3DO Interactive Multiplayer [Archive] - Retrogaming Roundtable

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Sonicwolf

01-08-2009, 10:01 PM

I had to create a topic about the poor system that got screwed by high prices, huge competition and a very large majority of crap games that had the stench of Sega CD all over them.

I bought a Panasonic FZ-1 system and controller off of ebay, came with two games. I must say I was surprised as I began finding other games and playing them that this system has a some pretty good ones. Some of the them are questionable (PLUMBERS DONT WEAR TIES? *vomits*) but all in all it is pretty worth it for retro gaming. It even has the best console port of Night Trap. Many of you would probably retch at that statement but im one of the few people that actually found that game to be a bit of campy fun.

The controller itself is one of my favorite controllers of any console. (talking about the original, larger sized Panasonic one with the headphone jack) It is the perfect size with just the right amount of buttons to not become too complicated. The headphone jack idea was way ahead of its time and the daisy-chain idea removed the controller limitation that most consoles were plagued with at the time.

Anyone else find this console to be more than meets the eye? It seems everyone slings mud at it without even playing it. It wasnt as bad as people seem to make it out to be. It has some pretty good games. Too bad the companies that produced the 3DO thought that everyone was Donald Trump and could afford $799usd. Here in Canada it was probably well over 1000 bucks at launch.

One last thing, does anyone have any sales numbers of the 3DO? I have heard it is around 2 million units world wide but I am not sure of this as it is from one source only.

Kid Ice

01-08-2009, 10:35 PM

Here's a nice thread on the 3DO:

http://www.digitpress.com/forum/showthread.php?t=32396&page=2

Looks like the classic discussions index took a dump again or I'd have a few more. :-(

I must be a 3DO fanboy because I want to punch these know-nothing pseudo-collectors who come here and say the 3DO doesn't have any good games (and 100% of the time reveal shortly thereafter they have never actually played one).

IMO the 3DO library consists entirely of 2 different types of games:

1) Good (but not great) games

2) Bad games that are so bad they make you fall over with laughter

You simply cannot lose with this system.

Mobius

01-08-2009, 10:48 PM

I had to create a topic about the poor system that got screwed by high prices, huge competition and a very large majority of crap games that had the stench of Sega CD all over them.

The rest of us 3DO fans are hanging out on our own board! :) http://3do.cdinteractive.co.uk/index.php

Steve W

01-08-2009, 10:53 PM

I bought the first-gen model Panasonic at a thrift store for $5. It makes me smile when I think about the original owner paying $700 for it, then I pick it up for next to nothing in comparison.

I have two consoles, but I didn't play them for some time. I was waiting until I had a 'critical mass' of games that would make me want to hook it up. Well, I bought Star Blade, an arcade game I've always loved, so I hooked the sucker up and pulled out as many 3DO games as I could and gave them all a go at once. Star Blade was great (especially with my nice Logitech controller), and none of the others piqued my interest enough to be able to remember them. Still, it was good for FMV games, which I've always enjoyed, so $5 was well worth it.

ooXxXoo

01-08-2009, 11:01 PM

Sonicwolf

01-08-2009, 11:19 PM

One thing I noticed with the 3DO is that it seemed to have been built for a long haul. It had 2 expansion ports and all the modern connectors for televisions in the back. Most consoles back then were hard-pressed to have anything more than RF on the back of there systems, esppecially inputs for standard video and audio cords instead of some proprietary retro game collectors nightmare connecter (Atari 5200 anyone?)

retroman

01-08-2009, 11:39 PM

i love the 3DO. I got my first one back when Goldstar came out with there 3DO units. Years later it failed, and i got a Panisonic front loader. I have had that one now for about 13 years and it still works like a champ.

Sonicwolf

01-09-2009, 12:34 AM

I wish I could have experienced the 3DO as a new system though. I was born in 1990 so I was a little to young to get a first hand impression of the state of the video gaming community and the systems around. I got my first system in 1994, the Super Nintendo. It wasnt until '08 that I finally got a 3DO and it is great.

LiquidPolicenaut

01-09-2009, 12:57 AM

I am also a 3DO fan and have been an owner of the Panasonic FZ-1 since day one...yup, I'm one of the $700 suckers lol. Honestly though, I still love my 3DO as well as my Sega CD and feel both systems are way underrated and I have many great games for each one. Both definitely do not get enough credit..

Sonicwolf

01-09-2009, 01:14 AM

I love the Sega CD also. If they had enticed more developers and put a limit on FMV/related games that could be released yearly, the Sega CD would have become a major strength for the Genesis. I recently had a multi-day spout of playing Sonic CD. I love that game.

jcalder8

01-09-2009, 01:14 AM

I remember renting the system when it was still relatively new. I rented Fifa and something else. I was shocked by how good the graphics were and I've wanted to own one ever since. I keep holding out with the hopes of finding a system in the wild but by the looks of things I'll end up buying one online at some point.

Sonicwolf

01-09-2009, 02:18 AM

sonoranreptile

01-09-2009, 07:50 AM

I too love the 3DO and think it is unfortunately underrated. I think mostly because people have not played one. Star Control 2 anyone? Great friggin game in any generation! Long live the old school CD systems!

mailman187666

01-09-2009, 10:11 AM

I got a 3DO back when the prices droped to around $300 or less (can't remember). I loved the crap out of that system and still do. My friends all also liked it when they came over to play it. Yes there were bad games, and some of the bad games became good once you got used to controls and choppiness (I played the shit out of the 3DO doom). One of the first games I played was Escape from Monster Manor. Awesome game for its day. Also some other games people tend to not like so much that I enjoyed were (in no particular order):

Pantaank
PO'ed
Quarantine
Phoenix 3

and one that were good that nobody talks about:

Bladeforce
Killing Time
Hell
Shanghai: Triple Threat

it really started to pick up some speed for a while there back in the day and ALMOST was a contender. I wish it had another 6 months of life and saw a few more releases.

The 1 2 P

01-09-2009, 10:42 AM

I bought the first-gen model Panasonic at a thrift store for $5. It makes me smile when I think about the original owner paying $700 for it, then I pick it up for next to nothing in comparison.

I got you beat. I picked mine up at a flea market for a $1. The guy selling it had no idea what it was. It was complete and to my surprise(when I got home) I found out it had a game inside it(Crash and Burn). It's a nice system and I actually like it's version of Star Wars: Rebel Assult alittle better than the Sega cd version because it lets you be either a dude or a chic for the main character.

Of the 14 games I have for it I honestly haven't played many and some are still factory sealed. I have four or five of the Vivid porn games and I haven't played any of those yet either. But my biggest dissapointment is that I haven't played Royal Pro Wrestling(a Japanese import only title) yet and I bought that online about three years ago. All in all it's a pretty cool system but I feel it lacked a true killer app to help sell it. But it's internal hard drive and demo games on a console were ahead of it's time.

01-09-2009, 11:34 AM

I paid $ 500 for mine back in the day and i played the sh#$ out of it.

I actually loved sewer shark and night trap.

More great games

The Horde
Road Rash (best version including the playstation version)
Shanghai: Triple Threat
Return Fire
Battle sport
Twisted
Slam and Jam
Wolfenstein

I highly recommend any of these titles

.

Xian042

01-09-2009, 01:14 PM

I originally got a 3DO in maybe 199...uh...97 I think. It was used and came with about 10 games. I bought it for just under $200. Fifa was awsome for its time, the shadows of the players on the field were very realistic looking. I also loved Samurai Showdown, Return Fire, and The Horde. Return Fire plays better than the PS1 port.
Well this bad boy got stolen from me by some punk ass kids. Bye Bye 3DO.

Well fast forward almost 10 years, I was working at EB Games and the manager needed some extra hands to get a floor move completed. They wouldnt approve the payroll so she bribed me with her 3DO to work a late night shift. So for 5 hours of organizing video games I got a 3DO and 10 games. So I guess I got the best deal so far. It was FREE! Unless you count how much I would have made if I was on the clock legit!

eugenek

01-09-2009, 01:34 PM

But it's internal hard drive and demo games on a console were ahead of it's time.

Hard drive? I don't think it ever had a hard drive...

I bought my 3DO from a friend for like 40 bucks back in 1995 (the original FZ-1). It was enormous. But I liked it a lot. It blew away the ports it shared with the Sega CD, and for a while it had the best home conversion of SSFII.

shopkins

01-09-2009, 02:07 PM

I like the 3DO, too. I got an FZ-10 off some Web site that was still selling them around 2003, paid about $60 for it, I think. The third-party controllers that came with were the crappiest and cheapest that I've ever had, both broke within an hour of play. I ended up buying a converter that let me use a SNES controller, which worked great.

3DO has great looking versions of the American Laser Games gun games like Mad Dog McCree. They're miles better than the Sega CD versions, at least, I haven't compared them to CDI. The only problem I had was that the gun was way too expensive and hard to find, and I couldn't really finish them with the controller. I really enjoyed cheesy stuff like Space Pirates, though.

Mine also had S-Video out and RCA jacks built-in, which I appreciated because I didn't have to find a special cable. It also was basically region-free except for a few incompatibilities, so I got to check out some neat Japanese games like Dr. Hauser and a pretty nice Yu Yu Hashuko fighting game. There's no hard-drive, but it does have built-in system memory for saves like most other CD systems of the time.

I have a lot of games for it, many of which I have never played. I agree that for the most part even the better ones are "good, not great." I really liked Twisted, though, and even though it was a kiddified version, Station Invasion. Oh, and Strahl for some reason. I'm sort of a sucker for those FMV anime games like Time Gal and Road Avenger, and Strahl fit pretty nicely. I'd recommend it if you liked those.

The 1 2 P

01-09-2009, 07:17 PM

Hard drive? I don't think it ever had a hard drive...

You are correct. I was thinking about it's 1MB of video ram.

bitrate

01-12-2009, 06:43 PM

It has some pretty good games.

It has many good games.
It has a few great games too.
And, it has many bad games.

I love the system. Here is a pic of about half of my long boxed games for the 3DO.

http://i165.photobucket.com/albums/u49/bitrate_photos/DSC03760_30.jpg

Kid Ice

01-12-2009, 07:20 PM

It has many good games.
It has a few great games too.
And, it has many bad games.

I love the system. Here is a pic of about half of my long boxed games for the 3DO.

http://i165.photobucket.com/albums/u49/bitrate_photos/DSC03760_30.jpg

Why so many doubles? Are you a selller or something.

bitrate

01-12-2009, 07:30 PM

Why so many doubles? Are you a selller or something.

Not a seller. Just a crazy collector.
Also, I used to buy a lot of 3DO lots to complete holes in my collection.

Joe West

01-12-2009, 07:50 PM

nice "Collection" about how many games do you have....................?

bitrate

01-12-2009, 08:12 PM

nice "Collection" about how many games do you have....................?

Thank you,

Including US, Japanese, Korean, European, and unreleased 3DO titles, I have 349 unique titles at last count.

Counting duplicates, cover art variations, multi-region same-game releases, etc., I have well over 3000 pieces of 3DO software.

I have been collecting for the 3DO for 8 years now. I even still have my original 3DO FZ-1 from when I was a teen back in the 90's.

Kid Ice

01-12-2009, 09:59 PM

Yeah there's that Dinopark Tycoon right in the middle there. For the longest time I wasn't even sure a longbox version existed.

bitrate

01-12-2009, 10:07 PM

Yeah there's that Dinopark Tycoon right in the middle there. For the longest time I wasn't even sure a longbox version existed.

That one in the picture there is even factory sealed :).
I have a couple more in another box.

Dinopark Tycoon is downright common compared to some of the Japanese and Korean 3DO games that I have.

Sonicwolf

01-14-2009, 01:01 AM