Fifteen Classic Game Console Design Mistakes [Archive]

A Black Falcon

08-12-2009, 02:52 AM

Hmm, some good points there, but some I disagree with of course, most notably the N64 using carts and the original Xbox controller... I've always preferred the original style Xbox controller to the S (it has a better button layout, and it's at least as comfortable too), and think that the N64 is better off for using carts.

I can understand putting the N64 on the list for carts because it is true that that decision was a significant factor in Nintendo's failure that generation, but still, I at least absolutely feel that the benefit of quick access to all of the data on the cartridge (that is, short or no loading times and larger areas than can be done on CD systems then without good streaming technology). I love the N64, and definitely think that it wouldn't be as good as it is if it used CDs. So despite the downside of its impact on their success that generation, I at least think they did the right thing.

But as I said I can see justification for putting it there even if I don't agree at all. The Xbox controller, though... I've never understood why people dislike it. But I guess I like larger controllers -- my favorite controller ever is the N64 controller, and the Saturn 3D controller and Dreamcast controller would probably be my next two. (Two analog sticks are overrated! :))

And no one mentioned Sega's decision to stick the Pause button on the Master System on the console, rather than the controller? And even worse, to put it next to the reset button and make it the exact same color and shape? I mean, really. Who among us here hasn't accidentally reset a game at least once while trying to pause it?

That was a common design decision back then, though. The Atari 7800 was the same... before the NES, apart from the Atari 5200 I don't know if any system had the pause button on the controller and not on the system, if they had one at all.

That doesn't excuse the SMS though of course, which came out after the NES. They should have known better by then... but on the other hand they were probably just re-using the technology from their first system, the SG-1000. That's likely the explanation. The SMS had a new controller, but the same "two buttons and a pad/stick" design... but yes, they should have known better. The same goes to Atari for putting the pause button on the system on the 7800 after the 5200 had pioneered having a pause button on the controller... I know they went back to the 2600 controller port, but still, that shouldn't have presented the pause button from being on the controller somehow!

garagesaleking!!

08-12-2009, 02:53 AM

i dont agree that there were flaws with the n64, i personally at that point in time preferred cartridge based gaming. I would love to see cartridges rise to the top again although it will never happen. Discs just scratch too easily, and break etc. I am not a fan of digital copies of games either because you have no physical property you can touch.

Aussie2B

08-12-2009, 03:07 AM

Honestly, I'm surprised no Sega controller is on the list. The problems mentioned regarding the Master System and Dreamcast controllers are the least of their issues. I don't think I've ever used a first party controller more painful and frustrating to use than the Dreamcast's controller. I'd rather fight with the ColecoVision's controller than that piece of junk. The bicycle handle grip is atrocious, the D-pad is all but useless, and why on earth did they have the cord coming out of the bottom? And don't tell me because of the VMU because surely there was a better way to incorporate it. Even that is a failure too because, as nifty as it is in concept, the battery is dead in a freakin' week, and then it's just an excessively bulky memory card until you spend the money and time to replace it. And on the subject of cord placement, how about how the original Master System controller had the cable coming out of the SIDE? Seriously, were they playing a joke on us?

I think people are too fixated on the quality of the Saturn controller to realize that Sega has a pretty pathetic history of controller design.

A Black Falcon

08-12-2009, 03:28 AM

Oh, and I forgot to mention it, but I think the Virtual Boy's design was fine. I mean, they even in that article did a good job of describing why there was no color... it couldn't be done at that time. And really, greyscale (redscale, whatever) isn't that bad... but of course, I am also a Game Boy fan... but still, greyscale isn't that bad, and the VB's 3d technology looks really, really cool, and the graphics are pretty good too, way above anything possible on GB or GBC. I think that the system may have been hurt publically for not having color, but technologically and looking back, it really shouldn't be criticized for it... and other things hurt the VB too, like all of those red-box warnings, the headaches, that you can't 'get it' without actually playing the system yourself and can't understand why it's cool by just watching someone play, or watch anyone play period, etc. I think those things were bigger hurdles than the lack of color, GB was doing fine without color at that time...

i dont agree that there were flaws with the n64, i personally at that point in time preferred cartridge based gaming. I would love to see cartridges rise to the top again although it will never happen. Discs just scratch too easily, and break etc. I am not a fan of digital copies of games either because you have no physical property you can touch.

Great point, carts are much more durable and that's another thing I really like them for. CDs you need to constantly take good care of and worry about because they can be so easily damaged... but carts? No problem, they'll be fine.

Honestly, I'm surprised no Sega controller is on the list. The problems mentioned regarding the Master System and Dreamcast controllers are the least of their issues. I don't think I've ever used a first party controller more painful and frustrating to use than the Dreamcast's controller. I'd rather fight with the ColecoVision's controller than that piece of junk. The bicycle handle grip is atrocious, the D-pad is all but useless, and why on earth did they have the cord coming out of the bottom? And don't tell me because of the VMU because surely there was a better way to incorporate it. Even that is a failure too because, as nifty as it is in concept, the battery is dead in a freakin' week, and then it's just an excessively bulky memory card until you spend the money and time to replace it. And on the subject of cord placement, how about how the original Master System controller had the cable coming out of the SIDE? Seriously, were they playing a joke on us?

I think people are too fixated on the quality of the Saturn controller to realize that Sega has a pretty pathetic history of controller design.

Bah, no way. As I said the DC controller is one of my favorite gamepads ever, and I actually prefer the Saturn 3D controller to the original Saturn one and think that that 3D pad is also one of my favorites. Also, my favorite ever gamepad without an analog stick is actually the Genesis 6-button controller (the standard Sega one with the Mode button on the right shoulder position). It's just an exceptional pad, perfect design and comfort...

You're right that the SMS pad was horribly designed, but starting with the Genesis Sega had some of the best controllers around. But I know how much people like controllers is something which is pretty much 100% personal opinion. Here's some more proof of that. :)

I do agree the VMU's battery life was miserable, but at least they were only necessary if you wanted to play the VMU minigames, not for anything else. Most of the time you can just forget the batteries. As for size VMUs are only a little bigger than PSX or N64 (particularly third-party N64) memory cards, and are a heck of a lot smaller than the memory carts on the Sega CD or Saturn...

Leo_A

08-12-2009, 04:04 AM

At the very end he mentions it.

And I had a real WTF moment with this part of the article:

"If one wanted to leave a video game system hooked up to a TV set and then be able to watch standard television programming later, one had to manually slide a switch � that provided by the RF switch box � to select between the two signal sources."

What the Fuck is he smoking?

What are you smoking? That statement is correct for classic consoles like the Atari 2600 and Atari 7800.

Oldest console you've played must be a NES. There were at one time switchboxes that weren't automatic.

Darren870

08-12-2009, 07:23 AM

What about the 3D0 and how you have to "link" controllers for more then 1 person to play.

That was the WORST idea.

FantasiaWHT

08-12-2009, 07:37 AM

Gotta hate on the DC controller. I remember getting horribly cramped up just from playing PSO. Had to stretch fingers too far to reach the triggers, the layout was too vertical.

sidnotcrazy

08-12-2009, 10:54 AM

I felt like the author missed the boat. He didn't even mention the Atari 7800 joysticks. Those were packed in the states, and they were terrible. I had hand cramps on top of hand cramps using those. Decent list, but again a lot of his "complaints" were not seen or even able to be addressed at the time. Like the RF switchbox, most tvs had two screws for rabbit ears, so lets just say it was a different time then.

How did the Colecovision skip the list? If the Intellivision controller was unconfortable, the Colecovision had to be the same or worse? I like both controllers, but they do take some getting use to.

Gentlegamer

08-12-2009, 12:01 PM

What are you smoking? That statement is correct for classic consoles like the Atari 2600 and Atari 7800.

Oldest console you've played must be a NES. There were at one time switchboxes that weren't automatic.
Yup, that was a ritual for playing the VCS.

When I saw the article was by Benj Edwards, I knew it would be good. His blog at http://www.vintagecomputing.com/ is excellent.

alxbly

08-12-2009, 01:25 PM

"The complexity and depth of Nintendo 64 games suffered as a result".

Hmmm. I'm not so sure that N64 games did suffer in that way as a result of cartridges. Sure, there wasn't as much third party support as Nintendo hoped (understatement!) but a lot of the games that did get produced certainly didn't lack complexity or depth. For example, Ocarina of Time is full of depth, Goldeneye certainly didn't lack detail. There's plenty third party games that have sufficient complexity/depth as well; Shadow Man, Quake 2, Duke Nukem Zero Hour, Turok 2, etc, etc...

Gentlegamer

08-12-2009, 02:04 PM

"The complexity and depth of Nintendo 64 games suffered as a result"."The inclusion of crappy FMV in Nintendo 64 games suffered as a result."

That's how I read it.

garagesaleking!!

08-12-2009, 02:13 PM

i know nothing about game programming at all, but am i wrong to think that mario party is a somewhat complex n64 game?

StoneAgeGamer

08-12-2009, 02:14 PM

I liked the DC controller and I played many hours of PSO as well and never had a problem with it. I have noticed the DC controller is very polarizing. People either love it or hate it.

Article was pretty spot on though.

Kiddo

08-12-2009, 02:16 PM

I'll have to go with the "n64 problem is exaggerated", crowd. It's really more the decision to fuck over all the 64DD hype that's peeving there. The rest of the problems though are more legit.

On the Sega end: Hwo did they miss the fact that a Genesis/CD/32x required so many power adapters that Sega made a SPECIAL POWER STRIP just for using all of them? Combined with the 32x ALSO needing it's own cable to connect to the Genesis's AV out ALONG with needing to connect through the cartridge port. Oh, and that supposedly most of the initial release batch was defective.

On the Saturn: The US Saturn's first controller version - this more or less mirrors the original Xbox's "Duke" vs "Controller S" scenario.

Sony: the original Playstation's lack of RAM - or RAM upgradability - came to bite them when Capcom wanted to port their VS. series fighting games. Although this didn't matter much in America (The Saturn was already mostly dead here), it led to Sega having superior a notably superior port of an arcade hit.

Super Famicom: The Satellaview had a load of ridiculous limitations (Most were more software-enforced than hardware-related, actually, but one of them was obviously that Satellite Radio streaming was NO Substitute for proper CD Audio.) that have led to a faded popularitiy in Japan and confusion among collectors,researchers and Nintendo fanboys who try to look for information on it and see/read things that they can't put proper context on.

Kid Fenris

08-12-2009, 03:06 PM

"The inclusion of crappy FMV in Nintendo 64 games suffered as a result."

That's how I read it.

Crappy FMV games were dead and buried by the time the Nintendo 64 launched. How many awful FMV games were even released for the PlayStation and Saturn in North America? Was Fox Hunt the only one?

Edit: After looking it up, I count six FMV titles on the PlayStation: Fox Hunt, Psychic Detective, The X-Files, Cyberia, Novastorm, and Braindead 13. Thank heavens the Nintendo 64 was spared such a plague.

Using cartridges for the Nintendo 64 was a hilarious mistake, and the article is right to point that out.

Gentlegamer

08-12-2009, 04:21 PM

Crappy FMV games were dead and buried by the time the Nintendo 64 launched. How many awful FMV games were even released for the PlayStation and Saturn in North America? Was Fox Hunt the only one?

Edit: After looking it up, I count six FMV titles on the PlayStation: Fox Hunt, Psychic Detective, The X-Files, Cyberia, Novastorm, and Braindead 13. Thank heavens the Nintendo 64 was spared such a plague.

Using cartridges for the Nintendo 64 was a hilarious mistake, and the article is right to point that out.I'm referring to the FMV in games like Final Fantasy VII, for example. Square pulled development of the original N64 because FF7 'wouldn't fit on a cart.' The game itself would fit just fine, but the FMV cut scenes would not.

Benj also neglects to mention the legal implications of Nintendo using CD format that influenced its decision: having to pay Sony royalties.

A Black Falcon

08-12-2009, 04:21 PM

What about the 3D0 and how you have to "link" controllers for more then 1 person to play.

That was the WORST idea.

How, exactly, is that a worse idea than needing to buy a separate addon in order to be able to play with more than 1 or 2 people? I'd say that multitap-free multiplayer is a very good thing... having to buy an addon in order to play some multiplayer modes is annoying, and the 3DO had a pretty interesting idea there. Microsoft used it later on, the original Sidewinder Gamepad for the PC had a gamepad port on it, so you could plug a second pad or joystick into the Sidewinder and switch between them (for certain joystick models such as the Microsoft Sidewinder 3D Pro). Great idea, I thought.

"The complexity and depth of Nintendo 64 games suffered as a result".

Hmmm. I'm not so sure that N64 games did suffer in that way as a result of cartridges. Sure, there wasn't as much third party support as Nintendo hoped (understatement!) but a lot of the games that did get produced certainly didn't lack complexity or depth. For example, Ocarina of Time is full of depth, Goldeneye certainly didn't lack detail. There's plenty third party games that have sufficient complexity/depth as well; Shadow Man, Quake 2, Duke Nukem Zero Hour, Turok 2, etc, etc...

Agreed here as well for sure, N64 games did not suffer in any way graphically or in game design because of the cart decision. The only things that were really affected were music and making it harder for developers not good at compression, really (the low-res textures are mostly because of the tiny texture cache, not the carts).

3d N64 game complexity and depth was above that of your average game on any other system that generation, and at the top end they did more than anything possible on any other system that generation.

"The inclusion of crappy FMV in Nintendo 64 games suffered as a result."

That's how I read it.

Hah, now that I agree with. Quite true. :)

Crappy FMV games were dead and buried by the time the Nintendo 64 launched. How many awful FMV games were even released for the PlayStation and Saturn in North America? Was Fox Hunt the only one?

Edit: After looking it up, I count six FMV titles on the PlayStation: Fox Hunt, Psychic Detective, The X-Files, Cyberia, Novastorm, and Braindead 13. Thank heavens the Nintendo 64 was spared such a plague.

Using cartridges for the Nintendo 64 was a hilarious mistake, and the article is right to point that out.

FMV doesn't just mean live-action video, it also means CG cutscenes. And if one thing hurt the N64, it was the fact that JRPG developers couldn't do their precious pre-rendered FMV cutscenes on N64, so they all went to PSX instead, and doomed Nintendo in Japan that generation.

There were some other factors, but I think that was one of the biggest ones. Of course Resident Evil 2 for instance shows that you CAN actually do FMV on the N64, but it takes a lot of effort...

Using cartridges on the N64 was absolutely not a mistake, it was a good decision that made games on the system more fun and less frustrating (no/less load times, etc).

AB Positive

08-12-2009, 05:06 PM

I have to agree with the "Carts being a mistake" on the N64 side of things. Now, yes - you can do a LOT with 64 MB. But you can do a lot more with 650. You suffer due to loading times but a smart programmer can ease this.

Not that every PSX or Saturn programmer was smart (who coded the PSX version of Street Fighter Alpha? WHO????) but still - it can be easily mitigated.

This isn't to say that N64 was a bad system though. Not one of my faves but come on - Mario 64, Zelda OoT, Starfox 64... clearly you can make a classic on the N64. I just wonder how many more AAA titles would've hit the N64 if it had more spacious media, that's all.

Jorpho

08-12-2009, 05:10 PM

What about the 3D0 and how you have to "link" controllers for more then 1 person to play.

That was the WORST idea.That came up in the AVGN Plumbers Don't Wear Ties video. Just what is so terrible about this idea? It's a bit odd, but it seems quite reasonable to me. I can see it as potentially even reducing the occurrence of tangled cables.

Kid Fenris

08-12-2009, 05:43 PM

I'm referring to the FMV in games like Final Fantasy VII, for example. Square pulled development of the original N64 because FF7 'wouldn't fit on a cart.' The game itself would fit just fine, but the FMV cut scenes would not.

Square also shunned the Nintendo 64 because the system's memory and the price of cartridges made it far more feasible to make CD-based games on the PlayStation. Consider the Square games that don't use FMV extensively: Threads of Fate, Einhander, Ehrgeiz, Bushido Blade, the Tobal games, and so on. If FMV was the only factor in Square rejecting cartridges, the company would have hosted a few games on the Nintendo 64.

They didn't. Politics played some role in this, but Square also thought there was no profit, creative or financial, to be made on the Nintendo 64. Like the majority of developers, they realized that the cartridge format was a moribund money-sink for console games.

FMV doesn't just mean live-action video, it also means CG cutscenes. And if one thing hurt the N64, it was the fact that JRPG developers couldn't do their precious pre-rendered FMV cutscenes on N64, so they all went to PSX instead, and doomed Nintendo in Japan that generation.

And yet most of the early PlayStation RPGs don't use FMV extensively: Suikoden, Arc the Lad, Wild Arms, and Persona all have very limited FMV sequences. Only Final Fantasy VII heavily integrates them. Later games, made well after the PlayStation dominated the market, use FMV more often, but it's still prevalent mostly in Square titles. In fact, Dragon Quest VII, the other big Japanese RPG of the PlayStation era, doesn't have many video sequences.

JRPG developers, like many other developers, went to the PlayStation because it was cheaper, it was easier to develop for, it offered better music/video/voice integration, and it wasn't hopelessly tied to fading, obsolete cartridges.

Aussie2B

08-12-2009, 05:57 PM

The PlayStation has enough weaknesses in its own hardware to negate any advantage it had in pure storage space, if you ask me.

I don't think the Virtual Boy or N64 should be on that list. When you compare them the other Nintendo mentions, they just aren't on the same label. The Game Boy Advance problems, those were pure boneheadedness, and while they had their reasons given the market, the front-loading of the NES certainly wasn't necessary and is a real flaw. But the Virtual Boy and the N64 are a result of what Nintendo valued and what limitations they had to deal with.

Yokoi's original concept for the Virtual Boy was brilliant, but it was too far ahead of its time. The product that came to market was they best they could give us short of asking for an exorbitant amount of money. Given that, I think they still did fine. Not being in a comfortable position when playing is just whining and entirely the player's fault. You don't have to "crouch up" to it to play. In fact, I generally play standing up with the system on a shelf, and I'm perfectly comfortable for the 30-60 minutes that I play. And, sure, full color would've been lovely, but it's not as if it was feasible and Nintendo just didn't feel like it. It was the best they could offer given the era, and I see it silly to complain about it just as it would be to whine that the original Game Boy was black and white or that the Atari 2600 didn't have the color palette of, say, the NES.

And with the N64, no one ever has nor ever will make a good argument for "carts = inferior games". It's not like discs were some godsend that made games infinitely better. If they were, why was the Sega CD such a flop? Just because Sega and Sony had decided to go with discs doesn't mean a memo was sent saying "Hey, Nintendo, you're not allowed to use carts anymore." There were and will always been some clear advantages to carts, and that's precisely why Nintendo went with them. Obviously, there are clear advantages to discs too. From a business standpoint, I'll agree that it was a mistake in that they did lose third party support, but from a design point, I don't think so. They simply chose to go their own route, it suit their needs, and in the end they had many of the biggest selling games ever on that platform.

Ed Oscuro

08-12-2009, 06:05 PM

I'm with Aussie2B on this one. Cartridges weren't responsible for muddy N64 textures, nor did they prevent the system from having otherwise excellent visuals and sound. It didn't hold back Zelda games (imagine Zelda with more FMV).

It wasn't amazing to be limited to cartridges, and they were expensive, which certainly holds back who can develop for the system (no doubt that kept smaller companies, and others as well, from releasing both awesome and terrible games, and led companies more towards releasing "sure hits").

But at the end of the day my N64 still works just fine, and it will remain doing so for many years to come. (So does my PlayStation, knock on wood.)

The real mistake with the N64 was the analog sticks - not exactly flimsy but the plastic knob turns into powder after a time (even without the help of Smash Bros.).

Sonicwolf

08-12-2009, 06:09 PM

The real mistake with the N64 was the analog sticks - not exactly flimsy but the plastic knob turns into powder after a time (even without the help of Smash Bros.).

Are we forgetting the real culprit for Nintendo 64 analog stick failures? That damned minigame in Mario Party with the boat and the oars. The one where you have to rapidly rotate the joystick.

Darren870

08-12-2009, 06:16 PM

How, exactly, is that a worse idea than needing to buy a separate addon in order to be able to play with more than 1 or 2 people? I'd say that multitap-free multiplayer is a very good thing... having to buy an addon in order to play some multiplayer modes is annoying, and the 3DO had a pretty interesting idea there. Microsoft used it later on, the original Sidewinder Gamepad for the PC had a gamepad port on it, so you could plug a second pad or joystick into the Sidewinder and switch between them (for certain joystick models such as the Microsoft Sidewinder 3D Pro). Great idea, I thought.

They should have simply had 2-4 control ports. Linking was just a pain and in my opinion created more of a mess. If someone tugged there controller it would just screw up everyone else.

Kid Fenris

08-12-2009, 06:19 PM

The Virtual Boy was an idea ahead of its time, and Nintendo was wrong to attempt it with mid-1990s consumer technology. The Virtual Boy's existence was therefore a mistake. You can say it's a fun little failure, but you can't excuse Nintendo pushing it to the market.

There were and will always been some clear advantages to carts.

What's the advantage to cartridges beyond durability and the lack of loading times, neither of which improves actual game design?

Sonicwolf

08-12-2009, 06:30 PM

What's the advantage to cartridges beyond durability and the lack of loading times, neither of which improves actual game design?

The ability to include special hardware or software options that compliment the abilities of the console ala Super FX? Or how about the ability to save without game-external storage.

Kid Fenris

08-12-2009, 06:50 PM

The ability to include special hardware or software options that compliment the abilities of the console ala Super FX?

That's a fair point, though it didn't really help the Nintendo 64. The system's expansion pack was sold as a separate item instead of being integrated into the cartridges.

Or how about the ability to save without game-external storage.

Eh, I can't give you that. It has no influence on game content, and there are equal advantages to having save files separate from the game media itself.

MASTERWEEDO

08-12-2009, 07:36 PM

Eh, I can't give you that. It has no influence on game content, and there are equal advantages to having save files separate from the game media itself.

Renting comes to mind.

Jorpho

08-12-2009, 08:24 PM

They should have simply had 2-4 control ports. Linking was just a pain and in my opinion created more of a mess. If someone tugged there controller it would just screw up everyone else.If the cords were long enough, one person tugging on a controller wouldn't affect someone else, unless they were sitting really far apart. Besides, if you tug on the cord that hard, you can probably yank a system right off whatever shelf it is sitting on.

Sonicwolf

08-12-2009, 09:00 PM

Eh, I can't give you that. It has no influence on game content, and there are equal advantages to having save files separate from the game media itself.

I meant if more for an advantage thing. If your memory card for a disc based console dies, it takes ALL of your game saves with it.

A Black Falcon

08-12-2009, 09:36 PM

That's a fair point, though it didn't really help the Nintendo 64. The system's expansion pack was sold as a separate item instead of being integrated into the cartridges.

True, apart from the modem for access to the 64DD's Randnet service. Still though, there were many varieties of carts, with a bunch of different save types and cartridge sizes available... carts aren't one-size-fits-all. Of course even the cheapest levels are more expensive than anything on CD most likely, but at least companies aren't stuck with one very high price. The N64 for instance had six or seven different cart sizes and four or five on-cart save types or no oncart saving. Lots of options.

Eh, I can't give you that. It has no influence on game content, and there are equal advantages to having save files separate from the game media itself.

Yes, there definitely is an advantage -- you don't need to buy additional hardware just to save your game! With the N64 half of games do require the controller paks, but that's one half less than the number of PSX games that you need a memory card for. :)

Also at the time of course N64 games were more expensive usually, but now they aren't, and buying games with on-cart saving can save you the hassle of needing quite as many memory cards... though you do still need lots of them because of all those annoying (third-party) games that require memory cards.

Really that generation Saturn was probably best -- the memory card was very large, able to hold lots of save files. N64 would be second because of all the games with on-cart saving. PSX would be last of the three, because everything needs a memory card and those memory card access times on the thing are so long...

Oh, every single game published by Nintendo on the N64 has on-cart saving. Only third party games require memory cards, though most of those do.

Ed Oscuro

08-12-2009, 09:44 PM

The N64 for instance had six or seven different cart sizes and four or five on-cart save types or no oncart saving. Lots of options.
Lots of options a convoluted supply chain makes!

Are we forgetting the real culprit for Nintendo 64 analog stick failures? That damned minigame in Mario Party with the boat and the oars. The one where you have to rapidly rotate the joystick.
Probably. I've owned neither game so these things are mysteries to me.

I believe the N64 ships with little gremlins that spin the controllers while you sleep.

Kiddo

08-13-2009, 02:46 PM

Really that generation Saturn was probably best -- the memory card was very large, able to hold lots of save files. N64 would be second because of all the games with on-cart saving. PSX would be last of the three, because everything needs a memory card and those memory card access times on the thing are so long...

Sega's best decision for the Saturn was having the CD-based media -with- the cartridge expansions done on an as-needed basis for, say, "X-Men Vs. Street Fighter".

Of course, it kind of needed that considering that without such expandability it was difficult to make games for the system rival the Playstation.

The N64's RAM Expansion was a similar concept, but it seems kind of awkward when on previous consoles they would've just had a special chip manage something like that.

j_factor

08-14-2009, 03:05 AM

Agreed here as well for sure, N64 games did not suffer in any way graphically or in game design because of the cart decision. The only things that were really affected were music and making it harder for developers not good at compression, really

Have you ever played the N64 version of DDR? It's god-awful, and not just because it's Disney themed. Something like MTV Music Generator would be downright impossible. Music isn't of no importance.

(the low-res textures are mostly because of the tiny texture cache, not the carts).

But limited space (of carts) still means less room for texture data. Even if the N64 had been given a larger texture cache, it would still have generally worse texturing. If not low-res, then simply fewer textures.

FMV doesn't just mean live-action video, it also means CG cutscenes. And if one thing hurt the N64, it was the fact that JRPG developers couldn't do their precious pre-rendered FMV cutscenes on N64, so they all went to PSX instead, and doomed Nintendo in Japan that generation.

It's not just JRPG's. Lots of games used FMV. And you know what? They're not all bad. I've noticed N64 fans have a tendency to get really hyperbolic with their dismissal of video sequences in games. Cutscenes can be important. Take the FMVs out of Oddworld and you have a much less memorable, charming game (although still good gameplay-wise).

There were some other factors, but I think that was one of the biggest ones. Of course Resident Evil 2 for instance shows that you CAN actually do FMV on the N64, but it takes a lot of effort...

RE2 was the first 64MB cartridge, and it came out relatively late into the N64's life. A cartridge of that size wasn't available prior. There's a reason it was Resident Evil 2 (and a year and a half after the PSX version), and not Resident Evil 1.

Yes, there definitely is an advantage -- you don't need to buy additional hardware just to save your game! With the N64 half of games do require the controller paks, but that's one half less than the number of PSX games that you need a memory card for.

Games with on-cart saving typically cost even more than a regular N64 game, which was already more expensive than a Playstation game. PSX memory cards were quite cheap. You could buy a Playstation game and a memory card for the cost of an N64 game alone.

Using cartridges on the N64 was absolutely not a mistake, it was a good decision that made games on the system more fun and less frustrating (no/less load times, etc).

Since when are load times the worst thing in the world? In the vast majority of games, they're only a few seconds. When a game does have long load times, it's a fault of the game, not the disc format. Even on Sega CD, lots of games have very minimal loading. Fun fact: The Sega CD version of Out of This World actually loads faster than the SNES version.

In any case, the cartridge format was quite limiting. It's not just music, and it's not just video. And neither of those are insignificant either.

Ed Oscuro

08-14-2009, 04:54 AM

Kiddo

08-14-2009, 05:29 PM

Have you ever played the N64 version of DDR? It's god-awful, and not just because it's Disney themed. Something like MTV Music Generator would be downright impossible. Music isn't of no importance.

I'm gonna immediately guess the reason it was awful was because I can't remember there even being a dance pad for the N64.

You just can't play an arcade-style-game without a resemblence of it's control interface.

*Got an arcade stick that was N64-compatbile specifically for DK Arcade mode on DK64.*

Soviet Conscript

08-14-2009, 09:21 PM

That came up in the AVGN Plumbers Don't Wear Ties video. Just what is so terrible about this idea? It's a bit odd, but it seems quite reasonable to me. I can see it as potentially even reducing the occurrence of tangled cables.

i agree, i always liked the 3do controllers and never had a problem with the daisy chain idea. i also really liked the headphone jack on the controllers

kupomogli

08-14-2009, 10:53 PM

Since when are load times the worst thing in the world? In the vast majority of games, they're only a few seconds. When a game does have long load times, it's a fault of the game, not the disc format. Even on Sega CD, lots of games have very minimal loading. Fun fact: The Sega CD version of Out of This World actually loads faster than the SNES version.

I'll agree with this right here. Alot of people always assume disc format has terrible load time, these days it's when bashing PSP games. There are alot of games that load as fast as most cart games do. It's all dependent on how the games are developed.

Generally however, the cart format does have faster load times because it really doesn't require any optimization to ensure faster speeds.

Speaking of the Sega CD. In the Lunar games, battles are entered and exited pretty much instant, same with changing areas, anime sequences, etc. After anime sequences it did take about a two or three seconds before the previous screen reappeared, but that's about it.

Play Rogue Galaxy on the PS2. The game has almost no load times. The battles have short load times, but it's well hidden that you don't really realize it when you're playing.

Xenogears on the Playstation is another that has next to no load times. This is another game that hides load times well. Battles actually load while you're still in control, and then once loaded you enter the battle. If you have ever played it on an original PSX, you'll always know that you were about to get in a battle because you start to hear it read a different area on the disc. At this point you also get more time to still move around, the only thing that is locked out at that point is the ability to jump, open your menu, or leave the area.

Breath of Fire 3 for PSP or PSX has no real noticeable load times. Entering and exiting the map to a dungeon/town takes no time at all. Battles are in the exact same location your characters are standing at, no large load times. Probably about two seconds.

I'll finally end with the PSP. The GTA games load the entire game fairly quickly, then whenever entering or leaving a mission or building, it's only a few seconds before the entire map pulls up. Brave Story, Gurumin, Star Ocean First Departure, Second Evolution, etc. Barely any load times. Though you got other games like the WWE games which have pretty bad load times for the system, some Japanese game that I've heard that has a full minute each load screen, Wipeout Pulse that has about 10 seconds when loading a race, etc.

So yeah. It's all about how the game is developed.

An example of a recent cartridge game that has semi poor load times. Look at Final Fantasy 4 DS. When entering battle it takes atleast three to four seconds to load. Then when entering towns/dungeons, it's got about three seconds load time. It's also got a fairly noticeable load time when entering/exiting a different menu(two to three seconds.) Using L and R cuts down on that because it stays in the same menu.

So yeah. Cartridges don't necessarily mean it's the godsend of loading times. Though an opinion of mine would be Square did no optimizing on the load time for FF4DS. They sure as hell didn't with that piece of crap called FF4 Advance with lag from hell and bugs all over the place.

j_factor

08-14-2009, 11:04 PM

I'm gonna immediately guess the reason it was awful was because I can't remember there even being a dance pad for the N64.

There was, it was packaged with the game. There was only one N64 release of the series, and it was Japan-only, so the pads aren't exactly common.

Kiddo

08-15-2009, 02:03 AM

There was, it was packaged with the game. There was only one N64 release of the series, and it was Japan-only, so the pads aren't exactly common.

Thanks for that correction. Might be something I should look into, since it helps me realize that I can't recall many N64 accessories, much less specialty controllers like those - the Arcade stick I got in fact is a custom-built one and not a standard release like "arcade shark" (which I would looked hideous.)

Which then begs the question: We got two opposite ends of this scale here with

a) The N64, which had hardly any speciality controllers whatsoever.
vs
b) the Dreamcast, which had so many specialty controllers that I swear new ones are STILL popping up.

Would you think any one extreme or both extremes to be any sort of mistake?
Those on one end might feel an overabundance of specialty controllers to be too much of a money pit to attract casuals. On the other hand, not having a good official stick to play Killer Instinct Gold with.... sorry, Nintendo, Analog sticks do NOT work as Arcade sticks.

Ed Oscuro

08-15-2009, 02:50 AM

There are alot of games that load as fast as most cart games do.
Not a rebuttal, but more an expansion on that theme:

Blu-Ray's maximum advertised throughput is 54MB/sec; meanwhile, compact flash can get 45MB/sec WRITE speed, and SDHC is close. SDXC, which is ~5 years newer than Blu-Ray, is going to leave it in the dust, with minimum speeds around 100MB/sec, with a possible future speed on the roadmap of 300MB/sec, and minimum capacities of 64MB/sec. The Secure Digital format gets upgraded for bandwidth as often as is needed (although that makes these upgrades out of the question for a gaming device). Sony could always rev their discs, but you get the idea - there's not a huge gap between these two technologies. The consumer disc tech tends to be finalized in design for ease and cost, while applications that require the fastest data transfer rates (both up and down) are going to more than keep pace with disc media - but, as I said, solid state tech also has a barrier. Nintendo doesn't really have to go head-to-head with anybody for performance so they can get by with cheap media.

However, on the (all-important) business side there is an important point to be made: Discs are always at risk of going the way of a certain flightless Mauritanian bird, but solid state media (convenient bulk storage) has a strong future. Discs are just a way of getting some data to you, but solid state media is not can be used to hold data delivered digitally (displacing the optical media) just as well, it is more flexible with a wider range of uses across various devices and so is not in danger of being displaced itself any time soon.

Still, optical media is much better than it once was; file placement for optimizing fast reads works fairly similarly to hard drives, and so should sequential reads, something that it may do better than ROM or solid state media.

When it comes down to random reads, though, a solid-state solution wins. Of course, few (if any) games are built needing that.

Of course, the other questions that work out in favor of solid state haven't been raised, including power and relia/durability.

Generally however, the cart format does have faster load times because it really doesn't require any optimization to ensure faster speeds. [...] Though an opinion of mine would be Square did no optimizing on the load time for FF4DS. They sure as hell didn't with that piece of crap called FF4 Advance with lag from hell and bugs all over the place.
Uh, whatever you say.

A Black Falcon

08-15-2009, 03:24 AM

Have you ever played the N64 version of DDR? It's god-awful, and not just because it's Disney themed. Something like MTV Music Generator would be downright impossible. Music isn't of no importance.

There are some N64 games with decent-quality vocal music, such as Top Gear Overdrive, and others with plenty of voiced dialog, like Shadow Man, Conker, PD, Rogue Squadron, etc. You can't do as many songs on N64 as on PSX (maybe like six seems to be the limit in most voiced-dialog-songs games), but quality is plenty good enough. N64 audio is not that bad.

Of course DDR would only suffer with only a few songs, though. That is something designed for CDs, sure. Just like how anything with lots of stuff to load is better on cart.

But limited space (of carts) still means less room for texture data. Even if the N64 had been given a larger texture cache, it would still have generally worse texturing. If not low-res, then simply fewer textures.

Not really. Very few games that generation used much of that space with actual textures, there's a reason that so many of those games have huge FMVs and redbook audio taking up most of the discs... the actual games themselves are pretty small. While there may have been some limits on texture size thanks to using the carts, that gen, it wouldn't have been much of a problem. The carts and compression were plenty large enough for higher-resolution textures, had they been possible.

It's not just JRPG's. Lots of games used FMV. And you know what? They're not all bad. I've noticed N64 fans have a tendency to get really hyperbolic with their dismissal of video sequences in games. Cutscenes can be important. Take the FMVs out of Oddworld and you have a much less memorable, charming game (although still good gameplay-wise).

Sure, FMV's not all bad. Blizzard is my favorite game developer (for their RTS games in particular), and I've always been very impressed by their CG FMV work... but that is not gameplay, and gameplay is what matters the most for games. Having fancy FMVs does nothing to help your game's actual gameplay. And the N64 clearly wins in that department, in my opinion.

RE2 was the first 64MB cartridge, and it came out relatively late into the N64's life. A cartridge of that size wasn't available prior. There's a reason it was Resident Evil 2 (and a year and a half after the PSX version), and not Resident Evil 1.

Yeah, back when RE1 came out Capcom was still refusing to develop anything at all for the N64. :)

... I admit, a 16MB version of RE1 or something (for 1997 release; 32MB wasn't available until '98) wouldn't have been as good as the 64MB version of RE2, for sure. RE1 was only one disc though, a 32MB version at least should have been possible, had they wanted to try... 16MB would have been tough though, sure. But the point is, Capcom didn't even want to try, they were most definitely not an N64 supporter. Even RE2 wasn't done internally at Capcom, it was done by Angel Studios, who had previously made the two Ken Griffey games on N64 and were a part of the original Dream Team, I believe.

Games with on-cart saving typically cost even more than a regular N64 game, which was already more expensive than a Playstation game. PSX memory cards were quite cheap. You could buy a Playstation game and a memory card for the cost of an N64 game alone.

Cost more to the developers, yes, but not to the customer, necessarily. Remember, all of Nintendo's first-party titles have internal save. Nintendo did not massively overprice its own games. Some third parties did, but they did this to some games without internal save as well, so that wasn't the whole explanation, they just wanted to make more money... which is why most of the time they just required controller paks, lower costs.

But anyway, it's not true that N64 games with internal save were always more expensive. Also, by 1999 or so N64 prices had decreased. I got my N64 that year, and never paid more than $50 for anything, and I bought new games sometimes. Few games were priced higher than that by that point. The price issue was mostly a problem early on.

Since when are load times the worst thing in the world? In the vast majority of games, they're only a few seconds. When a game does have long load times, it's a fault of the game, not the disc format. Even on Sega CD, lots of games have very minimal loading. Fun fact: The Sega CD version of Out of This World actually loads faster than the SNES version.

It's the fault of the game? No, not really. 2d fighting games have horrible load times on all CD systems that generation except the Saturn with 4MB RAM cart for a good reason, and it's not one that had anything to do with the fault of the games. And yes, there is the occasional cartridge game with loading.

Hydro Thunder on the N64, for example. It has loading, maybe 3 or 4 seconds to get into a race or see the best-times table, maybe a second between track and boat selection. However... just look at the loading times on the Dreamcast version and those load times look AMAZING. Seriously, on DC that game takes forever to load! It affects how much fun I have with the game to the point that I absolutely would prefer to play the N64 version, even if it runs a bit slower and has slightly worse graphics... that loading is just really annoying.

Sometimes good programming can reduce the impact of loading time, but for a long time such things were few and far between... but I actually will agree about the Sega CD, I haven't been annoyed by the loading in most SCD games I've played. There's only one where it really affected play, the combat animations in Dark Wizard (which take forever to load and are short and irrelevant for anything other than looking nice), but you can disable them, so that's not too bad. I guess that the areas loading are just smaller... though I will say, I haven't tried to play any 2d fighting games on the thing. From what I've heard about MK1 Sega CD, it's pretty bad there...

But anyway, sure, on PSX and such some games have loading that's not too bad, others have loading that's really annoying. But the point is, N64 loading times are less across the board -- and why waste any more time looking at loading screens than you have to?

In any case, the cartridge format was quite limiting. It's not just music, and it's not just video. And neither of those are insignificant either.

Yeah, it's not just music or video, because while those are drawbacks, they aren't that big ones. It's about the load times, memory access times, durability, and on-cart save options. Those are all very strong good points for carts over CDs. But I somehow doubt we'll ever agree on anything here... :)

Kid Fenris

08-15-2009, 09:38 PM

Sure, FMV's not all bad. Blizzard is my favorite game developer (for their RTS games in particular), and I've always been very impressed by their CG FMV work... but that is not gameplay, and gameplay is what matters the most for games. Having fancy FMVs does nothing to help your game's actual gameplay. And the N64 clearly wins in that department, in my opinion.

Even if the Nintendo 64 had clearly superior gameplay (an argument that only the most delusional of the system's fans will put forth), it wouldn't be due to cartridges.

Yeah, it's not just music or video, because while those are drawbacks, they aren't that big ones. It's about the load times, memory access times, durability, and on-cart save options. Those are all very strong good points for carts over CDs.

Not one of those is a strong point for carts, because not one of those has any relevant effect on the content of a game.

j_factor

08-15-2009, 10:34 PM

There are some N64 games with decent-quality vocal music, such as Top Gear Overdrive, and others with plenty of voiced dialog, like Shadow Man, Conker, PD, Rogue Squadron, etc. You can't do as many songs on N64 as on PSX (maybe like six seems to be the limit in most voiced-dialog-songs games), but quality is plenty good enough. N64 audio is not that bad.

Of course N64 audio isn't all bad. The N64 sound chip is perfectly capable. It's a problem of capacity.

Of course DDR would only suffer with only a few songs, though. That is something designed for CDs, sure. Just like how anything with lots of stuff to load is better on cart.

You said, "N64 games did not suffer in any way graphically or in game design." I would say DDR suffered in game design. And the N64 overall suffered because a lot of games are more suited to CD. Some games are better suited to cartridges, but relatively few.

Sure, FMV's not all bad. Blizzard is my favorite game developer (for their RTS games in particular), and I've always been very impressed by their CG FMV work... but that is not gameplay, and gameplay is what matters the most for games. Having fancy FMVs does nothing to help your game's actual gameplay. And the N64 clearly wins in that department, in my opinion.

I play a game for the overall experience, not strictly the core gameplay. Having FMVs (which I really don't consider "fancy") absolutely does make some games better. I already gave you an example with Oddworld. Do you really think that game would've been just as fun without the FMVs? Would Mr. Bones?

It's the fault of the game? No, not really. 2d fighting games have horrible load times on all CD systems that generation except the Saturn with 4MB RAM cart for a good reason, and it's not one that had anything to do with the fault of the games. And yes, there is the occasional cartridge game with loading.

And yet, you didn't see hardly any 2d fighting games on N64 at all, did you? There's a good reason for that. Most of them by then were too large, with lots of animation data. Samurai Shodown 4, which came out the same year N64 launched, was 94.5 MB on Neo Geo, roughly 50% larger than RE2 and multiple times larger than Mario 64. They ported it to Neo Geo CD, Saturn, and Playstation. The Playstation version took a dip in quality due to limited RAM, but was still fairly intact. Yes, these versions had loading times -- simply because there's so much data. More, in fact, than N64 could've handled.

Could the N64 have handled a port of SamSho 4 in some way? Sure. It would've been significantly cut down, but feasible. But it's also true that if they had cut down the Playstation version to an N64-level amount of data, it would've had far less, if any, loading.

Sometimes good programming can reduce the impact of loading time, but for a long time such things were few and far between...

Disagreed. Truly bad load times were always the exception, not the rule.

But anyway, sure, on PSX and such some games have loading that's not too bad, others have loading that's really annoying. But the point is, N64 loading times are less across the board -- and why waste any more time looking at loading screens than you have to?

Because the benefits (plural) outweigh the drawback (singular). :)

Have you played the N64 version of Tony Hawk? It's pretty silly. I'd much rather play the Dreamcast (or even PSX) version, even though I have to wait a couple seconds to load a level.

Yeah, it's not just music or video, because while those are drawbacks, they aren't that big ones. It's about the load times, memory access times, durability, and on-cart save options. Those are all very strong good points for carts over CDs. But I somehow doubt we'll ever agree on anything here... :)

Yeah, I really don't think load times, "memory access times" (isn't that the same issue as load times?), durability (I have never broken a CD), or on-cart saving (doesn't add anything), outweigh music and video. Music and video are specifically important to a lot of games. I've played games that rely on music and/or video to convey the right atmosphere, and sometimes for the gameplay itself (would Phantasmagoria work without video? I think not). I don't think I've played a single game that relied on a lack of load time or on-cart saving.

I can think of lots of Playstation and Saturn games that wouldn't have worked on N64. I can't think of any N64 games that wouldn't have worked on Playstation or Saturn, other than in the sense of N64 being a bit more powerful graphically.

A Black Falcon

08-15-2009, 11:14 PM

Even if the Nintendo 64 had clearly superior gameplay (an argument that only the most delusional of the system's fans will put forth), it wouldn't be due to cartridges.

What, because only a delusional N64 fan could possibly dare to say that the PSX didn't have the best gameplay of that generation? Only a hardcore Sony fan and Nintendo hater would say such a ridiculous thing... ;)

Seriously though, that's an absolutely ridiculous thing to say. What, does having more games make a system's gameplay better now or something? Um, no.

I mean, all other things being equal, you'd think that the best chance for the best games would come from the most powerful system. The N64 was the most powerful system that generation. As a result, it has the best looking and most technically advanced games (this is really not up for debate; you can say that you like PSX graphics better, plenty of people do, but on an objective level the N64 looks better.), and, I would say, the best gameplay as well.

Not one of those is a strong point for carts, because not one of those has any relevant effect on the content of a game.

Load times have an impact on gameplay, yes they most certainly do.

Beyond that though, if you recall, when defending the carts decision along with the load times point, one of the other things Nintendo made a big deal about was saying that the games on N64 were only possible on cartridge and that on CD they could not have been done as they were. This was surely partially propaganda, but not entirely. The fast access times of a cart allow you to make larger game areas than you can do on CD unless you've come up with a pretty good streaming technique; later on some PSX games of some kinds managed that, but on N64 it's just naturally there, no problem, all the time. This absolutely makes a difference in terms of game design.

Of course N64 audio isn't all bad. The N64 sound chip is perfectly capable. It's a problem of capacity.

The N64 doesn't have a sound chip. This is one reason people criticize the audio, because unlike SNES it didn't have a dedicated audio chip. I think that things turned out okay anyway.

You said, "N64 games did not suffer in any way graphically or in game design." I would say DDR suffered in game design. And the N64 overall suffered because a lot of games are more suited to CD. Some games are better suited to cartridges, but relatively few.

Yeah, I know, only 2d and 3d games of pretty much every genre except for FMV games and music games are better on carts. That's not many kinds of games, sure. :)

I play a game for the overall experience, not strictly the core gameplay. Having FMVs (which I really don't consider "fancy") absolutely does make some games better. I already gave you an example with Oddworld. Do you really think that game would've been just as fun without the FMVs? Would Mr. Bones?

The gameplay in Oddworld isn't affected by the FMV, only the story... and sure, they're amusing, but if they'd tried it on N64 I'm sure they'd have come up with a decent way of doing it.

As for Mr. Bones, never played it. But again, FMV isn't gameplay. But anyway, I agreed that sometimes FMV is nice... but it's not gameplay, and gameplay is what matters most in games. Of course every aspect of the experience counts, but things that actually happen while you are playing -- the gameplay, graphics, music, etc -- should count more than things which are non-interactive and you are just watching. FMV can be a useful storytelling tool, but as Command & Conquer 64 shows for example, removing all the FMV from an FMV-heavy game actually doesn't hurt it very much. C&C 64 is still a very good game (and plus, it has new, N64-exclusive 3d graphics which actually look quite nice!).

Disagreed. Truly bad load times were always the exception, not the rule.

Not in a lot of genres, that's for sure.

Because the benefits (plural) outweigh the drawback (singular).

Have you played the N64 version of Tony Hawk? It's pretty silly. I'd much rather play the Dreamcast (or even PSX) version, even though I have to wait a couple seconds to load a level.

Never played N64 Tony Hawk, no. Never played it on PSX either; I'm not a series fan, and the little bit I have played has only been on DC and Gamecube. I have Tony Hawk 2 for DC, but haven't played it much. But what does that have to do with this point? They have loading times or something that are as long as on DC?

And yet, you didn't see hardly any 2d fighting games on N64 at all, did you? There's a good reason for that. Most of them by then were too large, with lots of animation data. Samurai Shodown 4, which came out the same year N64 launched, was 94.5 MB on Neo Geo, roughly 50% larger than RE2 and multiple times larger than Mario 64. They ported it to Neo Geo CD, Saturn, and Playstation. The Playstation version took a dip in quality due to limited RAM, but was still fairly intact. Yes, these versions had loading times -- simply because there's so much data. More, in fact, than N64 could've handled.

Could the N64 have handled a port of SamSho 4 in some way? Sure. It would've been significantly cut down, but feasible. But it's also true that if they had cut down the Playstation version to an N64-level amount of data, it would've had far less, if any, loading.

That is absolutely not true. First, your sizes are wrong. Samurai Shodown IV was 47.2MB, not 94. Neo-Geo roms can be deceptive because they often have duplicated information in them to boost file sizes, for some reason... by the end Neo-Geo games did reach about 80MB, but if you look at all the cuts to animation done on the PSX and Saturn versions to fit it in those systems' limited RAM, it's not like those versions were that big.

Originally the Neo-Geo was supposed to be limited to 330Mb (about 40MB), as the logo screen says with "Max 330 Mega". That only changed later in the system's life. But anyway, N64 versions of SNK fighting games may have needed small cuts, but nothing worse than was happening on PSX and Saturn for RAM reasons, I believe. Certainly the ports would be a a lot better than the SNES ports of earlier Neo-Geo games... and even there some were pretty good, like World Heroes 2 and King of the Monsters 2 for example.

Anyway, the reason that the N64 didn't have more 2d fighting games had absolutely nothing to do with cart size limits. It had everything to do with the simple fact that Japanese publishers didn't want to support the N64. This can be supported by looking at who actually DID make fighting games on the N64. It was, surprise, companies supporting it better! So, Midway was the biggest producer of fighting games on the N64. Many of the rest were also Western, because the N64 had pretty good Western support. Konami made several as well, because they were one of the stronger Japanese supporters of the system (including one 2d one as well as some 3d).

Capcom didn't make fighting games on N64 because they didn't make much of anything on N64. If they'd started supporting the platform earlier, I'd bet we'd have seen something. At least 3d stuff like an N64 version Street Fighter EX, maybe something 2d as well... maybe in some cases you'd need to cut some animation to fit into the carts, but again, compared to the cuts being made on other versions for RAM reasons, the only home ports that may have looked better than these prospective N64 ones would be Neo-Geo games and Saturn games that supported the 4MB RAM cart (which except for one beat 'em up was only supported by fighting games).

I strongly believe that this really was a huge missed opportunity for Capcom and SNK. The N64 has Nintendo's best gamepad ever, their only one with six face buttons, and hardware that would have meant for short loading times, unlike the uniformly very long ones everywhere except Saturn 4MB (or Jaguar)... and they did nothing with it. Very disappointing, but cart size was definitely not a factor, the games would have looked fine and played great, I'm certain, had they actually tried.

Kid Fenris

08-16-2009, 12:35 AM

What, because only a delusional N64 fan could possibly dare to say that the PSX didn't have the best gameplay of that generation? Only a hardcore Sony fan and Nintendo hater would say such a ridiculous thing... ;)

Seriously though, that's an absolutely ridiculous thing to say. What, does having more games make a system's gameplay better now or something? Um, no.

You've missed the point, so I'll spell it out for you: only a delusional fan would claim that the Nintendo 64's library features obviously better gameplay than contemporary disc-based systems. By any reasonable critical measure, the best-playing games of the era were distributed among all of the major systems.

I strongly believe that this really was a huge missed opportunity for Capcom and SNK. The N64 has Nintendo's best gamepad ever, their only one with six face buttons, and hardware that would have meant for short loading times, unlike the uniformly very long ones everywhere except Saturn 4MB (or Jaguar)... and they did nothing with it. Very disappointing, but cart size was definitely not a factor, the games would have looked fine and played great, I'm certain, had they actually tried.

OK, this MUST be a joke post.

j_factor

08-16-2009, 12:57 AM

Yeah, I know, only 2d and 3d games of pretty much every genre except for FMV games and music games are better on carts. That's not many kinds of games, sure. :)

Very funny. Pretty much every genre is better on CD, barring massive cartridges. Still not seeing how load times outweight content.

First, your sizes are wrong. Samurai Shodown IV was 47.2MB, not 94.

You're right, my math was wrong. But still, 47MB was significantly larger than any N64 game at the time, due to cost.

Never played N64 Tony Hawk, no. Never played it on PSX either; I'm not a series fan, and the little bit I have played has only been on DC and Gamecube. I have Tony Hawk 2 for DC, but haven't played it much. But what does that have to do with this point? They have loading times or something that are as long as on DC?

Point is, I would rather have a few seconds of loading in an otherwise better version of a game, than have an instantly loading version that sucks in all other areas of comparison. The Sega CD version of Earthworm Jim has loading times between levels, but it also has additional content, improved animation, and an excellent re-done soundtrack. I've never heard anyone disagree that the Sega CD version is the best version.

Anyway, the reason that the N64 didn't have more 2d fighting games had absolutely nothing to do with cart size limits. It had everything to do with the simple fact that Japanese publishers didn't want to support the N64.

How is that not related? Cartridges were the very reason Japanese publishers didn't want to support the N64 in the first place.

Sonicwolf

08-16-2009, 12:58 AM

How is that not related? Cartridges were the very reason Japanese publishers didn't want to support the N64 in the first place.

Now is this because of cost-of-manufacture or the well known limitations..

j_factor

08-16-2009, 01:14 AM

Now is this because of cost-of-manufacture or the well known limitations..

Hard to believe it's cost of manufacture in this case. When SNK created the Saturn version of King of Fighters 95, they made one of only two games for the system that had its own cartridge (not a RAM cart). Possibly the only two games in history (the other one was Ultraman, which is unrelated to this discussion) to run on both a cartridge and CD, at the same time. Additionally, most games that supported a RAM cartridge were available both separately and bundled with the RAM, and a couple were only available as the bundle. So I definitely don't think Capcom and SNK were unwilling to put out games that cost a little bit more.

A Black Falcon

08-16-2009, 02:18 AM

You've missed the point, so I'll spell it out for you: only a delusional fan would claim that the Nintendo 64's library features obviously better gameplay than contemporary disc-based systems. By any reasonable critical measure, the best-playing games of the era were distributed among all of the major systems.

Each console has different strengths and weaknesses, sure. Saturn had the best 2d games, N64 the best 3d games, PSX the most games, in general. Which one any person prefers depends on their likes and dislikes. For mine, the N64 absolutely has the best, best-playing games.

OK, this MUST be a joke post.

... And now you prove once again why I said you obviously hate Nintendo, or at least the N64.

Joke post, the idea that the N64 can do good fighting games? Seriously? How much DO you hate the N64? Must be quite a bit...

I don't know what aspect of that you're complaining about. The controller? The N64 controller is my favorite controller of all time, hands down. (The Saturn 3D controller and Dreamcast controller would probably be the next two). The controller has a fantastic d-pad, infinitely superior to the awful PSX one, and a great six face button layout, perfect for fighting games and again vastly superior to the 4 buttons on PSX. Six face buttons has always been something I strongly prefer. Oh, and the Z trigger is awesome.

Or do you mean fighting games on N64? Again.. well, as far as 2d or 2.5d fighting games go, the N64 only had four -- Super Smash Bros., Rakuga Kids (JP/EU only), Mortal Kombat Trilogy, and Killer Instinct Gold. All are at least competent, in what they try to do. SSB is of course the best by far though...

MK Trilogy does have like two or three fewer playable characters than on PSX/Saturn/PC, but it also has no loading times, versus long ones. Choose which you prefer. (The characters were only removed because this was an early release and thus limited to 8MB)

KI Gold is the only home port of KI2, so that's your only choice... again a few characters from the first game weren't there, but it was just because of the early release cart size limit, that's all.

As for 3d fighting games, the N64 has a lot more of those. Most are mediocre or poor, like most 3d fighting games that generation on any platform, but there are a few I would consider good, namely Fighter's Destiny (quite unique and original game), Flying Dragon, and Mace: The Dark Age. It isn't theoretical that the N64 can do decent fighting games, it's proven. All that was needed for it to be a truly great fighting game to be on N64 was to see better fighting game developers work on the system -- not the B and C grade ones the system got, but top-rank A-grade ones. You can't say that they'd be bad when they were never tried, and for reasons nothing to do with how good a competent team could have done on them!

Very funny. Pretty much every genre is better on CD, barring massive cartridges. Still not seeing how load times outweight content.

Why? You can't say that like it's an obvious fact, because it isn't. But you have done nothing to try to prove that point, so I don't think I need to say much.

You're right, my math was wrong. But still, 47MB was significantly larger than any N64 game at the time, due to cost.

But it would have been absolutely doable in a form that would have looked and played great. Remember, N64 games were also usually compressed more so than other games, to save space... you can't just compare megabyte-to-megabyte numbers. But that should be obvious, or Resident Evil 2 would never have been possible in 64MB as opposed to two CDs... :)

Point is, I would rather have a few seconds of loading in an otherwise better version of a game, than have an instantly loading version that sucks in all other areas of comparison. The Sega CD version of Earthworm Jim has loading times between levels, but it also has additional content, improved animation, and an excellent re-done soundtrack. I've never heard anyone disagree that the Sega CD version is the best version.

It depends a lot on how much, and how frequent, that loading is. You consistently try to under-estimate how long PSX loading times are, that's for sure!

You also massively overstate how much N64 games were "downgraded". Usually, they were better; there are very few games on both N64 and PSX that are actually better on PSX, and in every one of those cases it's because it was a PSX game lazily ported to N64 and better on the original system.

But really, most good N64 games aren't on other systems. The N64 was not like the Gamecube in having huge mountains of ports from the PSX as the GC did from PS2; instead, most of its games are original, or are original versions unlike the others (such as with Forsaken 64, Doom 64, Quake II...). And those games were often the best console ports available. Multiplatform games were better on N64 if they were designed for it first, too, or if the development team was actually competent, such as the Midway teams that did games like Hydro Thunder and Rush or Acclaim with Shadow Man (with full voice acting too, no downgrades there on N64!). I think that Wipeout 64 is the best Wipeout game of that generation. Etc.

Point is, PSX versions were not usually better. Sometimes they were better, sometimes worse, but it wasn't something that had to do with the medium in most cases, just the development teams. The weaker PSX hardware just cannot keep up with the N64. Playstation image quality is almost always horrible, with the screen full of jaggies and popping polygons and polygon seams all over the place... while on N64, the filtering and Z-buffering and all that gets rid of all that. There's a dramatic difference in image quality that far, far more than makes up for the often lower resolution textures. Would everything the N64 does be possible with CDs? I believe Nintendo when they say no, because with the slow speed of CD drives then you just couldn't have done it. Loading, area size, etc...

I admit though, it is hard to separate system power -- where the N64 clearly wins -- from media format -- which is what this debate is supposed to be about. An N64 just as powerful as it is, but with CDs... how would it have looked? What would the impact be? Could games be made the same as they are, just with more loading, or would design changes be needed to deal with the fact that you can't just stream stuff off the cart? I think that that would be required, and game design would thus have been restricted in that way more than it was. But we can't know for sure what the impact would have been because this is all speculation.

Oh, and yeah, you're right that EWJCD is the best console version of the game. But it's not because of the CD music, it's because of the save system (being able to save makes any game better!) and extra level. The CD music is just a bonus. :) You're also in those levels for a long time and the loading isn't too long, so sure, in that case the CD isn't a big hindrance. But other times it is. It depends on the game and kind of game. Each medium has advantages and disadvantages... I'm certainly not saying carts are perfect, they aren't. But they also were not a bad decision for a new console in 1996, there were as many advantages to using them as disadvantages.

How is that not related? Cartridges were the very reason Japanese publishers didn't want to support the N64 in the first place.

Yes, the fact that they wanted FMVs in their games and couldn't do it on N64 was one major reason the system lost in Japan, yes. Licensing fees were equally important, though, being much lower on PSX than N64... and it also got companies away from Nintendo's history of restrictions; even though those were mostly gone on N64 game content wise, Nintendo still kept some hardware details to themselves, such as the alternate programmable microcodes which would definitely have helped some games. I've always heard Square's decision to leave Nintendo as being key... and while the carts were one part of why, they were also just really annoyed at Nintendo for other things, such as all their demands on how to make Mario RPG, etc. The Square-Nintendo split was pretty bitter, as the fact that Square did not make one more game for a Nintendo system from 1997 to until they merged with Enix and Yamauchi retired from Nintendo... they had a personal dislike for Yamauchi.

And really, carts does not explain why Square was supporting WonderSwan and not Game Boy. Their dislike for Nintendo does. As a result, I think that there's a good chance that even had the N64 been a CD system, Square well may have gone Sony anyway... maybe not, but I think it would have been quite probable. And a lot of other publishers followed Square's lead away from Nintendo and Sega and towards Sony -- 1997 was also the crucial year in Japan that generation, when the PSX finally got clearly ahead of Saturn.

Kid Fenris

08-16-2009, 03:39 AM

Joke post, the idea that the N64 can do good fighting games? Seriously? How much DO you hate the N64? Must be quite a bit...

I don't know what aspect of that you're complaining about. The controller? The N64 controller is my favorite controller of all time, hands down.

The Nintendo 64 controller is pathetic when it comes to 2-D fighting games. The yellow face buttons are much too small, the d-pad is stiff, and the analog stick is no substitute for an arcade joystick. The controller was designed to work well with certain types of game, and the 2-D fighter was not one of them.

If you're seriously trying to argue that the Nintendo 64 controller was suited to 2-D fighters, you've passed some sort of game-nerd event horizon, slipping into a place where taste and logic can never reach you.

A Black Falcon

08-16-2009, 04:22 AM

The Nintendo 64 controller is pathetic when it comes to 2-D fighting games. The yellow face buttons are much too small, the d-pad is stiff, and the analog stick is no substitute for an arcade joystick. The controller was designed to work well with certain types of game, and the 2-D fighter was not one of them.

If you're seriously trying to argue that the Nintendo 64 controller was suited to 2-D fighters, you've passed some sort of game-nerd event horizon, slipping into a place where taste and logic can never reach you.

Or maybe we just completely disagree about what good controllers are. How about that? Sounds a lot more likely to me... because no, the fact that the C buttons are small is no problem at all as far as using them goes. Lots of N64 games use the C buttons as action buttons, and they work great, absolutely no problem at all for any kind of game, fighting games included. As I said I've played fighting games on the N64 and have some, the controls are really good.

Apart from improving the durability of the d-pad, there is absolutely nothing about the N64 controller that I would change.

The d-pad is fantastic as well. Stiff? Nah, just use it more. It's mostly just underuse from the fact that so few N64 games make use of the thing. :) It's a really good dpad, every bit as great as the SNES one and extremely similar in design. And the SNES dpad worked well for fighting games.

Ed Oscuro

08-16-2009, 04:41 AM

Capcom didn't make fighting games on N64 because they didn't make much of anything on N64. If they'd started supporting the platform earlier, I'd bet we'd have seen something.
Like oh, uh...Resident Evil 2?

Possibly the only two games in history (the other one was Ultraman, which is unrelated to this discussion) to run on both a cartridge and CD, at the same time.
I have a copy of Samurai Spirits III for Saturn - for $45 it's yours!

Now, that's a RAM cartridge, not a data cartridge, but the idea is the same really.

I now return the discussion to its regularly scheduled arguments about N64 joysticks.

A Black Falcon

08-16-2009, 04:55 AM

Like oh, uh...Resident Evil 2?

RE2 was released in late 1999, three years after the system came out, and was ported by Angel Studios, not Capcom itself. It was also a PSX port, not a new title.

Capcom's only other two N64 releases were the 2000 game Mega Man 64, a port of the 1998 PSX game Mega Man Legends, and Magical Tetris Challenge, a 1998 Disney-themed Tetris game also in arcades and on PSX. And that's it. I think that proves my point of how Capcom started N64 development very late, and even then put only a halfhearted effort into it, as the extremely small number of releases shows. I said "they didn't make much of anything" (as in, very few games), not "they made nothing".

Ed Oscuro

08-16-2009, 04:58 AM

RE2 was released in late 1999, three years after the system came out, and was ported by Angel Studios, not Capcom itself. It was also a PSX port, not a new title.
Therein lies my point. I'm having difficulty working up the spirit of discovering who is promoting which proposition, so I just popped that in.

A Black Falcon

08-16-2009, 05:44 AM

Therein lies my point. I'm having difficulty working up the spirit of discovering who is promoting which proposition, so I just popped that in.

Ah, okay.

Kid Fenris

08-16-2009, 10:53 AM

Or maybe we just completely disagree about what good controllers are. How about that? Sounds a lot more likely to me... because no, the fact that the C buttons are small is no problem at all as far as using them goes. Lots of N64 games use the C buttons as action buttons, and they work great, absolutely no problem at all for any kind of game, fighting games included. As I said I've played fighting games on the N64 and have some, the controls are really good.

Apart from improving the durability of the d-pad, there is absolutely nothing about the N64 controller that I would change.

The d-pad is fantastic as well. Stiff? Nah, just use it more. It's mostly just underuse from the fact that so few N64 games make use of the thing. :) It's a really good dpad, every bit as great as the SNES one and extremely similar in design. And the SNES dpad worked well for fighting games.

Just keep on polishing that turd, Sunshine.

kupomogli

08-16-2009, 12:27 PM

Uh, whatever you say.

Just like a hard drive, it's got a better read write speed. If it's not optimized to find the data quickly it'll be slower. Kindof like how doing a defrag on your PC makes it go faster since the data used is together.

A Black Falcon

08-16-2009, 03:13 PM

Just keep on polishing that turd, Sunshine.

What are you going to say next, that you actually like the Playstation dpad? It's one of the worst dpads this side of the Xbox 360 one or your average third-party controller... while the N64 (and Saturn), on the other hand, have the best dpads of any consoles in the last three generations. The last two generations really have been pretty bad, as far as dpads go... Sony sticks with their awful one, Nintendo uses small ones that work fine but aren't quite as good as SNES/N64 ones, Dreamcast's was definitely not as good as Saturn's... as for Microsoft the Xbox had a decent if small dpad, but the 360, not so much.

The N64 is still the last console released with an actual great dpad on the controller that comes with the system.

j_factor

08-16-2009, 04:09 PM

Why? You can't say that like it's an obvious fact, because it isn't. But you have done nothing to try to prove that point, so I don't think I need to say much.

You said, "2d and 3d games of pretty much every genre except for FMV games and music games are better on carts." I find that extremely outlandish and silly, and you've done nothing to try to prove that point yourself.

Once again I will make the simple statement that I'd rather have a better game with loading, than an otherwise worse game with no loading.

But it would have been absolutely doable in a form that would have looked and played great.

You know what else looks and plays great? The Saturn version. Would the hypothetical N64 version have been better? I'm not inclined to believe so.

It depends a lot on how much, and how frequent, that loading is. You consistently try to under-estimate how long PSX loading times are, that's for sure!

Since when was this strictly a PSX discussion? I thought we were talking about the merits of cartridges versus CDs.

I don't think I'm underestimating. I own about a hundred PSX games, more than that for Saturn, another 50 for Sega CD, and maybe 30 for Turbo CD. I also own a few Amiga CD32 games. I owned all these systems except CD32 when they were current, and my friend had a 3DO. I've had plenty of experience with CD games and their load times. Some of them are bad, but they're the exception, not the rule. And in most cases it's due to poor programming rather than being the inevitable result of being on CD.

You also massively overstate how much N64 games were "downgraded". Usually, they were better; there are very few games on both N64 and PSX that are actually better on PSX, and in every one of those cases it's because it was a PSX game lazily ported to N64 and better on the original system.

There aren't that many games on both systems, and few of them are noteworthy. Generally, if they were better on N64, it was due to it being a more powerful system (or in some cases just bad porting), not the cartridge format. But when they were worse on N64, it was usually due to the cartridge format. Quake is a good example (compared to the Saturn version).

Yes, the fact that they wanted FMVs in their games and couldn't do it on N64 was one major reason the system lost in Japan, yes.

It's not just FMVs. There are plenty of Playstation and Saturn games, even RPGs, that have no FMVs, or not much.

Licensing fees were equally important, though, being much lower on PSX than N64...

Cartridges were the reason for the difference in licensing fees, though.

And really, carts does not explain why Square was supporting WonderSwan and not Game Boy. Their dislike for Nintendo does. As a result, I think that there's a good chance that even had the N64 been a CD system, Square well may have gone Sony anyway... maybe not, but I think it would have been quite probable. And a lot of other publishers followed Square's lead away from Nintendo and Sega and towards Sony -- 1997 was also the crucial year in Japan that generation, when the PSX finally got clearly ahead of Saturn.

Square is irrelevant. It's not just Square. It's almost every developer.

A Black Falcon

08-16-2009, 10:38 PM

You said, "2d and 3d games of pretty much every genre except for FMV games and music games are better on carts." I find that extremely outlandish and silly, and you've done nothing to try to prove that point yourself.

I did say some things, though, I mentioned reduced load times and larger gameworld areas without needing streaming. Those are real points.

It's somewhat different, but it's also better when a game actually works, and in this (durability) carts win by a longshot. :)

Once again I will make the simple statement that I'd rather have a better game with loading, than an otherwise worse game with no loading.

Your basic assumption there that games on CD are better is ridiculous. They aren't better, just different. (I never said carts are better at everything so that's not what I'm saying, just that both have advantages and disadvantages and both are good choices for game mediums.) But it's not like saying that again is going to convince you of anything.

You know what else looks and plays great? The Saturn version. Would the hypothetical N64 version have been better? I'm not inclined to believe so.

What about PSX, then? I think it wouldn't have much trouble matching that, or Saturn stuff without ramcarts. Saturn stuff with the ramcart? I'm not sure. It would depend on cartridge size, I think -- that is, how much is the publisher willing to pay?

Since when was this strictly a PSX discussion? I thought we were talking about the merits of cartridges versus CDs.

True, it could be... but consoles of the same generation should be compared really, go beyond that and other technology will matter more than just the media format. So PSX v. N64 is one of the best examples. You could do others though... Sega CD or Turbo CD or CD-i versus the cart systems that gen, PSP v. DS, etc.

I don't think I'm underestimating. I own about a hundred PSX games, more than that for Saturn, another 50 for Sega CD, and maybe 30 for Turbo CD. I also own a few Amiga CD32 games. I owned all these systems except CD32 when they were current, and my friend had a 3DO. I've had plenty of experience with CD games and their load times. Some of them are bad, but they're the exception, not the rule. And in most cases it's due to poor programming rather than being the inevitable result of being on CD.

I have plenty of experience with CD games too, particularly on the PC but also on consoles, I have a PSX, PS2, Saturn, Sega CD, DC...

Looking at PS2 or DC versus Gamecube though, you really can see how much Nintendo cared about minimizing load times, and how great the results were. You may say "but those load times weren't bad".. compare that to any decently programmed GC game and if you're being honest you'll realize how big a difference there really is. GC games usually have very impressively short load times, thanks to those small discs... and it really does make a difference. You can always tell the bad PS2 ports when games have bad load times... LOL

I don't know if I can think of one GC exclusive with load times as long as Hydro Thunder on DC for example, or Off-Road Thunder in Midway Arcade Treasures 3 on GC (also on PS2 and Xbox)...

But, though it mostly avoids the load times issue, the GC does suffer one downside from using discs -- the durability issue. I've had a couple of GC games fail. I have no idea why, the discs look great and have quite minimal scratching, the games just crash. There's a local game store that can resurfaces discs around here, he wasn't able to fix either of them either, yet they now look like they have almost no scratches at all... and I also have like four or five Sega CD discs that have failed, that CD I stepped on, the one that my computer's CD drive blew up (this was maybe eight or nine years ago, but it's something hard to forget... shreds of that thing were rattling around inside afterwards and we had to replace the drive), etc. In comparison apart from games I have lost, there is only one cart-based game that I got working and now doesn't at all. (That is Mario Bros. Deluxe for GBC, and I have no idea what happened there, it corrupted or something... but one out of many is a great ratio.)

Still though, as far as discs go GC's pretty much the best this side of PC games which install themselves entirely to the hard drive. (Not that load times from hard drives aren't sometimes long... they most certainly are. But they're even longer off of the disc.)

There aren't that many games on both systems, and few of them are noteworthy. Generally, if they were better on N64, it was due to it being a more powerful system (or in some cases just bad porting), not the cartridge format. But when they were worse on N64, it was usually due to the cartridge format. Quake is a good example (compared to the Saturn version).

Quake is a good example? How so, when Doom 64 and Quake II are both amazing, and had entirely new, N64 exclusive levels as well, instead of just being a PC port like Quake 1? A good example of that it wasn't the greatest port ever, I guess... but not much beyond that. Both of those aforementioned other titles help prove that. Doom 64 is the best looking version of Doom there is (and the gameplay is great too), and Quake II is great, has four player splitscreen, etc... so no, I don't think that quite proves your point on that. :) For another example look at Forsaken 64 (another one where the N64 version gets an entirely new set of levels, while the PSX just gets a downgrade of the PC original). Games that looked worse on N64 usually do because of poor programming -- and even there the filtering and Z-buffering and stuff usually save it and make it look better than the poor programming originally intended, something that doesn't apply on PSX, Saturn, or anything else that generation. :)

I do agree that games better on N64 often were because of the hardware and not necessarily the carts, but as I showed with the Hydro Thunder example, this is not always true. I guess if you don't mind waiting (for a version with worse graphics too, not that it's the game's fault given that the PSX is less powerful) this wouldn't apply, but I, and many others, do mind.

It's not just FMVs. There are plenty of Playstation and Saturn games, even RPGs, that have no FMVs, or not much.

And that's where the other factors like momentum, going for the most successful platform, and lower licensing fees and production costs step in. Or lots of voice acting, that wasn't really possible early on on N64 either.

Cartridges were the reason for the difference in licensing fees, though.

No, that's not really true. Yes, carts are more expensive to make than CDs. But licensing fees and game production costs are different things. Licensing fees are what the company has to pay the hardware company just for the right to publish on their system, go through the checking process, etc. And Sony had lower licensing fees, not just lower than Nintendo but also lower than Sega. This might help explain how the Saturn lost, despite also using CDs.

The high cart production costs made this worse, but it wasn't just that.

And as I said, unhappiness with Nintendo's arrogance was also definitely a factor. This is the same thing that happened to Sony in these past few years, and very much affected Nintendo then as well.

Square is irrelevant. It's not just Square. It's almost every developer.

No, Square is relevant. As I said, it was Square and Final Fantasy VII that was, along with the announcement than Dragon Quest VII would be Playstation only, the key title in Sony's victory in Japan. And I've read many rumors that Square was active in pushing other developers, such as Enix, to go to Sony and not support Nintendo (or Sega). The fact that they did all go to Sony and not Sega, when both had CD-based systems, shows how the media format was not the only consideration. It was one, but definitely not the only one.

Of course it was about lots of developers, but remember to look at this in each separate region. In the US, it was simple -- anyone tired of Nintendo's high licensing fees, or impressed by Sony's great advertising that aimed older than any game company had before, went with the Playstation. Others went N64. In Japan though, for the first two years after their releases the PSX and Saturn were very close. Only in '97 after those Square and Enix announcements did Sony conclusively pull ahead. Coincidence? Given how popular those series were and are in Japan, I doubt it. Many other developers just followed their lead. As for Nintendo, they released later and just never caught up, and were also hurt a lot by the software droughts that were sometimes pretty bad on the system; at least in the US we had a few more titles at the start, but in Japan right after launch there was a long wait for the next release... would things have been better there with Nintendo on CDs? Likely, sure. They may even have won with CDs, who knows. But given how many other factors were also involved, I can't say that I think they would definitely have won Japan with CDs; maybe, but maybe not. We'll never really know...

j_factor

08-17-2009, 03:38 AM

I did say some things, though, I mentioned reduced load times and larger gameworld areas without needing streaming. Those are real points.

I'm not really seeing "larger gameworld areas" being evident. I'm not sure what you mean by "without needing streaming", any transmission of data is streaming by definition. A cartridge does have quicker access than a 2x CD drive, yes, but there are other limitations in play. I don't recall seeing much in the way of large, open 3D areas until the Dreamcast.

It's somewhat different, but it's also better when a game actually works, and in this (durability) carts win by a longshot. :)

Durability is a complete non-issue, IMO. The only times I've had problems with CD games were when I bought them used and they were scratched to hell. Even that isn't very common.

What about PSX, then? I think it wouldn't have much trouble matching that, or Saturn stuff without ramcarts. Saturn stuff with the ramcart? I'm not sure.

The RAM cart isn't anything terribly special, it just increases the system's memory. Thus we see that the problem with PSX (in this case) isn't the CD medium, it's the system's limited RAM.

Looking at PS2 or DC versus Gamecube though, you really can see how much Nintendo cared about minimizing load times, and how great the results were. You may say "but those load times weren't bad".. compare that to any decently programmed GC game and if you're being honest you'll realize how big a difference there really is. GC games usually have very impressively short load times, thanks to those small discs... and it really does make a difference. You can always tell the bad PS2 ports when games have bad load times... LOL

I don't know, I think the shorter load times with the Gamecube (which is definitely noticeable compared to PS2) were merely a side effect of those discs (the laser having a short distance to move), rather than a major part of Nintendo's design reasoning. Also, if you compare it to Dreamcast or Xbox rather than PS2, the difference is less great.

No, that's not really true. Yes, carts are more expensive to make than CDs. But licensing fees and game production costs are different things. Licensing fees are what the company has to pay the hardware company just for the right to publish on their system, go through the checking process, etc. And Sony had lower licensing fees, not just lower than Nintendo but also lower than Sega. This might help explain how the Saturn lost, despite also using CDs.

Licensing fees and production costs are not necessarily separate. Unlike Sega did with the Genesis, Nintendo did not allow third parties to manufacture their own cartridges. All cartridges were manufactured by Nintendo, and their cost was part of the licensing fee. This even carries over to Saturn -- higher license was a result of the copy-protection "ring" on Saturn discs, which had to be pressed a special way.

No, Square is relevant. As I said, it was Square and Final Fantasy VII that was, along with the announcement than Dragon Quest VII would be Playstation only, the key title in Sony's victory in Japan. And I've read many rumors that Square was active in pushing other developers, such as Enix, to go to Sony and not support Nintendo (or Sega). The fact that they did all go to Sony and not Sega, when both had CD-based systems, shows how the media format was not the only consideration. It was one, but definitely not the only one.

Dragon Quest VII didn't come out until 2000, and its original announcement was that it would be for Saturn. (The original Dragon Quest VII was cancelled and a new game was developed from scratch for Playstation, kind of like RE2.) As popular as Dragon Quest is in Japan, its release, given the timing and platform, didn't affect market share. Enix did publish a few Saturn games in Japan, just not Dragon Quest. I don't think Square and Enix had a particularly cozy relationship prior to the merger.

It is simply not true that they "all" went to Sony and not Sega. The only major Japanese developers who didn't support the Saturn are Squaresoft and Namco. Namco went Sony exclusive from the launch of the system, and I have no idea why, but it certainly had nothing to do with Square. Square stuck strictly with the Super Famicom until relatively late. I don't know why Square never made anything for Saturn (nor any other console besides Famicom, SFC, PSX, PS2); they were always a one-system company, for whatever reason.

But yeah, everyone else in Japan supported Saturn. Capcom, Konami, Atlus, SNK, Falcom, Hudson, Taito, Bandai, Game Arts, Data East, Irem, Koei, Sunsoft, Treasure, Takara, Climax, Victor, Spike, Jaleco, RED, Genki, Warp, Psikyo, Technosoft, Compile, Cave, Banpresto, Naxat Soft, Human Entertainment, Gainax, ASCII, NEC Interchannel, Media Quest, Riverhill Soft, Imagineer... Any independent company that was releasing console games in Japan between 1995 and '98 was on Saturn. After much pondering, the only exceptions I could find, other than Namco and Square, are Technos Japan (went bankrupt in 1996, having switched mainly to Neo Geo, but they did make Geom Cube for Playstation) and Kemco (who went through some difficulties and made hardly anything during that time). I might be forgetting an obscure Japanese developer that released three Japan-only Playstation games, but by and large, Saturn was supported by almost every company in Japan.

Of course it was about lots of developers, but remember to look at this in each separate region. In the US, it was simple -- anyone tired of Nintendo's high licensing fees, or impressed by Sony's great advertising that aimed older than any game company had before, went with the Playstation. Others went N64. In Japan though, for the first two years after their releases the PSX and Saturn were very close. Only in '97 after those Square and Enix announcements did Sony conclusively pull ahead. Coincidence? Given how popular those series were and are in Japan, I doubt it. Many other developers just followed their lead.

Although Final Fantasy VII undoubtedly sold a lot of Playstations, the Saturn's dramatic decline in Japan was almost entirely Sega's own fault. Sega of Japan always had their collective thumbs up their asses and never had any idea of how to make a system successful in their homeland. The one time they stumbled on success with the Saturn, they had no idea how to maintain it, and they were way too quick to hint at a successor console.