I’ve recently come into possession of a working Genesis and Saturn. I didn’t own either of these systems until recently but I’ve always heard about the great games that were available for them (mostly in Japan in the Saturn’s case.) Now’s your chance to wax 16-bit. Tell me what your favorite games are!
I wish I could at least give you a genre or something, but honestly I like a little of everything. I do prefer multiplayer games so The Wife-face can join in.
Thanks!
NHL 95!!!
I played more NHL 95 than all other Genesis games put together. Mutant League Football was a really fun game too - like John Madden football, but with mutants and weapons. Somehow the hockey version wasn’t very good.
For RPGs, Shining Force 2 is spectacular (you don’t need to play the first one to play this one…if you do want to play the first one, the GBA remake is superior). I’ve never been into sci-fi RPGs, but I’m sure plenty of people are gonna recommend the Phantasy Star games too. However, I DID really enjoy Shadowrun, which was a sci-fi-ish RPG, and was totally different from all the other Shadowrun video games that have been released over the years.
Sonic 1-4 is a given, of course. #3 is my favorite in that series.
For beat-em-up games, I was fond of Golden Axe and Captain America (partly because of it’s totally cheezy 16-bit recorded engrish dialogue), and the X-men game, although it was more adventurous, and had one of the most twisted final battles ever:
the only way you could defeat the final boss, which was a super computer, was to press reset on the Genesis! It actually worked too, the idea that pressing reset stopped the computer’s reign-of-power program, and would initiate the ending sequence
Gunstar Heroes is a great run-n-gun game, similar to Contra.
this should get you started. I never did own a Saturn (did ANYONE?)
I can’t recommend Phantasy Star IV highly enough (don’t have to have played the previous entries). It’s absolutely up there with the best console RPGs in the Final Fantasy or any other series.
Subterranea was a fantastic 2d spaceship combat game, with the unique feature that you actually had to worry about gravity. Fantastic visuals, too.
I’ve only played the Genesis (or Megadrive as it was called over here). I always liked the Streets of Rage games, although I’ve only completed the second one. They’re all two player games. You may also want to try one of the Sonic games as they’re Segas main game series. I’ll see if I can remember any more games later.
I’ll second Phantasy Star IV, awesome game.
I’d also recommend Warsong if you like turn based strategy games.
My cousin and I used to spend hours playing Toejam & Earl together on his Genesis.
Krusty’s Super Fun House for Genesis was a great game I played many times, even though I could never figure out the last level. I think it’s worth checking out. It’s basically a puzzle-platformer.
I bought a Saturn on ebay a few years ago to try NiGHTS. It came with the special analog controller, which was kind of fun (apparently it was one of the first with an analog stick) – unnecessary, but it did make some moves easier. NiGHTS is an interesting game which was probably *really *cool when it came out. It was fun, and the flight mechanics work pretty well, but it didn’t hold my interest for a super long time. Apparently there’s a remake coming for the Wii – it might be cool to play the original just to see how it was redone.
The Saturn also came with Daytona (a pretty generic racing game… games like Wipeout have spoiled standard racing games for me – I need weapons!) and [Revolution_X](Revolution - Wikipedia X), which is possibly the worst, cheesiest game I have ever played.
Might want to skip those two 
Alrighty, I’ve done some reading. I think I’ma try that X-Men game. It looks like fun… and I’ve already got Sonic 2 on the way. I believe I’ll try Phantasy Star as well. I think I saw a copy of Toejam and Earl at one of the thrift stores around here.
I ordered Nights into Dreams with the analog controller last night on Amazon but the seller cancelled my order and relisted it at more than twice the price. I’ve threatened to neg him if he doesn’t sell it to me at the price we agreed on, so we’ll see how that goes. It looks like a great game.
I watched some vids last night of Panzer Dragoon Saga… I’m still drooling. Unfortunately I don’t have two hundred bucks to spend on it. 
Another vote for *Streets of Rage * 1-3 (although the first one is way better than the other two).
Excellent gameplay and really fantastic sound.
Well, compared to the soundtracks of other games at the time, anyway.
If you do like it, are you aware that Sonic and Knuckles, whilst being a seperate game, also connects to Sonic2 to allow you to play as Knuckles. It also connects to Sonic 3 in a similar way, although I think it unlocks more in that game.
How the heck does that work?
You plug the Sonic 2 cartridge into the top of the Sonic & Knuckles cartridge, which has a pluggy-inner thingy at the top of it. That’s an absolutely horrible description, but it’s how it is.
Also, someone mentioned NHL 95 above; that man is a liar. NHL 94 revolutionized sports gaming and revolutionized my life, too, actually.
Hahaha… while I am most grateful for the gusto with which people are approaching my inquiry, I failed to mention in my initial post that I don’t play sports games as a general rule. Although if they’re that good, I may make an exception. It hadn’t even occurred to me to mention that, I avoid them so thoroughly.
In other news, my aquisition of Nights for the Saturn has taken a turn for the worse so that one may be a while in coming.
So, Streets of Rage or Mortal Kombat? I think both would be overkill.
Still enjoy playing Streets of Rage to this day (eh, I live in a family of pack rats, so we still have the Genesis and all our games). As far as good multi-player/family games go, my family and I enjoyed Monopoly so much that we burned through three cartridges. (Saves the mess of dragging out the actual board game! haha!!)
As far as Sonic goes, I LOVE Sonic 2! Also, Sonic 3D Blast (I believe it was called?) was enjoyable to a point.
Whilst I like mshar253’s explanation, with all it’s technical jargon 
theres a full explanation on here
That is really cool. I’ma have to find one of those.
They’ve got quite a few on eBay, including this one which, I think, has Sonics 1, 2 & 3, Sonic & knuckles plus a few other genesis games for $10 starting bid + P&P.
They’re a bit different - SoR is a trad side-scrolling beat-em-up a la Double Dragon, whereas MK is a one-on-one battle like Street Fighter II.
Personally, I always thought the original MK was way overrated- very pretty graphics, but weak gameplay. Most of the characters (Scorpion, Sub-Zero, Johnny Cage, Raiden) only have one useful special move, and some (Kano and Sonya) didn’t really have any. To pull off Kano’s one effective move, for example, you had to spin the pad in a circle and hit punch with perfect timing, and even after a day of practice I only made it work 50% of the time. Sonya’s big move was even worse - you had to block while crouching and then pray your opponent was dumb enough to stand almost right in front of you.
Lots of good suggestions in this thread. I’ll throw in a few of my faves.
For the Genesis, I’d recommend Aladdin. It was one of the main reasons I got a Genesis in the first place. This version blew the SNES version away. (And I was a hardcore SNES fan back then.)
I know you said you don’t like sports games but get Super Tecmo Bowl for the Genesis if you change your mind. 
For the Saturn, I heartily recommend Sega Rally, Clockwork Knight, Virtua Fighter 1 and 2. And if you’ve never tried Myst, Sim City 2000, X-men Children of the Atom, or Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3, all of them are available for the Saturn as well.