Sega Rally on Sega Saturn - Retro Review

One of the best ever arcade racers of the 32bit era..?
Let's take a closer look, as I both review, discuss my own experiences with and discuss just what an important game Sega Rally on the Sega Saturn was.
Easy left.. maybe..
#SegaRally #SegaSaturn #ArcadeRacer

[@MrThunderwing]

*My Retro Reviews Playlist:* kzbin.info/aero/PLAevDYyhvzHq8B3mB2UIxt5ktaGoqdQnO

[@isamuu99]

An absolute KILLER review mate!! Watched this review on my lunch break at work, and it was arguably the best lunch break I've had in quite awhile! Keep up the great work! Makes me want to go out and play some Sega rally ASAP!

[@MrThunderwing]

Cheers bud!

[@iMichael123S]

Final some SEGA love!

[@trevor_mounts_music]

I play the Sega Rally games as much as Dirt or WRC full stop - just fantastic gameplay, music, and overall aesthetic. Loved it when I was a kid, love it as an adult.

[@georgesb3388]

The Sega Saturn was always very mysterious and interesting to me. I had a Playstation growing up and so did all of my friends so the only time I ever heard about the Saturn was through advertisements or magazine articles. Being able to explore these games now feels like finally resolving the mystery that I had always wondered about all those years ago.

[@MrThunderwing]

I was the only one out of my friend group at the time that had a Saturn, everyone else I knew had PS1s. I did eventually jump ship over to Sony in the 32 bit era and I ended up loving my PS1 just as much as my Saturn.

[@crimsonshadow1140]

I love the Saturn Port of Sega Rally, I will always prefer the original arcade release soully because of Nostalgia but the Saturn port is still superb and is one I play regularly to this day 😁

[@wayevs]

My most played game on the Saturn by a mile . The time trial racing against your ghost was amazing I just wouldn't put it down until I bested my time every time brilliant by the Devs. I swear I couldnt be beaten on the first stage I had it down to perfection in the end

[@OverJumpRally]

Great video, mate! I'm glad you learned to appreciate Sega Rally!

[@MrThunderwing]

Me too!

[@Natsu25100]

Sega totally loves motorsports from stock cars (Daytona USA), European touring cars (Scud Race and Le Mans 24) into rally car racing (Sega Rally)!

[@jiiiiiib]

don't forget DTM with Sega Touring Cars Championships!

[@pokepat4433]

Dang, sega really did all types of motorsports back in the day rally (sega rally) nascar (Daytona usa) class 1 touring car (sega touring car) GT1 (scud race) and Lemans prototypes (le mans 24)

[@ACatCalledSnow]

I'd love to see a retro review of F355 Challenge on the Dreamcast. I loved that game, despite it being super tough. Or Virtua Racing, even though the Saturn port was very subpar. I also didn't like Sega Rally to begin with until my dad randomly decided to purchase the PC subpar port of Sega Rally when it was released and I got to play it properly. I enjoyed it and I decided to go to the source and so I purchased a Saturn with Sega Rally - good times. The Saturn version was far better than the PC port! It's a great game once you get into it. Keep up the great work!

[@MrThunderwing]

Thanks! I've actually already done a Virtua Racing Retro Review (albeit the PS2 port) kzbin.info/www/bejne/rpSpZmykiNJ9p5Y I've never been a fan of Ferrari F355 TBH, that kind of sim style racer isn't something I enjoy, I'm all about the arcade racers.

[@ACatCalledSnow]

@@MrThunderwing I just watched it and I really enjoyed it. Thank you. If only Sega would remaster the classics like Sega Rally and Daytona (M2 can do it). Or maybe the holy grail, Scud Race, another arcade classic you did a great video on. Thank you!

[@GeordiLaForgery]

I remember in this era being wowed by fmv in games and not appreciating sega. Thus began my life journey of mistake after mistake..

[@crimsonshadow1140]

the GtFour just isn’t the same without it’s castrol rally livery, it’s what makes it so iconic to me

[@victerzian7877]

Very good job on the production values buddy. I appreciate the video and your knowledge. I also am an old school Sega fanatic that grew up playing their games in the '80s and '90s. Sega arcade games are some of the best memories I've had growing up thanks again

[@MrThunderwing]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@athermahmood1065]

Brilliant review mate and a proper trip down memory lane. I also waited for the Saturn and picked up a second hand one in 1998 then had it modded in central London to play all regions and 60hz. Classic uni stories of gaming and partying 😝. Coming back to the game, who hasn't poured hours and hours into this as you said just to a slice a slither off your previous time? And the sense of achievement you get from finally completing the game and watching your replays is second to none. The soundtrack is one of the best for driving games and I play those tunes when I'm actually driving so watch out for me on the roads! As you can tell I love this game but as usual Sega flopped when they had the winning formula in their hands. Respects to the team for what they managed to do and create something that has withstood the test of time and long may it continue. Thanks again for doing this one bro 👏🏽👏🏽

[@MrThunderwing]

Glad you liked it mate. I wish I'd got my Saturn modded back then. I can remember seeing all those awesome JPN exclusive games in the pages of the Official Saturn Magazine (like X-Men Vs Streetfighter and Radiant Silvergun) and just being so incredulous that Sega wouldn't bring them out here. It wasn't until years and years later I got an Action Replay 4-in-1 cart so I could get Chase HQ for my Saturn.

[@athermahmood1065]

@@MrThunderwing Better late than never I say. I was a Street Fighter fan since the SNES so had get a hold of those Jap games that were Arcade perfect. The gun games were really good too, loved Virtua Cop 2 player with my brother. It really was a great console sadly let down by SEGA as usual in the end, as with the Dreamcast. Oh well at least we still have this, hopefully one day someone will do something amazing with this game and bring it up to current visuals like the NFS Underground games. Not sure if you've ever been into them or will be reviewing those 2 iconic games? 😉

[@CaseTheCorvetteMan]

It's funny looking back and seeing that Daytona was dead set king in the arcade racers, but Sega Rally was king of the Saturn racers. This is a very good video and quite thorough. The Ridge Racer thing for PS1 was flawed from the get go, because it was less than half the resolution of the original arcade version, even though it was a common thing at the time that was said the game was "arcade perfect", when it wasn't even close and neither was Ridge Racer Revolution but at least it had link play. Daytona on the PAL regions was indeed optimised, just not the resolution. The speed is basically identical to the NTSC versions, and you can see this when you run the PAL version at 60Hz, it is WAY too fast. The resolution was the exact same, but was displayed in the 625 lines of the 50Hz display, instead of the 525 lines of the 60Hz display. I don't know how many visible lines Daytona did use, but even the 60Hz regions had borders. Sega Rally used all 480 visible lines on the 60Hz versions, and the 50Hz optimised uses more lines, but not the full 576 visible lines that 50Hz could display, and i don't think any PAL region releases did actually use the full 576 lines.

[@SEGARALLYCHAMPIONSHIP]

Really enjoyed this, Thanks!

[@Cafeman_2D]

Great video! I'm a big fan of SR, and its music.

[@ClassicSonicSatAm]

My Favorite Sega Saturn game, great review!

[@nattila7713]

just watched and quite enjoyed. but we need more... like a "25 years of" video of the serie which deserves your calm voice a nice presentation! ;)

[@LJay54]

Nice little review of my all time favourite racing game though I think the Delta is iconic car because it’s 6 times world rally champion, the most successful ever built. I do wish the Saturn had been more successful as it’s waaay more powerful than most think it is, it would’ve been nice to see it being pushed like GT does with the PS. All it need needed was more time.

[@EnzoTestarossa740]

Awesome Video :). This is one of the best arcade ports on the Saturn. I still enjoy this on my console

[@MrThunderwing]

It really is!

[@viperx220racing3]

It’s worth picking up a arcade racer as they are so cheap these days if you’ve still got your Saturn. It takes Saturn Sega Rally to another level 🤔

[@MrThunderwing]

TBH, I really haven't got the room for another wheel. I tend to play the actual Model 2 version with my DFGT wheel though.

[@nattila7713]

@@MrThunderwing one?? the original sega wheel has no pedals... you need one with those so that makes the saturn a two wheels console :)

[@Natsu25100]

Super GT 24, a game made by Jaleco, the studio behind City Connection and Field Combat, has the same graphics as Sega Rally because it also runs on Sega AM2 Model 2 hardware and it was ported on Sega Saturn too.

[@MrThunderwing]

Yeah, I've played it once or twice on Model 2 Emulator.

[@Natsu25100]

This game also brought inspiration for its competitor, Sony, to create Gran Turismo, combining all of the racing events from rally car racing and indoor touring circuit.

[@sitrep123able]

more of this type of vids, pleaseeeee

[@acecarrera1]

I wasn't disappointed of Daytona USA when it came out, it looked great and played great, even I had seen Ridge Racer before.One thing I noticed about Sega Rally was its handling physics, it was years ahead before we saw anything like that again in Gran Turismo.

[@MrThunderwing]

Hrrrm, not sure how comparable Sega Rally's physics are to Gran Turismo, what with SR being an arcade racer and GT being a Sim.

[@VideoWare-ox9qv]

To be fair Daytona USA has wider scenarios and much more cars on screen than Ridge Racer. I mean apart from the Saturn's more complex architecture... It was a much harder task.

[@houseoftheted637]

Class video 😎👍

[@alex.starostin]

I absolutely loved and adored Sega arcade cabinets back in the 90's. But these games just never clicked with me when playing them at home on console with a controller, it's a totally different exp for the worse. That's what ultimately led Sega to its demise as a hardware developer. As the arcades eventually died because of games being available to play at home for "free". But Sega still relied heavily on its arcade games for the Saturn and Dreamcast thinking that 15 min experiences with no extras would be enough for people. Well, they were very wrong.

[@MrThunderwing]

See, I absolutely loved those arcade ports, I'm still aggrieved that we didn't get ports of Scud Race and Daytona 2 on the Dreamcast. I agree that if you just had the absolute bare bones of an arcade conversion, then content-wise you weren't left with much. But Sega back then would often add a lot of extra content in. I'm thinking Daytona USA on the Dreamcast with all it's extra cars, courses and GP mode and Outrun 2 on Xbox with all the added mission modes.

[@MrThunderwing]

I actually not that long ago made a video all about this very topic: kzbin.info/www/bejne/nZO3d2medtaHmac

[@alex.starostin]

@@MrThunderwing I'll look into it, thx. On the other hand, we all know what game came out for Sony PlayStation in 1998 and basically destroyed all the arcade competition back in the day. I remember those days while I was a teen and all my friends only started to care about Sim racers and couldn't give a shit about some short fun arcade games. And well two decades later not much has changed. And I love both old arcade racers and Gran Turismo, Forza games

[@MrThunderwing]

@@alex.starostin Yeah, bloody Gran Turismo, killing off all the arcade racers. I tried so many times in the past to get into dim racers, but they're just so boring...

[@alex.starostin]

@@MrThunderwing well I think the undisputed king in the arcade racers nowadays is Forza Horizon series, it's really fun

[@trzy]

Sega Rally is a technical masterpiece. The Saturn really was an overpriced underpowered turkey relative to the Playstation, which was a brilliantly designed and gutsy bet on the future of gaming. Getting Sega Rally to the state it was released in was no small feat and I wish we had interviews with the development team covering the specifics of what they did to make it all work. I personally would love to see the source code. It's a fantastic game. Graphically, to be honest, any number of PS titles look significantly better, and Sega Rally is probably near the very best the Saturn could muster in 3D. Gameplay-wise, it's masterful. I'd love to figure out how the digital d-pad -> analog steering conversion works under the hood.

[@MrThunderwing]

Yeah, it's amazing how many levels this game excels at. It's both an incredibly polished and visually impressive game, that also just happens to have one of the best interpretations of proper arcade controls just using a digital d-pad. Amazing stuff.

[@heilong79]

You are right, I saw Daytona and Tekken running side by side in an import shop and chose the PS1 because of the disappointment, in Magazines it looked fine. 2 years later I got a Saturn and it was brilliant. Price of the systems was the big difference, most people did not care about the Mega CD/32x as it was just seen as an add on and not full systems despite what retrospective game journos try to say.

[@Natsu25100]

I hope you'll do other retro reviews of other arcade games such Pac-Man, Jaleco arcade games, etc.

[@MrThunderwing]

I won't ever be doing a retro review of Pac-Man I'm afraid, it's not a game I've got any kind of nostalgic connection with. Likewise, I can't think of any Jaleco games I'm that bothered about. Probably next on my list would be a certain PS1 game, but I'll keep that one to myself for the moment...

[@crimsonshadow1140]

The Saturn port of Sega Rally also has one of the most catchiest options themes ever made, it’s downright impossible not to hum along and in my case dance along to it 🤣

[@MrThunderwing]

Too right it's catchy! I use it in this very video.

[@RGF]

😀 loved it...

[@ardhan7351]

I see that you already do gameplays like these Sega rally 1 and 3. But you also forgot to mention the Sega Rally 2 lol

[@MrThunderwing]

I didn't 'forget' to mention Sega Rally 2, this is a look back specifically at the Saturn port - not the whole series. I only showed a bit of Sega Rally 3 footage at the end, when I very briefly mention the fact the game had sequels, as it's generally less well know than Sega Rally 2.

[@ardhan7351]

@@MrThunderwing Ah ok then. Good to know I guees.

[@MrThunderwing]

Yeah, dude, I'm a huge Sega Rally 2 fan, there's no way I'd forget to accidentally feature it.

[@ardhan7351]

@@MrThunderwing That game is legendary, even the second game like has 6 (idk) new cars plus 2 secret cars from the first game too.. No wonder, it also come consoles as well for Sega rally 2.

[@afropowa1598]

I never beat this game on the saturn version even though I follow the tips & tricks guide. I never beat this game on the PS2 even tho I change it to easy & set the timer to the longest. Even with all of that, I still love playing this game. I love Sega racing games cuz they really care making great music (most of the time) which add greatly to the replayability!

[@MrThunderwing]

Yeah, the Saturn version had some really awesome music, not just on the tracks but also in stuff like all the in-game menus and the replays. It's definitely tough. I managed to beat it back in the day, but that was after putting a lot of hours into it.

[@athermahmood1065]

Agree with Mr.T a lot of hours. Funnily enough I fired this up a couple of months ago to see if I still had it and I beat it after a few frustrating sessions. Place 9th for Dessert, place 3rd for Forest to stand a chance of getting 1st on the the final race. Lakeside is a tough bastard but if you can get around the manual and braking it can be done. Let us know how you get on 👍🏼

[@whatamalike]

That was quite delightful. It's a shame it's never been re-released in any form for modern systems....M2, do your thing please 🙏

[@ClassicSonicSatAm]

M2 did handle the PS2 port, so all they gotta do is get the licence for the cars and release it for modern systems.

[@OverJumpRally]

Or maybe as a bonus for a full reboot...

[@whatamalike]

@@OverJumpRally yeah deffo BTW love the work your doing :)

[@OverJumpRally]

@@whatamalike Thanks! I've been working on the gameplay lately, quite challenging but it should feel great!

[@jakescartoons6045]

So here are my thoughts on the Daytona USA Saturn port. For starters, I wasn't alive yet in 1995, so I obviously didn't get to experience the launch of the Sega Saturn. However, I will say that looking at the visuals of the game and comparing it to consoles that came before it, like the SNES, Sega Mega Drive (or Genesis for those of us who call the bonnet of a car the hood), Atari Jaguar, and Sega 32X, I'd say that the graphics show a significant improvement over those older systems. And yes, I understand that Ridge Racer on the PS1 looks and runs far better, but given the fact that I'm already a hardcore Sega mega fan, if I was alive back in those days, I would have bought the Saturn in a heartbeat. Of course, this is just a personal opinion of mine as a Sega fan, so it definitely doesn't apply to everyone. As for Sega Rally, I definitely agree that it looks far better than Daytona USA on the Saturn. Daytona USA may be my favorite game of all time, but I'd consider Sega Rally to be a very close second. In fact, the controls are so good that I'm actually going to try and replicate it in a game I'm making myself. The only real difference is that if you prefer manual transmission, the cars would be set to 2-speed instead of 4-speed, partly because I also want to pay homage to Outrun, but mostly because I believe it would be easier to code. Wish me luck.

[@MrThunderwing]

Good luck!

[@OverJumpRally]

What are you coding on? Adding 4-speed instead of 2 won't make much of a difference, to be honest, but people that likes MT might not be that happy. The car also won't behave that realistically, especially when there are a lot of turns and you constantly slow down. 2-Speed worked on Out Run but that's a very stylized driving game.

[@jakescartoons6045]

@@OverJumpRally I'm using the Unity Engine and coding with C#. Keep in mind, while I'm very familiar with the fundamentals of game design, I'm also still getting used to writing code. I'm getting better at it, but I figured that for my first racing game with manual transmission as an option, 2-speed would probably be much easier for me to wrap my head around as a programmer. Besides, I want to make an arcade version of the game, and I'm hoping that limiting it to two gears would prevent kids from breaking the gearshift. I often go to Dave and Buster's, and they have a four player setup for Daytona Championship USA. The unfortunate thing is that for cabinets 3 and 4, the gearshifts are broken. So yeah, those are my reasons for sticking with 2-speed.

[@OverJumpRally]

@@jakescartoons6045 I strongly reccomend you to move to UE, especially when it comes to code with Blueprint. I don't know much about coding but being able to see what everything does visually is a huge help. You can still add stuff in C++ if you want, but you can also just make the whole game with just Blueprint. Even a lot of seasoned Unity devs are jumping ship. I mean, have you seen what Lumen and Nanite are capable? Or the huge free Quixel library? My Sega Rally reboot, should also give you an idea... You could also use plugins, like Fgear, which is also available for Unity. I'm also pointing to an arcade version, but I just figured that if they break a 4-shifter they could also break a 2-shifter, with twice the damage. Plus, 99% of people would play it on console and PC, so you shouldn't really limit your gameplay based on future and extremely small percentage of users. My 2 cents on a topic I'm full-time on ;)

[@jakescartoons6045]

@@OverJumpRally I already started development of the game in Unity, but I will admit that I haven't gotten that far due to me being busy with school and a part-time job. I'm also developing an RC car racing game in Unity before my rally style game, (the rally game being called "The Crazy Pizza Rush", in which you're delivering pizzas on what are basically rally courses), but now that you brought up Unreal Engine, I think I might switch to that after I'm done with the RC car game.

[@freedomisdead9638]

0:32, footage gameplay seems from an emulator, can you confirm? I had the Saturn and i feel like the graphics were far better and close to the arcade version seen on youtube with less pixelated and smoother graphics.

[@MrThunderwing]

All the Saturn footage in this is emulated. I still own a Saturn, but I sold my copy of this game about 17 years back - I'd planned on selling the Saturn itself back then too, but I ended up holding off and picking up a small collection of Japanese games for it.. There's no issue with the emulated footage - you're probably remembering it looking smoother and less pixelated because you were playing it on a CRT TV, not an HD LCD display.All old games tend to look more pixelated like this, it's why so many arcade purists always want CRT displays for their arcade cabs.

[@oldatarigamer]

Great game, for some reason, Sega never came close to this gameplay in future racing games.

[@MrThunderwing]

I dunno about them never surpassing this. Indy 500, Scud Race, Daytona USA 2 and Outrun 2 were pretty awesome. Le Man's 24 was pretty cool too.

[@oldatarigamer]

@@MrThunderwing On the Saturn or Dreamcast

[@MrThunderwing]

@@oldatarigamer Ah, gotcha. Yeah, Sega Touring Car and Manx TT on the Saturn weren't games I was especially excited about. Sega royally botched the graphics of Sega Rally 2 on the DC due to making it with Windows CE. Daytona USA 2001 on the Dreamcast was pretty good though.

[@oldatarigamer]

@@MrThunderwing I didn't mind the graphics on either, but on Daytona for the Dreamcast, the controls weren't as good. You really had to tweak the controller settings to get it right, which shouldn't have been the case.

[@MrThunderwing]

@@oldatarigamer Yeah, it was so sensitive when played with a pad I actually didn't really love it back in the day. I developed a new found appreciation for it playing it in emulation over the last couple of years though. It handles absolutely superbly using my DFGT wheel - it almost feels just like the arcade version this way.

[@MrLazenby007]

@MrThunderwing does what Jerry Seinfeld don't!

[@MrThunderwing]

😂😂😂

[@trzy]

Haha speaking of Seinfeld have you listened to Thunder Blade's stage 2 music lately? Have a listen from 9:25 here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/a5faiqpjmc-sn6M -- definitely one of my favorite game sound tracks.

[@MrThunderwing]

Man, that it is pretty slap-bass 'tastic. Thunderblade was one of those games I never saw in the arcade, so it's music's never really penetrated and embedded itself into my psyche like the Afterburner, Outrun, Super Hang-On and Space Harrier themes did. I'm always on the look out though for good old game BGMs, because they make for excellent royalty free background music for videos (well, mostly... I've had some bullshit 3rd party claims from some cowboy music outfits that reckon they own the rights to some of the old Sega stuff I was just talking about. I normally just dispute the claim and it goes away after 30 days).

[@southbronxny5727]

That sr3 looks like the car is just gliding on the track as a background.....terrible.

[@MrThunderwing]

It's actually a pretty decent game. 100% better than Sega Rally Revo.

[@basshunter2007]

Dayton USA was fine it was the console that was the let down

[@thefonz585]

I can't pick a hole in anything you said. Well reviewed sir! You play in 3rd person.?!? ewwww