Getting properly into Shadowrun for the Megadrive after getting into the setting, the rpg, the tie-in novels etc.
How is this a game from 1994?
How does Fallout and FFVII and Baldur's Gate etc etc get so much praise yet no-one talks about how ahead of its time Sega Shadowrun was?
Because Genesis Shadowrun felt janky and weird and the combat sucked. Yeah, it nailed the setting and the writing and was nonlinear, but so much about it didn't gel.
It was linear but it had the random generated mission system for you to grind money and experience (karma) since there was't much of a chance for you to get far in the linear story part of the game without leveling up your stats and skills. The romhack Shadowrun 2058 improves this aspect quite a bit by balancing the rewards better for longer runs, giving more money and karma and making the corporate runs and lower to mid-level matrix runs worthwhile.
Not as hard as a lot of people in this thread claim though. If you just do enough basic escort and delivery runs in the beginning you can buy one of the best guns in the game, a heavy pistol that fricks things up and has a 15 or so round capacity for pretty cheap.
It's not a very good game to play.
For games ahead of their time on the MD, Zero Tolerance got a lot of praise.
>For games ahead of their time on the MD
Herzog Zwei gets my vote. It's a great real time strategy game made in the late 80s.
I like Starflight
it was ahead of its time but quite rough around the edges too. it really couldve used a few more months in development and better balancing. its my favorite genesis game despite its flaws. i love both shadowrun games but this one has much more to offer.
Nobody here plays video games
People don't play games for "how ahead of the time" they are, they play them for fun.
Because it was a really messy game to actually play. You get thrown into encounters that are difficult on an actual, statistical level of your DPS / HP relative to your enemies that would be hard in a well polished game almost immediately. Except the combat is not well polished so you are trying to navigate actually hard situations while also trying to figure out the game's jank ass combat within 10 minuets of starting to play.
Most people probably got as far as talking to the first Mr Johnson, getting a ghoul cleanup mission with 20 enemies, walking into the designated building and getting ass raped. There is nothing to indicate these missions are way out of depth for a starting character since you are following the logical progression of "find the first quest giver, take that quest" and it gives the impression the game is just unfairly hard almost immediately. If you are just bad at games even getting jumped by Halloweeners on the street is probably enough to get you turning the console of
they used to call it Nintendo hard
Not really m8, for how out of scale the ghoul runs with high enemy counts are for the point of the game where you take those missions it would be like going from the first Shinra Plant in FFVII straight to going up the Tower without anything to tell you it was going to splatter your party.
>how ahead of its time Sega Shadowrun was
It wasn't ahead of it's time, it was right where it belongs. The problem is the SNES has the reputation for being the "JRPG machine", and SNES JRPGs are remarkably poor compared to the better RPGs of the era, see also Phantasy Star IV, Shining Force II, or the Lunar games, which are all leaps ahead of anything on the SNES. The mediocrity of SNES JRPGs unfairly tainted the entire genre for years, leading people who discover the actual good 16-bit RPGs to believe they are somehow outliers.
Being ahead of its time doesn’t make it good.
>How's Siberia anon?
Phantasy star games are great - even 3 - but the SNES has plenty to equal them, depending on taste. You're only ripping other anons off with that console warring hot take.
OP here, I mean, tbf I do use the ABBACAB cheat to get karma and nuyen cos I'm a comfy gamer, I'm not here for challenge, I have a fulfilling life that provides all the challenge and achievement I need. Gaming to me is putting on god mode and enjoying some exploration with the added stimulation of collecting and shooting things.
Shadowrun is a supremely comfy game doing runs with maxxed stats.
Even when I DM for friends I just give them a huge map to explore with a cool plot that unravels and instead of taking damage, they just either win easily or by the skin of their teeth, and I keep a numeric score of how well/badly they do in decisions and skill checks.
At the end I just use their score to determine how good/bad an ending they get.
I'd rather vidya have an option for that too, like say you're playing Streets of Rage etc, your lives don't count down, they count UP, and 1-UPs reduce that number.
At the end, there are several endings meaning you always get to the end but if you're a skillgay you can try get better endings.
Us casuals can just play casually.
Shadowrun was limited by console hardware of the time, however what they accomplished with such limitations is pretty impressive.
How was it ahead of its time?
Wasteland, Darklands, Realms of Arkania, Ultima Underworld, ... all predate it.
>Person has a consumer brained "NEW GOOD, OLD BAD" mindset
>actually plays old game
>is surprised to find that it is complex and deep
>"it was ahead of its time"
>Ahead of its time?
>Hidden... gem?
>gay-sounding zoomer lisp voice
Do you choose the best armor in the game or discounts at the best shop in the game which can result in you making free money when buying and selling back?