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d21lewis on 24 August 2019
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DonFerrari said:
PAOerfulone said:

Sony? Or Sega?

Genesis - 8.39 million units
NES - 8.3 million units
SNES - 8.15 million units

The European Console market nearly doubled with just Sega bringing the punch and actually outselling the SNES, which only sold just slightly less than the NES. Sega planted the seeds long before Sony brought the fertilizer.

Europe (and the entire market as a whole) was going to keep growing, expanding, and reach new heights with or without Sony. I'm not saying Sony wasn't a factor, they certainly were. But they weren't the huge different maker. A substantial part of the PS1's success and establishment came from Sony just being at the right place, at the right time, to take advantage of the mistakes of Nintendo and Sega, especially Sega. Sega's blunder was directly due to Sony. The main reason why Sega released the Saturn so early, shooting themselves in the foot in the process, was because they wanted to get a head start on the PlayStation in the Western markets, because both systems were already out in Japan for close to a year and the Saturn was actually outselling the PlayStation. However, by doing that, they completely blind-sided fans and retailers, they launched the system way too early with little to no important software titles to make an impressive launch, they completely killed the momentum they worked so hard to build with the Genesis, and that was the beginning of the end for Sega as a hardware developer. With no Sony, no PlayStation, and Nintendo's next system not due for another year, Sega could take their time and stick to the fall/holiday launch they originally had planned for the Saturn. Or maybe even delayed it to spring of '96 to make sure it was as ready as possible for the Nintendo 64's launch. Which means they wouldn't have pissed off the retailers, confused the fans, or squashed their hard-earned momentum. The Saturn would have been readily available in all retailers and markets instead of some, with a much stronger launch lineup, and the system would have sold significantly better than it did. (In fact, I think the Saturn would have outsold the Nintendo 64 in that scenario.) And today's Big Three would be Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sega. Or it might still be just Nintendo and Sega. Who knows? Sony definitely helped the market grow and expand at an exponential rate. Much faster than it would have if they didn't enter the console market, but the market was going to grow and expand regardless.

Any reason why do you think Sega would have become bright with N64-CD being a thing (so they would still have a CD company there to preassure them) or Sony not being in the Market?

They had early release of Genesis against SNES as well. So all point that Sega would have done basically the same mistakes.

About your expectations of Nintendo basically doubling their sales with the CD, what is your explanation that Nintendo having all advantages during SNES weren't able to significantly outsell Sega and why do you think the Europe and RotW would become much bigger sales to Nintendo? They simply didn't go there when they had Strong NES, competitive SNES and loser N64 so why in the alternate history would they also start caring?

I think we're putting too much of the value on the company and not the content. Some people are loyal to a brand but most just want the best content. There's been BS comments in the past l like "Xbox 360 just sells in North America because it's an American console" but no. People but the best product. The Genesis launched in 1989 in North America and it was obviously superior to the NES. It had the market to itself for over a year, unchallenged. Even when the SNES launched, the Genesis appeared to be the better product for a long time and up until the end got better versions of many multiplats. The thing is, Nintendo supported the SNES longer when it felt like Sega had already moved on. Their focus shifted to Sega CD to 32-X to Saturn. They quit being competitive. When you compare SNES and Genesis you have to keep in mind that you're comparing a console that seemed to quit fighting halfway through the battle---a lot like Xbox seems to do against PlayStation.

Again, using North America because I know nothing of Europe, the PS2 was the most successful console of all time. Everyone had one. How did it go from being so dominant to being outsold so handily in North America? Why did people suddenly start caring about the Xbox brand? And why did they suddenly go back to PlayStation a generation later? Same with Nintendo time and again. The name on the box matters much less than what the box has to offer.

If the N64 was able to offer a better experience than the PS1 (and being twice as powerful that would be a given) for the same price, that would be a given. Side by side, I think a lot of people would agree that Nintendo's first party content was overall superior to Sony during the 5th gen. Third parties won the battle for PlayStation the same way they made Xbox 360 a contender and the same way they made PS4 such a beast (though I will gladly admit that Sony really stepped up their first party game during the PS3 era and much of the PS2's lifespan). The N64's cartridge format just created obstacle after obstacle for developers.