Afterburner was the first of Sega's super scaler games that I got to play. I had seen an Outrun cabinet but didn't get to play it yet, and I knew of Space Harrier but also hadn't played it. Afterburner though, my young uncle and I played it a fair bit. They had it in the entrace to this department store down from my grandparent's. They had the standard, stand-up cabinet along with, at the time, the Double Dragon cab we loved and Pole Position II. Good times. Afterburner was just amazing to us. I didn't have access to a Master System at that time, and I never bought this for the PBC I bought later. I'm not sure if I've played it it all. My first home experience with Afterburner was Afterburner II on the Genesis and that was just my uncle renting it. I didn't own a copy of Afterburner until Afterburner Complete on the 32X, which was great fun. Obviously, the Master System isn't going to come close to reaching the performance, detail, speed, and music and sound quality of the arcade here. The SMS version is definitely choppy, but it does look alright aside from that. I would have certainly liked to have tried it (or the NES version too) back then, but I never did. Everytime I see a super scaler game featured in a comparison, I always wish we would have seen some others ported to maybe the 32x or even Saturn. I know older super scaler games would probably not have been financially viable, especially less-well-known ones, but I still think it would have been neat to see them given a shot (and not just Sega's super scaler games but similar games like Konami's Hot Chase, which is one of my favorite 80s/90s 2d racers).
I never got to see any of these super scaler games in person until years later at conventions but I guarantee I would have been all over those had they been at my local arcade. I think the SMS version is pretty damn good taking into consider the limitations of the hardware thought the 32x port is definitely the way to go for 90s ports. I've never even heard of Hot Chase so I'm gonna watch some gameplay.
Sega really were ambitious with the Master System... remember when they announced the 3d glasses for it? there were some great ports on that little machine... might have to get one back again...
The first super scaler game I played was Space Harrier for SMS, boy did I suck at it. I vaguely remember playing this in the arcade with stand up unit and full cockpit. Honestly the SMS sounds awesome for what it is. It does seem like a bit of a lazy port tho. Winner: The arcade awesomeness and the start of Super Scaler wars. I just love the arcade version and just blown away by how awesomely fun it is. It does look like at the start you had to figure out what button did what lol. Good stuff man!
Lol yeah I kept getting the buttons wrong somehow. It was like when I play NBA Jam on the SNES instead of the Genesis, no matter how many times I try to tell myself this button shoots and this button passes I do the opposite. The SMS port looks fantastic but it does lack in some departments. It's funny because the NES port of After Burner 2 looks worse but is a little more true to the original game. That's so awesome that you got to play the stand up unit of this. I've always wanted to try out the cab on this but I've never seen it anywhere. I'm going to try making it out to the Long Island retro expo this year so fingers crossed they have it there.
Master System was an ambitious port given the limitations. However, the better ports would be the Famicom (AB2) from developer Sunsoft, 32X, PC Engine, and Genesis.
Nice comparison, haha I remember this game as a kid sitting in the whole cabin thing and the whole thing moving also from T2 lol one of the games John was playing right before the T-1000 located him and started chasing him lmao. I would say the MS version is a decent port but you can tell there's some slowdown slightly compared to the arcade. Fun game in general.
Oh man I'm jealous! I never got to play the arcade cabinet of this. I'm hoping to go to the Long Island retro expo this year and fingers crossed they have that cabinet there. I never realized this was in T2. Looking out for that is a good excuse to watch it again:)
@@RetroComparisons lol yeah its in that mall scene haha pretty cool! Oh nice I'm in that tri-state area well I'm in NYC but I have friends and relatives out in LI. Cool!
@@MKF30 Lol! The mall scene with arcades back in the day was incredible if you had a big enough mall. Oh that's awesome! I'm in CT so I usually just go to the local Hartford one but my cousin told me that they have a Puyo Puyo tournament in Long Island which peaked my interest. I'll probably lose in the first round though lol!
@@RetroComparisons Oh you like thr puyo puyo game huh? Cool. They have that tetris X puyo puyogame I saw haha. I'm more of a Terri's Attack, Dr. MARIO and Bust-A-Move aks Puzzle Bobble guy with puzzle games haha 😄 The dr. Mario scene got bigger over time and Terri's attack but sadly Puzzle bobble not quite as much. Itsporbably bigger in the Japan scene than ours but still a fun game bank shots are key in that game lol Best of luck dude! Nice I have 2nd and third cousins in CT. Lots of acres in houses in CT lol my moms cousin he had money got this huge house near a lake the backyard you could play baseball, football or soccer thata how huge it was and they had a pool on top of it lol one of those houses with a lake behind the back yard grass so they could fish from their backyard, go for a swim in the pool or play a plethora of sports I think they had a batting tee set up and volleyball bet too.
@@MKF30 Oh man those are all fantastic puzzle games! It's a shame Puzzle Bobble isn't bigger than it is because that is one hell of an addictive game. I suck at most of those though and Puyo Puyo is one of the few I'm pretty good at. Thanks my friend, hopefully I can get through at least the first round. Oh man that sounds like a hell of a house! My house is a glorified shack lol! CT is such a weird state, you go through neighborhoods with mansions and down the road are tiny apartments everywhere. It's both the richest and poorest state and it's very evident almost anywhere you go there.
I know people don't like the sega 32X very much,HOWEVER,if you got a sega genesis,the 32X version of After Burner is definitely the best way to go if you want to come close to experiencing the arcade version of it at home.At least back in the 90s it was.(minus the arcade machine experience of course) Also,the other minor difference is that the 32X version moves at around 30FPS whereas the arcade version is a perfect 60FPS. that never bothered me,tho.
I love that 32x port and I have a soft spot for the 32x overall anyways since that was my way of playing 32 bit graphics at the time. If Sega took the route of making the 32x their budget console with near arcade perfect ports of their 80s and early 90s games I think it could have done pretty well in the market or at least better than it did.
@@juststatedtheobvious9633 Technically both the NES & Famicom ports are for After Burner 2 and it's a pretty interesting to see how the 2 companies made 2 versions kind of like Ms. Pac-Man on the NES.
Afterburner II is like Galaxy Force II and later revisions of Soul Edge. Sega's marketing team can insist that 3 new stages out of 21 plus a few speed challenges are totally a whole new Afterburner game, but c'mon. It was just DLC for arcade owners.
Me: Well, I can imagine visuals and the sound department will take the obvious hit...🤔 Video: ...You forgot about fps....🤭 P.S. SMS' music sounds kinda cute though, but obviously not as epic/dramatic as the arcade's one🥰
@@RetroComparisons actually...I think the NES one was more impressive 'cause they actually tried to recreate the music and background from the original game, while on SMS there are pretty much no backgrounds, just some floors. Also...I don't get it. So, After Burner and After Burner II was the same game, more or less? Like, the update or something? Like SFII:WW versus SFII'?
@@oldfan4049 That is a good point, I can see how that one could be considered more impressive. The SMS port went for the better graphics and the NES port went for the closer to arcade port. So After Burner 1 & 2 are basically the same game. There's a little added to the second game but if this was released now it would just be considered DLC but even that may be too generous. Maybe more of a patch. Sega did that for some other games too like Galaxy Force and Thunder Blade.
