Jess Ragan Posted January 2, 2014 Share Posted January 2, 2014 It was sure nice of Electronic Arts to mark all their games with a yellow tab, so we know right away which ones not to buy. Unfortunately, these days that's ALL you can find at pawn shops and thrift stores. Those stores, man, they've been picked clean. Last year I found a copy of Midway Arcade's Greatest Hits in the box and was exceedingly grateful for it. It doesn't hold a candle to the Saturn version, but damn, at least it's not a freaking sports game. Those yellow tabs give me chills. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rex Dart Posted January 2, 2014 Share Posted January 2, 2014 The Strike series ain't bad. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess Ragan Posted January 2, 2014 Author Share Posted January 2, 2014 Yeah, but they're pretty tough to find in the midst of all the John Maddens and NBA Lives. The cartridges aren't even worth a damn as plastic repro cases because of their weird shape and plastic tabs. The tabs are like skulls on a bottle of poison, signaling the innocent gamer to beware! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rex Dart Posted January 2, 2014 Share Posted January 2, 2014 (edited) Yeah, I had wanted to re-use an EA shell for my Everdrive flash cart, and to re-situate the SD card so that it sits under that yellow tab for protection. (Anti-theft, too... who would steal Shaq Fu?) No dice; those non-standard screw holes prevent it from being useful even as a flash cart shell. Edited January 2, 2014 by Rex Dart 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
R.Bear Posted January 3, 2014 Share Posted January 3, 2014 I have more good EA games than bad ones (Techno Clash, Strike series, Starflight, Road Rash series, Populous and Theme Park) and probably some more, but yeah it seems these are becoming difficult to find in the wild without specifically looking for them online or at markets. So not all the yellow tabs are bad haha, although I do wonder why they decided to use a weird cartridge shape. Bubsy and all of the Codemasters games are ones which use strange shaped cartridges as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
108 Stars Posted January 3, 2014 Share Posted January 3, 2014 It was sure nice of Electronic Arts to mark all their games with a yellow tab, so we know right away which ones not to buy. Unfortunately, these days that's ALL you can find at pawn shops and thrift stores. Those stores, man, they've been picked clean. Last year I found a copy of Midway Arcade's Greatest Hits in the box and was exceedingly grateful for it. It doesn't hold a candle to the Saturn version, but damn, at least it's not a freaking sports game. Those yellow tabs give me chills. I wish I'd find that Midway Collection here. Blasted game was not offered to us lowly Europeans at all, and it seems pretty uncommon in the US too, especially with Americans having the habit of losing the boxes of their games and trying to rip off the label (it must be an American tradition or so to do both looking at eBay). We had plenty of yellow tabbed EA carts though. EA was really hit or miss back then. They ported stuff like Sword of Sodan, that was crap to begin with to the MD. But they also ported the occasional gem like Starflight, or Naughty Dog's first console game Rings of Power. Once they had success with EA Hockey they immediately stopped all the porting and focused on sports games and Strike. Granted, the sports games were the cream of the crop back then, but it still doesn't make them more interesting from today's perspective. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rex Dart Posted January 3, 2014 Share Posted January 3, 2014 Midway Greatest Hits... is this the one titled Williams Arcade's Greatest Hits, or something else? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
108 Stars Posted January 3, 2014 Share Posted January 3, 2014 (edited) Yes, that one. Which explains why I never find it much on eBay usually.^^ And hey, there is even a couple of good condition ones on sale right now, eventhough shipping is a bit steep. Edited January 3, 2014 by 108 Stars Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rex Dart Posted January 3, 2014 Share Posted January 3, 2014 Yeah, I only paid a couple of dollars for mine. It has a pretty good version of Robotron included, which plays well with two sticks. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
108 Stars Posted January 3, 2014 Share Posted January 3, 2014 Yeah, I only paid a couple of dollars for mine. It has a pretty good version of Robotron included, which plays well with two sticks. Robotron is exactly why I want this. I first learned to know Robotron just last year on my Lynx, and I LOVE the game, if the Genny version supports dual sticks, all the better! I didn't even know that, I was just looking for Robotron goodness on my MD. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess Ragan Posted January 3, 2014 Author Share Posted January 3, 2014 Midway's Williams' Arcade's Greatest's Hits' Possessive Nouns is pretty good on the Sega Genesis, but it's noticeably harder than the arcade games, and there are plenty of irksome little quirks I could never get used to (ie having to press Mode turn on six button firing at the start of a Robotron game). Getting back to the topic, I think a lot of those games have been scooped up by speculators. You've got no problems finding them on eBay or Amazon, but at a pawn shop, forget it. Some have even raised their prices to achieve parity with eBay's inflated prices! Boo, hiss! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rhomaios Posted January 3, 2014 Share Posted January 3, 2014 Of my paltry 37 Genesis games, I'm proud to claim I don't own a single EA game, a single sports games even. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Osgeld Posted January 4, 2014 Share Posted January 4, 2014 (edited) there was a few good ones, strike series, road rash series, james pond give or take but yes most of the EA library is sports games, or computer (mostly amiga) ports that were just on the edge of OK in the firstplace before it was watered down and rushed out for the quickest buck Edited January 4, 2014 by Osgeld Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mbd30 Posted January 7, 2014 Share Posted January 7, 2014 Hey, the Genesis port of "Starflight" is pretty good. At least you don't need a code wheel. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bohoki Posted February 27, 2015 Share Posted February 27, 2015 i dislike them because they fall down in my vertical cassette storage sytem road rash is about the only game worthy of owning well syndicate is pretty good too Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OldSchoolRetroGamer Posted February 27, 2015 Share Posted February 27, 2015 I like EA Zany Golf also. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Loguidice Posted February 27, 2015 Share Posted February 27, 2015 EA was critical to the Genesis's success (and vice-versa) and they had a ton of great games on the platform, so I don't see how it's fair to criticize the company during that era. Even their sports games were almost all fantastic, in-depth, yet still reasonably accessible. That was clearly a second golden age for the company after their initial 8-bit computer successes. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atariboy Posted March 1, 2015 Share Posted March 1, 2015 (edited) The two Lotus games, developed by Gremlin Interactive and published by EA, are favorites of mine. They're conversions of Lotus II and Lotus III for the Amiga. My Strike series are in normal Genesis cartridge casings, thanks to Majesco. And while back in 2000 or so, I could've named every game that they rereleased for this system and the SuperNes, I recall at least one Road Rash as well at this point. It wouldn't shock me if they did all three. Still confused all these years later why all three 16 bit Strike games were rereleased for the Genesis, yet they skipped Desert Strike on the SuperNes and just rereleased Jungle and Urban Strike. Edited March 1, 2015 by Atariboy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rick Dangerous Posted March 9, 2015 Share Posted March 9, 2015 A remnant of Trip Hawkins attempt to make Genesis games with or without a licence from Sega. They are a tad ugly! Plenty of good EA games on the Genny though!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rhomaios Posted March 9, 2015 Share Posted March 9, 2015 My first yellow tabbed game in 2 decades is actually by Psygnosis: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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