The Sega Mega Drive is my favourite console. I grew up on it. Since we have this topic about interesting and recommended MAME games, why not start one for the SMD? I realise it was not really that successful a console in some areas, but there are some real gems for it. Join in if you guys remember any particularly obscure but great games for this great system.

I'll start off with...


RISKY WOODS



Published by Electronic Arts back in the day, Risky Woods for the Mega Drive was a port of the previously released Amiga and DOS versions. Several elements were stripped away while new mechanics were introduced but the game was ultimately a fun side-scrolling action game, although a fiendishly difficult one.

The story was the run of the mill fare likely conceived by the poor soul assigned to author the instruction manual. Essentially you were a warrior named Rohan who needed to cross the countryside and free monks imprisoned in stone. What was just a semblance of a real plot was likely due to names of places and enemies, amongst other things, being inexplicably removed from the Mega Drive version. Every third stage was a boss stage, but the monsters you came up against were really inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. All that the game really required was that you moved left to right, killing everything in sight. In that way it was like a hundred other platformers from the mid-nineties.



What set Risky Woods apart was its upgradeable weapon and gatekeeper systems. Keys were picked up over the course of a level and occasionally used to get passed menacing-looking 'gatekeeper' demons. These ugly SOBs would knock out a sequence of up, down, left and right commands, tasking the player to repeat the order. If successful, they got out of the road and dropped a bunch of weapons that the player could choose from. Consecutively picking the same weapon would increase its effectiveness, and by far the smartest way to get through the game was to decide on a single weapon and stick with it. Most were extremely reminiscent of the Castlevania weapons- the knife and axe in particular were almost exact duplicates. Unusually, the method for getting weapons was vastly different in the original games - there were no gatekeepers at all and coins collected were used at shops to purchase things - they were not simply handed out.



Risky Woods is a very hard game to be sure. However one stupid addition to the Mega Drive port makes it the easiest walk in the park you'll ever take. Since coins and shops were removed, the spoils dropped by enemies were changed to 'armour links'. Collect 33, and gain silver armour which cuts damage taken in half. Get 67 or more and gain gold armour, armour which - you guessed it - makes you nigh invulnerable. Hits at this point only make you drop 1 link at a time. The reality of the situation is that you can never realistically die. Pity.

All round I love this game. Anyone else have fond memories of it? Here is a video of the first stage to jog your memory;

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I actually had enough time to do a full run of this game. If anyone deigns to see the rest of the videos, check my blog.

Good games Electronic Arts did in the old days

Good Game. Plays like Ghouls n ghosts

I've never played it before, but from the games I have played, it plays like Chuck Rock and Ghouls n ghosts.

Zero wing, anyone?

While many people consider it a "classic", it's a classic for the wrong reason; namely the absolutely hilarious opening cinematic. The game itself is a mediocre ripoff of Gradius. Not exactly Toaplan's best works and it's not a very good space shooter either.

I still sorta like it though.

I kinda liked Zero Wing, too.

My classic Mega Drive Games would be:

Streets of Rage II and III, Skitchin', Toejam and Earl, Splatterhouse 2 & 3, Robocop vs Terminator and Castlevania: Bloodlines.

Streets of Rage II is probably my favourite out of those.

Well Not going to let this thread die seeing how Genesis is my favorite system. Plus, I've been lazy with Mame thread anyways.

I'll do..

Crusader of Centy



If you ever were jealous of those SNES Bastards with their bragging of their adventures in hyrule, you can now have similar adventures in the world of Soleil. Yes, this game is considered a zelda clone, but still, it has its merits and uniqueness to set itself apart from zelda.



One thing I like about CoC over Zelda was the overmap. Getting lost or having to go from one point to another just for a damn heart piece was annoying. So the overmap kind of cuts down on the walking from one area to another. There are plenty of areas to explore in Soleil. Most of them being dungeons. On the screen, you can see the school. It's basically three obstacle course. Completing one of them will earn you a medal depending on the difficulty. Obviously, you cant' beat all three in one go until you have enough abilities, but doing so will give you the holy sword. I apologize for you seeing that twister in the lake. It's a pretty neat part of the quest.



So what's different from CoC than Zelda? You can still slash with your sword, cut grass for money, etc. You can also jump and throw your sword rather than spinning around. Instead of items, you get animals. Yeah Animals.

The monsters in CoC are pretty easy to dispatch. Unfortunately this could be said about the bosses also. I think the bosses are a bit easy once you figure out what sword combo (Explained below) to use. You'll find yourself getting hurt more by the environment due to your carelessness rather than the actual enemies. But some of the boss (almost final) ideas are pretty clever.



This is basically your "animal" screen. Each animal enchants your sword or abilities in their own way. You can equip up to 2 animals and sometimes, there will be a combo that makes the effect stronger or whatnot. Most animals will join you as the adventure continues on, but some animals have to be bought in a store.



The enjoyable part of CoC are creative parts like these. They turn your hero into a classic slime ball. The story in CoC is quite odd until you get to this point. In the beginning, you're just told to wander around and train, but eventually you get the ability to talk to animals (but not humans!). Up to this point (The screenie), you still have no idea what the hell you're doing, but you start to get an idea after you finish this part and revert back to your human self (Oh sh.. spoiler)



The music in CoC Is pretty nice. They're long enough not to be repetitive, and they're catchy enough to not be annoying. Usually, you don't stay in one area too long so the music changes somewhat frequently. And if you're stuck in a dungeon, the music is usually ambient to not be distracting. And yeah, go kart racing.



Some wacky text. Reminds me of a user on here (*Cough*Davis*cough*)



And every review of CoC needs to have this picture. Why he is in there I have no idea why other than it being a sega game.

Good game. Would play it again and rare to find offline except if you want to buy it for ridiculous prices on ebay. Oh well.

i miss the days when the worse the title was the better the game, it was so simple

SUPER VAMPIRE FIGHT OF DESTINY HYPER X FOR THE HOLY GRAIL?!?! AWESOME!!!!

remember the first time i got strider on the megadrive imported from japan
god that game was good and still is i still think its better than the arcade version the music was
chuffin great

OMG! I'd forgotten completely about this thread.

You know Sonic 2 and Golden Axe are next.

Old games just had something special that new games don't have in so much abundance.

I know exactly what you mean. I've never gotten rid of any system I've had. The magic never goes away. Sure, I have the newer systems, but i don't get the same rush or joy from them. Those guys knew what they were doing back then.

Well, now for my hit list of games...........................................................................
..............

Altered beast (oh, the addiction. I spazzed out when I finally beat it.)
Ghouls and Ghosts (I wish I knew you had to play through it twice before I celebrated victory)
Gunstar heroes (More major addiction. First thumb blisters from this one.)
King of the monsters (Yeah! Go Woo! the monkey woo, not like woo hoo)
Splatterhouse 2+3 (Killing zombies with cinderblocks and 2x4s? Count me in)
Sword of vermillion (Took months of my life and I don't want them back.)
any Phantasy star (Classic. classic. classic. Fed my love for rpgs)

That's all I can think of off the top of my head. If and when I think of more I'll post them.

I loved altered beast! the "Beasts" were new for the first 3 levels then it repeated i loved that! and "Wise fwom youw gwave"

i never played ghouls and ghosts but it sounds pretty cool.

never played gunstar but ive heard good things

King of the monsters is one that i regret saying that ibve never played but my life isnt over and i still have time

Splatterhouse speaks for itself

sword of vermillion is one of my favorites
and i love phantasy star....

Great collection of games onetrueblade!

Gunstar Heroes is THE game for the Genesis/MD along with Sonics.

Damn right.

I played it all the time with my older brothers, for hours. As a child.

We played it on every difficulty, I always picked the red guy, because of the control variation.

It had great music, sound effects, humor, and a great storyline, and of course gameplay. The version on Gameboy is trash and can never compare to the original.

Just remembered 3 more.

Mutant league hockey. Any hockey game where you can kill all the members of the other team to win is golden in my book.

Mazinger Z. Kind of obscure, but I love side scrolling brawlers and the street fighter/mortal kombat style boss fights were cool.

Columns. I never got into tetris, but this is the only game I could literally not stop playing. I had to have someone shut off the tv so I could be freed.

wait... hold the phone. How could you NOT get into Tetris?!

I mean it's fukcing Tetris! The granddaddy of all puzzle games! What the hell man?

Heh. I was about to ask the same question. I suppose Columns involves more thinking because not only you have to align colors, not blocks so much.

Like Tetris, Columns has about a gazillion variations and ports. Well, one can argue that Columns itself a variation Tetris, which is true.

Whenever it hit on game boy i was too into ninja turtles ( I was a youngun' in the days of the brickomatic game boy) to notice. by the time my attention turned to puzzle games I got hooked on tetris clones instead of the real thing. After this though, I'm heavily considering playing it.

I edited that post a bunch of times trying to spell youngun' "Right" (Is there a right way to spell hilbilly speech?)
However, I'm absolutely sure I spelled brickomatic right because i just made it up.

And the actual name of that mazinger z game is mazin saga: mutant fighter. Btw, Did anyone like echo the dolphin?

forgotten worlds great shooter
ghoulsnghosts brill
eswat
first experience of the megadrive(genesis) was being the first one in my area to have one.
imported from japan cost a ruddy fortune chuff me

For the few times I was able to play it, to me Ecco was really strange because I didn't really know what I was supposed to do. So I just swam around aimlessly.

I was goofing with it on psp awhile ago. It took me a long time to figure out what the hell to do.

Cool Mega Games.

what a lovely contribution to this thread...

Streets Of Rage 1-3
...... just had a brain fart, can't think of anything else at the moment. I shall return to this thread soon...

eswat better than the arcade version nuff said.

Nice game risky wood

No gravedigging.