Sega has a huge stable of legitimate classics that they’ve released across all of their video game systems. They were mostly an arcade developer early on, and a significant amount of their home console releases were ports of these. Titles such as OutRun and Afterburner will long be remembered for their excellent gameplay, but I was surprised to see just how many of their arcade releases were awful. One of these such titles is Altered Beast. It was an immediate hit in the coin-op world, and is often considered a true blue classic even today. My first exposure to this title was the Sega Genesis port, and I was immediately put off. I simply do not understand how it was ever popular because this is one of the worst games I’ve ever played from the house of Sonic.
In Altered Beast you play as a deceased Roman soldier who has been revived by Zeus in order to save the deity’s daughter from the forces of the underworld. What makes this warrior unique is the fact that, by gathering power orbs, he can transform into a combination human and beast hence the title of this game. Altered Beast is best considered a hybrid beat em up and side scroller. There’s little to no platforming, and the focus instead is on punching and kicking oncoming enemies. The screen scrolls automatically so as to keep the action moving along, but it’s slow enough that you won’t feel rushed or overwhelmed. As I mentioned earlier your punch and kick are the main methods of attack here and each is designated to a separate button. Aside from these abilities you can only walk left and right as well as jump, but the ability to attack midair as well as alter the direction of your punch/kick by holding down has an effect as well. I don’t really get how pressing the kick button while holding down on the d-pad causes you to kick upwards, but let’s just roll with it for now. Even as a beat ’em up the mechanics are very limited and this one is more about using the right attack as well as mastering your timing against incoming enemies.
The game is fairly difficult. You have a small life bar at the top of the screen, and the reach of your punches and kicks is a little on the short side. Enemies often take one or two strikes to defeat, and many leave behind the floating energy balls I mentioned earlier. As you collect these your character gains muscle mass and becomes slightly more powerful. When you collect a third one you morph into a different beast which changes between the different levels. In the first stage the main character will transform into a werewolf, and the others include an electricity based dragon, bear, and more. What’s interesting is that, on top of being more powerful, you gain new moves in these forms and often you can even use projectiles. Some of the forms are better than the others (the thunder dragon is by far the best in my opinion) and they’re all pretty much a necessity to beat each of the end level bosses. The fact that each level features a different one is a cool feature, but even after transforming the gameplay is still too simplistic and the levels sorely lack variety.
What I have a problem with most here is the repetitive nature of this title. The level design never throws you any curve balls, and the enemy types are generally too similar to one another. The only things that really change between each stage are the graphics as well as the beast transformation, and that’s simply unacceptable when the gameplay is so bland and trivial. There’s no real variety, and to offset this the game is super short. I can run through the game in no time at all which is fine when you’re spending quarters in an arcade, but at home gamers have always wanted a deeper, longer, and more rewarding experience. Even compared to similar titles released in the same time frame as Altered Beast’s debut this one simply comes up short. The gimmick may have been a pretty big draw back in the day, but now it’s cheesy and feels aged. This title is a serious blemish on Sega’s long and illustrious career as an arcade game specialist.
The graphics are quite weak. It suffers from the lack of colors in the Genesis’ color palette although Sega was able to re-create the title pretty well on their home hardware. The art style is very bland with generic references to Rome in a few of the backgrounds and terrible looking characters/enemies. Am I kicking a pig, or is that supposed to be a cerebrus? The scrolling isn’t even particularly smooth although it might just be this way because of the fact that it moves so slowly. The beast transformation sequences, even with their limited animation, are the only moments in the game that impressed me visually. The soundtrack is also very lame. The music sounds tinny, and hardly conveys the game’s themes or setting in any impressive manner. It’s either out of place low pitched notes or screechy effects. The digitized voice work is limited, but mildly impressive despite “grave” sounding like “gwave.” The audio is pretty sub par here.
Altered Beast is a faux classic. It wasn’t an important step in its genre, nor is it even fun to play. I may disagree with many gamers when it comes to the classics, but I can’t even fathom how anyone had fun with this one even at the time of its release. It’s hard to believe Sega packed this one in with the console at one point in time. Do yourself a favor and don’t play this one.
