@Blrb#6696 Thanks, these are some nice, off-the-beaten-path recommendations. Asuka 120% is another one I've been meaning to check out forever.
I got that exact question last year so I can just copy-paste and translate my advice.
To understand the SegaSaturn, you need to understand it was the true heir to the generation of video games that preceded its release. The previous generation was still very dependent on arcade ports. _The console with the most arcade ports?_ It's the Saturn. _The closest successor to the Super Famicom school of game design?_ Clearly the Saturn with its old school RPGs and 2D action games (even the PlayStation is ahead of the N64, somehow). _The true successor to the PC Engine?_ Well, everyone from that camp bailed out on the PC-FX and moved to the Saturn. Shmups, RPGs, dating sims, you name it. _The closest successor to the Mega Drive?_ It's the Saturn, but only by default really, because even the Saturn was not that good of a successor to the MD library, especially outside Japan. _PC-98 hits?_ Found a mainstream home on the Saturn. _The most faithful Neo Geo ports of the era?_ They were on the Saturn, obviously. _Etc._
The Saturn is the ultimate console of the 16-bits era. It lost the commercial war it got into because it picked the wrong fight, against two companies who understood how to make that previous generation uncool. But in retrospect, pound for pound during its existence (so roughly 1994-1998), the Saturn's software catalogue is just as strong as its contemporary PS1 (which got many of its best games from 1998 onwards) and N64 (which barely existed side by side with the Saturn and arguably spent more time facing the Dreamcast). And if you did prefer the kind of games designed in the previous generation, especially arcade games and the PC Engine, there is no sweat seeing the Saturn as the best machine of its era. There you go! That's my best defense for the Saturn, conveniently hiding all the crap and the stupid under the carpet while you're looking away.
With this cheerful perspective in mind, here are the types of games I recommend to understand and encapsulate the Saturn without spending too much cash. That list of recommendations was addressed to a person who had novice notions of Japanese so I added some notes (â˘) about which games could present potential issues.
### Sega AM, King of the Arcades
### Sega CS, the Eternal Challenger
### Children of the Mega Drive
### The Super Famicom legacy
### The PC Engine Diaspora
### The PC-98 gets mainstream
### The true Neo Geo CD
### The Best of '90s Arcades
And I will add (for free!) two categories dedicated to the two arcade games that could be described as "social phenomenons" in Japan at the time, and the inevitable rivals / clones / cousins that followed.
### Virtua Fighter-xploitation
### It's Puyo Puyo Fever!
*VoilĂ !* Pick between 1 and 3 games from each category (maybe depending on your personal interests) and you will end up with a catalogue of 10 to 30 games that properly encapsulate the SegaSaturn. I could have picked many more candidates for each category. I know from experience that I could make three different lists of games (so 90 games total) with the same "constraints" / categories in mind.
_**Notes:**_
(â˘) Speaking japanese is advised, but an official English version of the game exists
(â˘â˘) Speaking japanese is advised, but an unofficial English patch, an official English translation on a different platform and/or a well-detailed walkthrough can be found on the Internet.
(â˘â˘â˘) Get cracking on these Japanese lessons, it will be worth it.
@chazumaru#6709 this is a great take on the Saturn. Such a fascinating platform that got lost in the shift in game design. Itâs odd that Sega was pushing 3d in big ways at the arcade but focused on 2d for the home market. Seems like they were caught by surprise on how big 3d would become.
Congrats on the Saturn acquisition! It's probably my second favorite console next to the Mega Drive.
Guardian Heroes, Guardian Heroes, Guardian Heroes!! I cannot recommend Guardian Heroes enough! Also the Japanese version is still affordable (it's how I got my own copy). Burning Rangers is neat for seeing how Sonic Team explored full 3D outside of the human navigation (and messy Sonic) parts of Nights.
Sonic Jam, while a compilation of Mega Drive Sonics, is still the _best_ compilation game out there, I feel. Roaming around Sonic World is really neat, and the one thing that comes close to it are the Namco museum games on the Playstation.
Sonic R is also fun once you get use to setting your mind to play it like a racing game with an accelerator and drift buttons.
Going back to Treasure, the Saturn version of Silhouette Mirage has some more subtle flourish on their 2D art that's missing in the Playstation version, and is also way more balanced than the Working Designs release.
Mega Man 8 has some extras the PSX version is missing, too, with two extra boss battles and a few other changes.
@chazumaru I really like this reading of the saturn library, and I guess because of that I'll put my recommendations into this thread instead of starting a new one. But I think your reading of it does the system a lot more justice than my way of thinking about it.
Ultimately, I think of the Saturn as a pretty bad console with weird games on it, despite how much I like it. It was tough to make games for! This was both it's worst and best point. Worst because without herculean effort or an arcade/PC game to start from (plus a somewhat lesser herculean effort), you made crap. Best because those who pushed through and really did something made experiences, visuals, and concepts unseen anywhere else.
So here's an attempt at some lists. I'll do one that's "games everyone knows but are indeed worthwhile," second is "games that are slightly under the radar but gaining popularity, or which are known in general but under-discussed," third is "games not so many people know but which are cool" and finally "games that are not necessarily good but are interesting for one reason or another" which frankly encompasses the majority of the non-kusoge library.
Chaz' list is more concise and includes some of my games, and some I don't have. I didn't put anything on the list that I can't personally say much about, but suffice it to say, daytona USA CCE is very good even though it's not on the list.
**GOOD GAMES PEOPLE KNOW ABOUT**
**IN BETWEEN**
**UNDER THE RADAR**
**JUST INTERESTING**
well the end
I will add that you absolutely should not buy a real copy of it, but Deli Soba Deluxe is one of the most fun 5 minute long games I have ever played
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBVAHtfGubs&ab_channel=SaturnMemories
My only real two cents here is that no one should sleep on how good Capcom's Japanese Saturn library was, especially their CPS2 ports using the RAM cart. Importing X-Men vs. Street Fighter is what sold me on picking up a Saturn, after I begrudgingly refused to support the system (long story short, I had a 32X and felt betrayed by SEGA ⌠but I am such a huge Capcom/FGC person, that X-Men vs. Street Fighter broke my âprotestâ).
X-Men vs. Street Fighter, Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter, Vampire Saviour, Street Fighter Alpha 3 ... all used the RAM cart and all were so, SO close to the CPS2 experience (for the time).
Wow, thank you so much, @chazumaru and @exodus. Thanks to you and everyone else who's responded in this thread, I will be occupied with Saturn deep-diving for at least the next few months.
We've started delving into what has always made the Saturn such a compelling and mysterious console for me. Whereas the Genesis, SNES, PlayStation and Nintendo 64 were all well-known quantities for me growing up, the Saturn existed somewhere in between all of them, delivering _something_ all its own, but from an outsider 12-year-old's perspective, it was never exactly clear what that _something_ was. It was vaguely intimidating for me, at that age, and so remained that way for decades.
Since purchasing my Saturn, I've sort of been reflecting on the fact that this new console (in my life) provides me with far more excitement than either of the actual new consoles (PS5 and Xbox whatever) that the industry is trying to get me interested in. At first, I chalked it up solely to nostalgia, but you've helped me figure out that there's more at play: hardware in the 16 and 32 bit eras genuinely did have distinct personality. Because development for each machine was so different, and there were such limitations in place on what could be accomplished, each console really did have its own flavour, or personality. People who've been around long enough to remember when this was the case seem desperate to apply that sense of personality to the new consoles, but Sony and Microsoft are really both just bringing affordable PCs to people who don't want to buy an actual PC, for whatever reason. There's very little to distinguish those two machines from each other, and if the Switch didn't have portability, it would also feel basically the same, except less powerful and with a hilariously hard-to-navigate eShop.
Plugging in my Saturn for the first time and watching its logo materialize out of what appeared to be broken glass, I knew I was in for a defined aesthetic. I like what Sega printed on the console's box, in 1994, for Japanese consumers: "SEGASATURN represents a leap into the new age of entertainment. Its launch is a new step for SEGA, too. Let's go forward together." Sure, that's just catch copy, but with 26 years of distance between it and now, we've got a crystalized understanding of what that new step ultimately became for Sega, and it sure is cool to be able to pull the lid off of four years' worth of hard-won game design victories (and compromises) and see what it looks and feels like.
In 2020, digging into a library this old, with this distinct a flavour, feels like discovering a band you never knew existed, or even a whole new genre of music. That's not something anyone will be able to say in the year 2040, if they were to purchase a vintage PlayStation 4 and dig into its back catalogue.
As a game liker, I can't imagine a more exciting proposition than this, is how I feel.
I gotta say, as someone who hasn't really started digging the Saturn catalog past the most popular games due to feeling super overwhelmed and not really knowing where to start this thread is a tremendous resource. Sincere thanks to everyone participating!
Most of anything remotely interesting I have to say @exodus has already covered (mostly things about Silhouette Mirage, one of my favourite games, ever, but also because Battle Monsters does in fact rule somehow by being terrible in a lot of ways), but I do have a few tiny additions:
All of these games are exclusively in the 'probably don't bother unless you're made of money or are playing with ISOs and have run out of other things to try'.
Edit: Oh wow, hadn't intended for all these to be fighting games, but they are!
Edit 2: I'm taking a risk that my Saturn fan credentials will get revoked for saying it, but I also like the inferior yet expanded Saturn version of Akumajou Dracula X: Gekka no Yasokyoku (AKA Castlevania Symphony of the Night), mostly for anthropological reasons. Like my suggestions above, I can't recommend you buy it, but you might just consider playing an ISO or watching a longplay.
if you have any musical inclination at all, Techno Motor is inexpensive and very fun to mess around with:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUg3G2aIOFA
oh I meant to say @chazumaru good call on chaos seed in the SFC successor area!
@Neko#6782 that looks rad.
@exodus#6785 Great game, and a great guide has appeared during the last decade; I certainly wish I had it back then! Itâs for the SFC version but the basics apply just as well to the Saturn remake. I also looked into and picked up the original guidebooks released for both versions a couple of years ago.
Here is a live play session of the Saturn version with some members of the original dev team.
https://youtu.be/ItNAQbq6B6Y
This game would have been perfect on the DS! Portable dungeon-making with the info divided on two screens. Too bad nobody got around to making it. I am not entirely sure who has the rights to Neverlandâs catalogue nowadays.
yeah, as I was testing it out myself I thought it'd be great for DS!! I wish that form factor were still viable.
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Man. You know what made me realize the Saturn has been the last console I had yet to pick up and play?
Because I did something I hadnât done since I was a teenager.
I read the lists on Racketboy. You know what Iâm talking about? For every console, racketboy has lists of the rarest and most expensive games in every region, as well as lists of the âobscure â hidden gems" and âobvious choicesâ. I love these, I cut my retro gamer teeth on them back in the day when I would google for âobscure _console namegamesâ. Itâs been a very long time. Maybe I should go browse the HG101 Saturn list while Iâm at it. :j
I hope Legend of Oasis is good. It could be the Alundra of the SaturnâŚ.
Iâd been waiting years to finally play Elevator Action Returns and I wasnât disappointed.
Princess Crownâs pixel art graphics are in another class than anything Vanillaware made after. Itâs the only 240p game they made.
Also Odin sphere straight ripped the opening menu with the girl and the kitty and the book from PC! I can imagine O sphere improved a lot⌠but the fact PC even has the cool inventory menu from Odin Sphere is pretty remarkable for a game of this vintage. Such well executed, stylish choices. These are some of the best 2d games Iâve ever played! Everything is animated smoothly. Elevator Actionâs seamless scene & stage transitions are so cool. I was a fan of the original famicom game somewhat ironically⌠It is amazing how "90âs cool" they managed to make Elevator Action, a game that always had a somewhat lame appearance before.
Saturn did so much good 2D stuff right that we could make lists all day even on a forum like this and weâd still be overlooking something. I really must second @exodus Astal mention since youâre playing on a CRT.
No one has mentioned how good winter heat is yet, either.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSXCWb4Ypgc