Which competitor is more responsible for the demise of Sega?

[The_Liquid_Laser]

Chrkeller said:

The_Liquid_Laser said:

I'd have to say that Sonic was not as good as 8-bit Mario.  However, 16-bit Sonic was definitely better than 16-bit Mario.  I liked Super Mario World when I first played it, but I also felt it was somewhat disappointing.  It didn't hold a candle to Mario 3, and I think they destroyed the difficulty in Super Mario World which is what disappointed me about the game the most. 

However, this isn't even the worst part.  The worst part is that Super Mario World was the only 16-bit Mario game.  Meanwhile the Genesis had 3 regular Sonic games, Sonic and Knuckles and Sonic CD.  They really, really delivered when it came to high quality platformers and that is what the market wanted at the time.  Nintendo's answer to Sonic wasn't Mario.  It was Donkey Kong Country.  I personally do not think the DKC games are nearly as good as either Mario or Sonic.

Also, you are right that Sega had awesome arcade games, however you are wrong that the world has moved on from arcade style games.  Here are some games that have been made fairly recently that could easily work in an arcade with some minor modifications:  Mario Kart 8, Super Smash Bros Ultimate, Just Dance, Guitar Hero/Rock Band/any rhythm game, Puyo Puyo Tetris, Wii/Switch Sports, Splatoon, Flappy Bird, etc....  People still like arcade style games, but outside of Japan, the venue doesn't really exist like it used to, and Nintendo would rather make arcade style games for their consoles.

Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island??

I won't disagree that 16-bit Sonic was good...  but god awful transition to 3D.  Adventure is terrible compared to Mario 64 and Sunshine.  

Sure, but that is a very small list of arcade 'like' games compared to Elden, Zelda, Mario, Souls, God of War, Uncharted, Halo, Gears, Horizon, Tsushima, Final Fantasy, Tomb Raiber, etc, etc, etc.  

Yoshi's Island is not a real Mario game, and I suspect you already know that.  It was really the beginning of the "Yoshi" line of games like Yoshi's Wooly World, etc....  Super Mario World was the only real Mario game in the 16-bit era.

Yeah, I agree that Sega was only real competition for Nintendo for one generation.  I've never played a 3D Sonic game, but it's obvious that they weren't received nearly as well as their 2D counterparts.  However, the main point I was making is that, in terms of first party output, Sonic was the closest competitor that Nintendo ever had.  The Sonic games were the best games of the 16-bit generation, but I do think the SNES had more S-tier and A-tier games than the Genesis did.  This is mostly because I think the SNES had better third party support.  I mean, what does Phantasy Star 4 get compared to?  Final Fantasy 6.  I personally think Final Fantasy 6 is a better game, but Nintendo wasn't making RPGs that were as good as either one.  If you strip away all games made by third party companies (including things like Super Mario RPG), then I think Sega and Nintendo are really close in the 16-bit era.  They both made their share of great games, and sometimes I would give the win to Sega (e.g. Sonic, Shining Force) and sometimes I would give the win to Nintendo (e.g. Zelda), and there are other games that don't have a good first party counterpart on the other system (e.g. Metroid, Punch Out, Golden Axe, Streets of Rage, etc...).

The list of arcade-like games is small, because it is mostly Nintendo making them.  It is not because people don't want to play them.  I named quite a few popular franchises (e.g. Mario Kart, Smash Bros, etc...).  There are a lot of people that like these games.  However most big publishers simply choose not to fund games like these.