What are the biggest historical mistakes committed by the video game industry?

[Prowler]

I thought this would be a fun thread. The video game industry has had a lot of successes and failures. Let's remember the failures shall we?

Nintendo insisting on cartridges instead of moving to CDs in the N64 era: A decision based on pure greed by Nintendo to sell game for a higher price and to get more money from them. This led to developers mostly preferring to take their games to the PS1 instead. This was Nintendo's biggest mistake in history, imo. All the mainstay 3rd party series we've mostly associated with Nintendo systems such as Castlevania, Street Fighter, Final Fantasy, Mega Man, etc. were either gone now or gave the N64 more divisive and not so loved games like the two 3D Castlevania games, while the PS1 got Symphony of the Night, for example.

People forget that the PS1 had a slow start and there was a lot of skepticism about it in its first year or so. Most of those classic PS1 games we all associate with the Sony console, would have been N64 exclusives had Nintendo opted for CDs instead of cartridges. And the history of gaming would have been very different these days. The PS1 would have probably bombed and Sony wouldn't have attempted the video game console market again.

Sega in the 90s in general: Lol, come on now. The Sega 32X plus the botched launch of the Sega Saturn. By the time the Dreamcast came out, it was too late, even if Sega was trying to correct course by then.

Failed systems like the Apple Pippin, the 3DO, the Virtual Boy, the R-Zone, etc.: Enough said.

[Coola Yagami]

Originally Posted by Prowler

Sega in the 90s in general: Lol, come on now. The Sega 32X plus the botched launch of the Sega Saturn. By the time the Dreamcast came out, it was too late, even if Sega was trying to correct course by then.

Ahhh I was gonna bring up the SEGA stuff, especially the poor Genesis getting gangbanged by the SEGA CD and the 32X, with the Saturn right around the corner.

I'd say the Virtua Boy was another big blunder.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by Coola Yagami

Ahhh I was gonna bring up the SEGA stuff, especially the poor Genesis getting gangbanged by the SEGA CD and the 32X, with the Saturn right around the corner.

I'd say the Virtua Boy was another big blunder.

I mentioned the Virtual Boy briefly alongside other failed systems haha

Surprised you didn't address my first point. Wasn't it you who, some years ago, said that one of the issues with Nintendo was its systems becoming the Mario, Zelda and Pokémon only consoles after a certain point in history when they also needed the Castlevanias, Mega Mans, Street Fighters, Final Fantasies and Chrono Triggers to build themselves up in the past? Or was that another user?

[Coola Yagami]

Originally Posted by Prowler

I mentioned the Virtual Boy briefly alongside other failed systems haha

Surprised you didn't address my first point. Wasn't it you who, some years ago, said that one of the issues with Nintendo was its systems becoming the Mario, Zelda and Pokémon only consoles after a certain point in history when they also needed the Castlevanias, Mega Mans, Street Fighters, Final Fantasies and Chrono Triggers to build themselves up in the past? Or was that another user?

Yeah that was me, though that was more of a personal pet peeve of mine. Clearly the N64 hit it big with Mario 64, Mario Kart 64, Ocarina of Time and Goldeneye. It wasn't my cup of tea but it was for many.

My example would have worked had the N64 flopped due to lack of Street Fighter and King of Fighter but that clearly wasn't the case.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by Coola Yagami

Yeah that was me, though that was more of a personal pet peeve of mine. Clearly the N64 hit it big with Mario 64, Mario Kart 64, Ocarina of Time and Goldeneye. It wasn't my cup of tea but it was for many.

My example would have worked had the N64 flopped due to lack of Street Fighter and King of Fighter but that clearly wasn't the case.

Well, actually, I've seen people call N64 "a bit of a flop" before. It seems a gross exaggeration to call a system that sold around 32M units worldwide "a bit of a flop" when the Saturn didn't even sell 10M, but keep in mind that the PS1 broke the 100M barrier in comparison...

So I guess it was a bit of a shock at the time and in the eyes of the public opinion it looked like Sony just waltzed in and crushed both Nintendo and Sega, the two video game giants at the time.

Anyway, I'm a huge Nintendo fan, but I had to get a PS2 in my teens eventually since the GameCube was not getting a lot of good stuff that the PS2 got. As an adult, I've found the PC to be a good alternative for Nintendo, but the Switch also has been changing that. Having said that, I own the Switch versions of NieR Automata, The Witcher III, FFVII-FFVIII remaster twin pack, Resident Evil REmake, FFX/X-2 HD remaster, Red Dead Redemption(never came out on PC iirc) and Diablo III. And plan on getting more in the future. I love that the Switch has so much 3rd party support.

Of course I love the first party Nintendo series, but I can't just limit myself to those, you know? There's a lot of cool **** out there and a world outside Nintendo. So yeah, I'm all for having a good collection of 3rd party titles for my Nintendo systems.

[ToTheNines]

Naughty Dog never making Jak 4.

[Prowler]

This probably ties into my 90s Sega point as well but...

Sega dropping the ball on Virtua Fighter and almost letting it die: VF2 revolutionised 3D fighters. It had everything to become the Street Fighter of 3D fighters, but somehow, was completely surpassed by Tekken.

[Coola Yagami]

in that case I'd throw in Capcom's flop with Street Fighter III. The long-awaited sequel and we got only Ryu and Ken and a bunch of weirdos. I get new generation but maybe it was too new, too soon. At least throw in some people like Guile's daughter or a disciple of Sagat with similar fighting styles, which is what they kinda did with Sean and I guess Remy but that was until Third Strike. Maybe throw in Hugo from the start to have that 'hey that's the guy from Final Fight' hype.

Roster-wise I would have had Ryu, Ken, Akuma, Chun Li, Hugo and Sagat from the getgo, some character that references Guile and then the new guys. That might have gone over better than just Ryu, Ken and Sean at launch.

Capcom's flop with Marvel VS Capcom Infinite. So bad it missed EVO. So bad Marvel was like 'fine, we'll do it ourselves' when they started working on Tokon Fighting Souls.

Also Tecmo nearly killing the DOA series with 6. I was ready to go all in (Hitomi) and purchase the dlc characters and whatnot, but they pulled the plug after a year.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by Coola Yagami

in that case I'd throw in Capcom's flop with Street Fighter III. The long-awaited sequel and we got only Ryu and Ken and a bunch of weirdos. I get new generation but maybe it was too new, too soon. At least throw in some people like Guile's daughter or a disciple of Sagat with similar fighting styles, which is what they kinda did with Sean and I guess Remy but that was until Third Strike. Maybe throw in Hugo from the start to have that 'hey that's the guy from Final Fight' hype.

Roster-wise I would have had Ryu, Ken, Akuma, Chun Li, Hugo and Sagat from the getgo, some character that references Guile and then the new guys. That might have gone over better than just Ryu, Ken and Sean at launch.

Capcom's flop with Marvel VS Capcom Infinite. So bad it missed EVO. So bad Marvel was like 'fine, we'll do it ourselves' when they started working on Tokon Fighting Souls.

Also Tecmo nearly killing the DOA series with 6. I was ready to go all in (Hitomi) and purchase the dlc characters and whatnot, but they pulled the plug after a year.

3rd Strike is a GREAT game, but I too would have preferred a more familiar cast. I simply am not a fan of most SFIII newcomers except for Elena, Makoto, Ibuki and Yun maybe. And I'm the biggest Necro and Remy defender you'll find! But I'd rather just have Dhalsim, Blanka and Guile instead.

And Sean, who was supposed to be the breakout new character of SFIII was made into a low tier geek.

Tecmo killing off DOA basically sucks yeah. DOA 5 is much better than DOA 6. DOA 6 has CRIMINAL prices for DLC packs, holy hell.

[Coola Yagami]

Originally Posted by Prowler

3rd Strike is a GREAT game, but I too would have preferred a more familiar cast. I simply am not a fan of most SFIII newcomers except for Elena, Makoto, Ibuki and Yun maybe. And I'm the biggest Necro and Remy defender you'll find! But I'd rather just have Dhalsim, Blanka and Guile instead.

And Sean, who was supposed to be the breakout new character of SFIII was made into a low tier geek.

Tecmo killing off DOA basically sucks yeah. DOA 5 is much better than DOA 6. DOA 6 has CRIMINAL prices for DLC packs, holy hell.

At least in my area, some people tried out SF3 and went right back to playing Super Turbo which was still around.

It also didn't help that there weren't any 'jump in' characters. Everyone seemed to suck or be very weak compared to the tried and true Ryu and Ken.

[FredWolfLeonardo]

During the making of PS4 and Xbox One, that guy at Microsoft who said that if you want an offline console, you should buy an Xbox 360.

Sony couldn't have asked for a bigger endorsement. They even made a "How to trade PS4 games" video which trolled the at-the-time stated feature of Xbox One games being untradeable.

[Coola Yagami]

Originally Posted by FredWolfLeonardo

During the making of PS4 and Xbox One, that guy at Microsoft who said that if you want an offline console, you should buy an Xbox 360.

Sony couldn't have asked for a bigger endorsement. They even made a "How to trade PS4 games" video which trolled the at-the-time stated feature of Xbox One games being untradeable.

LMAO I remember that. And to top it off, they said it while the 360 was pretty much dead.

Like if Sony was dumb enough to say something similar, they could at least say 'we are still making PS4 titles for those that wish to wait' or something.

[Prowler]

Funny thing is, the Sony consoles were probably the best choices for single players back in the day. The N64, the GameCube and the Wii always were very good co-op/party consoles allowing up to 4 players each. The Xbox 360 had the best online capabilities of its era by far, even though it was paid, while Wii's online was rudimentary to say the least and PS3 suffered massively with the attack on the PSN. Therefore, the PS1, PS2 and the PS3 were perfect single player machines. Especially the PS1 and the PS2. It's where most of the JRPGs and other long adventure-like games could be found on.

Were there any major party games like Mario Kart, Mario Party, Melee, Super Monkey Ball on the PS2? The Smackdown series and Singstar, perhaps? Tekken and Pro Evolution Soccer for 1 vs. 1 matches as well. But the GameCube and the Xbox also had fighting games like and FIFA...

[Andrew NDB]

Originally Posted by Prowler

This probably ties into my 90s Sega point as well but...

Sega dropping the ball on Virtua Fighter and almost letting it die: VF2 revolutionised 3D fighters. It had everything to become the Street Fighter of 3D fighters, but somehow, was completely surpassed by Tekken.

They haven't given up yet: https://forums.thetechnodrome.com/sh...ad.php?t=63952

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by Andrew NDB

They haven't given up yet: https://forums.thetechnodrome.com/sh...ad.php?t=63952

Yes but the series has been dormant for ages at this point. It was already considered a dead series in 2015.

[Andrew NDB]

Originally Posted by Prowler

Yes but the series has been dormant for ages at this point. It was already considered a dead series in 2015.

Considering the last Virtua Fighter came out in 2006, yeah. Pretty baffling. By 2006 Tekken 5 had come out 2 years ago, and Tekken 6 would drop a year later. I found this explanation online that sort of tracks:

* Tekken games were on Playstation and Playstation 2 consoles which were a massive success. Virtua Fighter games were on Sega Saturn and Dreamcast - two colossal flops. Arcades were on the way out, people were moving to home consoles, so people ended up picking up Playstations and playing Tekken as their first 3D fighting game. So simply because there were 200+ million units sold of the PS1 and PS2 combined, compared to a few dozen Saturn/Dreamcast consoles sold, Tekken was immensely more popular. By the time Virtua Fighter made it to the Playstation, Tekken was already the de facto fighting game franchise for the Playstation - it was synonymous with the Playstation, and unless you were an arcade player, you wouldn't have known of Virtua Fighter. If you were a console-only gamer (as many were), the fighting game you knew of was Tekken.

* For brand new players, Tekken is easier to play than Virtua Fighter in that if you're completely new to fighting games, you can mash buttons in Tekken and your character will go into some fluid looking sequence of attacks that looks cool. Mashing in Virtua Fighter nets you nothing but some awkward punches and kicks here and there. VF looks much more stiff and robotic for new players who have no idea how to play VF. With Tekken, they can at least get some sort of flow going with mashing.

* Tekken visually looks much cooler. The character designs are cooler (Jin, Kazuya, Heiachi, Yoshimitsu etc) , the effects and attacks look cooler (electrics). It's must more interesting and visually dazzling to watch for casual players. Virtua Fighter on the other hand has been hamstrung by trying to look 'rEaliStiC' and as a result, the characters look generic as all hell, the combat looks like people just doing simple punches and kicks, there are crap all effects and unless you really know what's going on, the gameplay doesn't look interesting.

[Prowler]

Yeah I'd say that's all accurate.

Honestly, as someone who grew up with Stret Fighter 2 and Virtua Fighter 2 and whose first Tekken game was Tekken 5 when I was already 15-16, it took me a while to like Tekken. It felt rather basic and bare bones. "Press X twice and voilá, a combo!"... as someone who grew up learning the inputs for hadokens, spinning bird kicks, Vega's wall diving attack and Virtua Fighters long inputs for very high damaging moves, Tekken seemed to lack in substance. But it is a game that's accessible and yet can be deep if you want to.

Dead or Alive is a surprisingly deeper game than you'd expect, by the way. Since its main selling point is the bouncy boob physics. But I consider it more challenging than Tekken.

[Andrew NDB]

What are the biggest historical mistakes committed by the video game industry?

* Any game studio, ever, letting themselves get acquired by EA (Westwood Studios, Origin, Maxis, etc.). Tons of great series were swallowed up and sat on, never to be seen again.

* Oh yeah, Nintendo being weird about jumping to CDs bigtime. This cost them immeasurably.

* Adventure games jumping into 3D before that was really viable (King's Quest 8, Quest for Glory 5, etc.)... thereby killing the genre.

* Square skipping Final Fantasy II, III, and V on NES and SNES in the US.

* Mortal Kombat regressing from 3D fighting back to 2D fighting right after Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe.

* Abandoning lightgun games. What happened here? It would be so much cooler now on my 85" TV than back in the day on my tiny 18" CRT and yet... this isn't a thing anymore.

[CyberCubed]

The funny thing is despite Nintendo losing ground to Sony with N64, and then the Gamecube, they bounced back considerably with the Wii, Switch, and Switch 2. Not to mention at the same time in the early 2000's, they had the Gameboy Color, Gameboy Advance, DS and 3DS all selling like hotcakes too.

The Gamecube was kinda doomed since GTA only came out on PS2 and Xbox had Halo, so in terms of third party Gamecube just had Resident Evil. Even Metal Gear Solid 2 and 3 never came out on Gamecube, weirdly enough when Twin Snakes did.

[Prowler]

Originally Posted by Andrew NDB

What are the biggest historical mistakes committed by the video game industry?

* Any game studio, ever, letting themselves get acquired by EA (Westwood Studios, Origin, Maxis, etc.). Tons of great series were swallowed up and sat on, never to be seen again.

* Oh yeah, Nintendo being weird about jumping to CDs bigtime. This cost them immeasurably.

* Adventure games jumping into 3D before that was really viable (King's Quest 8, Quest for Glory 5, etc.)... thereby killing the genre.

* Square skipping Final Fantasy II, III, and V on NES and SNES in the US.

* Mortal Kombat regressing from 3D fighting back to 2D fighting right after Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe.

* Abandoning lightgun games. What happened here? It would be way cooler now on my 85" TV than back in the day on my tiny 18" CRT and yet... this isn't a thing anymore.

What genre? Adventure games are dead? Eh, Zelda and its clones? Also adventure game is rather vague, so what do you mean exactly?

USA? Not just there. FF II, III and V were Japan exclusives!

Mortal Kombat 9 and X were great games. 11 was pretty good too. Anyway, MK9 (2011) was then the Netherealm Studios took over the series, wasn't it?

Lightgun games? Virtua Cop 2 was the **** on the Saturn. I still have the blue gun somewhere.