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Segaiden 82: ALF (Patreon)

Published:
2025-05-07 12:53:00
Imported:
2026-06
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Content

Hmm, yeah. ALF. It was bound to happen eventually.

There's not actually all THAT much to say about this game, and it's not like Sega based it on a classic media property that I love deeply. No, the majority of running time for this episode is more of a John the Baptist-style preparing the way for the Sega Genesis, since that console launch looms on the horizon and has a weird relationship with ALF.

Man. ALF.

Files

Previews only

Not your Lucky day: ALF | Segaiden 083

One of the more bizarre and infamous games on Master System—not because of the game itself, which is fairly mundane and unremarkable. It's just... of all the properties to license, why ALF? And if ALF, then why not base a game on one of the cartoon spin-offs that lends itself more to outlandish fantasy settings and gameplay conventions? Nevertheless, here's Sega dipping into that licensing budget to create a video game about an annoying little alien whose entire world while trapped on earth consists of hiding in a suburban home with a family of uninteresting mid-tier sitcom Americans. Not exactly a gripping premise for a video game, at least not by the standards of the Master System! I'm sure a modern indie dev could knock it out of the park, but this was video gaming in 1989. The experimental, anything-goes recklessness of the early-to-mid ’80s had subsided by this point. And this is what it gave us. Please support this channel by buying books—by me! Based on these videos! https://limitedrungames.com/collections/books Production notes: Video Works is funded via Patreon (http://www.patreon.com/gamespite) — support the show and get access to every episode up to two weeks in advance of its YouTube debut! Plus, exclusive podcasts, eBooks, and more! Master System footage captured from MiSTer (thanks to MiSTerAddOns) with a SNAC adapter for Paddle Controller material. Video upscaled to 4K with RetroTink 4K. RGB cables courtesy of StoneAgeGamer.com and Allie Bellrose. Thanks to Josh Fairhurst for hooking me up with this terrible game!

Comments

Chad Serrant

Yeah that would have done better as a text based adventure game. Interesting to see how backwards compatibility affected the game. Reminds me of how some Gamecube games had animation issues on the Wii.

John Learned

I never knew that SMS games played differently or worse through a Powerbase Converter. Is there a list of these somewhere?

Nicole Express
>>173297852

I think ALF is the worst of it; there's a bug in the Genesis' implementation of the Master System's hardware collision detection, but the hardware collision detection was basically unused (it's useless in most cases). There are also a few European and Brazilian games that use Master System 2-exclusive features that the Genesis doesn't support. (A higher-resolution graphics mode and double-sized sprites)

Normallyretro
>>173295209

Good point. As short as it is, it would've probably worked better as a text adventure.