Those exotic consoles were cool to think and daydream about while reading your monthly issue of EGM. Also there was a store at our local mall that for some reason liked to put the obscure consoles on demo. Those were my only hands-on experiences with the TG16, CD-i, Jaguar, 3DO, and Neo-Geo, and I relished those opportunities. But yeah, no one was going to do anything crazy like buy any of them, especially when Blockbuster didn't stock their games for rental.
There WERE Sega CD games at Blockbuster, and I knew more than one kid who had one. It wasn't nearly as exotic as the others.
EGM was definitely where I learned about all the peripheral consoles, even though coverage was scarce there, in retrospect. They were so mysterious and expensive, ridiculously so, but such was their allure.
I would have loved to have known someone with a Sega CD, because then I likely would have played Sonic CD as a kid and that would have meant the world.
The funny thing is the reality for us involved a lot more Mad Dog McCree.
You look back 30 years now and see only a handful of classic Sonic games, so to the Sonic fan each one is a treasure. But from where we were sitting, by the time Sonic CD came out, we hadn't fully digested Sonic 2. Sonic 3 was around the corner. There was also Sonic Spinball, and Sonic on Game Gear. Not to mention, the world was awash in 2D platformers more generally.
But lame as it seems now, there was nothing else like Mad Dog McCree.
I recall a friend having it. Though I want to say that he rented it from Blockbuster, if that was possible, because I only recall using it one time at his house, and the memory of it is pretty fuzzy.
My recollection was trying to play MK2 on SNES with it and finding it wasn’t really worth the trouble, mainly due to the time it to took to matchmake. Though we thought it was really cool conceptually. I can’t even remember how bad the latency was.
Time to be connected (called back by service) depended heavily on local metro market. So if you lived in Atlanta metro for example... no problem. Also , you always had the option to call long distance and go nationwide. 😉
Oh maaaaan, seeing the name Mad Dog McCree psychs me out.
You're right, though, Sega CD was all about those FMV titles, Sewer Shark, Night Trap, Corpse Killer, Fahrenheit, etc. They were definitely one-of-a-kind for a super brief time.
As a child at the time, I couldn't get enough Sonic, but it's true that Sega absolutely showered us in Sonic games until around 1996.
1994 was a great time for games. SNES was really hitting its stride, Sega was really competitive. And so many platforms… plus arcade and PC.
Fun read.
Those exotic consoles were cool to think and daydream about while reading your monthly issue of EGM. Also there was a store at our local mall that for some reason liked to put the obscure consoles on demo. Those were my only hands-on experiences with the TG16, CD-i, Jaguar, 3DO, and Neo-Geo, and I relished those opportunities. But yeah, no one was going to do anything crazy like buy any of them, especially when Blockbuster didn't stock their games for rental.
There WERE Sega CD games at Blockbuster, and I knew more than one kid who had one. It wasn't nearly as exotic as the others.
EGM was definitely where I learned about all the peripheral consoles, even though coverage was scarce there, in retrospect. They were so mysterious and expensive, ridiculously so, but such was their allure.
I would have loved to have known someone with a Sega CD, because then I likely would have played Sonic CD as a kid and that would have meant the world.
The funny thing is the reality for us involved a lot more Mad Dog McCree.
You look back 30 years now and see only a handful of classic Sonic games, so to the Sonic fan each one is a treasure. But from where we were sitting, by the time Sonic CD came out, we hadn't fully digested Sonic 2. Sonic 3 was around the corner. There was also Sonic Spinball, and Sonic on Game Gear. Not to mention, the world was awash in 2D platformers more generally.
But lame as it seems now, there was nothing else like Mad Dog McCree.
In 1994 for the SNES, we were on the edge of the release of the XBAND video game modem and network. Oh man... those were the days!
Did you have a good experience with a Xband?
I recall a friend having it. Though I want to say that he rented it from Blockbuster, if that was possible, because I only recall using it one time at his house, and the memory of it is pretty fuzzy.
My recollection was trying to play MK2 on SNES with it and finding it wasn’t really worth the trouble, mainly due to the time it to took to matchmake. Though we thought it was really cool conceptually. I can’t even remember how bad the latency was.
Time to be connected (called back by service) depended heavily on local metro market. So if you lived in Atlanta metro for example... no problem. Also , you always had the option to call long distance and go nationwide. 😉
He probably took advantage of the Blockbuster deal: XBAND plus 2 game rentals for 19.99. Basically you got the unit for about six bucks.
FYI I wrote about my XBAND experience back then: https://open.substack.com/pub/stevenland/p/generation-xband-goes-online?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=4129tc
Oh maaaaan, seeing the name Mad Dog McCree psychs me out.
You're right, though, Sega CD was all about those FMV titles, Sewer Shark, Night Trap, Corpse Killer, Fahrenheit, etc. They were definitely one-of-a-kind for a super brief time.
As a child at the time, I couldn't get enough Sonic, but it's true that Sega absolutely showered us in Sonic games until around 1996.