11 Facts About the Sega Saturn You Maybe Didnt Know

Want to know some facts about the Sega Saturn? How about 11 of them because I'm funny like that? Well here you go! For best results view at 1080p60fps. Find out some information on the Sega Saturn including a few odds and ends I haven't seen in other videos that cover the console.
UPDATE: In the interest of consistency, I should have mentioned a sales range for the PlayStation. Depending on the source you use for sales numbers, it sold between 90 and 101 million. I've added a card at the appropriate time, updated this description and will add a sticky comment with the note.
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#segasaturn #saturn #sega #32bit #cdrom #cartridge #virtuafighter2 #segarally #daytona #kingoffighters #xmenvscapcom #polygons #quads #homeconsole #jupiter #mars #retrogaming #expensive #panzerdragoon #panzerdragoonsaga

[@InglebardGaming]

Hey folks, just a quick update. I should have said PlayStation sales were between 90 and 101 million instead of just 90 million. The amount depends on the source you get the numbers from. Sony themselves report 101 at this website: sonyinteractive.com/en/our-company/business-data-sales/ so I wanted to make sure that's out there. I should have listed the range like I did for the Saturn for the sake of consistency, sorry about that! EDIT: Correction #2: obviously Panzer Dragoon Saga came out in 1998, not 1988. Managed to miss that in the final edit, sorry!

[@Gametester110-qf8vs]

The Sega Saturn is my all-time favorite game system. Sadly, the system arrived during a period where Sega was simply it's own worst enemy.

[@quajay187]

and Panzer Saga was 1998😁

[@InglebardGaming]

That's what's we in the biz call a boo-boo. Fat fingered that and didn't catch it while watching the final edit, ugh.

[@Adamtendo_player_1]

PlayStation sales were actually 101 million according to official figures from Sony.

[@Adamtendo_player_1]

@@Gametester110-qf8vs the Saturn is a great system and I’m interested in owning one but my favourite system Sega system is rhe Genesis (Mega Drive) my all time favourite system is the Nintendo Switch.

[@loganford3921]

You can reset a game without pressing the reset button. If I remember right if you press and hold the abc buttons and press start it will take you to the game title screen and if you press and hold xyz and press start it will take back to the Saturn boot up screen. I used to do all the time to rage quit if was getting beat in SF Zero 2 with my friends as they didn't know about the reset in the late 90s.

[@segat-800]

Well remembered!

[@HellTantrumbull]

Pressing ABC Start during gameplay will take you back to the title screen. Pressing those buttons again while at the title screen will go back to the dashboard. Buttons XYZ don't do anything.

[@m.jordan5181]

​@@HellTantrumbullCorrect

[@avalond1193]

Damn cheater

[@Larry]

Jim Bagley has done quite a few impossible ports, like putting Virtua Fighter on the GBA. (I think he did Virtua Racing too)

[@arcadianlhadattshirotsughW33Z]

i gotta party with larry,.. ill fight with him about how boilermakers are better than pints, and how the saturn smashed the jaquar and n64..

[@EhHold]

Legend of Oasis, Astal, Sega Rally, VF2, Dark Savior, Street Fighter Alpha Series were awesome. Love this system.

[@juststatedtheobvious9633]

This series is a wonderful zen. Even knowing most of it (the soundchip's exact capabilities were a surprise), it just always feels good to see someone fighting ignorance, who actually knows what they're talking about.

[@InglebardGaming]

Thanks, always appreciate your comments! Glad you're enjoying these!

[@m.jordan5181]

The whole "fighting ignorance" theme is *paramount* and quite relevant today.

[@Adamtendo_player_1]

I really wish Sega used a similarly capable sound chip in the Mega Drive even if it drove up the cost of the console slightly.

[@juststatedtheobvious9633]

@@Adamtendo_player_1 Streets of Rage, Sonic, Devilish... It was very capable for the time. Unfortunately, western developers lacked experience with FM synth and many multiplats abused demonstration instruments included with the GEMS sound engine. Other developers, like Capcom, did horrors like splitting the sample channel in 2 - there exist hacks that restore the audio quality.

[@InglebardGaming]

Yeah, agree here, the ym2612 and the PSG combo was perfectly fine in 1988, it was similar to a lot of arcade games of the time. The 2612 isn't THAT different from the 2151 used in loads of arcade boards. For any that don't know I'm doing music for new Genesis games and really like its sound setup, it was just used poorly by a lot of devs back in the day. Anything fancier would have been way too expensive back then. Maybe if they could have integrated a dedicated sample chip that added a couple of all digital channels, that would have been nice. But again, probably would have been more money than it was worth.

[@douglasmarquezin3575]

these 27 minutes flied. thanks for the amazing storytelling +1 subscriber

[@InglebardGaming]

Thanks! Welcome and glad you liked it!

[@mortenera2294]

The Sega Saturn is easily one of my favourite consoles, a lot of great arcade ports as well as original titles like Sakura Wars. Unfortunately it had a shitty life in the west, it deserved a lot more

[@AgentLazarus]

It's called favorite.

[@jontomustalent575]

Man I love your videos!! You really breakdown everything. You, Segalord X, Gamesack and Console Wars guys should do a video together, that would be AMAZING!

[@InglebardGaming]

Thanks, I appreciate it! But I'm small potatoes on here compared to those guys.

[@jontomustalent575]

@@InglebardGaming no your not man, trust me! In my profession, it's my job to discover talent for TV and film. You have a good "niche" going on in these videos. Don't short change yourself man.

[@jpdevs]

Here in Argentina it was never a strong system. There were too few units on the market. Now its very expensive to get one

[@delalicanto7432]

Yo conseguí las mías en Mendoza (tengo dos y una sin abrir desde el 97) Es cierto que no se la vio casi por ningún lado, había que buscar mucho para conseguir juegos/etc...

[@HielUFF]

The Saturn is the console of my life, I live and breathe for it at 44 years of age, greetings from Venezuela, the best console that exists!! I have a video on my channel with my top 21 on the console.

[@OtakuFREEMAN]

Still my favourite gaming system! ♥

[@nathandaniels4823]

I have PTSD from the Saturn. Loved it back in the day, but it seriously felt more isolating being a Saturn-exclusive owner than it was being a Master system-exclusive owner.

[@InglebardGaming]

I understand. One my friends was also a big Saturn fan, but ally other friends were ps1 all the way. They would always say the Saturn was garbage until I made them actually sit and play some games on mine.

[@samuraispiritsx]

Just got a Saturn serviced with new capacitors F ram mod and installed an ODE, the system is incredible really great games and amazing sound. The controller is on another level. I love digging into its library.

[@InglebardGaming]

My Saturn currently has a dead motor. Been thinking about getting an ODE, but don't really have the money to spend on that luxury right now.

[@BenWard29]

Speaking of planet names, there was also the Sega Neptune- an announced but unreleased 2-in-1 Mega Drive and 32X.

[@itsGeorgeAgain]

Also, there was a PC 3D accelerator card at the saturn's time from Diamond 3D that used Quads, and even had a port for a Saturn gamepad and the 3d chip used was from nVIDIA, their very very first NV1. It saw a few Sega games ported to it.

[@piccolo1976]

Great video. Saturn was a worthy Sega console. My cool Saturn still sits under my telly with a Satiator to have that great catalogue on tap. Although its hardware was complicated, I still think it having higher resolutions than the Gamecube makes it pretty remarkable considering its release date. Who can forget Segata Sanshiro? Play Sega Saturn!

[@InglebardGaming]

I got a whole bunch of Sega Sanshiro videos I was going to put in here but couldn't find a good place to fit them in. Also made an animated sales graphic I forgot to use. Oh well!

[@piccolo1976]

@@InglebardGaming Another time, another video, none of your work should go to waste!

[@Chrozi]

Loved the Saturn back in the day, I imported the D&D games and the Capcom fighters, also scored a PDS at retail and still have it. Bummed I passed on Burning Rangers and Radiant Silvergun at the time

[@InglebardGaming]

Same here, I have a lit of domestic games and a small little collection of imports from back in the day. The first version of Symphony of the Night I played was on Saturn, I got it for that before I even owned a PlayStation.

[@Anthonyelmio2]

I was given a Saturn/w 2 contrillers as a kid without any games around 2001 and in 2020. I decided to do something about it and did a recap, fram, Action Replay cart, got the 3d controller, Brook wingman for fight sticks, saturn Mouse, and a Terraonion Mode Now it it one of my favorites ❤

[@InglebardGaming]

Definitely plenty of good games on it! If I had more money to waste, I'd get an ODE for mine, which has a dead drive motor right now.

[@Anthonyelmio2]

@InglebardGaming definitely worth it. Mine the drive died, too but responsibilities come 1st 🥲

[@HellTantrumbull]

I was actually unforgiving towards KB toys for not carrying the Saturn and any games for the system since I usually went there to buy games for the Genesis, Nes and Snes. once the 8 and 16-bit days ended I never went back to them since by that point I obviously had no reason to go since I was already at the age where I longed stopped playing with toys and just wanted games for whatever console I had at the time.

[@MrSez1979]

Well, Sega did screw KB Toys at launch, so I don't blame them saying a metaphorical F*CK YOU back! Lol

[@dfcx1]

I can totally see why Carmack would've been particularly allergic to affine texture swim at that time considering it was one of the problems he dealt with in Quake's software renderer himself.

[@ArneChristianRosenfeldt]

Quake interpolates across 16px. I don’t see how this is better than adaptive subdivision of quads. Make it so that quads never expand more than 16px along z ( the up vector projected on screen ). You can split along both texture coordinates independently and locally. Though locality has a price. Cuts better propagate.

[@dfcx1]

​@@ArneChristianRosenfeldt I agree, particularly since they're quads anyway and don't get that harsh angle that tris do. Probably why Carmack changed his mind afterwards.

[@DDRmails]

"hey! we gonna do 2D super consule! but it will not handle transparancy" 2 year old snes: *lol*

[@InglebardGaming]

I mean, technically it does do transparency, its just affected negatively by the weird way it mashes all the sprites into one output layer. But there are 2D games on the system that do it right.

[@ArneChristianRosenfeldt]

@@InglebardGamingthe SNES also mashes together sprites into one layer and then does translucency. This is crutch. With the advent of a framebuffer every sane hardware dev would have said: finally a clean way to do translucency !

[@litjellyfish]

This is exactly how SNES handle the same… Ehum

[@costumeninja1914]

Burning Rangers has loads of transparencies. Saga as well. Loads of 2d games like Astal.

[@litjellyfish]

@@costumeninja1914 yea and Sonic racing game as well. Thing is all those are bound to some restrictions while on PS1 you have much more freedom to use transparent stuff. And sometime those restrictions restrict the game which is bad. And sometimes they use it smart and manage to add it without affecting the game itself

[@collinwaugh939]

i bought a saturn at launch it was a amazing console with some of the best games ive ever played still one my favs to this day !!

[@MarginalSC]

IIRC, Panzer Dragoon Saga's first run for NA was 7,000 copies. Makes me wonder if they'd go even lower than that for Daytona, or if they simply just boxed up some leftovers from the pressing that went in with the Netlink bundle...

[@m.jordan5181]

Back then, it was said to have been only 3000 copies (from my local Babbage's store manager). Those numbers might have been higher officially, but it was definitely sub-10k.

[@MarginalSC]

@m.jordan5181 I was hearing more than that but that was on usenet rec.games.video.sega

[@thedrunkmonkshow]

I always knew that talking point that Sega added 3D to the Saturn at the last minute was a gross over simplification and we finally have confirmation straight from the horses mouth. It also implies that Sega somehow wasn't considering 3D consoles until the Playstation came along when it's the complete opposite. Sega had already been envisioning a 3D capable system way back in 1988 after the Megadrive came out because their next goal was to create a fully 3D Arcade platform which became the Sega Model 1 and they wanted to ensure a way those games could still be played at home. At the turn of the decade the idea of a 3D console still felt years ahead because of how expensive CPUs and video memory was. Therefore, when Sega began development on the Saturn in 1991, it was almost like business as usual for them by making the most powerful 2D console. What changed things was suddenly in 1992 there was this explosion of cost effective 32-Bit CPUs from companies like MIPS, Hitachi, NEC and ARM as well as 3D graphics acceleration either as co-processors or built into the video chips. What still baffles me is how if this was their goal all along, why they rejected Tom Kalinske's deal with Silicon Graphics? The internal disputes and conflicts between Sega Of America and Sega Of Japan were wild. 😃

[@l.kagawa6108]

Great video. I'm having déjà-vu moments just by watching this video.

[@InglebardGaming]

Thanks, appreciate it!

[@darktetsuya]

I thought I remembered hearing SEGA was making it as a 2D system and the shift to 3D came later. makes a lot of sense with all the Japanese exclusive arcade ports the saturn got. between the SNK fighters and Capcom's arcade ports having the extra ram attached, you could basically get the arcade experience at home! I did import a Japanese system last year (plus the pseudo saturn kai cart to fill in for the RAM carts and act as a region unlock) definitely not regretting that purchase.

[@segat-800]

I love Sega Saturn videos and yeah, some of that info presented is new to me. Didn't the PS1 sell over 100 million units?

[@InglebardGaming]

It depends on the source you look at the sales numbers from. BUT, since I mentioned the sales range for the Saturn, I will add a card and a pinned comment on the video say that it's it's between 90 and 101 million which is how I should have listed it. Thanks!

[@MarquisDeSang]

I miss Hang On so much. I loved it on the Saturn even witht the digital input.

[@PierFlies]

That Sega hardware designer sounds like he was way underqualified for the job. Tasked with building Sega's next hardware, and the guy is making decisions based off what playstation was doing.

[@litjellyfish]

This is usually how market design work… why make something expensive and very next gen if you don’t need it?

[@PierFlies]

​@@litjellyfish .......You strive to be the best, that doesn't mean most expensive, that's your interjection. A designer designs the best piece of hardware he can with what is available at the time, factoring in cost, supply chain and many other factors. Sony created the best gaming console they could to take them into the future, Sega watched Sony to see what actions they would be forced to take as a result. Sony had a winner's mentality, Sega had a loser's mentality. You either see the different approaches or you do not. I'm not sure what wisdom you think there is in defending Sega's losing strategy, but some just seek to argue. You won't get any more from me.

[@litjellyfish]

@@PierFlies yes i agree that Sega in that sense for their first console had a pretty meh mind set. But remember no know knew what SONY was cooking up. Saturn power wise at the time really looked powerful but yea of course one could have said sega should have been more proactive. A bit the same with Dreamcast. Ok sure that the memory was half of the Naomi boards as it was expensive but price wise they could had thrown another SH4 in as if you looked at pure polygons crunching numbers Dreamcast was a lot better than PS1 but not amazingly better. And then knew that they would need to do cut back on their arcade model 3 ports. They knew that in theory the GPU could do arcade perfect ports almost but the CPU would be the bottle neck. And that really backfired when PS2 Was announced

[@InglebardGaming]

Sato was fine at his job. Every company that has competition cares what its competition does and makes changes because of it. When it comes to mobile phones, both Google and Apple have taken lots from each other. The whole reason Windows even exists is because Microsoft looked at what Apple was doing with the Mac, basically copied it whole cloth and even released Windows first. Show me any market where a company doesn't care or doesn't respond to what its competition is doing.

[@PierFlies]

​@@InglebardGaming Na, he was adding things as he went and Sony interrupted his grand scheme at least twice that you mentioned. You have to be aware of other products in order to even understand the hardware's capabilities, but you also need a plan and direction of your own. This guy failed Sega because he designed a potato, and then tried to fix it buy making additions wherever Sony outclassed him on the surface.

[@tonecot8932]

Senior year in high school, 1998, i saw a used Saturn for sale at a record store. It came with 30 or so games. All for only 300 dollars. I should have bought it then and there, but it was all about PS1 and N64 at that time.

[@InglebardGaming]

Honestly I wouldn't have done that deal back then, either. I know it came with 30 games, but the system was often priced around $100-$150 in places by late 1998 and games were cheap and easy to find in those days.

[@gc3k]

Everyone says Saturn was incredibly popular in Japan, but I can only think of a couple Saturn-exclusive games (no arcade version) that have been remade or re-released on a modern platform. Being perfectly honest, I only know of one Japanese Saturn exclusive that's scheduled for re-release, Assault Suits Leynos 2

[@InglebardGaming]

I wouldn't count its "good" games by only exclusives that are getting rereleases. There are loads of games people WISH would get rereleased namely Panzer Dragoon Saga and all of Shining Force III just to name a few.

[@gc3k]

I don't mean to say that the only "good" Saturn games are exclusives. But if Saturn was popular in Japan, there should be more demand to relive the games that can only be found on Saturn. Meanwhile, several cult classic PS1 games have had re-releases or reboots over the years, alongside remakes of the "killer apps." If Sega makes the Saturn Mini, the jp list of exclusives would probably reflect what that region liked about the console in the '90s. The Saturn's arcade ports are misleading, because fans could have played them in arcades without owning a Saturn

[@segaarcade_baby0888]

"a fortuitous injury." 🤣

[@InglebardGaming]

Well, it was 😁

[@graalcloud]

Sega Saturn may indeed have more good games on it than any other console ever made.

[@thebest12700]

I dunno both PS1 and PS2 had plenty of good games too.

[@TexasHollowEarth]

... only if you include Japan. US releases for the Saturn were far fewer than PS1 had in The States 🤷‍♂️

[@m.jordan5181]

Any console with over 1000+ titles released for it is bound to have some "duds" to wade through. For the Saturn, the 'highs' were *really* high... and they were plentiful depending on personal tastes.

[@ActionGamerAaron]

I would love to see the hypothetical video of you talking about the YMF292.

[@atolm1]

Loved the Saturn so much, 2nd only to the Genesis for me. I worked at Kay Bee Toys when SEGA pulled their retail favoritism fiasco and it was so depressing, as a SEGA fan. I remember the district manager saying the system wasnt very good anyways and this peon trying to tell her otherwise 😩LOL.

[@InglebardGaming]

Ha, yeah, I bet a lot of employees at the time wished they'd carried it. At least we know the upper management of the company eventually led it to going completely out of business. Ok thr other... sorry if you lost your job over that, and to everyone else that did.

[@Gambit771]

A very entertaining video.

[@InglebardGaming]

Thanks!

[@GenMasterB]

Great video sir!

[@InglebardGaming]

Thanks, glad you liked it!

[@erockbrox8484]

Any console can be great. All you have to do is make great games for the hardware. The problem is........... it takes time and money to make such games.

[@fennkell]

Sheeesh!!! Thank goodness for emulation. Great vid 👍🏾

[@InglebardGaming]

Thanks, appreciate it!

[@arcadianlhadattshirotsughW33Z]

about the whole sega naming systems after stellar bodies thing.. you know how when you boot up the sega cd, you see an image of the earth and some other body, (could be the moon could be venus i dont know) what does that make the sega cd and whatever the answer why is it taken from that angle?.. i know its not saturn related, but it reminded me.. ive been playing a lot of saturn games on retro arch (yabause core) but lots of games arent working right on it.. hell, shining force 3 plays but then freezes after the first attack in the first battle.. the one early shining force game i cant play and its infuriating.. anyways this was a great video and all the background music your playing cracks me up for some reason..my brain combining "ride of the valkyries" with "polygons on the saturn are made of quads" will be forever ingrained now..

[@bradleymcavoy3432]

The Saturn is one of my favorite failed/underrated consoles next to the Dreamcast and PS Vita! I don’t have Panzer Dragoon Saga but I think Panzer Dragoon Zwei is the systems best game probably next to Nights into Dreams! 🤩 So many good games such as Virtua Cop 1 and 2, Saturn Bomberman ( Greatest Party Game Ever!), Shining the Holy Ark, DragonForce 1 and 2, Radiant SilverGun ( Which I wish I had along with Burning Rangers! 🙄). I have a refurbished and modded Saturn and just wish I had the Action Replay Cart(ridge) and I have a copy of Tomb Raider that Looks and Sounds BETTER than the PlayStation version! Although it helps to have the right TV though. 😎

[@yeolemillinial8295]

n64 only had 388 worldwide releases btw

[@RRC6490]

I just bought my first Saturn this past weekend. Couldn’t afford any games though 😢

[@fazares]

I knew most facts here but sometimes a little repassing isnt bad at all

[@m.jordan5181]

Same... but this video was necessary, as many people surely didn't (know most of it). And Inglebard does such a fine job 💯

[@kevinstrade2752]

Just because it didn't win, doesn't mean there weren't great games or efforts. Gamers are learning this. Most losers aren't total losers, just means they fell short in some areas. Doesn't mean they didn't do anything right. That being said Sega did make a lot of mistakes this generation. However there were still great experiences and games! Wish they unlocked its potential back then. Only recently have I upscaled mine along with territorial and memory expansion, video playback expansion. Had this system been more expandable back then early enough on, it may have made a difference. But shoulda coulda woulda...

[@m.jordan5181]

The true "winner(s)" are the ones you actually enjoyed. Sales figures don't affect or indicate actual quality.

[@kalvinravn8431]

My little brain still can’t understand the whole transparency thing. I know you explained but it was Greek to me. Yes I still have my Saturn and was a PlayStation hold out back then. I was angry when final fantasy 7 didn’t come to the Saturn. Great video and by the way I had Panzer Dragoon Saga back then I was a huge gamer then but guess what I sold it to a mom and pop video game shop shortly after owning it because, wait for it, I really didn’t like it…Great Video!

[@InglebardGaming]

Thanks, appreciate it. I feel your pain with Panzer Dragoon. I have Keio Flying Squadron on Sega CD, went to open the box to check on it last year when I thought about selling it. The disc wasn't in the box and I have no idea where it is 😯 EDIT: Forgot to address the transparency thing. Think of it this way. The Saturn renders every sprite/polygon. It sticks it all into one single layer, like in Photoshop or Gimp. Because it's all mashed together, the sprites/polygons behind the ones in front that are transparent just vanish and you see the background behind them instead. It's what happened when I showed that close-up in Guardian Heroes and zoomed way in, any sprites behind the transparent cape just weren't rendered at all.

[@ArneChristianRosenfeldt]

@@InglebardGamingit has to mash them in a single layer because quads paint pixels multiple times and in a quite erratic manner. Triangles draw every pixel once and do the translucency exactly once. At least I am to dumb to come up with a general and stable algorithm for bookkeeping of painted pixels. Maybe Sega could have used SRAM with 1bpp for this. And then clean after the quad.

[@nathandaniels4823]

Regarding quads and how triangles weren’t the standard at that time: the Voodoo 3Dfx hardware, one of the most popular early graphics cards, supposedly used quads as well.

[@ArneChristianRosenfeldt]

No, it did not. Also 1996 was the year when triangles won. N64 and PC graphics cards.

[@litjellyfish]

No it was triangle base and as said it was more or less then that triangles cemented themselves as they way to go. Not just for 3d graphic software but for 3d in games as well

[@nathandaniels4823]

@@litjellyfish my bad, it was the NVIDIA MV1 that used quads.

[@Gary_Hun]

The Doom story is only complete with the explanation of the actual final retail version's slowness. A totally different kind of Doom did not get greenlit, that is probably understandable even. Although it was perfectly fine on N64... whatever. But Carmack flat out forbid the developer from using more than one CPU for everything, "because the PC version uses one CPU only". Even though a PC CPU is much more powerful on its own, and only the Saturn's multiple CPUs add up to that sort of power, the rest of the performance could not have been utilized. Some like to tell it as if it was only because Carmack picked up the phone at that precise minute at ID Software.

[@ArneChristianRosenfeldt]

It was more like: the first version did not use quads in a good way. You gotta split them up before the walls warp. Carmack would not have said anything. Two CPUs to draw the floors like Doom resurrection on 32x would be okay. Certainly faster than 3do. I am too lazy to look this up, but didn’t Doom on Jaguar use Tom and Jerry?

[@Bowen_Landry]

I've always wanted a Sega Saturn. I still do lol. but with those game prices lol...

[@HellTantrumbull]

It's true prices have gone up a great deal over the years but thankfully you can still get the system and still get games for it thanks to the multiple ways people have made it so you can play on it. for me I just need some CDR and the modded action replay cart. would be nice to have the original discs but the out the ass prices just make that impossible.

[@arcadianlhadattshirotsughW33Z]

i agree.. ive been emulating saturn games on the yabause core on retro arch for a while but it is very hit or miss.. a lot of misses in fact

[@BigGainer98]

Get Japanese games and get yourself a Pseudo Saturn Kart.

[@yuvraj01]

Someone should have asked Sato, why did the Saturn struggle so much with transparencies, (which in some respects was it's Achilles heel) when the likes of the SNES, and even the 3DO could do a better job?

[@InglebardGaming]

There's probably no need to ask, the hardware approach he (or the other designers) used for it had very known limitations. It was likely a remnant of the system's design from before they added the geometry engine that basically just used sprites as polygons.

[@costumeninja1914]

The developers who took the time were able to use transparencies. It was perfectly possible and mini games did show it, both in Tootie in 3-D. Another Saturn myth busted.

[@yuvraj01]

@@costumeninja1914 yeah but even Sega themselves barely made the effort...case in point their big hitters like Daytona, Panzer Dragoon, Sega Rally... Or the standout title of that generation... Wipeout didn't look as good as the PSX version

[@Megageoe]

@@yuvraj01 @InglebardGaming I had an official S-Video cable from Sega of Japan back in 1995 and could see all the meshes for transparencies, but it was really only for 3D based games. I think almost all the 2D games I played back in the day had alpha blended transparencies (minus MMX4 for the spotlights), just like the SNES. One controversy back in the day was that GameFan magazine, complained that the Saturn version of SF Alpha had transparencies for the characters shadows during their super moves - making it not as close to the arcade as the PlayStation version. The transparencies were only enabled when you selected Remix BGM in the option, otherwise the shadows were a solid color like in the arcade version.

[@yuvraj01]

@@Megageoe yeah but clearly Sega knew about it, and especially at a time when 3d gaming was getting bigger and bigger, yet the 3DO managed it fine without issue and wasn't even as "powerful" as the Saturn, yet was vying for the same market

[@johnnada6855]

I think the Saturn was a great console and it had more hype for sure than the ps1 in 1994-1995, but kinda started to die in 1996, i think from my consumer perspective of back then when i was like 13, is because the type of games, the ps1 had better games and the style of the games also looked a lot more modern and different, the games on the saturn felt like stuck in the mid to early 90s, i remember that both for the saturn and dreamcast there were lot of hype, but both systems came and went, all of the sudden, both systems just disappeared, so was the situation that i asked my self years after what happened to sega?, in those days there were not a lot of information and i did quit gaming for a lot of time, but the amount of information were around ps2 and gamecube even there weren´t a lot about xbox, but sega kind disappeared

[@pixelsrnautded9286]

With rf or composite cable on a crt the mesh does look transparent from a Saturn.

[@InglebardGaming]

Hard disagree there. For years I used composite cables (before switching to S-video on a bigger TV) and even with composite cables on the small 13 inch monitor I used, the meshes were super obvious. With S-video on a mid-range 32 inch TV, they were even more obvious.

[@hopeless4ever]

You forgot to mention the Sega Neptune in your list for #1...

[@InglebardGaming]

I left it off initially since it was just a reworking of the 32X/Mars but for the sake of completeness I should have probably thrown it in there, so fair point.

[@roberto1519]

I think most people gets confused about the Saturn's approach because the jump from the 16-bit era was such a shift in gaming, without standards for 3D graphics and the change from plain 2D games, that it hasn't and won't repeat again. No other generation changed so much before or after this one. With that, let's consider the following: SEGA hardly cared about plain 2D games basically since the start, take Zaxxon, Hang-On, OutRun, Space Harrier, After Burner, Galaxy Force and the list goes on and on, technology aside, they wanted to bring 3D-esque gameplay styles, giving players more immersion, which was increased with those amazing deluxe arcade cabinets. Now, let's think for a bit, do we really think the Mega Drive successor would be a super 2D console? Why would anyone by 1994 think that, SEGA, the same company that was developing and earning millions in the arcades front, would give us a NEOGEO+, in 1994? Here's my own answer to that, no, the Saturn was designed to be a 3D console with the obvious benefit from receiving arcade ports as its chips were well documented by that point, I wonder if people know that OutRun (1986) and specially Galaxy Force II (1988) used 2 and 3 CPUs, respectively? All major 5th gen consoles had their strengths and weaknesses, none was sovereign and as the time went on, developers started taking out the best out of them, so we, unfortunately will never truly know what would had been achieved if the Saturn was supported like the PS1 and N64 up to 2001, heck, even the 3DO and the Jaguar, the latter was also subtilized most of the time. Now, it's true that from 1992 up to late 1994, ANY console development changed as the technology was evolving so quickly, it's a given, true that SEGA feared even the Jaguar competition at the time, but in no way the Saturn would be a 2D monster console, the Genesis was already a monster 2D machine, not powerful as the NEO GEO, but it didn't need to be to outsell even the SNES, it has great games enough to earn this reputation.

[@litjellyfish]

Actually the Saturn did start out a 2D monster. It’s facts. And remember the cost of 3d in arcades at the time was high. I mean Saturn clearly also as told evolved or transformed into 3d. In the end it’s not a 3d machine with 3d polygons. It’s a sprite monster where they changed so sprites could be skew / distorted on axis while using the rotation and scaling 2D features of the sprites. And voila suddenly you can deform a 2D sprites into the outline of 2 3d tris or one 3d quad. But it’s still really a 2D sprite

[@roberto1519]

​@@litjellyfish Yes, what you state, is technically correct. The way the Saturn handles 3D is different from the PS1 and N64, and again, there was no standard at the time, even PCs hardly had 3D accelerator cards at that point, even Nvidia's first cards were very similar to the Saturn, using quadrilaterals and stuff. Still, like I said, the choice of technology don't change the fact that every big console manufacturer knew that 3D was the step to take in 1994 onwards, 1993's 3DO, Jaguar and 32X paved the way to the true 32-bit generation, all three capable of rendering 3D to some degree, no matter how they did that. Whether the Saturn uses sprites, contrary to the more orthodox PS/N64 designs, 3D games were 3D games, in the sense how they played, you could have Tomb Raider on the SAT/PS/N64, they'd play the same, while looking and performing differently on each system. All in all, even 2D games suffered on the Saturn due to underutilization, SimCity 2000 using a single CPU ran so choppily on fuller cities, it's kinda sad to see, Alien Trilogy also uses only a single CPU and performs basically on par with the PS release, but lacks a few lighting effects. All these cutbacks are indeed underutilization of the hardware and rushed development.

[@litjellyfish]

@@roberto1519 yeah so true. It’s funny. You can in emulated Saturn see how all the quads is tomb raider is really sprites with 2D positions. And yeah I mean som early 3D was built with n gons or not even the concept of polygons just points and lines. The first nvida card was actually not using quads but supported n sided patches (can you believe that Pixar have started to use that again for better skin deformation of characters) So basically you could define a 4 sided patch and also have it tesselate it in hardware based on the tangent curve of each point in the quad patch (basically you can have 6 patches stitched together and with there create a perfect sphere - with the smoothness depending on how many times you tessellated the patches ) it was not the quickest card and of course maybe in some sense to early and also not really fitting for games as designing things with patches was not easy (although most mayor 3d packages at that time supported it as well as classic polygon modeling) worth nothing also was that those patches was true 3d patches and not really those deformed 2D sprites Saturn used. So the nvida card was totally different from Saturn. Also there was actually quite a few cards at the time. Most OpenGL - triangle based. But they was very very expensive and used for CAD, or 3D Software. And not also very performant. It was with 3dfc both power and price really landed PC - and well they used triangles. Some people talk that tri was standard as models for games was made using it. But at the time patches and NURBS was also used as much (as most 3d built stuff was for prerendered stuff anyway) So for me it was really the PS1 as hardware and Quake as software that cemented triangles

[@litjellyfish]

@@roberto1519 yeah. To be fair almost all consoles or computers (Amiga) with a bit more “special” hardware setup suffered. I mean even PS2 took a while for devs to learn how to push. Compared to say Dreamcast and Xbox etc that was more straightforward. Heck PS3 was also a beast - I pushed the right way. And not all did. So I think that set the nail in the coffin for those special hardware designs. And thank everything for that 😅

[@roberto1519]

Yes, it's true, some compare the PS3 to the Saturn as far as complexity goes, and Sony's console was hated by devs, Red Dead Redemption runs much better on the 360, while looking even better than Sony's machine, which struggles to maintain a stable frame rate. This is what happened most of the time with the Saturn, but I don't technically care how those 3D games work in either 5th generation console, as the gameplay of the games themselves are 3D, that's what mattered, but unfortunately, they could hardly use the hardware skillfully enough.

[@OwtDaftUK]

1027 is alot of games but if you exclude Japan exclusives that number plumits down to 242. You might say that's still doesn't count as a failer, at the very least it's not a failer in Japan. IMO, a products job is to make the company money and so it's a success or failer is dependant on how much money it brought in if any.

[@saberkok8209]

I loved sega saturn. The only 2 reasons why they failed badly is because there were not much English translations to some Japanese rpg games. I had to play it in that raw format. Then also the 2 cpu system makes it harder for the programmers to code the game. I think if had they have a kind of free support for the game coders and more translators for the game, they would not have flop so badly. BTW the ceo of playstation recently says they 160 millions units were sold. Not 100. Thumbs up for the video and effort.

[@ArneChristianRosenfeldt]

Symmetric multiprocessing with those great SH2 CPUs is easy. The problem is the rest. Total mess. SH1 here, SegaDSP there . Two totally different VDP.

[@m.jordan5181]

Sony tends to fabricate or embellish its sales figures, just like they've usually done with their system specs.😄 But anyway... my jabs aside, that guy was talking about Ps2 sales. He wasn't talking about the original Playstation, which Inglebard was specifically referencing in this video. The Sony guy is doing the sales speak because Nintendo's Switch is moving towards overtaking ps2 in sales worldwide... aka typical Sony behavior. In the end, do those sales numbers actually matter either way? Absolutely not, in my opinion.

[@RolandoMarreroPR]

I rented both systems from Blockbuster & the original US Saturn controller was terrible with that d-pad & shoulder buttons. Went with a PlayStation instead. Now I play more Saturn games than PlayStation...

[@InglebardGaming]

I got my Saturn ASAP, didn't get a ps1 for a few years, but I did eventually end up with two of them (ps1s). There are plenty of great ps1 games, but I probably have played Saturn more over the years.

[@costumeninja1914]

Am I the only one who love the American model one Sega Saturn controller? Lol.

[@richlong4119]

Poor genesis was getting it in the back and the front with tbe sega cd and 32x 😐

[@costumeninja1914]

😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😅

[@DDRmails]

24:15 1988?

[@InglebardGaming]

Uh, yeah, obviously I missed that typo. I already added info on it to the pinned comment.

[@DarDarBinks1986]

Sega shot themselves in the foot by having the 32X and Saturn both in development to the point of release. WHY? You can't compete with yourself! If Sega had me around, they'd have cancelled the 32X and focused on development for the Saturn! They'd have made the SVP chip a 3D accelerator cartridge that other Genesis games would piggyback on; going forward, all new Genesis and Sega CD games would have access to the SVP chip. Much better than building the chip into a cartridge (i.e. Virtua Racing). They'd have also made the Saturn backward-compatible with Genesis and Sega CD games right out the box. And they'd have also given us a proper Sonic game right at the launch of the Saturn. Not having a Sonic game at launch makes no more sense than Nintendo releasing a new console and not having a Mario game for it right at launch. Bug! and Clockwork Knight would have been cancelled and all the resources that would have gone into those games would be diverted toward a Saturn Sonic game instead.

[@freddiejohnson6137]

Well that's because Sega of Japan and Sega of America wanted different things in Japan they wanted a fresh start with the Saturn and in America they wanted to attempt to hold on to the Genesis for a couple more years by releasing the 32X even though the adoption rate of add ons for consoles was usually only a fraction of the install base. At the end of the day the two sides never seen eye to eye on many business decisions and rather than ever work together they were too competitive with eachother often not wanting to help each other out. So I doubt anyone would have been able to fix that relationship at the time.

[@InglebardGaming]

They definitely spread themselves too thin and had too much hardware going in that era, and I agree making the Saturn compatible with Genesis and Sega CD games would have helped, as would have not doing the 32X at all. They also should have stuck to the launch date and not annoyed their retail partners. SVP, I think it only would have worked on cartridge on a per game basis, though, otherwise you're kinda back in 32X territory if some had it and some didn't.

[@DarDarBinks1986]

@@InglebardGaming There was no need to make the 32X in the first place. All the money that Sega sunk into that would have been better spent on developing the Saturn instead. Also, why couldn't Sega make the Saturn easier to program games for? What did they think was going to happen?

[@ArneChristianRosenfeldt]

@@DarDarBinks1986It is difficult to create a clean interface. In the dawn of 3d no one at SEGA knew how to do it. Jaguar at least has a z-buffer. So they were thinking about a bullet proof solution. Saturn was uh, something 2d and mode-7. The Jaguar could have be saved with some slight tweaks. The Saturn is totally off. I once thought that maybe it could use VDP2 for deferred texture mapping. But then you need to squeeze all textures into 64k. Also the frame buffer would need 16bits for texel address, more for bilinear interpolation, 16 bits more for lighting, and still would not support translucency. Saturn is a dead end. With so much parts on the PCB, I would have tried a z buffer with extra pixels “in the border”. So if a pixel is translucent, it points to a linked list in the border. If a developer does wild fog effects, the buffer overflows. Only small clouds allowed.

[@m.jordan5181]

The 32X really did "kneecap" SEGA's further aspirations. That was just one of the major factors that compromised them from a hardware sales vantage point.

[@johneygd]

I hardly can take you any serious being sounding so enthusiast along with some generic parts in it, BUT in terms of sales figures, i wish you mentioned that the saturn even sold better then the sega dreamcast and that all despite sega did everyhing right with the dreamcast, the only biggest most frustrating hurdle with the dreamcast was that everybody wanted a console with builtin dvd player and not a console with builtin internet and that all despite the internet was a big thing to and overhyped back then, Thing is sega just didn’t had the luck like sony had whatever they did.

[@nathandaniels4823]

Question @InglebardGaming , why did the chip-based music on the Saturn typically sound worse than the PSX chip-based music? The sample quality and instrument sample rate usually seemed significantly more crusty than most PSX games. I say this as a Saturn fan.

[@InglebardGaming]

Personally, I don't think that it did. Can you give me some specific examples of the games you're talking about on each?

[@faustinuskaryadi6610]

Don't spread lie, music of Lunar 2 Eternal Blue Complete is better in Saturn version than Playstation version.

[@HellTantrumbull]

Haven't heard a Saturn game that used chip music sound worse than ps1.

[@nathandaniels4823]

@@InglebardGaming After listening to some examples, I misspoke. A lot of games sound similarly good on each system. The comparison that got me thinking about this was the Panzer Dragoon games and Final Fantasy VII. Panzer Dragoon II Zwei in particular has beautiful music, but the musical elements all seem to suffer from a low sampling rate. FFVII on the other hand, has a more PC MIDI sound, with really clean instrument sounds. The biggest difference to me though is that FFVII uses an in-chip stereo reverb effect, which adds a sense of depth and polish. I may be misremembering but I don’t think the Saturn sound chip had built-in DSP (as in reverb, echo, phaser, etc) effects.

[@nathandaniels4823]

@@faustinuskaryadi6610 try to communicate like a decent human being, please. Why would you assume I’m lying? I could just be incorrect.

[@epicon6]

Saturn and Dreamcast didn’t fail because how could these ”failed” consoles also be some of the best consoles of all time? Who cares about how well they sold if the games are incredibly great and the hardware works great and gave a unique look to the games. I would even say these two consoles were big wins because for those who had the sense to buy these consoles got an sweet exclusive experience

[@InglebardGaming]

There's nothing wrong with loving the games you love for any system. But when it comes to sales, the numbers don't lie, which is why the Saturn and DC are usually considered failures. I love a lot of games on both systems and wish things had happened differently, but what can ya do.

[@epicon6]

@@InglebardGaming Yeah. What i mean is failure to who? Are you a Sega excecutive with money in the company? Or a gamer who benefited and was blessed with a Saturn and a Dreamcast? Did you lose your house because the Dreamcast was cancelled? Or did gamers get to buy the system and games for even cheaper after the news? The only way the Saturn could have failed is if it was cancelled before launch.

[@ArneChristianRosenfeldt]

@@epicon6Saturn is a failure because despite a pcb with tons of chips, the PSX is as good or even better. And PSX memory cards don’t need a battery.

[@yeolemillinial8295]

actually dithering DID work on all CRTs, when you use composite, hell it still works on HD tvs if you use composite, it just looks really really bad everywhere else. good video but that statement is very wrong, using s-video or component or playing in emulation kills the dithering.

[@InglebardGaming]

You might want to edit that, as written it doesn't make sense (you said it does work with composite than later it doesn't). Also, I 100% stand by my statement. For older systems I only ever used composite and you can still see the dots, they don't "blend" unless maybe you have a terrible quality TV. In the old days I used c64 and Amiga monitors (composite mode and inputs on the Amiga monitor) primarily and dithering was super obvious on them. For later systems like the Saturn and Jaguar, I used them either with composite connections on composite monitors or with s-video connections on larger (32 inch) TVs. When comparing composite and s-video on the same TV, s-video is noticeably clearer but not magic. You could still easily see the individual dots in dithered images with a composite connection on a TV. If you jump down to an RF connection (and if you had any other choice, why would you?) then MAYBE you'd see what looks more like blending, but you're sacrificing so much quality at that point it makes zero sense to play games that way. It absolutely is not "just HD TVs" it looks bad on.

[@yeolemillinial8295]

@@InglebardGaming thanks, last one was component

[@desultadox5900]

There’s actually no official “how it works” for bit rating for consoles. Depending on how you look at it, Saturn could be considered anywhere from 16 to 64 bit

[@ArneChristianRosenfeldt]

Still would have been cool if Jaguar would fetch texels in 64 bit phrases and draw 4 columns in doom at once (4x16bpp). JRISC could fetch a phrase or two of instructions. Jerry could fetch a phrase of samples for the wavetable. No one would doubt the 64 anymore.

[@costumeninja1914]

32 to 64- not 16

[@ArneChristianRosenfeldt]

@@costumeninja1914 I think that there is a 16 bit 68EC00 on the PCB.

[@Greenchrysopsaro]

N64 only got 388 games

[@InglebardGaming]

I'm not much of an N64 fan (I have one and plenty of games for it) but I can't knock it for "only" having 388 games. Sure, it's not much compared to the PS1 or Saturn, but that's still a pretty good amount overall. There's no denying that some of them were outsized megahits, too, like the Zelda games.

[@Greenchrysopsaro]

Sorry Yes that's what I meant I don't know if people think the N64 is a failure I don't But it did not have a lot of games The Atari VCS 2600 had over 500 games That was a success but very close to other systems in terms of games Saturn was not by any means a failure Much as you said

[@user-vv3wq6ln4o]

Very cool video, but please leave the classic music aside, it is better even with just your voice.

[@Sinn0100]

You were doing good there for a while, but then you said, "Everyone hates the bit wars." I don't know a single person that says that, nor have I heard anyone say something anything like that before. The "bit wars" for all the ignorance it spread was a huge driving factor in innovation. As a very early adopter of all things gaming (starting with the 5th generation, I got my Playstation and Saturn on 9/9/95) I can say with perfect clarity...the Saturn was a failed console. Yes, it sold well in Japan but unfortunately, that alone has never really been enough to carry a console. As far saying it had over 1,000 games while "X failed system only had 65" isn't a proper metric or measurement for success. My Android phone has access to tens of thousands of games yet no one in their right mind would say it's better than a PS5/Series X. Sega had so many games because the had incredible 3rd party support (in Japan). Unfortunately, that was not enough and like the Jaguar, CDi, 3DO...it was killed off early. The Snes outlived the Sega Saturn my friend and that is not good. Fun Fact: Sega Saturn actually had 3 32-bit processors. You know about the two SH2's, but no one ever talks about its SH1 processor. ;)

[@InglebardGaming]

Well, "Everyone hates the bit wars" is talking about today how people's eyes usually roll up in their heads when you start talking about what system is 16-bit, which is 8-bit, which is 32 or 64 etc. the console 'wars' themselves absolutely drove the tech at the time. As for the SH1, I lumped it in as a coprocessor since it really only manages the cd-rom. Edit: oh, quick point about the number of games. With your example, whether you like the games or not, no one can really argue Android is a failure as a platform. The number of games isn't the only measurement, but it is an important one. In a case like the Jaguar where you have fewer than 400k systems sold AND only 63 games total, it's pretty hard to argue that it was a success. For something like the Saturn where it sold between 9 and 17 million AND had over 1,000 games... sure, it died early and sold less than Sega needed it to, but I think it's tough to make a good faith argument it was a total flop.

[@Sinn0100]

@@InglebardGaming No, the Jaguar was a MONUMENTAL failure (so bad I had to do it in all caps!). It was a failure unlike anything we had ever seen before at the time. I just used it as an example. As far Android being a failure...what?! It has outpaced everyone in the cellphone market. I just wouldn't call it a games machine just as I wouldn't say Dell, Compaq, or any other PC manufacturer from time immemorial were in the video game industry either. As far as people rolling their eyes when the bit wars are mentioned...I have never experienced that. Actually, I have always gotten the opposite reaction especially from kids who have never experienced it. How often do I talk to kids about gaming in the 1980's and 1990's you ask? Well...I'm actually a teacher and every year I run an ELA workshop dedicated to all things gaming in the golden era. I get their best work during that month and they get to experience (from an educational standpoint) the bit wars. We're talking pencils down, full attention, and tons of questions. Eyes rolling...not in my class. ;)

[@gc3k]

Just the other day I saw an old Japan Saturn TV ad that said it's a 64-bit console. It's still available on youtube

[@InglebardGaming]

@Sinn0100 hey, guess what? I'm a teacher, too! I teach high school IT 😁 Unfortunately, even when I bring games up in class, which I do every now and then since my field is IT and they fit, most of the kids I see don't care about the old systems at all, but at least most of them at least know of the NES, SNES, Genesis and most of what came after. If you mentioned bit wars to the kids I teach, they'd have no idea what you even meant. Bit old fogies like me, they're the ones that I'd say are the eye rollers, since so much of that stuff was contentious back in the day.

[@Sinn0100]

@@InglebardGaming Oh brother that is so cool! Well from one teacher to another, I love your channel. What grade do you teach, if you don't mind me asking? It might be the age...I don't know.

[@TheKraftwerk79]

👍

[@segat-800]

Heres another interesting fact that I just remembered due to reading a comment here. This guy basically saved Sega from going under. Read it here en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isao_Okawa