What are the "must have" games on SegaCD / 32X

[Deleted member 9290]

I'm new to this mutation of the genesis but find it quite interesting.
What got me into looking it in first place was to play star wars arcade:

Fucking expensive but worth it. So far I got star wars arcade and sonic CD.
It seems there isn't much more in these systems to really get?

What else to get?

 

[Jamesac68]

Lunar 1 and 2
Popful Mail
Ecco the Dolphin
Panic!
Robo Aleste
Keio Flying Squadron
Snatcher

Shadow Squadron 32X

There's a lot out there, honestly. I loved my Sega CD and I know I'm forgetting a few things from the list.

 

[Deleted member 9290]

Lunar 1 and 2
Popful Mail
Ecco the Dolphin
Panic!
Robo Aleste
Keio Flying Squadron
Snatcher

Shadow Squadron 32X

There's a lot out there, honestly. I loved my Sega CD and I know I'm forgetting a few things from the list.

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I saw Ecco the dolphin but it's essentially the genesis version with better sound and Bugfixes, isn't it?

 

[daninthemix]

I saw Ecco the dolphin but it's essentially the genesis version with better sound and Bugfixes, isn't it?

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And more levels. Honestly PC version with Fixed and Enhanced patch is the best.

 

[sir_crocodile]

Lunar 1 and 2
Popful Mail
Robo Aleste
Keio Flying Squadron
Snatcher

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+

Shining Force CD
Dark Wizard
Vay
Silpheed
Batman Returns
Dungeon Explorer
Thunderhawk
Battlecorps

I wouldn't call it essential, but Heart of the Alien is of interest. The Prince of Persia port on the Mega CD was pretty nice and I think was one of the ones with the hilarious cut scenes.
Night Trap is actually good but I'd get the new version for switch/ps4 with better video.

 

[Huey]

For 32X, try Kolibri - a hummingbird shmup from Ed Annunziata, creator of Ecco the Dolphin (amongst other accomplishments). Just one of those games that you'll never play anything else like it.

For sega cd, definitely Silpheed - my favorite sega cd game.

As an enormous fan of Another World... I would avoid Heart of the Alien. It kills me to say it, but Eric Chahi was not involved and the game is just a goddamn mess.

 

[Ogni-XR21]

Soulstar is my absolute favorite game on the MegaCD/SegaCD.

Best Star Fox clone ever made.

 

[sir_crocodile]

As an enormous fan of Another World... I would avoid Heart of the Alien. It kills me to say it, but Eric Chahi was not involved and the game is just a goddamn mess.

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I still think it's interesting but I just looked it up and it's expensive as hell now lol. At those prices it's defo not worth it

 

[Dphex]

 

[Jamesac68]

I saw Ecco the dolphin but it's essentially the genesis version with better sound and Bugfixes, isn't it?

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Technically yes, but the "better sound" is absolutely worth the upgrade.

 

[Karlinel]

Mega Cd:
Shining force cd
Lunar
Silpheed
Soulstar
BC racers
Sonic CD
World Cup USA'94
Eternal Champions: Challenge from the Dark Side

Mega 32x/
Kolibri
Virtua Racing Deluxe
Blackthorne
Darxide
Virtua Fighter

That's pretty much it, imho.

 

[Bjones]

To add
Vay is a decent rpg

I would also recommend Sherlock Holmes and Dracula unleashed. These are some of the fmv games.

 

[Romain]

I'd add the 32X version of Mortal Kombat II to the list.

 

[RestEerie]

 

[Deleted member 1627]

Final Fight is an essential Mega CD game for the music alone.

 

[Jazzem]

Played through Popful Mail last year with the hack that reinstates the easier difficulty of the Japanese version and had a blast :)

It's a very fun, breezey sidescrolling action RPG, if a bit repetitious at times, but of course the real star is the hilarious writing + voice acting. It's possibly not to everyone's taste and there's the odd joke that hasn't aged well unfortunately, but still I laughed uproariously so many times

 

[Deleted member 9290]

Soulstar is my absolute favorite game on the MegaCD/SegaCD.

Best Star Fox clone ever made.

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That looks fucking awesome! But it's even pricier than star wars T_T

 

[Jashobeam]

Sonic CD

 

[werezompire]

Basically anything Working Designs released (Lunar 1 & 2, Vay, Popful Mail) is at the very least decent and generally good. Lunar 2: Eternal Blue is one of my favorite games ever.

One neat thing that the Lunar games do is instead of using the regular FMV playback functions, all of the cutscenes are handled via code & regular art assets. That's why their cutscenes look so much cleaner & higher resolution than any of the FMV games. Lunar: Eternal Blue in particularly is really impressive since they went all out on it compared to the first game.

Beyond that, I don't have a lot of experience, but I can say that Willy Beamish is ruined by the load times on Sega CD so if you want to play that, grab it from GOG for PC.

 

[Platy]

Tempo is a better platform than Knucles Chaotix, the sonic 32x game =P

 

[Video Games Are Dumb]

Sega CDs have no copyright protection so you could, if you ignored laws, burn them straight to a disc without paying the crazy collectors prices.

 

[Decarbia]

The major problem with both these systems is that the games that are truly good are FUCKING EXPENSIVE.
Like Snatcher should be experienced by everyone but it cost me $150 over a decade ago. It's a $600 game now.

Tempo and Knuckles are $100 games.

The working designs rpgs are in the $100 to $300 range

 

[krae_man]

Get the CD 32X version of one of these:

Corpse Killer
Fahrenheit
Night Trap
Slam City with Scottie Pippen
Supreme Warrior

If you own a Tower of Power, you should own at least one game that requires the whole thing.

 

[s_mirage]

As an enormous fan of Another World... I would avoid Heart of the Alien. It kills me to say it, but Eric Chahi was not involved and the game is just a goddamn mess.

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The best thing about it is that it comes with a better port of Another World than the cart version, but yeah, Heart of the Alien kind of missed what made Another World good.

 

[Sixfortyfive]

One game that I've been meaning to get around to for a while is Dark Wizard, simply because it looks like the spiritual predecessor of Dragon Force despite much of the gameplay being substantially different.

 

[mute]

For as much ire that it gets I do think people should play Chaotix for the special stages and the final boss.

 

[Teh_Lurv]

If you do decide to buy Knuckles Chaotix, be aware that game is super buggy with certain revisions of the Genesis & 32x. I had to try three different Genesises (Genesisii?) before I found one that wouldn't crash the game shortly after launch.

The 32x library is pretty small and most of the titles aren't great/can be played elsewhere. This is my list of decent games to play:

• Afterburner
• Blackthorne
• Doom (Doom is like pizza, even when it's bad it's good. It helps that the game is cheap)
• Golf Magazine Presents 36 Great Holes Starring Fred Couples (It's a decent golf game)
• Kolibri
• Shadow Squadron
• Space Harrier
• Star Wars Arcade
• Tempo
• Virtua Racing Deluxe
• Virtua Fighter

Checking the loose prices while making that list, the 32x as a system has really shot up in value. I think I sold off my 32x system & library for a quarter of what they're worth now.

 

[SnatcherHunter]

Making sure my game was mentioned.

First reply didn't disappoint.

 

[Deleted member 17210]

Soulstar is my absolute favorite game on the MegaCD/SegaCD.

Best Star Fox clone ever made.

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I think it resembles '80s arcade games more than Star Fox but yeah, it's cool.

I agree with most of the picks in this thread. The essentials have been covered but I would also recommend these for Sega CD:

The Terminator - a solid run 'n gun elevated by an amazing soundtrack. It's a totally different game than the cartridge one.

Adventures of Batman and Robin

Lords of Thunder - if you don't have access to the slightly nicer looking Turbo CD version.

Rise of the Dragon - It's no Snatcher but it's a good cyberpunk adventure.

Mansion of Hidden Souls - A short CG FMV adventure game.

If you like cartoon laserdisc arcade games, there's Road Avenger, Time Gal, Dragon's Lair, and Revenge of the Ninja. There are smoother and less grainy versions out there but it's still neat to play them on Sega CD.

And some Japanese imports. If you want to play them legally on a Western Sega CD, buy them, then burn a copy but use a program to change the region. These are games like Night Striker (port of the Taito arcade game) and Game no Kanzume Vol. 2 for the MD exclusive Penguin Land game.

 

[Decarbia]

Making sure my game was mentioned.

First reply didn't disappoint.

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You should change your name to BurnedSnatcherCDRHunter because no one is paying those prices.

 

[ascii42]

If you get Pitfall, get the Sega CD version over the 32X version. Better audio (of course), and runs better.

 

[Hippopuncher12]

As long as Snatcher is listed as a must have I am fine with anything else being listed. Sega CD in all honesty had so many good games now that I think back on it.

 

[Huey]

The Terminator - a solid run 'n gun elevated by an amazing soundtrack. It's a totally different game than the cartridge one.

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I only realized this recently. Agreed, really incredible soundtrack - Tommy Tallarico, yes?

Arguably one of if not the worst box arts to come out of the entire 16-bit (or 32-bit) generation though.

 

[Dr. Zoidberg]

Kolibri is the finest hummingbird-based shooter you'll find on the 32X.

 

[Skulldead]

The major problem with both these systems is that the games that are truly good are FUCKING EXPENSIVE.
Like Snatcher should be experienced by everyone but it cost me $150 over a decade ago. It's a $600 game now.

Tempo and Knuckles are $100 games.

The working designs rpgs are in the $100 to $300 range

Click to shrink...

You are right, this is the problem with Sega-Cd and Saturn, most of the very good game are just too expensive to be bought. There no way any of these game worth the asking price just to be played... Snatcher is that good, but no game worth 600$.

 

[sibarraz]

Is the Wrestlemania: The Arcade Game good?

 

[SnatcherHunter]

You should change your name to BurnedSnatcherCDRHunter because no one is paying those prices.

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LMAO!

 

[Senor Spielbergo]

 

[Camwi]

I only realized this recently. Agreed, really incredible soundtrack - Tommy Tallarico, yes?

Arguably one of if not the worst box arts to come out of the entire 16-bit (or 32-bit) generation though.

Click to shrink...

Wow, can't believe I haven't seen this until now.

 

[JusDoIt]

Final Fight CD.

The best beat'em up on the Sega Genesis...

 

[PetrCobra]

Let me just say that of all the 32X games I played, I enjoyed Motherbase the most. People don't often recommend this one, so just wanted to do that.

Of course, there's Virtua Racing Deluxe, but I only briefly tried that in an emulator so it doesn't count.

 

[MrNelson]

The major problem with both these systems is that the games that are truly good are FUCKING EXPENSIVE.
Like Snatcher should be experienced by everyone but it cost me $150 over a decade ago. It's a $600 game now.

Tempo and Knuckles are $100 games.

The working designs rpgs are in the $100 to $300 range

Click to shrink...

Holy shit, I didn't know Knuckles jumped in price. I bought it cart only for like $30 years ago, and now it seems to be running around $70 these days. I haven't been able to find it for years though. It's probably buried somewhere in my parent's house.

Agreed on all the other points though. Popful Mail is good, but it's not $300 good.

 

[fontguy]

I only realized this recently. Agreed, really incredible soundtrack - Tommy Tallarico, yes?

Arguably one of if not the worst box arts to come out of the entire 16-bit (or 32-bit) generation though.

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I don't even begin to understand what they were going for with that cover.

It looks like an accident.

 

[Deleted member 41651]

Doom and Virtua Racing were on repeat for me. Of course, Doom has been done better since then.

I'm still SO fucking salty about the 32x and now even saltier that I threw out games like Chaotix in my early 20's.

 

[Huey]

I'm still SO fucking salty about the 32x and now even saltier that I threw out games like Chaotix in my early 20's.

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Like... actually threw them out??

I get the salt though - for those of us stupid enough to have bought 32Xs, Sega's lightspeed abandonment of it as a platform absolutely left my head spinning at the time. What did it have 40 games total? Of which, maaaaaybe 10 were worth owning? Still amazing to this day.

 

[SpitztheGreat]

I'm going to step in and be Debbie Downer. As someone who owns a Sega CD and has collected for it when prices were cheaper, I simply can't recommend it now. There are precious few games that are really good, and only a few of those remain exclusive to the system. Of those few, the prices they want for them are too high. Sonic CD is a really good/interesting game, but it isn't worth more than $30. Snatcher is fine, but because it has become this cult classic the cost is astronomical. The game is fun, but it simply isn't worth the money you're going to pay for it. Meanwhile games like Lunar ended up on Playstation where they're much cheaper. Some will argue which version is better, but even if you prefer the Sega CD version, it isn't worth the $100+ extra dollars you're going to pay for it, not when the Playstation version goes for less than $100 and the Sega CD version is $200.

There are some retro consoles that are worth collecting for (The Saturn) even though the prices are really high. To me, the Sega CD and 32x are not two of them- there just aren't enough games at reasonable prices that are fun to play to make it worth it.

 

[i-Jest]

Shining Force CD is a must have.I hear good things about the Sega CD versions of Lunar 1 and 2.

 

[IrishNinja]

so glad to see so many greats recommended here, even my weird beloved shit like panic and wirehead

Final Fight CD.

The best beat'em up on the Sega Genesis...

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thems fighting words

 

[SbnaS]

Most of the must haves for Sega cd are expensive. I recommend Mickey Mania. It's a great platformer that goes through the history of Mickey Mouse and it's relatively cheap.

 

[Deleted member 48897]

Virtua Racing DX is really, really good. Most of the original stuff, even if it's not great, is at least interesting, though about half of the system's library can be played better elsewhere. I would imagine the Star Trek Starfleet Academy game is better on 32X than SNES though I've not spent much time with it.

In addition to a very good MK II port, the port of NBA Jam is excellent. I've heard QB Club isn't good though.

If you get Pitfall, get the Sega CD version over the 32X version. Better audio (of course), and runs better.

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I would say to get the PC version, because it has the same redrawn art, runs better, and has the CD soundtrack. I actually like the soundtrack of the stock Genesis version -- ironically, even then, the 32X version is lacking the sampled drums, so it doesn't even sound as good as that.