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If Consoles Were Hot Dogs |
If
you're an Atari Jaguar fan, you know how often this
"Jaguar is 16-bit because it has a Motorola 68000 CPU!"
nonsense pops up. Self-proclaimed "experts" think the
"proof" that the Jaguar isn't 64-bit is by looking at
the quickly ported games like Cannon Fodder, Dino
Dudes, Pifall, Brutal Sports Football, Flashback, Soccer
Kid, Zoop, and Bubsy while "conveniently"
ignoring games no SNES or Genesis could do. Games like
Tempest 2000, Alien vs. Predator, Iron Soldier 1 & 2,
BattleSphere Classic & Gold, Cybermorph, Battlemorph,
Skyhammer, Space War 2000, Phaze Zero, Missile Command
3D, Towers II, Zero 5, Black Ice/White Noise, Myst,
Hover Strike, Highlander, World Tour Racing, Fight for
Life, Vid Grid, I-War, or even the awful games like Club Drive,
White Men Can't Jump, Supercross
3D, Checkered Flag, & Aircars!
Even 10 years after the demise of the Jaguar, these "experts" (aka Nintendo & Sega fanboys) refuse to admit the Jaguar was more powerful than their systems. Blind loyalty I suppose.
Since it's difficult to explain to the "experts," I've thought of a simple way of explaining the differences in power between the three systems while preparing my lunch one day. We all love hot dogs, right? We all doctor them up with our own condiments like mustard, ketchup, and relish right? And we don't often eat a hot dog without a Coke or pretzels or chips, right? And sometimes it's nice to have a dessert to go along with our lunch too.
So, without further delay, here is a guide for the self-proclaimed "experts" to help them understand the differences between the Super Nintendo, Genesis, and the (vastly more powerful, this is no contest) Jaguar.
 Sega Genesis - First, you get the Sega Genesis. It's raw, sometimes rough and grainy looking graphics make you think you're eating a raw uncooked hot dog. Sure, it's nutritious, but you somehow know that there are better ways to eat a dog. Perhaps cooking it would be a start? |
 Super
NES - Next, you have the Super Nintendo. Someone
remembered that the dog needs to be cooked! Not only that, but they
thought to include a bun! Sure, the games are fun, but then so are
games on any system! The SNES's smooth high color graphics look nice
for awhile, but the 2D quickly gets
repetitive and bland. And the "Mode 7" effects begin to look
gimmicky. You begin to wish there was more to this wiener. |
 Super
NES + SFX chip - So you add some ketchup to doctor it up.
Wow! now you've got a Super Nintendo with an SFX chip capable of
doing some rough 3D graphics! Finally the system has the flavor to
do games like Starfox and a crude (almost unplayable) version
of Doom. But that's about it. The SFX leaves you wishing for
even more. You know there must be a hot dog that can do all of this
and much more. |
 Sega
Genesis + 32X - Along comes the Sega 32X! Wow, now here's
a pretty capable dog. It can churn out the 3D graphics fairly
nicely. It significantly improves the Genesis's color palette which
smoothes out the look of the graphics. This is a dog with ketchup,
mustard, AND relish! Doom is much faster than on the previous
dog, but it still lacks a bunch of features (most noticeably,
full-screen mode.) Still, is a hot dog good enough by itself? Aren't
you still missing a few key things (like a drink?!) |
 Atari
Jaguar - With the Jaguar, you get all of the previous
stuff with more than a few additionals. You get the great hot dog
along with pretzels and a Coke! You can do the 16-bit looking stuff
as well as being able to churn out 3D graphics the SNES and Genesis
could only dream about (or try to mimic with add-ons.) Stuff like
Iron Soldier 2, AvP, and Battlesphere are so graphically
and technologically superior they make the SNES and Genesis look like the bland dogs that they are. Sure, not
all the games are winners, but this hot dog's smooth graphics and
color palette show just how lacking the earlier systems were.
There's only one thing that could make this hot dog even better.
Some dessert! |
 Atari
Jaguar + CD - The Jaguar CD is just the extra sweet topper
to your lunch. It's the M&M's dumped on your plate. Now you can play
super boring (but popular) titles like Myst and the
exceptional 3D Battlemorph. It's not an essential improvement to
the original system, but it adds some sweet features like the VLM and
a few more games to the mix. |
Can it get even better than that? Sure it can. Is a hot dog the greatest meal ever? Certainly not. You could always go with the foot long hot dog. Or maybe even a steak dinner with all the fixins. Every game system has it's rough edges. Not all hot dogs are the same. But when some insane ranter begins comparing the 64-bit Jaguar to the 16-bit dogs, there's no top dog like the Jaguar.