On point 6 -- There is a difference between needing to be an uber-hacker (3733T) or just not having any copy protection.

DC had very easy to break protection and that is cited as one reason it failed.
Meanwhile, Sega CD and 3DO games can be copied today by CD-Burners because they had NO protection. Of course, back then, no one thought it was necessary (even though optical drive technology had been around and discussed for years).

Mike from Morgantown

OK, so we stand at following...

1. Price too high - Sega Saturn, PS3, 3DO, Neo Geo

2. Lack of games available at launch- Sega Saturn, N64, Sega 32X + PS2

3. System reliability - Xbox 360, Ps2, PS1, Atari Jaguar, Atari 5200

4. Pointless Ad-ons - Sega 32X, Jaguar CD

5. Difficult to program for - PS3, Sega Saturn + PS2 and N64

6. Lack of or bad copyright protection to prevent piracy - Xbox 360, Wii, Dreamcast, 3DO, Sega CD, PSP - While some of these had copyright protection, for those systems listed it was broken in less than a year

7. Short Supply - Wii, PS2
8. Unnecesssary Censorship - SNES and maybe n64?
9. Allowing only 3-5 games per company per year - Nintendo - what system?
10. Destroying 3rd party support - N64, Sega Saturn

i dont see "difficult to program" as a big as deal as you do. Its called a learning curve and its involved with all things new. Unless you totally dont innovate and just do a gimped PC in a box (x360)

system reliability on PS2???

pointless addons - HD-DVD drive X360

Thinking that technological superiority alone determines success - PS3, Neo Geo, Xbox, N64

I agree that "difficult to program" is not a deal breaker but games do suffer for the first year or two which can be enough for the console to get a bad reputation. Also, lack of tools provided by the manufacturer for programming is included in this category.

PS2 had lots of issues when it came out, most of which were bad DVD laser. You wont find many 1st, 2nd and 3rd gen ps3's working today. Lets not forget overheating for the slim model...

HD-DVD drive is not a console add on. You don't have to get it to play a single game...

Yea definitly add the N64 to "Too difficult to program for"

Sticking with Cartridges-N64
Awful PR- Saturn, PS3, Jaguar
Add GameCube to no third party support
Crappy controller- Atari 5200, Atari Jaguar, Saturn, Xbox, SIXAXIS

@ikilledkenny

what the heck is wrong with the sixaxis?! I know its not some biased against motion controls, maybe a biased against PS3? Only other thing you can try to throw out is that you have some kinda obsession with rumble. Or I guess you could like heavy controllers or something? So does that mean you will give dualshock 3 thumbs up and sixaxis thumbsdown?

@dgm6780
I don't like the Sony controllers in general. The sticks make it uncomfortable to hold, and the D-Pad is awful. The things I dislike about SIXAXIS are the triggers and how light it is. Lack of rumble doesn't help either. I won't like Dualshock 3, but it will still be better than SIXAXIS.

I'd put Virtual Boy in the categories "Price too high" and "lack of games". Of course these were not the main reasons why it failed.

I'd also include the ill fated 64DD as a "pointless add on" - even though it was never released outside Japan.