This is the data I was able to compile through no less than seventeen polls I conducted on Usenet. What I asked for was every game anybody could remember as having unique gameplay, and/or featuring an exceptional level of polish when compared to other games in its genre. Well made games in underrepresented genres, or niche genres, were also included by default if they were recommended. If a notable game came out on multiple systems, without any losses that affect the gameplay on either system, it was included on both console's lists.

This description was chosen because the definition of what is and isn't a quality title is too subjective, a user's genre preferences can especially affect their perception of what is and isn't a quality game.

For example, a person who plays PC style First Person Shooters primarily may think that a 3rd person action game with shooting, that doesn't allow you to aim at specific parts of an opponent, limiting, even if the 3rd person game has more advanced controls for movement and jumping than FPS games do. Similarly an individual who likes Real Time Strategy might think that a Turned Based Strategy game is not as good, or a person who likes PC style Adventure games, or Adventure games with real time fighting in them, might think that a straight beat-em up is too short or shallow.

Whether a game has a specific gameplay aspect, and whether that game did that gameplay aspect first, or whether the level design was considered unique, is not subjective and is easier to document. However, as a side effect, this definition includes games that did end up being mediocre or even bad, but should also include every game fans of each genre would call good, great, polished, unique or innovative.

For the year or so since I started these polls, and into the future, if somebody ever finds game's status as notable questionable, all that somebody has to do is e-mail me and ask me why that particular game is on the list, or tell me specific gameplay related reasons why it shouldn't be, and I will reply. Similarly, if anybody wants a game added, all they have to do is e-mail me the name of the game, and a gameplay description of it. If I can find another source that details the same gameplay mechanic for the game, I will add it to the list.

Facts:

PS2:
There are 138 games on this list, 91 exclusives, out of 350 available in its first two years.

Dreamcast:
There are 138 games on this list, 108 exclusives, out of 248 available in its two year life span.

PS1:
There are 167 games on the PS1 list, 118 were exclusive. The PS1 saw full fledge mass market release numbers for six years.

Saturn:
There are 107 games on this list, 66 were exclusive. The Saturn was on the market for three years, and had consistant releases for about two and a half years.

Observations:

These lists are incomplete, none of them have every game with notable gameplay mechanics, or that featured an exceptional level of polish for that type of game at the time of its release. However, these lists do still offer information, and a large amount of games for each system that are worth looking into.

The conclusions that can be drawn by looking at the lists and responses to the polls I conducted on Usenet are as follows. None of the polls produced a list of games, for either Sony platforms or Sega platforms, that either implies or proves that platform as the system with vastly superior numbers of unique or higher quality software, that advocates of that platform consistantly claim.

Alternately, there are enough games listed to easily prove that the PS1 and PS2 have just as much, if not more, unique or higher quality titles as any of the Sega systems. This eliminates the possibility, claimed by fans of opposing consoles, that the Playstation systems don't have any good games, or that they only have a lot of popular games.

The same conclusion applies to each of the Sega consoles as well. Each Sega console had a large enough number of games listed to be comparable to the Sony consoles they were competing against. This is true especially when considering that the two competing Sega console's releases stopped in less than 3 years.

Side by Side Comparison :

Saturn library -vs- PS1 library

Dreamcast library -vs- PS2 library