Most Underrated system?

[MacCarth]

Looking back on how systems have changed, I've always wondered why the Dreamcast never succeeded. It was one of the first consoles to have online play, it had VMU's (virtual memory units) which allowed you to play mini games on the memory cards in order to unlock stuff in the original game, it had a backing from their mascot, sonic, as well as DOA 2 and Power Stone (two of the greatest fighting games ever behind SF, IMO). The controllers were tolerable, and the game lineup was better than a lot of games out for the PS3 and Wii right now.

I guess the Playstation 2 kinda blew dreamcast out of the water once it was released.

But still, I'd like to see the revival of a VMU. Those things rocked hardcore.

 

[The Irrelevant Gamer]

Rampant piracy, no EA Sports, lack of advertising, and extremely popular franchises being all over the PS2 would be my guesses as to why my favorite console failed. I still have my Dreamcast.

 

[BonsaiK]

The Vectrex was the coolest console ever to exist. Firstly it had the best controller in the world (an analaog stick - in 1982!!! - plus 4 big old 'doomsday device' style buttons with cool numbers on them so you knew that touching one was serious business) it could display any colour you liked (thanks to awesome colour overlays) and the vector graphics were silky smooth. The games on it didn't utilise the hardware as much as they could have but there was a goregeous 3d space flight type thing, and boy did the version of Asteroids that came with it kick ass, it made the original arcade version look like a turd. Sure the console died fast and hardly anyone ever got one, but just because it wasn't popular doesn't mean it wasn't awesome.

For underrated computer systems, I always liked my Amiga 1200 which outperformed the PCs of the time with its amazing integrated graphics hardware (a forerunner to today's graphics cards), the wonderful Amiga OS which pissed all over both Windows and Mac OS from a great height in terms of stability and ease of use, and a big-ass 200mb hard drive and 10mb ram! The games on it out-doomed Doom and I still use it today for live music because unlike a PC or Mac I can trust the Amiga OS to run correct and never crash. Ever. Mine still runs perfectly 15 years after I got it (playing with Merzbow ruined my keyboard though). Of course it commercially bombed too thanks to Commodore's inability to keep up with the joneses, but so what, it was awesome and still is. And the versions of Frontier and UFO Enemy Unknown that came with it crapped on the PC versions.

 

[Slurms]

Id mark the Saturn on there to. I was a big Saturn fan but it just had bad timing. It was never intended to be a 3D system, it just happened to be developed when the PS one was comming out and the Sega dev team said " Quick! throw in a 3D capable GPU!" .

also, agreed with the Dreamcast....I couldnt get enough of Ready 2 Rumble boxing and Power Stone...

 

[twilight_dweller]

The SNES. It had great games, but was soon forgotten with the rush of "3d lol" game consoles.

 

[blackadvent]

For me, it's a tie. Dreamcast and N64.

Dreamcast for obvious reasons, ie squashed by the PS2 and ignored by EA.

N64 for being demoted to 'kid' status whilst the PS1 got all of the 'mature' games that people craved. There were good games (Banjo series, Zelda, Mario, Star Wars games), but no one seemed to care when Final Fantasy started getting released on the PS1.

 

[The Irrelevant Gamer]

The SNES. It had great games, but was soon forgotten with the rush of "3d lol" game consoles.

Are you serious? The SNES was one of the greatest consoles of all time, but underrated? I find that hard to credit. It reigned supreme for quite some time, and nobody can seriously deny the impact it had on gaming at large.

 

[twilight_dweller]

Are you serious? The SNES was one of the greatest consoles of all time, but underrated? I find that hard to credit. It reigned supreme for quite some time, and nobody can seriously deny the impact it had on gaming at large.

Not "one of" it is the greatest console of all time. But presently it is vastly underrated. For example. Ask anyone and they will say Final Fantasy VII is better than Final Fantasy VI. The only thing FFVII did is have tits in full 3D.

 

[RelentlessRolento]

my vote goes to Neo Geo Pocket Color. It had so much potential, then the Game Boy color came and killed it.

 

[raankh]

I'm voting Vectrex too, with a cool plotter screen and a YM2149 soundchip, that thing rocks. One of the best games is the built-in Asteroids clone. dum DUM dum DUM, dum DUM DUM-DUM! Plus, Space Harrier in plotted colour vector graphics!

It was just waaaay too expensive, I gather from people a few years older than me.

 

[laikenf]

I think the N64 was pretty underrated.

 

[The Irrelevant Gamer]

Not "one of" it is the greatest console of all time. But presently it is vastly underrated. For example. Ask anyone and they will say Final Fantasy VII is better than Final Fantasy VI. The only thing FFVII did is have tits in full 3D.

Oh I see what you're saying. Yeah kids these days don't appreciate the classics.