archbrix said:
Actually, NEC's PC Engine (TG16) outsold Sega's Mega Drive (Genesis) in Japan - so yeah, they kinda did matter to Sega in their homeland regarding the fourth generation... |
Yeah, the PC-Engine outsold even Nintendo... in Japan. The TG16 and Turbo Duo, both of which I own, sold terribly in the US and didn't matter to Nintendo or Sega. The largest market is what matters to the big companies. Japan is a small little island. NEC may have been king of a mole hill, but Nintendo and Sega were titans fighting in mountains.
The little guys that get stepped on are not driving competition. NEC's PC-Engine was super cheap and easy to dev for. Beyond that it was so underpowered that I doubt Sega or Nintendo ever bothered to print an ad even mentioning their superiourity. But they sure did try to one up each other. Nobody tried to one up the Turbo Grafx-16 and nobody even noticed it's CD addon like they did the Sega CD.
All this is moot anyhow. Regardless of the little companies that came and went without notice, Sega dn Nintendo owned half the market each during the 16bit generation. Their competition was plenty to drive games forward. The same would be true if it was just Nintendo and MSony even if the Ouya even gets released. Nobody will notice the Ouya or care about it's tech. Everyone will be talking about the big two and their tech. The big two will be enough to drive gaming forward just like back in the 16bit days.








