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Forums - Gaming - Which is the most significant (important) console in history?

 

Which is the most important console ever?

Atari 2600 119 6.86%
 
NES 806 46.48%
 
SNES 109 6.29%
 
Sega Genesis 25 1.44%
 
N64 54 3.11%
 
PSX 303 17.47%
 
XBox 14 0.81%
 
PS2 225 12.98%
 
XB360 20 1.15%
 
Other - please explain 59 3.40%
 
Total:1,734
COKTOE on 12 July 2017
bigtakilla said:
COKTOE said:

Also, Goldeneye and Perfect Dark say hello. The N64 in general was a FPS monster.  On topic: I won't jump into this debate head first. There's a handful of legit contenders. NES and PSX would be my front runners, with some 2600 and Dreamcast love.

N64 also had Turock (this may be misspelled) which was huge at the time. 

Turok was pretty big, especially Turok 2. Let's throw in the best console versions of Quake, and more importantly, Quake 2 as well. Doom 64 was fantastic. Even The World Is Not Enough, while not nearly as popular as Goldeneye, was a highly regarded FPS.



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h2ohno on 12 July 2017

I'd say the N64 was pretty influential when you consider Mario 64 pretty much wrote the book on 3d movement and camera control on consoles, Zelda invented the lock-on camera, and the console popularized multiplayer in a way which wasn't possible on other systems before or at the time but which became the standard afterwards.

Popularity is one thing, but a ton of the core of modern 3d game design is based on mechanics which originated in N64 games. I don't think it's as influential as the NES or Atari 2600, but in my opinion it is the most influential console for 3D gaming.



bigtakilla on 12 July 2017
COKTOE said:
bigtakilla said:

N64 also had Turock (this may be misspelled) which was huge at the time. 

Turok, was pretty big, especially Turok 2. Let's throw in the best console versions of Quake, and more importantly, Quake 2 as well. Doom 64 was fantastic. Even The World Is Not Enough, while not nearly as popular as Goldeneye, was a highly regarded FPS.

No argument from me, lol.



Nymeria on 12 July 2017

NES, GB, PS2, iPhone

All of these changed the industry in different ways.



Goddbless on 12 July 2017
monocle_layton said:
NES

any other console wouldn't even exist if it didn't save the gaming industry.

This is really the most acceptable answer. I know there are those of you that grew up with PSX or PS2 so that era is everything to you but when you talk importance it has to be NES. Without Nintendo this industry doesn't exist anymore. Atari would be runner up since they were more like pioneers but then they nearly killed it all.



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Mandalore76 on 12 July 2017
Lawlight said:
Kai_Mao said:

Nevertheless, Zelda was miles away from what Hydlide was and garnered an even greater legacy than the latter could have ever achieved. I didn't say Zelda was the first open world or adventure game, but the game brought a whole new standard to the genre in the modern console world. The huge overworld map, the music, the enemies, the hidden dungeons and cavs, the items, etc. You're more likely to use Zelda as a reference to making games than Hydlide. And as I said, having characters like Link, Zelda, and Ganon become enduring characters helped.

Yeah, well, Zelda came 1.5 year after - 1.5 year back then was an eternity. And it wasn't released on a popular platform or outside of Japan at release. Imagine if PlayStation existed back then and Hydlide was released on it. Things would have been way different.

Hydlide on Play Station would have looked like this, and still not be able to touch The Legend of Zelda:

 

 



Mandalore76 on 12 July 2017
Lawlight said:
Soundwave said:

There is quite possibly no Squaresoft, Capcom, or Konami period without an NES. 

Game. 

Over. 

Everything about the modern game business stems from the bedrock established by the NES. 

There is no Final Fantasy VII without a NES coming first. There is no Metal Gear Solid. There is no Playstation as Sony likely wouldn't have been involved in the business period. 

FF7, MGS would've just been on Sega Saturn if there was no Playstation and they'd have been basically the same games. Without an NES, I'm fairly doubtful Squaresoft for example even exists come 1997. Final Fantasy on the NES/Famicom was even titled as such ("final") because they thought it was going to be their last game. 

Without the NES I think what actually would've happened is the game market would've remained largely dormant for many more years until Windows PC revitalized it, but the market you are talking about in this alternate history would be radically different. There would be no Nintendo as you know it, but also no Capcom, Square-Enix, Konami, etc. as you know it either. 

The games and series' that would be popular today would be radically different, you're probably talking abuot a world where people don't know what Final Fantasy or Metal Gear even is and Mario is just some minor character akin to Pac-Man. 

I've already explained to you why you are wrong. Both Konami and Capcom were big in arcade back then. Without the NES, they would have gone to the Master System. Ditto with Final Fantasy.

And without the PS, those games would not be on the Saturn because it was too hard to develop for and Sega was already going down.

If you remove Play Station from the equation, Sega survives the 5th Generation a lot better than they did.  Yes, their consumer base felt burned by Sega's attempts to extend the Genesis' lifespan with the Sega CD and 32X addons so close to the release of the Saturn.  But, without a major CD based competitor, there is no way you can say that Saturn doesn't get the big games that wound up on Play Station.  The Saturn was more than capable of handling them:

      

    



monocle_layton on 12 July 2017
CGI-Quality said:
Goddbless said:

This is really the most acceptable answer. I know there are those of you that grew up with PSX or PS2 so that era is everything to you but when you talk importance it has to be NES. Without Nintendo this industry doesn't exist anymore. Atari would be runner up since they were more like pioneers but then they nearly killed it all.

In its current form, no. But that's not to say another competitor wouldn't have stepped up. 

It's weird to think about how many consoles changed the way we play games. I wouldn't be surprised if the PC market ended up being massive while consoles turned into a niche.



se7en7thre3 on 12 July 2017

These are the clear ones to me for many of the reasons listed

top 3 in order

-NES
-PS1
-OG Xbox (also considered 360 and Dreamcast in this "modern online gaming" spot)

Basically the debut console of each manufacturer are the trailblazers with better follow ups that kept their vision going. I had to show love to DC though Sega was always ahead of its time, can't forget the classic NFL2k online sessions (4 vs 4 online co op as well!).



superchunk on 12 July 2017

dp