Failed Consoles - Part One
From the Atari 5200 and the ill fated Nintendo Virtual Boy to the Atari
Jaguar and the poorly timed Sega CD, the trashcans of the past were stuffed
with consoles that simply failed to catch on. This episode examines why some of
them didn’t become the next big thing.
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now i have 3 Sega Mega Drive, 1 Sega Master System, 1 Nintendo, 1 Dreamcast, 1 PS, 1 PS2 , 1 PSP, 1 Xbox, 1 Xbox 360 and a pc
lol I have a Magnavox Odyssey 2 but I unfortunately dont have it no more
Sega had Tomb Raider on the Saturn First
At least the PS3 has MGS4 now, while a bit geared towards the hardcore gamer, it's the closest to a killer app they have right now.
In all reality though, I don't think a console's success relies on killer apps as much anymore, I think it really revolves around their support (online mostly). Microsoft has their Xbox Live infrastructure nailed down, where PS3's (free) PSN is really lagging behind in terms of features / support (HOME is still MIA, in-game XMB just added, non-mandatory Trophy support).
why didn't sega learn from intellivision sega should have learned that no body wants to buy add ons
well actually the CD was a good idea they just made a bunch of FMV "games" when they really should have been making more games like sonic CD.
yeah but after that they should have learned
Yeah, the show is only about the US market. I wish I had enough time to go into other countries. The Master System KILLED in Brazil as well as Europe. No kidding.
The Master System was anything but a failure, while Nintendo did have it by the neck in the US, Sega had obliterated the NES in Europe and parts of Asia, I grew up in the UK and only one chemist chain store sold NESes. Infact it was partially Nintendo's fault, snubbing Woolworths in the UK was an absolute catastrophy for them.
Guru Larry - Screwattack.com
& Presenter on European Video Game channel XLEAGUE.TV
I grew up with an Intellivision II with the voice module attachment, my best friend had a ColecoVision and my cousin had an Atari 2600. We all talked our parents into getting diffrent systems so that we could play all the games. It was great growing up on the early 80s. The Coleco was the best out of our three systems.
Ruben S. Rodriguez
Jon Rose: I agree completely. Also, the failure of the dreamcast was a failure brought on largely by the incredible amount of ill-will that Sega had generated with its previous blunders. Game developers, especially EA, didn't want any part of it due to Sega's previous history of abondoning their hardware at the first sign of trouble. And the public was extremely wary of anything bearing the Sega name and for good reason. All it took was for Sony to merely announce the Playstation 2, and that was enough to convince most consumers to wait an entire year for it, rather than pickup a Dreamcast. Sega never could fully shake its reputation as an unstable hardware investment. Shame. Such a great console.
The Dreamcast would be an interesting one in terms of an entire company failing its consoles. Everything about the Dreamcast's death isn't rooted in its poor performance on its own, but in Sega's bizarre handling of things going all the way back to the Master System. The DC caught on just fine, but by the time it was ready to really sprout legs, Sega itself (specifically Sega of Japan) was such a headless blunder that it simply didn't matter how well it was doing. If the console is the sail on the ship of a company, the Dreamcast was top-of-the-line fabric on a boat that was already full of holes. And yet, it's still favored by some developers because of how cheap licensing is now and the ease of porting NAOMI-based arcade games.
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GericVas: Hey, we went pretty easy on the Vectrex! While I completely agree with you that all mediums evolve, my point (which is expaned in part two of this series) is that most of the consoles that failed to catch on, failed on creative grounds, not technological grounds. And there are some lessons to be learned along the way, like focusing on the multiplication of hardware is a sure-fire way to kill a system. I liked the Sega master system, but it did bomb next to the NES, despite being a better piece of hardware. But, again, it just didn't have games to compete. Since Nintendo had exclusive agreements with all the great 3rd party companies, all Sega could really offer were ports of their arcade games, and they didn't port very well at all on an 8-bit system(which led to the creation of the 16bit genesis). Nintendo had the games, Sega had the hardware. And games always win in that fight. The Genesis wasn't a failed attempt; the Genesis did really well and shifted the whole industry. But the sega-cd, the 32x, all that... well, that's in the next episode. As for the Sega Dreamcast, I debated whether or not to cover the dreamcast in this series. There are already so many Sega consoles discussed between part 1 and 2. Ultimately, I decided not to include the dreamcast, and I will focus on it in a upcoming episode which will be all about the Dreamcast, and can give it the space it deserves. It's failure to catch on was more complicated than I could cover in 45 seconds or so, and the Dreamcast was really, really great. It deserves its own show.
Don't you ever fuckin talk shit about the vetrex!!..ever...lmao!!...ok jeremiah here's where we start the ball'a'rollin...all mediums of communication evolve...books (coloring books, brail,books on tape and pop up books) movies (projector,Beta max, vhs and DVD) but see here's the thing yes alot of inventions fail but you know what it's also a learning lesson...in the video game industry there is no real learning lessons...just flat out competition...from the get go you mentioned the atari (which you mention alot in your videos) which came out with several versions of the initial system..which like the Xbox 360 now comes out with updates so that we don't have to buy a new x-box every 5 months or so
I will say though you made alot of valid points such as the idea of a "killer app" it's horrible to think that still applies today...most on and off video game players stick to the killer app titles..hence forth that's why halo is so popular..in the title itself is a killer app...even third party companies can become killer apps of there own right (square,capcom,konami,etc) you go way back and you can see it in VG history including mario and link...way back to pac man
The one thing that i disliked was the fact you mentioned the master system...that's a hot button for me...it was in its own way the beginning of sega...like the nintendo had the NES...there was the master system so it really wasn't a failed attempt...now the genesis i think was a failed attempt considering all the adds on it had...fucking horrible..just horrible.
all and all good work...i'm looking forward to see part 2 of this...i know the dreamcast will be the highlight...it's sad kind of...R.I.P Dreamcast...you had us with your blue stinger and your bleem...oh bleem