Biggest success as a console?

[buzz_n64]

It's simple

Consoles

Late 70s/Early 80s
2600

Late 80s
NES

Early 90s
Genesis/SNES

Late 90s
Playstation (though I prefer N64)

Early 00s
PS2

Late 00s
Wii

[kupomogli]

Not 3D polygon graphics, but platform/action/adventure games that take place in 3D free-roaming worlds.

For better or worse, Super Mario 64 single-handedly destroyed 2D gaming. As a result of that one game, 3D games became the standard for everyone.

I have to say that Tomb Raider is the first action/adventure/platformer that has open world levels. Neither Super Mario 64 or Tomb Raider are actually open world due to certain barriers.

Super Mario 64's castle is nothing more than a hub in which you are able to travel to the rest of the stages in any order of your choosing, much like Super Mario Bros 3 and Super Mario World's still hubs, or even better, Chakan's and Bubsy's hubs which you go to which stage you want.

Tomb Raider is three very large connected areas which just like Super Mario 64's stages, you can tackle however you want and are free to go wherever you want and you need to actually search for the items in order to proceed. However, once leaving one of those areas, it locks behind you and is unable to be returned to(making two different saves allow you to traverse each of the three areas.)

Both games have stages that are open world, but the games themselves are not.

King's Field, although not a platformer, is an open world action/adventure game. You could technically call it a platformer because in order to get to some areas and some of the special items, you're required to walk off an edge and land on another. The only difference here is you can't jump.

There's also Daggerfall. The second Elder Scrolls game, but the first of them to allow you to jump and you are required to do so. Another game that was released prior to that of Super Mario 64 being an action adventure game, this one requiring platforming in order to complete. This is the only game listed that is an action/adventure/platformer that is infact open world.

[j_factor]

Not 3D polygon graphics, but platform/action/adventure games that take place in 3D free-roaming worlds.

Out of all the PlayStation games you listed - Resident Evil, WipEout, Ridge Racer, Tekken, and Destruction Derby - none of them were 3D free-roaming platform games.

"Free-roaming" is not relevant to my original statement. You're throwing in unrelated qualifiers to artificially boost Mario 64's importance.

But after Super Mario 64 was released, the market was suddenly flooded with them: Spyro, Gex, Croc, Glover, 40 Winks, Ape Escape, Banjo-Kazooie, Donkey Kong 64, Rayman 2, Shadow Man, and even Mega Man and Castlevania.

Those games would have been 3D anyway. Mario 64 only influenced how they did it, not the mere fact of being 3D.

For better or worse, Super Mario 64 single-handedly destroyed 2D gaming. As a result of that one game, 3D games became the standard for everyone.

You can't be serious. No one game can do that. There was an industry-wide shift. There are plenty of 3D games before and after Mario 64 that had an impact.

Also, 2D gaming was not destroyed in late 1996. You'd probably get that impression if your only system was N64.

[buzz_n64]

Super Mario 64 was monumental in 1996. It basically did for 3d games, what Super Mario Bros. did for platformers. When SM64 came out, that was all I could think about, and then waited for Super Mario 64 2 to come out, but to no avail.

Check out my Super Mario 64 review http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhpMssIeRis

[Rob2600]

Those games would have been 3D anyway.

No, if it weren't for Super Mario 64, those games I listed wouldn't have existed in the first place.

You can't be serious. No one game can do that. There was an industry-wide shift. There are plenty of 3D games before and after Mario 64 that had an impact.

Also, 2D gaming was not destroyed in late 1996. You'd probably get that impression if your only system was N64.

You're right, there was in industry-wide shift...because of Super Mario 64. And how many 2D PlayStation platform games were released after Super Mario 64?

To deny the success, importance, and overwhelming influence of Super Mario 64 on the video game industry is silly.

[pepharytheworm]

You're right, there was in industry-wide shift...because of Super Mario 64. And how many 2D PlayStation platform games were released after Super Mario 64?

How many were released before? Not many and not many after.

EDIT: found this list on this site of 2D ps1 us titles
http://www.digitpress.com/forum/showthread.php?t=54374
More than I thought but I wonder how many came before and then after Mario 64.

[NayusDante]

How many were released before? Not many and not many after.

Castlevania... Mega Man 8, X4, X5, X6... Lots of Street Fighter...

[migo]

Considering that the Wii didn't have a good game for quite some time and people still bought it, it's cheaply made, and Nintendo rarely developed anything for it. I'd say that the Wii is the biggest success.

Well it was going up against the Xbox 360 which had a horrible RRoD problem and the PS3 which didn't have any good games for about the same amount of time and cost 3x as much. If you bought a 360 it was like throwing $450 down the toilet, and if you bought a PS3 it was like spending $600 that could have been in a bank collecting interest. The Wii cost $280 and had some interesting potential. GameCube backwards compatibility also helped it out through the start.

K&M is only way to go, yet you say the touchscreen is going to be the bees knees.

Pick a side, dingus.

I never said it was the bees knees, you're making a straw man argument. I said it was better than any other option on a portable.

I like DS and PSP. I do not like iPhone games. I've played plenty of them to know it's not really worth my time.

You still haven't played even a small fraction of all the games available nor have you bothered to look at the titles being put out and the developers working on them given the patently false claims you were making about it.

The thing has no Crisis Core competitor. No pokemon competitor.

It has Square Enix developing for it, and you say it has no Crisis Core competitor? You can make subjective claims about what counts as a CC competitor, or not, but you'll be eating your hat once Square ports it. As for Pokemon competitor, if that's your thing, then sure, get a DS. But neither the DS, and espeically the PSP (with it's single analog stick fail) has a single dual analog shooter, and iOS has at least 50.

If they already did better on iPhone, tell me the name of the game then.

bejeweled doesn't count.

The best selling game on the PSP is Monster Hunter Freedom's Unite at 3.5 million sales. Assassins Creed 2 on iOS hit over 8.5 million sales, and it's not even the highest selling game. You have no argument. iOS has hugely successful games by big name developers that are preferring it as a platform to the PSP and DS - notice the lack of Sonic 4 on either platform.

For better or worse, Super Mario 64 single-handedly destroyed 2D gaming. As a result of that one game, 3D games became the standard for everyone.

I think you're neglecting the importance of 3dfx on the PC with games like Quake.

And once again, you've proven that nothing you post should be taken seriously.

You're not making a great case for yourself with nothing to back up quips like this.

It seems he hasn't even played GoldenEye on N64. I've played Syphon Filter and a lot of shooters on the PS, but nothing ever beat GoldenEye, and I'm not even a gamer.

You claim not to be a gamer, yet you're here. You're comparing GoldenEye on the N64 to the PS. I'm comparing it to the slew of far better FPS games for the PC. It's thoroughly unimpressive.

This thread was doomed from the start, with no set definition of success to go by. We have a few posts that point out the sales statistics, which are hard facts, and then we have three pages of arguing over ideological successes, which are opinions. Half of it is the OP arguing his opinions as facts, when the thread asked for opinions. Whether a console has games in genres you like determines how successful it was? That's interesting logic, which brings me to an important lesson I've learned:

You're twisting things. The only genre that the N64 has anything that I have no interest in is wrestling. It's poor in the FPS department simply on account of being a console. Racing it doesn't hold up to the PS. Quirky games, while great, I never heard of, none of my friends with N64s ever talked about them nor did I ever see them mentioned on forums or getting front page treatment on game sites. As I didn't have an N64 I didn't go digging deeply for them, but if there isn't even any mention of them as there is nowadays with echochrome and Flower showing up on non PS3 specific blogs, it can't be counted as that much of a success.

Now I know that 32.93 rounds down to 9.5. The Saturn did just as well as the N64! I've been using bad arithmetic all these years...

Round to 1 significant figure, the PS sold an order of magnitude larger than the N64 and Saturn. It's not a solid second place that it had, it's an incredibly weak second place.

No, if it weren't for Super Mario 64, those games I listed wouldn't have existed in the first place.

Crash Bandicoot was released on the PS before anyone knew anything about Mario 64. They would have happened all the same. 3D platformers on the PS were competing with each other more than they were with Mario 64.

You're right, there was in industry-wide shift...because of Super Mario 64. And how many 2D PlayStation platform games were released after Super Mario 64?

They were releasing 3D platformers on the playstation before Mario 64, so it's not like it had as amazing a shift as you're claiming.

To deny the success, importance, and overwhelming influence of Super Mario 64 on the video game industry is silly.

It had success yes, importance, not really, overwhelming influence - hardly. Nothing from the N64 or GameCube eras had overwhelming influence on the video game industry. That was all Sony.

[Rob2600]

Nothing from the N64 or GameCube eras had overwhelming influence on the video game industry.

Wow. I'm done.

[Greg2600]

Biggest success? NES. Hands down.

[Arkhan]

I never said it was the bees knees, you're making a straw man argument. I said it was better than any other option on a portable.

I don't know chief, I think I would prefer the actual thumbstick on a PSP over a frictiony touch screen.

I also think most people don't want an FPS on a 5" screen and that is why they aren't the big focus of handhelds.

Next, iPhone is best for VR Sims because of the touch interface being more realistic than a controller, right?

You still haven't played even a small fraction of all the games available nor have you bothered to look at the titles being put out and the developers working on them given the patently false claims you were making about it.

Neither have you. Flid.

I've played enough games to know that if there is a ton more like what I DID play, then it isn't worth two fucks of my time.

It has Square Enix developing for it, and you say it has no Crisis Core competitor? You can make subjective claims about what counts as a CC competitor, or not, but you'll be eating your hat once Square ports it. As for Pokemon competitor, if that's your thing, then sure, get a DS. But neither the DS, and espeically the PSP (with it's single analog stick fail) has a single dual analog shooter, and iOS has at least 50.

I will believe it when I see it for Crisis Core competitors. It's not a subjective claim. It's plain as day. I want to see a graphic intensive handheld action RPG with voice overs/cutscenes, and at least 20 hours of solid gameplay. Where is it. The stuff Square put on the iCrap is not very epic. Just because Square made it doesn't mean it can compete with it. Next you will tell me that the FF1 and FF2 ports are great and compete with Crisis Core right?

iOS has 50 shooters. of the 50, 48 of them suck more man shaft than a back alley hooker on a saturday in July.

You have no argument. iOS has hugely successful games by big name developers that are preferring it as a platform to the PSP and DS

Citation needed.

Round to 1 significant figure, the PS sold an order of magnitude larger than the N64 and Saturn. It's not a solid second place that it had, it's an incredibly weak second place.

Leave the statistical analysis to someone who isn't operating at <50% mental capacity.

No, if it weren't for Super Mario 64, those games I listed wouldn't have existed in the first place.
.

Gex 3D would have though!

[Doonzmore]

I consider the N64 to be a success despite never getting a lead on the PS1. It may have had a smaller library compared to that system, but from what I remember whenever there was a new first party 64 release it would garner tons of attention and be talked about for months in the magazines.

Super Mario 64
Mario Kart 64
Banjo Kazooie
Diddy Kong Racing
Star Wars Rogue Squadron
Goldeneye 007
Perfect Dark
Paper Mario
Turok 2
Super Smash Brothers
1080 Snowboarding
Wave Race 64
Zelda: Ocarina of Time
Zelda: Majora's Mask
Donkey Kong 64
Starfox 64
F-Zero X

I just don't remember many PS1 games getting as much attention as these. Maybe Final Fantasy 7 or Crash Bandicoot 2.

Again, the sales numbers may not have matched the PS1, but it hung on to the market for at least 5 years and the games are still widely known and cherished. I once heard someone compare it the Game Gear, which i think is way off the mark. The Game Gear never had a killer app like the N64.

@j_Factor - I never said N64 wasn't a success, not sure who you are directing your response to.

[Arkhan]

I just don't remember many PS1 games getting as much attention as these. Maybe Final Fantasy 7 or Crash Bandicoot 2.

tons of stuff dude!

Street Fighter Alpha 2! Star Ocean 2, Einhander, Oddworld series, Tomb Raider

there were a buncha ooo-oooo pS1 games too.



Also you left Jet Force Gemini off the n64 list

[pepharytheworm]

tons of stuff dude!

Street Fighter Alpha 2! Star Ocean 2, Einhander, Oddworld series, Tomb Raider

there were a buncha ooo-oooo pS1 games too.



Also you left Jet Force Gemini off the n64 list

Tomb Raider and SF Alpha were on Saturn too. I never heard a lot of hype on Star Ocean 2 and Einhander other than places like this. So, Crash, Metal Gear Solid, Gran Turismo, Spyro the Dragon and Final Fantasy had universal appeal. Some secondary iffy titles would be like, Driver, Twisted Metal, Tekken, and Syphon Filter.

[j_factor]

You're right, there was in industry-wide shift...because of Super Mario 64.

Yeah, Mario 64 caused an industry-wide shift... in platform game design. You can't seriously believe that ONE GAME made games in general go 3D. What about Tomb Raider? What about Virtua Fighter? What about Quake? What about Descent, Magic Carpet, et al? What about the dozens of editorials/articles talking about how 3D was the future of gaming long before N64 was released? What about the very design of the Playstation and Saturn consoles, being made with 3D graphics in mind?

And how many 2D PlayStation platform games were released after Super Mario 64?

Why are you saying platform games? My original comment was not specific to platform games. You keep making red herring statements. (And actually, a significant number of Playstation games were 2D still -- Mega Man 8/X4/X5/X6, Skullmonkeys, Oddworld 1 and 2, Heart of Darkness, Tomba, Strider 2, Castlevania SOTN/Chronicles, the list goes on)

And games take a while to develop. If it were all because of Mario 64, its influence would've taken a while to kick in, and Playstation and Saturn would have been dominated by 2D games until early 97. But that was certainly not the case.

To deny the success, importance, and overwhelming influence of Super Mario 64 on the video game industry is silly.

I do not deny that Mario 64 was hugely successful, important, and influential. I do, however, deny the ludicrous notion that any one game could be responsible for polygonal graphics becoming standard. It was happening either way, and was obvious at the time.

I consider the N64 to be a success despite never getting a lead on the PS1. It may have had a smaller library compared to that system, but from what I remember whenever there was a new first party 64 release it would garner tons of attention and be talked about for months in the magazines.

When there are much fewer games to talk about, individual games get more attention.

However, to say the N64 wasn't a success is just silly. You don't have to be #1 to be successful.

Again, the sales numbers may not have matched the PS1, but it hung on to the market for at least 5 years and the games are still widely known and cherished. I once heard someone compare it the Game Gear, which i think is way off the mark. The Game Gear never had a killer app like the N64.

Well, Game Gear was also a #2 system that lasted more than 5 years, and its library is almost the same size IIRC. It may not have had anything as significant as Mario or Zelda in terms of success or influence, but it did have its own killer apps, otherwise it wouldn't have kept going. Its most popular games were Sonic, Columns, Shinobi, Streets of Rage, Mortal Kombat, X-Men, Spider-Man, Jurassic Park, and several Disney games.

[Doonzmore]

"You're twisting things. The only genre that the N64 has anything that I have no interest in is wrestling. It's poor in the FPS department simply on account of being a console. Racing it doesn't hold up to the PS. Quirky games, while great, I never heard of, none of my friends with N64s ever talked about them nor did I ever see them mentioned on forums or getting front page treatment on game sites. As I didn't have an N64 I didn't go digging deeply for them, but if there isn't even any mention of them as there is nowadays with echochrome and Flower showing up on non PS3 specific blogs, it can't be counted as that much of a success."

That's because now there's simply a much bigger craving and desire for the the quirky and obscure. Games like Space Station, while well reviewed in mags like EGM, didn't have the luxury of internet blogs and forums to stimulate interest and garner much attention back in 1998.

[physics223]

In the past twenty years, here are the top 10 games in terms of critical acclaim.

Guess what's the top game? Guess the seventh top game? There's no GoldenEye in here, even.

Let me restate myself. I am a gamer, and so is everyone here. But I'm not the 'gamer' that is described by most of society. I just play casually, and I have never thought of the N64 as a failure. It didn't sell as much as the PS, but it's simply ignorant to say that it wasn't a success, and even more ignorant to say that it was a failure.

[NayusDante]

This thread needs more multi-quoting. >_<

[Rob2600]

Yeah, Mario 64 caused an industry-wide shift... in platform game design. You can't seriously believe that ONE GAME made games in general go 3D.

No, but that one game showed every developer how to make a 3D game the right way. Before Super Mario 64, most developers had no clue how to make good 3D games other than first-person shooters.

How many "Top 100 Video Games of All Time" lists are Magic Carpet, Battle Arena Toshinden, Destruction Derby, Decent, Bubsy 3D, and Tail of the Sun featured in?

[kupomogli]

No, but that one game showed every developer how to make a 3D game the right way. Before Super Mario 64, most developers had no clue how to make good 3D games other than first-person shooters.

Nintendo should have made a camera system for Super Mario 64 that didn't suck. Then you could say Nintendo was the innovator for that as well. However, you could say that Nintendo was the innovator of the bad multi perspective camera. Castlevania copied it and the camera sucked almost as bad.