At the time I could never figure out what Axel was saying when he growled out his ‘Bare Knuckle’ attack. Decades later thanks to TH-cam I finally figured it out😉
Bare Knuckle to me sounds like you scraped your hand when falling off your bike as a kid. Streets of Rage on the other hand, sounds like all-out urban warfare. So yeah, agreed.
I bought Revenge of Shinobi when it was first released and the version I got was IDENTICAL to the Japanese version. If you put it in a US system in '89 it would read "Revenge of Shinobi", but if you put it in a Megadrive it would read "Super Shinobi". All of the things that were supposed to be cut were still in it. Godzilla, Terminator, Rambo, Spider-Man, Batman, were ALL there.
Yeah games weren't zoned before 1992 and most cartridges contained all the localized versions in one. I discovered this by myself back then when I bought the imported Japanese version of Quackshot, I was expecting the game to be in Japanese but it detected my PAL Mega Drive and loaded the English version.
The early cartridge revisions had the pop culture references in them. I believe Rev 00 was exclusive to Japan, but Rev 01 was in both the US and Japan. Not sure about PAL regions, since they got the game later all cartridges might have been Rev 02 or later.
I'm pretty sure the launch day Revenge of Shinobi I got at Toys R Us had all the cultural references intact. It wasn't until much later in the internet era that I realized they had removed a bunch of them. And funnily enough it wasn't until this year that I found out there was a good and bad ending to the game. I thought I had mastered the game and had only ever seen the "bad" ending lol. I had zero idea.
I still remember being in the store with Lightening Force in my hands examining it trying to figure out if it was Thunder Force 4. Glad I decided to go with it because its still a favorite. Love the Sega Ages version on the switch.
That game is one of the best looking 16 bit games ever made from a sheer sprite perspective. It uses all of the assets of Genesis/Mega Drive so well. 10 sound channels instead of the typical Gems audio driver’s 6. The last 4 added channels come from the on board Master System 2 sound chip built into the Genesis motherboard for the Mega Drive/Genesis Power Base Convertor. And it manages to add another FM sound channel to the single one on the Genesis Sound Chip. Lightening force also has 2 scrolling layers with 7 line rolling background layers, and it uses the faster CPU on the Genesis to keep from having bad slow downs while pushing around sprite effects. Lastly, it uses line doubling to add more onscreen colors to the highly limited Genesis color pallet. If you watch the StafeFox Splash Wave TH-cam channel, and watch their Streets of Rage 2 making of video, then their Sonic 1 making of video that shows that it’s the first game to use line doubling to add more colors in the under water stages. Sadly, due to the name change, many people never playing Lightening Force.
I like how Socket is clearly a hook-beaked bluejay or something by his sprite, but the American boxart cements him as a duck despite his in-game appearance.
Killing Game Show was renamed Fatal Rewind, because some retailers told us they wouldn't stock a game with "Killing" in the title. Such was life in videogame publishing, back in the early 90's.
This was actually a pretty cool topic to cover. It is interesting how the titles of games that were entries in established franchises were changed. The Darius series is notorious for this. Its second entry on the SNES was also changed to a weird off-brand name (Darius Force = Super Nova), much akin to the drastic rebranding on Assault Suit Leynos. And agreed that 90% of the time, the Japanese box art mops the floor with the Western designs. This was true across the industry during the '80s and '90s, though. I'll never understand where Western game publishers got the idea that gamers didn't like animé/manga-styled art. Yeah, the "Lightening Force" moniker for Thunder Force IV is a crime against humanity. For future reference, "Soleil" is pronounced "so-lay", French for "sun".
Best part of the Bare Knuckle II cover art is that they used Jean Claude Van Dame's face for Axl and Arnold Schwarzenegger as the villains face in the background.
I've always found game changes between countries to be quite fascinating, especially when it comes to licensed games released in Japan that were completed changed when they were ported to the US. For example, there was a "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" video game released on the Famicom Disc System in Japan that was changed to "Bug Bunny's Crazy Castle" when it was released for the NES in the US, and the "Donald Duck" video game that was released in Japan was changed to "Snoopy And Friends" in the US. Sometimes, however, there are some rare ocassions in which games released in the US would actually become changed when ported to Japan such as "The Jetsons: Invasion Of The Planet Pirates" on the SNES, which was remade into a title featuring the female mascot of a popular Japanese video game magazine.
The entire Crazy Castle series is full of this stuff. The weirdest one I've seen is a cancelled South Park game for Game Boy color that ended up being released in various territories as Maya the Bee as well as TWO Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen video games.
@@KasumiKenshirou Speaking of which, perhaps on the most unusal changes to be made in a game before it was released internationally would have to be "Mickey Mouse IV" for the Game Boy, which was reworked into a game based on "The Real Ghostbusters" when it was released in the US. But when the game was ported to Europe, however, it was changed to a game starring Garfield, which I definitely would have loved as a kid.
Crying / Biohazard Battle was made by M2 and was originally an X68000 project that switched to the Megadrive halfway through the project after Sega showed interest. M2 still has the beta X68000 version and has shown some footage from it on Facebook a few years ago.
I never knew that. It would explain why it's so unusual. That unusual quality to it is what drew me to it when I tried it. I didn't expect much from it, but it played well and that music was something, in a good way. Glad to know more about it. I need to play that again sometime soon.
TH-cam: How niche is your content? Sega Lord X: Yes. Sorry to use such a hoary old joke format to praise your work. This channel always surprises me with creative focus and always-interesting content. Thanks for creating, sharing and loving video games.
For Master System and Sega Saturn, here are some examples; Master System = Alex Kidd: High-Tech World was originally Anmitsu Hime (if it wasn't already obvious enough this is hardly an Alex Kidd game), Aztec Adventure was originally Nazca '88: The Golden Road to Paradise, Bubble Bobble was Final Bubble Bobble, Cyborg Hunter was Choon Sneshi Borgman, and Power Strike was Aleste. Sega Saturn = Alone in the Dark 2 in Japan retains the original official name, but for some reason Europe went with Alone in the Dark: Jack is Back and NA went with Alone in the Dark: One-Eyed Jack's Revenge, the infamous Battle Arena Toshinden Remix was Toshinden S (Japan sure has a thing for sticking a letter at the end of some titles), the word blam was added for the North American version of Machine Head, Puzzle Bobble became the Bust-a-Move series, Daytona USA: Championship Circuit is ironically not just a localized version of Circuit Edition, DecAthlete was changed to Athlete Kings for Europe, Die Hard Arcade was modified into Dynamite Dekka and that Japan version got an actual sequel, Weirdly; Digital Pinball: Last Gladiators was split into two different names outside of Japan, and High Velocity: Mountain Racing Challenge used to be Touge King the Spirits (honestly, the NA name works out better).
The arcade version of Runark / Growl will really make you laugh out loud: it is perhaps _the most vegan game ever made,_ but it's both intentionally and unintentionally hilarious.
The Thunder Force IV -> Lightening Force swap burned me when I was a kid. I loved TFIII to death but never knew TFIV came to NA due to the name change and missed it. Still mad.
This is such a good episode, I like all the comparisons you made between regions. Any way maybe we can get one of Nintendo game title changes? Thank you for your good Sega content, love it.
Nice to note the differences beyond the names. I also liked you showing more of the gameplays, but feels much when more than 10 seconds. Keeping the box art more would also be nice to look at the differences without pausing very much. Having time stamps for the games would also be a welcome improvement. Great content nonetheless, thanks!
Thank you so much for spreading your love of Sega. I appreciate you giving a segment to the SoR/BK3 club stage. It's one of the best songs on the hardware and it gets overshadowed by other, lower quality songs from the game.
Crusader of Centy/Soleil (French for "sun") is underrated. One weird thing is that the Nintendo Switch Online version only features English texts, while the version on Mega Drive Mini II that I imported from Japan also has the German and French translations.
I think both stack up nicely. I will say using the Japanese/European name is a lot less confusing and rolls off the tongue a lot easier. I kind of liked how the non-American name was matched well it's eventual competition, the Super Famicom/Super Nintendo. Sounds like they still 1-up'd Nintendo... depending on which sounds bigger/cooler to you I suppose.... SUPER or MEGA. But always liked too how the 2 big American 16 bit consoles at the time had their Brands and Console Names flipped... SEGANintendo Kind of weird when you think of it that way. So was Nintendo's console actually just called "SUPER"? Rhetorical question but it's fun and interesting pick apart.
@@codydfwnwas more that the SNES was the Super NES then anything - Nintendo wanted to use the name to ensure everyone knew it was a sort of continuation. Shame that thinking wasn't present with Wii -> WiiU 🤦♂️
I'm pretty sure the reason Sega didn't care about Socket's similarities to Sonic was because they were already on great terms with Vic Tokai due to them already developing Columns 3 for them at that time. Heck the main characters of Battle Mania eventually appeared as the only official third party characters in Segagaga.
Ah Probotector. I miss the Probotector Branding of Contra. I always found it way cooler to play as Battlemechs instead of "lame" Humans. Of course as I grow older I got over that but I still miss the Probotectors.
Excellent comparison video! Kind of surprised you didn't mention Splatterhouse 2, what with the cover art differences and the Terror Mask being changed to the skull in the U.S. and PAL territories. Mystic Defender/Kujaku Ou 2 would have been nice to see as well.
Battle Mania 1-2 is one favorite shoot em ups on the Genesis. Has that Treasure/SEGA charm and humor to a T. The developers clearly admired SEGA's brand/image at the time.
It's taken them so long but it feels like they're finally acknowledging they actually didn't suck at one point. With all the SEGA L's throughout the years, it's finally a relief to see them looking in the mirror and reflecting proudly for a change. Their side of the 16-bit era has been overshadowed by the wave of Nintendo-tubers. When everyone declared Nintendo won the console wars due to AVGN's console war video back then which people took as gospel at the time. It left a stain for years. It's sad that it's only now that we seem to be having the more adult mindset seen throughout that we can just buy what we enjoy and don't have to be a loyal fanboy to corporations that generally could not care less. lol
@@codydfwnit's really got nothing to do with AVGN, people that grew up with the systems back in the day already made their minds up years ago. Really talking about zoomers being persuaded, well maybe. Talking about the Genesis or Snes, plenty of bullshit trash talk on both sides.
I can think of two more examples: Kujaku Ou 1 and 2 for Sega Mark 3 and Mega Drive turned into Spellcaster for Master System and Mystic Defender for Genesis/European Mega Drive, respectively (Kujaku Ou 2 even had a change of box art because of some nudity). Then, Tatsujin (Mega Drive) is known as Truxton in Europe and US. Why, I have no idea.
Well done! You keep coming out with such interesting ideas for videos and it's always amazing to watch! You can easily make a part 2 as i've found another 6 off the top of my head that were not showcased in part 1. 1. Super Shinobi II/Shinobi III 2. Mazin' Wars/Mazin Saga 3. Captain Lang/Captain Havoc/Havoc 4. Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine/Puyo Puyo 5. Mick & Mack As The Global Gladiators/Global Gladiators 6. World Cup Italia' 90/Sega Soccer General notes: I'm pretty sure Grindstormer was developed by Toaplan not Tengen and only published by Tengen. I kind of prefer the name Gynoug and the PAL European cover art over the U.S. variant myself and Dariius II/Sagaia is a really decent shooter on the system, loved it on the Master System where I first learned about it and played it, then finally got the Mega Drive/Genesis port imported from the U.S. which blew me away even more! Also i'm in Australia and i've never heard of us getting a unique version of Castlevania with the gore back in the day, but then again the game was rare as rocking horse shit in Auz even back in 1994 as I never saw it on game shelves even back then? My version that I own was imported from France or Portugal so it's the European PAL port known as ''The New Generation'' I also own a cheap repro of the beta version of Castlevania - The New Generation'' which has a typo in it and no real ending. It does have different options in the menu to the final retail version.
I still will never understand the change of Thunder Force 4 to Lightening Force. It was a good thing that I knew of the existence of the actual name of the game prior to it coming out or I would've otherwise missed out on that excellent game.
Localization was always interesting. Japan usually got the better cover art, though! 😋 Yeah, the whole Thunder Force IV name change in the US made no sense and was just completely confusing! The great thing is that there are many game patches available, so you can enjoy some of the localized changes in other regions. I do remember some old '90s game tip publications during the 8 and 16 bit era had some weird mistakes regarding localization. One of the games shown in one of US publications was "Gynoug" but they had not changed it to the US name "Wings of Wor". This confused me completely as a kid as I wanted this game called "Gynoug", but no game or rental store carried it. It wasn't until years later I figured out that the publication had the wrong game name for the region. 😅
As kids, we just got used to the extra difficulty in Streets of Rage 3. I’m not any good at the game anymore, but I definitely remember me and my friends beating it on the hardest mode repeatedly- we’d been playing the SOR series for years at that point, so it didn’t actually seem all that hard in “normal.” Currently, both versions kick my ass, but Bare Knuckle 3 feels way slower and kinda boring compared to the US version. Honestly, my only complaint with SOR3 is the pointless censorship.
I always thought the marketing department of these early software companies were full of people who had no idea about their potential customers. That old story of the guy in the Nintendo store room being asked by executives to yay or nay games being the exception 🇦🇺✌️
I remember seeing Fatman also listed as Mondu's Fight Palace in a magazine and, meaning it actually took time for the brass to decide on these different names. While I agree on the Target Earth art not being an improvement, it certainly hearkens back to the Atari art of the 80's. Could've been far worse!
Devil Crash MD being renamed (and 'censored') to Dragon's Fury always bugged me... but I owned the Japanese version long before it got localized - and now I own both!
Reminds me of motorcycle superbike game Redline Racer, which was released as "Suzuki Alstare Championship Racing" I played it on the Dreamcast around 99-2000, also hearing about this Redline Racer game I wanted to add to my motorcycle game library, and had no idea I played it, lol.
Biohazard Battle was such a good shooter with a great soundtrack. I had no idea it was called Crying in Japan. And I never noticed the poor spelling of Lightening Force. Wow, that was bad.
The change to Lightening Force didn't bother me back then, I was huge fan of Technosoft (love me some Herzog Zwei) and the Thunderforce series of games that we got on the Genesis, and rationalized the change because Light(e)ning is the real power behind the Thunder. Trouble Shooter gives me Forgotten World vibes, I'm sorry I missed this one back then.
19:35 I remember seeing that Power Moves box art/ad and thinking the graphics looked like concept art. Seeing the thing in action, my suspicions are confirmed. How did they get away with that?!
What i found interesting was how games loaded up with the different name if in the different console. I had a japanese megadrive and cut the edges down to fit in English cartridges. When my friend put in his revenge of shinobi it came up as super shinobi.
❗️Firstly, I am a gamer from 🏴 12:34 I STILL refer to it as 'Runark' as that is what it was called on a MD Emulator (Genesyst) for PC: Pentium 2 I got in 2000. I like the game and wish it would come back, especially in this 'save the animals' climate we're currently in. 31:01 I refer to it as 'Beyond Oasis' as 'Thor' to me is the Marvel Comics character.
Lightening Force pissed me off so much. I ignored it on the shelf for years, not knowing it was Thunder Force IV. I bought it instantly upon learning that, and only regretted waiting so long. ;)
Mondu's Fight Palace / Tongue of the Fatman / Slaughter Sport is the first time I remember a game getting a bunch of name changes before it came out. I remember seeing all of them in EGM before it finally came out. I guess a "rose" by any other name still smells like garbage.
As an old Amiga gamer (my family had an Amiga before we had a Nintendo), I love the Roger Dean artwork of old Psygnosis games, but I'll admit that's one of his weaker pieces. weirdly, the Amiga cover for Killing Game Show doesn't use that art and is much worse. (Looked it up, and the art comes from Dean's pitch for the art for Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds rock opera, which he lost to some other artists. Similar art was used for the game Terrorpods).
did your family get (have) the Nintendo 2DS, 3DS, DS, GB, GBA, GBC, NES, SNES, N64, GameCube, Wii, Wii U, Switch 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 years after Amiga?
Very confusing development lies behind this game. The original name for the game was ''Sonic Spindrft'' and Traveller's Tales were British and based in the U.K. which is a PAL region yet Jon Burton the head programmer has stated that the game was always meant for 60Hz speed. It's the very first time i've ever heard a developer from one region make a game better in another region and not the actual region the game was made in and with no speed increase implemented for 50Hz. Usually the game would run better or be intended to play better in it's own region of development, but Jon Burton says otherwise apparently?
Slaughter Sport/Fatman was originally Tongue of the Fatman for MS-DOS, and the box art for that game was really grotesque and creepy. Just like the main antagonist: Mondu the Fat himself!
what or who had trademarked the Mega-Drive name in the USA or Canada? or is it a possibility Sega America had a disagreement with Sega Europe or Sega Japan on the Mega-Drive name then Sega America changed it to Genesis?
I remember hearing about the super shinobi's cameos and how some of them were changed! also I think tongue of the fatman also went by 'mondu's fight palace' back on PC?
Luckily, the Japanese boxes tend to have Katakana. Just for the sake of knowing and not to be a stickler, Ex-Ranza is Ek-u-su(like ex) Ranza and not E-X. I made that mistake at first too. Ranger X is not a bad way to rename it, in my opinion. Gynoug is ji-no-gu, or jee-nogue(like rogue). Of all the ways to pronounce Gynoug, that's not one I expected. And just for fun, Darius is Da-rai-us, with the rai being like the word rye. But I'd only pronounce it that way if I was talking to someone from Japan, but it's interesting to know. I love Grind Stormer, and I always liked the Genesis port. It helped me get better at the arcade version, as the Genesis version is a bit easier without being significantly different. Your criticisms of it are fair, and it is rough visually, though it may have looked decent on a CRT. The first impression isn't the best as the opening stage loses a lot of color, and most of the sprite flicker in the game is on that first real boss, but after that it's a pretty solid experience, and there are lots of sprites for the system to display, as the arcade version is very close to bullet hell territory, and it somehow manages to do it all pretty well. The PCB issue does appear to be true as I've seen people talk on discussion boards about dead carts and have seen videos of transplanting to ROM chip. I believe John Riggs did a video for that. I seem to recall Pit Fighter being considered a good source for a compatible PCB. There are probably enough Pit Fighter carts around that it won't matter much. And I say that as someone who likes Pit Fighter. Crying/Biohazard Battle is really cool. When I tried it, I had no expectations for it. I only tried it because it was one of the Genesis games Sega had on Steam 10 years ago. Maybe it was the low expectations, but I really enjoyed it, and it didn't take long to feel that way. The strange soundtrack is one of my favorite parts of it. I should go back to that one again soon. I never did get to the end on that one.
Seeing as there's no separate rom available anywhere for the Australian version of Castlevania, I would hazard a guess, that they didn't get a separate uncensored version.
Brotheeeeeeer i played kid chameleon on sega mega when i was a kid and you just unlocked a visceral memory thank you imma play it on my retroid pocked 3 asap lol
In terms of bad names in different territories the original bomberman was called here in the UK Eric and the Floaters when a floater is a slang term for a turd that is hard to flush 😅
I'll be hollered with you when I was growing up I can remember going to Kmart and choosing between whitening for and bowhazard battle because both came to $20 a piece and I didn't have enough money to get both of them with my allowance So what ended up picking up lightning Force and it still one of my favorite Genesis games and one of my favorite shoot them up games to this day The only regret I have is getting rid of my complete copy when I was in my 20 cuz I was upgrading to get newer games at game crazy But I do own a cart only copy now and I would love to get a complete copy of them to get someday Thank you for reading this and thank you for your content sir and I hope you're having a good day And I hope everyone that is reading this is having a good day God bless you and your family God bless you Jeremy Scruggs
One of the most egregious was on the Game Gear. For some reason, they renamed Wonder Boy to "Revenge of Drancon" and gave it spooky cover art. Come on, this game was already released in North America as Wonder Boy on the Master System!
Funnily enough, the European Game Gear release keeps the original Wonder Boy title but combines it with the spooky cover art of the North American version.
I've had to repair many Tengen carts, not just Grind Stormer, with bad vias. Not sure why they decided to make their own boards but they can be problematic for sure.
I honestly think the box art used for Europe and America with Sonic 2 is better. While it's strange that Eggman has a beard; it's conceptually more memorable. Sonic 2's Japan box art just wasn't as good of an effort as with Sonic 1, Sonic 3, Sonic Jam, Sonic Spinball, and Sonic 3D Blast. Japan has the best Sonic 3 box art, but I also quite like the North American box art. Sadly, the European one is not all that good. There were multiple artists involved and the end product feels sloppy. Sonic & Knuckles has a rather similar box art in all regions. Though I lean more into the European and North American box arts.
'Streets of Rage' sounded better to me than 'Bare Knuckle' - even way back when.
At the time I could never figure out what Axel was saying when he growled out his ‘Bare Knuckle’ attack. Decades later thanks to TH-cam I finally figured it out😉
idk.. they both work imo
@@maxstoner5527SoR2 was better than SoR3
Bare Knuckle to me sounds like you scraped your hand when falling off your bike as a kid. Streets of Rage on the other hand, sounds like all-out urban warfare. So yeah, agreed.
Streets of rage says to me the whole city has become dangerous.
I bought Revenge of Shinobi when it was first released and the version I got was IDENTICAL to the Japanese version. If you put it in a US system in '89 it would read "Revenge of Shinobi", but if you put it in a Megadrive it would read "Super Shinobi". All of the things that were supposed to be cut were still in it. Godzilla, Terminator, Rambo, Spider-Man, Batman, were ALL there.
For real 😁
Yeah games weren't zoned before 1992 and most cartridges contained all the localized versions in one. I discovered this by myself back then when I bought the imported Japanese version of Quackshot, I was expecting the game to be in Japanese but it detected my PAL Mega Drive and loaded the English version.
I remember when I was younger my brother did the infamous swapping cart trick and it was changed to Super Shinobi.
Yes I posted this point above. I had a Japanese megadrive and my friends revenge of Shinobi came up as super Shinobi.
The early cartridge revisions had the pop culture references in them. I believe Rev 00 was exclusive to Japan, but Rev 01 was in both the US and Japan. Not sure about PAL regions, since they got the game later all cartridges might have been Rev 02 or later.
I'm pretty sure the launch day Revenge of Shinobi I got at Toys R Us had all the cultural references intact. It wasn't until much later in the internet era that I realized they had removed a bunch of them. And funnily enough it wasn't until this year that I found out there was a good and bad ending to the game. I thought I had mastered the game and had only ever seen the "bad" ending lol. I had zero idea.
Every true Ninja who thinks he’s a master has forgotten that his mentality must remain as a student.
I liked more the Skullgreymon like Godzilla than the original. It scared the hell out of me.
@@cliffchampion5501 Lmfao!! 🤣🤣🤣
I still remember being in the store with Lightening Force in my hands examining it trying to figure out if it was Thunder Force 4. Glad I decided to go with it because its still a favorite. Love the Sega Ages version on the switch.
'LIGHTEN-ing force' lmao I wonder if it was ever figured out if it was a typo or not
That game is one of the best looking 16 bit games ever made from a sheer sprite perspective. It uses all of the assets of Genesis/Mega Drive so well. 10 sound channels instead of the typical Gems audio driver’s 6. The last 4 added channels come from the on board Master System 2 sound chip built into the Genesis motherboard for the Mega Drive/Genesis Power Base Convertor. And it manages to add another FM sound channel to the single one on the Genesis Sound Chip. Lightening force also has 2 scrolling layers with 7 line rolling background layers, and it uses the faster CPU on the Genesis to keep from having bad slow downs while pushing around sprite effects. Lastly, it uses line doubling to add more onscreen colors to the highly limited Genesis color pallet. If you watch the StafeFox Splash Wave TH-cam channel, and watch their Streets of Rage 2 making of video, then their Sonic 1 making of video that shows that it’s the first game to use line doubling to add more colors in the under water stages.
Sadly, due to the name change, many people never playing Lightening Force.
I like how Socket is clearly a hook-beaked bluejay or something by his sprite, but the American boxart cements him as a duck despite his in-game appearance.
Before seeing the box art, I thought it was a croc or something. 😆
I loved Beyond Oasis and Crusader of Centy.Two fantastic games.
No way! Soleil and The Story of Thor are way better! :V
the Ex Ranza and Chelnov Japanese boxart are my faves here, just gorgeous
Welcome back Sega Lord X and your content is extraordinary 😁
Killing Game Show was renamed Fatal Rewind, because some retailers told us they wouldn't stock a game with "Killing" in the title. Such was life in videogame publishing, back in the early 90's.
Love this video idea, keeping track of the different region changes gets very complicated
I can't believe how many of these games are on my Super 196 in 1 multi cart.
I had a huge laugh when I put on Bare Knuckle III for my friends.
This was actually a pretty cool topic to cover. It is interesting how the titles of games that were entries in established franchises were changed. The Darius series is notorious for this. Its second entry on the SNES was also changed to a weird off-brand name (Darius Force = Super Nova), much akin to the drastic rebranding on Assault Suit Leynos.
And agreed that 90% of the time, the Japanese box art mops the floor with the Western designs. This was true across the industry during the '80s and '90s, though. I'll never understand where Western game publishers got the idea that gamers didn't like animé/manga-styled art.
Yeah, the "Lightening Force" moniker for Thunder Force IV is a crime against humanity.
For future reference, "Soleil" is pronounced "so-lay", French for "sun".
Those name changes are amazing! Some of them are unique and the others are pretty absurd but all in all this video was awesome! Great job SLX!
agreed.some you can understand due to not really translating, but some are just bizarre!
Best part of the Bare Knuckle II cover art is that they used Jean Claude Van Dame's face for Axl and Arnold Schwarzenegger as the villains face in the background.
I've always found game changes between countries to be quite fascinating, especially when it comes to licensed games released in Japan that were completed changed when they were ported to the US. For example, there was a "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" video game released on the Famicom Disc System in Japan that was changed to "Bug Bunny's Crazy Castle" when it was released for the NES in the US, and the "Donald Duck" video game that was released in Japan was changed to "Snoopy And Friends" in the US. Sometimes, however, there are some rare ocassions in which games released in the US would actually become changed when ported to Japan such as "The Jetsons: Invasion Of The Planet Pirates" on the SNES, which was remade into a title featuring the female mascot of a popular Japanese video game magazine.
The entire Crazy Castle series is full of this stuff.
The weirdest one I've seen is a cancelled South Park game for Game Boy color that ended up being released in various territories as Maya the Bee as well as TWO Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen video games.
@@KasumiKenshirou Speaking of which, perhaps on the most unusal changes to be made in a game before it was released internationally would have to be "Mickey Mouse IV" for the Game Boy, which was reworked into a game based on "The Real Ghostbusters" when it was released in the US. But when the game was ported to Europe, however, it was changed to a game starring Garfield, which I definitely would have loved as a kid.
Crying / Biohazard Battle was made by M2 and was originally an X68000 project that switched to the Megadrive halfway through the project after Sega showed interest. M2 still has the beta X68000 version and has shown some footage from it on Facebook a few years ago.
I never knew that. It would explain why it's so unusual. That unusual quality to it is what drew me to it when I tried it. I didn't expect much from it, but it played well and that music was something, in a good way. Glad to know more about it. I need to play that again sometime soon.
TH-cam: How niche is your content?
Sega Lord X: Yes.
Sorry to use such a hoary old joke format to praise your work. This channel always surprises me with creative focus and always-interesting content. Thanks for creating, sharing and loving video games.
I laughed :)
For Master System and Sega Saturn, here are some examples;
Master System = Alex Kidd: High-Tech World was originally Anmitsu Hime (if it wasn't already obvious enough this is hardly an Alex Kidd game), Aztec Adventure was originally Nazca '88: The Golden Road to Paradise, Bubble Bobble was Final Bubble Bobble, Cyborg Hunter was Choon Sneshi Borgman, and Power Strike was Aleste.
Sega Saturn = Alone in the Dark 2 in Japan retains the original official name, but for some reason Europe went with Alone in the Dark: Jack is Back and NA went with Alone in the Dark: One-Eyed Jack's Revenge, the infamous Battle Arena Toshinden Remix was Toshinden S (Japan sure has a thing for sticking a letter at the end of some titles), the word blam was added for the North American version of Machine Head, Puzzle Bobble became the Bust-a-Move series, Daytona USA: Championship Circuit is ironically not just a localized version of Circuit Edition, DecAthlete was changed to Athlete Kings for Europe, Die Hard Arcade was modified into Dynamite Dekka and that Japan version got an actual sequel, Weirdly; Digital Pinball: Last Gladiators was split into two different names outside of Japan, and High Velocity: Mountain Racing Challenge used to be Touge King the Spirits (honestly, the NA name works out better).
The arcade version of Runark / Growl will really make you laugh out loud: it is perhaps _the most vegan game ever made,_ but it's both intentionally and unintentionally hilarious.
The Thunder Force IV -> Lightening Force swap burned me when I was a kid. I loved TFIII to death but never knew TFIV came to NA due to the name change and missed it. Still mad.
7:12 The arcade version was also called Sagaia outside of Japan and can be played on Darius Cozmic Collection in all regions.
This is such a good episode, I like all the comparisons you made between regions. Any way maybe we can get one of Nintendo game title changes? Thank you for your good Sega content, love it.
Leave the Nintendo stuff to 'Scott The Woz' 😛😂
Nice to note the differences beyond the names. I also liked you showing more of the gameplays, but feels much when more than 10 seconds. Keeping the box art more would also be nice to look at the differences without pausing very much. Having time stamps for the games would also be a welcome improvement. Great content nonetheless, thanks!
Impressive work on this, my friend. The Contra, Ex Ranza and Chelnov japanese artworks are stunning!
One name change I ran into was "Leander" on the Amiga got renamed by Electronic Arts to "Galahad" on the Genesis.
This is a great idea for videos. And dang "Lightening Force" was a pretty game!
Thank you so much for spreading your love of Sega. I appreciate you giving a segment to the SoR/BK3 club stage. It's one of the best songs on the hardware and it gets overshadowed by other, lower quality songs from the game.
Soleil - so-lay - French for "sun".
Crusader of Centy/Soleil (French for "sun") is underrated. One weird thing is that the Nintendo Switch Online version only features English texts, while the version on Mega Drive Mini II that I imported from Japan also has the German and French translations.
And also the Spanish translation.
Mega Drive: is the best name.
I think both stack up nicely. I will say using the Japanese/European name is a lot less confusing and rolls off the tongue a lot easier.
I kind of liked how the non-American name was matched well it's eventual competition, the Super Famicom/Super Nintendo.
Sounds like they still 1-up'd Nintendo... depending on which sounds bigger/cooler to you I suppose.... SUPER or MEGA.
But always liked too how the 2 big American 16 bit consoles at the time had their Brands and Console Names flipped...
SEGANintendo
Kind of weird when you think of it that way. So was Nintendo's console actually just called "SUPER"? Rhetorical question but it's fun and interesting pick apart.
Yes
Still have my original mega drive and all my games a full box full
Genesis: suck it
@@codydfwnwas more that the SNES was the Super NES then anything - Nintendo wanted to use the name to ensure everyone knew it was a sort of continuation.
Shame that thinking wasn't present with Wii -> WiiU 🤦♂️
I always thought that US box art for Revenge of Shinobi is really well done, thanks for calling it out here
It's a Japanese artwork. It appears on the backcover of the Japanese release.
@@WeskerSega ok, that's cool
I'm pretty sure the reason Sega didn't care about Socket's similarities to Sonic was because they were already on great terms with Vic Tokai due to them already developing Columns 3 for them at that time. Heck the main characters of Battle Mania eventually appeared as the only official third party characters in Segagaga.
Ah Probotector. I miss the Probotector Branding of Contra. I always found it way cooler to play as Battlemechs instead of "lame" Humans. Of course as I grow older I got over that but I still miss the Probotectors.
Excellent comparison video! Kind of surprised you didn't mention Splatterhouse 2, what with the cover art differences and the Terror Mask being changed to the skull in the U.S. and PAL territories. Mystic Defender/Kujaku Ou 2 would have been nice to see as well.
Decapattack is another one I love and the original graphics are so boring I thank God someone changed them to Monsters and Skeletons
Battle Mania 1-2 is one favorite shoot em ups on the Genesis. Has that Treasure/SEGA charm and humor to a T. The developers clearly admired SEGA's brand/image at the time.
I miss old Sega
Alot of us do!
It's taken them so long but it feels like they're finally acknowledging they actually didn't suck at one point. With all the SEGA L's throughout the years, it's finally a relief to see them looking in the mirror and reflecting proudly for a change. Their side of the 16-bit era has been overshadowed by the wave of Nintendo-tubers. When everyone declared Nintendo won the console wars due to AVGN's console war video back then which people took as gospel at the time.
It left a stain for years. It's sad that it's only now that we seem to be having the more adult mindset seen throughout that we can just buy what we enjoy and don't have to be a loyal fanboy to corporations that generally could not care less. lol
Old Sega died with the Sammy merge.
@@codydfwnit's really got nothing to do with AVGN, people that grew up with the systems back in the day already made their minds up years ago. Really talking about zoomers being persuaded, well maybe. Talking about the Genesis or Snes, plenty of bullshit trash talk on both sides.
The funny thing about the whole Socket/Time Dominator 1st change is that the game went from being named after the hero to named after the villain.
I can think of two more examples: Kujaku Ou 1 and 2 for Sega Mark 3 and Mega Drive turned into Spellcaster for Master System and Mystic Defender for Genesis/European Mega Drive, respectively (Kujaku Ou 2 even had a change of box art because of some nudity).
Then, Tatsujin (Mega Drive) is known as Truxton in Europe and US. Why, I have no idea.
Well done! You keep coming out with such interesting ideas for videos and it's always amazing to watch! You can easily make a part 2 as i've found another 6 off the top of my head that were not showcased in part 1.
1. Super Shinobi II/Shinobi III
2. Mazin' Wars/Mazin Saga
3. Captain Lang/Captain Havoc/Havoc
4. Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine/Puyo Puyo
5. Mick & Mack As The Global Gladiators/Global Gladiators
6. World Cup Italia' 90/Sega Soccer
General notes: I'm pretty sure Grindstormer was developed by Toaplan not Tengen and only published by Tengen. I kind of prefer the name Gynoug and the PAL European cover art over the U.S. variant myself and Dariius II/Sagaia is a really decent shooter on the system, loved it on the Master System where I first learned about it and played it, then finally got the Mega Drive/Genesis port imported from the U.S. which blew me away even more! Also i'm in Australia and i've never heard of us getting a unique version of Castlevania with the gore back in the day, but then again the game was rare as rocking horse shit in Auz even back in 1994 as I never saw it on game shelves even back then? My version that I own was imported from France or Portugal so it's the European PAL port known as ''The New Generation'' I also own a cheap repro of the beta version of Castlevania - The New Generation'' which has a typo in it and no real ending. It does have different options in the menu to the final retail version.
Love Bio Hazard battle the animations was really impressive especially the blobs
Yay! Another SLX vid!
This guy's cadence is likely the most unique element of this channel
I still will never understand the change of Thunder Force 4 to Lightening Force. It was a good thing that I knew of the existence of the actual name of the game prior to it coming out or I would've otherwise missed out on that excellent game.
Localization was always interesting. Japan usually got the better cover art, though! 😋 Yeah, the whole Thunder Force IV name change in the US made no sense and was just completely confusing! The great thing is that there are many game patches available, so you can enjoy some of the localized changes in other regions.
I do remember some old '90s game tip publications during the 8 and 16 bit era had some weird mistakes regarding localization. One of the games shown in one of US publications was "Gynoug" but they had not changed it to the US name "Wings of Wor". This confused me completely as a kid as I wanted this game called "Gynoug", but no game or rental store carried it. It wasn't until years later I figured out that the publication had the wrong game name for the region. 😅
Topics like this always fascinate me
'Bare Knuckle' sure is a wild title choice for a game where literally EVERY character wears some sort of gloves or gauntlets.
As kids, we just got used to the extra difficulty in Streets of Rage 3. I’m not any good at the game anymore, but I definitely remember me and my friends beating it on the hardest mode repeatedly- we’d been playing the SOR series for years at that point, so it didn’t actually seem all that hard in “normal.”
Currently, both versions kick my ass, but Bare Knuckle 3 feels way slower and kinda boring compared to the US version. Honestly, my only complaint with SOR3 is the pointless censorship.
I always thought the marketing department of these early software companies were full of people who had no idea about their potential customers. That old story of the guy in the Nintendo store room being asked by executives to yay or nay games being the exception 🇦🇺✌️
Here in the UK I brought Cyber Cop from a second hand store. Got home and found out the hard way it was Corporation
I remember seeing Fatman also listed as Mondu's Fight Palace in a magazine and, meaning it actually took time for the brass to decide on these different names. While I agree on the Target Earth art not being an improvement, it certainly hearkens back to the Atari art of the 80's. Could've been far worse!
Man i remember those old magazines. Electronic Gaming Monthly, Gamepro and Die Hard Game Fan.
Devil Crash MD being renamed (and 'censored') to Dragon's Fury always bugged me... but I owned the Japanese version long before it got localized - and now I own both!
Don’t let the woke/lgbtq/feminist community hear about the Streets of Rage 3 western changes. They might cancel it.
Reminds me of motorcycle superbike game Redline Racer, which was released as "Suzuki Alstare Championship Racing" I played it on the Dreamcast around 99-2000, also hearing about this Redline Racer game I wanted to add to my motorcycle game library, and had no idea I played it, lol.
Biohazard Battle was such a good shooter with a great soundtrack. I had no idea it was called Crying in Japan. And I never noticed the poor spelling of Lightening Force. Wow, that was bad.
Another great video fella. Interesting choices on some of these reginal changes
The change to Lightening Force didn't bother me back then, I was huge fan of Technosoft (love me some Herzog Zwei) and the Thunderforce series of games that we got on the Genesis, and rationalized the change because Light(e)ning is the real power behind the Thunder.
Trouble Shooter gives me Forgotten World vibes, I'm sorry I missed this one back then.
Thank you SLX for joining Rumble. Without free speech and competition gaming and life in general will get a lot worse
05:16 I loved the Battlestar Galactica (2004) boxset. I might watch it again soon as a consequence of this reminder.
Your consistency and the quality of your content are over the top!!🎉
21:15 Never trust sidewalk pizza, dude.
Bio hazard battle seems like a direct precursor to something like Mushihimisama
Langrisser was released in North America as Warsong. The character names were changed and portraits were updated to make them look less anime
3 names! Mondu’s Fight Palace - Tongue of the Fatman - Slaughter Sport
Zombies ate my neighbors and Zombies were sold on the same shelf here in europe
19:35 I remember seeing that Power Moves box art/ad and thinking the graphics looked like concept art. Seeing the thing in action, my suspicions are confirmed. How did they get away with that?!
What i found interesting was how games loaded up with the different name if in the different console. I had a japanese megadrive and cut the edges down to fit in English cartridges. When my friend put in his revenge of shinobi it came up as super shinobi.
❗️Firstly, I am a gamer from 🏴
12:34 I STILL refer to it as 'Runark' as that is what it was called on a MD Emulator (Genesyst) for PC: Pentium 2 I got in 2000.
I like the game and wish it would come back, especially in this 'save the animals' climate we're currently in.
31:01 I refer to it as 'Beyond Oasis' as 'Thor' to me is the Marvel Comics character.
Lightening Force pissed me off so much. I ignored it on the shelf for years, not knowing it was Thunder Force IV. I bought it instantly upon learning that, and only regretted waiting so long. ;)
Lightening Force rocks it looks too good to be Thunderforce. The leap in graphics is really astounding but its weird to forget the franchise like that
Mondu's Fight Palace / Tongue of the Fatman / Slaughter Sport is the first time I remember a game getting a bunch of name changes before it came out. I remember seeing all of them in EGM before it finally came out. I guess a "rose" by any other name still smells like garbage.
It was released as Mondu's on the C64. I actually finished it back in the day.
Kept waiting for Warsong. My friends and played it so much. Great music imo too.
6:41 Gives "speak from the gut" new meaning. LOL
Although I'm not a huge Genesis fan, this is an impressive video highlighting your in depth knowledge.
Thanks.
Another day with Sega Lord X thanks
As an old Amiga gamer (my family had an Amiga before we had a Nintendo), I love the Roger Dean artwork of old Psygnosis games, but I'll admit that's one of his weaker pieces. weirdly, the Amiga cover for Killing Game Show doesn't use that art and is much worse.
(Looked it up, and the art comes from Dean's pitch for the art for Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds rock opera, which he lost to some other artists. Similar art was used for the game Terrorpods).
did your family get (have) the Nintendo 2DS, 3DS, DS, GB, GBA, GBC, NES, SNES, N64, GameCube, Wii, Wii U, Switch 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 years after Amiga?
I can forgive Japan for having Sonic 3D: Flickies Island as an actual title. However, it's strange that Europe kept the same name.
Very confusing development lies behind this game. The original name for the game was ''Sonic Spindrft'' and Traveller's Tales were British and based in the U.K. which is a PAL region yet Jon Burton the head programmer has stated that the game was always meant for 60Hz speed. It's the very first time i've ever heard a developer from one region make a game better in another region and not the actual region the game was made in and with no speed increase implemented for 50Hz. Usually the game would run better or be intended to play better in it's own region of development, but Jon Burton says otherwise apparently?
Love the channel, watching you for years keep it up brother
Slaughter Sport/Fatman was originally Tongue of the Fatman for MS-DOS, and the box art for that game was really grotesque and creepy. Just like the main antagonist: Mondu the Fat himself!
Forgot to add I think it wound be kind of funny to find X-Men games that had thier name changed to Wellcome to Die.
Genesis is a name change itself. It was only called the Genesis in the US and Canada for copyright issues.
what or who had trademarked the Mega-Drive name in the USA or Canada? or is it a possibility Sega America had a disagreement with Sega Europe or Sega Japan on the Mega-Drive name then Sega America changed it to Genesis?
I remember hearing about the super shinobi's cameos and how some of them were changed! also I think tongue of the fatman also went by 'mondu's fight palace' back on PC?
Top Gunner and Jackal
Great Stuff, as always!
The console itself.
USA - Sega Genesis
Rest of the world - Sega Mega Drive
Actually, Samsung marketed the Mega Drive 1 as the Super GamBoy and Mega Drive 2 as the Super Aladdin Boy in South Korea.
@@SegaLordX I never knew that. Interesting.
Each to there own but i definitely prefer turtles in time on snes to hyperstone heist. Both great though.
Luckily, the Japanese boxes tend to have Katakana. Just for the sake of knowing and not to be a stickler, Ex-Ranza is Ek-u-su(like ex) Ranza and not E-X. I made that mistake at first too. Ranger X is not a bad way to rename it, in my opinion. Gynoug is ji-no-gu, or jee-nogue(like rogue). Of all the ways to pronounce Gynoug, that's not one I expected. And just for fun, Darius is Da-rai-us, with the rai being like the word rye. But I'd only pronounce it that way if I was talking to someone from Japan, but it's interesting to know. I love Grind Stormer, and I always liked the Genesis port. It helped me get better at the arcade version, as the Genesis version is a bit easier without being significantly different. Your criticisms of it are fair, and it is rough visually, though it may have looked decent on a CRT. The first impression isn't the best as the opening stage loses a lot of color, and most of the sprite flicker in the game is on that first real boss, but after that it's a pretty solid experience, and there are lots of sprites for the system to display, as the arcade version is very close to bullet hell territory, and it somehow manages to do it all pretty well. The PCB issue does appear to be true as I've seen people talk on discussion boards about dead carts and have seen videos of transplanting to ROM chip. I believe John Riggs did a video for that. I seem to recall Pit Fighter being considered a good source for a compatible PCB. There are probably enough Pit Fighter carts around that it won't matter much. And I say that as someone who likes Pit Fighter.
Crying/Biohazard Battle is really cool. When I tried it, I had no expectations for it. I only tried it because it was one of the Genesis games Sega had on Steam 10 years ago. Maybe it was the low expectations, but I really enjoyed it, and it didn't take long to feel that way. The strange soundtrack is one of my favorite parts of it. I should go back to that one again soon. I never did get to the end on that one.
Seeing as there's no separate rom available anywhere for the Australian version of Castlevania, I would hazard a guess, that they didn't get a separate uncensored version.
Brotheeeeeeer i played kid chameleon on sega mega when i was a kid and you just unlocked a visceral memory thank you imma play it on my retroid pocked 3 asap lol
In terms of bad names in different territories the original bomberman was called here in the UK Eric and the Floaters when a floater is a slang term for a turd that is hard to flush 😅
I think calling them “Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles” is one of the lamest things Europe has ever done.
True, but that box art was great.
I loved the story of thor and was able to play the game and find the unlimited fire swords and unlimited bomb crossbows, I loved Probotector as well.
I'll be hollered with you when I was growing up I can remember going to Kmart and choosing between whitening for and bowhazard battle because both came to $20 a piece and I didn't have enough money to get both of them with my allowance
So what ended up picking up lightning Force and it still one of my favorite Genesis games and one of my favorite shoot them up games to this day
The only regret I have is getting rid of my complete copy when I was in my 20 cuz I was upgrading to get newer games at game crazy
But I do own a cart only copy now and I would love to get a complete copy of them to get someday
Thank you for reading this and thank you for your content sir and I hope you're having a good day And I hope everyone that is reading this is having a good day
God bless you and your family
God bless you
Jeremy Scruggs
It's weird that Fat Man got changed to "Slaughter Sport", considering that it's a port of Tongue of the Fatman on DOS.
One of the most egregious was on the Game Gear. For some reason, they renamed Wonder Boy to "Revenge of Drancon" and gave it spooky cover art. Come on, this game was already released in North America as Wonder Boy on the Master System!
Funnily enough, the European Game Gear release keeps the original Wonder Boy title but combines it with the spooky cover art of the North American version.
I've had to repair many Tengen carts, not just Grind Stormer, with bad vias. Not sure why they decided to make their own boards but they can be problematic for sure.
The reason it was called "Fatman", is because it is a port of an old pc game called "Tongue of the Fatman",
Love me some good box art differences.
You can do a video of each game or some or all with the screen side by side comparison about the graphical changes and or sounds per region.
I honestly think the box art used for Europe and America with Sonic 2 is better. While it's strange that Eggman has a beard; it's conceptually more memorable. Sonic 2's Japan box art just wasn't as good of an effort as with Sonic 1, Sonic 3, Sonic Jam, Sonic Spinball, and Sonic 3D Blast.
Japan has the best Sonic 3 box art, but I also quite like the North American box art. Sadly, the European one is not all that good. There were multiple artists involved and the end product feels sloppy.
Sonic & Knuckles has a rather similar box art in all regions. Though I lean more into the European and North American box arts.
Fantastic Video Thank You.