Customer Reviews

Sonic Ultimate Genesis Collection

5 star:		(33)
4 star:		(28)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Right to the point: There is nothing not to like about this collection. I've played it for the last few days and have loved every moment.

This disc brings together a huge collection of almost all of Sega's best games from the Genesis era. All the expected titles are here -- the Sonic the Hedgehog games, the Golden Axe series, Space Harrier, Shinobi and much more -- plus some awesome stuff you might not expect. (Presumably we'll see games like Afterburner and the lock-on version of Sonic 3 + S&Knuckles in a second installment.)

Two of the biggest reasons to be wowed by this set are:

Phantasy Star series -- With the four games included here (1-4), you get some of the best RPGs of the era and dozens upon dozens of hours of gameplay. The ahead-of-its-time Phantasy Star, the stunning Phantasy Star II (which influenced the direction of Final Fantasy in a big way), the amazing epic Phantasy Star IV. Just these four games alone are worth the $30. Heck, DOUBLE that. No fan of JRPG's should go without playing these.

Shining series -- Two predecessors of the popular Final Fantasy Tactics series (Shining paved the way for this sort of game) as well as a first-person dungeon crawler, these are fan favorites for a reason. They're great. Ahead of their time and they hold up great.

And SO many more. Shinobi. The difficult roguelike Fatal Labyrinth. Fun platformer Alex Kidd. Tetris clone Columns. Even coin-op classic Zaxxon! A HUGE collection!

All games allow you to save at any time, in any game, anywhere. This is a GREAT feature. Plus it saves high scores, has full 16:9 support for widescreen TVs, and you can toggle on graphics smoothing to make the games look even better than they did upon release. It's a dynamite feature. (The "museum" and interview extras are a nice bonus, too.)

All in all this is one of the best retro gaming bargains of the year. Got my copy a few days ago and already have loads of hours under my belt. The inclusion of not one but TWO fan favorite RPG series gives this disc an enormous amount of play value.

If you have any interest at all in retro gaming, ESPECIALLY if you were a fan of the Genesis era or if you missed out on the Genesis because you had a SNES, you owe it to yourself to grab this collection.

Late last year, Sonic Team over at Sega released "Sonic Unleashed" which did have its problems, mind you, but didn't really do anything stellar the entire way through. Reviewers pointed out that Sonic's previous games were miles ahead better and I find nostalgia can help make a game's success. After all, that one game that critics hated at the time might've been one of your favorites but looking at it now you go "wow did that game have issues". Therein lies the major issue/fun with the Ultimate Genesis Collection: does the bulk of these games stand the test of time? Some definately do while others will probably get barely a few minutes before you decide it's awful but there's a lot of work to be done here if you get this.

One of the most important and influential game series that kickstarted the Sega Genesis was Sonic the Hedgehog, Sega's answer to Nintendo's Mario and included is a truckload of Sonic games: 1, 2, 3, Sonic and Knuckles, 3D Blast, Pinball and to a degree, Dr. Beatnik's Mean Bean Machine, a puzzle game akin to Dr. Wario, Yoshi's Cookie and Super Puzzle Fighter II. The first 4 are great and well worth the purchase while 3D Blast controls awkwardly, Pinball is decent but not stellar and Mean Bean Machine is good though later stages work a bit too damn fast for my tastes.

Another group featured is the side scroller platformer which run the gamut from Ristar to Kid Chameleon (woo!) to Decap Attack to E-Swat (big eh) to 2 Vectorman games. Beat-em-ups like Streets of Rage and Golden Axe are included and for RPG fans: all 4 Phantasy Stars. It's safe to say that nearly every kind of game is available on here from long drawn-out games to quicker arcade-y stuff but be warned: some of these games are...kind of hard. Not in that underpowered "everyone's better than you" way like a Ninja Gaiden but rather many times in the games you won't even get continues so if you die, boom, Game Over and you're sent back to the title screen which is really disheartening and I'm surprised I don't remember getting more furious when I was younger.

Now of course any collection from greatest hits to game collections is bound to have some stuff missing or curious additions. Fatal Labyrinth well...sucks, the Ecco games are familiar but playing through them, they're surprisingly boring and Super Thunder Blade is too easy to die in. But then, most likely because of dual releases on the Super Nintendo we're missing some other favorites: Battletoads, Toe Jam and Earl, the awesome WWF games, Maximum Carnage, any of the Road Rashes and to be honest, I quite liked the Aero the Acro-Bat games. Most of these games you probably wouldn't give the time of day too while other ones like Ristar and Comix Zone actually surprised me.

Naturally like all Xbox 360 games, there's achievements and these aren't just simply beat game, beat game kind but rather objective based so for example one of Golden Axe's achievements is to use magic a certain amount of times. Easy right? Every time you get a magic ability, use it and eventually, there we go. And thanks to the ability to save games anywhere you want but pressing the Back button, some achievements like the ones for Mean Bean Machine, Columns or Sonic Pinball can be done just by saving states after a certain time and loading save if you die. There's a couple like "Yatta!" that can potentially drive you crazy since it's more luck than anything while others are just simply "Turn to easy, max lives, play".

Another disappointing factor is that the games don't have online play, whether co-op for Golden Axe or Streets of Rage or leaderboards. Imagine competing against somebody to see who can get the highest score in Columns or taking on enemies with other buddies but sadly none of it are implemented and it's strictly offline co-op. But there's quite a few unlockables from videos of the games' developers to additional games (while unlocking Shinobi is cool, Congo Bongo flat out sucks) but it's the games that are important and for completionists, having so much games to beat will surely keep you busy.

The Ultimate Genesis Collection is tough to judge as a game because for every Sonic the Hedgehog or surprising gem like Ristar there's godawfulness from Fatal Labyrinth to Flicky to Bonanza Bros. However getting all Sonics, Phantasy Stars, Streets of Rage, and Golden Axes on one disc is reason enough to get it.

This is just what it looks like - a collection of Sega Genesis titles for the 360, complete with updated graphics, achievements and save capability.

The collection is a decent cross-section of the platform's offerings, with the noticable exception of sports games, which are totally absent. Most of the classics are here though, like Sonic, Streets of Rage and Ecco. There are also a few deep cuts and the occasional "why did this one make the cut?" choice, but as a whole the collection is solid, especially when counting the nine unlockable games.

The achievements (33 total) are a curious lot. Not all the games have them, and the ones that do have only one as far as I've seen. Sometimes they're involved (like unlocking Roo as a playable character in Streets of Rage 3) and other times they're almost ridiculously easy (like "Get a Chaos Emerald" in Sonic). Most are worth 30G. I would have liked to see more achievements worth less. That way each of the 40 primary games could get 25G and have multiple achievements. Instead of having only one achievement for Sonic the Hedgehog 3 ("Get 100 Rings with Tails in the first level" for 30G), we could get four or five ("Beat the game in any mode" (5G), "Get 100 Rings with Tails in the first level" (5G), "Get a perfect on a Special Stage" (10G), "Collect all the Chaos Emeralds" (5G)).

The "Save" feature is very nice, meaning you don't have to have a five-hour session to beat a particular game. The listing of the games is also a nice touch: you can do it alphabetially, by genre, by release date. Players can also rate the games on a scale of 1 to 5 and sort the games by their ratings.

The graphics have also improved, though not so much so they don't still feel like the originals (think what the memory add-on for the N64 did to that console's standard games and you get the idea). This is accomplished via a widescreen option and a smoothing option (like the Genesis titles you can get on the Xbox Live Arcade).

All in all, this is a good collection of classic titles at a decent price (if you downloaded them all from the Xbox Live Arcade - most are available there - you would be paying a lot more) with some other titles thrown in for good measure.

I initially bought this for a sense of closure. I owned a handful of the titles in the collection with my Genesis growing up, and never got around to beating some of them. After about 15-20 hours, I had wrapped up my personal vendettas, and got around to looking at the rest of the collection, and was amazed at the wealth of gaming here. To anyone who can appreciate older games, and especially those who didn't have the money to get all of these when they were younger, this is a wonderful way to spend (upwards of) $20.

To gaming historians, this is an invaluable resource, showing just how far we've come, but also what we've come dangerously close to losing with the new generations of hardware. There is a simplicity here that, even amid the fracas of the action titles, and particularly in the RPGs, can be sort of calming. What's more, the online communities for these games have had more than a decade to develop, so it's very easy to find help for those hitting a snag.

Fans of puzzle games will be disappointed, but that's one of the few areas where the games truly have only been getting better. Columns is fun, and so is Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine, but they are more or less the same game. Also, while games like Flicky and Alex Kidd are a nice look at where gaming was at that point, they aren't particularly fun, and there are a handful of others that probably won't hold you attention. Snob that I am, I still have nearly 30 games here that I gladly played.

For people interested in easy gamer points, getting a full 1,000 shouldn't take you too much time, especially if you're willing to cheat. Only one game (Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine) requires that you beat it; all others have fairly easy achievements, many attainable within the first 30 minutes of gaming. But seriously, if you're playing just for points, there are prettier places to go.

If you need to scratch that "vintage gaming" itch, or if you want to see the genesis (ahem) of a few big franchises and gaming standards, this is a great place to go. There are literally well over 100 hours of gaming here... And did I mention you can save any game at any time?

There are plenty of other retro game compilations available, including both classic arcade titles and games from the Genesis era, but the majority of them are full of filler with a few choice games thrown in to justify the price. I've never gone for these personally because the value is just not there, but Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection has totally bucked the trend by delivering 40 Genesis games, many of them classic and highly regarded titles, and a host of other features for just $20. This is something that you need to own if you consider yourself a retro gamer of any description.

I never owned a Genesis back in the day (I was a Nintendo boy all the way back then), so this is my first time playing the majority of the games in the collection. All of the Sonic the Hedgehog games are included, even the classic Sonic & Knuckles and the less-than-classic Sonic Spinball. Mixed in with the landmark franchise titles are several of the best games the Genesis ever saw, including Streets of Rage, Altered Beast, Golden Axe, Shining Force and the excellent Phantasy Star series. Mixed in with these titles are some lesser-known games like Fatal Labyrinth, Beyond Oasis, Ristar and the stylish Comix Zone. The only real disappointment is the first two Shinobi games are not included (only Shinobi III) and the classic titles that were cross-platform with the SNES are also not here. But you are getting an excellent collection of Genesis exclusives that will keep you busy for hours, so it's easy to forgive the omissions.

Also included in the game is a lot of unlockables, including video interviews with the game designers and other goodies, as well as arcade games like Zaxxon that completely floored me. Zaxxon was my favorite arcade game as well as the reason I had a Colecovison back in the 80's, so my nostalgia meter was definitely kicked into overdrive. The last thing I'll touch upon is the benefits of this game for achievement hunters. Several of the games support achievements and the majority of them are easy to obtain, such as 45 points for reaching level 11 in Vectorman 2, something you can do by entering a cheat code to get there instantly. Other games have simple objectives, such as survive a level without dying or reaching a certain number of points within a limited period of time. If achievements are your thing, this game is definitely worth picking up (not that the games aren't incentive enough).

Many of you reading this will belong to two different camps: those who experienced the Genesis back in the day and those who are too young but are curious about retro gaming. To both, this collection is an easy recommendation. These games come from a time when story, challenge and sheer fun were the main draw of a game, so don't let the primitive graphics and lack of modern tweaks discourage you. This collection is, simply put, a must-have.

First let's talk about the value of this game. Essentially, it's 49 Sega games (including the unlockable titles) for about 20 dollars! If I was buying these games separately, it would be well over 100s of dollars because these titles tend to go for 5-6 dollars each. And some are not available on the wii, ps3, or xbox live outside of this disc. Good luck finding a genesis and cartridges too. I most likely would have never played most of these titles if it wasn't for this compilation. Example: Alex Kidd, Bonanza Bros. and Dynamite Headdy. I never even heard of these games but I love them so much after I played them.

This game is great for its nostalgia factor too. I feel like a gaming archeologist playing Flicky and the arcade version of Altered Beast. It's like exploring your grandparents attic for the first time. There's so many interesting things inside this disc. Playing Alien Storm for the first time was crazy cause I didn't expect to play a robot that self-destructed. There were moments in Streets of Rage 3 where I couldn't stop laughing at the sheer silliness of the game.

I also love the multiplayer games like Golden Axe, Streets of Rage, etc. There were times when my husband and i were just "accidentally" beating each other up in Streets of Rage and it was so hilariously fun. I loved every minute of it.

Here's my only problem with the game. The manual isn't really complete. You need to go to [...] to download a complete game manual. I understand this because it is 49 games, and I think if they had to re-print all the manuals to each game, it probably cost a heck of a lot more than 20 dollars. The HD graphic improvements are hit or miss for some games, but it's OK cause you can turn that option off. It's kinda sad that you can't lock Sonic and Knuckles with Sonic 3, but I'm fine with that cause this has 49 games!

Finally, Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine just makes me angry.

Yes the title is correct, you get over 30 classic sega titles. Some of them include Vectorman 1&2, Sonic 1, 2, and 3, Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine, Ristar, Altered Beast, Golden Axe I, II and III, among plenty others. Some of these games also feature co-op BUT it's only LOCAL co-op, not online. Which kind of sucks because it would be cool, but it doesn't kill how great this collection is. All games also feature a save-state, which means you can save at any time during the games. I highly recommend this to ANYONE who plays games, whether they have played these or not.

I bought this game when it first came out. Most would wonder why i havnt written a review till almost a year later? The answer is simple.... i just finished playing!
This game collection is proof of what genesis did and what it had to offer when it was in its prime. You get a ton of old classics for literally no money and have the replay value and gamer points you didnt have when you were playing on the original systems. Even if you werent able to play these games in their prime they are still solid games with decent story and loads of play time.

Pro
-Cheap
-Loads of old classics from genesis.
-Ability to save wherever you are and continue later at the exact same spot
-Unlock new games with more play time.
-Franchise games have 1/2/3 not just one of the trilogy
-Achievement points are easy to unlock
-Updated graphics
-Easy Controls
-rating system that allows you to go right to your favorites without scrolling through all the games

Con
-No Sonic 3 with knuckles..... So no Hyper sonic
-Rating the games between 1-5 bars sometimes changes when you dont want it to

All and all this game is A+ and i would suggest anyone that is a genesis fan or someone that just wants to try some old games, gets it.

I was ecstatic to hear the collection of titles for this collection. Since I sold my genesis a few weeks ago to buy this I figured it would be a great trade off and I could now play all my favorites on the XBOX360 without having to fuss with having another console hooked up.

I want to point out a few of the things for people on the fence about this collection. First if you enjoyed these games growing up you will love this collection. They play great, look great, and each game has a museum where there is tidbits of information about the game and box art.

Now to the negatives:

1. Sonic and Knuckles in the collection can not be used in "Lock on" mode. So you can not play Sonic 2 or Sonic 3 with Knuckles. This is disappointing considering the fact that Sonic Jam on the Sega Saturn has this feature.

2. No online leaderboards. I was surprised by this announcement. Other gaming collections feature online leaderboards and it would have gave all the games a greater sense of replay value. I am one of those people who loved and conquered Sonic 3 so many times I would have played it over and over just to make a leaderboard.

3. Achievements are fairly easy. (http://www.gamersdailynews.com/story-7993-SEGA-Mega-Drive-Ultimate-Collection-Achievement-List.html). Where the heck is the achievement for beating Streets of Rage 3 on hard? I can not tell you how many nights I stayed up when I was younger trying to beat it on hard with a friend. This leads me to my next point.

4. No online multiplayer. I will not go into this. Obviously this feature would have been awesome.

Some positive feature include being able to save your game and being able to organize the games by list so that your favorite game will always appear at the top of the list when you start up the collection.

Regarding the video quality. I have a 42 inch 1080p Westinghouse LCD TV and all the games look really bright and colorful when stretched to full screen. By default all games start in a windowed mode and you have to press the "Start" button and select "Video Options". From there you can stretch the game to full screen and enable a "Smoothing" option that makes the colors a little better. You have to do this for every game so it makes a little annoying when starting up each game for the first time.

In the end if you are a die hard Sega fan and want to relive the games of the past you owe it to yourself to pick up the collection. If you are hoping for something new then you might as well skip this collection for now. I doubt Sega will patch in online leaderboards or multiplayer.

The only complaint I have is with the games you have to unlock. In order to unlock Phantasy Star you need a 2nd controller and a 2nd player which I don't happen to have in order to beat the required game. What's the point in publishing a game that not everyone is going to be able to unlock? There are way too many Sonic games for my taste as well but being an RPG fan I'm pretty focused only on those.