Sega Genesis & MegaDrive Classics Review

Developer: Sega / Publisher: Sega / ESRB: Teen (Blood, Violence) / Played on: PC / Price: $7.50

Our gaming generation has matured; we’ve reached that fine vintage when we’re willing to re-buy our childhoods at a premium. Movies like G.I. Joe and Transformers package our rose-tinted memories in a dazzling veneer of Michael Bay-splosions, while standalone games like Bionic Commando Rearmed and Final Fight Double Impact give yesteryear’s games a spit polish. Sega Genesis & MegaDrive Classics, on the other hand, offers the bare minimum in terms of price and features for a collection, so it might just satisfy the retro enthusiasts were it not for better options elsewhere.

Gameplay

Buying and downloading these games is a simple process thanks to Steam’s distribution (at the time of writing, Steam is the only platform on which these games are available). The first title you purchase downloads two separate applications: Sega Genesis & MegaDrive Classics and the actual game you purchased. The former application is an emulator program, and any subsequent purchases are added in to the emulator’s main menu. Beyond that, any gameplay involved is completely an emulation of the game you purchased. Here’s a quick rundown of the initial offerings:

Altered Beast – A clunky beat ‘em up. Slighty homoerotic [No], very furry.

Comix Zone – You beat up monsters inside a comic book. Fun, but impossible.

Crackdown – It’s Gauntlet.

Ecco the Dolphin – You’re a dolphin and aliens abduct the rest of your pod. It’s fun to explore the ocean, and thankfully your fellow sea creatures never burst into song.

Gain Ground – Gauntlet again, with more character

Golden Axe – A clunky precursor to Battletoads.

Shadow Dancer – An enjoyable platformer with a ninja dog.

Shinobi III: Return of the Ninja Master – Somehow better than Shadow Dancer despite the lack of ninja dog.

Sonic 3D Blast – Rejected titles: Sonic Eyestrain, Sonic on Skates, Sonic Isometric is a Terrible Idea.

Space Harrier II – An older, trippier Star Fox.

Vectorman – A sucky platformer where enemies often shoot you from offscreen with no warning.

Let’s be honest, these games aren’t all “classics” as dubbed by Sega, so the real appeal is if any of those names dredge fond memories of simpler times. But what of the emulator itself? It offers a minimal list of features – save states, controller configuration, and only three visual filters. While the emulation is solid and stable, it doesn’t offer nearly the options that other free emulators already do (such as online multiplayer). There are no little bonuses or extras either. The downloads don’t even include the original manuals for nostalgia’s sake (there are manuals, but they’re piddly two-page things hidden in Steam’s download folder). As such, each game has a hard time justifying the asking price. Given that all the games save Sonic 3D Blast ($5) are only $3, that’s saying something.

Control

Navigating the emulator included with Classics is more annoying than necessary, primarily because you can’t do anything while a game is running. After loading a game, any action other than saving your active game to one of the five available slots makes you quit the current game first. This means that tweaking display resolution, visual options, or even controls themselves requires you to quit your game. Granted, you can just save to a slot, quit out, adjust your options, and then reload the game, but that process is extremely annoying especially when setting up controls and display for the first time.

Other aspects also nag, such as the lack of a Steam overlay in-game or the near-requirement of a gamepad thanks to these games’ arcade nature. Owning a gamepad doesn’t immediately solve the control problems, either, as most gamepads now have four face buttons. Squeezing the six button Genesis layout on to a four button controller is uncomfortable, even with shoulder triggers.

Visuals

Like its controls, Classics’ visual options are paltry. With only three visual filters (four if no filter at all counts) and four window resolutions, you’ll want for a lot of tweaks that could make these games look a hell of a lot better. Thankfully, the emulator does offer vSync and the ability to retain the 4:3 aspect ratio in fullscreen mode. The emulator menu exhibits a few neat visual tricks, such as showing an active screen of every save slot, but the novelty quickly wears off when you realize you can die if you saved in a remotely dangerous situation because the game is already running.

Sound

Classics’ sound comprises precisely two options – on or off. Beyond that, the sound’s quality will rely on your fond memories of the warbling music and chippy sound effects produced by the Genesis / MegaDrive. Amusingly enough, listening to thirty-year-old sound effects and music out of a modern sound system almost feels sinful. Put a pillow in front of your speakers for the authentic experience, and hell, call your mom over to nag you into going outside while you’re at it.

Bottom Line

These games are twenty years old, and none of them are “classics” in the sense that their gameplay holds up under modern scrutiny. This, combined with the featureless emulator, means thatClassics will only appeal to serious retro enthusiasts, who have probably already fixed on the Sega Classics Collection or the Sega Genesis Collection on the PlayStation 2. What’s more, all of the offered games (excepting Crackdown) are available on Gametap for only $5 a month. If you’re the one person on the planet that can play Altered Beast for more than a month and not tire of it, you’re weird, but this is a good option for you. If not, there’s a cheaper and easier way to scratch that erstwhile retro gaming itch.

4.5

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