The Sega Genesis vs The Sega Saturn

[Music] one of the most exciting times i had as a kid was when new video game hardware was released for a while it was about inching ever closer to that arcade feeling at home and then it was all about polygons and the new gameplay possibilities they presented but really it was all about playing games the previous generation simply wasn't capable of doing with that in mind i thought it would be fun to take a look at some of the games that appeared on both the genesis and the saturn compare them visually and see if there really was a generational difference i've got 14 games that range from super scalers to fighters to platformers and even a few 3d games mixed in there did the saturn blow away the genesis in every comparison or did sega 16-bit powerhouse hold its own and still play great let's go ahead and find out [Music] one area where the sega genesis struggled mightily during its lifetime was porting arcade super scalers most of these were choppy lower detailed cousins of their much more impressive arcade versions afterburner 2 was no exception the saturn could do a great many things with 2d sprites the genesis simply wasn't capable of and you can see it here and then some the saturn almost flawlessly replicated the arcade right down to the speed number of items on the screen and the color the genesis needs to compromise everything it's choppier there's reduced sprites and the color takes a nose dive the saturn of course sounds incredible as well another area the genesis version takes a massive hit in this is definitely one instance where the increase in power and the cd technology helps the saturn really make a stellar showing leaving the genesis game in the dust it's a great example of how new technology can really make some sizable differences when it comes to certain types of games and the saturn wins this one by a mile [Music] [Music] so castle of illusion is one of my favorite games on the genesis it wasn't a hard game by any means but it had a charm that was backed up by rock solid gameplay and level design when sega brought out the saturn version i was expecting it to be a full on upgrade in every way but they instead released it as a sega aegis product that was meant to be a 101 port and the saturn of course does it easily castle of illusion was an early game in the life of the genesis as well so there's no crazy tricks employed similar to other disney properties like toy story here the old genesis just puts up some nice sprites and backgrounds that the saturn handles easily the gameplay is smooth and the sound is spot on for the most part this one is definitely an oddity because most of the games the two platforms share came from arcade hardware or were ports to many different systems this one originated on the genesis first and foremost and the saturn perfectly mimics the graphics sound and gameplay it kind of makes you wonder why sega didn't reissue a lot of genesis games on the saturn super cheap since most of its games sold best there i would have picked up a streets of rage or shinobi trilogy for 30 dollars in a heartbeat [Music] [Music] unlike castle of illusion earthworm gem 2 was a game that saw some design changes to improve a number of areas when it jumped to the saturn while the genesis did a great job itself the saturn gets a bump in resolution improves sound effects cd music and new backgrounds the question here is could the saturn have done more i think the developers played it really safe with this one the sprites are mostly untouched and i think the backgrounds could have been a lot more impressive the fact that it was such a strong title to begin with means a next generation version should have been something really special to earn your money again given the fact that you must now contend with load times i can't say this one impressed me much the genesis version is just as playable and in most cases loses nothing against the new changes outside of the improved audio gameplay is king and you can't go wrong with either one race driving originally appeared in the arcade thanks to atari it was a 3d driving game released in 1989 well before mainstream polygons showed up i'm not a fan of this game personally i never found the gameplay to be very interesting and the home porch just never kept my attention for very long with that said the genesis version of this was a bit of a technical marvel considering the platform had no inherent polygon acceleration of any kind it wasn't smooth but it's always interesting to see 16-bit hardware run three-dimensional games when the saturn version landed in 1995 it was much less impressive however slow-moving racing games with single-digit polygon counts had no place in a game of that time and race driving was a mess start to finish side by side it's almost laughable that the saturn barely does a better job than its older sibling oh it runs a lot better on the saturn but the actual visuals are remarkably similar if they were going to do this for a platform of the saturn's capability it should have been a full-on remake with a much more impressive engine i wasn't the only one unimpressed as most gaming magazines at the time absolutely slaughtered the saturn release it received some of the lowest scores i've ever seen for the platform [Music] being a fan of the nfl you can bet i was excited to see the madden series jump to the saturn i had greatly enjoyed electronic arts take on american football and played many of the genesis releases for years there are two matins that share the same release years between these two platforms madden 97 and mad 98 when it first showed up on the saturn it used a mix of two-dimensional sprites and 3d polygonal stadiums the engine worked well looked great and kept the same feeling we had grown accustomed to from the 16-bit games there was more animation the sound was much better and you even got some commentary from time to time madden had not changed much over the years on the genesis however while the look of the sprites and the field were modified some these games were remarkably similar in most of their design elements so by the time we get to 1998 you had seen this game plenty of times i had also thought that sega was really going to hammer electronic arts with a football game of their own that never happened and instead we get nfl 97 one of the worst 32-bit sports titles i ever had the displeasure of buying five [Applause] [Music] mortal kombat 2 was a major release on the genesis but by the time it hit the saturn everyone was already playing part 3 on the playstation seeing these two games really illustrates the challenges that the saturn still faced when doing two-dimensional games it had more than enough horsepower to give you large detailed sprites and great looking backgrounds but it still had its hands tied due to the rather tiny pool of memory the system had to work from this translated to long low times missing sound effects and issues with characters like shang tsung and his morphing ability it's pretty easy to see that visually the saturn game is much closer to the arcade but still is nowhere near a 100 complete arcade port in fact the hitching during gameplay is bad enough to impact my enjoyment and i actually prefer the genesis edition more many neo geo ports on the saturn would suffer similar issues translating games that ran on rom chips to a system that was restricted by cd-rom technology and limited system memory presented a ton of challenges i can't help but feel that the saturn could have done this game flawlessly if it had only used one of the extended ram cartridges otherwise it's a fine example that power isn't everything when it comes to gameplay [Music] fight fight i'm willing to bet most of you have played an nba jam at least once in your lives for a time it was one of the most popular games on the market selling millions of units in the u.s alone this one is a great example of how the abilities of a new generation can really impact the quality of an arcade port the genesis version had been great in its own right it played fast and smooth and for the most part looked close enough graphically to make everything feel just like the arcade of course running it side by side to the saturn you quickly realized just how much better the 32-bit version actually was larger sprites that are animated better more sound effects that are clearer and just an overall better representation of the color and detail from the arcade there's nothing wrong with the 16-bit version but having a choice i'll take the saturn game every time [Music] [Applause] robinson having a previous look at afterburner 2 you'd think outrun would be a waste of time but i don't agree i chose this one because it's a great example of the saturn not just bettering the genesis version but bettering the arcade source material that both are based on the genesis version was a decent enough port when it was released in 1991. the scaling is of course nowhere near as nice and the colors are a bit wrong but for a home conversion at the time it was well worth playing you expected the saturn to come along and better it but they went quite a bit further first it has a great new remix soundtrack that adds all kinds of atmosphere and replayability and then there's the smooth mode a 60 frames per second update that makes the game run like butter coupling these additions together you had one of the very best versions of this game for years and it absolutely trounces the genesis game in every way it sort of set a standard for bringing older arcade games home if you are gonna do it do it right and improve it in areas that really make it stand out it's a must-own on the saturn and highly recommended [Music] [Music] while not a big fan of primal rage myself i felt it was a good one to cover because of the jump in quality from 16 to 32-bit the genesis version of this was extremely watered down you name it and it took a massive cutback to get it running on the older hardware the sprites are tiny the color is dithered heavily the backgrounds are much simpler and the animation is severely compromised on the other hand the saturn version is much closer visually while it still sees some cuts to animation and sound effects it resembles the arcade much more they even added some full motion video intro and endings to the saturn release digitized images were perhaps the hardest thing for the genesis to do thanks to its limited on-screen colors and games like this tended to suffer the most it also didn't help that it was developed by probe entertainment who rarely went above and beyond when it came to these kinds of projects the final nail in the coffin of the 16-bit release is the fact that it plays like older revisions of the arcade game so anyone expecting up-to-date combos and fatalities will be greatly disappointed [Music] rage [Music] i was a big fan of street fighter 2 so when special champion edition showed up on the genesis i was extremely happy with how it turned out the only real issue were the scratchy voices but otherwise it was a great looking and playing port of the arcade but side by side to the saturn you can really see just how compromised things needed to be so the genesis could run it properly sprites are much smaller and see huge cuts in animation backgrounds do as well one thing that is easy to notice when comparing saturn capcom games are the differences in resolution these games always had the saturn did not have a mode that could copy the arcade one to one so there were always some noticeable effects on sprites and backgrounds often this would make things look thinner or fatter depending on how the developer treated the image in the case of many capcom fighting games it often had the effect of making the fighters look larger than even their arcade counterparts of course one area where the saturn version of champion edition really shines is its cd audio and much improved voice samples super street fighter 2 the new challengers was also on both machines and have even more noticeable differences despite the genesis version coming on a whopping 40 megabit cartridge to put that into perspective that's larger than some early neo geo titles [Music] [Music] fight [Music] [Music] since we are on a fighting game kick let's go ahead and compare ultimate mortal kombat 3 as well this is another interesting one to see side by side while again the saturn is much closer to the arcade it has shortcomings of its own the cd-rom strikes again with load times and its effect on shang soon and there is even a missing character called rain that was available in the genesis of course the 16-bit edition is missing loads more shiva is gone sound effects are absent and it's missing animalities and mercy there are numerous other differences that are simply too large in number to cover but the ones that you notice right away are the visuals it's mainly the color that suffers in the genesis version in order to deal with the limited palette extreme dithering is used giving everything a washed out look that really impacts the digitized assets the saturn version suffers this to a much lesser extent and otherwise mimics the sprite size and animation quite well gameplay wise they both play great they're both fast smooth and had just about all the moves i could pull off from memory this did not land at home until the summer of 1996 eight years after the release of the japanese mega drive all things considered you really have to respect the genesis in this regard they may have needed some cuts but this was still a very playable version from much much more capable hardware [Music] [Applause] fatality [Music] wins fatality when virtua racing popped up in 1994 for the genesis it was powered by the svp or sega virtual processor this additional math chip helped the hardware render polygons much faster than it could on its own this resulted in a polygon engine orders of magnitude beyond what we had seen before on the genesis it really is something to see 1988 technology pulled us all and i can't tell you how much i wanted sega to pursue this technology for future games on the platform when it hit the saturn in 1995 we got some big increases in performance color and polygon counts time warner interactive also added some additional features like extra tracks vehicles and a new grand prix mode there's no question the saturn version is the superior of the two when it comes to graphics and sound but you know what i am still fully impressed with the 16-bit version i think it really showed that sega was on the right path with the svp chip had they used that as a standalone 50 upgrade and made games for it the genesis could have easily lasted another two years in the us and europe giving sega much more time and experience with regards of how to handle the saturn the possibilities could have been truly tantalizing virtual fighter star wars arcade doom and many more could have benefited from this chip's addition hell i still break it out every so often just to see the old workhorse in all its glory [Music] [Applause] i wanted to use world series baseball as a follow-up to the svp segment to show you what a difference a 3d field could have for sports titles you see the saturn version uses two-dimensional sprites for its players and 3d polygons for its stadium and field i think this would have greatly benefited all of sega's 16-bit sports titles at the time had sega used the svp i mean world series baseball on the saturn is an absolute blast and is hands down one of the better baseball games i've played the way the camera spans and moves across the 3d field really elevated sports titles it also runs great the detail is impressive and you just gotta love the speed between switching batters and sides you can blow through a full game in under 30 minutes typically the genesis version looks and plays nice itself but the flat stadiums really age it against a much more dynamic saturn version i also don't like how almost all of the batter's body is off the screen in this one had sega built a new line of sports titles from 1994 onward using the svp chip i really think it could have been a game changer football soccer basketball baseball boxing you name it and it could have been a huge boon for the brand what will he throw next is it out of here bond it's a game time home run [Music] i included wwf wrestlemania the arcade game because i was always impressed that this game made it to the genesis as well as it did again the saturn version is clearly superior in color sprite size animation and pretty much every other area i can think of but seriously take a moment and consider what you are seeing the gameplay here is just fine on the older 16-bit hardware great even you still get multiple wrestlers on screen multiplayer options and most of the moves are there from what i can tell many people lament the fact that 2d games were seen in a negative light during the 32-bit generation but there were still plenty of them even in the west polygons may have been a new thing but games like these really showed the 16-bit hardware could still play them just fine this lends a bit more to the evidence that sega pulled the trigger much too early with the saturn with the north american and european markets doing so well for them kicking the legs out from under your best-selling hardware may not have been the best strategy instead of worrying about competition for hardware they had not sold yet concentrating on customers they already had may have been the better course of action they would need to do something eventually of course but more time to strategize certainly wouldn't have hurt in the saturn's case a capacity crowd here tonight [Music] my intention here was not to take a 20 plus minute crap on the genesis versions of these games going in you knew the saturn was going to look better in every circumstance but i wanted to show that the genesis wasn't exactly washed up when the saturn appeared while the saturn wins hands down in presentation of these titles in many instances the 16-bit versions played just as well hell and a couple i dare say better this leaves all kinds of points to discuss about sega killing the genesis much too soon and putting that early u.s saturn launch under even more scrutiny sega couldn't have held out forever of course but i think a genesis market using the svp to introduce polygonal elements into tried and true sega properties could have been a big deal the svp on its own likely wouldn't have been more than 50 or so an enticingly cheap buy to get access to polygon games for those that already owned a genesis i think this video also showed that while the saturn had nearly limitless two-dimensional power that capability was somewhat stifled by the cd-rom technology that was behind it in order to reduce load times developers often had their games loading things like animation and sound effects during gameplay which in some cases had some unwanted side effects like hitching that really hampered the flow of things even with all that processing power the saturn's limited memory was a huge bottleneck that held back its full abilities just look at any of the neogeo games on the saturn for proof perhaps if sega had allowed the genesis to go another year or so the u.s and european saturns could have shipped with the first extended ram cartridge built directly into the unit and that could have made a very big difference i'm segalordx thank you guys for watching and i will catch you next time [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] you

Channel: Sega Lord X

Views: 127,254

Keywords: sega saturn, sega genesis, mega drive, segalordx, sega lord x, sega dreamcast, megadrive, game gear, 32x, mega cd, genesis, saturn, master system, sega, sega cd, gameplay, review, movies, retro games, retro gaming, video games, ps4, xbox, wii, nintendo, gamecube, n64, ps1, ps2, ps3, psp, vita, switch, atari, sega saturn games

Id: fr2Bg5Qcbok

Length: 26min 7sec (1567 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 05 2021