Sega has announced that it is bringing a collection of vintage games to your mobile via an app called Sega Forever, allowing you to play games from classic consoles such as the Master System, Mega Drive, and Game Gear (it will eventually be expanded to include others like Dreamcast). On top of this, every game is free-to-play, ad-supported, can be played offline, and includes updated features like controller support and cloud saves, although if you want each game without ads that'll cost you $1.99 USD (bear in mind you'll also have to watch videos to cloud save in the free version).
"Above all else Sega Forever is a celebration of nostalgia. It's about allowing fans to reconnect with past experiences and share them with family and friends in an accessible and convenient way," said Mike Evans, CMO of Sega's Mobile Division in the West. "Join us on a journey of rediscovery as we roll out two decades of classic games free on mobile. Create your own 'Sega Forever folder' and collect your favorite classics. Enjoy moments of nostalgia on the go, or sync a Bluetooth controller to enjoy a console-like experience in your living room. Sega Forever democratises retro gaming, and seeks to change how the world plays, rediscovers, and shares in classic game experiences."
The first batch of games includes Sonic the Hedgehog, Phantasy Star II, Altered Beast, Comix Zone, and Kid Chameleon, but "following [the] launch, the Sega Forever collection will continue to grow with additional releases coming every two weeks," Sega added.
Some reports have found issues with Sega Forever already, however, including the fact that the feature whereby you can get these games ad-free if you've owned them before isn't working, as 'recover purchase' times out.
There are also many performance issues being reported, including skips and stutters in gameplay as well as inconsistent frame-rates. Older hardware also seems to play games better as well, bizarrely, as the iPhone 3GS could play these games at 60FPS in 2009 while the iPhone 6S+ can't. It seems, then, that Unity performs much worse than emulator RetroArch would have done.
In terms of where Sega Forever could go in the future, though, Mike Evans said that the "first focus is mobile. It's a huge project and what I really want to do is get mobile right. After this, there are options: we can look at desktop, Facebook, we could even take these games to consoles like Switch."
For more on Sega Forever you can visit the official website. Have you experienced issues with Sega Forever? Do you like the premise?