The world's premier resource for SEGA's arcade and console hardware legacy!
As the Sega Sports brand moved forward, it continued to improve on existing titles in different sports, such as tennis. The second offering from Sega is a definite step up over the original Wimbledon, but it still doesn’t quite obtain the heights most fans were expecting this late in the console cycle.
Among the slew of baseball games on the Genesis, Accolade’s Hardball! strikes out. Poor gameplay overpowers all other considerations, making this one title to forget about. Later installments fixed many of the problems, but by then there were much better alternatives. The best thing about Hardball!? The Boris Vallejo box art.
EA’s seminal hockey series lasted well into the twilight of the 16-bit era, and while fans will debate which is the best installment, the series never really dropped its overall level of quality. That’s pretty impressive compared to the many other sports franchises that floundered as time wore on, and the 1997 edition of NHL is proof positive that “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” does work.
Looney Tunes games are multiple on the Genesis, and to their credit, they’ve tried to do more than just be Sonic clones with a cool license. This experimentation often resulted in titles that were a bit off the beaten path and too quirky for some gamers. Sylvester and Tweety’s only Genesis outing went overlooked by many and deserves at least a cursory playthrough.
One would think that a basketball game feature two of the greatest athletes to ever play would be a no-brainer for greatness. Unfortunately, Electronic Arts proved us wrong. Stiff, unintuitive gameplay overshadows some excellent presentation, and what should have been the definitive version of One-on-One ends up bench-warming for all the others instead.