After the successful release of Nintendo’s NES Classic and the upcoming release of the PS Classic, I’ve been wondering if Sega will release their own mini console? And if so which one should it be and what are the must have games for it?
For me it would be perfect if we got a Sega Satan ‘mini’. Obvious games to include are:
Panzer Dragoon Series, Nights into Dreams, Virtual Fighter, Guardian Heroes, Sonic, etc.
What do you guys think? Should Sega do something like this, what games should they include?
A mini Dreamcast might be interesting too… they could include games such as Skies of Arcadia and Chu Chu Rocket which aren’t on modern digital distribution platforms. Phantasy Star Online might be too much of a challenge.
What’s the concept behind PS classic exactly? Does it emulate only the games it is preloaded with? What is the advantage of owning one VS owning an old PSX? I mean, I heard it costs $99US, so what’s the deal? It’s the price of all the games? But then, are more expected to be available later or what?
Why not just make a bundle available in PSN? I already am noticing the backlash from people cancelling pre-orders.
I’d like a Saturn mini, but let’s be real - if it did happen it’d be Japan only. My understanding is that it’s success in Japan is mostly due part of the Saturn being an indie RPG-box more than anything else, so if there was a Saturn mini, it’d be mostly just games like that. In Japanese.
Well, my original playstation’s disc laser died last year (22 years old!) and I had to buy a new system. Got it cheap though. So, maybe in the long run, with no moving parts the PlayStation Mini will last longer?
I’d just save your money anyway and go the emulation route! Besides nostalgia, there really is no reason to buy this with such a limited number of games…
I played quite a few games using ePSXe. My entire original, collection is backed up actually. There are a bunch of plugins you can play around with to get the audio and video to your liking. There is also a cheat code plugin to use all of those great game shark codes we grew up using!
It would probably be best to get as many roms/iso’s as you can seeing how many of those sites like Emuparadise seem to be disappearing…
Thoughts? I like the collection of games but a few that would have made this an instant buy are Sonic 3 and Knuckles, Shining Force 2, and Streets of Rage 3. I may still pick this up and am holding out hope for the ability to add more games upon release.
It doesn’t really interest me, because many of these games have been re-released numerous times. I’d much rather play these games on existing hardware that I already own (such as in MegaDrive Classics collection for current gen consoles or the mobile versions of these games). I’m glad they’re including Landstalker.
I think the real appeal is that M2 are doing the ports so that we can almost guarantee that the emulation will be extremely accurate and that most likely there will be lots of upgraded features and options available. After reading more about the M2 Dev team and based off their past Sega Ages and classic ports, it is probable that this device will make the Nintendo mini systems seem like they are only just decent. The only disappointing thing for me are the missing games that have been available on Segas other PC classic collections like the games I mentioned above.
I don’t regret buying the Mega CD at all, its after the Saturn my favourite console (ok its an add-on) with a great line up of games and some utter gems. Its just a shame SEGA Japan never used the ASIC hardware to port the likes of Outrun, Space Harrier, AB II, Super Hang-on to it
The 32X is a pile of rubbish and a complete waste of time and really what cost SEGA in the 32-bit Hardware battle (it split not just SEGA teams and PR begets, but also SEGA fanbase) . I’ve always hated it and never bought one myself (mine was gifted to me by a family member lol)
The problem with the Mega CD and 32X was how they confused the lineup, especially the 32X that arrived so close to the Saturn. It seems Sony and Microsoft have been careful to make the games for their Pro/X systems compatible, rather than creating fragmentation, a move that I think Nintendo would be wise to follow with their next Switch model.
I don’t think they was anything confusing with the Mega CD, the clue was in the name of the system :). The trouble was, SEGA didn’t make much use of all that nice tech they put inside the system. When used the system could not only outclass the MD or Snes, but even a system like the Neo Geo.
The 32X was just a joke of a system, that should never have seen the light of day. But there you go, SOA/SOE was so sure that the system would sell on its price alone.
The 32X was actually an interesting idea and it did have quite a few good games. It wasn’t the best business decision to have two separate competing 32 bit systems. The 32X actually was better hardware than the Saturn when it came to 3D, hence it having the best ports of some of Sega’s arcade games like Virtua Racing. It wasn’t as good as the Saturn at 2D sprites, but I would argue it was good enough, Calibre and Knuckles Chaotix are examples of very colorful pretty 2D games. If Sega had released the Saturn with hardware more similar to the 32X, it would have been easier to develop on, would have been cheaper to produce, and would have been much more competitive with the PlayStation hardware at the time. We might even still have Sega around as a hardware Dev.
The 32X wasn’t better than the Saturn at all, even the SH-2 in the Saturn run faster . The only reason why Virtual Racing Deluxe looks and runs better is becasue it was made by SEGA own CS team and not the crap Time Warner and Virtual Fighter on the 32X is miles off the Saturn version graphically and sound wise. The 32X was just a huge mistake and a waste of time and money and worst still Split SEGA development teams, retail and 3rd parties
The 32X uses the same two SH2 CPUs. The real difference between the two in hardware was the way rendering was handled. Per the head of Sega of America’s team at the time:
“Saturn was essentially a 2D system with the ability to move the four corners of a sprite in a way that could simulate projection in 3D space,” adds Bayless. “It had the advantage of doing the rendering in hardware, but the rendering scheme also tended to create a lot of problems and the pixel overwrite rate was very high; much of the advantage of dedicated hardware was lost to memory access stalls. 32X on the other hand did everything in software but gave two fast RISC chips tied to great big frame buffers and complete control to the programmer. To be honest, there’s a part of me that wishes Saturn had adopted the 32X graphics strategy, but that ship had sailed long before the green light call from Nakayama.”
The 32X games that looked worse were only due to the rush to release. If Sega would have released the 32X as a standalone system with a CD drive and the same backwards compatiblity, we might have seen more 3rd party support and better graphics over time than the Saturn achieved.
I personally also think Sega dropped the ball by releasing both systems too early and at too high a price. I honestly don’t understand why the Saturn had a cart slot but no backwards compatiblity. These poor business decisions and strong competition contributed to the downfall of Sega.
