Parents' Guide to

Sega Genesis Classics

By David Chapman, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 10+

Nostalgic 16-bit game buffet has something for everyone.

Sega Genesis Classics Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this game.

Community Reviews

age 8+

Based on 1 parent review

age 8+
Oi, Columns is hardly casual, you philistines. You must be thinking of Bejeweled and all it's mobile clones. THAT is casual. Columns is one third of the Holy Puzzle Trinity along with Tetris and Puyo Puyo. You can spend decades working towards mastery. Speaking of Puyo Puyo, I very much recommend the Steam version of Sega Classics Collection, since you can mod the Americanized "Mean Bean Machine" bastardization back to how it's meant to be played.

This title has:

Great messages
Great role models
Easy to play/use

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (1 ):
Kids say (1 ):

It may hard to believe in this era of 4k graphics and virtual reality, but there was a time when 16-bit images were king, and gamers milked all kinds of fun out of every available pixel. Players can revisit that period in gaming history with Sega Genesis Classics, a collection of more than 50 titles from the heyday of the Sega Genesis console. Of course, as with any collection, fans are going to have heated opinions about which games are here and which aren't. But you've got to give credit to Sega for including a huge range of themes and genres. There really is something here for just about everyone.

Each game stays faithful to its original presentation, though it's the added little extras that make the collection shine. Things like the save status and rewind functions encourage players to try out different strategies without fear of a dreaded "Game Over." Meanwhile, options like Mirror Mode take the familiarity of some classic experiences and switch things up, offering a fresh new feeling that relies on more than muscle memory. While it would have been nice to toss in some extra trivia or commentary to appeal to fans, this still feels like a real love letter to the retro games that ultimately paved the way for modern gaming hits.

Game Details

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