The Sega Saturn appreciation thread

[TrekkiesUnite118]

Honestly I think the root cause of a lot of these add-on issues is the result of some really bizarre decisions Sega made with the Genesis design. For example the VDP had lines for CRAM expansion, but they are not hooked up to anything from what I remember hearing. The clock line on the YM2612 isn't hooked up to the Z80 as it should be either and I believe Chilly mentioned in another thread that the audio memory is in serial and should be in parallel, or something like that (Care to clarify this Chilly?). From what I understand minor changes concerning these issues could have painted a radically different picture for the Genesis.

The Clock Line on the YM2612 and the other change could have allowed for better PCM playback. Simply hooking the CRAM expansion lines to the expansion port, the Cartridge port, or both would have allowed for the Sega CD or even individual games to expand the amount of color palettes or even the master palette easily as needed. With those changes the 32X may not have even existed as the Sega CD would have most likely addressed the color issue along with all the other issues it addressed with the Genesis hardware.

[sheath]

There is a fair bit of difference between a market comprised of systems from multiple companies, each of which can focus attention upon their own system.
3rd party manufacturers can port their games to any they feel work and would be economically beneficial for them.

Sega's situation was not comparable to that because they were one company with 3 distinct systems (and half of another if you count the 32x CD). All of them were dependent upon having the Genesis.
A new buyer could not just go out and buy a Sega CD or a 32x and play it, they had to have the Genesis first. That is not comparable to someone looking between the 360 and the PS3 for instance.
Likewise many of the systems you mention above target different markets.
The PS2 doesn't target the same market as the ps3/360, which do not target the same people as the handheld systems.

What was stopping the Genesis from targeting younger gamers and new gamers on a budget while the Sega CD targeted budget minded CD-ROM adopters and the 32X 32-bit 3D budget gamers?

In time frame we are talking about here, the genesis, 32x, sega cd, and saturn were all targeting functionally the exact same demographic. The average age and income for gamers at the time was also lower. Meaning a purchase for one was often more likely to cannibalize the expenses of a purchase for another.

Sega split it's effort into too many similar areas at the time. Had the 32X been a new handheld instead of an add on, things might have been different from a market perspective. But even that is a moot point. They might have changed their minds if it sold obscenely well... but short of some miraculous turn like that, they were never going to give it a chance, and barely had the ability to do so. It sold on promises they never had any intention of delivering. Not that the hardware was incapable, but the company itself was unwilling, perhaps at the time fully unable, to fulfill them.

The Genesis was a mass market item by then, so it made sense for the Sega CD and 32X to be peripherals for a product that was already in tens of millions of households anyway. As products the Sega CD and 32X only needed to function in the same way that the Eye Toy, Kinect or Playstation Move have. Create an air of technical achievement and expandability and support it with some games that sell, it is a simple concept that the industry has actually adopted. If Sega wanted to avoid confusion between the 32X and Genesis from 1995 on all they needed was a DUO console.

When it came time for the Saturn, the Sega CD and 32x came back to haunt them. Sony's serious push to gain entry to the market cemented the misgivings of other gamers and retailers alike who were ready and willing with wallets in hand to give the new guy a chance, especially since Nintendo was still in the game to fall back onto if the playstation was a bomb.

Nope, I don't like narrative history, not at all.

[Saturn Fan]

Because it WASN'T an idiotic idea. Anyone with half a brain could see the advantages. Instead of paying $20 more for a cart like SNES+FX/2, you paid a one time fee to get better games on your existing Genesis and pay the same for carts. It paid for itself in just 8 or so games. It was genius, extending the low-end market until the high-end took hold and prices dropped. No one simply stops making games for the previous generation console... until Sega did just that. Did it TWICE in fact - first with the 32X, and once more with the Saturn. That completely shattered whatever faith people had in Sega as a console maker. They're lucky they survived at all.

Genius? Yeah....you tell yourself that. But most of us back in the day knew better that it was a really foolish idea, and that our money would be better spent on the Saturn instead. Which it was.

Why waste $$ trying to extend the viable life of the Genesis? It was a great system but one that had its time at the forefront, and everyone knew a great new system would soon be around the corner no matter what.

Only fools....

[sheath]

Well, thanks for calling me a fool then. I bought and enjoyed the 32X at launch and for the following twelve months was more than occupied with its library while everybody else either waited or paid a premium for the "true 32-bit experience". By late 1995 a couple of my friends had a PS1 and Saturn, but that was it.

[Saturn Fan]

I choose to wait a bit for the Saturn and not bother with knock off 32-bit games, from an add-on that i doubted Sega would support for very long anyway. And i was right.

Most of us saw the writing on the wall. 32x should have never been.

[Barone]

Genius? Yeah....you tell yourself that. But most of us back in the day knew better that it was a really foolish idea, and that our money would be better spent on the Saturn instead. Which it was.

Why waste $$ trying to extend the life of the Genesis when a great new system would inevitably be around the corner soon anyway, delivering much better games and true 32-bit experience?

Only fools....

Some appointments from the "fool" side of things:
1-Prior to SOJ's dumb ass decision of antecipating Saturn's release and its "surprise" launch, the "great new system" hasn't materialized yet and nobody knew how "great" it would actually be in practice.
2-Most of you, smart guys, shouldn't be buying and reading any magazines back then. 'Cause the fools doing it were actually quite excited about the 32X and the initial word of the press was very positive about the Sega's new add-on (as well as dozens of readers' letters). It wasn't until the, later, dozens of Saturn games screenshots popped up with "amazing looking" graphics (like the bs of Saturn's V.R.) that people started to consider the 32X an arguable/bad idea and, still, most of the opinions were quite favorable about the system until Sega had shitted all over the 32X's owners heads with its fantastic decision of dropping its support sooooo quickly.
3-An upgrade that would give you games like Virtua Racing Deluxe, which actually looked and played better than any Jaguar/3DO/Genesis/SNES game of the time, for less than half of the then estimated prices of the "great new systems" wasn't a dumb idea at all.
4-Even lackluster ports/versions/games like MKII on the 32X compare fairly well with some early PS1 and Saturn releases. Just for being able to avoid the attrocious loadings of some early 32-bit CD based games, like for 2D fighters, and being able to reuse all your Genesis controllers it could have been an interesting platform for some time, had Sega marketed it a little better, provided a consistent port of Doom, didn't anticipate the Saturn's US release that way and killed it so abruptly like they did.

[Chilly Willy]

Honestly I think the root cause of a lot of these add-on issues is the result of some really bizarre decisions Sega made with the Genesis design. For example the VDP had lines for CRAM expansion, but they are not hooked up to anything from what I remember hearing. The clock line on the YM2612 isn't hooked up to the Z80 as it should be either and I believe Chilly mentioned in another thread that the audio memory is in serial and should be in parallel, or something like that (Care to clarify this Chilly?). From what I understand minor changes concerning these issues could have painted a radically different picture for the Genesis.

The Clock Line on the YM2612 and the other change could have allowed for better PCM playback. Simply hooking the CRAM expansion lines to the expansion port, the Cartridge port, or both would have allowed for the Sega CD or even individual games to expand the amount of color palettes or even the master palette easily as needed. With those changes the 32X may not have even existed as the Sega CD would have most likely addressed the color issue along with all the other issues it addressed with the Genesis hardware.

The FM clock being the same as the 68000 is fine. Where they blew it was 1) they didn't connect the interrupt line from the FM chip to the Z80, so you couldn't use the timers in the FM chip for much, and 2) the bank register that allowed the Z80 to access the cart was set serially one bit at a time instead of in a parallel manner. That means you take almost 100 clock cycles on the Z80 setting the bank register. This prevented the Z80 from being able to easily and quickly mix multiple PCM channels at a decent frequency. Instead, those 2 points meant devs had to be pretty smart and tricky about programming the Z80. Lazy programming wound up giving mediocre results.

[TrekkiesUnite118]

Thanks for explaining that Chilly. Is there any logical reason or benefits for setting that part of the hardware up the way they did?

[Zz Badnusty]

[...] quite excited about the 32X and the initial word of the press was very positive about the Sega's new add-on (as well as dozens of readers' letters). It wasn't until the, later, dozens of Saturn games screenshots popped up with "amazing looking" graphics (like the bs of Saturn's V.R.) that people started to consider the 32X an arguable/bad idea and, still, most of the opinions were quite favorable about the system

The magazines (whether independently published or not) are extensions of the game industry PR departments. Of course they were favorable about a major new product from Sega. Referencing reader letters means little, the editorial staff of the magazine is going to print letters which go along with the story they're selling, I'm quite sure there were plenty of seasoned and jaded gamers who saw the 32x for what it was - at least I was one of them, and I tried my damnedest to enlighten the few fools I knew who talked openly (and excitedly) about purchasing a 32x, they were blinded by the promise of 32 bits.

[Barone]

The magazines (whether independently published or not) are extensions of the game industry PR departments. Of course they were favorable about a major new product from Sega. Referencing reader letters means little, the editorial staff of the magazine is going to print letters which go along with the story they're selling, I'm quite sure there were plenty of seasoned and jaded gamers who saw the 32x for what it was - at least I was one of them, and I tried my damnedest to enlighten the few fools

I didn't say the magazines were the ultimate word coming from gamers of all ages, but they were surely influential in terms of changing/affecting people's opinions.
And you have to consider the context of my answer, which was to point that Saturn Fan's statement that "most of us back in the day knew better that it was a really foolish idea, and that our money would be better spent on the Saturn instead." is a false premise since the Saturn hadn't even materialized.
The amount of 32X units sold in the first days also shows that there were a lot more fools out there than he and you are suggesting IMO.

By the way, I never bought a 32X.

I knew who talked openly (and excitedly) about purchasing a 32x, they were blinded by the promise of 32 bits.

32-bit = 2 x 16-bit = 2 x fun
32X games = 40 x faster than 16-bit ones (this line is especially fun considering the half-assed 32X ports running at half the framerate of the Genesis versions)
32X = realistic 3D graphics
...

I didn't buy that shit but thought Sega would do something interesting with that new hardware.

[sheath]

Yeah, I didn't care about the 32X until I saw Virtua Racing Deluxe running and the promise of Arcade perfect After Burner and Spacer Harrier on the horizon. I pretty much bought it for those three games alone, but it was Shadow Squadron and the enhanced video output that completely sealed the add-on as a permanent attachment to my launch model 1 Genesis. The rest was rental fodder until I found it on the cheap or, more recently, decided I had to have it.

-edit-

Back on topic, I picked up Shinobi X for the Richard Jacques soundtrack so I'm watching this pretty cool longplay now:

[Black_Tiger]

[gamevet]

Some appointments from the "fool" side of things:
1-Prior to SOJ's dumb ass decision of antecipating Saturn's release and its "surprise" launch, the "great new system" hasn't materialized yet and nobody knew how "great" it would actually be in practice.
2-Most of you, smart guys, shouldn't be buying and reading any magazines back then. 'Cause the fools doing it were actually quite excited about the 32X and the initial word of the press was very positive about the Sega's new add-on (as well as dozens of readers' letters). It wasn't until the, later, dozens of Saturn games screenshots popped up with "amazing looking" graphics (like the bs of Saturn's V.R.) that people started to consider the 32X an arguable/bad idea and, still, most of the opinions were quite favorable about the system until Sega had shitted all over the 32X's owners heads with its fantastic decision of dropping its support sooooo quickly.
3-An upgrade that would give you games like Virtua Racing Deluxe, which actually looked and played better than any Jaguar/3DO/Genesis/SNES game of the time, for less than half of the then estimated prices of the "great new systems" wasn't a dumb idea at all.
4-Even lackluster ports/versions/games like MKII on the 32X compare fairly well with some early PS1 and Saturn releases. Just for being able to avoid the attrocious loadings of some early 32-bit CD based games, like for 2D fighters, and being able to reuse all your Genesis controllers it could have been an interesting platform for some time, had Sega marketed it a little better, provided a consistent port of Doom, didn't anticipate the Saturn's US release that way and killed it so abruptly like they did.

When I had first heard about the 32X through magazines like Die Hard Gamefan, I was pretty excited about what it could do. I totally lost interest in it, the moment I found out about the Saturn and actually played the Japanes console in 1994 at a Die Hard Gameclub in Dallas.

[Barone]

several lols and lmaos

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to Black_Tiger again.

When I had first heard about the 32X through magazines like Die Hard Gamefan, I was pretty excited about what it could do. I totally lost interest in it, the moment I found out about the Saturn and actually played the Japanes console in 1994 at a Die Hard Gameclub in Dallas.

This is exactly what I'm talking about.

[Zz Badnusty]

Back on topic

Yeah, I love the Saturn.
Earlier in the thread someone brought up Game Tengoku, which inspired me to give that a spin. Played through the first loop in a couple nights (didn't want to credit feed too much) super fun and got me psyched on playing some vertical shooters.
I've been listening too some Irem MP3s lately and that led me back to playing some Image Fight, and that led to playing some Gun Frontier

..point being; and I've said this ad nauseam, the Saturn library is a concise and concentrated sampling of all the best that 2-D action gaming ever had to offer.
And the top-tier 3D games on the system arguably hold-their-own or outclass their contemporaries on other systems.
Saturn can always serve up something immensely enjoyable to play no matter what my preference calls for.