Play Saturn Games Online
The Sega Saturn shelf is stacked and ready — every game here runs full-speed on your PC through the free RetroWave Player. Sega hardware from 1995, the real thing, no cartridge needed.
The Saturn has a dual-CPU architecture and eight processors. The Sega Saturn is a home video game console developed by Sega and released on November 22, 1994, in Japan, May 11, 1995, in North America, and July 8, 1995, in Europe.
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The Saturn Story
The Saturn was designed around a dual-SH2 configuration. According to president Tom Kalinske, Sega of America "fought against the architecture of Saturn for quite some time". Publicly, Kalinske defended the Saturn's design: "Our people feel that they need the multiprocessing to be able to bring to the home what we're doing next year in the arcades." In 1993, Sega restructured its internal studios in preparation for the Saturn's launch.
In April 1994, Acclaim Entertainment announced it would be the first American publisher to produce software for the Titan. As a result, Nakayama ordered his engineers to have the system ready for launch by the end of the year. Because the machines share many parts and were prepared to launch around the same time, tensions emerged between Sega of America and Sega of Japan when the Saturn was given priority.
Why the Saturn Still Hits
Stolar has also been criticized; according to Fahs, "Stolar's decision to abandon the Saturn made him a villain to many Sega fans, but [...] it was better to regroup than to enter the next fight battered and bruised. Perry of Gamasutra noted that, from its surprise launch to its ultimate failure, the Saturn "soured many gamers on Sega products". At the time of the Saturn's release, Famicom Tsūshin awarded it 24 out of 40, higher than the PlayStation's 19 out of 40.
By December 1998, EGMs reviews were more mixed, with reviewers citing the lack of games as a major problem. In 2009, IGN named the Saturn the 18th-best console of all time, praising its unique game library. He also commented on the many Japan-exclusive Saturn releases, which he connected with a subsequent boom in the game import market.
How Saturn Games Run on Your PC
Every Saturn game on this shelf runs in the free RetroWave Player — a quick desktop download that plays the original game code full-speed on your PC, just like real hardware. Each page previews the game first, and the app has full controller mapping built in; Premium adds save states and local or online two-player.