About this Site

Hi everyone. I’ve played, reviewed, and documented my thoughts about every game that was released in North America during the 16-bit era. That’s 716 Super Nintendo, 704 Sega Genesis, and 95 TurboGrafx-16 games, for a grand total of 1,515 fourth-generation titles.

My goal in reviewing all these games was to create an ordinally ranked, best-to-worst list of every 16-bit game.

The reviews are full of typos and incomplete sentences, but I don't care. The notes are simply gravy on top of the scores assigned to each game.

Some Background

Project Scope - This page explains the scope of the project, including a breakdown of all noteworthy games that were included or excluded. 

Methodology - Here's an explanation about the methodology I employed when reviewing and grading each game and how I assigned each game an overall score.

Who Am I? - In case you want to know more about the author.

Sortable Lists

You can explore the reviews in three different ways: by scrolling down on this page (not recommended), via the labels in the right nav, or by viewing the three pages linked below. Each page includes a table where you can sort or filter the list of games by Title, Score, Publisher, and Year.

All SNES Games
All Genesis Games
All TurboGrafx-16 Games

Please enjoy one man's fully formed opinion of the fourth-generation of video game console libraries.

Zico Soccer for SFC

Image: MobyGames

Zico Soccer

RTS soccer

Genre: sports - soccer

Publisher: Electronic Arts Victor

Year: 1994

System: SFC

Gameplay Score: 0

Gameplay Notes:

This is ostensibly a simulation game, but rather than picking strategies or doing anything like a turn-based game, this one has you using a cursor to play some sort of RTS gameplay. Whoever has the ball obeys your command (more on that later) and will otherwise do absolutely nothing. So yeah, your job is to micromange the guy with the ball using a mouse cursor. Instead of, yaknow, micromanaging the guy with the ball using the d-pad like every other normal soccer video game. This would all be tolerable if pressing buttons actually did something but alas that isn't the case. It's impossible to make your guy do what you want to. It's truly awful.

Level Design Score: 1

Level Design Notes:

Fine, it's got the modes, but the gameplay is so awful that I can't give it any credit here. If there was some configuration to change the controls then fine, but this is terrible.

Theme Score: 3

Theme Notes:

Looks and feels like a FIFA title with all the licenses to boot.

Art Style Score: 2

Art Style Notes:

Looks ok, but the viewport is so tiny.

Audio Score: 3

Audio Notes:

Some rocking menu tunes

Overall Score: 18

Review ID: 1967

Zero4 Champ RR-Z for SFC

Image: MobyGames

Zero4 Champ RR-Z

Another 9 seconds of gameplay

Genre: racing - simulation

Publisher: Media Rings

Year: 1995

System: SFC

Gameplay Score: 0

Gameplay Notes:

Level Design Score: 1

Level Design Notes:

Theme Score: 2

Theme Notes:

Art Style Score: 3

Art Style Notes:

Audio Score: 2

Audio Notes:

Overall Score: 17

Review ID: 1966

Zero4 Champ RR for SFC

Image: MobyGames

Zero4 Champ RR

9 seconds of gameplay

Genre: racing - simulation

Publisher: Media Rings

Year: 1994

System: SFC

Gameplay Score: 0

Gameplay Notes:

It's a drag race, so the gameplay loop is less than 10 seconds long. The controls are awkward because you have to hold down on A for the gas and simultaneously push in the clutch with Y, shift with the d-pad in the gearbox, and never let up on the gas. Whoever has the bigger engine and better dexterity will win, and of course the computer will destroy you every single time. So... yeah that's the game.

Level Design Score: 1

Level Design Notes:

Two modes: Story and VS. Story is unplayable unless you know Japanese, so thankfully the verses mode can be played by one player. However, there's not much to the mode. You just play one race and it ends.

Theme Score: 2

Theme Notes:

Ok presentation

Art Style Score: 3

Art Style Notes:

Audio Score: 2

Audio Notes:

Overall Score: 17

Review ID: 1965

Zenkoku Koukou Soccer 2 for SFC

Image: MobyGames

Zenkoku Koukou Soccer 2

Plays better but still not readable

Genre: sports - soccer

Publisher: Yojigen

Year: 1995

System: SFC

Gameplay Score: 3

Gameplay Notes:

Significant improvement over the original. You can run around, pass the ball, play defense, and score a goal every now and then. Good stuff.

Level Design Score: 1

Level Design Notes:

Just like the original, there's so much Japanese to read that you'll have no idea how to navigate the many, many menus.

Theme Score: 1

Theme Notes:

Less arcadey than the first game. More stuffy

Art Style Score: 2

Art Style Notes:

Tall, small, spindly sprites. Again, terrible menus.

Audio Score: 2

Audio Notes:

Ok music

Overall Score: 44

Review ID: 1964

Zenkoku Koukou Soccer for SFC

Image: MobyGames

Zenkoku Koukou Soccer

I hope you know Japanese

Genre: sports - soccer

Publisher: Yojigen

Year: 1994

System: SFC

Gameplay Score: 1

Gameplay Notes:

Good luck getting the ball to the other side of the pitch. Ugh, yeah it's one of those games. Utterly impossible, which is a shame because it actually controls well. But the opponents swarm you and run circles around your slow players.

Level Design Score: 2

Level Design Notes:

It's got the modes, but since everything in Japanese they're hard to find.

Theme Score: 1

Theme Notes:

Way too much Japanese. Still, the game looks very arcadey.

Art Style Score: 3

Art Style Notes:

Nice chunky sprites with good animation. The menus look awful, but the game looks good in motion.

Audio Score: 3

Audio Notes:

Great music and sound effects

Overall Score: 33

Review ID: 1963

Zen Nihon GT Senshuken: Hyper Battle Game for SFC

Image: MobyGames

Zen Nihon GT Senshuken: Hyper Battle Game

Turn here. Here? HERE!

Genre: racing - overhead

Publisher: Banpresto

Year: 1995

System: SFC

Gameplay Score: 4

Gameplay Notes:

As good as it gets with an overhead racer. Fast acceleration, responsive movement that doesn't require too much correction, a weighty feel to the controls, nice arrows indicating what upcoming turns look like, and good physics for bumping the walls and driving offroad. It's all very forgiving, but rewarding to get good at. The only thing missing is a HUD with a map.

Level Design Score: 2

Level Design Notes:

Only two modes - Story/GT and Time Trial. Unfortunately, the only way to race against other racers is in GT and it's hidden behind multiple warm up races and layers upon layers of menus. I played for 30 minutes and never did get to play an actual race. I only know it exists because of the demo video from the title screen. There are only 4 tracks! Four!! I don't see this game having much replayability.

Theme Score: 2

Theme Notes:

Lots of Japanese text. It's hard to recommend this as a competitive racing game since you need to know Japanese to play the GT/Story mode. But this works well as a time trial only, driving simulator. There are real-world drivers and realistic headshots of people all over the menus. It has an authentic, real-world feel to it.

Art Style Score: 5

Art Style Notes:

WOW! I'm shocked that this is running on an SNES. It looks simply incredible. The framerate, in particular, is blazing fast and helps to convey a tremendous sense of speed. The car sprites and are detailed and feature amazing animation. This is easily one fo the best looking 16-bit racing games ever and beats a lot of the next generation's titles as well. Simply stunning.

Audio Score: 2

Audio Notes:

Terrible music. It's high-pitched and shrill. The menu theme drove me absolutely nuts. No music plays while racing, and thankfully the sound effects are perfect. Mute the game while in menus and then unmute while racing.

Overall Score: 66

Review ID: 1962