Top 5 #002: Best SEGA Games of All Time

Hi there mates! How is it going? I know it's been a while since the last time I posted something here, but again I was busy with a lot of things and finally I have some time to write something new here. This time, I'm gonna list my favorite games made or published by Sega without repeating franchises, which means there's not gonna be 2 Sonic or 2 Virtua Fighter games in the list, only the best ones they made since the beginning of the company in 1984!

Grab your bucket of popcorn and buckle your sit belt, here we go!

Brazilian Cover Art for Sonic the Hedgehog 2 on the Sega Mega Drive

This one, people always complaint with me one particular reason: why not the first Sonic game? When I first bought the Mega Drive back in 1999 this was the very first game I ever played on the Mega Drive, and the impact was HUGE. Understand that at that time I was a big Nintendo fan that never played any major franchises made by Sega because I always looked at the games pictures in the magazine and found them always worse on the Mega Drive, so why I would I bother playing them? What a retarded kid I was.

When I bought the system for R$ 50,00 at the time (aprox. 20 US Dollars), it only came with the Sonic 2 cartridge and nothing else, not even an controller! I had to ask a friend to lend me one of his to play it and seriously, I was a little shocked first time I played the game. It has it all: amazing graphics, amazing soundtrack, amazing controls and most important of all: the sense of speed! Oh yes, Mario games were all about precise jumps and collect items, but that was the first time I experienced something that fast and that fun. So I asked myself: WHY IN THE FUCK I DIDN'T PLAYED IT BEFORE?

I had an Super Nintendo from 1995 to 1998 but my parents had to sold it to pay some debt and I ended up with an Mega Drive Brazilian model 3 (the international Model 2) and I expend quite some money it, but Sonic 2 has to be the game I most played on it. I played the first game after and found it amazing too, but not as much as the second one. The possibility of playing with both Sonic and Tails and the 2 Player split screen mode (which sucks but I played it a lot anyway) counted a lot for me and when I finally bought Sonic & Knuckles and played it all again has to be one of the best experiences I had with the Mega Drive.

"Final Showdown" was released with almost an 2 years delay from the Arcade version and only on digital format for the PS3 and 360.

Virtua Fighter... Many people hate it, a few love it to the death - I'm the second one. Aside from the Mega Drive version (which sucks big time), every single one game from the franchise blew my mind on it's time. Virtua Fighter 2 had an AI that memorize your movements and would not fall for the same mistakes after some time, Virtua Fighter 3 introduced the huge scenarios with different layers (already commom in the Dead or Alive franchise) and Virtua Fighter 4 had a bunch of interesting new characters and really well design scenarios that I couldn't believe it when I played in my PlayStation 2.

But why Virtua Fighter 5? It was the last game of the franchise that Yu Suzuki worked on, thus his is not even involved on this upgrade released by Sega in 2011, and it's the only fighting game of the current generation of consoles that runs in 120fps and has at least 200 frame per move, which is twice more than any other game released until 2013 at any console or PCs... And the game was originally released in 2007! Final Showdown only adds new content and the poor Taka Arashi, who has to be the most hated character every created for a fighting game franchise ever! I mean, the creator has to left the company for the guy to be included in the game!

Ok, you can complaint about the lack of a background history in the game, which is repeated in every single one since the first, but this game has to be one of the masterpieces of martial arts ever created. Every single movement and every single art is represented by one character and it's done in a high level of detail and precision. If you haven't played any game of the franchise or simply haven't played the 5th game yet, I highly recommend you pick a digital copy of this game because is definally worth!

In a time where most of the players were looking into 3D games, Sega was still releasing amazing 2D platformers.

Astal, Oh Astal. It has to be the most underrated game of all time. Games are all about 2 things: timing for the release and HYPE. Back in 1995 people were waiting for the highly hyped 3D games, but most of them still suck big time because it was a technology that the companies were not used to work yet, and in the middle of all, Astal was released on the Saturn without much warning from Sega. Seriously, I still asking myself to this day why Sega didn't make an good marketing to advertising the game...

Astal is, by far, the best 2D platformer released on the Sega Saturn and a serious candidate to the best game of the genre of all time! I'm not joking. The rhythm of the game is a little bit slow but every single stage is a unique experience and has a different music style that fits it just fine with all the situations. There's very little who can be said about the game because it's a very straight game with a very straight background story and a simple gameplay, but if you have an Sega Saturn and don't own a copy of this game, SHAME ON YOU!

Another Mega Drive classic. I don't even like motorcycles that much, but this game caught my attention on Sega 6-Pak.

Super Hang-On is one of the launch times for the Mega Drive. It never really caught my attention until one day, back in 1998 I think, my grandmother give the cartridge "6-Pak" and an 6-button Turbo Controller for birthday. In this cartridge are included 6 Sega Classics: Sonic the Hedgehog, Revenge of Shinobi, Streets of Rage, Golden Axe, Columns and Super Hang-on (of course). The premise is pretty simple: the game has 4 tracks, divided by difficult levels, and 4 musics which you can choose from before playing - it's more or less like Outrun, but you don't have separated ways to drive, you only drive forward on the same path.

On the Mega Drive, Sega included an new mode called "Original Mode" that you can upgrade and fix your motorcycle, because if you get to many hits in a race it will start to show some problems with the engine. It's a pretty simple concept, used by many games before and after it, but it was nice to see a new feature to extend the games life, since most of the arcade adaptations from Sega didn't include many extra modes. If you like racing games and are looking for a real good challenge, that's the game to you!

Brazilian Cover of the Mega Drive version. Both versions of the game pushed it consoles to the limits.

Ristar got an very interesting story behind it's development: first, it was a scrapped out idea for the first Sonic game back in 1990. Second: they changed the characters from a bunny to a star with eyes, feet and stretch arms and named the game "Feel". Later, the same guy responsible for the Sonic game steps in and changes the name to Ristar and bring in all ideas that were to be used on the first Sonic game that were left out for some reason and VOILÁ: Ristar was released in 1995 on both Mega Drive and Game Gear almost at the same time.

It's a very challenging platformer that not only has amazing graphics and an very nice soundtrack but also took the console to it's very limits. Sonic 3 & Knuckles showed us some nice backgrounds but because the game was running too fast, Sega couldn't put that much details that Ristar has because it could possibly compromise the frame-rate of the game. So here, they filled it with background animations and effects that were never seen before on a Mega Drive game - at least not with all that quality.

A game that good and Sega forget but one thing: to publicize it! Yes, the game was released and all, but not much people heard about it because the company didn't put much effort to show the game when it was released so it eventually earned the status of "cult". Looking for a pretty challenge game yet fun to play? I highly recommend you grab a copy of this and never sell it, because it is a little rare to find one at a good price!

Hope you enjoy my favorite Sega games of all time! I would have put Space Harrier on this list but I would do no justice to Ristar if I had excluded it, so maybe next time! Agree? Disagree? Let me hear about it on the comments below! See you next time, space cowboy!