Underrated Consoles

[Aliem]

The Sega Master System.

I didn't even know the Master System was a thing till just a few years ago. On a similar note, how about the Atari 7800?

[MasterSwordUltima]

What about it? It's incredibly easy to find NIB (sealed even) atari games. Including 7800 games.

You wanna talk about underrated consoles?


Not sure if the definition of a console requires external media to be inserted to play. Either way, this thing was tits.

[King Aquamentus]

This might be something of a stretch, but I'm going to toss the Microsoft MSX computer into the mix. Stretch, because A: computer, and B: possibly the overrated of the underrated. However though, in terms of gaming, the MSX ran a lot of parallels with the NES, with quite a few of the same games the NES got. Oftentimes though, especially those released in 1986 and later, the SCC sound chip meant that while the games were still graphically inferior to the NES, the music and sound were incredible. The MSX2 got Metal Gear and Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake, and the graphics for that version of the console definitely were a touch above the NES. One of the games, Space Manbow, looks so much like a 16-bit arcade that you really have to double-take at it and say "no, there's no way that's the same console Metal Gear came out on."

Plus, there's the fact that with some of the stuff Konami released on this console, it is almost as if Konami made this *their* console. It features two completely unique Gradius titles (one of which has only been remade on other obscure computer consoles like the sharp x6800), and a dramatically different version of Life Force, with an actual plot that feels almost RPG-ish for a shoot em up.


Gradius without the chip:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kmwfp6I9Nkc

Here's Gradius *with* the chip. Notice the big difference?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1ZRc6r4BzQ

And here's Space Manbow.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugXjAW8nRGQ