Sega Genesis vs. Super Nintendo

[Kelthaz]

I’m pretty sure this poll is going to lean heavily towards Nintendo, but I’m still curious to see which system TrekBBS considers to be king of the golden age of gaming. Both systems had an almost unlimited supply of great games, but which one was the best? Sega or Nintendo?

It's a close one, but my vote goes to the Genesis. The SNES wins in platformers and RPGs, but the Genesis wins in SHMUPs and run 'n gun games. Although both consoles were strong in all 4 categories. Overall, the Genesis narrowly beats out the SNES for me.

 

[crouteru]

Super Nintendo all the way! This is likely to dredge up an old console war.

 

[MyCylon]

I had and loved both consoles. But for me, it's the Genesis / Mega Drive.

Although there were a lot of games that were really good and that I really liked on the SNES ("Super Mario World", "Super Mario Kart", one of my all-time favorites, or "Turtles in Time", for example) I personally found the GEN / MD and its games library more exciting. Simply put, to me the GEN / MD was simply a far more lean and mean gaming machine than the SNES ever was. I see this reflected in the designs for both machines where the MD was simply more striking and more interesting even to look at.

In terms of games, "Sonic the Hedgehog", "Streets of Rage", "Revenge of Shinobi", or "Road Rash", for example, were, in my opinion, just a lot 'cooler' and more exciting (for lack of a better word) than just about anything I can remember from the SNES. Also, the GEN / MD had so many great jump'n'run games which I was really into at the time including (in addition to Sonic) "Castle of Illusion", "World of Illusion" or "Aladdin".

I think IGN's top 25 consoles of all times list made me ask myself which console I'd put at no. 1 myself. And I think I'd have to say the GEN / MD. That was probably the most exciting time in gaming for me.

 

[JuanBolio]

I owned a Genesis myself. At the time I was a bit put off by Super Nintendo - with its cream and purple color scheme and plethora of kid-friendly games, it seemed like more of a child's toy at the time (especially since Nintendo committed the unforgivable sin of censoring the blood and gore in their port of Mortal Kombat), and the Genesis seemed edgier and sleeker to my untrained mind. In retrospect, the Super Nintendo had better color, sound, and a far superior controller. Additionally it had a full and interesting game library that certainly was not limited strictly to "kid stuff", including several very respectable RPGs - a genre not really found on the Genesis. I see all this now, playing emulators. At the time I couldn't tell - but then I couldn't tell the difference between the graphics of arcade games and 16-bit consoles either, so it shows how attentive I was.

Super Nintendo was the superior machine, both for the quality of the games it offered and its technical edge. I will say, however, that I still think the Genesis was a great machine for its day, its processing power was unquestionably better, and has plenty of games that I still enjoy to this day. Close contest, very close indeed.

 

[Holdfast]

I had a Mega Drive (Genesis) so my answer is obviously going to be biased. But I just preferred the games that were out for it - Streets of Rage, Sonic, Road Rash, Super Monaco GP, Mortal Kombat (with gore), Golden Axe, Gunstar Heroes, World of Illusion, the Strike series, etc, etc.

But really, both consoles were awesomely good.

 

[JuanBolio]

Road Rash... what an awesomely good game. I never liked a racing game before I played it.

 

[Holdfast]

Road Rash... what an awesomely good game. I never liked a racing game before I played it.

It got the adrenaline pumping, for sure. The (original) music was great too. My one wish was to really do the police bike cops some proper damage, but IIRC, you could never knock them off their bikes completely, only delay them or outrun them.

The better bikes in the game were really fast - taking a blind crest in the wrong lane and jumping over the oncoming traffic was enough to give heart palpitations.

 

[MyCylon]

^
I think you were able to knock them off, actually. But it was pretty difficult. And if you were unfortunate, you'd slow down to a halt and get yourself arrested .

 

[Holdfast]

^
I think you were able to knock them off, actually. But it was pretty difficult.

Really?

It's a long time since I've played the game, obviously, but I seem to remember hitting them a ton of times and all they did was slow down. Sometimes, if I was just goofing around in the game rather than playing properly, I'd even deliberately slow down a bit to let them catch up enough again to hit them more. I don't remember ever knocking the cops off. Maybe I just never got good enough at it.

 

[General_Phoenix]

I would have to go with the SNES, because that's the system I played the most, and had a majority of the games I still love. Zelda A Link to the Past is still a great game, and I still love Super Mario All Stars with the enhanced graphics of those games. I had tons of games for the SNES, just a fun system really. Plus, it had the Super Star Wars trilogy, still think Super Empire Strikes Back is a hard game to beat (on Brave or Jedi mode.)

I loved Rock N' Roll Racing, Earthworm Jim, and I thought Kirby Superstar was good. Mega Man 7, which I still love to this day, Super Mario RPG, Super Mario World, Contra III, Yoshi's Island, Super Metroid, etc. I could go on and on.

I was a huge Wing Commander PC gaming addict back then, it wasn't until a couple years ago I finally bought and played Wing Commander for the SNES, I still prefer the PC version - but it was interesting.

I like the Genesis too, Contra Hard Corps. is still one of my favorite games to this day, Road Rash is another great one, and Gunstar Heroes. It seems that most of my gaming time back then was mainly on my PC or SNES though.

 

[crouteru]

IMO, the Mega Drive/Genesis never had any games on the same calibur as Super Metroid, Chrono Trigger or Zelda: A Link To The Past, to name a few.

 

[MyCylon]

^
I think you were able to knock them off, actually. But it was pretty difficult.

Really?

It's a long time since I've played the game, obviously, but I seem to remember hitting them a ton of times and all they did was slow down. Sometimes, if I was just goofing around in the game rather than playing properly, I'd even deliberately slow down a bit to let them catch up enough again to hit them more. I don't remember ever knocking the cops off. Maybe I just never got good enough at it.

It's been a long time for me as well. So I'm by no means certain. But I'm inclined to think it was possible.

 

[Brikar99]

I liked them both... but I owned a Genesis, so I'm gonna have to go with that. But I have no ill-thoughts on the Super Nintendo.

 

[Skywalker]

I owned a Genesis first, and loved it, so it gets my vote. All my friends had Super Nintendos, so when my parents decided they wanted to buy me a game console, I decided on the Genesis since if I ever wanted to play SNES I could just head over to one of my friends' houses.

 

[General_Phoenix]

I owned a Genesis first, and loved it, so it gets my vote. All my friends had Super Nintendos, so when my parents decided they wanted to buy me a game console, I decided on the Genesis since if I ever wanted to play SNES I could just head over to one of my friends' houses.

Yeah, in my neighborhood there were tons of SNES systems, but only a couple Genesis consoles. I bought a Genesis late in its life, but I was able to get a lot of games cheaply due to clearance sales and such. I ended up getting that 32x expansion, I think the only game I ended up getting for that was Star Wars Arcade or something.

 

[HairOfTheDog]

I still remember all the gaming magazines at the time showing stills of a game that came out on both consoles. Street Fighter II was scrutinized heavily. Those were the days, for sure.

 

[Mr. Adventure]

It's amazing what a difference there is between the SNES's 256 colors and the Genesis's 64. Then again, I always wondered how well the Commodore 64 would have held up with 64 vs 16.

At the time I loved the Genesis with its edgier games and what I think of as a more "European" graphic sensibilities. As time has gone on and my tastes have changed I've warmed up a lot to the SNES. Hell, I didn't even know what a JRPG was back in the day, now I lament not playing those games at the time. To have played Chrono Trigger in the day...

I remember playing my cousin's Genesis when he got it though and being blown away by Sonic and Madden.

I guess my heart is still with the Sega even though I certainly give kudos to the SNES. I'm currently in the process of trying to get my Genesis3 modded to output S-Video. (Of course, the SNES can already do that....)

 

[Kirkman1987]

SNES

I loved Super Mario World and Super Metroid. Link to the past.

It was a great time for video games.

 

[Jax]

Streets of Rage, Sonic games, Robocop vs. Terminator and tons and tons of more makes it a SEGA win here for me.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

I’m pretty sure this poll is going to lean heavily towards Nintendo, but I’m still curious to see which system TrekBBS considers to be king of the golden age of gaming. Both systems had an almost unlimited supply of great games, but which one was the best? Sega or Nintendo?

It's a close one, but my vote goes to the Genesis. The SNES wins in platformers and RPGs, but the Genesis wins in SHMUPs and run 'n gun games. Although both consoles were strong in all 4 categories. Overall, the Genesis narrowly beats out the SNES for me.

Back then, I played almost exclusively platformers, so my vote goes to the SNES.

Also, the SNES seemed to have a controller that was better for me. I'm not sure of the graphics potential of the Genesis (before adding the extra crap to it), but I doubt it beat DKC3 (any of the DKC games probably would put it ahead for me).