alianger

Really haven't played much from that year.

WarioWare, Inc.: Mega Microgame$! (GBA, 2003)

Astro Boy: Omega Factor (GBA, 2003)

Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne (PC, 2003)(Expansion)

Mega Man Zero 2 (GBA, 2003)

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (GBA, 2003)

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (PC/XB, 2003)

Fire Emblem (GBA, 2003)

Ninja Five-O (GBA, 2003)

Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando/Ratchet & Clank 2 (PS2, 2003)

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga (GBA, 2003)

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (XB/PS2/GC/PC, 2003)

Boktai: The Sun Is in Your Hands (GBA, 2003)

F-Zero GX (GC, 2003)

Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising (GBA, 2003)

Ys VI: The Ark of Napishtim (PC, 2003)

Disgaea: Hour of Darkness (PS2, 2003)

Beyond Good & Evil (PC/GC/XB/PS2, 2003)

Zone of the Enders: The 2nd Runner (PS2, 2003)

Freelancer (PC, 2003)

Haven't thought about it much this time, been pretty busy with other stuff like work lately.

-Guess I'll finish up some bonus content for my platform adventure history site as well as its migration to Wix

-Gonna branch out a bit more in terms of genre and play some more weird stuff

-Maybe do some more chiptune work

-Will try not to buy any games for the next 3 months or so, besides maybe Metroid Dread and Cadence of Hyrule

-There's a lot of canonized classics I haven't played but it's nothing new, I'll try to beat a few this year

Nice write-up. Here's some of what it would've been up against in the US if released there in 1987 (checked the dates with mobygames and wikipedia, the ratings are from gfaqs)

PC NetHack 4.38

NES The Legend of Zelda 4.20

NES Super Mario Bros. / Duck Hunt 4.15

NES Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!! 4.13

NES Castlevania 3.90

NES Zanac 3.88

AII Maniac Mansion 3.85

NES Metroid 3.81

SMS Zillion 3.77

NES Mega Man 3.74

NES Rygar 3.60

ARC Contra 3.58

ARC Double Dragon 3.57

ARC Shinobi 3.56

NES Wizards & Warriors 3.56

NES Kid Icarus 3.54

NES The Goonies II 3.48, NES Arkanoid 3.47, NES Rad Racer 3.43, SMS OutRun 3.43, SMS Wonder Boy 3.40, NES Solomon's Key 3.38, NES Pro Wrestling 3.33, NES Lunar Pool 3.33, SMS Space Harrier 3.30, NES Kid Niki: Radical Ninja 3.30, ARC 1943: The Battle of Midway 3.29, NES Lode Runner 3.28, NES Rush'n Attack 3.25

Oh, all good then. Yeah I do know which game you're referring to and it could've been swapped with most of the ones I posted really. :)

My bad, forgot you were doing US titles only :)

There's a bunch of Koei strategy games on the Saturn, so you might as well learn one of them sooner than later.

Nice write-up. The PCE sound chip often sounds similar to the Famicom chip with a VRC6 chip expansion (Castlevania 3 for example) or Konami's MSX games, although more accurately it's like 5 channels of the Famicom Disk System's wavetable channel, plus a noise channel, stereo and the ability to make one or more channels play lo-fi samples (which gives the low end more oomph though you can get pretty good bass without them). If used right it can sound pretty nice I think.

Some of the best sounding games for future reference:

Soldier Blade

Air Zonk

Magical Chase

Devil Crash/Dragon's Fury

Legendary Axe II

Dragon Saber

Blazing Lazers/Gunhed

Snatcher (PCE CD) - part redbook

Legend of Xanadu II (PCE CD) - part redbook

1943 Kai

​Dragon Spirit

Yes, a lot of CD games actually used mostly chiptunes.

From my perspective (which is scandinavian to be clear), I didn't get the Saturn because of poor advertising and the lack of sequels in series like Sonic, Streets of Rage, Earthworm Jim and Toejam & Earl, as well as a (perceived anyway) lack of games like Zelda 3, Super Metroid and Secret of Mana/Evermore. In 1995 I was still happy with SNES and MD games, and also had a PC that could play Warcraft 2, C&C and Doom clones, then got a new one a year or two later which could play more recent 3D games and started playing games like Diablo, SC and Quake 2 online.

I don't remember much talk about either the SAT or PS1 before the N64 also arrived to be honest, I think I got my PS1 in late 1997 or early 1998 after having rented it once maybe 6-8 months before. Tomb Raider, FF7 and OoT were early games with what I'd call more widespread hype at school, later RE2, Gran Turismo, MGS, Tony Hawk. Maybe Crash Bandicoot too, personally I was sick of platformers at that point and didn't like the character. But playing the earliest games retrospectively I'm not that surprised the PS1 was doing better by the end of 1995.

Really wakes me up in the morning.

Oh, I read that as you not liking the game much. :D I feel Rayman has more going for it but it's also more frustrating, especially without cheats to not have to 100% it to beat it. I've yet to try the asymmetric 2-player in Astal.

Yes it did excel at 2D generally, especially shooters and to a lesser extent fighting games if you're into those. But there are some nice platformers too, I forget which ones were actually localized now: Elevator Action 2, Final Bubble Bobble, Psychic Assassin Taromaru and Mega Man X4 are a few.

If a game is unforgiving, but not too hard to be enjoyable with some save states here and there that's a good time to me.