Features

What can Nintendo learn from Sega's foray into mobile?

The old rivalries are the best

What can Nintendo learn from Sega's foray into mobile?
|

With Nintendo finally announcing its intention to enter the smartphone game market (which can either be seen as a good or a bad thing), we thought we'd reflect on how its former great rival, Sega, has been getting on.

The answer, as with Sega's recent console efforts, is 'could do better,' with a fair few dodgy ports and a couple of mediocre freemium Sonic cash-ins clogging up its roster.

Sega's smartphone performance isn't a complete cautionary tale for Nintendo, though. The house of Sonic has turned out some genuinely fine efforts on iOS and Android over the years.

An interesting point to note is that only two of our seven featured games are straight up ports of Sega classics. The rest are either original games or carefully rejigged and enhanced efforts made by other studios and published by Sega.

On this evidence, then, Nintendo's promise not to do mobile ports sounds like a wise one.

Sonic Racing Transformed
Download on iOS / Download on Android

Nintendo may not wish to do a mobile port of Mario Kart, but on Sega's evidence, that could be a mistake. Sonic Racing Transformed (to give it its snappier Android title) is a splendid kart racer that looks and feels just like a console game.

Featuring slick kart racing action, solid controls (though it benefits if you have a joypad peripheral), and imaginative track design, it's enough to have us believing that a mobile Mario Kart might not be sacrilege.

Total War Battles
Buy on iOS / Buy on Android

Rather than cramming a port of Creative Assembly's sophisticated strategy series onto mobile, Total War Battles is a finely honed, custom made smartphone effort.

It sounds like a contradiction in terms, but this is deep and absorbing real time strategy game that's perfect for playing on the move.

Sonic CD
Buy on iOS / Buy on Android

Sonic CD never got played as much as it should back in the day, because very few people bought the Sega CD device that it was made to run on. That's a shame, because it's one of the most ambitious and intricate entries to the 2D Sonic series.

That's one of the reasons it deserves to be on this list. The other is that its open, explorative design and slower pace makes it better suited to mobile play than the newer Sonic 4.

Spellwood
Buy on iOS / Buy on Android

A fine example of Sega's mobile publishing work, Spellwood is an unassumingly charming little word game.

It takes the timeless Scrabble formula and applies it to a 1 v 1 battle format - albeit with cute anthropomorphic animal wizards. This is a Sega game, after all.

Sonic the Hedgehog 2
Buy on iOS / Buy on Android

We haven't included the link to our review of Sonic the Hedgehog 2, the port of one of the most beloved 2D platformers ever. That's because the version of Sega's classic sequel that currently sits on the App Store and the Google Play Store is completely different.

Well, the basic game is the same, but this is a vastly improved remastered version with improved performance and controls. It also contains additional lost levels that never made it into the original game.

Football Manager Handheld 2015
Buy on iOS / Buy on Android

In truth, we're growing a little impatient with the Football Manager Handheld series as the years tick on. We think it's high time we saw a shift to the nuanced mechanics and modern presentation of the main PC series.

While Football Manager Handheld 2015 got the lowest rating yet for the series, however, it remains the best mobile footy sim on the market.

Virtua Tennis Challenge
Buy on iOS / Buy on Android

It's looking a bit old now, but Virtua Tennis Challenge remains the most downright playable tennis game on mobile. That's because it manages to squeeze that timelessly brilliant Virtua Tennis engine into a portable package - yep, even with virtual controls.

Like Roger Federer, the years are starting to take their toll, but there's no hiding Virtua Tennis Challenge's continued class and impeccable poise.

Jon Mundy
Jon Mundy
Jon is a consummate expert in adventure, action, and sports games. Which is just as well, as in real life he's timid, lazy, and unfit. It's amazing how these things even themselves out.