So, how did reviewers treat 'retro' games on then 'Next-Gen'

[Rogue Trooper]

Kinda a spin-off from the Jaguar reviews/lookback thread (which i did'nt want to de-rail anymore than i already have), hopefully in right area (i don't really view PS1 as all that Retro just yet), but thought i'd continue looking at how the 'press' at the time treated 'Retro' games on the 'Next-Gen' super console platforms and see how it compared to say Jaguar reviews moaning at 16 Bit ports, old genres dressed up in 65,000 colour graphic engines etc.


Few from C+VG

Super Pang Collection PS1 3/5

Megaman 8 3/5-anyone wishing for the good old days of SNES+MD will find what they are looking for here.This is the sort of game you should pick up if you see it fairly cheap.

Clockwork Knight Saturn 74% 'Other than exceptional graphics, nothing you could'nt have in a MD game'

Ultimate Parodius (PS) 85% but reviewers dissapointed by lack of new features, hard to part cash with a game that could be had for half the price on SNES, not the kind of thing they expected to see on PS and for what a Playstation cost, punters had a right to expect more.

Gale Racer (Saturn) 17% 'is'nt so much a Gale as a wet fart...been rushed out the door...sprites are 2D, badly defined, lot of flicker on screen when things get busy'

Pop 'N' Twinbee (PS) 87% 'Nothing here that could'nt be replicated on a SNES.

Playstation Plus mini-review Guide scores:

R-Types 81%

Raiden Project 72% Enjoyable, but limited, graphics and animation are only medicore.

Rampage World Tour 69%

Rapid Reload 80% (with a Rent It tag next to it).

Rayman 43%-Well we know they were'nt fans!

Real Bout:Fatal Fury 30% Very stale and slow beat-em-up.avoid

Robotron X 66% Overpriced, underspecced.

Samurai Showdown 19%

Sentient Returns 30%-Having your eyes skewered with fish hooks is better than this

[onthinice]

Not good so far. I am not to familiar with the early Playstation games. Are these reviews high, about right or way to low?

[Shadowrunner]

I would say the scores for Rayman, Real Bout:Fatal Fury, and Samurai Shodown are very low!
The rest seem about right to me.

[Rogue Trooper]

And Laird thought the press were hard on Jaguar beat-em-up's lol, just found a review for Xbox 'Kabuki warriors'

Edge gave it 1/10 said 'This is'nt Kabuki, it's Yie ar Kung Fu with blusher'

Apparently your 1st characters not only lack special moves, but textures, Edge beat game using same move over and over again.

Right back on topic:even as far back as the Jaguar reviews, the same vibes are coming from reviewes:Not what was expected, over-priced, Atari charging £49.99 for Missile Command 3D, now there was no VR headset to play it on, set Les Ellis off, saying it was too expensive for a poor adaption of a 16 year old game.

In Mega's feature on the Jaguar, they question why Humans was coming out on Jag, as it appeared on MD and was'nt very good, MD owners were playing Raiden year before it was annouced on Jaguar, Kasumi Ninja (which back then looked very different)was all well and good but MD owners already had SF", but article suggested SF2 was being coded for Jaguar .

Right back to review scores:

C+VG

Real Bout Fatal Fury (Saturn) 3/5 Paul Davies who said unless your a rabid SNK fan, go for the superior SFA2

Sonic Jam 4/5 (Saturn)

Xevious 3D/G+ (PS) 2/5 A missed opp...one for die-hard Xevious fans only

ThunderForce V (Saturn) 3/5 'It looks terrible...Thunderforce IV on MD looked a lot cooler.

Rockman X3 (PS) 2/5 looks pretty similar to SNES version...it's not even a very good game.


Playnation did a 'Special Report' Are 2D games finally dead, questioning wether 2D had a future in 'todays 3D world'.

[TrekMD]

Interesting idea for a thread!  And, boy, those scores really do suck! 

[Rogue Trooper]

Cheers.guess i'm scrabling to establish 'what was going on' back then.Was it a case of reviewers wanting state of the art on a £300 console or...as long as a 'retro game was handled properly  and priced fairly ,or a compilation offered VFM, they'd be treated fairly?.

Few more for you guys:

C+VG

Asteriods PS1 3/5 'Graphical overhaul looks nice...lots of particle effects, backgrounds play a part in some levels..if you're a fan of the original, you'll love this update.



Spot Goes To Hollywood (Saturn) 2/5 too dated+Simple

Contra (PS) 3/5 a bit of a disapointment for the hardcore Contra fans...still a decent shoot-em-up, but not one worthy of that name.

Playstation Plus next:

Namco Museum Vol 1 84% '...at the end of the day, the value of this CD is very much down to wether you care about old games or not'

Ballblazer Champions 87% Superb Stuff...Fast, Furious and highly recommended.

Namco Museum Vol 5 79% Jolly good fun if you enjoy a little nostalgia.

Atari Collection 75% Retro gaming comp.with dubious appeal.


Lone Solider 72 Commando in 3D, but sadly it's too slow.

Lost Vikings 2 63%

Namco Museum 2 63% Not as strong as the 1st

Namco Museum Vol 371% Better than Vol 2, but still more poor games than classics


Tempest X3 80% an update of a great shooter

Williams Arcade classics 89% A retro comp.with 5 good games out of 6

[Rogue Trooper]

Few snippets from interview EDGE talked to the team behind the Namco Museum series on PS1

They were dissapointed by the CD drive speed on PS1, so had to cut down on animation frames in some games converted to PS1, strong market for Retro comps in Japan, games converted were based on survey findings from Namco staff+general public to see which exactly they wanted, sales wise, Vol's 1, 2+3 together sold 600,000 in Japan USA sales for Vol 1 alone were between 80,000 and 90,000 they hope for good sales in the UK as well.

Back to reviews, all from EDGE

Tetris+ (Saturn)  6/10 'little more than a PC or Mac desktop add-on

Tempest X3 (PS) 8/10

Pitfall 3D (PS) 6/10

Rampage World Tour (N64) 5/10-would be more at home on a Retro comp.CD than a costly N64 Cart.

G-Darius (PS) 7/10

Darius Gaiden (Saturn) 6/10 'looks uncomfortably 16 Bit, with little to exploit the Saturns potent 2D'

Xevious 3D/G+ 7/10

Strider 1+2 (PS) 7/10 arcade fans should not miss

Ballblazer Champions 6/10 An acquired taste



Thunderforce V 6/10 Maybe Thunderforce VI on sega's Dreamcast is where the series future really lies (if only that had been true...sigh)

[TL]

Crock of shit.

I have Rampage World Tour, Darius Gaiden and Tetris Plus for the Saturn - they are all excellent! 

[Rogue Trooper]

Few more, all from EDGE:

N.B:I'm NOT going to be typing out entire review, just score and comments that relate to fact reviewer felt dissapointed by games roots/or could have been done on existing 16 Bit systems etc.


Swagman PS 5/10 'simply feels 16 Bit'

Legacy Of Kain PS 6/10 'take away the FMV and you could be playing any SNES action RPG circua 1994'

Mass Destruction 6/10 'Shallow structure, poor A.I...Saturn owners will expect a lot more'

[TL]

Mass Destruction 6/10 'Shallow structure, poor A.I...Saturn owners will expect a lot more'

What in actual fuck??? 

[Alberto 2K]

Real Bout:Fatal Fury 30% Very stale and slow beat-em-up.avoid

Samurai Showdown 19%

These two killed me... :19:

[Rogue Trooper]

Edge once did a 'special feature' where reviewed some classics of old as if the publication had been around in 1978 onwards:


Elite on BBC scored 10 'There's never been a game like it.In the future, all games will be like Elite'.


Exile on BBC 10 'so far ahead of everything else that it's practuically a vision of the future'.


Dungeon Master ST/Amiga 9 'Dungeon Master can be summarised in one word:beguiling'

Rogue PC 8

Captain Blood ST/Amiga  7  '....a unique and strangely affecting space oddity'

Pilot Wings SNES  9 'Supremely entertaining'

Sonic The Hedgehog MD 8 'all MD owners should sample it's delights'

Powerdrome ST/Amig 8

[Rogue Trooper]

Mass Destruction 6/10 'Shallow structure, poor A.I...Saturn owners will expect a lot more'

What in actual fuck??? 

Yep, it's this attitude from the press that THEY and THEY alone know what the user wants that grips me, just as much as the attitude they have that say's they know how history went down...

I loved Mass Destruction, utter carnage and looked and sounded bloody superb to boot.

[Rogue Trooper]

Posted it in Lynx reviews/look back thread, but Joust on Lynx scored 6/10 in Lynx User fanzine at review, with reviewer complaining it was'nt sort of game that showed off the power of the system and rather than straight conversion, they'd have been better off doing an updated version.

[Rogue Trooper]

Few more from EDGE:

Namco museum Vol 1 PS 7/10

Reviewer warns newbies games are brutally hard which is fair point, some of the caption text is bit odd though, talks of Pole Position being 'dire' when compared to modern racers, fair enough game has strict time limits and the steering just does'nt translate well to joypad, but why would you compare an early 80's coin-op to racer from 1995?

Castlevania SOTN PS gets 8/10, though reviewer says some of the visuals are surprisingly crude, looking as if they were originally designed for SNES/MD.

Nuclear strike PS 6/10 Reviewer bemoans it's not a graphical leap over Soviet Strike and game has strong feel of deja Vu.

Hang On GP'95 Saturn 6/10 But this seems let down by poor coding-bikes movement in realation to speed it's going at is poor and fails to capture the riding experience, sound chip poorly used (dire music, engine sounds like a fly trapped between 2 panes of glass), reviewer said game looks rushed and uncared for.

Ray Crisis PS1 '...plays like a 16 Bit shooter in Playstation polygons....if that's what you want it won't dissapoint, but niether will a 2nd hand Mega Drive'