Battle of the Ports

[Nu-Eclipse]

To this day I can't believe they released the arcade version of Shadow Dancer on the Master System and a different one for the MD. They could've released both versions.

The exact same thing could be said about E-SWAT - original coin-op ported to the Master System and "adapted" game released for the MD. That said, MD Shadow Dancer is still a fine game in all fairness.

They still have so many properties they don't exploit.

When in doubt, rehash Sonic 1/2/3/& Knuckles, no?

The Sega way.

[Team Andromeda]

It's gotta be said: The MD ports of Sega coin-ops were seriously underwhelming - all of them.

Super Hang-On, Alien Storm, Golden Axe, OutRun, Altered Beast...it always bugged me immensely that the MD ports of these games weren't as close to their arcade parents as they could've been.

I would agree with Out Run and to a point Alien Storm but Aletered Beast played and looked very close to the Arcade version, Super Hang-On pissed over the Amiga and ST versions and also had a top 'Consumer' mode and the Mega Drive version of Golden Axe was very close and again pissed over almost any other version around at the time .

SEGA ports of Strider, Final Fight , Ghost N Ghouls , Mercs were also spot on and better than almost any other home versions around at the time

[monel]

If I won the lottery in an alternate reality (I don't bother with it), I would buy every copy of Altered Beast I came across and smash that thing to pieces.

[Nu-Eclipse]

SEGA ports of Strider, Final Fight , Ghost N Ghouls , Mercs were also spot on and better than almost any other home versions around at the time

While the MD ports of these games weren't bad for their time and might well have even been the best ports available at the time in some circumstances (ie. to the vast majority of western gamers), they certainly weren't spot on - MD Mercs didn't have the 2P co-op, and MD Daimakaimura & Strider weren't 100% arcade perfect either (things either left out or altered in-game). Despite being Japan-only, the X68000 ports of Final Fight, Daimakaimura & Strider were arcade-perfect (due to being on what was essentially CPS-1 development hardware) and comfortably leagues ahead of the MD ports.

In any case, my original point was regarding the MD ports of The aforementioned games developed by Sega, and I stand by it: All of them were considerably inferior to their arcade parents when they could've been much better.

[Yakumo]

The biggest reason the early MD port were not that perfect comes down to the price of Memory. Strider is no of the better ones because it was one of the first high memory games. Everything else is 4mbit rather than 8.

[Team Andromeda]

Despite being Japan-only, the X68000 ports of Final Fight, Daimakaimura & Strider were arcade-perfect (due to being on what was essentially CPS-1 development hardware) and comfortably leagues ahead of the MD ports.

I really don't know why you keep on brining up the X68000 - The price difference between the 2 was vast... its like comparing a Ferrari to a Ford Focus ; Sure they both do the same thing in the end , but it's really not fair to compare the both. I don't think it's really fair to compare current consoles to a PC these days , never mind a Snes or MD to a Sharp X68000 due to price and memory advantages

and MD Daimakaimura & Strider weren't 100% arcade perfect either (things either left out or altered in-game).

Whats with this 100% - They was no way in those days there we going to be 100% on a basic console for the masses , Who really cared that Street Fighter 2 on the Snes wasn't quite perfect ? it was more than good enough and sure people and a price point that was in the reach of the masses.Its always a balance . R-Type, Tiger Helli weren't quite Arcade perfect on the PC-Eng didn't anyone really care Snes fans always go on about the likes of Final Fight, Parodius, Area 88 on the Snes and there were missing loads , but they were still close enough for most ..

Same goes for Mercs and Strider, Ghost N Ghouls for me and Final Fight on the Mega CD had almost everything from the coin up

All of them were considerably inferior to their arcade parents when they could've been much better

They was no way the likes of Outrun was going to prefect - not unless SEGA put another 2 68000 CPU's and Sprite scaling hardware into the console and made it the biggest Mega Drive cart ever made .Strider was hurt by memory limits and being a rather early title - I'm sure in SEGA went back to Altered Beast, Golden Axe, Strider with 32 Meg Carts some 3 to 4 years into the Mega Drive life cycle bar the scaling they would have been all but perfect , I mean Aletered Beast features more parallax scrolling and better speech than its Arcade counter part and it was a launch title . They're were more than close enough for most to look over the short comings

[CMcK]

With plenty of ROM space and compression the MD should've been able to fake the sprite scaling pretty well. Look at how well the Lotus games on the Amiga faked sprite scaling.

[Nu-Eclipse]

I really don't know why you keep on brining up the X68000 - The price difference between the 2 was vast... its like comparing a Ferrari to a Ford Focus ; Sure they both do the same thing in the end , but it's really not fair to compare the both. I don't think it's really fair to compare current consoles to a PC these days , never mind a Snes or MD to a Sharp X68000 due to price and memory advantages

Whats with this 100% - They was no way in those days there we going to be 100% on a basic console for the masses , Who really cared that Street Fighter 2 on the Snes wasn't quite perfect ? it was more than good enough and sure people and a price point that was in the reach of the masses.Its always a balance . R-Type, Tiger Helli weren't quite Arcade perfect on the PC-Eng didn't anyone really care Snes fans always go on about the likes of Final Fight, Parodius, Area 88 on the Snes and there were missing loads , but they were still close enough for most ..

Same goes for Mercs and Strider, Ghost N Ghouls for me and Final Fight on the Mega CD had almost everything from the coin up






They was no way the likes of Outrun was going to prefect - not unless SEGA put another 2 68000 CPU's and Sprite scaling hardware into the console and made it the biggest Mega Drive cart ever made .Strider was hurt by memory limits and being a rather early title - I'm sure in SEGA went back to Altered Beast, Golden Axe, Strider with 32 Meg Carts some 3 to 4 years into the Mega Drive life cycle bar the scaling they would have been all but perfect , I mean Aletered Beast features more parallax scrolling and better speech than its Arcade counter part and it was a launch title . They're were more than close enough for most to look over the short comings

Not that I even want to interact with you in all honesty, but try reading the name of the thread (BATTLE OF THE PORTS. Get it?). The X68000 is definitely relevant because those games that you mentioned were also ported to it (despite me only talking about Sega-developed first-party MD games in the first place). Also, you might want to try reading and comprehending what I wrote in the first place. Yes - they were not arcade-perfect on the MD, they were not 100% spot-on like you claim. That's a fact, whether you want to acknowledge it or not. There were better ports, as shown by the X68000 versions. Simple, really.

Whether they were close enough or nearly perfect is neither here nor there. My argument is simply that they weren't 1:1 arcade conversions - a fact. Nothing more or less.

[Strider]

Mercs was three player, not two player. I personally feel the md has great conversions.

[SUMIRE]

Is there any reason they decided not to make the axe golden in Golden Axe apart from the arcade? I loved the Megadrive version, was an awesome game back in the day.

[SUMIRE]

If I won the lottery in an alternate reality (I don't bother with it), I would buy every copy of Altered Beast I came across and smash that thing to pieces.

granted it is poor, but that was the game that after seeing it in C+VG made my brothers import a Megadrive. The way the eye moved on the intro looked amazing back then.

[Nu-Eclipse]

Mercs was three player, not two player.

You are correct.

That said, it is possible to dip-switch between 2P and 3P co-op modes. Full 3P Mercs coin-op cabinet set-ups weren't exactly easy to come by back in the day.

[monel]

granted it is poor, but that was the game that after seeing it in C+VG made my brothers import a Megadrive. The way the eye moved on the intro looked amazing back then.

The beast transformations looked pretty good for the time. It's just that when Sega packaged it as the bundled game here, they could have chosen far better games that could demonstrate what the system could do. It was a bit of a cheapskate move, if not that then just a stupid decision.

[Baseley09]

I for one like Altered Beast, I'm a fan of games where you basically walk right punching stuff like this - The Kung Fu, Last Battle/FOTNS, Golden Fighter.

Simple needs for simple minds.

[sj33]

I think it has to be seen in context. In 1989/1990, the most advanced games that most people were exposed to were NES titles, so Altered Beast must have looked really special.

Even during the MegaDrive days, graphics moved on very quickly. Look at how basic Golden Axe looks compared with, say, Streets of Rage 2.