chrisbid
05-29-2004, 01:39 AM
1994 was a grand year. 12 years of moderately-hard work paid off with my graduation from high school. Video games were at a crossroads, while 16-bit consoles were at the pinnacle of 2D gaming, the first drops of the next generation were raining on the market. Star Fox and Donkey Kong Country on the SNES, Virtua Racing on the Genesis, the 3DO, the Atari Jaguar, and a plethora of incredible 3D dotted the arcades next to the aging Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter II machines. The 3D storm was brewing.
Having my own meager income in High School finally allowed me to break the confines of owning only one console. I lived in a Nintnedo household since 1987. The NES was my best friend in Middle School, and the SNES was a fine upgrade, but I was secretly in love with Sega's black box of joy, the Genesis. In 1992 when the price of the Genesis dropped and came with Sonic 1 and Sonic 2 I saved my money and bought one. I was finally above the silly arguments at school. "The Genesis kicks Super Nintendo's ass!!" "The Genesis is cheap, Nintendo has class!" I didn't care, and I didn't need false machismo to cover up any insecurities over monogamous gaming. I had two 16-bit systems, side by side, hooked up to a crappy 13" inch TV in my bedroom. I had Sonic. I had Mario. I had Strider, Columns, Zelda, Final Fantasy, Madden and more. I was on top of the world.
Of course the feeling didn't last that long. Though I knew nobody that actually owned one, there was a machine called the Neo Geo that ran circles around my beige and black consoles. My cousin's PC was doing things I never imagined possible on a monitor. On top of that, every night during Beavis and Butthead commercial breaks, Sega was taunting me. "YOU STILL DON'T HAVE A SEGA CD?!" The images were irresistible. This was to be my beachhead in the next generation of gaming. In late 1993 I saved every penny I could for months to buy my first CD-ROM drive with a bold blue stripe on the left side. It came with a game called Sewer Shark. It was an OK game once I got a handle of the gameplay, but I found the terrible acting more fun than the game itself. My friend and I would give it the MST3K treatment while playing. I did find better titles for the unit like Sonic CD, Prize Fighter, NHL '94, and Lunar: The Silver Star.
1994 finally arrives. The Sega Saturn is poised to hit the market late next year. Nintendo's Project Reality is on the distant horizon, and Sony is going to make a video game console (?!) called the Playstation. The Saturn looked the most promising. Virtua Fighter and Daytona were incredible arcade games, and my imagination began to picture Sonic the Hedgehog in a 3D world. However the rumors were that it was going to retail for $400. I was a senior in high school, and, needless to say, I didn't have that kind of money. In the spring, I got my copy of Sega Visions in the mail. The cover had explosive news, "32-BIT GAMEPLAY ON THE GENESIS YOU ALREADY OWN!" I read the article, and the logic behind the upgrade made all the sense in the world. At $150, this 32X will allow my Genesis to play more games like Virtua Racing, without inflating the cost of cartridges over $90, and the cost of the machine itself would be almost one-third of the cost of a Saturn or Playstation.
In the following months, more news about the machine and its lineup was leaked in Sega Visions and other magazines. This was the plan I conceived; I would buy the 32X during Christmas break of '94. The Saturn and Playstation were not due until the Holiday season of 1995. During this time Sega would throw their best games to the 32X. After the launch of the Saturn and Playstation, the two companies would fight each other for a year or so until Nintendo threw their hat into the ring. At that point, competition would hopefully drive down the cost of the machines, at which point I would buy one.
The plan was set and I bought the mushroom-shaped upgrade (I thought Mario used mushrooms to power up?) for $149 dollars. Along with the machine, I also picked up a copy of Virtua Racing Deluxe and Doom and got a $10 rebate out of the bundle (whopeee!). Doom was a blast, and Virtua Racing Deluxe exceeded its Genesis cousin which I loved but would not buy. Later I would buy the outstanding port of Mortal Kombat II, and the underrated Knuckles Chaotix. I had fun with all the games, but the love affair was over before I returned home for summer vacation. At the first E3 in the Spring of 1995, Sega had surprised everyone by launching the Saturn early. Sadly, 32X support fell by the wayside, in favor of the Saturn which desperately needed to grow its lineup before the Playstation launched in the fall. Even the games the few 32X games that did interest me were difficult to find in stores. Game stores had to make shelf space for SNES, Genesis, Sega CD, Jaguar, 3DO, PC, and now Saturn and upcoming Playstation games.
I had fun with my 16-bit machines and their upgrades, but my wallet was now empty. My interests started to turn to music, pushing video games to the back burner. 1996 came and went, and instead of a Sega Saturn, I bought a nice stereo and turntable for my growing music collection. I did buy a Playstation in late 1997 to play Final Fantasy VII, but my interest in video games remained pretty passive until the release of the Dreamcast two years later.
So I admit it, I bought a 32X at full price. However I feel no shame. I was the biggest Sega fan in the world, but my faith in Service Games didn't fade because the 32X was a sub-par machine. It waned because they broke their promise of 60 game releases within the first year of the machine's life. The fun was there in the titles I owned, but it wasn't sustained. I never felt any ill will or malice toward Sega. I guess I just fell out of love with them.
Having my own meager income in High School finally allowed me to break the confines of owning only one console. I lived in a Nintnedo household since 1987. The NES was my best friend in Middle School, and the SNES was a fine upgrade, but I was secretly in love with Sega's black box of joy, the Genesis. In 1992 when the price of the Genesis dropped and came with Sonic 1 and Sonic 2 I saved my money and bought one. I was finally above the silly arguments at school. "The Genesis kicks Super Nintendo's ass!!" "The Genesis is cheap, Nintendo has class!" I didn't care, and I didn't need false machismo to cover up any insecurities over monogamous gaming. I had two 16-bit systems, side by side, hooked up to a crappy 13" inch TV in my bedroom. I had Sonic. I had Mario. I had Strider, Columns, Zelda, Final Fantasy, Madden and more. I was on top of the world.
Of course the feeling didn't last that long. Though I knew nobody that actually owned one, there was a machine called the Neo Geo that ran circles around my beige and black consoles. My cousin's PC was doing things I never imagined possible on a monitor. On top of that, every night during Beavis and Butthead commercial breaks, Sega was taunting me. "YOU STILL DON'T HAVE A SEGA CD?!" The images were irresistible. This was to be my beachhead in the next generation of gaming. In late 1993 I saved every penny I could for months to buy my first CD-ROM drive with a bold blue stripe on the left side. It came with a game called Sewer Shark. It was an OK game once I got a handle of the gameplay, but I found the terrible acting more fun than the game itself. My friend and I would give it the MST3K treatment while playing. I did find better titles for the unit like Sonic CD, Prize Fighter, NHL '94, and Lunar: The Silver Star.
1994 finally arrives. The Sega Saturn is poised to hit the market late next year. Nintendo's Project Reality is on the distant horizon, and Sony is going to make a video game console (?!) called the Playstation. The Saturn looked the most promising. Virtua Fighter and Daytona were incredible arcade games, and my imagination began to picture Sonic the Hedgehog in a 3D world. However the rumors were that it was going to retail for $400. I was a senior in high school, and, needless to say, I didn't have that kind of money. In the spring, I got my copy of Sega Visions in the mail. The cover had explosive news, "32-BIT GAMEPLAY ON THE GENESIS YOU ALREADY OWN!" I read the article, and the logic behind the upgrade made all the sense in the world. At $150, this 32X will allow my Genesis to play more games like Virtua Racing, without inflating the cost of cartridges over $90, and the cost of the machine itself would be almost one-third of the cost of a Saturn or Playstation.
In the following months, more news about the machine and its lineup was leaked in Sega Visions and other magazines. This was the plan I conceived; I would buy the 32X during Christmas break of '94. The Saturn and Playstation were not due until the Holiday season of 1995. During this time Sega would throw their best games to the 32X. After the launch of the Saturn and Playstation, the two companies would fight each other for a year or so until Nintendo threw their hat into the ring. At that point, competition would hopefully drive down the cost of the machines, at which point I would buy one.
The plan was set and I bought the mushroom-shaped upgrade (I thought Mario used mushrooms to power up?) for $149 dollars. Along with the machine, I also picked up a copy of Virtua Racing Deluxe and Doom and got a $10 rebate out of the bundle (whopeee!). Doom was a blast, and Virtua Racing Deluxe exceeded its Genesis cousin which I loved but would not buy. Later I would buy the outstanding port of Mortal Kombat II, and the underrated Knuckles Chaotix. I had fun with all the games, but the love affair was over before I returned home for summer vacation. At the first E3 in the Spring of 1995, Sega had surprised everyone by launching the Saturn early. Sadly, 32X support fell by the wayside, in favor of the Saturn which desperately needed to grow its lineup before the Playstation launched in the fall. Even the games the few 32X games that did interest me were difficult to find in stores. Game stores had to make shelf space for SNES, Genesis, Sega CD, Jaguar, 3DO, PC, and now Saturn and upcoming Playstation games.
I had fun with my 16-bit machines and their upgrades, but my wallet was now empty. My interests started to turn to music, pushing video games to the back burner. 1996 came and went, and instead of a Sega Saturn, I bought a nice stereo and turntable for my growing music collection. I did buy a Playstation in late 1997 to play Final Fantasy VII, but my interest in video games remained pretty passive until the release of the Dreamcast two years later.
So I admit it, I bought a 32X at full price. However I feel no shame. I was the biggest Sega fan in the world, but my faith in Service Games didn't fade because the 32X was a sub-par machine. It waned because they broke their promise of 60 game releases within the first year of the machine's life. The fun was there in the titles I owned, but it wasn't sustained. I never felt any ill will or malice toward Sega. I guess I just fell out of love with them.