Sega's Early Arcade Games from Worst to Best - The Flops, Classics and Oddities | Kim Justice
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- Опубликовано: 22 июл 2024
- Here's a look at Sega's early arcade machines from the mid-late '70s to the mid '80s! While the scaler games like OutRun are worthy of a list all of their own, you can find many classics here...and some not-so classics too. This list features no less than 68 games, ranked from worst to best. Enjoy!
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#retrogaming #sega #arcade 
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I remember when I discovered I'm sorry on a small site in 2001 that was called "Manny's MAME Mystifiers". It was just a fansite for weird arcade games with ROM downloads directly on the page (good luck finding a site like this now...sheesh). There were 12 total games on the page, and others on the list to share the limelight with I'm Sorry were Snacks'n Jaxson, PuLiRuLa, Trio the Punch, and a bunch more. I fell in love with I'm Sorry...and I had a fun time trying to explain the ballgag and whip scene to my mom when she saw me playing it. Strange memory. Right at the beginning of this video, before you stated you were excluding the vector games...well, I expected my favorite really old Sega game: Tac/Scan...but I'm sure I'll be seeing that high up the next list. Really cool to learn about Heavy Metal, and I'll be giving it a try soon.
An hour of new Kim content on a Monday morning?! It's going to be a good week 😁
Nearly 60k! And thanks for showcasing little known games again, Fun to see
Pitfall II is one of the few games that I actually like on the 2600, along with the first Pitfall.
I have to confess me my bro and our mates got fair bit of fun out of My Hero, not that we ever thought it was amazingly, it just seriously tickled us how the enemies fly off screen when you hit them.
Loved Sega Ninja, remember watching people play it in an arcade, bloody hard game!
I've only just discovered your whole back catalogue of videos and I think you're amazing! The Spectrum +2 was my first home computer and I was completely obsessed with it! I share your love of retro gaming on all platforms, and when I saw you playing the bass to game soundtracks you REALLY blew me away! Thanks so much for your videos. I think you're awesome! :-D
Some things to keep in mind in future videos (most videos I've seen on Sega arcade hardware miss this stuff).
System C was Megadrive based but used the VDP's external color RAM and pixel buss pins and an external color encoder (the same one as System-16) and had greatly expanded colors over the Megadrive. If you are wondering why Sega never did anything like that on the Megadrive (e.g. with the Sega CD) it's because when they designed the Megadrive they left those pins unconnected to anything on the PCB.
The Turbo, Zoom 909/Buck Rodgers and Subrock boards used analog sprite zooming, they used a bank of voltage controlled oscillators to control how fast the objects were read out of the object ROMs as the CRT drew the screen which controlled how large the sprite objects were drawn on the screen. So Sega had figured out a way to do sprite scaling without math chips years before Space Harrier.
3:27 Yes, this was commonplace in the arcades and toilets I used to frequent in the late 70s
even more fantastic videos to come about obscure SEGA arcade history?? color me excited!
How do you only have 60k subscribers! That's criminal! Well, just keep existing and I'm sure you'll have millions more.
Pitfall 2 on the arcade was soooo good and I love the extra levels they add, a truly enjoyable game that outshines the original release.
Apparently there was also a Atari computer versions with a second stage too
Astro Blaster is not only a great game to play, but it was (as far as I know) the first game to be full of secret bonuses to uncover. An arcade game with trophy support. From 1981!
Great video. Lots of games I'd never heard of. Loving the lists. Keep up the excellent content!
The wolf from the Pig Newton game looks exactly like the Zeke Wolf character from the Disney cartoons and comics.
I’m subscribed since the oh I don’t know but you were still playing bass mostly? Thank you for the many years of fine entertainment Kim, you rock. 🙏🏻
No Sega Turbo? That game's a classic. I remember being on vacation to a college town in the summer of 1982 when I was nine and playing Turbo every day at this massive arcade next to the college. Begged my parents every day for quarters, played as much as I could (had to save my last buck to get a Namco-themed Slurpee cup from 7-11 on the walk home, however). That same arcade had Samurai as well and I was shocked at seeing a game completely in Japanese in the middle of the U. S. Great memories.
That's actually Sega's earliest scalar and for being a scalar game, it's not included in this video but it will appear in a future video as they said.
I'm so excited for this series. Thank you for this!
It's funny how no matter how good or bad some games are, they stick with you.
Shooting Master is one of those games, I saw it in Torquay in one of my earliest holidays as a child, I was much too small to play it but would watch others do so. It's a memory that's been with me all this time.
I was lucky enough to purchase an Arcade Marquee of Shooting Master I now display in my room =)
Hi KJ - love your work - I didn’t know most of these but we had in our arcade Wonder boy in monsterland! - Much love to you KJ
This is probably my favourite era of arcade games. I thought I was the only one who loved I'm Sorry... Tanaka dancing out of Mt Fuji makes me laugh every time. Nice to see games like Teddy Boy Blues and Ninja Princess rated so highly although I would have put Wonderboy and Bank Panic closer to the top myself. The original Wonderboy is one of my all-time favourites.
The Wonderboy series was always done by Westone by the way, they changed their name from Escape after the first one. Wonderboy was their very first game and IIRC they were just three people at the time.
Love these videos, because I always learn about new gems and I'm playing games since Pong.
I do like these run downs but I'm really starting to yearn for one of your documentaries.
I went on a ferry to Denmark in the early-80s..was a 7 hour trip and I spent most of it in the ferry's arcade. Definitely remember playing Safari, and the fancy-looking Depthcharge machine complete with physical periscope, and a few ancient light gun games..
Yup - Wonderboy in Monsterland was in the arcades in Europe - I remember watching people play it and beat it.
Great vid, nice to see some of the older games.
Nice list yet again! Interestingly I also used to play Wonderboy in Monsterland in my local arcade when I was a kid so in was definitely playable in UK arcades in some form.
9:40 my man! Casually dropping the knowledge like a boss!
Love everytime you say "bastard", Kim.
Carnival had probably the first chip generated soundtrack which plays during gameplay while also featuring more than one harmony at the same time and being longer than 30 seconds.
Great video, Kim. Loved it. I had no idea Wonder Boy in Monster Land was a Japanese only arcade release as it was one of the most popular cabinets in an arcade I used to frequent as a child. In Co. Kerry, Ireland! Back in the late 80s. How it got there, I don’t know. But we all adored it. Though Pengo is probably my own personal fave off the list.
44:18 As a spaniard, I can mention three bullfighting games, all by spanish companies: Toro (2016), Torero (2002) and Ole, Toro (1984). The latter was by Dinamic (Freddy Hardest, Abu Simbel Profanation, Game Over). It created controversy in UK. C&VG asked the ears of the programmer and gave it zero.
thanks, another great upload. definately one of my fav. YT'ers!
As a huge Flicky fan - you really should check out Super Rub'a'Dub for the PS3 - one of the finest games of all times on it’s on merits, but the ducklings in a row nod to Flicky really makes you smile.
What a great watch! Really picked up a couple of gems I need to try out some time - both Heavy Metal and Regulus, but possibly Future Spy as well. Maybe it's me, but not needing to change heights (ala Zaxxon) kind of makes it a bit more playable.
I do have a soft spot for Star Jacker, but that's based on its SG-1000 version over the arcade one. I really need to give that a proper whirl as well.
I wonder if that disappearing move in Sega Ninja inspired the Vanellope’s glitch on Wreck it Ralph? 🤔
Your videos are so inspirational, thank you.
I loved playing deep scan to earn credits on the Saturn port of Die Hard Arcade.
I seem to remember a sit in cabinet for Choplifter that I rarely played because it was so difficult but I cannot find proof and I am questioning my memories
Weird that Nobouranka was made by Data East-according to TCRF, Data East was originally going to distribute Brain in the US, and an unused copyright graphic reading “©️1986 DATA EAST USA” is actually buried within Brain’s source code. Unfortunately, Brain never got released in the US, and I only just recently discovered that game a week ago as I’m typing this.
Thanks for the great content Kim. I think you are 'bloody brilliant' and one of the inspirations behind me starting my own channel which I'm planning to launch in the next few weeks 😊
I remember playing Wonder Boy in Monster Land in Whitley Bay in the late 80s.
where is Whitley Bay? Is it Corwall?
Such a brilliant video, thanks very much Kim. Switched me on to a number of arcade games I have never played before. There’s nothing like discovering killer games from the past. Great stuff!
Obligatory yankee comment to the effect of "was about to go to bed at 3 AM, until this popped up!"
As always, your insights (and gags) are appreciated, and the history on offer is fascinating. Love to watch as the classic manufacturers slowly learn the trade over a course of years -- from early 1-bit / '8080' curios to the days of dedicated boards. I had somehow never heard of 'Invinco," despite a fascination in the first wave of Invaders clones, or 'Shooting Mastery' despite a penchant for light gun titles, so it's always nice to be able to add more mediocre titles to my pile.
I know these videos require a metric ton of work across having to play / research / rank / write summaries for dozens on dozens of games, but I do hope to see you get around to a video on Nintendo's early arcade output -- the likes of 'Monkey Magic' and 'Sheriff' (still a favorite of mine) and so forth. I've tried to cover that particular subject in brief a long time ago [in the larger context of 'Radar Scope'], but I reckon you'd certainly do a better job of it than I. You'd even wind up having to cover 'Head On' again in the form of 'Head On N' -- where the 'N' stood for Nintendo, in an early distribution deal between the two manufacturers!
if I remember correctly, sega was the European distributer for super cobra. speaking of which, sega was also the distributer for of several atari games outside North Ammerica (I can confirm they distributed Missile Command in Europe).
sindbad mystery had 2 versions: one with discrete cerkutry for the audio and one that uses the sn77489 for the the audio (the same chip used on sega's 8 bit consoles).
Astron Blaster had another limitation, you had that heat meter where if you tried button mashing through the game, your guns would overheat and be unable to fire until the meter came back down.
I think most folks of our generation, if they recognize it at all, would recognize Deep Scan as the game you have to play in the Saturn port of Die Hard Arcade to earn additional credits in the main game. (Fun fact: it was replaced in the PS2 version with a 3D rendered version of classic Sega electromechanical game Periscope.)
the choplifter and pitfall 2 games were created primarily for the then recently recovered US market.
Nice one Kim! Here's one you missed: Repluse (1985)
I think Super Locomotive probably only became popular with the advent of emulation as it's one of the rarest arcade cabs out there.
Sega only produced 35 cabinets for it worldwide - one of which was in my local arcade when I was a kid - but for most people the chances of ever seeing this game in the wild are slim to none.
Not sure why Sega didn't get behind the game and produce more cabs - it was a great game and as far as I could tell at the time it was pretty popular
Another excellent list. Have you tried using a mayflash & Wii Remote for arcade lightgun games?
Cool Feature. Space Firebird was one hell of a shoot `em up, especially from 1980 and while it maybe obscure now I knew it well back in the day. The Graphics looked great on a CRT and the sound FX are very nice plus the fact that the movement of the Aliens were majestic and playable against too unlike the similar and much overhyped Phoenix arcade game and ............ I even bought the cocktail version of Space Firebird cheap from a funfair later in the 80`s and enjoyed playing that at home for a while until it broke eventually and I had no idea how to fix it. It deserves a lot more hype these days over othe garbage out there from back in the day, oh yes
I spent hours playing Heavy Metal a couple of years ago after chancing upon it on Mame. Then promptly forgot what it was called. Now I know again ! Thanks !
absolutely cracking vid
the real draw of the vic dual's games is actually related to the board itself. true to it's name, the vic dual allows 2 games to be installed in the same machine, similar to the mega tec/mega play I suppose. this made it perfect for smaller arcades that don't have the space for the 2 indevidual games, and also made it easyer for games to be swapped out, which also cut costs for the owner.
These early B/W games had a mirror reflecting the monitor image onto a colorful background to substitute the lack of graphics. I know how Frog is supposed to look. It's been ported to the Atari 2600 and several others and is actually a quite nice game.
True. I recall Space Invaders having colorful backdrop artwork of a moon and night sky that the game's graphics were overlaid on, but when you see footage taken from emulators it's usually just a plain black background - doesn't really represent how games of that era actually looked when you played them in the arcades back in the day :)
I had a Grandstand Scramble machine, loved it.
I still have the big screen lcd version grandstand released around the same time (pocket scramble), plays surprisingly well considering how limited the screen is and has all the arcade machines levels including the big base thing at the end of level 5. Also had a supercobra tabletop, that had an impressive multicolour vhd display. Not sure who made that one though, might have been ccl.
It's a real shame that Monaco GP can't be emulated due to lack of CPU. Probably the first game I got really hooked on as a kid.
Call Jeremy Parrish, someone else made a Heiankyo Alien reference!
These documentaries are a big help at the moment. Lockdown gets boring quickly! Lol Thank you KJ!
Let's get you to 100,000 subscribers! #KJ 100K
'Sindbad' is a very common and accepted spelling of the name.
It's the original spelling I believe.
Yes. Sinbad/Sindbad are anglicized versions the same Arabic name. Both spellings are common and legit. As that "Sindbad" game was released in 1983, I'm guessing Sega may have gone with the alt spelling to avoid being sued by Columbia Pictures who had released a string of popular "Sinbad" films during the 1970s, e.g. "Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger" (1977).
It all sounds like ancient history now (!) but when that game was released the most recent Sinbad movie was only as long ago as 2014 films like Interstellar or Guardians of the Galaxy are to us today in 2020.
I give you your dues Kim you do compile some excellent documentaries.
32:16 Music of Teddy Boy Blues ;) Good choice!
Thank you Kim!
Am only a few minutes in, but had to pause to stop laughing. "Masturbate furiously right there in the middle of the game centre" is the new "30-50 feral hogs".
I like My Hero on Master System. Great idea for a video Kim.
Pengo was my first arcade game I played. It was a cocktail style
Perfect timing for a Monday, just finished work and this shows up in my recommended :)
Space tactics was great...I remember they used to have that on weston super mare pier many yrs ago...used to spend a decent amount of time when parents allowed down there playing
I love Flicky. I'm still trying to 1CC clear the Megadrive version. I come really close, getting to level 28 or so, but can never quite clear all 32 stages. Also, on this list, I'd have swapped Sindbad and Space Firebird. Sindbad is quite fun and unique because you can clear a stage without getting all the 'dots'. The whole point is you're getting a map to where the treasure is on the stage. If you recognize it before getting all the map pieces, you can bonus out by digging it up sooner. To do this while not getting caught by enemies means it's working both your reflexes and your brain, sorta of like one of those 'what's different in these two pictures' bartop games crossed with pacman. Space Firebird...eh...Moon Cresta's definitely better but I really don't think Space Firebird deserved top 30. It's really just a Mad Planets prototype, imo. Also RE: Flicky...the ones with sunglasses are blind. They'll run off their platform because they can't see. This makes them typically end up at the bottom of the stage. Depending on the stage, this can be very good or horribly bad based on the exit door's location.
Also, I love Bank Panic. Our local arcade had it and I played it quite a lot. They also had Altered Beast and I'd play Bank Panic instead!
I'm surprised Die Hard Arcade/Dynamite Deka wasn't mentioned with Deep Scan.
48:50 I played this at Great Yarmouth Arcade inside of Vauxhall Holiday Park in the late 80s, early 90s .I wonder if that was a bootleg as well. Was in English though.
Rydeen! Used in many games First heard on the BBC B/Master's Stryker's Run.
so much sweet sweet product thanks Kim!
I definitely played Wonderboy in Monster Land in the 80s in the UK in Codonas in Scotland
You're right. I'm surprised to see Regulus so high on this list. I used to play a cabaret version at a cafe years ago, and while it's not terrible, it's slow and plodding and frustrating in a way Xevious wasn't. Also, it looks and sounds so much like a Master System game that I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if it used the same hardware.
I love Choplifter. The best port that I own of it is the Master System version. Complete and colorful, it's miles ahead of the 7800 and Famicom ports (both of which I also own). I also really like Borderline, which I have for the 2600 and the SG-1000. In fact it was the first release for the SC-1000. I also own the second release, Safari Hunting (which I never play. Once was enough). I also have Flicky for the SC-1000, so there's that.
I find all the love The Ninja gets these days weird because at the time I remember the mags HATING it. I didn't play it until years later as a result and immediately clocked it as the classic it undoubtedly is.
Happened with Gain Ground. Mags just didn't like it, yet for me (and others) It's a unique and utterly fantastic game that is still underrated and underappreciated today.
There are other examples too throughout each console generation and arcade history.
quality content kim
the only sega could get away with releasing tranqualizer gu these days was retooling it as a game starring Doctor Eggman (or one of his assistants) since then there would be the implication that the animas are being converted to your minions and the timer is actually sonic triing to stop you.
Bank Panic, I assume you know about West Bank too, on 64/Spectrum/etc? Loved it on the C64!
have you ever done a demo scene summary? Id be into that, i know the amiga and achemedes demos as well as some other earlier ones, not sure if ud find them boring or not
Was the Monster Land bootleg in L'Estartit by any chance? I'm sure I remember playing it, too.
I guess Sega arcade games with that weird analogue scaling like Turbo (1981) and Buck Rogers - Planet of Zoom (1982) were already covered on a different list?
What about that Fonz motorcycle racing arcade game from 1976?
5:40 Mr Viking looks like some sort of Gain Ground prototype
I had the arcade board of it, it's actually not a bad game at all
S E G A
Samurai... "I have the low ground, don't try it"
I also played Wonder Boy in Monster Land in arcades here in NA, swear I saw a SEGA logo on it so I question that no western release information. If they were bootlegs, they were high quality ones I played.
Interesting list of games, some still worth playing and some so primordial they're more just historical footnotes now. Can really see a phase there of "Throw shit at a wall, and see what sticks." degrees of experimentation going on early to mid 80s. ^_^
Anyone know if there is a connection between games like Borderline and the ZS-spectrum that seems to have the same color palate?
I’m biased towards Frogger being this is what brought about making the gaming world my hobby.. Segas version of Pitfall looked pretty cool
I so wish you gave a sountrack source in your description, the name for game that the tune @5.35 is from is now really bugging me :)
I want to go on record saying that I find your intro animation delightful.
Not sure if it has been said, but there is a surprisingly good bullfighting game on the Commodore 64 :)
People (rightfully) tweak Sega for its vast catalog of properties that have gone unused for decades, but rarely mention Pengo. I don’t think it’s ever been included in any home compilation, and hasn’t gotten a Virtual Console/eShop/PSN/XBLA release.
Wasn’t Congo Bongo the work of Ikegami Tsushinki, the same people who actually coded the original Donkey Kong for Nintendo?
13:09 mice from chuchu rocket.
This is a really great video, but I have to ask: did Sega actually have a version of Dixie playing on one of their arcade cabinets? Or was that just some background music you randomly chose? Or am I just too sleep deprived right now and hearing things?
EDIT: Okay they did, it was from the game Bank Panic.
Maybe I'm simply easily impressed but Space Odyssey (1981) looks amazing for the time
Awesome! 🔝
Oh well done kim