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Shadow1980 said:
DonFerrari said:

You are aware that because of Nintendo clauses for exclusivity (even after laxed) several "ports" ended up being different games developed by different studios, right?

Also as posted by an user Konami was already using Sony chip for their árcades, and that had nothing to do with CD.

Your post direct that most of the third parties favored Nintendo or stay exclusive, most on VGC will claim that Nintendo 1st parties were the best in the gen, and yet Nintendo wouldn't have won that gen without Sega moving on to Sega CD and 32X (besides Saturn). So using the claim that because Nintendo first party was better on the 5th gen and wouldn't lose so much of the 3rd party but would anyway I see little reason to see why N64CD would do better than SNES with not one but 2 big competitors.

Plus many of the games didn't need CDs, including we have some best versions on N64 because of it, while others even without CGI scenes benefited from CD.

So I keep my instance that you understimate Sony and overestimate Nintendo on your projection.

"You are aware that because of Nintendo clauses for exclusivity (even after laxed) several "ports" ended up being different games developed by different studios, right?"

Please cite specific examples.

Alladin from Genesis and SNES, na other licensed games.

A link for you to read if yiu want https://forum.digitpress.com/forum/showthread.php?135147-Different-games-with-the-same-name-(Genesis-and-SNES)

"Konami was already using Sony chip for their árcades."

Not relevant to support of a specific console.

Shows they were already working together and easy port of árcade to console.

"Nintendo wouldn't have won that gen without Sega moving on to Sega CD and 32X."

Based on available data, the Genesis was only competitive in the U.S. and Europe, and the latter barely counts because of how small the European console market was back then. In the U.S., the Genesis was the top-selling system in 1991 (only a partial year for the SNES), 1993, and 1994. By the end of 1994, it appears that the Genesis had the lead, but only a relatively slight one, and the final lifetime tally according to the NPD was 20M for the SNES and 18.5M for the Genesis. The Genesis was doing fine even with the Sega CD around, and the 32X was released less than six months before the Saturn came out, at which point Sega was already focused on next-gen. The data I do have indicates that the Genesis had weaker legs than the SNES, which may have been a factor, but even if Sega didn't bother with any peripherals and didn't abandon the Genesis as quickly as they did once the Saturn was released, I fail to see how the Genesis would have conclusively won in the U.S. or significantly widened its narrow lead in Europe.

You may have the tracking, and the information I heard here may be false, but until Sega decided to go to CD and 32X they were leading against SNES, and if I'm not wrong like a year ago someone posted a link from one exec of sega or Tectoy (their partner in Brazil). The legs were dying out because they lost focus, same is said about Wii and that were fast death.

In Japan it was totally lopsided in Nintendo's favor. Like, not even close. The Super Famicom beat the Mega Drive by a 4.8-to-1 ratio. And it wasn't purely on the basis of the strength of Nintendo's first-party titles, either. Based on data from this site, the Top 10 best-selling Super Famicom games were:

Super Mario Kart 3.820.000 Nintendo
Super Mario World 3.550.000 Nintendo
Dragon Quest VI: Realms of Revelation 3.200.000 Enix
Donkey Kong Country 3.000.000 Nintendo
Street Fighter II: The World Warrior 2.900.000 Capcom
Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride 2.800.000 Enix
Final Fantasy VI 2.550.000 Square
Final Fantasy V 2.450.000 Square
Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest 2.210.000 Nintendo
Super Mario All-Stars 2.120.000 Nintendo
Street Fighter II Turbo 2.100.000 Capcom
Chrono Trigger 2.030.000 Square
Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble! 1.770.000 Nintendo
Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island 1.770.000 Nintendo
Super Puyo Puyo 1.690.000 Banpresto
Secret of Mana 1.500.000 Square
Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars 1.470.000 Nintendo
Dragon Ball Z: Super Butoden 1.450.000 Bandai
Final Fantasy IV 1.440.000 Square
Dragon Quest III: The Seeds of Salvation 1.400.000 Enix


Less than half of those were Nintendo titles. Japanese gamers by and large didn't give a rat's ass for the Mega Drive (and Sega as a console brand in general was never successful there to begin with). It didn't have a single million-seller in Japan, and the system itself ran ended in third place, having also been beaten by the PC Engine. There wasn't a damn thing Sega could have done to be competitive in Japan. Without being competitive in Japan, the Genesis had no chance of closing the gap in global sales with the SNES.

May very well be true, but consider the increase it have from Master System and decline of NES to SNES. I see it very clear that Nintendo was losing power worldwide and would continue against Sony that was a much better structured company than Sega.

"So using the claim that because Nintendo first party was better on the 5th gen and wouldn't lose so much of the 3rd party but would anyway I see little reason to see why N64CD would do better than SNES with not one but 2 big competitors."

That... wasn't the point I was trying to make. In fact, it took me a while to realize you were addressing my post prior to the one you quoted. The point was that Sony was initially almost entirely dependent on the support of third parties. Had they not had the degree of third-party support they had, the PS1 would have struggled as their first-party output was severely lacking at the time. In terms of exclusives, the only thing major they had going for them early on was Tekken, Crash, Resident Evil, and maybe also Namco Museum, and none of those were first-party. They were also clearly not enough to generate interest in the system, since as was mentioned much earlier in the thread the PS1 was not an instant hit, and it didn't hit the big time for real until Final Fantasy VII was released. Sony didn't have a huge first-party hit until Gran Turismo, which wasn't released until Dec. 1997 in Japan and May 1998 in the West, and I doubt a racing sim, even a damn good one, would have been as huge or important had the PS1 not already started taking off before that point.

Very much true, but those games didn't need CD to work and that already show that even if Nintendo had CD Sony would still have snatched a lot of support. We do have some devs interviews showing they left Nintendo because of CD (but funny enough didn't go to Sega which was the consolidated brand, they gone Sony). I'm pretty sure Sony would have used their financial power to bring the devs because they were even less developed as developers than Sega so their dependence on 3rd parties would push them to it and Nintendo would still think they had the game won. Just look at they keep not caring about getting support until Switch really and how people claim several companies still hold a grudge.

Without FFVII, the PS1 loses its biggest killer app of the first half of its life. While even if the N64 was CD-based the PS1 would still likely have had Tekken, Crash Bandicoot, and Spyro as notable third-party exclusives, and Gran Turismo and the output of 989 Studios for first-party content, Nintendo would likely have retained exclusivity with Square and Enix, and most other major third-party titles from Capcom, Konami, Eidos, EA, etc., would be multiplatform. In such an event, Nintendo would have almost certainly won in the U.S. without FFVII to spur the PS1 ahead of it, and in Japan it would be no contest, seeing as how critical third-party Japanese titles, especially Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, were to the PS1's success. Europe is harder to predict, but with the overall balance of game libraries almost certainly favoring the N64 had it been CD-based, it's likely the N64 would have came out on top. I think Sony would have taken Sega's place, perhaps becoming more competitive with Nintendo in another generation or two in the West but still running a somewhat distant second in Japan.

The key here is likely, you are considering inertia would have caried all that support to Nintendo if they hadn't left CD behind. Like if they cared so much to have that support they wouldn't have kept away from CD like they did. The newcomer would have targeted exactly those companies (perhaps even purchasing them if necessary). You yourself said they had no loyalty to Sony so there is no reason to believe they would have any for Nintendo that ignored their inputs.

"Plus many of the games didn't need CDs."

But some did, at least in the eyes of their developers, and those were some of the most important games of the generation. The CD format was absolutely the deciding factor for Square and Enix leaving for the PS1, and thus turning the tide of that generation. The importance of Final Fantasy to the PS1's success cannot be overestimated. It was also almost certainly the reason Capcom and Konami moved the bulk of their support to the PS1. Developers want to develop games on platforms that best facilitate the development of the kind of games they want to make. The N64 didn't meet that criteria for the major third parties because of the format. That was less of an issue for the GameCube, but still an issue. The Wii and Wii U meanwhile had a proper format, but were underpowered, and the Switch has both issues, which is why third parties haven't been putting their biggest and best games on those systems (the Wii was a dumping ground for shovelware, the Wii U's third-party standouts were ports of older 7th-gen games, and the Switch's AAA third-party releases can be counted on your fingers with digits to spare, with Doom, Wolfenstein, Mortal Kombat 11, and The Witcher 3 being the only real standouts). A CD-based N64 would have met the requirements for what many major third parties were looking for at the start of Gen 5. The format had the capacity they wanted, and provided it at a tenth the cost.

You may say otherwise but you most agree with me than disagree (GC could have any game PS2 had, multiples discs weren't a problem in the gen prior, GC gen or even next gen). Nintendo simply didn't care about the needs of third parties, to make them happy or even have they on their platform for multiple gens. So I fail to see why in this alternative universe just by having CD they would start caring.

Based on the available evidence, I can see no other conclusion. The N64 being cartridge-based was the single biggest deciding factor of the outcome of Gen 5, and produced perhaps the single biggest sea change in the industry since the Crash of 1983. Had the N64 been CD-based, things would have turned out a lot different, and I simply cannot agree with people who think the outcome of Gen 5 would have still been roughly the same.



duduspace11 "Well, since we are estimating costs, Pokemon Red/Blue did cost Nintendo about $50m to make back in 1996"

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=8808363

Mr Puggsly: "Hehe, I said good profit. You said big profit. Frankly, not losing money is what I meant by good. Don't get hung up on semantics"

http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/post.php?id=9008994

Azzanation: "PS5 wouldn't sold out at launch without scalpers."