Seach Independent Gamer Blog

Monday, March 28, 2011

Sega Genesis Classic Collection: Gold Edition Review

Sega Genesis on a PC?



If I could name a mascot that has plenty of ports than a boat yard I would have to say that mascot is Sonic the Hedgehog. Ever since the demise of the Dreamcast he has been in almost any for of console version from Gamecube with his Sonic's Mega Collection Plus to last years release of Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection. This year he makes an appearance in the PC version of Sonic's Ultimate Collection, Sega Genesis Classic Collection: Gold Edition with other mascots from the golden age but does this collection stand on it's own or is it time to retire the old titles and move on to the new ones?

When I first installed SGCC, I was also installing another program and when SGCC finished installing, it gave me an error message and told me to reinstall it again. So I reinstalled it and everything was working fine so I guess when you're installing this game you shouldn't have any other programs running? I don't know. When you first boot up SGCC you will be thrown into an interface that's as basic as plain ice cream. If you don't hear music don't worry your speakers aren't broken and you haven't gone deaf either. That's because there is no music. From this interface you will select a game and watch a preview of the screen on top. Still no sound is played.

There are a total of 46 games, all catergorized in 4 volumes within the Graphical User Interface. which is great but I think it should have included other titles as well. For example it doesn't have Sonic and Knuckles which is probably one of my favorite genesis games however it does have Sonic Spinball for some reason and Columns I and II . It also doens't have any Phantasy Star Games. I also wished it had 3rd part titles as well such as Maximum Carnage, Earthworm Jim, Mortal Kombat etc.

While it doesn't have certain titles, the games included in this collection are fun and no matter how many times you've played these games in the past or in other consoles, they're still fun to play. Sonic 1, 2 and 3 are still great games. Gunstar Heroes, Streets of Rage, Ristar, Shinobi II, Vectorman, Comix Zone, Super Thunder Blade, etc. All games can be played via the keyboard, although a PC controller is highly recommended for simpler gameplay. A wireless one would be better so you can sit back and relax. The only downside is that you must always press Esc if you want to save or exit the game. You must also use your mouse to switch volumes. It doesn't just allow you to keep pressing right or left to switch.

Since this is a collection it's hard to judge it graphically, each game has it's own distinct look. However the game does support 1080p and fullscreen mode which can't be said for most of the Genesis Collections in the past even Sega's own Playnet service which has you playing on a small screen on your computer. It also doesn't require a powerful computer to run this game. It can still run on an old pentium 4 computer with 1.6GHZ and all it requires is a video card with at least 32mb of dedicated memory.

There's really nothing much to say about SGCC that hasn't already been said in other collections. It's great for PC gamers who want to relive the old days but with a PS3/360 version released last year, people who already played that might not play this. Granted they both a few different games within their collection but most people will not play all the games. If anything I would just recommend this game to have it in the office and play it during your lunch break since it is a PC game and can run with the bare minimum of the computer specs.

Verdict: Buy

SGCC is available at retailers for $29.99 but I've seen them as low as $9.99 so if you find one that is $9.99 I say purchase this title. It has 46 games, half of which you would not touch but it is a great deal considering that these titles are available on other consoles for download for $5 each. It's fun for short burst of gameplay when you are busy while using the computer. It runs on the bare minimum so you can practically take it with you where ever a PC is available.

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