Let's Reminisce: Sega Saturn

[No One]

The problem is that for whatever reason people who had an SNES and PS1 seem to be ignorant about everything else far too often. Unlike any other era, there were four very, very solid platforms from 1990-1995. And I still contend the SNES is the worst of those four unless you just had to play a large quantity of RPGs. The Saturn and N64 weren't slouches either. If someone went Genesis to Saturn and didn't know shit else, I'd have the same issue, but that doesn't seem to happen anywhere near as often.

What are you basing that on, other than anecdotal evidence? Is the argument that old Sega fans are more worldly when it comes to gaming? Most of the people I knew growing up had an NES and then a Genesis (throw a TG16 in there and you have my story as well). Nobody really had an SNES until the home port of Street Fighter II came out.

What's the fourth platform you're talking about? SNES, Genesis, TG16/CD, and what...Neo Geo? PC? Game Boy?

[YellerDog]

I don't know what the actual final sales figures were, but growing up, there were a lot more people around me with NES and SNES units than gen units (and forget about master system. No one had that).

I still haven't met anyone from the south who owns(ed) a sega CD or seen another one used. You could get games in Tupelo, Jackson, Memphis and Florence, so someone must have had one other than me, but fuck if I met them.

For the longest time, this worked out pretty well too. I could buy gen games and then go play snes and nes games at a friends house. I didn't see much if any Gen ownership until the model 2 came out. A lot of people got the Sonic 2 package deal in 92 or 93. And those people tended to buy nothing but piles of shitty sports games.

Hey now. Genny sports games were pretty rad.

[Yoshi]

What's the fourth platform you're talking about? SNES, Genesis, TG16/CD, and what...Neo Geo? PC? Game Boy?

Neo Geo. It's definitely anecdotal. I'm not claiming to have empirical data, though I wish I had a way to gather it.

cheeks, he's right. The SNES didn't catch the Genesis in sales until after the Saturn was out. Now that's a North America statement. In Japan, the Mega Drive got clobbered.

[jyoung]

I had:

SNES -- 1992
N64 -- 1996
Genesis -- 1998
Dreamcast -- 2000
Gamecube -- 2001
PS2 -- 2003
Xbox 360 -- 2007

A lot of my friends had Playstation and Genesis, so I never bought those 'til later on when they were super cheap.

[Shou]

I first played the SS right after its November 94 launch in Japan as a good friend is an absolute Sega nut and got it for VF. So while, most were playing Donkey Kong Country, we were on VF1 which was amazing good (100% gameplay wise) to the 16 bit generation. Being fortunate to manage a Die Hard franchise store, we had all of the new imports all throughout the system's life, so we were always knee deep in it and sold 100s of units of popular titles. While it's certainly remembered for all of the great arcade ports (and I did play many of those), loved the original titles too. For me, I look at the global catalog of titles for a platform and I'd say up to 97 that it was a great adversary to the PS and it only stopped because SOJ pulled the plug.

My SS original favs not counting ports:
Azel (all of the Panzers really)
Detective Saburo Jinguji 6
Grandia (best JRPG ever)
Island of the Seven Winds Story
Sakura Wars series
Shining Force III series
Taromaru
Thunder Force V
Tomb Raider

[Fe 26]

cheeks, he's right. The SNES didn't catch the Genesis in sales until after the Saturn was out. Now that's a North America statement. In Japan, the Mega Drive got clobbered.

Hard to believe. I'd have to see the yearly sales figures. it didn't seem like the model 1 sold much. And model 2 owners didn't seem to buy many games. Or good games (mostly just used the system for sports games).

I guess I could see the number being inflated by that last model 3 money grab

[Some Stupid Japanese Name]

The genesis had the market until sega decided to drop 16 bit in favor of the saturn and the 32x. Not everyone was ready to plop $300-$400 down to enter the 32 bit era and nintendo wisely recognized this. The super nintendo had established its dominence long before the piece of crap genesis 3 launched. But throughout 92 and 93, sega was winnIng the war, as far as non japan territories were concerned.

[Korian]

I already stated that the 32X contributed to the failure of the Saturn, people didn't want to shell out another $400 for a 32 bit system.

Despite slowdown and other issues Castlevania purisists prefer the Japanese version.

Are we off topic? or can I say Tonka Toys didn't know how to market a game system, they did sandbox toys.

[gamevet]

I first played the SS right after its November 94 launch in Japan as a good friend is an absolute Sega nut and got it for VF. So while, most were playing Donkey Kong Country, we were on VF1 which was amazing good (100% gameplay wise) to the 16 bit generation. Being fortunate to manage a Die Hard franchise store, we had all of the new imports all throughout the system's life, so we were always knee deep in it and sold 100s of units of popular titles.

I loved going to the Die Hard game store we had in Plano Texas. I got to see Mario 64, Resident Evil and countless other titles they had on import, before they were released in the States. I knew things were going south for the store, when the manager I always talked to when I visited the place was gone and 2 douchebags were in his place. It closed about 6 months later.

[Fe 26]

The genesis had the market until sega decided to drop 16 bit in favor of the saturn and the 32x. Not everyone was ready to plop $300-$400 down to enter the 32 bit era and nintendo wisely recognized this. The super nintendo had established its dominence long before the piece of crap genesis 3 launched. But throughout 92 and 93, sega was winnIng the war, as far as non japan territories were concerned.

that correlates with what I remember.

92-93 was when the sonic 2 pack in model 2 came out. Most walmarts had started carrying sega stuff around that point. I remember a lot of people getting the sonic 2 model 2 around then too.

Then they just got sports games.