Ranking and Reviewing Genesis Games Published by Takara

[@johnhancockretro]

Check out my other ranking videos here: bit.ly/3nL5Yol

[@jesusramirez4537]

Thanks for your videos. King of monsters Giant super hero guy. Brings back that memory. gold

[@Gorgon.Reviews]

“You may have different opinions to me and that’s ok we can still be friends” classic John Hancock love his personality 👍

[@Gorgon.Reviews]

@TrueSinister My spelling is sometimes off sorry just corrected it.

[@Gorgon.Reviews]

@TrueSinister ha no worries I feel nothing beats the original format probs just me

[@seanthegamer1337]

Me too. Well said

[@DarKKnightt07]

Could you do a Data East games ranking video? that was great company in the 90's.

[@Rhadaman1]

Nicest, most friendly, warm and genuine Gaming personality on KZbin. Never change and keep up the great work!

[@Delekhan]

Oh my, I totally forgot about "King of the Monsters"! I played it at our local Godfather's Pizza! Dude, thanks for the memory!

Thanks for making these videos, John! I found you through Metal Jesus and your content is REALLY good. Your comments are always gentle and thoughtful. Congrats on hitting 100k subs! Here's to the next 100k, my dude!

[@edvmth]

Samurai Spirits is the best fighter game for generation ,in my country the mega drive is marketed today, the best console of all time. I have 3 Japanese Mega Drive, 1 Brazilian and 1 Genesis(USA) and 1 Mega Drive 2017 official Sega. Sega has always respected Brazilians a lot. Thanks for the vídeo

[@WickedGamerCollector]

Congratz on the 100k subs ! 🙌😁

[@MCastleberry1980]

The original Fatal Fury kind of hits different when viewed through the lens of it being created by one of original Street Fighter creators and was a spiritual successor to it , so you kind of see the creative vision of fighting games split during that time period with SFII and Fatal Fury/Art of Fighting/KoF

[@atranfanatic]

Congrats on 100k subs John!

[@jedirun]

congrats on 100K :) and great job on keeping your content focused on video games :)

[@anvin33]

Congratulations to 100k subscribers dude!🤟🏻

[@Evercade_Effect]

Thanks for sharing your story on how you saved up for genesis.

[@johnhancockretro]

Samurai Showdown on Genesis is missing Earthquake. Oops.

[@dad7275]

Yea I was going to let you know here but you beat me to it. 😁 But it still is a fun game. Have you ever noticed the sprite comparison between this version and the snes version? Wow. Enjoyed this video. 😁

[@jasonmenefield7974]

@@dad7275 Hey didn't Takara publish Art of Fighting for the genesis. I think John forgot a game.

[@liambyrne3488]

@@jasonmenefield7974 I thought that too.

[@jessragan6714]

@@jasonmenefield7974 Nope, published by Sega, just like World Heroes was. But while Art of Fighting was a decent port of the arcade original with the compromises expected from a Genesis game, World Heroes was... well... imagine walking out into a cattle field and getting your foot stuck in a freshly dropped turd the size of a dinner plate.

[@knightimusprime25]

he also forgot fatal fury special

[@robmason5799]

John I’ve been loving your weekly videos on the genesis rankings. You and Riggs are awesome at doing these videos I know you did some of the snk games with this video but maybe a Neo Geo/snk. Ports on the genesis would be a good choice to see how they compare. I feel like the genesis for what it could do did pretty good bringing the snk library over to the genesis

[@enriquepinero707]

The immortal! I am really digging these ranking vides and stories about your experiences with when you first got them.

[@fazares]

Fantastic video as usual ^^ samurai shodown didnt have all the characters though..it lacked the damn EARTHQUAKE but AMAKUSA was selectable in VS. Mode ^^

[@Dangitjibe]

Congrats on 100k Subs, John!!! 👏👏👏

[@DarksladeDiaries]

Round Table!!! Greatest Pizza in the universe. Ours was in the Woodside Plaza in Redwood City, CA. Ahhhhh... you brought back some great memories.

[@danestegman155]

Good video! Nice presentation of these Takara Games for the Sega Genesis! I have never seen the game Joe and Mac for the Sega Genesis! I will have to look this one up!

[@jesusramirez4537]

nice show. I would trade my soul to go back in time. Genesis Forever

[@aaronchapman6994]

Another great choice for a ranking video keep it up dude

[@williamshenanigans9977]

Congrats on the 100K

[@DarKKnightt07]

Could you do Data East? Would be cool to see do these rank and review videos for Playstation 1&2 and Gamecube

[@lucabalossino]

Congrats on your 100k subscriber! You deserve it! Btw I love the genesis (2nd best system for me) 1st is the Dreamcast.

[@johnhancockretro]

Love them both!

[@Nathan.007]

Remember seeing Samurai Shodown on an arcade machine and thinking this is a step forward, a progression, was flabbergasted at how good it looked and played. Characters with weapons? What is this tomfoolery? Always remember looking at the neo geo as a kid, knowing that it was so expensive that I couldn't afford it even in my dreams, which is a sad realisation as a kid to have haha. The games looked so slick -polished. Just something about the graphics/animations. Superb 🤌

[@yakkowarner1990]

I would love to see the Sega published games themselves, black box era ones from 1989-1991, if it doesn't become too big a list. Those are a great era of Sega games. Great work, love the ranking vids!

[@ShinobiWan1]

I like being able to choose any of the characters in King of the Monsters 2. Also, the special moves are easier to pull off! (not the timing method) But for sure, very different from the Arcade. And it's missing the final boss :(

[@jeff97ish]

Very cool video!

[@DaTravBoo]

Fatal Fury 2 was one of my favorite fighting games of the time.

[@Sinn0100]

I'm going to have to disagree with you on Fatal Fury. Remember, this came during a time when the Genesis did not have Street Fighter and Sega fans were salivating for anything like it. Fatal Fury for the Genesis flies surprisingly close to the AES version where it counts. The sprite work is nice albiet a bit small, everything is highly detailed (for the time), had two plains to fight on, voice work was clean, the backgrounds were fantastic, and dare I say the Genesis port is faster than the MVS/AES original. It cannot be easy to squeeze a 150 meg cart into an 8 meg one. I would give Fatal Fury for the Genesis a solid B+. Fatal Fury 2 was by far a better game. Other than that my friend, spot on.

[@usagijojo]

I loved Fatal Fury on Genesis and I didn't even realize there were missing story mode characters until later. Great memories of playing it for hours.

[@Laynel8]

@@usagijojo Being able to go head-to-head with the other two selectable characters for whoever you did choose in the single player mode sure as hell made up for the absence of the two other boss characters that were in the arcade/SNES versions of the game. Oh and being able to select the boss characters for both Players 1 and 2 as well as the CPU players in the multiplayer modes was pretty dope as hell.

[@THENAMEISQUICKMAN]

Worth noting that on the SNES, you couldn't play as anyone other than Terry, Joe or Andy. In general, while Neo Geo games were always going to suffer on 16 bit consoles, the Mega Drive got them a lot better than Super Nintendo.

[@Sinn0100]

@@THENAMEISQUICKMAN It was the same on the Sega Genesis. You only had Terry Bogard, Andy Bogard, and Joe Higashi. However, you are very correct in saying the Genesis got the best SNK conversions and there's a pretty big reason for that my friend. You see, the Sega Genesis shares quite a bit in common with the AES/MVS and the Snes is so different it might as well be alien in nature. Sega's 16-bit machine and the Neo Geo both share the Motorola 68K with a Zilog Z-80 co-processor setup so many arcade cabs of the time had. Of course the Neo Geo had quite a bit more going for it than the Genesis did and this includes much faster processors. Still...very cool.

[@Patmanx1]

I've never seen joe & mac on genesis before. What you showed looked hilarious. The animations gave me a good laugh lol. Never put 2 and 2 together with takara. I played all of these (except j&c) as a kid at some point and only thought they did the gameboy SNK games. the more you know...

[@jamesmincks7526]

I remember seeing a Neo Geo AES at Funkoland back in the day. It was $600 with one game. The games were huge carts that cost $200-250 each. I ended up getting a Genesis and Fatal Fury. Along with the Altered Beast pack in I had a great time for a fraction of the cost of a Neo Geo.

[@cdjxman]

Congrats on 100k subs John! 200k next conquest!😎👍

[@cdjxman]

@@markula_4040 😃

[@chadmolitor6691]

Also, I bought Samarui Shodown on SNES and loved the hell out of it. Solid game and one of my favorite fighting games of all time.

[@danielsantana540]

I got king of the monsters on GENESIS Snes the Snes port released October 1992 while GENESIS came out March 1993. Id rate console ports of King of the monsters a C.it s limited in comparison to arcade but it s fun to break out every once in a while

[@animemaster4861]

Awesome ranking video the only thing that I might be able to disagree on I probably would have given Samurai shodown an s but that's just that one of my all time favorite genesis games. And idea for another ranking video maybe some kind of a ranking video about the RPGs of Sega Genesis or maybe even RPGs of the NES

[@pixelperfectpaddy]

Great video! I still love playing the Fatal Fury games on the genesis. Concerning this ranking I would give Fatal Fury ab B und Part 2 an A. Great graphics, music and gameplay for it's time. Takara mainly did a great job porting these NeoGeo/Arcade games to the genesis. Sadly they werent responsible for the port of Art of Fighting. The Fatal Fury 1 sound is still music to my ears :)

[@stephen44gxp]

AWESOME! gotta say....Fatal Fury 2 should be at the top lol I love that game

[@johnliller3032]

When I went to northern California about 35 years ago I went to a Round Table pizza with my cousins. That was the first time I ever had Hawaiian Pizza (ham/pineapple). Didn't even know that was a thing because pineapple wasn't available as a topping out east where I live.

[@kjhoskins]

Great video, John. Thanks.

[@malcolmar]

Great list. I would love to see what you think about the Takara games on the Sega CD.

[@johnhancockretro]

But I still have 30 companies to do on the Genesis haha.

[@malcolmar]

@@johnhancockretro Definitely would not mind mixing it up like having a Sega Genesis compilation and a follow-up Sega CD and/or 32X video.

[@gamingwithmama4059]

Love your videos. Joe and Mac on sega is awesome. Bought my copy at funcoland along while ago.

[@redstratus97]

How about the makers of Shining Force or Fantasy Star?

[@themystx2]

lol, i’d love to see you do LJN reviews. would be a riot

[@axelfoley20]

I think he already did Arena. Not sure about Flying Edge but essentially Arena and Flying Edge are subsidiaries of Acclaim and so was LJN. The LJN brand was not featured on the Genesis to my knowledge.

[@johnhancockretro]

Did both Arena and Flying Edge.

[@Soynereh]

Samurai Shodown might be my fav Genesis fighter.

[@nbttl1975]

Love your vids!!! Absolutely love Sega. I just reviewed Panzer Dragoon Remake and Orta. Will you ever do master system?

[@nathanieldeclarador1466]

John Hancock the lawnmower! Respect.

[@rodrigomolinsky]

Love these videos. Love the Mega Drive.

[@SirStoneyOfBow]

Samurai Showdown on the Neo Geo is one of my favorite fighting games of all time. The Megadrive version I recall wasn’t a bad port overall compared to the Super NES version.

[@homejonny9326]

Wow, I didn't know there is joe and mac for the sega genesis! Nice!!

[@Godzilla1982]

Somebody probably pointed this out already but here goes - you said that Samurai Shodown on Genesis has all characters- I'm fairly sure it is missing Earthquake. Anyway, love the videos.

[@thepowerofmetal362]

Good content John, gotta pay some respect to an OG in the gaming community 💚

[@ezekieloruven]

Much respect to John and to POWERWOLF!

[@kornsin]

I was such an SNK fan during my arcade days that being able to play Samurai Shodown at home was a gigantic moment. I put so many hours into SamSho. The entire presentation fascinated me. The gameplay, graphics, setting... and with that especially the music. I have the vinyl OST framed and hanging on the wall in my collection room.

[@TheLadsBandLive]

Treasure has a short-but-sweet Genesis library (plus one Mega Drive import).

[@thaR3N]

Fatal Fury 2 shouldve been S tier. The next best fighter after Street Fighter and MK. I daresay one of the best and underrated OSTs throughout the whole consoles library

[@seanflanagan3118]

You swapped your dad's lawnmower for a Genisis .nice work !

[@mattb9664]

Spent lots of time playing Genesis Samurai Showdown, and it does capture most of the actual Neo Geo game. That was another expensive cartridge game-$65-$69 if I remember right. Good times.

[@mileskirsch7675]

great stuff...namco or namcot would be good

[@rorytaylor626]

6:16 Inspiration for Gaping Dragon from Dark Souls?

[@panaceaartist]

thought takara might've made atomic robo kid. loved that game

[@johnhancockretro]

No that was Treco

[@panaceaartist]

@@johnhancockretro oh man- just googled them. they did 7 genesis games. would love to see a vid on them. would donate but its like i dont even own a car. anyway loving these vids

[@linuxlover_8436]

now that seems like a rare game to find in the wild...I remember magazine advertisements for it way back in the day and that it was very expensive iirc

[@screwthatwedding]

Hi John do you plan to rank Vic Tokai games for the Genesis?

[@johnhancockretro]

Eventually

[@screwthatwedding]

@@johnhancockretro cool was hoping to get your thoughts on King Salmon The Big Catch

[@alejandromenendez8039]

My first fighter game in mega drive was fatal fury. Great time with him. Im from argentina. Great moment in these time was launch street fighter 2 for mega drive. Until fatal fury was great for my.

[@jeffm5056]

I LOVED Fatal Fury! It was one of the first great fighting games on the Genesis. It’s at least a B or A-. Lol. But that’s just my opinion.

[@predaking2wings]

i agree as well!

[@VincentsVideoVisions]

At the time but not today

[@andrewt6338]

I don't remember John, have you done Treasure yet? Probably. And thanks for explaining KOF and FF. I never quite knew how they connected.

[@johnhancockretro]

You are most welcome.

[@j.goggels9115]

Did you do Data East ?

[@johnhancockretro]

Not yet

[@reddogg3118]

How about non sports electronic arts games. Starflight needs to be at the top of the list.

[@davidtran9444]

To me fatal fury 2 is an s rank title. Its the only version of ff2 (including the original neo geo) that has a functioning combo system. Some characters even have infinite combos. In the options menu you can toggle turbo on or off for speedier gameplay. To top it off you can select the 4 bosses by going to the bottom corner of the character select and press down and start.

[@misterjersey5460]

Is Takara the company that made those ChoroQ games?

[@maxxdahl6062]

Fatal Fury special on sega cd was pretty darn good.

[@johnhancockretro]

Yes it was. Even the Game Gear version was good.

[@maxxdahl6062]

@@johnhancockretro Game gear did fighters surprisingly pretty well compared to other 8 bit systems.

[@caseyhayes4590]

@@maxxdahl6062 totally agree, the big color palette at that small screen resolution played some amazing tricks. People can't get the same impact now from an emulator. If you played those games in the day on the actual hardware they really got the job done for a handheld in the 16-bit home console era.

[@maxxdahl6062]

@@caseyhayes4590 Yeah, even the Mortal Kombat games were surprisingly decent on Game Gear/Master system.

[@paulj5336]

Who did the megadrive port of Art of Fighting? I remember hating that version compared to the Super Nintendo, which Takara pretty much nailed.

[@johnhancockretro]

Snk developed with Sega publishing.

[@Islandswamp]

I never once saw a neo geo in a store or one of my friends house

[@yfz350twin]

I remember playing Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat back in the day and not many 2D fighters compared. Eternal Champions and Fatal Furry 2 came very close to the big 2.

[@linuxlover_8436]

I thought Eternal Champions had the best graphics and sound but they really needed to better balance the game before release...The cpu would constantly steal inner strength gauge and prevent you from doing or finishing certain moves esp. if you would use Shadow.

[@redrum1116]

one thing i didn't like about the genesis version of fatal fury was that it was missing 2 characters Hwa Jai and Billy Kane also the genesis version of Samurai Shodown was missing Earthquake

[@studiokadaver]

I was the Genesis kid all the way till PlayStation 1. My childhood journey was C64 -> Intellivision -> NES -> GENESIS -> PS1 ....

[@zybon777]

Hey John, nice beard

[@778899mike]

Sega Genesis is the greatest console ever made!

[@SocialAutism]

Solid rankings. One criticism: Takara is still around in the form of Takara Tomy. So, they're still a toy company, not were.

[@SocialAutism]

Sorry, Transformer fan here. I had to say something

[@danielporchas2703]

Good video, but apparently Takara's best game in Genesis was Samurai shodown but the roster of fighters was not complete as he needed Earthquake. And in the Supernintendo version if the full roster comes. Greetings!!

[@jessragan6714]

Sure, if you like Samurai Shrinkydinks. Those characters are so tiny even Earthquake looks kind of puny next to his Neo-Geo counterpart.

[@kenshirootomo6993]

where is the link to do my own list?? O_O

[@johnhancockretro]

Its in the description bit.ly/3r2LfgE

[@danielsantana540]

John Hancock i agree. Samurai showdown is the best GENESIS fighter on this list

[@heavysystemsinc.]

Didn't Takara also publish Art of Fighting for Genesis?

[@johnhancockretro]

Nope Sega published that.

[@vectorman1890]

Is there an NFL game for the n64 you recommend?

[@moarab936]

whtat rating do you give Alterd beast?

[@johnhancockretro]

Owning the game back in the day for Genesis, Altered Beast succeeded with demonstrating what the Genesis was capable of. As a pack-in game it was good but as a stand alone game it falls a bit short. If I was to review it now, I would give it a C or C+.

[@moarab936]

@@johnhancockretro I agree, Alterd beast as Pack-in game plays a roll on the nostalgia factor but gameplaywise it was mediocre. But the soundtrack was fantastic.

[@pferreira1983]

Oh my gosh the PAL version of Fatal Fury 2 goes for huge money! 😆

[@retronemesis7064]

You and Riggs are doing very similar videos right now except he's doing NES and you're doing the Jenny.

[@forrestwright7378]

Good video. I personally thought all of the Neo Geo fighting games were second rate (except for the King of Fighters series, those were really fun). They all felt average and just carbon copies of better fighters. But hey, to each their own. Keep up the good work.

[@Sinn0100]

Wait a minute my friend, Samurai Shodown on the Genesis does not have every character. If it's any consolation the Sega CD is also missing the same character. That character was Earthquake. I have heard the reason for this is both games are cropped making the characters look bigger. Speaking of either version...it's a bit irritating that Takara did not implement zoom on either game and they definitely could have. The Genesis would need a software scaler and the Sega CD has one built in.

[@notaflightreactsfan3706]

Love these ranking vids,also check out John Riggs channel if u enjoy these also! Keep up the great work mr hancock!

[@usagijojo]

My rank S: Fatal Fury 2, Samurai Showdown A: Fatal Fury, Joe & Mac B: King of the Monsters 2 C: King of the Monsters

[@claytonweaver7335]

I'd flip King of the Monsters 1 and 2 but other than that Id say thats exactly how I felt about all of those games. Samurai Shodown was probably my most played fighting game on the Genesis and probably the best one not related to Street Fighter 2.

[@jasonlee8842]

What I realized, is that I can no longer be John's friend.

[@jeremygregorio7472]

Fatal Fury 2 had a completely different combo system than the arcade, a lot of people prefer it

[@johnhancockretro]

Thank you for pointing that out. I find that most people have overlooked this decent fighter on the Genesis.

[@jessragan6714]

It feels more like Fatal Fury Special, perhaps because developer Gaibrain knew it wasn't going to be released on the Genesis and decided to bring some of its features to the game. There are dip switch settings hidden in Fatal Fury 2 as well, which let you customize the gameplay to some extent.

[@villain5873]

Samurai Showdown all 12 characters aren't present no Earthquake.

[@Plissken1773]

true , but much better than the snes port

[@villain5873]

@@Plissken1773 agreed

[@chadmolitor6691]

Man I loved the arcade version of king of the monsters, but BOY was I heartbroken when I got that game the week it released. I played the crap out of it but it sucked so bad lol.

[@balboa0621]

I don't think Samurai Shodown has Earthquake so, no, they don't have all of the characters. And KotM2 in the arcade was changed from the first. The port is accurate in that regard, even if the game is worse off for it.

[@MarkoTulio]

Takara ... Beautiful graphics and music but those little details like laggy inputs, mutilated games kept them at just one step of being perfect ports. I personally loved all of their games. It seems like some projects were developed in a rush, and in consequence not giving enough time to polish some aspects. Its a shame because its (or was?) a good company.

[@jessragan6714]

What? Takara's still around, although it merged with Tomy. I don't think they make video games anymore either.

[@magdcs]

Rev it up for the immortal John. May he stream shiny and chrome eternal.

[@rorytaylor626]

There were a lot of crappy fighters released in the 16-bit era. I'm going through the SNES games on Switch and I played through Tuff E Nuff. Jaleco had a lot of damn nerve to release that a full year after Street Fighter II.

[@moot6794]

Are you from Philly?

[@johnhancockretro]

No, saw Eagles on TV and fell in love.