DAY 95 / GAME 95
Altered Beast
Here we go again with another classic Sega title. This one was a launch title bundled with the Sega Genesis during it's first release up until the debut of Sonic the Hedgehog. A port of an already popular arcade game, Altered Beast showed at the time just how powerful the 16-bit system was, duplicating the upright cabinet version very closely.
Designed by Makoto Uchida, who worked on Golden Axe, it shares some similar design sensibilities. There's even a few enemy designs that cross over between the two. Unlike Golden Axe though, Altered Beast is a flat side scroller with no fore-to-back travel. The side scrolling was also forced left-to-right, not allowing you to retrack your steps left (like most side scrollers of the time) but also slowly scrolled right, forcing you to keep pace.
Altered Beast was a big really your basic beat-em-up game. You have the option to punch, kick, or jump as your make your way through ancient Greece controlling a centurion resurrected by Zeus with the classic line "Rise from your grave!". Which on the 16 bit console actually sounds more like 'Wise fwom your Gwave'. Voice samples like this were very new at the time on a console and it still sounded pretty awesome. And the truth is, I recently tried the arcade version, which has a much clearer audio sample, but turns out the distortion in the Genesis version actually made it sound more menacing. The arcade version actually ends up sounding more like they voice recorded one of the programmers and he sounds like a real weiner rather than a Greek God. But weiner or not this god has raised you (and a friend if you're playing two-player) to rescue his kidnapped daughter from the hands of the evil Neff.
The best part of Altered Beast is of course, the beast part. As you make your way through the levels you pick up blue orbs. These orbs continue to make you more and more disproportionate as your head shrinks and your muscles bound. Finally, you pick up one last orb and morph into a half-man half-animal centurion who is now capable of fighting Neff, who shows up at the end of each level for a boss fight as one 5 different monsters. The beast choices were awesome; you morph into a Werewolf, Dragon, Bear, Tiger and finally a Golden Werewolf, each has a special attack. Neff himself has some amazing transformations as well; including a head-tossing ogre, eyeball tossing plant thingy, fireball tossing 'moldy snail', a 'crocodile worm' and an armored rhinoceros creature.
Everyone loves this game. It's basic, classic arcade. Everything is well designed, from the clean 16-bit art and animation, solid soundtrack and gameplay that doesn't leave you yelling at the game because you died for no reason. It had all kinds of crazy designs that felt like they were designed for fun and not for a panel of PR people trying to reach a key demographic. Altered Beast has been ported a million times and is easy to get for a ton of platforms. But I still always have a soft spot for the Sega Genesis version, one of the first games I'd ever played.
Altered Beast
Here we go again with another classic Sega title. This one was a launch title bundled with the Sega Genesis during it's first release up until the debut of Sonic the Hedgehog. A port of an already popular arcade game, Altered Beast showed at the time just how powerful the 16-bit system was, duplicating the upright cabinet version very closely.Designed by Makoto Uchida, who worked on Golden Axe, it shares some similar design sensibilities. There's even a few enemy designs that cross over between the two. Unlike Golden Axe though, Altered Beast is a flat side scroller with no fore-to-back travel. The side scrolling was also forced left-to-right, not allowing you to retrack your steps left (like most side scrollers of the time) but also slowly scrolled right, forcing you to keep pace.
Altered Beast was a big really your basic beat-em-up game. You have the option to punch, kick, or jump as your make your way through ancient Greece controlling a centurion resurrected by Zeus with the classic line "Rise from your grave!". Which on the 16 bit console actually sounds more like 'Wise fwom your Gwave'. Voice samples like this were very new at the time on a console and it still sounded pretty awesome. And the truth is, I recently tried the arcade version, which has a much clearer audio sample, but turns out the distortion in the Genesis version actually made it sound more menacing. The arcade version actually ends up sounding more like they voice recorded one of the programmers and he sounds like a real weiner rather than a Greek God. But weiner or not this god has raised you (and a friend if you're playing two-player) to rescue his kidnapped daughter from the hands of the evil Neff.Everyone loves this game. It's basic, classic arcade. Everything is well designed, from the clean 16-bit art and animation, solid soundtrack and gameplay that doesn't leave you yelling at the game because you died for no reason. It had all kinds of crazy designs that felt like they were designed for fun and not for a panel of PR people trying to reach a key demographic. Altered Beast has been ported a million times and is easy to get for a ton of platforms. But I still always have a soft spot for the Sega Genesis version, one of the first games I'd ever played.
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