What is the best-selling classic console?

[markusman64ds]

I know the PS2 is the best-selling video game console of all time, but what is the best selling classic game console? I'm guessing the NES.

[Gamevet]

I know the PS2 is the best-selling video game console of all time, but what is the best selling classic game console? I'm guessing the NES.

Well, in the world of Cars, 15 years is considered classic. If that applied to videogame hardware, then it would be the Playstation.

[Ryudo]

PS1 sold over 100 million
NES 60 million
SNES 49 million
Genesis 40 million
N64 32 million
Dreamcast 10.6 million
Saturn 9 million

[Buyatari]

PS1 sold over 100 million
NES 60 million
SNES 49 million
Genesis 40 million
N64 32 million
Dreamcast 10.6 million
Saturn 9 million

I'd be curious to see the numbers on the Atari 2600 and the Nintendo Gameboy.

[Shulamana]

I'd be curious to see the numbers on the Atari 2600 and the Nintendo Gameboy.

30 million for the 2600 and 118 million for the Game Boy (counting all variants through the GBC)

[tom]

Pretty sure Genesis and SNES are closer together in sales figures

[Rickstilwell1]

30 million for the 2600 and 118 million for the Game Boy (counting all variants through the GBC)

I don't see why they don't separate the b&W Game Boy sales from the Game Boy Color. They're pretty much a separate generation from each other. I am guessing the Game Boy Color's sales were a lot worse than original Game Boy or Game Boy Advance. The GBC had very few titles that justified buying one. Some 8 bit remakes, Pokemon Gold and Silver, Zelda Oracle of Ages and Seasons, and other than that mostly a bunch of licensed junk. Some people who waited a while for the good games to come out heard the news about Game Boy Advance around the corner and just waited for that. That's what I did. I just bought the games for GBC that I wanted to play before I had the system to play them on, then grabbed a GBA with Super Mario Advance as soon as it came out. The hybrid titles like Dragon Warrior I & II I just played on Super Game Boy with less color till then.

[Gamevet]

I thought the numbers were a little low for the NES and Snes. I've seen numbers somewhere around 65-70 million for the NES.

[jb143]

I don't see why they don't separate the b&W Game Boy sales from the Game Boy Color. They're pretty much a separate generation from each other. I am guessing the Game Boy Color's sales were a lot worse than original Game Boy or Game Boy Advance.

Technically they are extremely similar hardware wise. It was an update, not a complete redesign. A color screen of course, a slight modification for how monochrome palettes are now treated as color palettes, and a few other minor changes. It wasn't the same leap that GBC to GBA was. Technically, an original GB could play GBC games as well, the colors showing as shades of green would generally make it look too screwy to play though so they generally blocked out that ability with the lack of a notch in the cart and a screen that's triggered saying it's only for play on a Game Boy Color.

[tom]

I thought the numbers were a little low for the NES and Snes. I've seen numbers somewhere around 65-70 million for the NES.

More the other way around, as stated in the book Game Over, Nintendo (and Sega for that matter) always over exaggerated their sales figures.

[Rob2600]

More the other way around, as stated in the book Game Over, Nintendo (and Sega for that matter) always over exaggerated their sales figures.

Interesting. I was under the impression that Nintendo always released the actual number of units sold to customers, while companies like Sony always released the number of units shipped to retail.

[Gamevet]

Europe has always been the region where sales numbers are questionable. The NES wasn't a huge seller there though, due to poor distribution and a late entry.

There's no question that it was far more successful than the 16-bit consoles, in North America. And in Japan the Mega Drive barely sold a couple million, while Snes and NES thrived.

[FoxNtd]

Europe has always been the region where sales numbers are questionable. The NES wasn't a huge seller there though, due to poor distribution and a late entry.

There's no question that it was far more successful than the 16-bit consoles, in North America. And in Japan the Mega Drive barely sold a couple million, while Snes and NES thrived.

Yes it would be best to show the regions for all the numbers. For example, both Mark III and Mega Drive were not huge sellers in their native land but in Europe they did pretty well, I think.

Here's the most curious fact about best-sellers per console generation, and it applies to virtually all generations and regions. The console that was the most powerful in terms of hardware/processing power was NOT the best seller. This is my proof for stating that having the best machine is not going to make your console the "best" in terms of sales. How good the software library for the console is, that is a whole other matter entirely. :)

[jb143]

Here's the most curious fact about best-sellers per console generation, and it applies to virtually all generations and regions. The console that was the most powerful in terms of hardware/processing power was NOT the best seller. This is my proof for stating that having the best machine is not going to make your console the "best" in terms of sales. How good the software library for the console is, that is a whole other matter entirely. :)

Well...that makes sense. More power is generally going to mean more expensive. And as far as how good the software library is...you have things like the Jaguar, which you argue all day long about how powerful it really was, but in the end it's extra power also brought a ton of programming challenges which surely affected the quality of the library.

[FoxNtd]

Well...that makes sense. More power is generally going to mean more expensive.

If we look at each region and each generation, grouping the consoles by price then I wonder if the cheapest console is often the winner or not. It might be tricky since a console's lifetime of sales can persist over periods of price drops which can boost sales toward the back-end of the lifetime. :|

Speaking about price reminds me of game depreciation. I have some Square games for SFC that have values over 10,000-11,000 Yen printed right on the box. These games are very near worthless today. It's kinda disturbing...

[jb143]

If we look at each region and each generation, grouping the consoles by price then I wonder if the cheapest console is often the winner or not. It might be tricky since a console's lifetime of sales can persist over periods of price drops which can boost sales toward the back-end of the lifetime. :|

Yeah, but the same thing is happening with their competitors as well so I would think it would even out from a comparison point of view.

[A Black Falcon]

Technically they are extremely similar hardware wise. It was an update, not a complete redesign. A color screen of course, a slight modification for how monochrome palettes are now treated as color palettes, and a few other minor changes. It wasn't the same leap that GBC to GBA was. Technically, an original GB could play GBC games as well, the colors showing as shades of green would generally make it look too screwy to play though so they generally blocked out that ability with the lack of a notch in the cart and a screen that's triggered saying it's only for play on a Game Boy Color.

The GBC is definitely a new system and not just aredesign. It's got exclusive games, more powerful hardware (faster CPU, more RAM, color screen)... what more do you need to make something a new system? They blocked some games from running on the original GB probably because they make use of the more powerful hardware, not just for the reason you say; dual-mode titles generally have to limit themselves to the original GB hardware only, though of course there are a few cases of dual-mode titles with big differences between the GB and GBC versions on the cart, such as R-Type DX or Conker's Pocket Tales.

And yes, the DSi is a new system as well, very similarly to how the GBC is, but with fewer dual-mode games (games enhanced for the upgraded system that also work on the original).

Also, I think some good efforts at GB/GBC sales breakdowns do exist, even if Nintendo itself has generally merged the two. Both sold very well, but separated neither one hits 100 million, obviously (given the 118 million total), so the Playstation is indeed the best selling "classic" console. I'm not sure which system is second offhand, though -- it well might be the Game Boy, not sure if GB or NES is 2nd. (Probably not GBC, but it's certainly high on the list).


Here's the most curious fact about best-sellers per console generation, and it applies to virtually all generations and regions. The console that was the most powerful in terms of hardware/processing power was NOT the best seller. This is my proof for stating that having the best machine is not going to make your console the "best" in terms of sales. How good the software library for the console is, that is a whole other matter entirely.
Quite true. The only time the most powerful even kind of won was the SNES, which was the most powerful system that generation if you ignore the Neo-Geo (and 32X, on the basis that it was an addon and released after some next-gen systems).

[tom]

Not really, the SNES had a CPU which was more 8-bit than 16-bit, and the console processing power was plaqued with slow down quite often.

[A Black Falcon]

Not really, the SNES had a CPU which was more 8-bit than 16-bit, and the console processing power was plaqued with slow down quite often.

The slow CPU is pretty unimportant compared to the great power of the system in every other way. You seriously would say that the Genesis and Turbografx are more powerful than the SNES, really? It's just not true. They have faster CPUs, but are worse in every other way, and those other ways amount to being worse in far more ways than the one that they are better at.

And plus, for games that really do need help, the system was designed for addon chips in the carts.

[Ryudo]

The slow CPU is pretty unimportant compared to the great power of the system in every other way. You seriously would say that the Genesis and Turbografx are more powerful than the SNES, really? It's just not true. They have faster CPUs, but are worse in every other way, and those other ways amount to being worse in far more ways than the one that they are better at.

And plus, for games that really do need help, the system was designed for addon chips in the carts.

Yup SNES had Sony's 8 channel sound chip to Genesis 4 Channel.
Mode-7
More colors than Genesis
Plus SNES had the carts made so if they wanted a Cart could have a chip to extend it's limits. As Shown with games with the FX chip.
=======================================
Also the sales numbers I posted are well documented.
I have many old mags and a couple books plus look around the internet. Those numbers are solid.

The thing that finally pushed SNES past Sega was Street Fighter II. It was a SNES exlusive for a s short while and had very good sales. Not to mention as few remember it was supported by Xband. So you could take it online. When the Genesis version came out it also supported by Xband

[tom]

Extending carts was already done to VCS (Atari's Sara, CBS RAM), so Megadrive could have done that if needed.....hold on Sega done that too (V.R. Virtua Racing).

The SNES colour difference wasn't noticeable when compared to Megadrive either. Same with the sound, there was no issue with that.

Mode 7. Megadrive beat that with speed.


The sales numbers are documented, oh well I got old mags and books too.....as I said the documented book Game Over mentioned Nintendo over exaggerated their sales figures (That book had input from NCL, Yamauchi, Miyamoto and numerous other people from Nintendo), all companies lie to make them look better.

Look around on the internet....sure, on the internet I'm a hunk with dozen girlfriends.

[Ryudo]

Extending carts was already done to VCS (Atari's Sara, CBS RAM), so Megadrive could have done that if needed.....hold on Sega done that too (V.R. Virtua Racing).

The SNES colour difference wasn't noticeable when compared to Megadrive either.

Mode 7. Megadrive beat that with speed.

I can tell you don't know much how chips works or anything to do with computing.
Speed really doesn't mean a thing. Efficiency does. Genesis allowed 64 colors and SNES 256.

Mode-7 is widely known as the most amazing feature SNES had outside it's sound chip. Genesis didn't have Mode-7 Which allowed multiple scaling moving background. Contra III & Terramigma are some good examples of using it in a unique way. Genesis had a 4 channel sound chip. Less advanced than SNES however Genesis was better with bass. SNES 8 channel sound ship from Sony allowed more well channels of sound. It also allowed and he admitted loving the SNES for the first time Nobuo's compositions sounded as intended for the first time. Skip a gen go to PSone vs N64. N64 had a 93MHz CPU yet was lousy at textures and had a lower poly count than PSone. Saturn in all technical aspects had a beast of a powerhouse. (look at the Shenmue Saturn footage to see what the system was capable of) PS2 Vs DC While DC only lasted 2 years so to devs never fully unlocked it's secrets and PS2 had a faster CPU DC was actually better with color and textures reflections and shadows than PS2. In fact just ask my buddy at R* but Shenmue would actually be impossible on PS2. PS2 could not handle it. Sure a screenshot war should show PS2 games looking better than almost any DC game but the architecture was different PS2 was Open GL & DC was Direct X 6.1(to compare Xbox was 8.1) There is another example. GCN was capable of a few things Xbox could not. It was better with load times thanks to it's TSRAM. GCN is also one of the most efficient pieces of hardware ever made in terms of consoles. Also if you go by speed alone PSP's 333MHz was more powerful than PS2? Nope not even close. (PS2 is 294 and 299 in later models)


Also don't forget Nintendo had 2 full years to work on SNES after Genesis launched. You could not pull Yoshi's Island off on Genesis Hardware. It just isn't capable. Same with StarFox(Lylat Wars)

Yeah long blabby post. Also not a fanboy as I love Sega far more.(Fave system is a Sega console and own nearly all of them)

Also that last comment had to be bad sarcasm or else comes off as desperate with a side if insecurity and false machoism.

[madman77]

Not really, the SNES had a CPU which was more 8-bit than 16-bit
That doesn't even make sense. The 65816 is a 16-bit CPU. It's not more 8-bit than 16-bit. It's 16-bit.

[A Black Falcon]

Extending carts was already done to VCS (Atari's Sara, CBS RAM), so Megadrive could have done that if needed.....hold on Sega done that too (V.R. Virtua Racing).
It could somewhat, but not quite to the same extent the SNES could, and as the fact that only one game used an addon chip shows, it wasn't really planned for. In comparison, Nintendo planned for addon chips on the SNES from the beginning, as you can see from the design including those two extra sets of pins on the sides of the cart port that are initially unused.


The SNES colour difference wasn't noticeable when compared to Megadrive either. Same with the sound, there was no issue with that.
The SNES color advantage is VERY noticeable. While the Genesis is running from a small, limited palette, and can only put a small number of colors on screen, the SNES"s huge palette and 256 color graphics give it an advantage the Genesis can never match. In addition, the SNES has a significant audio advantage over the Genesis as well, with a better, higher quality, more capable sound chip.

If you dislike the SNES you're free to your opinion, but don't say things like that as facts when they are not. It's like people who say that the PSX or Saturn are more powerful than the N64 -- no, they of course are not. Don't let your dislike for the system in question blind you to the fact that it IS more powerful!


Mode 7. Megadrive beat that with speed.
Certainly not. Show me the Genesis's answer to F-Zero... oh right, it doesn't have one.


The sales numbers are documented, oh well I got old mags and books too.....as I said the documented book Game Over mentioned Nintendo over exaggerated their sales figures (That book had input from NCL, Yamauchi, Miyamoto and numerous other people from Nintendo), all companies lie to make them look better.

Look around on the internet....sure, on the internet I'm a hunk with dozen girlfriends.
I think it's probably safe to assume that everyone exaggerates their sales figures. Is there any reason to belive that Sega's are any more accurate? I mean, particularly considering that Sega never even GAVE an overall worldwide sales number, and the number we have ("low 40 million range, probably") is far from specific.


N64 had a 93MHz CPU yet was lousy at textures and had a lower poly count than PSone.
That's not really true, when pushed the N64 could do as many polygons as most anything on the PSX. The issue is that the N64 was actually doing effects on its polygons, like Z-buffering, triple buffering, etc., so of course it had a reduced maximum. Its vastly superior polygons more than make up for their slightly reduced number in most titles.


Saturn in all technical aspects had a beast of a powerhouse. (look at the Shenmue Saturn footage to see what the system was capable of)
The Saturn had power, sure, and I like the system quite a bit, but it clearly wasn't as powerful overall as the Playstation, much less the N64.


While DC only lasted 2 years so to devs never fully unlocked it's secrets and PS2 had a faster CPU DC was actually better with color and textures reflections and shadows than PS2.
The Dreamcast IS less powerful than the PS2, and though you're right that the overall graphics level on the system would have gotten better with time -- the system has far too many games ported from the PS1, most notably -- it could never have matched the PS2 overall, much less the Gamecube or Xbox. I do agree that the DC does do some things better than the PS2 (it has better image quality, most notably), but the PS2 is the more powerful system overall.

Oh, and because of how easy the DC is to develop for, a lot of its power WAS pushed by games, much more so than was true for the Saturn on average. At least Sega did learn that lesson.


There is another example. GCN was capable of a few things Xbox could not. It was better with load times thanks to it's TSRAM. GCN is also one of the most efficient pieces of hardware ever made in terms of consoles. Also if you go by speed alone PSP's 333MHz was more powerful than PS2? Nope not even close. (PS2 is 294 and 299 in later models)
That's true, and the Gamecube is pretty close to the Xbox overall for sure... not quite its match, but not far behind! It's closer to the Xbox than the PS1 or Saturn are to the N64, certainly.


That doesn't even make sense. The 65816 is a 16-bit CPU. It's not more 8-bit than 16-bit. It's 16-bit.
Good point, that's true. It's the Turbografx that has the 8-bit CPU.

[Ryudo]

I was just saying Saturn was more powerful than often credited for. Again Check Shenmue footage for it.
Also I know that about PS2 & DC however I was just saying due to different architecture and some limits PS2 had Shenmue would be impossible to put on PS2. Shenmue IIx was more of a remake than a port as they had to do almost everything all over again. However even though Xbox was a PC in a console shell it had a couple familiar things for Sega.
However yes DC I think with full effects in terms of raw power it's limit was 7 million polys. One of the better cases hown what DC could do is again Shenmue but it's Passport disc. GCN was I think 12 million with full effects. I only mention the game as it's just good for technical examples

PS2 I don't know as Sony way inflated the numbers to over 60. I'm only making a total guess but maybe 9-10.
Xbox not sure maybe close to GCN but Xbox was better with shaders I believe. Actually don't think GCN or Wii has shaders.

[tom]

That won't work saying one console is capable of doing something the other console is not capable of. That's what they said about the VCS and it performed wonders. All doable via software.

[Rob2600]

Actual in-game graphics with lighting, texture effects, physics, etc. (not bogus, meaningless theoretical maximums):

1. PlayStation- roughly 180,000 texture mapped and light-sourced polygons per second max. (roughly 360,000 flat-shaded polygons per second max.)

2. N64- roughly 300k texture mapped and light-sourced high-accuracy polygons per second max. (with N64's hardware effects enabled and custom microcode)

SGI's Turbo3D microcode: 500,000–600,000 low-accuracy polygons per second (no hardware effects, similar looking to PlayStation games, Nintendo never allowed this mode to be used in finished games)
SGI's Fast3D microcode: ~100,000 high-accuracy polygons per second (hardware effects enabled, most N64 games used this mode)
custom microcode: ~300,000 high-accuracy polygons per second (hardware effects enabled, relatively few N64 games used custom modes)

3. Dreamcast- roughly 5-6 million polygons per second max.

4. PS2- roughly 12-15 million polygons per second max.

5. GameCube- roughly 25 million polygons per second max.

6. Xbox- roughly 35 million polygons per second max.

(Keep in mind, the number of polygons per second doesn't necessarily represent all of the graphical capabilities on a console.)


And the SNES's much larger color palette, transparency effects, and advanced sound capabilities were definitely noticeable to me. The slowdown seen in some 1st generation SNES games was gone after a year, once developers mastered the hardware.

[chrisbid]

The thing that finally pushed SNES past Sega was Street Fighter II. It was a SNES exlusive for a s short while and had very good sales. Not to mention as few remember it was supported by Xband. So you could take it online. When the Genesis version came out it also supported by Xband



That's not quite right, Sega was number one in sixteen bit sales in 91, 92, and 93. Nintendo took a small lead in 94, and Sega effectively killed the genesis in 95 and handed the still robust 16 bit market over to Nintendo.

The 91 SNES launch was mediocre... Super Mario World did not light the industry on fire like Nintendo had hoped. Meanwhile Sega dropped the price of the Genesis and released Sonic the Hedgehog. You can argue about whether Sonic or SMW was a better game, but at the time Sonic was fresh/new/original/exciting and Mario was getting a bit stale.

Street Fighter II was a defibrillator for the SNES. It got the machine off the mat. It was Nintendo's first strong counterpunch that turned the sixteen bit market into a full fledged war. It would be a year before SFII would come to the genesis, but by that point Mortal Kombat had become the it title, and Nintendo crapped the bed with their content restrictions, giving the genesis another boost.

[Rob2600]

The thing that finally pushed SNES past Sega was Street Fighter II.

Not quite. SFII was very popular on the SNES, but what helped push it past the Genesis in terms of sales was Donkey Kong Country in late 1994.


Sega was number one in sixteen bit sales in 91, 92, and 93. Nintendo took a small lead in 94, and Sega effectively killed the genesis in 95

I thought the Genesis wasn't officially discontinued in North America until 1997?

[Gamevet]

Not quite. SFII was very popular on the SNES, but what helped push it past the Genesis in terms of sales was Donkey Kong Country.

DKC came out near the launch of the 32-bit consoles. It was the superior port of MKII that pushes the SNES past the Genesis. It was also around that time when AAA titles like Super Metroid and Starfox came out.




I thought the Genesis wasn't officially discontinued in North America until 1997?

Sega had moved software support to the Saturn. It was pretty much 3rd party from 94 on.

[Rob2600]

DKC came out near the launch of the 32-bit consoles. It was the superior port of MKII that pushes the SNES past the Genesis. It was also around that time when AAA titles like Super Metroid and Starfox came out.

Donkey Kong Country, Super Metroid, and Mortal Kombat II were all released in 1994 (and Donkey Kong Country and MKII were toward the end of '94). So again, it wasn't until late 1994 that the SNES overtook the Genesis in terms of hardware sales.

I say it was mainly because of DKC, but I'm sure MKII helped as well. According to vgchartz.com, MKII on the SNES = 1.9 million copies, while DKC = 9.3 million copies.

[Gamevet]

Yeah, but in North America MKII was the hottest game going. The SNES version made it cool to own the Nintendo console again. The uncensored Mortal Kombat kept the Genesis ahead and forced Nintendo to rethink about their policies on violent games.

[tom]

I can tell you don't know much how chips works or anything to do with computing.
Speed really doesn't mean a thing. Efficiency does. Genesis allowed 64 colors and SNES 256.

Mode-7 is widely known as the most amazing feature SNES had outside it's sound chip. Genesis didn't have Mode-7 Which allowed multiple scaling moving background. Contra III & Terramigma are some good examples of using it in a unique way. Genesis had a 4 channel sound chip. Less advanced than SNES however Genesis was better with bass. SNES 8 channel sound ship from Sony allowed more well channels of sound. It also allowed and he admitted loving the SNES for the first time Nobuo's compositions sounded as intended for the first time. Skip a gen go to PSone vs N64. N64 had a 93MHz CPU yet was lousy at textures and had a lower poly count than PSone. Saturn in all technical aspects had a beast of a powerhouse. (look at the Shenmue Saturn footage to see what the system was capable of) PS2 Vs DC While DC only lasted 2 years so to devs never fully unlocked it's secrets and PS2 had a faster CPU DC was actually better with color and textures reflections and shadows than PS2. In fact just ask my buddy at R* but Shenmue would actually be impossible on PS2. PS2 could not handle it. Sure a screenshot war should show PS2 games looking better than almost any DC game but the architecture was different PS2 was Open GL & DC was Direct X 6.1(to compare Xbox was 8.1) There is another example. GCN was capable of a few things Xbox could not. It was better with load times thanks to it's TSRAM. GCN is also one of the most efficient pieces of hardware ever made in terms of consoles. Also if you go by speed alone PSP's 333MHz was more powerful than PS2? Nope not even close. (PS2 is 294 and 299 in later models)


Also don't forget Nintendo had 2 full years to work on SNES after Genesis launched. You could not pull Yoshi's Island off on Genesis Hardware. It just isn't capable. Same with StarFox(Lylat Wars)

Yeah long blabby post. Also not a fanboy as I love Sega far more.(Fave system is a Sega console and own nearly all of them)

Also that last comment had to be bad sarcasm or else comes off as desperate with a side if insecurity and false machoism.

I also have a twelve inch penis

[Rob2600]

in North America MKII was the hottest game going. The SNES version made it cool to own the Nintendo console again.

Star Fox (1993)
worldwide: 3 million copies
North America: 1.6 million copies

Super Metroid (1994)
worldwide: 1.4 million copies
North America: 0.6 million copies

Mortal Kombat II (1994)
worldwide: 1.9 million copies
North America: 1.5 million copies

Donkey Kong Country (1994)
worldwide: 9.3 million copies
North America: 4.4 million copies


You're right- MKII was very successful on the SNES, especially in North America. But Donkey Kong Country outsold it by 3-to-1 in North America. So again, DKC is what really gave the SNES a big sales boost...bigger than MKII.

[j_factor]

sorry, double post

[j_factor]

Mode-7 is widely known as the most amazing feature SNES had outside it's sound chip. Genesis didn't have Mode-7 Which allowed multiple scaling moving background.

Mode 7 only allowed one background layer. Mode 7 is nice, but it's a feature, it does not contribute to how powerful the SNES is.


Genesis had a 4 channel sound chip.

The Genesis had two sound chips and a total of 10 channels.


The slow CPU is pretty unimportant compared to the great power of the system in every other way. You seriously would say that the Genesis and Turbografx are more powerful than the SNES, really? It's just not true. They have faster CPUs, but are worse in every other way, and those other ways amount to being worse in far more ways than the one that they are better at.

The phrase used was "more powerful", not "overall technically better". A better color palette is a technical advantage, but it does not constitute more power. The Commodore 64 is not more powerful than the original Macintosh.


Actual in-game graphics with lighting, texture effects, physics, etc. (not bogus, meaningless theoretical maximums):

PlayStation- roughly 350-500k polygons per second max.
N64- roughly 350-500k polygons per second max.

You've got to be joking. It's more like 100k on N64 and a little higher on Playstation. The Playstation's "meaningless theoretical maximum" is 360k according to Sony. It certainly wasn't doing that in-game.


Dreamcast- roughly 5-6 million polygons per second max.
PS2- roughly 12-15 million polygons per second max.
GameCube- roughly 25 million polygons per second max.
Xbox- roughly 35 million polygons per second max.

The difference between these consoles isn't that large.


DKC came out near the launch of the 32-bit consoles. It was the superior port of MKII that pushes the SNES past the Genesis. It was also around that time when AAA titles like Super Metroid and Starfox came out.

The SNES version of MKII was better, but the Genesis version still outsold it, due to more Mortal Kombat fans already owning the console. However, the difference in sales wasn't nearly as large as with the first one. I don't think it contributed to SNES gaining over Genesis.

[Gamevet]

DKC was a pack-in game. The numbers for DKC2 would be a more accurate number to make a comparison.





The SNES version of MKII was better, but the Genesis version still outsold it, due to more Mortal Kombat fans already owning the console. However, the difference in sales wasn't nearly as large as with the first one. I don't think it contributed to SNES gaining over Genesis.


It should, because the Genesis still had more units at that time.

The combination of Nintendo's recently released titles, Sega's focus on 32-bit software and SFII/MK2 being on the SNES created a sales shift for the consoles.

[Rob2600]

You've got to be joking. It's more like 100k on N64 and a little higher on Playstation. The Playstation's "meaningless theoretical maximum" is 360k according to Sony. It certainly wasn't doing that in-game.

When developers used SGI's standard microcode on the N64, you're right, games pushed roughly 100,000 polygons per second (including texture filtering, perspective correction, Z buffer, etc.). However, the N64 was capable of up to roughly 600,000 polygons per second using other microcode. By comparison, Sony PlayStation games pushed roughly 180,000 texture mapped and light-sourced polygons per second (360,000 flat-shaded polygons per second). I've updated my previous post to be more accurate.

According to Boss Game Studios, who developed Top Gear Rally, Twisted Edge Snowboarding, Stunt Racer 64, and World Driver Championship on the N64, they were pushing roughly 300,000 polygons per second on the N64 in World Driver Championship.


More info:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_64:

"Some developers noted that the default SGI microcode ("Fast3D"), which allowed more than ~100,000 high accuracy polygons per second, was poorly profiled for use in games (it was too accurate), and performance suffered as a result. "Turbo3D" microcode allowed 500,000–600,000 normal accuracy polygons per second. However, due to the graphical degradation, Nintendo discouraged its use. Several companies, such as Factor 5, Boss Game Studios, and Rare, were able to write custom microcode that ran their software better than SGI's standard microcode.

...some of the most polygon-intense Nintendo 64 games, such as World Driver Championship, frequently pushed past the Sony PlayStation′s typical in-game polygon counts.

One of the best examples of custom microcode on the Nintendo 64 was Factor 5's N64 port of the Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine PC game. The Factor 5 team aimed for the high resolution mode (640 × 480) because of the crispness it added to the visuals. The machine was taxed to the limit running at 640 × 480, so they needed performance beyond the standard SGI microcode. ... Factor 5's microcode allowed almost unlimited real-time lighting and significantly boosted the polygon count."


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Driver_Championship:

"One of the last racing simulations to be released for Nintendo 64, this graphically intensive title used custom microcode optimization and high polygon count modelling. The development team was able to optimize the usage of the various processors within the N64 to allow far draw distance (reducing the need for fog or pop-up), high detail texturing and models, Doppler effect audio, and advanced lighting and fog effects for realistic weather conditions. Impressively the game has a high resolution 640x480 mode that does not require the add-on N64 RAM Expansion Pak."

[j_factor]

When developers used SGI's standard microcode on the N64, you're right, games pushed roughly 100,000 polygons per second (including texture filtering, perspective correction, Z buffer, etc.).

Which the vast majority of games used.


However, the N64 was capable of up to roughly 600,000 polygons per second using other microcode.

Yes but you said you were talking about actual in-game graphics, not theoreticals. :)


By comparison, Sony PlayStation games pushed roughly 180,000 texture mapped and light-sourced polygons per second (360,000 flat-shaded polygons per second).

I doubt any actual games got that high.


According to Boss Game Studios, who developed Top Gear Rally, Twisted Edge Snowboarding, Stunt Racer 64, and World Driver Championship on the N64, they were pushing roughly 300,000 polygons per second on the N64.

Cite?

[Rob2600]

Yes but you said you were talking about actual in-game graphics, not theoreticals. :)

Right. N64's in-game maximum, with all effects turned on and running in hi-res mode, was roughly 300k polygons per second according to a programmer at Boss Game Studios. I'll try to find the site where he posted that info. Of course, I won't be able to find it now...

[wiggyx]

The 91 SNES launch was mediocre... Super Mario World did not light the industry on fire like Nintendo had hoped. Meanwhile Sega dropped the price of the Genesis and released Sonic the Hedgehog. You can argue about whether Sonic or SMW was a better game, but at the time Sonic was fresh/new/original/exciting and Mario was getting a bit stale.


300,000 SFC units sold on launch day. The most EVER sold on launch day (at the time). I wouldn't call that mediocre. Mario may not have been revolutionary, but the other two launch titles, F-Zero and Pilotwings were very much so revolutionary.

As for Sonic, we all know how well he's aged :/

[chrisbid]

300,000 SFC units sold on launch day. The most EVER sold on launch day (at the time). I wouldn't call that mediocre. Mario may not have been revolutionary, but the other two launch titles, F-Zero and Pilotwings were very much so revolutionary.

As for Sonic, we all know how well he's aged :/


great, fanboy rhetoric...

the super nes lagged behind the sega genesis in the US market when the snes launched. it took three bitter years of battling for nintendo to edge ahead of sega. super mario world did not push snes systems off the shelf at the same rate sonic the hedgehog pushed genesis units. street fighter ii was the first killer app for the snes.


and to answer another question, sega drastically pared down their releases on all systems other than the saturn in 1995. here is a list of first party genesis games released in 1995


Adventures of Batman and Robin
Beyond Oasis
College Football National Championship II *
Comix Zone
Ecco Jr X
Garfield: Caught in the Act X
Light Crusader
Magic School Bus X
Marsupilami
NBA Action 95 *
NHL All Star Hockey 95 *
The Oooze
Prime Time NFL Football *
Ristar
Vectorman
VR Troopers X
World Series Baseball 95 *
X Men 2

* sports title, mostly recycled from previous game
X kids title

not a killer list, especially after you take away the sports games.

[chrisbid]

Star Fox (1993)
worldwide: 3 million copies
North America: 1.6 million copies

Super Metroid (1994)
worldwide: 1.4 million copies
North America: 0.6 million copies

Mortal Kombat II (1994)
worldwide: 1.9 million copies
North America: 1.5 million copies

Donkey Kong Country (1994)
worldwide: 9.3 million copies
North America: 4.4 million copies


You're right- MKII was very successful on the SNES, especially in North America. But Donkey Kong Country outsold it by 3-to-1 in North America. So again, DKC is what really gave the SNES a big sales boost...bigger than MKII.


thanks for bringing these up. super metroid is one of those games that grew into a legend after the fact. when it was released, it really didnt make much of an impact.

[tom]

Wow, this thread turned stupiditly into 'my console is better than yours'.

I guess that just shows, numbers (my console's got Mode 755, mine has 1000000000 polygons, mine has 400 sound channels) mean nothing:

http://i357.photobucket.com/albums/oo12/Alison123456789/jagdev.jpg



Obviously that goes for sales figures too (Like the 95 UK Hoover/Dyson fiasco, Dyson had the best selling vacuum cleaner of the year, Hoover said 'no, we had the best selling vacuum cleaner of the year'. Turned out Hoover forged their sales figures).



.

[wiggyx]

great, fanboy rhetoric...

the super nes lagged behind the sega genesis in the US market when the snes launched. it took three bitter years of battling for nintendo to edge ahead of sega. super mario world did not push snes systems off the shelf at the same rate sonic the hedgehog pushed genesis units. street fighter ii was the first killer app for the snes.


How is citing empirical data "fanboy rhetoric"?

I was arguing that it had a great launch, that's all, not how many "bitter" years it took for Nintendo to match or exceed the Genesis' sales numbers. Sega had a good head start and an established fan base, good for them. They took the risk by launching a new platform first and it proved itself a success. Again, I didn't say Mario sold more SNES units than Sonic did for the Genesis. Sonic was a great idea at the time.

I love a good console no matter who made or makes it. I love the SNES, hate the Genesis. Love the Dreamcast, hate the 'Cube. I'm no fanboy.



Wow, this thread turned stupiditly into 'my console is better than yours'.

I guess that just shows, numbers (my console's got Mode 755, mine has 1000000000 polygons, mine has 400 sound channels) mean nothing:

http://i357.photobucket.com/albums/oo12/Alison123456789/jagdev.jpg



Obviously that goes for sales figures too (Like the 95 UK Hoover/Dyson fiasco, Dyson had the best selling vacuum cleaner of the year, Hoover said 'no, we had the best selling vacuum cleaner of the year'. Turned out Hoover forged their sales figures).



.

Games sell consoles, and we all know that. If there are good games for a console, then its tech data doesn't mean much. Look at the PS2. By far the sales leader of its generation, yet cited as being the "weaker" console when compared to the Gamecube and Xbox.


Obviously it does not go for sales too. You cannot apply one theory to a hypothetical just because you feel that's there's a parallel. Nobody has "proved" anything about Nintendo's sales.

[kedawa]

I suspect famiclones outsell everything.

[chrisbid]

I love the SNES, hate the Genesis.




that pretty much sums it up

[A Black Falcon]

I was just saying Saturn was more powerful than often credited for. Again Check Shenmue footage for it.
It is true that a lot of people underestimate the Saturn -- it was close to the Playstation in power, even though it doesn't quite match it, and a lot of people don't seem to realize that it was actually decently powerful for its time. All of those games that fail to use the system's power well and only use one of the two CPU cores and such sure don't help, of course... it was hard to program for and few developers could get the most out of it. And given how much more successful Sony was, even fewer tried.


Also I know that about PS2 & DC however I was just saying due to different architecture and some limits PS2 had Shenmue would be impossible to put on PS2. Shenmue IIx was more of a remake than a port as they had to do almost everything all over again. However even though Xbox was a PC in a console shell it had a couple familiar things for Sega.
However yes DC I think with full effects in terms of raw power it's limit was 7 million polys. One of the better cases hown what DC could do is again Shenmue but it's Passport disc. GCN was I think 12 million with full effects. I only mention the game as it's just good for technical examples

PS2 I don't know as Sony way inflated the numbers to over 60. I'm only making a total guess but maybe 9-10.
Xbox not sure maybe close to GCN but Xbox was better with shaders I believe. Actually don't think GCN or Wii has shaders.
The gap between GC and DC is a lot bigger than that, as the numbers shown elsewhere in the thread show... but yeah, Sony's "60 million" was certainly massively overstated.

As for whether Shenmue could be done on a PS2, though, I don't know. The PS2 was the hardest system to program for that generation, with the biggest difference between its early, ugly games and its late, much better looking one... if it's possible, I assume it'd only have been later in the system's life.



That won't work saying one console is capable of doing something the other console is not capable of. That's what they said about the VCS and it performed wonders. All doable via software.

Fine, then show me all those Genesis games with 256 color Mode 7 style graphics all done in software and SNES-level music...

Oh, right. It can't do that. You can do some impressive things in software on the Genesis, sure, as you can see in games like Red Zone or Adventures of Batman & Robin, but you can't match SNES visuals. And of course, the SNES can do impressive things when pushed too.


Actual in-game graphics with lighting, texture effects, physics, etc. (not bogus, meaningless theoretical maximums):

1. PlayStation- roughly 180,000 texture mapped and light-sourced polygons per second max. (roughly 360,000 flat-shaded polygons per second max.)

2. N64- roughly 300k texture mapped and light-sourced high-accuracy polygons per second max. (with N64's hardware effects enabled and custom microcode)

SGI's Turbo3D microcode: 500,000–600,000 low-accuracy polygons per second (no hardware effects, similar looking to PlayStation games, Nintendo never allowed this mode to be used in finished games)
SGI's Fast3D microcode: ~100,000 high-accuracy polygons per second (hardware effects enabled, most N64 games used this mode)
custom microcode: ~300,000 high-accuracy polygons per second (hardware effects enabled, relatively few N64 games used custom modes)

3. Dreamcast- roughly 5-6 million polygons per second max.

4. PS2- roughly 12-15 million polygons per second max.

5. GameCube- roughly 25 million polygons per second max.

6. Xbox- roughly 35 million polygons per second max.

(Keep in mind, the number of polygons per second doesn't necessarily represent all of the graphical capabilities on a console.)
Great list here, thanks for that.


And the SNES's much larger color palette, transparency effects, and advanced sound capabilities were definitely noticeable to me. The slowdown seen in some 1st generation SNES games was gone after a year, once developers mastered the hardware.
Agreed about your first part of course, but you're right on the slowdown point too -- only early SNES games have the crippling slowdown, developers figured out how to get good speed out of the system with time.


That's not quite right, Sega was number one in sixteen bit sales in 91, 92, and 93. Nintendo took a small lead in 94, and Sega effectively killed the genesis in 95 and handed the still robust 16 bit market over to Nintendo.

The 91 SNES launch was mediocre... Super Mario World did not light the industry on fire like Nintendo had hoped. Meanwhile Sega dropped the price of the Genesis and released Sonic the Hedgehog. You can argue about whether Sonic or SMW was a better game, but at the time Sonic was fresh/new/original/exciting and Mario was getting a bit stale.
Nintendo and Sega were competitive in '91 to '93, but Sega did peak in '92-93, yes. Their highest marketshares were in that time. After that, of course, they started committing corporate suicide, while Nintendo finally got the game they needed with DKC and took over the generation, but it's not like teh SNES was doing terribly from '91 to late '94 or something... it was doing okay. DKC was a major help for the SNES of course, and was an outstanding game, but Sega's problems -- 32X, Saturn, etc. -- were also certainly an important factor in why Nintendo ran away with it in '95-97.


Street Fighter II was a defibrillator for the SNES. It got the machine off the mat. It was Nintendo's first strong counterpunch that turned the sixteen bit market into a full fledged war. It would be a year before SFII would come to the genesis, but by that point Mortal Kombat had become the it title, and Nintendo crapped the bed with their content restrictions, giving the genesis another boost.
I don't know if I'd go quite that far, Mario World, F-Zero, Mario Kart, and Zelda LttP were fairly successful games... sure, SFII was a big help, but it wasn't the ONLY thing the SNES had. SFII wasn't the system's first killer app.


I thought the Genesis wasn't officially discontinued in North America until 1997?
Sega of Japan canned almost all game development for systems other than the Saturn in fall 1995, but Sega of America did keep making some Genesis and Game Gear titles until 1997, and the system wasn't fully discontinued until 1998 or 1999 or something, after Majesco's 1998 Genesis 3 relaunch.


Star Fox (1993)
worldwide: 3 million copies
North America: 1.6 million copies

Super Metroid (1994)
worldwide: 1.4 million copies
North America: 0.6 million copies

Mortal Kombat II (1994)
worldwide: 1.9 million copies
North America: 1.5 million copies

Donkey Kong Country (1994)
worldwide: 9.3 million copies
North America: 4.4 million copies


You're right- MKII was very successful on the SNES, especially in North America. But Donkey Kong Country outsold it by 3-to-1 in North America. So again, DKC is what really gave the SNES a big sales boost...bigger than MKII.
DKC also doomed the 32X just as much as any of Sega's decisions (Saturn, etc.) did, I think. I mean, Nintendo said how why spend so much to get 32-bit (ie, why buy a 32X) when you can get 32-bit on your SNES, with DKC? Of course that's slightly deceptive -- DKC is just rendered stuff, not actually a 32-bit game -- but it does look and play fantastic (the DKC series well deserved its success!), and the campaign worked.

Sega sort of had a response, graphically, with Vectorman, but while successful (and a great game), that game was a year after DKC, and by then it was too late to salvage the situation.


Mode 7 only allowed one background layer. Mode 7 is nice, but it's a feature, it does not contribute to how powerful the SNES is.
What? Of course it does, it gives the SNES a powerful and important hardware effect that the other consoles that generation simply couldn't do (at all, in NEC's case, or without an addon, in Sega's). It's certainly significant, and makes for some good gameplay too.


The Genesis had two sound chips and a total of 10 channels.
However many it has, it's certainly a weaker sound chip than the SNES has.



The phrase used was "more powerful", not "overall technically better". A better color palette is a technical advantage, but it does not constitute more power. The Commodore 64 is not more powerful than the original Macintosh.
"More powerful" and "over technically better" are synonyms. Most powerful means the most powerful overall system, of course, not something that wins in one category but loses in every other one!



You've got to be joking. It's more like 100k on N64 and a little higher on Playstation. The Playstation's "meaningless theoretical maximum" is 360k according to Sony. It certainly wasn't doing that in-game.
See the full numbers above for the correct information there.


The difference between these consoles isn't that large.
5 or 6 versus 25 or 35 seems pretty large to me!


The SNES version of MKII was better, but the Genesis version still outsold it, due to more Mortal Kombat fans already owning the console. However, the difference in sales wasn't nearly as large as with the first one. I don't think it contributed to SNES gaining over Genesis.
This is probably true, but at least it didn't hurt the SNES, like MK1 had... that's an improvement at least.


DKC was a pack-in game. The numbers for DKC2 would be a more accurate number to make a comparison.
Lots of games are packin games at some point in a system's life, we can't rule every one of them out just because of that. DKC sold very well because it was an outstanding game and a technical achievement, not because it was a packin.


It should, because the Genesis still had more units at that time.

The combination of Nintendo's recently released titles, Sega's focus on 32-bit software and SFII/MK2 being on the SNES created a sales shift for the consoles.
Sega certainly messed up pretty badly in 1994-1995 when they decided that the 16-bit market was over several years before it actually was, yeah.


When developers used SGI's standard microcode on the N64, you're right, games pushed roughly 100,000 polygons per second (including texture filtering, perspective correction, Z buffer, etc.). However, the N64 was capable of up to roughly 600,000 polygons per second using other microcode. By comparison, Sony PlayStation games pushed roughly 180,000 texture mapped and light-sourced polygons per second (360,000 flat-shaded polygons per second). I've updated my previous post to be more accurate.

According to Boss Game Studios, who developed Top Gear Rally, Twisted Edge Snowboarding, Stunt Racer 64, and World Driver Championship on the N64, they were pushing roughly 300,000 polygons per second on the N64 in World Driver Championship.


More info:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_64:

"Some developers noted that the default SGI microcode ("Fast3D"), which allowed more than ~100,000 high accuracy polygons per second, was poorly profiled for use in games (it was too accurate), and performance suffered as a result. "Turbo3D" microcode allowed 500,000–600,000 normal accuracy polygons per second. However, due to the graphical degradation, Nintendo discouraged its use. Several companies, such as Factor 5, Boss Game Studios, and Rare, were able to write custom microcode that ran their software better than SGI's standard microcode.

...some of the most polygon-intense Nintendo 64 games, such as World Driver Championship, frequently pushed past the Sony PlayStation′s typical in-game polygon counts.

One of the best examples of custom microcode on the Nintendo 64 was Factor 5's N64 port of the Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine PC game. The Factor 5 team aimed for the high resolution mode (640 × 480) because of the crispness it added to the visuals. The machine was taxed to the limit running at 640 × 480, so they needed performance beyond the standard SGI microcode. ... Factor 5's microcode allowed almost unlimited real-time lighting and significantly boosted the polygon count."


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Driver_Championship:

"One of the last racing simulations to be released for Nintendo 64, this graphically intensive title used custom microcode optimization and high polygon count modelling. The development team was able to optimize the usage of the various processors within the N64 to allow far draw distance (reducing the need for fog or pop-up), high detail texturing and models, Doppler effect audio, and advanced lighting and fog effects for realistic weather conditions. Impressively the game has a high resolution 640x480 mode that does not require the add-on N64 RAM Expansion Pak."
... WDC released in May '99, that seems a bit early to call it "one of the last racing simulations to be released for the N64" given that the N64 had a lot more racing games released in 1999-2000... sure, most weren't sims, but a few were. But anyway, yeah, WDC does push more polygons than most N64 games because Boss got Nintendo to allow them to use custom microcode, something indeed not allowed most developers, and they pushed the system harder and got a lot better performance out of it. I think it did come at a cost of some hardware features, but still, the game looks quite good, certainly. And yeah, Factor 5's last two games, Battle for Naboo and Indy and the Infernal Machine, both look amazing, great examples of what custom microcode could do on the N64.

Of course, programming that stuff was not easy, so a lot of studios probably couldn't have handled it (given that they often couldn't manage to make even the normal microcode look as good as it could!), but still, it is unfortunate that Nintendo didn't let some more studios do custom microcode. It could well have helped some games for sure.


Which the vast majority of games used.
True, but the ones that don't have some of the system's best visuals.


Yes but you said you were talking about actual in-game graphics, not theoreticals. :)
True, but I at least would far rather see a smaller number of perspective-corrected, filtered, good-looking polygons over twice as many hideously ugly, popping, jaggy ones... the advantages more than make up for the disadvantages.


I doubt any actual games got that high.
Quite possibly not, but I don't know.


Cite?
One of the game's developers wrote about it on the web some years back.


great, fanboy rhetoric...

the super nes lagged behind the sega genesis in the US market when the snes launched. it took three bitter years of battling for nintendo to edge ahead of sega. super mario world did not push snes systems off the shelf at the same rate sonic the hedgehog pushed genesis units. street fighter ii was the first killer app for the snes.
You're right to complain about fanboy rhetoric, but isn't saying that SMW wasn't a killer app bordering on that yourself? Kind of seems so to me...


and to answer another question, sega drastically pared down their releases on all systems other than the saturn in 1995. here is a list of first party genesis games released in 1995


Adventures of Batman and Robin
Beyond Oasis
College Football National Championship II *
Comix Zone
Ecco Jr X
Garfield: Caught in the Act X
Light Crusader
Magic School Bus X
Marsupilami
NBA Action 95 *
NHL All Star Hockey 95 *
The Oooze
Prime Time NFL Football *
Ristar
Vectorman
VR Troopers X
World Series Baseball 95 *
X Men 2

* sports title, mostly recycled from previous game
X kids title

not a killer list, especially after you take away the sports games.
First, while it was a 1994 release in Japan, Phantasy Star IV released in the West in 1995.

In addition, you're right that in 1995 Sega cut back its Genesis release list a lot, but this list on its own doesn't really show that -- it'd be better in comparison to some past years...

Also, I don't think VR Troopers or Garfield should be called kids games. They weren't Sega Club titles, just licensed games; you can't call every licensed Genesis game a kids' game, only the Sega Club ones should be because they were the ones specifically designed for that line. Ecco Jr. and Magic School Bus were, of course, part of the Sega Kids line, along with other stuff from other years like Bonkers, Barney, Richard Scarrey, etc. VR Troopers and Garfield are no more kids' games than any of Sega's other non-Sega Club licensed games that generation.

Anyway, that little issue aside, the other thing I have to say is... sure, that wasn't as many games as they'd published before, but at least they kept the quality up! The Adventures of Batman & Robin, Comix Zone, Vectorman, Ristar, Phantasy Star IV, and Beyond Oasis are all among the best games on the Genesis, and several others of those (The Ooze, Light Crusader, maybe Marsupilami) are at least decent. Yeah, the Genesis did still have some great games in '95. I think a bigger problem than quality was consumer attention -- because Sega was putting so much effort at that point in marketing the Saturn and 32X, and because the SNES had taken over since DKC's release, people didn't pay enough attention to those late Genesis games, and some great games like Ristar, Adventures of Batman & Robin and Comix Zone didn't do as well as they should have. I'd say similar things for some of the 1995 Sega CD library, too.

Oh, and of course, a lot of those games were Western -- indeed, of that whole list there (plus PSIV), only PSIV, Light Crusader, Beyond Oasis, and Ristar are Japanese games; the rest are all Western. That's because Sega had moved most of its Japanese development over to the Saturn and 32X, and then Saturn only; only Western teams were left on the Genesis. That got even worse in 1996, of course, when the only Japanese title released was Virtua Fighter 2, and everything else of the system's thin library that year was Western. Of course some were good (Vectorman 2, and I at least like Sonic 3D Blast... oh, and Bugs Bunny in Double Trouble is okay.), but Sega's Japanese teams were their primary teams, and Sega had focused them all on Saturn. Nintendo, of course, never did focus everything on the N64, and kept the SNES going in Japan into 2000... I think they stuck with it maybe too long, and the N64 suffered as a result, but many Nintendo teams also were having issues with the move to 3d (Look at Intelligent Systems and HAL for great examples of that.). But anyway.

[tom]

above guy is just speculating.
Because it hasn't been done on said console, people think it's not possible. You have to prove that it's not, don't just guess.

As David Crane said about the VCS: We never knew that the 2600 was capable of doing things it wasn't supposed to. But we did it. Ace programmer, btw.

As for sound, well personally I think the Megadrive sounds better than the SNES, but then my Megadrive is set up on my guitar amp, my SNES is just connected to a 1084.

[Orion Pimpdaddy]

Wikipedia has an article entitled "List of Best Selling Consoles."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_game_consoles

It doesn't paste very well, but here's the current ranking:

Video game consoles (including handhelds)

Manufacturer Platform Released Units Sold
Sony PlayStation 2 2000 154.4 million[1]
Nintendo Nintendo DS 2004 151.06 million[2]
Nintendo Game Boy and Game Boy Color[3] 1989 and 1998 118.69 million[2]
Sony PlayStation 1994 102.49 million (shipped)[4]
Nintendo Wii 2006 94.97 million[2]
Nintendo Game Boy Advance 2001 81.51 million[2]
Sony PlayStation Portable 2004 75.4 million[5][6][7]
Microsoft Xbox 360 2005 67.2 million[8]
Sony PlayStation 3 2006 62 million[9]
Nintendo Nintendo Entertainment System 1983 61.91 million[2]
Nintendo Super Nintendo Entertainment System 1990 49.10 million[2][10][11]
Sega Mega Drive / Genesis 1988 39 million[cn 1]
Nintendo Nintendo 64 1996 32.93 million[2]
Atari Atari 2600 1977 30 million[15]
Microsoft Xbox 2001 24 million[16][17]
Nintendo Nintendo GameCube 2001 21.74 million[2]
Nintendo Nintendo 3DS 2011 15.03 million[2]
Sega SG-1000/Master System 1985 10–13 million[18][19]
Sega Game Gear 1990 11 million[20]
Sega Dreamcast 1998 10.6 million[21][22]
NEC TurboGrafx-16 1987 10 million[22]
Sega Saturn 1994 9.5 million[22]
Sega Sega CD 1991 6 million[22]
Nintendo Famicom Disk System 1986 4.5 million[23]
Atari Atari 7800 1986 3.77 million[24]
Nintendo Color TV Game 1977 3 million[25]
Mattel Intellivision 1980 3 million[26][27][28]
Coleco Mini-Arcade 1982 3 million[29]
Nokia N-Gage 2003 3 million[20]
Magnavox/Philips Magnavox Odyssey² 1978 2 million[30]
Coleco ColecoVision 1982 2 million[31]
Panasonic 3DO Interactive Multiplayer 1993 2 million[22]
SNK Neo Geo Pocket/Neo Geo Pocket Color 1998 and 1999 2 million[20]
NEC TurboExpress 1990 1.5 million[20]
Sony PlayStation Vita 2011 1.2 million[32]
Coleco Telstar 1976 1 million[33]
Sega Nomad 1995 1 million[34]

[Gamevet]

Lots of games are packin games at some point in a system's life, we can't rule every one of them out just because of that. DKC sold very well because it was an outstanding game and a technical achievement, not because it was a packin.


That's understood, but to compare its overall sales numbers to a game that wasn't a packin, isn't really a direct comparison. If DKC was included with every SNES sold after November of 1994, it's obviously going to sell 3 times better than a great selling 3rd party title. How many other SNES or Genesis games, that weren't included with the systems, managed to sell over 1.5 million units in North America? According to The-Magicbox (http://www.the-magicbox.com/Chart-USPlatinum.shtml) Mortal Kombat 2 sold over 1.5 million units in 1995, when they started keeping track of the sales numbers.

Yeah, DKC kicked the door open for the SNES in overall sales in North America, but the stellar lineup of titles that year shouldn't be overlooked.

[j_factor]

I had no idea N-Gage outsold 3DO and Colecovision.

[A Black Falcon]

I had no idea N-Gage outsold 3DO and Colecovision.

Every gaming generation has had higher overall sales than the one before it, so it shouldn't be TOO surprising when a newer system does better than an older one. But really, it did? None of those were successful systems ultimately, of course.

[tom]

Wikipedia has an article entitled "List of Best Selling Consoles."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_game_consoles

It doesn't paste very well, but here's the current ranking:

Video game consoles (including handhelds)

Manufacturer Platform Released Units Sold
Sony PlayStation 2 2000 154.4 million[1]
Nintendo Nintendo DS 2004 151.06 million[2]
Nintendo Game Boy and Game Boy Color[3] 1989 and 1998 118.69 million[2]
Sony PlayStation 1994 102.49 million (shipped)[4]
Nintendo Wii 2006 94.97 million[2]
Nintendo Game Boy Advance 2001 81.51 million[2]
Sony PlayStation Portable 2004 75.4 million[5][6][7]
Microsoft Xbox 360 2005 67.2 million[8]
Sony PlayStation 3 2006 62 million[9]
Nintendo Nintendo Entertainment System 1983 61.91 million[2]
Nintendo Super Nintendo Entertainment System 1990 49.10 million[2][10][11]
Sega Mega Drive / Genesis 1988 39 million[cn 1]
Nintendo Nintendo 64 1996 32.93 million[2]
Atari Atari 2600 1977 30 million[15]
Microsoft Xbox 2001 24 million[16][17]
Nintendo Nintendo GameCube 2001 21.74 million[2]
Nintendo Nintendo 3DS 2011 15.03 million[2]
Sega SG-1000/Master System 1985 10–13 million[18][19]
Sega Game Gear 1990 11 million[20]
Sega Dreamcast 1998 10.6 million[21][22]
NEC TurboGrafx-16 1987 10 million[22]
Sega Saturn 1994 9.5 million[22]
Sega Sega CD 1991 6 million[22]
Nintendo Famicom Disk System 1986 4.5 million[23]
Atari Atari 7800 1986 3.77 million[24]
Nintendo Color TV Game 1977 3 million[25]
Mattel Intellivision 1980 3 million[26][27][28]
Coleco Mini-Arcade 1982 3 million[29]
Nokia N-Gage 2003 3 million[20]
Magnavox/Philips Magnavox Odyssey² 1978 2 million[30]
Coleco ColecoVision 1982 2 million[31]
Panasonic 3DO Interactive Multiplayer 1993 2 million[22]
SNK Neo Geo Pocket/Neo Geo Pocket Color 1998 and 1999 2 million[20]
NEC TurboExpress 1990 1.5 million[20]
Sony PlayStation Vita 2011 1.2 million[32]
Coleco Telstar 1976 1 million[33]
Sega Nomad 1995 1 million[34]

Yeah that's Wikipedia for you, again, fabricated from fabricated source information. As I said before I am a sex god on the internet, so would you believe me?

Look on Wikipedia best selling musicians: ( (claimed figure(s) supported by at least 15% in certified units) 15% is not very much)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_selling_musicians

It even mentiones, artists like Nana Mouskouri and Deep Purple cannot be included, I don't think Nana Mouskouri ever sold 300 million records, but that's record companies, fans and the press for you....

Same goes for consoles.




.

[A Black Falcon]

Yeah that's Wikipedia for you, again, fabricated from fabricated source information. As I said before I am a sex god on the internet, so would you believe me?

Look on Wikipedia best selling musicians: ( (claimed figure(s) supported by at least 15% in certified units) 15% is not very much)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best_selling_musicians

It even mentiones, artists like Nana Mouskouri and Deep Purple cannot be included, I don't think Nana Mouskouri ever sold 300 million records, but that's record companies, fans and the press for you....

Same goes for consoles.




.

So you missed the fact that every one of those is sourced? I'm sure that some of those are wrong, sure, but many are right. To prove which is which you'd have to go through every one of those sources, and figure out which numbers are accurate and which aren't.

Otherwise, you're just saying things that aren't true without backing them up with any facts. You can't ignore the whole list just because some of those numbers are surely inaccurate, when most are right.

[tom]

Other way around, some might be accurate, most are not

[tom]

But prove yes as I already mentioned, the book Game Over states Nintendo and Sega exaggerated their sales figures, man do I have to tell you guys everything 1000 times????

[Rob2600]

But prove yes as I already mentioned, the book Game Over states Nintendo and Sega exaggerated their sales figures, man do I have to tell you guys everything 1000 times????

What are author David Sheff's sources? Also, what part of the book mentions that? Could you quote it please? I'm just curious, thanks.

[tom]

Yes, it's an excellent book about Nintendo's monopolistic practices to keep the prizes high, lying in court and wotnot. Gotta read it yourself, I'm not in the mood to re-read the book at the moment.
http://www.videogamecollectors.com/gallery2/main.php?g2_view=core.DownloadItem&g2_itemId=367923&g2_serialNumber=2

[TheChristoph]

Bickering aside, this thread's been a great read.

It makes me wish for an alternate videogame history where Sega didn't give up on the Genesis early, and we had another generation of Nintendo vs Sega 2D competition.