Sega Mega Drive UK Launch Titles

[JoeMusashi]

OK, breaking it down:

1   Alex Kidd in the Enchanted Castle
Surely no arguments here that Miracle World is better, right?
no argument

2   Altered Beast
Always a terrible game, even in the arcade. Laughed at by all magazines on release for the MD.
Ha, it is a bit cack. Has a lot of nostalgia attached to it for me so I love it. Don't remember all magazines laughing though.

3   Arnold Palmer Tournament Golf
PGA Tour, less than a year later, show how to properly do a golf game.
Not great but not too bad relatively

4   Forgotten Worlds
Decent, but suffers from not having the roll switch from the arcade. All the home versions were pretty broken as a result.
I first played this on the Master System so appreciated the improved visuals of this

5   Ghouls'n Ghosts   
Excellent.
Agree. Hard a bloody nails though!

6   Golden Axe
Good, as a conversion, but Golden Axe was always a bit repetitive.
This was among the first Mega Drive games I played and it blew me away. This was next gen.

7   Last Battle
Terrible. Everyone knows this.
Yeah, lol. I can give it the time of day for nostalgia.

8   Mystic Defender
Wardner and Strider both came soon after, and both were far better.
Played this on import at a friend of mine. Always had that extra appeal for that reason
Its quick aswell. I've just been playing it actually...

9   Rambo III
It's no MERCS or Ikari Warriors. Or even Commando.
Doesnt need to be any of those. Its Stallone thats enough for me

10   Revenge of Shinobi
Excellent.
This is the jewel in the line-up. Absolutely stunning game

11   Space Harrier II
Good, but like many MD conversions of Super Scalar arcade machines, pales next to the arcade.
Yup, flawed by the lack of scaling but very playable in my opinion

12   Super Hang-On
See above
Quite boring but the story mode adds extra depth

13   Super League Baseball
It wasn't even a good baseball game. You have very little control over your hits, and Sports Talk Baseball was better in every way, although that was 1992 I think. Hardball by Accolade was better too - not sure how early that was though, but was before they started being officially licenced!
Bit of an odd one this as its the only Baseball game I've played. It can be a bit sluggish

14   Super Thunder Blade
Without the cabinet it was nothing. The MD version was awful, with terrible, game breaking collision detection, especially on the into-the-screen levels.
Cack

15   Thunder Force II   
Great, of course.
The only one I've never actually played! Looking forward to picking this up.

16   Truxton
It's no Thunder Force II
I can see where you're coming but I guess it adds a bit of depth to the line up


*EDIT: removed the quote box.

[Shadowrunner]

There actually is a thread dedicated to this very subject if you guys want to talk about launch lineups in general

http://www.retrovideogamer.co.uk/http:/ ... ic.php?t=9 Mind you most of the people who posted in that thread are no longer members here or just don't come around any more, but feel free to bump it.

[JoeMusashi]

Just looked at that thread and it had a slightly different, smaller, Mega Drive UK launch line up that included Columns.

I found the list I used on Sega Retro. It appears to be different on Wikipedia which is where it looks like the other list is from.

Columns is quite a good puzzler.

[deKay]

It is, but the lack of a two player competitive mode, having played that exclusively on the superior Master System version, was a let down.