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0 pointsKranar3y ago0 comments

The first NES and Playstation were MASSIVE successes for their respective companies, as was the Gameboy. In fact, the NES is credited with single handedly putting an end to the video game crash of 1983. The Gameboy sold out in a matter of weeks and Nintendo managed to sell every single Gameboy that it produced for the course of its first two years.

Here's an article about how massive of a success the original NES and Gameboy were and how it revived Nintendo as a company:

https://www.polygon.com/2019/4/19/18295061/game-boy-history-...

I have no idea where you got the idea that any of those products were mismanaged or cost those companies enormous amounts of cash and in fact those specific examples are among the most successful product launches in video game history.

>The Xbox 360 sold 85 million units, one of the best selling consoles of all time.

The XBox 360 is the best selling console from Microsoft and ranks 9th among all consoles behind the Playstation, Playstation 2, Playstation 3, Playstation 4, Switch, Gameboy, and Wii.

Read into that what you will.

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ChuckNorris893y ago· 2 in thread

>The first NES and Playstation were MASSIVE successes for their respective companies, as was the Gameboy.

I never said they weren't successful, I said they were also mismanaged during development like you said about the xbox, because management at Nintendo did not believe in the product.

>I have no idea where you got the idea that any of those products were mismanaged

Documentaries and war stories on youtube rabit holes.

>in fact those specific examples are among the most successful product launches in video game history

Today it's easy to say that with hindsight, but before they were launched, during their development, many in the company did not believe in those projects would succeed at all, leading to many internal fights and turf wars.

Also, Nintendo has a number of fuckups that bombed as well. Anyone remember the Virtualboy? Or the Wii-U? Gamecube also didn't sell too good.

The only thing that moves Nintendo merch is their exclusive IP (Zelda, Mario, Pokemon, etc), as their HW products are mediocre at best both in technical capabilities and in quality.

KranarOP3y ago

Can you please link to a Youtube video or article indicating that Nintendo management thought the Gameboy or NES would be a failure or that Sony thought that the Playstation would be a failure.

I am looking at some quick sources that I can find, and it looks like the complete opposite, that the management at Nintendo was very eager to develop a home video game console based on the success of their arcade games. They believed in the NES so much that when Atari bailed on its partnership agreement with them (due in no small part to the video game crash of 83), they went ahead and decided to do it alone.

Here is an article that was posted to HN awhile back that does a very deep dive into the development of the NES. It's an excerpt from the book "Console Wars" and it does not paint a picture at all like the one you're suggesting:

http://grantland.com/features/the-rise-of-nintendo-video-gam...

A relevant quote is:

"Yamauchi wanted Nintendo to aggressively get into the videogame business, which was really two separate businesses: home consoles and coin-operated arcade games. He saw the potential in these industries and took the necessary steps for Nintendo to enter both."

As an FYI, Yamauchi was the President of Nintendo.

itsoktocry3y ago

I'm not sure what point you're making here. As the OP said, you took some anecdata about the Xbox's issues and speak about it like it was a disaster. They had problems, as did Nintendo and Sega (as talked about in Console Wars). It certainly wasn't all roses. Sega stopped building systems altogether!

The Xbox 360/One outsold the NES/SNES. That's amazing.

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