Ask most SNES or Genesis fans old enough to remember about various 16-bit Disney titles and you'll probably get an earful. Chances are pretty high someone's bound to mention the Aladdin tie-in platformer that hit both home consoles of the era in 1993, too – the SNES port was handled by Capcom while Virgin Interactive developed the Genesis edition, and which version is better has been a debate that's raged for years for two decades.
Now Shinji Mikami who worked as a designer on Aladdin SNES, has weighed in on this debate for the ages in an interview this week with Polygon. His verdict?
"If I didn't actually make [the SNES game], I would probably buy the Genesis one," Mikami said in the interview. "Animation-wise, I think the Genesis version's better. The Genesis version had a sword, actually. I wanted to have a sword."
The current Evil Within director also gave a slightly odder, more aesthetic reason – the genie was not on the cover of the Super Famicom version of the game in Japan, though the character was initially.
"Disney said no to that, so we had to move the genie to the back of the package in a smaller size. But the Sega version, they had the genie on the front," Mikami said. The change was likely over likeness issues Disney was having a spat with Robin Williams over at the time.
While box art seems an unlikely reason to prefer one version over another, but with Mikami's opinion out in the open it seems like the debate can perhaps finally be put to rest. Or it did until Polygon talked to Dave Perry, who helped develop Aladdin's Genesis version.
"I'd flip the quote, If I didn't actually make the Genesis version I'd probably buy the SNES one," Perry said.
So much for that idea.
Via Polygon
