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Review by Christopher Coleman |
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Recently, I decided to reacquaint myself with the Mega/Sega CD. Don't know what that is? Well, the Sega Genesis (known as the MegaDrive in Japan and in PAL using countries) was a 16 bit console, a competitor to the Super Nintendo system (called Super Famicom in Japan).
 The inspiration for this expansion - Mr Sega tripped over his son's collection of Def Leppard and Whitesnake CDs and as he hit his head on the banister and rolled down the stairs, he thought "CD add-on! The kids'll love it!". History ensued. The real history, unfortunately, wasn't a shining beacon of success. The SegaCD, and the additional 32x add-on, can't really be considered as popular or well remembered. There was a lot of shovelware - games that would've been essentially (or were exactly) the same on a cartridge, or laserdisc games like Who Shot Johnny Rock? or Time Gal. Did I mention the hardware limitations as well? I hope you don't like a lot of colours distracting you while you watch your windowed FMV clips of Debbie Harry and Corey Haim fighting off evildoers. Back in the day, I had a SegaCD of my very own, one which I bought on vacation in New Jersey and had to carry around New York City, New Jersey, LaGuardia Airport, and eventually all the way back to Australia. It was certainly a well travelled system, if not well loved. About the only game I played on it on anything approaching a regular basis was "Dune". There were some great games, like the "Lunar" series, or "Snatcher", but they were out of my price range at the time. A choice between a fistful of cheap PS1 games or half the cost of "Lunar" from eBay? Not really a choice at all for me. I sold the SegaCD off a few years back to pay for . . . well, let's not talk about that . . . but now it's time to reach back into the mists of history and sample the dubious delights of the expansion that contributed to Sega's decline and eventual demise as a console producer. Big call? Perhaps, but the 32x and the Mega/SegaCD lost Sega a lot of MegaDrive/Genesis fans, especially when the Saturn came out so soon after and killed off the relatively hefty investment people made in these devices. There are definitely some highlights to the Mega/SegaCD library . . . and some absolutely reprehensible piles of poo, too. Shall we take a look? Best Mega/SegaCD Games Snatcher It's "Blade Runner" as written by Hideo Kojima. Nice graphics and presentation, decent speech, a workable interface, if not overly action-y. Those in the know refer to it as more of a digital comic, which is probably about right, considering the level of interaction. Good luck trying to find the game inexpensively, however, as it's probably the most in demand SegaCD title in existence. The Lunar Games (Silver Star Story and Eternal Blue) If we're going to be honest with ourselves, the role playing game genre is probably the best represented genre on the SegaCD. There are very few RPG duds, and lots of quality. I've been playing quite a bit of Silver Star Story so far, and I have to say, it's definitely solid gold. The Lunar series has a strong positive reputation in certain gaming circles, and a well deserved one at that. Perhaps the story starts out a little clichéd - the child adventurer wanting to emulate his hero and head off to become a champion - but it seems well written enough and certainly has attractive graphics, speech and sound. There's some limited "movie" clips of the characters, done in a Japanese anime style, naturally enough considering where the game was written, as well as in game text bubbles. Good news: These games have been enhanced and remade for PlayStation 1, and there's a prequel to them for Nintendo DS called "Lunar Genesis". Bad news: The DS game isn't all that great compared to the originals, and the PS1 games are probably as expensive as the original SegaCD games now anyway. Worse news: Your mother dresses you funny. Honourable RPG Mention: Shining Force CD and Vay
I always loved the Dune universe . . . the first three books were genius, and the other three weren't overly annoying (let's not even mention the novels that came out after Frank Herbert's death). One of my favourite directors, David Lynch, nearly tanked his burgeoning career making a flawed masterpiece adaptation of the first novel into a movie, and… well, here's a licensed game based on it. A port of a PC game by French company Cryo, this is a sort of strategy and adventure hybrid. You start off, as the movie starts off, just arriving on Arrakis, and you control Paul Atriedes. Walking between locations in the palace, interacting with various people including the Duke (your father), Duncan Idaho, Gurney Halleck and your mother, the Lady Jessica. The characters give you various tasks to perform - find Gurney, recruit the Fremen, get stillsuits, etc - and you can use an ornithopter to fly out onto a map from sietch (cave) to sietch, and also explore to find new locations. As you talk to the Fremen and complete more tasks, the world opens up more. The ultimate goal of the game is to fight off the Harkonnen and take your rightful place. Those of you who've played Dune 2 (Dune: Building of a Dynasty, I believe the Genesis cart is called) will probably not be as impressed, considering Dune 2 was the basis for the ever popular real time strategy Command and Conquer series, but Dune itself definitely is worthy of checking out, at least for a few hours here and there. The SegaCD version has nice enough graphics - it uses a more hand drawn/cartoony style - but nothing overly spectacular. Lords of Thunder An excellent side scrolling shooter - yes, I know, dozens of these on carts, but at least this one's a bit of a better effort than Sol Feace. Trust me. 3 Ninjas Kick Back Yes, I'm kidding. It did come with Hook on the same CD in the US, though. Maybe I'm not kidding. Third World War A rather nifty little strategy game which reminded me in some respects of the games I used to play on the Commodore 64 way back in the day. This is a good thing, by the way. You choose a country to control and have to lead it to supremacy over the planet - you can do this with covert and overt operations, and through economics and PR. Definitely worth pursuing, but don't expect fast reflexes and a lot of hand-eye coordination to be required. Silpheed Mmm, more shooty goodness. Silpheed is a great 3D-ish vertical-esque shooter with some rather spectacular (for its time, at least) use of streaming backgrounds from the CD. The best part, however, is that the game is very, very, very fun. You'll find in your own explorations of the Sega CD or of early multimedia gaming in general that this is a rare and beautiful confluence of qualities - good use of CD tech and playability. Rise of the Dragon Rise of the Dragon is another PC port of another Blade Runner style setting, but this time things are a little more interactive than Snatcher. Perhaps not as well written or interesting, but games aren't always about well written and interesting - they're about blowing shit up. Some of the minigames are quite amusing, too - eg, picking locks. Worst Mega/SegaCD Games All the rest of them. All right, not really, that's a tad harsh. I didn't describe things like "Vay" above, another RPG of quality, taste and distinction. Some of the most putrid examples of Mega/Sega CD release include garbage like "Kris Kross: Make My Video" or "Marky Mark: Make My Video". An interesting concept, rearranging elements of a music video to make it your own. However, lousy choices of artist really spoil the fun. If you are or were a fan of Kris Kross or Marky Mark, here's hoping you don't breed. If you already have, I'm thinking burlap sack, large rock, rope and nearby river. There was an INXS version of this as well - yay for Australian bands. Laziness, Shovelware and Enhancements The Mega/SegaCD was plagued with a large amount of shovelware - inferior ports of laserdisc games (including Time Gal, Revenge of the Ninja, Cobra Command, Who Shot Johnny Rock? and others) and ports of MegaDrive/Genesis carts with minimal additions - usually just redbook audio (eg Wolfchild or Radical Rex). Some ports with more significant enhancements/alterations include: Cliffhanger It's the same awful run and punch game for the most part, but the Mega/SegaCD version gives you a few extra snowboarding style stages and some FMV from the movie.
It's Final Fight! It's Final Fight with CD audio! It's Final Fight with Guy intact and unmolested (take that, SNES fans). It's.. damn fun, even after all these years. Although, it's probably surpassed by some of the things people out there have been doing with the Beats of Rage engine. Neo Geo MVS Fun: Fatal Fury Special and Samurai Shodown Yep, you can get sexed up versions of your favourite MVS games on Mega/Sega CD. The load times are a little brutal, but the original music is nice. Honestly, though, you'd be better off playing these games on a Neo Geo system, or at least a Saturn or PS1.
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