The_Liquid_Laser said:
Only we actually do have data and history. The US had a few years where the console market died. During those years the home computer market filled in the void, especially the C64. The C64 sold about 1/4 of what the NES sold a few years later. Sure, I am speculating, but my speculation is based on what actually did happen. There are also examples, from other media, that show what happens when a successful medium crashes. During the 30's and 40's, comic books were the most popular medium in the US, more than movies, TV, radio, anything. It started out as a superhero medium, but gradually it started branching out to other genres, especially as kids grew up and wanted more mature content. In the 50's, the government imposed heavy regulation on comic books via the Comics Code Authority (because of the mature content). The comic book market tanked. It did recover somewhat in the 60's with Marvel and Stan Lee, but it was never nearly as popular as it was before the government regulation, and the main genre has always been superheroes since the 60's. Contrast this with comics in Japan. They never had anything that seriously tanked their market. The result is they have a very robust manga market that represents a variety of genres. There actually can be key moments in the history of a medium that determine its fate permanently. This idea that consoles would still exist, no matter what, is speculation that is not based on data. The easiest way to answer the "what would have happened" question is to ask "what actually did happen". In the absence of console gaming, computer gaming became the new norm. Consoles were seen as a fad, much like motion controls are seen today. Computer gaming was doing just fine. Why wouldn't it become the permanent standard? The real question is, "why do consoles have to exist?" In a world without the NES, why would they have to exist. Someone please make an argument more compelling than "it has to be this way", or "consoles totally wouldn't exist, yeah right". Gaming would still exist, but it would find another medium. Outside of Japan, most gaming in the 80's was being developed for a computer. In Germany during the 80s, they were actually building a new board game market. Gaming would still exist. Why would it always have to be on consoles, when the console market appeared so unreliable? |
I made plenty of points. But you dismissed them as “buat itz noat the YouWess”.
You made no compelling argument to explain why all the other console makers would have decided to close their businesses if the NES never happened. And here you give an example of an industry that you say tanked, yet is still alive to this day, making my points all the more valid.
Fun shit: Sega made the SG-1000 to move into people’s home more easily by having a product that’s more convenient and cheaper than the PCs of that time. Why would they have simply stop working towards that goal if the NES never happened?
And you know something else that’s funny? PCs coexist with consoles to this day, and always has. It was never a either/or between the two. Your argument that consoles would have ceased to be a thing despite companies wanting to make affordable and convenient products to bring the arcades and games from the expensive PC format into people’s homes is displaying a complete lack of judgment and logic.
One has to applaud that invisible data of yours. You keep bringing up the word “data”, yet provide none of it. It would be interesting to see you’d spin that data in the direction of your bias.
Last edited by Hynad - on 07 February 2021
