2021/5/8: Sega 32X: Darxide (Europe)

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VideoGameCritic
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2021/5/8: Sega 32X: Darxide (Europe)

Postby VideoGameCritic » May 8th, 2021, 6:56 am

I believe this will complete my 32X reviews... or am I still missing some CD games.

Anyway let's hear your thoughts.

LuckyWDFN
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Re: 2021/5/8: Sega 32X: Darxide (Europe)

Postby LuckyWDFN » May 8th, 2021, 10:07 am

I don't even own a Sega 32x but came in to say the Ellen DeGeneres line was hilarious

Also, I read the review before looking at the grade and was thinking you were going to give it at least B+ based on what I read. It sounds great. Anything that has Asteroids & little Rescue on Fractalus mixed in sounds fun to me

goldenband
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Re: 2021/5/8: Sega 32X: Darxide (Europe)

Postby goldenband » May 8th, 2021, 10:41 am

Awesome -- so pleased to see this one go up, and that the repro cart worked for you. It seems like a very fair review, one that appreciates the fact that the game is more than just "Asteroids in space" -- many people have stopped there. And I agree, the graphics on this one are remarkably good and hint at what the 32X might have been capable of doing in the hands of the best programmers.

In terms of remaining 32X reviews, you have one North American release left to review, and it is indeed a CD game: Supreme Warrior. I think if you get that one done, you'll be eligible for the complete set of steak knives and gravy boats. :D

However, there's also one European release left that you could review: FIFA Soccer 96. Unlike Darxide (which has region lockout), an original cart will (allegedly) play fine on a US 32X. Unfortunately FIFA 32X used to be cheap ($5-10) but is now stupidly expensive and hard to get. A repro cart is obviously an option.

There's also one, and only one, Japanese-exclusive game: the strategy title Sangokushi IV, aka Romance of the Three Kingdoms IV: Wall of Fire. With English-language versions on SNES, PS1, and Saturn, you can skip this one.

The last wild card is two Brazilian-exclusive 32X CD games: Midnight Raiders, and Surgical Strike. Both are "upgraded" Sega CD games that were advertised as "coming soon" in the US, but only made it out in Brazil.

Surgical Strike 32X has been known for a while, and was known to be by far the rarest 32X game, with only 3-4 copies known to exist. It was dumped a few years ago, and if you're willing to play a burned CD-ROM on your system (which should be 100% fine as long as you use the very best-quality discs), it will work.

However, a single copy of Midnight Raiders 32X was recently discovered. Only one person has it, and it hasn't been dumped, so you can't review it: problem solved. :D

tl;dr: If you really want to be a 32X completist, you'll want to do Supreme Warrior 32X CD, plus a repro cart of FIFA Soccer 96 and a burned CD of Surgical Strike 32X.

But as a North American reviewer, I think you're only "obligated" [sic] to do Supreme Warrior, and you can call the library done.

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Re: 2021/5/8: Sega 32X: Darxide (Europe)

Postby VideoGameCritic » May 8th, 2021, 10:59 am

Goldenband - thanks for the in-depth analysis! You'll be pleased to know I'm holding Supreme Warrior (Sega CD/32X) in my hand right now! So it shouldn't be long.

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Re: 2021/5/8: Sega 32X: Darxide (Europe)

Postby goldenband » May 8th, 2021, 11:48 am

VideoGameCritic wrote:Goldenband - thanks for the in-depth analysis! You'll be pleased to know I'm holding Supreme Warrior (Sega CD/32X) in my hand right now! So it shouldn't be long.

Awesome! I doubt there will be some sort of sea change between the Sega CD and 32X CD versions -- they're probably quite similar -- but that's the wonderful thing about a review: it takes "probably" and turns it into "Well, I actually checked it out".

At least the 32X version will probably (there's that word again) look better.

By the way, there are a few 32X prototypes, but nothing too interesting. There are "upgraded" versions of Spot Goes to Hollywood, which apparently crashes a bunch, and Pinocchio, which runs OK. There's an incomplete version of Soul Star (crashes after 1 level), and early alpha versions of two exclusive 32X games in development, X-Men and Virtua Hamster (with almost nothing to play). So Pinocchio's the only one that's complete and playable.

On the homebrew front, there were ports of Wolfenstein 3D and Rick Dangerous. I think that's it, at least for completed games.

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Re: 2021/5/8: Sega 32X: Darxide (Europe)

Postby MSR1701 » May 8th, 2021, 1:43 pm

Question, is the Repro Darxide cart NTSC or PAL?

goldenband
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Re: 2021/5/8: Sega 32X: Darxide (Europe)

Postby goldenband » May 8th, 2021, 3:47 pm

MSR1701 wrote:Question, is the Repro Darxide cart NTSC or PAL?

The game only came out in PAL regions, and an original copy will only play on PAL systems -- but making it playable on NTSC systems is literally a matter of changing one byte in the header.

It's just region lockout, in other words, and the Critic couldn't play his repro cart on real NTSC/60Hz hardware unless that byte had been fixed.

As for whether it's meant to be played at 50Hz or 60Hz, as a European-developed game, it was probably targeted for 50Hz, but it's still playable at 60Hz.

Some 50Hz games run faster on 50Hz systems, as sometimes the extra time for drawing the screen leads to fewer missed frames, i.e. less slowdown (that's not a great explanation but it'll do). No idea whether Darxide is affected by this, or whether its framerate is any better on PAL/50Hz systems.

(BTW I specify PAL/50Hz because Brazil uses an unusual PAL/60Hz system -- basically a hybrid of PAL's color encoding and resolution with NTSC's refresh rate. That doesn't apply here but is occasionally an issue. The more you know!)

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Re: 2021/5/8: Sega 32X: Darxide (Europe)

Postby Luigi & Peach » May 8th, 2021, 9:17 pm

LuckyWDFN wrote:I don't even own a Sega 32x but came in to say the Ellen DeGeneres line was hilarious

Also, I read the review before looking at the grade and was thinking you were going to give it at least B+ based on what I read. It sounds great. Anything that has Asteroids & little Rescue on Fractalus mixed in sounds fun to me


I, too, admit to being surprised that you gave this a C grade after all the praise you heaped on it. The Ellen line was great though.

djc
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Re: 2021/5/8: Sega 32X: Darxide (Europe)

Postby djc » May 8th, 2021, 11:32 pm

In terms of remaining 32X reviews, you have one North American release left to review, and it is indeed a CD game: Supreme Warrior. I think if you get that one done, you'll be eligible for the complete set of steak knives and gravy boats.


Oof - this game is terrible.

Regarding FIFA 32X. I really want that one (will probably go for a repro). It is a completely different game than the Genesis version and appears to use 3D-rendered players vs. sprites.

I really like the 32X as a whole and I wish Sega gave it more of a chance.

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Re: 2021/5/8: Sega 32X: Darxide (Europe)

Postby Atariboy » May 9th, 2021, 9:23 pm

Why not just buy a Mega EverDrive X3 for $50?

https://stoneagegamer.com/mega-everdriv ... black.html

No more need to buy repro cartridges for the Master System, Genesis, or 32X. Just download a rom pack (I'm sure at least 100 of the members here can hook you up with a safe download link), unzip it, copy the files to a SD card, and insert the SD card into the Everdrive cartridge.

Then just use the Everdrive as if it was a normal Genesis cartridge. You'll be presented with an on-screen game selection menu. Just scroll through with your Genesis controller, pick the game you want to play, and press A. No less official than expensive reproduction cartridges and you'll still be playing the original game code on the original hardware.


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