Two men. One unappreciated console.
These are the Sega Saturn Chronicles.
MATT is 32 years old, and has owned a
Saturn since December 1996. JAMES is 22 years old, and acquired his
Saturn in February 2015.
Duke Nukem 3D –
Lobotomy Software (developer), Sega (publisher), 1997
MATT: I’m a huge fan of Duke Nukem 3D on the PC. I
estimate I spent about 2,000 hours or more playing user levels or building my own
back in the day. If Sam’s Club stores offered expansion packs similar to how they
sell 35-pound cheese wheels, I’ve have been all over it. What had always been a
dark spot on my Nukem notoriety, however, was the fact that I never played the
Sega Saturn version… until now. Rebuilt from the ground up using the
Powerslave/Exhumed engine, Duke 3D on the Saturn has players feeling sea-sick
when turning thanks to a weird, world-tilting effect, and unlike the PC
version, you can only save after completing a level. Also, it’s based on the
original three episodes of the PC classic, so don’t expect to find levels like
Duke Burger or The Birth here. Some levels were cut or shortened, and the
exclusive toilet-based Saturn level, Urea 51, is piss poor. Finally, the
graphics look like they filtered the original game though YouTube at 144p.
Sounds awful, but Duke Nukem 3D is kind of like pizza: even lackluster versions
are still pretty tasty, especially with beer and peperoni. The Sega Saturn Duke
3D is the best of the major console ports of the time, in that it is playable.
The PS1 version suffered from sky-high difficulty and a crippling seven memory
card blocks to save, which took about as long as finishing the damn level did.
And the N64 version pointlessly changes weapons, removes anything even remotely
risqué, and controls like Duke is less ass-kicking machine and more unoiled
machine. The Sega Saturn version is basically fun despite itself, but I’m okay
with that. Any excuse to dive back into Duke’s combat boots is just fine with me. These
days, you’d be better off grabbing a copy of Duke Nukem 3D from www.gog.com (which does not stand for Gay Old
Grannies, that’s another site entirely) or playing the buggy-but-fun PS3
version, released earlier this year. But if all you’ve got is a Saturn, by all
means, pick this puppy up and start blasting that alien scum. Note: Though this
game used to feature online competitive play, that service has long since been
suspended. So if you’ve got the time, you’ll have to play with yourself. 7/10.
JAMES: Always bet on the Duke. Unless you’re playing a console
port. Then you should most certainly not bet on the Duke ever. Duke may not
look great, sound excellent, or control smoothly on this port, but you know
what? It’s still DUKE, damn it. Duke 3D is such a personal fav that I would
play a Tiger Electronic version if I was given the choice. This game is not my
preferred version by any means, but hell, it’s a good time. You still get to
make those alien bastards pay for shooting up your ride, decree that the aliens
should blow it out their ass, and you can lay it smackdab on their ass.
Pro-tip: Duke says ass a lot. Matt’s review pretty much nailed all the
important differences between this and the PC version. If you want to feel what
it’s like to play one of the best FPS games of this era, pop this SOB in, crack
your knuckles and lock and load. Come to
think of it, if you HAVEN’T played this, stop reading, go get a copy and PLAY!
It’s something you have to experience to call yourself a gamer. It’s like
Citizen Kane, but Orson Wells rarely, if ever, bellowed “Let God sort ‘em out”
while unloading lead into the face of a pig-cop monster. 7/10 for the port
10/10 for the PC version.
Fighters Megamix –
Sega, 1997
MATT: Fighters Megamix was the panicle of Sega’s 3D
brawlers before Virtua Fighter 3 proved to be a snooze fest and the floor fell
out from under the genre as a whole. Mashing up the entire cast of Virtua
Fighter and Fighting Vipers would have been enough to make a great game, but
Sega also threw in characters from its other popular titles of the time, like
Sonic the Fighters, Virtua Cop 2, and even Daytona USA. (Have you ever kicked a
car’s tires to make sure they weren’t flat? I’m still petrified of doing that
to this day, as Fighter’s Megamix taught me that sometimes, cars hit back.)
There’s nods to the pointless and downright freaky Virtua Fighter Kids, a bear
statue with zero points of articulation who attacks opponents via
creepypasta-style nightmare fuel, and a terrifying Mexican bean person who was
surely the inspiration for the majority of the anti-sex crime legislation on
the books today. His alternate costume makes him look like a giant,
bloodthirsty banana, uncomfortably similar the “Bananas in Pajamas” show, in
case you were wondering. You can also play as a massive slab of Castlevania
meat with disembodied arms and legs. Oh, and mother f**king plam tree. In the
end, Fighter’s Megamix is not only the Saturn’s best 3D fighter, but also
Sega’s greatest entry into the survival horror genre. What could have been a
lazy cut-and-paste job turns out to be much more than the sum of its freaky,
freaky parts. 9/10.
JAMES: This series has taught me a lot, you guys. About
one of the first CD based home consoles. About the gaming market in 1995-97.
About some progenitors of classic modern series. But mostly, it’s taught me
that Sega made terrible 3D fighter after terrible 3D fighter and then wondered
why their stupid console failed. So yeah, here’s another one! Ok, ok, let me
TRY to be positive. You can fight as a giant bear with no animations. For yuks
that’s pretty damn fun. You also can play as a race car which, SHOCKER, sucks
at fighting. Again, nice novelty. The thing I like most about this game is that
you get to play as Fighting Vipers characters. Since that’s like my third
favorite Saturn game so far, that’s awesome. And since this came out in 1997,
this has to be one of the first fighting games where they compiled different
fighters across several IPs and put them under one roof. I’d say Smash Bros.
owes something to this game, but I think in the grand scheme Sega is the one in
debt to Nintendo. Literally. I don’t like this formula, but for novelty this game
has enough batshit insane stuff to make you laugh. Play it with a friend for
maximum hilarity. 5/10
Virtual-On: Cyber
Troopers – Sega, 1996
MATT: Virtual-On looked amazing nearly 20 years ago, yet
I never got around to playing it during the Saturn’s short-lived heyday. But now
I know how James must feel when I show him an old game I loved, and he has trouble
understanding why I haven’t adorned it with rocks and sent it to a watery grave
in the mighty Hudson River. You’d think Virtual-On was a simple mech combat
game. Hell, the controls are even displayed on screen! Right? Not quite: the
majority of time, buttons don’t do what the instructions imply, and firing
while jumping produces radically different results than what you’d expect.
Sometimes, I’ll hit every button on the controller and my bot just sits there,
begging to be repurposed into some kind of military grade toaster. And be
careful while trying to get your metallic marauder to at least pretend to
fight: The perspective change, hidden somewhere on the controller, is neither
intuitive nor predictable. It exists merely to punish the poor fools desperately
mashing “attack” buttons. You will never, ever return the camera normal, and
will remain in the nefarious grasp of the “camera on the moon” viewpoint until
your mech is reduced to a smoldering pile of steel and wasted time. I
appreciate what they were trying to do with this, I really do, and I bet I’d
have figured it all out over a few weeks when I was a kid. But as an adult, I
don’t have the time to decode obtuse, underwhelming also-rans from a bygone
gaming era. 4/10.
JAMES: Growing up I watched a lot of Gundam Wing. I was
and still am a fan of giant robot combat. So I admit, I was a little more interested
in this title unlike say, the 20th Sega 3D fighter in a row which
feels exactly the same as the last 19. And after getting my robo-ass handed to
me in the first couple rounds, I started to get the hang of this insane game.
Sure the camera just goes wherever it wants and your opponent seems to always
find himself right on the edge of your perspective, but it’s still fun! It’s a
flat-out masher, folks. You mash to find the right camera angle, you mash to
jump, and you mash to shoot super robo-missiles at your hapless robo-pponent.
There are characters who are superfast, some have missiles, some have melee
weapons, and there’s a girl one. She’s pink. Honestly, I played as missile-bot
because he could spam ranged attacks and they sought out the opponent, which
solved the whole “where is this GIANT ROBOT whose shooting me?!” issue the game
suffers from. It’s not a super deep
game, and after six or so matches I was pretty done with it. But it’s got
pretty sweet level design, it’s satisfyingly insane, and it’s a frenetic mash
fest while it lasts. It’s the gaming equivalent of an extramarital affair.
Short, sweet, and you try hard to not get an STD. (I don’t think my metaphors
have made sense since episode two.) Anyway, 7/10. Check it out and see what
madness you can get into!
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