald), Aladdin, The Lion King, Duck Tales, Batman, &c. I also play lots of military games like shmups and Contra and Blazing Squadrons, but this doesn't mean I have any intent of picking up a gun or hopping in a plane and going off to murder some foreigners in order to make the world a safer place for big business. I don't know why you included 'faggot' to me, do I strike you as macho? It's simply the timbre of his voice and the cutesy crap he says that gets on my nerves.


However, might have existed some reason, stronger than 12 cents, to not put a battery save feature in every single cartridge in those times and, unless you bring some information with sources, I'll take your words as pure speculation or a childhood wish.
People fuck everything up is why. Also, they're businessmen running the show, not thoughtful or creative people, and certainly in few cases game lovers. I suppose it'd be pure speculation or childhood wish to resent game companies' not providing full colour manuals to every game for every country too.


Sadly, my Sega CD glasses This was a joke. Sunglasses are commonly advertised as blocking harmful UV rays, hence I had yours blocking the most harmful element of SCD games.

[sheath]

Puggsy a crappy game? That is a first for me.

[StarMist]

Puggsy a crappy game? That is a first for me.
The Genny game review is still down so I can't cite you that one, but the CD game only got a 7/10 here, which for a S-16 review means dog vomit.

[sheath]

Well, I find most Sega-16 reviews, and reviews that hold to a similar format, next to useless. Seven out of ten seems like a horrid game because of this completely horrible review structure. I would say that Puggsy is a completely solid game in its own genre but lacks the super shiny aspects of better marketed games. Puggsy also takes better advantage of the Genesis VDP color palettes than most of the Genesis or Sega CD library.

[agostinhobaroners]

No, you called the original a beta and said it looked like a 0. I'm telling you they have the exact same graphical lv: the same overdetailed 16 bit sprites and backgrounds.
I'll let you re-read what I wrote:

IMO the cartridge version feels like a beta, the menus are awful and the presentation quality is next to 0. The CD version corrects these aspects and gives you lots of extra content
I said "presentation quality". It has almost nothing to do with the in-game level of graphical detail.
The cartridge game is very poorly presented, that's what I meant.


Come off it man, who cares about an enhanced version of a crappy game? Improved music quality? Not if I could hear it better. This game just sucks, it doesn't deserve to lick the MD Punisher port's boots.
You seem to be arguing with yourself...


Go skim the Pet Peeves thread, see how many members listed their annoyance with repeated dialogue. And yes I do dislike Mickey in the cartoon. Like many gamers, probably at least half, I attempt to enjoy lots of different games despite aspects of them I find distasteful. One of those is the cartoon characters that people them, as in Mickey Mania, World of Illusion (including Donald), Aladdin, The Lion King, Duck Tales, Batman, &c. I also play lots of military games like shmups and Contra and Blazing Squadrons, but this doesn't mean I have any intent of picking up a gun or hopping in a plane and going off to murder some foreigners in order to make the world a safer place for big business. I don't know why you included 'faggot' to me, do I strike you as macho? It's simply the timbre of his voice and the cutesy crap he says that gets on my nerves.
I really don't care about it.


People fuck everything up is why. Also, they're businessmen running the show, not thoughtful or creative people, and certainly in few cases game lovers. I suppose it'd be pure speculation or childhood wish to resent game companies' not providing full colour manuals to every game for every country too.
If people do not stopping buying games with gray-scaled manuals it's a businessmen fault?
Do you think they should have taken the costs of full color manuals while everybody was "happily" buying tons of grey-scaled ones?


This was a joke.
I understood it in the first time.


The Genny game review is still down so I can't cite you that one, but the CD game only got a 7/10 here, which for a S-16 review means dog vomit.
7. Great fun but notably lacking in a few areas (i.e. too short, poor music, etc.) (http://www.sega-16.com/submissions/review-manifest/)




I always hated the Sony sound chip for the SNES. People say it sounds amazing but honestly I always though it sounded like crap. To my ears it sounds like a terrible electric organ keep playing the say three keys over again.
It sounds amazingly like this:
http://www.melsbrushes.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/vectortapecassette.jpg

[StarMist]

Well, I find most Sega-16 reviews, and reviews that hold to a similar format, next to useless. Seven out of ten seems like a horrid game because of this completely horrible review structure. I would say that Puggsy is a completely solid game in its own genre but lacks the super shiny aspects of better marketed games. Puggsy also takes better advantage of the Genesis VDP color palettes than most of the Genesis or Sega CD library.
Erase 3 points from such reviews, then you'll have an accurate score.

@ agostinho = Presentation is graphics, but you must mean it in a magazine jargon way. I don't know why menus should matter so much in a fighter, but so be it. Anyhow I'm sorry you took my post so sore. Nonetheless Puggsy will forever remain catbox liner to me.

[JCU]

Everybody always makes this same, wrong point. Let me begin this by saying I understand inflation better than those making this wrong point. Inflation is generally 3x higher than an economic source will tell you because there are always more taxes and other govt extortions being created year by year that aren't factored into what people earn and lose. University education, which is nearly compulsory, has also risen in cost, along with the frequency/ubiquity of random arrests and fines (particularly traffic and otherwise car related---one $200 ticket a year makes a big difference in video game console money; and even if it's only 1 every 3 years that'll hike one's insurance through the roof). So, in short, back in `91 everybody had much more money than any bullshit income/inflation graphic will ever show. Economics are pure propaganda; just think back for yourself how much more flourishing every aspect of the entertainment world was then. Why? Because everybody had more money to spend on it.
$40 back then wouldn't have meant shit. And even were I wrong, which I'm not remotely, Black Tiger's point would be valid too.

Notice how Nintendo priced the SNES as well as its subsequent systems up to and including the Wii? Don't take this as an insult but I think these companies are a bit more knowledgeable then yourself when it comes to pricing its products accordingly in order to entice consumers. It doesn't take much to push away a potential buyer so do not underestimate the effects of an additional $40.00 some twenty years ago. The gamer of today (who grew up during the 2600, SMS and NES) should be in the position of having more buying power. The price today is much more manageable then decades ago.

Money had nothing to do with the entertainment world flourishing more in the early 90's then it is now. Whether it was video games, music, movies, etc.., things were fresher and newer. We didn't see the rehashes and junk like we tend to see today. Of course this describes the entertainment industry as a whole and not one specific area. Continue giving people the same junk and watch how they turn away.

[agostinhobaroners]

@ agostinho = Presentation is graphics, but you must mean it in a magazine jargon way. I don't know why menus should matter so much in a fighter, but so be it. Anyhow I'm sorry you took my post so sore. Nonetheless Puggsy will forever remain catbox liner to me.
Misunderstanding on purpose is a pointless attitude...

Anyway, what jargon should I use instead? Yours???
You can call it "magazine jargon" but I just used it in the same way that we usually see on Sega-16 reviews and forums. If it sounds strange to you it's not my fault, but I don't know a better term...
Presentation is not just graphics. The first The Need For Speed has a much better presentation quality than 99.9% of its sequels and they have far superior graphics.
And, of course, I was not only talking about the awful menus of Genesis's Eternal Champions, however, they are so confusing and lacking that is hard to know what is going on... Compare EC with SFII, MK or even the atrocious Takara ports of SNK games: the menus are shitty, the character selection screen... Is there one?, the hud is awful, the transition between the fights is abrupt and non-sense, there's no announcers or anything (the same for the CD)...



Money had nothing to do with the entertainment world flourishing more in the early 90's then it is now. Whether it was video games, music, movies, etc.., things were fresher and newer. We didn't see the rehashes and junk like we tend to see today. Of course this describes the entertainment industry as a whole and not one specific area. Continue giving people the same junk and watch how they turn away.
This!
Also, Nintendo priced and phased their consoles much better than any other game company.

[Baloo]

Well, I find most Sega-16 reviews, and reviews that hold to a similar format, next to useless. Seven out of ten seems like a horrid game because of this completely horrible review structure. I would say that Puggsy is a completely solid game in its own genre but lacks the super shiny aspects of better marketed games. Puggsy also takes better advantage of the Genesis VDP color palettes than most of the Genesis or Sega CD library.

What's wrong with the review structure? Apparently you don't like to read the review and see what the good and bad points of the game are and just look at the number score? :/

[sheath]

It's not unique to this site, the review format in general is flawed. How many games have been trashed by a single reviewer, given a low score because the reviewer didn't get it? More than I like to think about, this site's reviews of Formula One and Joe Montana CD are perfect examples, not to mention Golden Axe Beast Rider. People who don't "get" a game, or who prefer other genres, shouldn't review the game but they do all the time.

[Bastardcat]

I think the SNES is one of the greatest consoles ever made. Its control pad alone influenced controller design for several years to come.

[Crackdown]

I think the SNES is one of the most horrible consoles ever made. Its terrible control pad alone put me of the machine and ones that copied it for years to come.

[Bastardcat]

If it works, people copy it. If it works well, everyone copies it.

[Iron Lizard]

I think the SNES is one of the most horrible consoles ever made. Its terrible control pad alone put me of the machine and ones that copied it for years to come.

I heard it was responsible for the plague, Spanish Inquisition ,holocaust, aids, and various wars. I'm sure it was in the background when ABBA was formed.

[Bastardcat]

No, that was all Kogen's doing.

[sheath]

I heard it was responsible for the plague, Spanish Inquisition ,holocaust, aids, and various wars. I'm sure it was in the background when ABBA was formed.

Speaking of the black plague, did you know that the first plague killed up to 30% of Europe's population. That meant that everybody left alive knew somebody who had died from it and they all thought it was the end of the world. Did you also know that most of the people killed were clergy? I just find that fascinating don't you?

[Bastardcat]

Well there was a lot of doing atrocities done in God's name, so that probably wasn't a coincidence.

[sheath]

Did you also know that the average monk in the year 1000 drank five gallons of wheat ale a day? Did you also know that the single greatest cause of death among women was full body burns from spilling the monk's ale on themselves while carrying it? I just find that fascinating.

[Crackdown]

Did you also know that the average monk in the year 1000 drank five gallons of wheat ale a day? Did you also know that the single greatest cause of death among women was full body burns from spilling the monk's ale on themselves while carrying it? I just find that fascinating.

And yet that and the plague were still less painful than using a SNES controller

[gamevet]

And yet that and the plague were still less painful than using a SNES controller

The SNES controller was fine, though the D-Pad could have been better. It a lot better than the square controller that came with the NES.

[Kollision]

^ This

the d-pad in the NES stock controller is awful

[TVC 15]

Its great looking back through the early pages of this thread seeing 16-Bitters transformation from a brash if interesting cocky, devils advocate to his latter day form of a contemptuous pain in the arse who really needed to stop reading wikipedia articles on Lacan and applying psudeo intellectual bullshit to everything.

I do miss him in a weird way though.

[evilevoix]

I always found the L & R triggers hard to reach, not natural as say the XBOX or PS2 controller, you had to move your finger up and open instead of just pulling.

[cowboyscowboys]

16-Bitter was an awesome poster I miss him.

[StarMist]

What's wrong with the review structure? Apparently you don't like to read the review and see what the good and bad points of the game are and just look at the number score? :/The review seldom tallies with the score. Wholly mediocre and poorish games customarily, almost constitutionally, receive a 6 or 7, when not an 8. As I said, take 3 points off to find the proper score of most reviews here----this isn't just in line with my bitchy take on certain games, it will simply make much more sense with what the reviewer has written.


Money had nothing to do with the entertainment world flourishing more in the early 90's then it is now. Whether it was video games, music, movies, etc.., things were fresher and newer. We didn't see the rehashes and junk like we tend to see today. Of course this describes the entertainment industry as a whole and not one specific area. Continue giving people the same junk and watch how they turn away.
This is as wrong as possible. There have always been rehashes and junk. People don't care about quality---those who do are great exceptions. There was a deeper vein of exceptionality then but it was largely ignored and totally irrelevant to the viability of any entertainment industry. Continue giving people the same junk and nothing changes. That's it.

originally posted by TVC 15
Its great looking back through the early pages of this thread seeing 16-Bitters transformation from a brash if interesting cocky, devils advocate to his latter day form of a contemptuous pain in the arse who really needed to stop reading wikipedia articles on Lacan and applying psudeo intellectual bullshit to everything.

I do miss him in a weird way though.
To be honest I don't see his contempt/arrogance/arsepain/&c. (And everybody needs to stop reading wikipedia articles). As many frays as he was involved in I haven't seen any where somebody else didn't attack him first, typically in some much blunter fashion, and as odious as I find that film student rhetoric he susbscribed to I don't see any reasonable objection to the topics he originated. SNES vs Genesis appears to have been his banner but it's always Genesis vs something here. Nor do I see any transformation, he just wasn't being flamed so much at the beginning. "Pseudo intellectual" (which is pseudo language) is just what one says of things one disagrees with, along with similar vulgarian (fascistic) terms like 'snob', 'pretentious', 'elitist', and so forth. He definitely trumped up some of his OP too much--that film student thinking coming in to play--but so what? W/o his style there wouldn't have been all the discussion he started, and whilst there are more intelligent members whose original topics I'd rather read (goldenband, agostinhobaroners, TVC 15, Kamahl, Kollision, Zebbe, Spaceflea, Baloo though he'd protest he's not, and so on) few of them ever do start any topics. So it is a loss.

[JCU]

This is as wrong as possible. There have always been rehashes and junk. People don't care about quality---those who do are great exceptions. There was a deeper vein of exceptionality then but it was largely ignored and totally irrelevant to the viability of any entertainment industry. Continue giving people the same junk and nothing changes. That's it.

The quality and variety of what we saw in the 1990's (for this discussion) makes the past two decades appear absolutely dreadful. Rehashes and junk are the norm for our current time though. More emphasis is placed on flash and panache then actual substance.

[sheath]

^ I agree with this.