Games where an emulated console version outclasses the PC port?

shnizmuffin , 6 days ago

Spider-Man 2 (the Sam Rami movie one) is almost a totally different game.

There is also a ton of between-consoles differences from the SNES/Genesis generation, where games with the same title are sometimes radically different. Jurassic Park, Star Trek TNG, and the Power Rangers brawler come to mind.

MamboGator , 6 days ago

Giants: Citizen Kabuto. I love the PC version, but the PS2 version–despite looking a lot worse–feels more like a finished game. There are things like elevators that don’t exist in the PC version, cutscenes don’t cut off dialog before it’s finished, and the UI is overall more polished.

spedswir , 6 days ago

Holy shit, I have not heard that name in many years. Definitely a +1 for reminding me of all the fun I used to have in this title

chunkystyles , 6 days ago

Oh man, I loved this game. I didn’t know this about the PS2 version.

CaptainEffort , 6 days ago

Persona 3 Portable

tuckerm , 6 days ago

I bought Rayman 2 on GOG a few years ago, and it had a hard time recognizing controllers. I even tried launching it through Steam, which usually fixes all controller problems, but it still didn't work. The Dreamcast version still looks good enough, and your controller will definitely work.

Due to licensing issues, Crazy Taxi 2 has a different soundtrack on the PC from the original Dreamcast version. The Dreamcast version is the one with The Offspring.

Sonic 3 has also had music licensing issues, so the version included in Sonic Origins has a different soundtrack. Sonic Origins was also buggy at launch, but I hear that's fixed now. Sonic Origins also adds a bunch of new features though, so this one may be a tossup.

Question for y'all: did anyone buy the recent PC port of Metal Gear Solid 2? It seems to have both a lot of praise and a lot of complaints.

_NetNomad , 6 days ago

i would recon this is true more often than not for attempts at 1:1 ports. glitches are more often introduced than fixed in the porting process, so if it isn't deliberately a remaster or offers extra content, you're probably better off with the original in an emulator. if you're interested in mods, it's also worth thinking about where the reverse engineering efforts have been focused- a lot of native PC ports have been picked apart and put back together with bugfixes and new content after the fact

sonic adventure is an example of all of the above. if you want the absolute worst version possible, just buy it off steam. if you want the best version possible, buy it off steam and mod the shit out of it. fan efforts to fix an abysmal port of a port ended up creating an experience that arguably surpasses the original before even getting into all the extra bells and whistles you can mod in

fan ports are also increasingly becoming a thing, so i guess the moral of the story is this: as far as official offerings go, emulation is probably going to be better than a native port, but if a game has enough enthusiastic hackers, then they may have frankensteined something even better together

pivot_root , 6 days ago

How has nobody mentioned Sonic Colors yet?

NoneYa , 6 days ago

Since I prefer controller over mouse and keyboard, it’s a lot of games pre-Xbox One era for me. But that is subjective because a lot of people prefer mouse and keyboard.

Games like Oblivion never had a proper way of getting a controller to work with them on the PC release and any tries to get it to work flat out suck. I’ve tried Steam’s button mapping and even that doesn’t work for a lot of these games. But working through an emulator helps translate my controller to the game with almost no issues.

Considering how the Steam Deck plays and you’re usually using it as a controller unless docked, this would be nearly any game from this time period.

AlternateRoute , 6 days ago

Sometimes the controls are just better on the Emulators at least on older PC ports as they would do dumb stuff like require a mouse / keyboard for menus etc.

On the steam deck in particular when getting steam versions of games with lower steam deck compatibility ratings it often comes down to odd menu issues or controller support.

setsneedtofeed , 6 days ago

The console and PC versions of Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter are entirely different games, and personally I think the console version is more fun. It emulatable.