Re-igniting The Console Wars, Vol. 1: SNES vs. Genesis

[CJ]

With so many consoles out there, I thought It would be fun to look back over the years, and see what consoles you guys prefer. So JUMP IN and make your voice heard. This poll will only be open for a limited time, so GET N OR GET OUT. No pressure or anything, but WII WOULD LIKE TO PLAY. The choice is yours: LIVE IN YOUR WORLD, OR PLAY IN OURS.

..BLAST-PROCESSING!

Round One: A new Challenger Appears!

Back in the 80s, Nintendo dominated the gaming market. Sure, a lot of people had Ataris, but the NES was the undisputed king of consoles, with a massive library of AAA titles, and Nintendo's chubby little mascot, Mario.

Enter SEGA. The company is struggling to compete, and decides to invent their own mascot. A blue hedgehog named Sonic. Much faster than Nintendo's plumber, and boasting an attitude, the spiky critter's debut game became a hit, but Nintendo wasn't scared. They had a new Mario game, with new power-ups and a new ally: Yoshi. Both mascots made big profits, and spawned cartoon series and tons of merchandising. (Both consoles also had a ton of AAA games from third-parties.) And thus, a war was waged. Fanboys were born, and a never-ending debate began:

Which was better? The SEGA Genesis or the Super Nintendo?

 

[Tanin]

I give it to the Genesis cause I could hold the controller and play it one handed.

 

[Havok83]

I was a Nintendo boy all throughout my childhood. SNES was one of the best consoles created

I give it to the Genesis cause I could hold the controller and play it one handed.

why would you want to play one handed?

I hated the Genesis controller bc it only had 3 buttons. That severely limited what could be done in games as opposed to the SNES's 6

 

[CJ]

I loved the the original NES, (It was a lot of fun going to a friends house and wasting hours playing co-op games like Ninja Turtles, Contra and Battletoads) but then Sonic came along and changed things.

I remember playing Sonic 1 at Toys R Us when I was 6.. My jaw hung open when he ran through that loop-de-loop in Green Hill Zone. Also, the graphics were pretty astounding at that time. And the music! Sonic games had the best tunes, IMO. (Green Hill, Chemical Plant, Hydro City, Flying Battery, Ice Cap, the list goes on..)

The SEGA Genesis was my "Red Ryder BB Gun" best Christmas gift I ever got.

 

[Soapy]

I was way more into Sega back then, but in hindsight the Super Nintendo was clearly the better console. SNES is on the shortlist for "greatest console of all time" which I don't think the Genesis/Mega Drive really qualifies for. I do think the Genesis is kind of underrated though.

 

[jacobed]

I liked Sega and its what I had as a kid but man Snes had Nintendo's games on its side. Link to the Past and Super Mario RPG, that's all that needs to be said. Snes gets my vote.

 

[The Hill]

I'm a Sega man till I die, if they had a console out now i'd still get it, sure the 32X and CD pretty much led to the end for them, but the Megadrive alone especialy after correcting the controller issue, made me a believer. Sonic, Shinobi, Streets of MF'n Rage was like a holy trinity on the system. Kinda mad Saga didn't revive Eternal Champions, but I guess the VF series kinda replaced that. Also, for some reason, sport games were better on the Genesis. A friend of mine used to get on my case (and still does) about hiow the Genesis could only produce three colors. Red Blue and Purple (as a product of red and blue) usedd to get so pissed off when he said it, but in hindsight, it wasn't too far from the truth.

 

[Upset Spideyfan]

Sega does what NintenDON'T

 

[Iron_Stark]

I was a Nintendo boy all throughout my childhood. SNES was one of the best consoles created


why would you want to play one handed?

I hated the Genesis controller bc it only had 3 buttons. That severely limited what could be done in games as opposed to the SNES's 6

When games like Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat came out for the Genesis, they made a six button controller. It was way better than the SNES controller since all six were lined up nicely, three on top, three on bottom.


-----------------------

I always liked the Genesis (or SEGA for that matter) better than Nintendo. Sure Nintendo had the prettier graphics, but most of their more popular games never interested me. I always chose Sonic over Mario, and SEGA-produced games like Revenge of Shinobi, Shadow Dancer: The Secret of Shinobi, Shinobi III: Return of the Ninja Master, Space Harrier II, Altered Beast, Golden Axe, Super Thunderblade, Streets of Rage, just to name a few, over Nintendo produced kiddy games.

As far as when games were being ported over to both systems, apart from Street Fighter and maybe Mortal Kombat, SEGA always had the edge.
Madden NFL, Jurassic Park, Captain America and the Avengers, Robocop vs Terminator and Earthworm Jim are just some examples of that.

Sports games, Genesis had the edge big time especially the EA titles.

SEGA also had a Spder-Man game titled The Amazing Spider-Man vs Kingpin, which if anyone remembers it, was one of if not the best Spidey games of the 90s.

And then X-Men, who if anyone grew up in the 90s or in high school would've known about them, since they were everywhere. Nintendo had X-Men: Mutant Apocalypse, which was pretty to look at, but clunky as hell and only a single player game. Genesis had X-Men which had come out two years prior, also had some good looking graphics, but this one was two players and at the time had that horrible Spidey & X-Men teamup game for the NES. Two years later SEGA released X-Men 2: Clone Wars which was praised by a lot of video game magazines, had more characters to choose from, even Magneto, who at the time playing as a villain, their greatest enemy no less, unheard of and it was also two players.

I was never an RPG guy or even owned an RPG game so I wouldn't know what RPG games either system had.

No one will ever convince me the SNES was better than the Genesis.

 

[amazingfantasy15]

I liked and had both. Genesis definitely had the better sports games, however, I think any other games SNES had the lead, they just looked better on SNES. You had to have both back then though because the 1st party games were great, Sonic, Mario, Street of Rage, Zelda, Golden Axe, Super Metroid. Just too many great games for each system.

 

[The Hill]

When it came to RPGs, SNES had the Final Fantasy games, while Sega had the Shining Force series.

 

[Soapy]

Also Phantasy Star.

 

[GREEN =w= DAY]

i love both systems, but i went with the SNES

Super Mario World, Mario Kart, Donkey Kong Country, Mega Man X, Super Contra, Final Fight, Super Double Dragon, TMNT: Turtles In Time, Star Fox, etc.

too many fun games for that system

 

[The Hill]

Also Phantasy Star.

I was thinking about that game when I typed Shining Force I get the two mixed up for some reason. also, it has occured to me that the 16-bit era has taught us as gamers, developers, and would-be console makers valuble cautionary tales that people still have not learned from. Did anyone ever play the Tubo Graphix 16?

 

[Blitzkrieg Bop]

I prefer Nintendo to every other company, but the one thing SNES didn't have was Sonic. I bought a Genesis a few years ago after buying a SNES just to play Sonic games. Now that I've got a Wii, I've got access to both libraries so I get to enjoy both.

 

[Doc Ock]

Although I was a Genesis fanatic for a very long time, even still playing it today I only discovered the SNES a few years ago. It quickly rose to my third favorite game console of all time, the SNES is just amazing. So many great games compared to Genesis, even though I prefer Sonic to Mario.

 

[Jick]

SNES all the way.
I still play its games sometimes.

 

[CJ]

I was way more into Sega back then, but in hindsight the Super Nintendo was clearly the better console. SNES is on the shortlist for "greatest console of all time" which I don't think the Genesis/Mega Drive really qualifies for. I do think the Genesis is kind of underrated though.

I understand your point, but I disagree. The SNES wouldn't come close to the top of my list. Sure, the SNES had Square RPGs and Zelda, (which is probably why most critics prefer it) but, I personally hated those kind of games. The overhead perspective found in RPGs at that time really annoyed me, and I often found myself confused on where I was supposed to go or what I was supposed to do in Zelda games.

And personally, I was never that big into Nintendo's franchises. (I like Mario, Wario, Kirby and Donkey Kong, but that's about it.)

I was much more into platformers, and Genesis had a bunch of exclusives. Sonic, Ristar, Kid Chameleon. Comix Zone was a blast too, but I guess that one was more of a beat 'em up. Also, Disney games were always better on Genesis. While the SNES got 'Mickey's Magical Quest' the Genesis had the vastly superior 'Castle/World of Illusion' series. 'Aladdin' on the SNES was a dull platformer with sub-par graphics, while the Genesis version was developed with the aid of actual Disney animators and looked gorgeous as a result. It was lot more challenging and fun, too.

While the SNES got Tiny Toons: Buster Busts Loose! (Which was an okay game, actually) the Genesis got Tiny Toons: Buster's Hidden Treasure, which was way, way better. One of my favorite 2D platformers ever.

Games were notoriously expensive for the SNES too.

I owned both consoles. I played my Genesis all the time, but pretty much just used my SNES for Mega Man X & Donkey Kong. There was a couple of other games I really liked, like TMNT: Turtles in Time & Super Mario World, but Genesis clearly had the edge, IMO.

 

[cryptic name]

SNES. It's what I had growing up and I still play it to this day. Great stuff like Super Star Wars, Super Mario World, Mario Paint (weird, but a favorite of mine) and of course em effing Donkey Kong Country.

 

[The Hill]

More often than not when it came to multi-platform games SNES had the better graphics Genesis had the better gameplay. Also this era was when Nintendo started to get the unshakable rep of being a kiddie machine thanks to Mortal Kombat.

 

[Galactus123]

Sega Genesis. It had Moonwalker

 

[GREEN =w= DAY]

More often than not when it came to multi-platform games SNES had the better graphics Genesis had the better gameplay. Also this era was when Nintendo started to get the unshakable rep of being a kiddie machine thanks to Mortal Kombat.

thankfully it was just a one time incident

after Nintendo saw that the 1st Mortal Kombat game wasn't selling as well as the Genesis version, they finally decided to have violent games on the SNES

 

[Spider-Aziz]

I was way more into Sega back then, but in hindsight the Super Nintendo was clearly the better console. SNES is on the shortlist for "greatest console of all time" which I don't think the Genesis/Mega Drive really qualifies for. I do think the Genesis is kind of underrated though.

This

 

[Iceman]

SNES is one of my all time favourite consoles alongside the original Playstation. Getting my Street Fighter II edition box (which was huge!) was one of my most exciting moments at that age lol.

 

[Spider-Vader]

Atari Jaguar