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Roar of the Beast was the first of our two-part review of Sunsoft’s Beauty and the Beast games for the Genesis, and we finish things off today with a full review of the other release, Belle’s Quest. An odd pair of platformers, the two play like a single Sunsoft title that was divided in half. We know how the first one is in terms of quality, but is the second part any better? Apparently not…
Sega’s Eternal Champions is one of the more controversial fighting series out there. Most people tend to either love it or hate it, and the debate only gets stronger as time goes by. The majority during the 16-bit era seems to have been on the side of the game, as Sega made a strong push to promote it and its characters. There was plenty of merchandising, and even some spin-offs, so the franchise was obviously selling. That being said, not everything with the series moniker was quality, as evidenced by the atrocious Game Gear side-scroller Chicago Syndicate, which featured private eye Larcen Tyler. The bland level design is fitting complimented by an awful fighting mechanic, resulting in a game no one ever need play again.
The Genesis is no stranger to controversy, especially where violent content is concerned. The current ratings system employed by the gaming industry is in very large part thanks to the initiative Sega took to identify the content of games released on its hardware. Titles like Night Trap and Mortal Kombat made huge waves in the press, but a few other equally violent games were almost completely ignored. One of those, TechnoCop, was probably given the cold shoulder due to one simple fact: it’s not very good. When you wrap dull gameplay in bad graphics and audio, the resulting package isn’t worthy of much notice.
Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, recently re-released on DVD, made a big impact on cinema back when it debuted, becoming the first animated film to win a Golden Globe award. As many a Disney franchise made the jump to the Genesis, it was a no-brainer that both the Beast and Belle would soon find themselves in 16-bit land. Each character got a its own game courtesy of Sunsoft, and today we take a look Roar of the Beast. Is this an action platformer worth playing?
The Genesis is home to lots of comic book games. There are plenty of Marvel titles and even a few DC. Also, there are some titles based on independently published comics, like The Tick, Dinosaurs for Hire, and Chakan: The Forever Man. Rubbing elbows with such company is Sega’s Ex-Mutants, based on the Eternity/Amazing/Pied Piper/Malibu series. An action/platformer with little to distinguish itself, it’s still worth spending some time with, provided that said time isn’t important at all and involves little cost.