Biggest mistakes of the game industry
- Thread starter lion2
- Start date
They should add "Selling the Bond license to EA."
winterbird@nerdshack.com
Newcomer
Then add to that: "Selling any license to EA"fearsomepirate said:
Oh. And Colin McRae 3. Disaster zone.
While SegaCD and 32X was mistakes (to some degree at least), I think there can be no doubt that it was Saturn that was Segas real downfall, not only draining them of cash but also consumer mindshare and confidence.
Saturn was way to complicated and expensive to manufacture.
This lead to A: Tricky to develop for, under-performing hardware (which was quite important in the early days of realtime consumer 3d) B: Great difficulty in competing with SCE on price.
That said, Saturn was a spectacular downfall if there ever was one in the video games industry.
Titles such as NiGHTS, Burning Rangers, Panzer Dragoon series, Sega Rally, Guardian Heroes, Silhouette Mirage and Radiant Silvergun all range on many peoples top ten of best games ever.
Saturn was way to complicated and expensive to manufacture.
This lead to A: Tricky to develop for, under-performing hardware (which was quite important in the early days of realtime consumer 3d) B: Great difficulty in competing with SCE on price.
That said, Saturn was a spectacular downfall if there ever was one in the video games industry.
Titles such as NiGHTS, Burning Rangers, Panzer Dragoon series, Sega Rally, Guardian Heroes, Silhouette Mirage and Radiant Silvergun all range on many peoples top ten of best games ever.
The Sega story is awesome. This is just a quick version, all iirc:
Before the Saturn, Sega had badly shaken the confidence of their consumer base (and just flat out pissed a lot of people off) with the Mega CD and (just as the Saturn was launching) 32X. With the Saturn, they not only made an expensive, difficult to devlop for system, but due to pressure from Sega of Japan they released it early (without decent software) and at too high a price. They did the same in Europe. £400 for the thing with 2 pads and Virtua Fighter.
To be fair, Sega of America knew this but the decision was forced on them by SoJ. SoA also weren't keen on the 32X, but SoJ made them do it, while pulling the limited software support they'd pledged as they focused on the Saturn (which they reportedly hadn't fully informed SoA about when they made them do the 32X thing).
SoJ also forced Sega to move away from the Megadrive about 2 years early, throwing away a good deal of profit and losing money on the Saturn instead.
For it's part, SoA prematurely announced the abandonment of the Saturn, greatly accellerating it's death and once again shaking consumer confidence. This also lead to a large period of absence from US (and European) retail space making the introduction of the DC even harder.
If the 32X hadn't followed the Mega CD, and had actually been propperly supported, it might have bought Sega time to redesign the Saturn propperly and been quite fondly remembered. For $150 it packed quite a punch for the time and price (cost £170 in the UK at launch though ffs). The Saturn was also impressive for a console redesigned pretty much from the ground up using stock/old components in the space of several months.
Before the Saturn, Sega had badly shaken the confidence of their consumer base (and just flat out pissed a lot of people off) with the Mega CD and (just as the Saturn was launching) 32X. With the Saturn, they not only made an expensive, difficult to devlop for system, but due to pressure from Sega of Japan they released it early (without decent software) and at too high a price. They did the same in Europe. £400 for the thing with 2 pads and Virtua Fighter.
To be fair, Sega of America knew this but the decision was forced on them by SoJ. SoA also weren't keen on the 32X, but SoJ made them do it, while pulling the limited software support they'd pledged as they focused on the Saturn (which they reportedly hadn't fully informed SoA about when they made them do the 32X thing).
SoJ also forced Sega to move away from the Megadrive about 2 years early, throwing away a good deal of profit and losing money on the Saturn instead.
For it's part, SoA prematurely announced the abandonment of the Saturn, greatly accellerating it's death and once again shaking consumer confidence. This also lead to a large period of absence from US (and European) retail space making the introduction of the DC even harder.
If the 32X hadn't followed the Mega CD, and had actually been propperly supported, it might have bought Sega time to redesign the Saturn propperly and been quite fondly remembered. For $150 it packed quite a punch for the time and price (cost £170 in the UK at launch though ffs). The Saturn was also impressive for a console redesigned pretty much from the ground up using stock/old components in the space of several months.
Megadrive1988
Veteran
Sega should have used the SGI technology that was offered to them, instead of releasing the very badly performing 3D version of the Saturn.
Sega should've called it a day with Saturn's ancester, the System32-based GigaDrive in 1992 (and never having a 32X) and then have had either SGI or Martin Marietta/Lockheed Martin design a 3D upgrade for the Gigadrive, or a new 3D system entirely by 1996. then by 2000-2001, a backwards combatible successor with even more powerful 3D technology that could compete with PS2 and Gamecube.
Sega should've called it a day with Saturn's ancester, the System32-based GigaDrive in 1992 (and never having a 32X) and then have had either SGI or Martin Marietta/Lockheed Martin design a 3D upgrade for the Gigadrive, or a new 3D system entirely by 1996. then by 2000-2001, a backwards combatible successor with even more powerful 3D technology that could compete with PS2 and Gamecube.
Blazkowicz
Legend
the atari Jaguar. Atari stopped computer activity to focus on it and it was a flop.
there was all this complex hardware to do stuff, and tacked on, a 16MHz 68000 CPU so there'd be something simple to use in the console, and intended to co-ordinate all the mess.
so, developers did ports of Amiga games
. really, did someone buy the Jaguar to play Flashback? same game is on amiga, megadrive and SNES.
there was Alien vs Predator though, it's said to be a brilliant FPS.
more Jaguar blunder : there's a CD expansion as well! I guess the three people who bought it still feel pissed off
but, the greatest tragedy about Jaguar : Atari cancelled the Panther, which would have been like a SNES on steroids (and released in the same timeframe). Had Atari released the Panther, they'd might still be here.
http://www.homecomputer.de/pages/panther.html
there was all this complex hardware to do stuff, and tacked on, a 16MHz 68000 CPU so there'd be something simple to use in the console, and intended to co-ordinate all the mess.
so, developers did ports of Amiga games
. really, did someone buy the Jaguar to play Flashback? same game is on amiga, megadrive and SNES.there was Alien vs Predator though, it's said to be a brilliant FPS.
more Jaguar blunder : there's a CD expansion as well! I guess the three people who bought it still feel pissed off
but, the greatest tragedy about Jaguar : Atari cancelled the Panther, which would have been like a SNES on steroids (and released in the same timeframe). Had Atari released the Panther, they'd might still be here.
http://www.homecomputer.de/pages/panther.html
Blazkowicz_ said:
Oh they're still here in some form (ok ok it's actually Infogrames or whatever, under Atari's name...), releasing some of the worst games in this generation, only making money off the licenses the games were based on.
Embarrassing thing is that their UK office is in my building here... We had a really ugly yellow car in the parking lot here for a few months, it was the one they used to advertise Stuntman... Or Maybe it was Driver3... Can't remember, they were both complete and utter messes.
I don't think the Saturn was "very badly performing" as it had some amazing looking 3D games even by PS1 standards. It could compete with the PS1, broadly speaking. It was mostly just too hard to use and too expensive to make.
I'm not sure who they should have gone with for a 3D chipset (the 3D accellerator market began taking off around that time) as cost was a huge factor, but I'd certainly agree they should have held off releasing the Saturn till they got the technology right. From the end of 93 to the end of 95 would have given them 2 years, which seems reasonable given they were normally developing hardware in about 12 months or less.
Add-ons have got a bad name now, but NEC showed they can work, for an entusiast/fan market anyway. After the Mega CD (which was too expensive and very badly supported from day 1) nothing may have worked. But the idea of adding a faster CPU, a bumped up graphics chip and a couple of high quality sound channels to an old system seems okay if the price is right and you don't expect to sell to the entire market.
Sega's add ons intially sold pretty well to fans and enthusiasts (both the expensive Mega CD and the even the 32X); people only dropped them and started badmouthing when it was clear Sega weren't trying and the games would dry up.
I still wonder if you could sell an ubermachine to the same type of people that relish upgrading to the next marginally faster pair of SLI graphcis cards.
I'm not sure who they should have gone with for a 3D chipset (the 3D accellerator market began taking off around that time) as cost was a huge factor, but I'd certainly agree they should have held off releasing the Saturn till they got the technology right. From the end of 93 to the end of 95 would have given them 2 years, which seems reasonable given they were normally developing hardware in about 12 months or less.
Add-ons have got a bad name now, but NEC showed they can work, for an entusiast/fan market anyway. After the Mega CD (which was too expensive and very badly supported from day 1) nothing may have worked. But the idea of adding a faster CPU, a bumped up graphics chip and a couple of high quality sound channels to an old system seems okay if the price is right and you don't expect to sell to the entire market.
Sega's add ons intially sold pretty well to fans and enthusiasts (both the expensive Mega CD and the even the 32X); people only dropped them and started badmouthing when it was clear Sega weren't trying and the games would dry up.
I still wonder if you could sell an ubermachine to the same type of people that relish upgrading to the next marginally faster pair of SLI graphcis cards.
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