I was lucky enough to experience Sega's scaling games in 1986 as a kid, the first game I ever tried was Outrun, and I was blown away, this was a time you didn't see anything like this outside the arcade, and we just had an Atari 2600 at home. Going to the arcade was like going to a CES show where you got to experience the latest and greatest eye candy tech.
I have so much respect for old school game devs, the limitations that they had only fostered great creativity, the work around for things and the inventive ways that devs used is akin to old school animators, you can see the love for their craft in every bit of these wonderfully crafted masterpieces.
Great idea for an episode! Gonna steal this idea, but I won't do it for a while. So when people in the future comment on my video saying "Sega Lord X did it first" you can all come back to this video and this comment and absolutely confirm that I ripped off the idea, lol.
I was looking for saturn collection releases on consoles , mostly only genesis games they provide whoch saturn gem games left nearly forgotten , the only ( some ) saturn games collection i found is at Nintendo 3DS and only around 5 games , i hope sega releases more saturn and arcade gems collections at stores / consoles instead of too many poor genesis sprite scaling visuals
@@ZombieFBody You luky guy. I live in Germany but in 1984, a year before I was even born, Arcade halls were forbidden because of addictive (HA HA HA). The only time when I was in an arcade hall was on a vacation in Italy with my parrent in 1999. Death Adder was not there but Virtua Fighter 2 and Daytona USA.
@@shaneg9081 The sad thing is that the Saturn could have had ports of this stuff with minimal compromise. It's pretty much the most capable home sprite hardware behind / next to the Neo Geo.
@@shaneg9081The architecture of the Saturn is derived from the system 32. This being super scaler games would absolutely have been no match for the fashion for polygonal 3d games and the Saturn would not have been cheaper to produce or more competitive.
After years of watching SLX’s channel, I’m starting to realize he is annoyed at Sega for having a fantastic back catalog of arcade games that haven’t been brought home.
He's not the only one! Not to sound ungrateful, they've done justice for many titles, but there are so many odd choices for titles they avoided that could have been home conversion classics.
Sega slits its own throat when it comes to its place in history. This company helped define nearly everything you play today. Yet few people know about it because so many of its games have no modern casual way to enjoy them.
@@SegaLordX Couldn't agree more. As a fellow Gen-Xer who started fanboying on Sega since Master System they should be ashamed of their current state of existence.
I don't understand what's the hold up. I'm 45 and grew up on sega when everyone else had nintendo there's soo many good games to bring home but they keep giving us the same games on every compilation disk. Sonic 1 through whatever shinobi games etc etc granted I love these games but I have all my original carts along with compilation disk. We deserve these other titles
Thank you SLX for continuing to make your unique brand of content. The way you review the games of the past with a lot of information and your classic presentation is something very special. It feels like if someone captured that feeling of cracking open a Gamepro or EGM magazine, and made it into a RUclips channel. RUclips wouldn't be the same without you. Appreciate all the hard work and don't ever change.
Being 50 years old,I was so blessed to witness it all buddy! There is something so special and exciting about sprite scaling. It was like entering wonderland when going to an arcade and seeing these videogame miracles!! Arcade games blew home games away back then wich made them more of a marvel. I use to think any game was possible with such graphical power. Being a young teenager Sega arcade sprite scalers had such an impressions on me that of course I became a Sega fan! Atari first, then Sega. I wanted the arcade experience at home. These games made me choose the Sega Genesis, the very first home console that I saved up my money and bought myself. These games put Sega in the homes. Everyone wanted to play them and the closest way was a Sega gaming console. Thanks for the trip down memory lane, man we were lucky weren't we?!
Close to 50 i was there. I am in Europe. Golden age for me was 1983-1989 for the arcade games. For console games Golden Age was NES,SNES,MEGADRIVE,N64, DREAMCAST. I experienced games from Black and white Space Invaders, Pole Position, lady bug, elevator action in the arcades to Outrun, Space harrier, Shinobi, Wonder boy, and many other amazing games. Remember when first saw system 16 Altered Beast i was blown away hearing clear voice from the machine. Also when i played for the first time SMB3 on my NES, then seeing Sonic the Hedgehog in a store for the first time, or experiencing FZERO on SNES . It made me pursue a CS degree, learn C++, asm to understand how all those things in my youth worked. The golden age of gaming is long gone. Nothing can replicate the feeling for me when i was young and played a new arcade for the first time. Now even though i have a good gaming PC and i could buy every new console that is out there if i wanted, modern games luck something which i cannot define. I think besides the arcade. CRT's were adding something and also the dev teams where smaller and more passionate back them, and maybe they had more freedom. Also the arcades where programmed on the Metal Hardcore Assembly language. Now days the dev does not know how the system works in an intimate level. He only knows what system calls are available to him and he works through those. The GPU guy or engine guy will write some libs for the gameplay dev to use. The point is that no single person noways knows the system as a whole and this shows. Back then some devs where truly wizards. Take John Carmack. My generation lived something that unfortunately it cannot be replicated and felt by the new generation . @@waynecuff3140
I agree, I wish the industry had put more effort into advancing 2D graphics as the technology improved. I feel like 3D graphics were pushed too hard with hardware that could barely handle it, while 2D games were abandoned at their perfect time to peak.
@@PCarDriver87the Atari Jaguar is quite good at sprite scaling ( no rotation for afterburner). Why did people buy full 3d ( 3do, psx ) ? Why did people play super Mario kart where you can drive in any direction?
The analog scaling Sega used in the VCO hardware games in the early 80's (Buck Rogers/Zoom 969, Turbo, Subrock) was fascinating. They scaled sprites in completely non digital way by using a bank of voltage controlled oscillators (VCOs) to supply the clocks to the object ROMs. The slower the oscillator frequency the slower the ROM was read out as the electron beam drew the screen line by line and the larger the object would appear on screen. Also, Subrock was AFAIK the first stereo 3D game and the first use of LCD shutter glasses in a video game (the front of the cabinet ate had a periscope you looked through which had the LCD shutters)
The level of Sega ingenuity was off the charts in the arcade. History simply does not give those programmers and hardware designers the credit they deserve. They guided an entirely industry for decades.
Seriously that sounds crazy complicated. I thought they had a custom dsp to do this based on simple multiplication table stored and just reading vram and adding the scaling factor.
The Saturn's video chips are upgraded versions of what was in System 32, so in fact it could've done perfect ports of all of these games. Mid 90s Sega has a lot of stupidity to answer for.
@@paulclinton6414 I don’t even think that explanation makes sense - it’s true that the gaming media were fawning over the PS1’s 3D capabilities on its release. Ridge Racer was an impressive port which showed up Daytona (graphically) on the Saturn. But many early 32 bit games used pseudo 3D - FIFA 96 is one example. Even Mario Kart 64 used sprites for the characters.
I love when you do vids like this. Showing not just how awesome Sega was as a game developer, but just how influential they were in pushing this industry forward. Particularly in the arcade. They'll always be my favorite developer and has been for 40 years. I remember being so blown away by Zaxxon back in '82
It's really a shame Sega almost completely forgot about the System 32. Being born in 1999, I really don't have any nostalgia for the early 3D games and honestly find them to be quite an eyesore, even if I enjoy playing them. But these 2D scaling masterpieces are timeless, something that even modern indie developers can't quite replicate to the level Sega put out back then. I hate using mame because setting it up is such a chore, even with MameUI, and Astro City Minis aren't cheap or readily available, so I haven't played any of these. I'm not sure why they never got a release on the 3DS and Switch like Virtua Racing, After Burner, Outrun, Super Hang-On, and other Sega arcade classics, but they really should.
I first played Arabian Fight on the Sega Astro City Mini, and I just love all the constant scaling and animations that game has! Good stuff. I’d love to properly try out SegaSonic the Hedgehog with a trackball someday.
I grew up in the 80s and loved these games. However, they're weren't looked upon quite as fondly at the time as they are now. When Daytona USA and Ridge Racer hit the market, all we wanted was more 3D games. These sprite scalers suddenly looked archaic, even if they weren't. If not for unique cabinets that moved or even spun, they would have been forgotten even faster than they were.
It's very interesting that in the mid 90's we've seen the premature "death" of many games (unreleased) and consoles (Saturn and Neo Geo, mostly) because 3D graphics were the next big thing. However... 20-30 years later, we can easily play an NES game with no problems and appreciate it's pixel graphics visuals, while those early 3D games have aged so, so sooooooo badly!! All Hail To 2D games!
Galaxy Force II was a great arcade, and the Master System version is impressive, but the Genesis version let me down... especially the caves felt like they could have done more there. Can't argue the music on any port though ;)
Its amazing to me that Sega had so many great arcade titels under its belt and these games would have been what the 32X should be all about. It would sell like hotcakes back then.
If I´m not wrong (and I could be), Sleepstream was only released in Brazil. Capcom had a very strong arcade cabinet division here at the time. To this day is possible to walk around some malls and check those old gigantic blue capcom cabinets.
I had never heard of Slipstream before. Wow, what a stunner. I played a lot of zoutrun back in the day and Slipstream looks super fun. A smooth running sprite scaler racer is a thing of beauty and really shows off the tech.
MAME emulates it pretty easily and my computer (mainly powered by an NVIDIA 1060 GTX old ass GPU and late 3rd gen i7 intel) is seven or more years old!
wow 😮 it never ceases to amaze me how well you pluck out not just one game but an entire family of games i somehow missed while exploring arcade emulation (been at it for 2 decades now!) - i always think ive seen the best of the best & lo and behold, you present more genius to explore - thx dude! 🙏🏼
Hey bro, the views are getting up there. I've been watching you for a few years now. As a Sega kid I totally get where you're coming from. Happy to see the channel growing 💗
There is a dual Cool Riders machine at the arcade on the Palladium Shopping Center in Curitiba, Brazil. Nice looking game. They have four networked Daytona's too, upgraded with LCD monitors instead of CRTs.
I really apreciate your videos especially after a hard weeks work. It's almost like a reward; especially when you release videos on friday. Thanks for the great videos.
What a way to start my Saturday morning off then watching a new SLX video! These videos always help get me pumped to play Sega. I'm sorry to say that I never had the chance to play any of these in the arcades (aside from Outrunners) or in the Cinema lobbys and bowling allies as a kid. Street Fighter II and Mortal Kombat were always the two dominant games being seen everywhere. I did play Outrunners once in the arcade though and was blown away by those graphics, of course the game destroyed me in a mere few minutes as I ran out of time, but it was a great few minutes of play. Also I wanted to mention that not only have I never seen Alien 3 and Jurassic Park in the arcades but I never even knew they existed outside the Mega Drive and Master System which got ports that were completely different and made into platformers. That arcade Jurassic Park footage you showed looked amazing! I knew of ''Aliens'' getting a SEGA arcade game but I didn't know they made an ''Alien 3'' arcade game.
SLX never fails to disappoint. Sega was absolute magic in the arcades. I knew of quite a few of these games in the arcades but there are many I never heard of. As a Sega CD, Sega 32X, and Saturn owner back in the day it is absolutely criminal how Sega did not release these games on their own systems. Even today I wonder why Sega has not released these games on modern consoles and Steam. I guess they just do not want to make money. Thanks again SLX.
Mi first contact was Hang On in 1988... was mind blowing. The arcade xp of the cabinet, the feel in the hands and all body is something VR will never replicate.
I can't believe that Sega never ported those games to any home console. I am sure there is a big market for a big Sega game collection or museum like Atari 50.
We need indie developers to make games like these for consoles, as in large Sprite arcade style games. Indie developers make a lot of 8-bit and 16-bit retro style games but never 32-bit Arcade games.
Scaling 2D sprites makes for a really cool abstract kind of world that is really weird to be in. Polygons are good but they are closer to Reality so they lose the strange effect of Sprites
Ahhh Classic Mel!! Such joy watching your videos whenever it is a good or bad day Wish you the very best to you and your family, and thank you very much for all the quality you always deliver!!
Great video, I recently suggested you look at System 32. I assume it was already planned. I remember being blown away by the few System 32 games I got to play as a kid.
Really like the way you present the content. Knowledgeable, not too over the top but not afraid to throw out your own opinions. Plus the way you come across is pleasant to listen to
The biggest mistake Sega made, in my opinion, besides the anemic color count (128 colors out of 512 would be sufficient) is the lack of hardware scaling on the Genesis. Of course there was no way to compete with arcade level scaling, but basic scaling capabilites for games like Outrun, Hang-On, After Burner, Space Harrier etc would be a dream come true back then.
I only came across one Spiderman the Videogame arcade ever and was beginning to think I was inventing it. That building tile style gameplay is unforgettable.
Yeah, I never got to play it beyond minutes. I would've loved to play it for HOURS, like I do their arcade offerings. Jurassic Park (Arcade) is SUBLIME. Played it many times, including at SEGA's amusement locations. I was looking for Spiderman Arcade to make the jump, same with Alien 3and Sonic. Never happened. 😢
Can't believe this video is how I'm finding out about a 4 player co-op Spider-Man game to rival the Konami X-Men arcade game. That's so wild, they never had any Spider-Man Sega cabinets in any of the arcades around Chicago when I was growing up because I would've been all over it!
I remember playing a game back in the late 80's early 90's that had some pretty decent sprite scaling. You sat in this really cool cabinet, piloting an attack helicopter, kinda like Blue Thunder, iirc, and you fly around this map destroying targets. You viewed it from above using the joystic for backwards, forwards, left and right, and another controller to the right of you to control the up and down movement - the sprite scaling happened while going up and down. The only level I can remember was one where you are attacking platforms in the ocean, kinda like oil rigs. Ring any bells with anyone? I'd love to know the name of it. And no, it's not Thunder Blade (I don't think! Lol)
It is neat learning about the technical aspects of these games. They were the frontrunner in video game arcade tech for a time, co-developing the software and more importantly the chips that allowed the software to function. It caused Sega to do things a little differently and their home systems always have quirks. One that comes to mind is the FM synth use, over midi. The two systems are completely different in how they generate music and requires completely different knowledge of computers (and music really).
Not only the super scalers are impressive, bit also the music they made. Speaking of, this video helped me find another banger which is Sonic Control from Outrunners. Man, does that slap hard 🤯
These late 80s and early 90s games are even more impressive when you think about what home consoles were doing at the time. I love SNES and Genesis, but the super scaler arcade games were just insane.
I was just playing Alien: The Gun on My Quest 2 using EmuVR, It lets you play light gun games in VR, such a great way to play light gun games these days.
SLX your the best bro! love your content and everything u do! i really appreciate all ur content, so much insite and new info i never knew about all eras and genres of gaming! tanks man u really keep the good ole days alive!
I've never heard of some of these games. Great video. I do remember the Time Traveller game you mentioned but didn't really understand what I was doing at the time I played it.
9:01 Dude I’ve wanted to know what this game was for ever it was in the back of my head from when I used to play the Boardwalk Arcade Games in Ocean City, MD. Back in the 80s it really used to mezmorize me seeing little guy hologram video guy walking around and interacting. Wow brings back memories old Marty’s Play Land, talk about a deep cut lol. As always love your content.
I didn't even know half these games existed. Amazing how much they pushed this hardware. It's crazy that the megadrive/genesis didn't have any hardware scaling. It would have made the cartridges smaller in terms of kb (no need to store multiple sizes of sprites) and allowed amazing ports of their 3D games. Weird.
Another awesome and educational episode. I think Hard Dunk would be a perfect game to be re-mastered, especially with modern 2D visuals. Thanks for the excellent content Sega Lord X!
Cool Riders is STILL screaming "convert ME to Saturn!!"😄. Love Sys32 games, still remember Modeler, first dedicated emu 20 years ago, fantastic video as always.
I agree, guess the closest to that was Yu Suzuki's game works for Dreamcast which had perfect Outrun, Afterburner & Powerdrift, but I think that was it.
@@byrosonline5876- Would love to see a collection of these arcade games for modern platforms. Perhaps it could look & play similar to the Street Fighter 6 lobby mode where you choose a character & navigate an arcade, then play all these SEGA arcade classics.
This video gave me a thought.. Did Sega (or any other company) release a scalar platformer? Not just special effects but actually moving into and out of the scenery? This was a dream i had as a kid..
All these games were ridicously impressive back in the 90's. I mean, there was nothing comparable in the home systems. I'll never forget watching SuperMonaco GP -which is another super scaling party - completely amazed in some obscure arcade, and the dissapoinment of the home version I got with the genesis.
That one burned me up, because some of the print ads were using Arcade screenshots to represent the coming Genesis port. I did appreciate that Sega at least gave us a career/season mode with a full calendar of races, it would have been really bad if the home port we got was strictly the arcade mode.
@Benjamin Jagun You are right about the expectations, but the Mega Drive launched with a pretty good version of Super Hang On, which got the music and a lot of the look right. The fake scaling was pretty good as well. It ran a few ticks slower than the arcade version but that's more noticeable on direct comparison. Even Space Harrier 2 (also a launch title) helped over sell the Mega Drive. Super Thunder Blade was a little suspect though... 😅 I liked the Mega Drive's Outrun, for the time it was the best home port graphics and gameplay wise. The PC-Engine port came closer with the palette, but the Mega Drive version was better all around, pushing more background/roadside elements. (obviously the later Saturn version blew it out of the water). Audio wise. it did suffer like you stated, but the bigger crime to me was the lack of any type of engine sound. The sound is one of those ingredients that made the Arcade games seem larger than life. Super Monaco GP for instance had that iconic very loud(and clear) downshift sample which made it intact to the home port. For Outrun, along with the music (which could have been closer), the continuous engine sound from the Ferrari in the arcade: accelerating, downshifting, braking, even passing traffic was very immersive. The home port only retained the tire traction squeal and a generic car passing sound.
I wish I could say I experienced more of these games then I did but sadly I didn't. I was lucky to find Sega games back in the day at various arcades and I always did gravitate to them whenever I could. The sad thing is if I didn't experience them then, now in the world we live in it's very unlikely I ever will. Not unless I go to the galloping ghost or somewhere very particular. Still I just seeing these games brought back such warm memories. The arcade of yesteryear was such a thing of beauty. I'm glad I got to experience it in some form before it went away.
I was lucky enough to experience Sega's scaling games in 1986 as a kid, the first game I ever tried was Outrun, and I was blown away, this was a time you didn't see anything like this outside the arcade, and we just had an Atari 2600 at home. Going to the arcade was like going to a CES show where you got to experience the latest and greatest eye candy tech.
Sega arcade was years ahead back then.
Same here old-time gamer here haha.
My first arcade was pole position then xevious, but I totally get what you mean
I have so much respect for old school game devs, the limitations that they had only fostered great creativity, the work around for things and the inventive ways that devs used is akin to old school animators, you can see the love for their craft in every bit of these wonderfully crafted masterpieces.
@@LILAC_CHAOS Totally
Man, SEGA really needs to release a super scaler compilation on modern consoles. I would buy it so fast!
Great idea for an episode! Gonna steal this idea, but I won't do it for a while. So when people in the future comment on my video saying "Sega Lord X did it first" you can all come back to this video and this comment and absolutely confirm that I ripped off the idea, lol.
But your video will have an *exclusive skit* that no one else does :p
Steal away, brother. It’ll have your own personal touch so it’ll be well worth watching.
Holy! I hope one day we´ll get a Sega System 32 Collection for the current Systems. These games deserves to be played at home.
I was looking for saturn collection releases on consoles , mostly only genesis games they provide whoch saturn gem games left nearly forgotten , the only ( some ) saturn games collection i found is at Nintendo 3DS and only around 5 games , i hope sega releases more saturn and arcade gems collections at stores / consoles instead of too many poor genesis sprite scaling visuals
I've been wanting a home port of Revenge of Death Adder since I first played it over 30-years ago!
@@ZombieFBody I would like to see an Arcade version of Moon Walker. We never got that port. Would have been awesome on the Sega Cd.
@@ksolo614 As Michael Jackson fan, I´m 100 % behind you.
@@ZombieFBody You luky guy. I live in Germany but in 1984, a year before I was even born, Arcade halls were forbidden because of addictive (HA HA HA). The only time when I was in an arcade hall was on a vacation in Italy with my parrent in 1999. Death Adder was not there but Virtua Fighter 2 and Daytona USA.
This is what I wish the saturn was. Maybe in another timeline we got just that with Outrunners as one of the launch titles 😔
In another universe probably Sega earth
Exactly
Yeah, in alternate universe, Sega release a Saturn based on this hardware and is today the leader in the console market.
@@shaneg9081
The sad thing is that the Saturn could have had ports of this stuff with minimal compromise.
It's pretty much the most capable home sprite hardware behind / next to the Neo Geo.
@@shaneg9081The architecture of the Saturn is derived from the system 32. This being super scaler games would absolutely have been no match for the fashion for polygonal 3d games and the Saturn would not have been cheaper to produce or more competitive.
After years of watching SLX’s channel, I’m starting to realize he is annoyed at Sega for having a fantastic back catalog of arcade games that haven’t been brought home.
He's not the only one! Not to sound ungrateful, they've done justice for many titles, but there are so many odd choices for titles they avoided that could have been home conversion classics.
Sega slits its own throat when it comes to its place in history. This company helped define nearly everything you play today. Yet few people know about it because so many of its games have no modern casual way to enjoy them.
@@SegaLordX Couldn't agree more. As a fellow Gen-Xer who started fanboying on Sega since Master System they should be ashamed of their current state of existence.
@@michaelh.8945 i was never a huge sega fan and even i was ashamed for them when they threw in the towel around 2002.
I don't understand what's the hold up. I'm 45 and grew up on sega when everyone else had nintendo there's soo many good games to bring home but they keep giving us the same games on every compilation disk. Sonic 1 through whatever shinobi games etc etc granted I love these games but I have all my original carts along with compilation disk. We deserve these other titles
Thank you SLX for continuing to make your unique brand of content. The way you review the games of the past with a lot of information and your classic presentation is something very special. It feels like if someone captured that feeling of cracking open a Gamepro or EGM magazine, and made it into a RUclips channel. RUclips wouldn't be the same without you. Appreciate all the hard work and don't ever change.
It means a lot to hear that. Thank you.
Completely agree and couldn't have said it better myself! I've been watching SLX for years and IMO every video has been excellent.
Being 50 years old,I was so blessed to witness it all buddy! There is something so special and exciting about sprite scaling. It was like entering wonderland when going to an arcade and seeing these videogame miracles!! Arcade games blew home games away back then wich made them more of a marvel. I use to think any game was possible with such graphical power. Being a young teenager Sega arcade sprite scalers had such an impressions on me that of course I became a Sega fan! Atari first, then Sega. I wanted the arcade experience at home. These games made me choose the Sega Genesis, the very first home console that I saved up my money and bought myself. These games put Sega in the homes. Everyone wanted to play them and the closest way was a Sega gaming console. Thanks for the trip down memory lane, man we were lucky weren't we?!
It was the best of times. Glad you enjoy taking the trip with me.
Likewise I'm 52, nothing will ever beat the golden age of gaming. You had to be there to understand.
Close to 50 i was there. I am in Europe. Golden age for me was 1983-1989 for the arcade games. For console games Golden Age was NES,SNES,MEGADRIVE,N64, DREAMCAST.
I experienced games from Black and white Space Invaders, Pole Position, lady bug, elevator action in the arcades to Outrun, Space harrier, Shinobi, Wonder boy, and many other amazing games. Remember when first saw system 16 Altered Beast i was blown away hearing clear voice from the machine. Also when i played for the first time SMB3 on my NES, then seeing Sonic the Hedgehog in a store for the first time, or experiencing FZERO on SNES . It made me pursue a CS degree, learn C++, asm to understand how all those things in my youth worked.
The golden age of gaming is long gone. Nothing can replicate the feeling for me when i was young and played a new arcade for the first time. Now even though i have a good gaming PC and i could buy every new console that is out there if i wanted, modern games luck something which i cannot define. I think besides the arcade. CRT's were adding something and also the dev teams where smaller and more passionate back them, and maybe they had more freedom. Also the arcades where programmed on the Metal Hardcore Assembly language. Now days the dev does not know how the system works in an intimate level. He only knows what system calls are available to him and he works through those. The GPU guy or engine guy will write some libs for the gameplay dev to use. The point is that no single person noways knows the system as a whole and this shows. Back then some devs where truly wizards. Take John Carmack.
My generation lived something that unfortunately it cannot be replicated and felt by the new generation .
@@waynecuff3140
I really like these kind of graphics. I wish they continued to improved this kind of stuff like they did 3d graphics.
I agree, I wish the industry had put more effort into advancing 2D graphics as the technology improved. I feel like 3D graphics were pushed too hard with hardware that could barely handle it, while 2D games were abandoned at their perfect time to peak.
@@PCarDriver87the Atari Jaguar is quite good at sprite scaling ( no rotation for afterburner). Why did people buy full 3d ( 3do, psx ) ? Why did people play super Mario kart where you can drive in any direction?
The analog scaling Sega used in the VCO hardware games in the early 80's (Buck Rogers/Zoom 969, Turbo, Subrock) was fascinating. They scaled sprites in completely non digital way by using a bank of voltage controlled oscillators (VCOs) to supply the clocks to the object ROMs. The slower the oscillator frequency the slower the ROM was read out as the electron beam drew the screen line by line and the larger the object would appear on screen. Also, Subrock was AFAIK the first stereo 3D game and the first use of LCD shutter glasses in a video game (the front of the cabinet ate had a periscope you looked through which had the LCD shutters)
Lol wtf is this hardware magic. I would never imagine it was that insane.
The level of Sega ingenuity was off the charts in the arcade. History simply does not give those programmers and hardware designers the credit they deserve. They guided an entirely industry for decades.
Seriously that sounds crazy complicated. I thought they had a custom dsp to do this based on simple multiplication table stored and just reading vram and adding the scaling factor.
I really wish scaling had continued to be further developed in parallel with polygon systems.
I love the scaling look.
All of these look like they could have performed perfectly on the Saturn. It's absolutely insane they didn't bother to port them
Especially when you consider some of the crap they did release in 95.
They didn’t want any money
By 1995, it was all about low poly trash 3D. These 2D master pieces were neglected.
The Saturn's video chips are upgraded versions of what was in System 32, so in fact it could've done perfect ports of all of these games. Mid 90s Sega has a lot of stupidity to answer for.
@@paulclinton6414 I don’t even think that explanation makes sense - it’s true that the gaming media were fawning over the PS1’s 3D capabilities on its release. Ridge Racer was an impressive port which showed up Daytona (graphically) on the Saturn. But many early 32 bit games used pseudo 3D - FIFA 96 is one example. Even Mario Kart 64 used sprites for the characters.
OUTRUNNERS! That's the version of the game that lets you plow into people!! Thank you for helping me remember.
SLX, it's a joy to experience a visual history of sega.
thank you for the countless hours you put into this channel over the years!
You are welcome. Thank you.
Holy crap, realising Rad Mobile predates Sonic 1 really puts into perspective just how far ahead arcades were back then.
Great video, Sega really needs to start doing compilations of these games!
Yes they do.
I remember the arcade games from this era being so much fun. When I was a kid we didn’t go to the arcade often but it was always such a treat.
You remember the arcade games from the era being so much fun.
Sprite scaling games are at the tip top of my list of favorite style of games. Even to this day they are beautiful and really fun to play
I love when you do vids like this. Showing not just how awesome Sega was as a game developer, but just how influential they were in pushing this industry forward. Particularly in the arcade. They'll always be my favorite developer and has been for 40 years. I remember being so blown away by Zaxxon back in '82
It's really a shame Sega almost completely forgot about the System 32. Being born in 1999, I really don't have any nostalgia for the early 3D games and honestly find them to be quite an eyesore, even if I enjoy playing them. But these 2D scaling masterpieces are timeless, something that even modern indie developers can't quite replicate to the level Sega put out back then. I hate using mame because setting it up is such a chore, even with MameUI, and Astro City Minis aren't cheap or readily available, so I haven't played any of these. I'm not sure why they never got a release on the 3DS and Switch like Virtua Racing, After Burner, Outrun, Super Hang-On, and other Sega arcade classics, but they really should.
I first played Arabian Fight on the Sega Astro City Mini, and I just love all the constant scaling and animations that game has! Good stuff. I’d love to properly try out SegaSonic the Hedgehog with a trackball someday.
I grew up in the 80s and loved these games. However, they're weren't looked upon quite as fondly at the time as they are now. When Daytona USA and Ridge Racer hit the market, all we wanted was more 3D games. These sprite scalers suddenly looked archaic, even if they weren't. If not for unique cabinets that moved or even spun, they would have been forgotten even faster than they were.
It's very interesting that in the mid 90's we've seen the premature "death" of many games (unreleased) and consoles (Saturn and Neo Geo, mostly) because 3D graphics were the next big thing. However... 20-30 years later, we can easily play an NES game with no problems and appreciate it's pixel graphics visuals, while those early 3D games have aged so, so sooooooo badly!!
All Hail To 2D games!
Always 2d ❤
Galaxy Force II is a masterpiece from visual and sound perspectives... It's music is classic, and the Genesis' version is great too.
Thats the only game Ive seen that uses Sprites to create 3D caves that can be navigated like polygon levels
Galaxy Force II was a great arcade, and the Master System version is impressive, but the Genesis version let me down... especially the caves felt like they could have done more there. Can't argue the music on any port though ;)
@@tursilion i was expecting an honest take of the very sup-par watered down Galaxy force II on Genesis/MegaDrive!
Fantastic work here, Shinobi. Loved seeing these. I played a ton of these in the arcade and didn’t realize how rare the experience would be.
Sega was sure ahead of its time with their sprites back in the 80s and 90s in arcade games. Really impressive that how much hardware it has.
It’s insane how many games have never received proper ports from the arcade and this video shows yet another stack of them!
Its amazing to me that Sega had so many great arcade titels under its belt and these games would have been what the 32X should be all about. It would sell like hotcakes back then.
Was it a bad omen that Sonic's very first appearance had him lynched and hanging from the windshield?
If I´m not wrong (and I could be), Sleepstream was only released in Brazil. Capcom had a very strong arcade cabinet division here at the time. To this day is possible to walk around some malls and check those old gigantic blue capcom cabinets.
Officially, I think you are right.
I'm blown away how impressive these graphics look for the time.
I had never heard of Slipstream before. Wow, what a stunner. I played a lot of zoutrun back in the day and Slipstream looks super fun. A smooth running sprite scaler racer is a thing of beauty and really shows off the tech.
MAME emulates it pretty easily and my computer (mainly powered by an NVIDIA 1060 GTX old ass GPU and late 3rd gen i7 intel) is seven or more years old!
I loved playing spiderman in the arcade. Those big sprites were amazing at the time..and heck, all these games are still impressive even today.
I clearly remember playing Outrun, Hang On, Thunderblade and Afterburner in the 80’s, and being blown away!!!! Love this video!
You are just too good at this. Sega should move you to their corporate office.
Haha, I'd take the position of Sega Evangelist very seriously.
Looking at these old games brings back old memories and that's why I know I'm feeling old.
wow 😮 it never ceases to amaze me how well you pluck out not just one game but an entire family of games i somehow missed while exploring arcade emulation (been at it for 2 decades now!) - i always think ive seen the best of the best & lo and behold, you present more genius to explore - thx dude! 🙏🏼
Hey bro, the views are getting up there. I've been watching you for a few years now. As a Sega kid I totally get where you're coming from. Happy to see the channel growing 💗
Yeah, the channel does fairly well I think. I'm glad most people seem to enjoy it.
A lot of nostalgia and arcade memories in of your vidéo. Those arcade monster was so cool. i'm glad to as growing in the 80's.
There is a dual Cool Riders machine at the arcade on the Palladium Shopping Center in Curitiba, Brazil. Nice looking game. They have four networked Daytona's too, upgraded with LCD monitors instead of CRTs.
@@IntegerOfDoom, bingo
I really apreciate your videos especially after a hard weeks work. It's almost like a reward; especially when you release videos on friday. Thanks for the great videos.
Great video Sir! Thank you for posting it.
i want to see more 2d sprite games that are not just side scrollers like this.
I'm a Nintendo nerd but when it comes to Sega I'm all in especially this type of vid 🙏🏽 Stadium cross is just like enduro racer arcade 🤘🏾
I absolutely loved Alien 3 The Gun. Probably one of my favorite games ever.
What a way to start my Saturday morning off then watching a new SLX video! These videos always help get me pumped to play Sega.
I'm sorry to say that I never had the chance to play any of these in the arcades (aside from Outrunners) or in the Cinema lobbys and bowling allies as a kid. Street Fighter II and Mortal Kombat were always the two dominant games being seen everywhere. I did play Outrunners once in the arcade though and was blown away by those graphics, of course the game destroyed me in a mere few minutes as I ran out of time, but it was a great few minutes of play. Also I wanted to mention that not only have I never seen Alien 3 and Jurassic Park in the arcades but I never even knew they existed outside the Mega Drive and Master System which got ports that were completely different and made into platformers. That arcade Jurassic Park footage you showed looked amazing! I knew of ''Aliens'' getting a SEGA arcade game but I didn't know they made an ''Alien 3'' arcade game.
SLX never fails to disappoint. Sega was absolute magic in the arcades. I knew of quite a few of these games in the arcades but there are many I never heard of. As a Sega CD, Sega 32X, and Saturn owner back in the day it is absolutely criminal how Sega did not release these games on their own systems. Even today I wonder why Sega has not released these games on modern consoles and Steam. I guess they just do not want to make money. Thanks again SLX.
Appreciate the comment.
@@SegaLordX You are welcome and thank you for the great content.
Mi first contact was Hang On in 1988... was mind blowing. The arcade xp of the cabinet, the feel in the hands and all body is something VR will never replicate.
Hail Sega Lord X. Keep bringing new audiences to the old school!!! This is proper gaming 😁
Doing my absolute best.
I can't believe that Sega never ported those games to any home console. I am sure there is a big market for a big Sega game collection or museum like Atari 50.
What about the same Genesis games in a new box? haha
We need indie developers to make games like these for consoles, as in large Sprite arcade style games. Indie developers make a lot of 8-bit and 16-bit retro style games but never 32-bit Arcade games.
Scaling 2D sprites makes for a really cool abstract kind of world that is really weird to be in. Polygons are good but they are closer to Reality so they lose the strange effect of Sprites
You're very good at making these videos. Always brings me back! Thank you.
Dude, this was a blast of fun! I thought I knew all the System32 games but you showed me some more!! Keep it up!
No what else is buttery smooth, the vocal stylings of Sega lord X.
I remember playing Stadium Cross at Chuck E Cheese as a kid when it first came out. It really felt like a new era of gaming.
Ahhh Classic Mel!! Such joy watching your videos whenever it is a good or bad day
Wish you the very best to you and your family, and thank you very much for all the quality you always deliver!!
Great video, I recently suggested you look at System 32. I assume it was already planned.
I remember being blown away by the few System 32 games I got to play as a kid.
I love sprite scaling, I love the sega Genesis man! Awesome video SLX!
Thanks. I really enjoyed this video! Back in the day I was hooked on Outrun, Power Drift & Thunder Blade in the arcades it was so fun..
I have almost every Sega system in existence except for a 32x and Nomad.. absolutely love my massive collection!!
Really like the way you present the content. Knowledgeable, not too over the top but not afraid to throw out your own opinions. Plus the way you come across is pleasant to listen to
The biggest mistake Sega made, in my opinion, besides the anemic color count (128 colors out of 512 would be sufficient) is the lack of hardware scaling on the Genesis.
Of course there was no way to compete with arcade level scaling, but basic scaling capabilites for games like Outrun, Hang-On, After Burner, Space Harrier etc would be a dream come true back then.
@Benjamin Jagun No, it would cost a fortune back then.
I only came across one Spiderman the Videogame arcade ever and was beginning to think I was inventing it. That building tile style gameplay is unforgettable.
Yeah, I never got to play it beyond minutes. I would've loved to play it for HOURS, like I do their arcade offerings. Jurassic Park (Arcade) is SUBLIME. Played it many times, including at SEGA's amusement locations. I was looking for Spiderman Arcade to make the jump, same with Alien 3and Sonic. Never happened. 😢
@@CarlosXPhone I'm not saying the answer lies in emulation but...
@@SerpentineDeity I gotcha. I got you.
The local DnB has that jurassic park sit down machine. Playing that drunk is a blast.
Can't believe this video is how I'm finding out about a 4 player co-op Spider-Man game to rival the Konami X-Men arcade game. That's so wild, they never had any Spider-Man Sega cabinets in any of the arcades around Chicago when I was growing up because I would've been all over it!
That was a Brilliant episode Sega lord X. Never aware how much arcade goodness was left untold until now.
I remember playing a game back in the late 80's early 90's that had some pretty decent sprite scaling.
You sat in this really cool cabinet, piloting an attack helicopter, kinda like Blue Thunder, iirc, and you fly around this map destroying targets. You viewed it from above using the joystic for backwards, forwards, left and right, and another controller to the right of you to control the up and down movement - the sprite scaling happened while going up and down.
The only level I can remember was one where you are attacking platforms in the ocean, kinda like oil rigs.
Ring any bells with anyone? I'd love to know the name of it.
And no, it's not Thunder Blade (I don't think! Lol)
Imagine making games in the 1980's which have a higher framerate than many games have 30 years later. Absolutely incredible hardware.
I learn so much from Sega Lord X's videos.
I grew up in the early 2000s and my local Chuck E Cheese still had one of those Jurassic Park cabinets. That footage brings back memories.
Man, awesome work. Congrats! You've made me discover new games I knew nothing about.
I remember playing Afterburner II in the arcade and it blew my mind.
Your videos are awesome man. Nice work!
Thanks, man. Appreciate the comment.
It is neat learning about the technical aspects of these games. They were the frontrunner in video game arcade tech for a time, co-developing the software and more importantly the chips that allowed the software to function. It caused Sega to do things a little differently and their home systems always have quirks. One that comes to mind is the FM synth use, over midi. The two systems are completely different in how they generate music and requires completely different knowledge of computers (and music really).
You rock Sega Lord!!! Awesome detailed vid that makes my day
I love all things Sega so these fascinating retrospectives are always much appreciated. 👍🏼
Glad you like them!
I remember playing that spiderman arcade at putt putt golf with my cousin and brother when i was a little kid, that game was so fun
I keep coming back to this video to get my sprite scaling fix
Not only the super scalers are impressive, bit also the music they made. Speaking of, this video helped me find another banger which is Sonic Control from Outrunners. Man, does that slap hard 🤯
Would be interesting to rewrite some of the system 32 gpu to maximize the draw distance.
These late 80s and early 90s games are even more impressive when you think about what home consoles were doing at the time. I love SNES and Genesis, but the super scaler arcade games were just insane.
I was just playing Alien: The Gun on My Quest 2 using EmuVR, It lets you play light gun games in VR, such a great way to play light gun games these days.
sper scaler style is what my cartoons are missing. I really need to focus on this.
SLX your the best bro! love your content and everything u do! i really appreciate all ur content, so much insite and new info i never knew about all eras and genres of gaming! tanks man u really keep the good ole days alive!
Awesome update, I forgot how good the most advanced sprite scaler games looked, some of them almost look like polygon based 3D.
I've never heard of some of these games. Great video. I do remember the Time Traveller game you mentioned but didn't really understand what I was doing at the time I played it.
9:01 Dude I’ve wanted to know what this game was for ever it was in the back of my head from when I used to play the Boardwalk Arcade Games in Ocean City, MD. Back in the 80s it really used to mezmorize me seeing little guy hologram video guy walking around and interacting. Wow brings back memories old Marty’s Play Land, talk about a deep cut lol. As always love your content.
I didn't even know half these games existed. Amazing how much they pushed this hardware. It's crazy that the megadrive/genesis didn't have any hardware scaling. It would have made the cartridges smaller in terms of kb (no need to store multiple sizes of sprites) and allowed amazing ports of their 3D games. Weird.
Great video as always. Thanks.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Another awesome and educational episode. I think Hard Dunk would be a perfect game to be re-mastered, especially with modern 2D visuals. Thanks for the excellent content Sega Lord X!
Cool Riders is STILL screaming "convert ME to Saturn!!"😄. Love Sys32 games, still remember Modeler, first dedicated emu 20 years ago, fantastic video as always.
In a better world, these would have all been on the Sega Neptune
What really baffles me is that most of these titles, like most Sega Arcade games, were never re-released.
Never understood why on earth did SEGA never did a super scaler arcade collection on Saturn or even DreamCast.
I agree, guess the closest to that was Yu Suzuki's game works for Dreamcast which had perfect Outrun, Afterburner & Powerdrift, but I think that was it.
@@byrosonline5876- Would love to see a collection of these arcade games for modern platforms. Perhaps it could look & play similar to the Street Fighter 6 lobby mode where you choose a character & navigate an arcade, then play all these SEGA arcade classics.
OMG you triggered an ancient memory with that Jurassic Park shooter! I remember playing it a Chuck-E-Cheese when I was really little.
Be great if Sega released a system 32 home console. They could even design new games for it.
This video gave me a thought.. Did Sega (or any other company) release a scalar platformer? Not just special effects but actually moving into and out of the scenery? This was a dream i had as a kid..
A series on Sega’s arcade hardware would be great @Sega Lord X!
All these games were ridicously impressive back in the 90's. I mean, there was nothing comparable in the home systems. I'll never forget watching SuperMonaco GP -which is another super scaling party - completely amazed in some obscure arcade, and the dissapoinment of the home version I got with the genesis.
That one burned me up, because some of the print ads were using Arcade screenshots to represent the coming Genesis port.
I did appreciate that Sega at least gave us a career/season mode with a full calendar of races, it would have been really bad if the home port we got was strictly the arcade mode.
@Benjamin Jagun You are right about the expectations, but the Mega Drive launched with a pretty good version of Super Hang On, which got the music and a lot of the look right. The fake scaling was pretty good as well. It ran a few ticks slower than the arcade version but that's more noticeable on direct comparison.
Even Space Harrier 2 (also a launch title) helped over sell the Mega Drive.
Super Thunder Blade was a little suspect though... 😅
I liked the Mega Drive's Outrun, for the time it was the best home port graphics and gameplay wise. The PC-Engine port came closer with the palette, but the Mega Drive version was better all around, pushing more background/roadside elements. (obviously the later Saturn version blew it out of the water).
Audio wise. it did suffer like you stated, but the bigger crime to me was the lack of any type of engine sound. The sound is one of those ingredients that made the Arcade games seem larger than life.
Super Monaco GP for instance had that iconic very loud(and clear) downshift sample which made it intact to the home port.
For Outrun, along with the music (which could have been closer), the continuous engine sound from the Ferrari in the arcade: accelerating, downshifting, braking, even passing traffic was very immersive.
The home port only retained the tire traction squeal and a generic car passing sound.
I wish I could say I experienced more of these games then I did but sadly I didn't. I was lucky to find Sega games back in the day at various arcades and I always did gravitate to them whenever I could. The sad thing is if I didn't experience them then, now in the world we live in it's very unlikely I ever will. Not unless I go to the galloping ghost or somewhere very particular.
Still I just seeing these games brought back such warm memories. The arcade of yesteryear was such a thing of beauty. I'm glad I got to experience it in some form before it went away.