Console Wars SNES vs. Sega Genesis

[Gentlegamer]

Great lists. Sega all the way for me. Super NES is great also, but too many RPGs and well, more childish games (not that there's anything wrong with that) for me.

All those Disney games sure are adult.

[celerystalker]

I'm bored, so I'll toss out a top 75 for SNES, too, and again not in any order:

1 Earthbound
2 Super Metroid
3 Super Mario World
4 Super Mario Kart
5 Donkey Kong Country
6 Final Fantasy II
7 Final Fantasy III
8 Final Fantasy Mystic Quest
9 TMNT: Turtles in Time
10 King of Dragons
11 Magic Sword
12 Illusion of Gaia
13 Soul Blazer
14 Super Bomberman 2
15 Secret of Mana
16 Zelda: A Link to the Past
17 Breath of Fire
18 Breath of Fire II
19 Ogre Battle
20 Contra III
21 King Arthur's World
22 Cybernator
23 Space Megaforce
24 Axelay
25 Gradius III
26 R-Type
27 R-Type III
28 Demon's Crest
29 Super Ghouls 'n Ghosts
30 Super Castlevania IV
31 Castlevania: Dracula X
32 F-Zero
33 Lagoon
34 Dragon View
35 SOS (Septentrion)
36 Street Fighter II Turbo
37 Rock 'n Roll Racing
38 Super Baseball 2020
39 Super Tennis
40 Violinist of Hameln
41 Act Raiser
42 Cho Aniki: Bakaretsu Rantouden
43 Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island
44 Super Star Wars
45 Super Empire Strikes Back
46 Super Return of the Jedi
47 Front Mission: Gun Hazard
48 Kishin Korinden Oni
49 Xardion
50 Brain Lord
51 Lufia
52 Lufia II
53 Knights of the Round
54 Brawl Brothers
55 Final Fight 2
56 Final Fight 3
57 Biker Mice from Mars
58 FireStriker
59 Fire Power 2000
60 Legend
61 Legend of the Mystical Ninja
62 Pocky & Rocky
63 Pocky & Rocky 2
64 On the Ball
65 Shadowrun
66 Super Nova
67 Tiny Toon Adventures: Buster Busts Loose
68 Chrono Trigger
69 Earthworm Jim 2
70 NBA Jam
71 Sim City
72 Super Mario RPG
73 Itadaki Street 2
74 Battle Dodgeball
75 Secret of Evermore

Love me some Super Nintendo.

[celerystalker]

Aaaand... just for kicks, although in the US it was a distant third, it's a shame it's always ignored, the Turbografx:

1 Ninja Spirit
2 Blazing Lazers
3 Super Star Soldier
4 Final Soldier
5 Sinistron
6 Air Zonk
7 Bonk's Adventure
8 Bonk's Revenge
9 Neutopia
10 Neutopia II
11 Keith Courage in Alpha Zones
12 Samurai Ghost
13 Salamander
14 Psychosis
15 Vigilante
16 Kickball
17 Download
18 Somer Assault
19 World Court Tennis
20 Final Lap Twin
21 Aero Blasters
22 Tiger Road
23 Cadash
24 Dragon Spirit
25 Galaga '90
26 Sidearms
27 Tricky Kick
28 Bloody Wolf
29 Dungeon Explorer
30 Space Harrier
31 Momotaro Katseguki
32 Splatterhouse
33 Moto Roader
34 Image Fight
35 Makai Hakkenden Shada
36 Shiryo Shinsen War of the Dead
37 Valkyrie no Densetsu
38 Cratermaze
39 Dragon's Curse
40 Silent Debuggers
41 Legendary Axe
42 Legendary Axe II
43 Pac-Land
44 Alien Crush
45 Devil's Crush
46 Momotaro Dentetsu
47 Military Madness
48 Kyuukyoku Tiger
49 R-Type
50 Boxy Boy
51 Jimmu Denshou
52 Gradius II
53 Gate of Thunder
54 Legend of Xanadu II
55 Kunio-kun Downtown Nekketsu Koushin Kyoku Soreyuke Daiundokai
56 Ys Books I & II
57 L-Dis
58 Conan Boy in the Future
59 Energy
60 X-Serd
61 Fantastic Night Dreams Cotton
62 Super Darius
63 Yokai Doukuchi
64 Flash Hiders
65 Dragon Slayer
66 Tengai Makyou: Ziria
67 Tengai Makyou: Manji Maru
68 Tengai Makyou: Kabuki Den
69 Bomberman '94
70 Battle Lode Runner
71 Last Alert
72 Exile
73 Cosmic Fantasy 2
74 Final Zone II
75 Gradius

Admittedly, I did have to include about 20 CD titles so as not to include filler HuCards, but the Turbo/PCE had a larger portion of its games in that format worldwide, and the Genesis lineup would definitely look even better with a similar number of CD inclusions.

[Tanooki]

Fun, not sure why I hadn't thought of doing that but was enjoying the Sega lists enough. I'll have to think it over and fire up a nice list here later today but I got to pick the kid up pretty quick.

[calgon]

75 is a bit much for me but I can certainly do the tried and true top ten
10. Thunder force III
9. Dynamite heady (jp ver)
8. Sonic the hedgehog
7. Mega bomberman
6. Shining force 2
5. Revenge of shinobi
4. Gun star heroes
3. NHL 93
2. Rocket knight adventures (jp ver)
1. Wonder boy in monster world

[Edmond Dantes]

Both are some fairly nice lists there. I must be alone in loving Dune and Star Control.

The hell you are! Both are considered classics on the PC, although I'm not sure if that love transfers over to the console versions (in Dune's case I'm pretty sure it does, since every time I've heard praise for the PC one I've also heard it for the Sega version. Star Control I've never thought to look up)

[Tanooki]

Well the Star Control conversion is an upgrade really. The old game was keyboard based, not sure if it even used a basic old school gamepad and was I believe 16 colors or so with very basic adlib level audio so the Genesis one with the few more colors, system sound, and the tight controller made it a better experience. I had it back in the day complete in the box, it was a big cardboard one which had this large fold out starmap of the entire area and a decent manual too. It was unlicensed, Renovation or something released it, so it came in a taller than usual cart. Dune though was licensed, that one is very solid on the Gen but it's also not a total true conversion, it's stripped to fit the system as it removed House Ordos from being controlled, so those stages are removed, but within the Atreides and Harkkonen those stages are there and the Ordos do along with Fremen pop up to attack so it's fairly faithful.

Man now I'm wishing those EA tightwads that own Westwood would put that old Dune 2 game, their original RTS that gave C&C life, up on GoGames.com to buy, but if that did pop up those they'd stuff it on that horrible Origin system.

I really need to get off my ass and buy those 2 games back along with Virtua Racing and a few others for my Retron 5.


**Just realized this was released for free a year ago on Android, but the scumbag who did it tried to charge for it and someone ratted him out to EA for being an abusive jerk to anyone not giving him great ratings on Google Play, but the APK is all over anyway online still. Also there's a browser version as well by another - http://epicport.com/en/dune2

[Gentlegamer]

Star Control, a friend had that back in the day, I never really got to play it, is it sort of a Star Trek sim?

[Edmond Dantes]

Here's a review of Star Control, granted its for the DOS version but I've always heard that the Sega version was much the same.

[GhostDog]

Both are great systems without a doubt. For me the Genesis wins because it holds the most nostalgia value as well as having more action oriented games that pleased my senses. Coming from the NES and then seeing the Genesis in action was a thing of beauty. The SNES had many great games but honestly I wasn't a big fan of many of the games that many SNES fans loved such as RPGs and whatnot. SNES games back in the day didn't much appeal to me beyond Street Fighter II, Super Mario World, Contra III, Ken Griffey Jr. Baseball and Donkey Kong Country. I wasn't impressed with Zelda, RPGs or Super Mario Kart. I know now there are plenty of good SNES games but back in the day it was all about the Genesis and arcades for me.

[celerystalker]

I think that for me, preferring the SNES isn't as much a statement that its overall library is more consistent than the Genesis. I think if I went in blind picking 5 random games for SNES and Genesis, I'd probably like more on the Genesis. It's just that the SNES' best games to me are some of the greatest ever, but it doesn't have much in the middle of the road. It'd amazing or crap with little in between for me. With Genesis, the middle of the road is jam-packed with decent games, but there are far fewer that I find remarkable or abhorrent. If I were to order those top 75 lists, I think the SNES for me would bebetter for the top 25-30, whereas the last 45 or so would largely sway toward the Genesis. The reason I always mention the Turbo other than its lack of love and Japanese successis that I think it does pretty much what the Genesis does, just a little better.

[Daria]

I'm the odd duck here. I play primarily RPGs and I prefer the US Genesis library over the SNES. :P

[Tanooki]

Here's a review of Star Control, granted its for the DOS version but I've always heard that the Sega version was much the same.

If my memory serves me right they are identical in content, just the a/v fluff and use of a comfy gamepad give the Gen game the edge back then, and even now not having to screw with dosbox.

Do read that review, its an interesting game. You work to control a star system, but if you arent developing those worlds or defending them you can get into a top view one on one combat melee zone where it is a battle to the death.

[calgon]

I'm the odd duck here. I play primarily RPGs and I prefer the US Genesis library over the SNES. :P

Same here. Not a huge RPG guy by any stretch but something about the genesis RPG library just has a lot of charm. SNES still has some complete classics, but a few do little to innovate the medium.

[Edmond Dantes]

I think its that the Genesis library tends to have either western RPGs (many of them PC ports) or else very off-beat Japanese RPGs, while the SNES is more full of just standard jRPGs. So that does give the Genesis a special flavor in that regard.

Also the Genesis has Landstalker and Crusader of Centy. Take THAT, Zelda!

[Tanooki]

That's a pretty good way to put that. Genesis really isn't lacking in RPGs, it's just lacking in what a majority think are good RPGs (ie: known standard JRPG format stuff.) It has the western flair, and it has the more obscure from other even more obscure systems (Exile) or just different than the usual type stuff but definitely not bad.

[thisIsLoneWolf]

That SNES list looks like it's missing a little game called Super Adventure Island.
New Adventure Island for the Turbografx is really great too.

[Neb6]

Although I'm primarily into arcade-style games, I prefer the SNES to the Genesis.

Why? Because I'm a color whore and it wasn't until machines like the TG-16 and SNES that I saw sprites that had enough color in them.

As someone else mentioned on here though, why not just play both (or all three) systems?

[treismac]

Aaaand... just for kicks, although in the US it was a distant third, it's a shame it's always ignored, the Turbografx:

As much as I love it, it's damn easy to ignore the TG-16 with the scarcity of it in the wild and the high prices online. Thank God for emulation, eh?

[Tanooki]

That's my beef with it, well that and the hucard library in the US sucked more than not -- the CDs are where it's at and from Japan too. I miss the Duo I had, but I will never buy into this system after people figured out how much they could break peoples wallets over it and get away with it playing the whole scarcity angle. It's not scarce at all online, just locally it's a bitch to find stuff and when you do, if it's retail, it's as bad as it is online if not higher. I saw a CIB (no sleeve) splatterhouse the other day for like $60-70 which was just sick. I could have bought that 4 years ago for like ten bucks.

The Genesis though I intend to get a few games for through my retron 5. I've got a short list I'm scouting out now to see what happens. I know that Dune at around $40 and Castlevania a bit more are the worst, but things like Star Control, Ghouls n Ghosts, Virtua Racing, Columns, and a few others are pretty tame because most people aren't trying to run Genesis games into the Nintendoland territory.