Altered Beast

Overview

Altered Beast is a 1988 beat 'em up video game developed by Team Shinobi and published by Sega for arcades. Set in Ancient Greece, the game follows a Roman centurion who is resurrected by the Olympian god Zeus to rescue his daughter Athena from Neff, the demonic ruler of the underworld. By collecting three power-ups in a level, the player character can transform into one of five mythical beasts.

The game's development was led by Makoto Uchida, and marked his first role as a project lead. Uchida and his team used the System 16 arcade system board. Altered Beast was ported to several consoles and home computers, and was the original pack-in game for the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive when the console was launched in North America in 1989 and Europe in 1990.

Altered Beast's arcade release and its ports received generally positive reviews, with mainly praising the gameplay and graphics. The game has been re-released several times for various consoles and as part of video game compilations, and there has been one sequel and one reboot.

Official trailer

Gameplay Video. Watch on YouTube

Screenshots

Game details

Genres

Hack and slash/Beat 'em up

Developer

Team Shinobi

Publisher

Sega Enterprises, Ltd., Sega Corporation

Series

Altered Beast

Platforms

PlayStation 3, Wii, Sega Genesis, Windows, Mac, Xbox 360

Age rating

ESRB E10+

Modes

Single player

Yes

Local multiplayer

No

Online multiplayer

Yes

Co op

Yes

Age ratings

ESRB

E10+

CLASS IND

12

CERO

B

PEGI

7

USK

6

ACB

PG

Release dates

Subscription history

Space and patches

Space neededAbout 35 MB

Playable today

Credits

Region

US

Time to beat

about 1 hour