Nuon - the newest "Classic Gaming" console

[gbpxl]

According to the Wikipedia page- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuon_(DVD_technology) it was released in early 2000, meaning that this would be the last North American game console to be released before the PS2 (October 26th, 2000.) Only 8 games were released apparently. I didn't even know about it until recently.

Did anyone have one of these back in the day? Did it "enhance" DVD playback in anyway? How were the games?

[Steve W]

I have two different models, one Samsung and one Toshiba model. The game's graphics are better than the N64 but not as good as a Dreamcast. It was originally going to be a game console before the tech was repurposed into a DVD decoder chip that could also play games. I have always wondered if there was a lowering of quality going from dedicated console hardware to DVD MPEG decoder.

As far as the games go, Tempest 3000, Iron Soldier 3 and Merlin Racing are my favorites. Ballistic is pretty good but can be played on just about anything nowadays since it's a common type of game. The same with The Next Tetris game (exclusive to the Toshiba console as a mail-in title) and Space Invaders X.L. Freefall 3050 A.D. is a promising concept but never played well enough for me to really get into. It also didn't help that Logitech's controller had analog issues meaning the stick couldn't travel as far as the other analog controllers that were made for Nuon (which were not easy to find back in the day).

There were only four movies released with Nuon-specific content. And one of those, the horrible Planet of the Apes remake by Tim Burton, was mastered wrong and it was incredibly hard to access any of the Nuon features. The added stuff wasn't exactly groundbreaking, so you aren't missing a whole lot. One nice thing I found was that you could fast forward at 128x on the Toshiba model and 256x on the Samsung model, and had better slow-motion options than ordinary DVD players. You can sometimes come across new copies of Bedazzled, and they're still mastering it with Nuon features even though that hasn't been a thing in a decade and a half. Apparently the more recent versions of Tim Burton's Planet of the Apes has the properly corrected Nuon features, although I don't think I'll ever buy another one to find out.

The Nuon is a niche console in every sense of the word. It was a DVD player that could also play games, right before the Playstation 2 would get released and take over that market. Still, I really loved mine. It was kind of a last gasp of Atari, seeing that most of the people involved were ex-Atari engineers and programmers. That was an interesting time to be a video game nerd and collector, that's for sure.

Edit: If you're wondering how some of the games play, Iron Soldier 3 and Merlin Racing were later ported to the Playstation 1. Merlin Racing was actually broken up by types of racing vehicles and sold as four different games, if I recall. The first release was Miracle Space Race, I can't for the life of me remember the other game's names. Sadly, they don't control as well as the Nuon original - you just can't seem to bank hard enough in the PS1 games. But at least those Nuon games managed to get out into the "real" video game world.

[goldenband]

Merlin Racing was actually broken up by types of racing vehicles and sold as four different games, if I recall. The first release was Miracle Space Race, I can't for the life of me remember the other game's names. Sadly, they don't control as well as the Nuon original - you just can't seem to bank hard enough in the PS1 games. But at least those Nuon games managed to get out into the "real" video game world.

Apparently (https://hg101.kontek.net/kusoge/kusoge-miracledesignracers.htm) the others are Rascal Racers, XS Airboat Racing, and ATV Racers. I only own Miracle Space Race of those, and haven't really played it yet.

Freefall 3050 A.D. does sound interesting. I wonder if the source code is out there somewhere? Totally pipe dreaming here, but maybe it could be ported to the Dreamcast.

[jb143]

I wonder if I've ever passed by one of these in a thrift store and never knew it, since it looks just like any other DVD player. I think I only ever knew of the name due to the Atari connection and Tempest 3000.

[buzz_n64]

I have all 3 North American models. The Samsung Extiva DVD-N2000, the Samsung DVD-N501, and the Toshiba SD2300. I have all 7 released games for it, and all 4 Nuon enhanced movies. The Samsung DVD-N501 is the best model for game compatibility since it can play cd-r discs that many homebrews were made on, but it also has the lowest resolution at 180x120 compared to the other systems at 360x240. Apparently some models have problems playing Iron Soldier 3. I haven't tested it out with all of my players to find out which ones. The only game none of these models can play is Crayon Shin-Chan that can only be played on the Korean Samsung DVD-N591 and that system can't play the other games. That's incredible, a game system that only plays one game!

[Steve W]

I have Iron Soldier 3, and it works on both the SD2300 and the N501. The only one that it doesn't play reliably on is the very first Nuon console, the N2000. After they were recalled Kevin at the Nuon-Dome sent interested people the recalled discs for free, with "demo" scribbled on it with a marker. But it is the fully functional game, just without a case. I think I only ever managed to get through three-quarters of the game.

[WelcomeToTheNextLevel]

The newest mainstream "Classic Gaming" console would be the GameCube; the newest altogether, IIRC, would be the Tapwave Zodiac. The cut-off is the Nintendo DS now (the Xbox 360 is the oldest non-classic TV console).

PS2, Xbox, and GameCube have been classic for quite some time now.

[jb143]

The cut-off is the Nintendo DS now (the Xbox 360 is the oldest non-classic TV console).

He's going off the description of the classic gaming sub-forum which says "classic means "before PlayStation 2."

But the definition of "classic" does not involve any arbitrary cut-off date.


classic: judged over a period of time to be of the highest quality and outstanding of its kind.

[danny_galaga]

I wonder if I've ever passed by one of these in a thrift store and never knew it, since it looks just like any other DVD player. I think I only ever knew of the name due to the Atari connection and Tempest 3000.

Same here. Would be cool to find one and play Tempest 3000. Tempest 2000 is excellent so I can only imagine 3000 being even better (",)

[Steve W]

Tempest 3000's graphics made it hard to play - the effects kind of swamped out the game graphics, making it easy to get killed because so much stuff is blasting around the screen.

[WelcomeToTheNextLevel]

He's going off the description of the classic gaming sub-forum which says "classic means "before PlayStation 2."

But the definition of "classic" does not involve any arbitrary cut-off date.

I guess I was calling classic as just retro. Super Mario 64 and Bubsy 3D are both retro, but only Super Mario 64 is classic in that sense.

[WelcomeToTheNextLevel]

The Nuon was a poorly implemented console. Its whole idea was that it could play both DVDs and games, but the PS2's DVD-playing capabilities were already well known before it came out, and it was only a few months from release anyway. Heck, it was already out in Japan.

Let's compare the Nuon and the PS2 at launch:

Nuon had only a few games, while the PS2 could play thousands of games on launch day (due to PS1 backward compatibility). PS2 also had a fairly large launch library with hundreds more games in the pipeline at launch.
Nuon had to use password saves, while PS2 had memory cards available and common.
Some Nuon games benefited greatly from an analog stick, but only a D-pad was standard. The PS2 came standard with a controller with analog sticks (and rumble).
Both could play DVDs. Admittedly, the Nuon did have 4 "Nuon Enhanced" DVDs, and all were mediocre movies IIRC.
Some Nuon titles could only play on certain brands of players. All PS2 and PS1 games could play on all PS2s.
Not to mention, the Nuon was more expensive. $300-350 at launch, PS2 was $299.
The Nuon games' graphics looked no better than PS1 or N64.

[gbpxl]

I cant imagine a console from 2000 still using passwords. even by the end of the SNES life cycle, passwords seemed dated. It was all about memory cards and SRAM at that point

[Steve W]

You have to take into account that they started working on the Nuon hardware back around 1996 - 1997, long before the PS2 was announced. It was developed as Project X, a game console that eventually morphed into an MPEG decoding chip once they saw where the technology was going and the fact that they didn't have hundreds of millions of dollars to sink into a console and multiple development studios. They could stealthily sneak a game playing machine into people's living rooms and attempt to capture that "casual gamer" market the Nintendo Wii eventually cracked.