Okay, I could only come up with like 9, but what are yours?
1. N64’s Dream Team - The straw that broke a long weakening Camel’s back in how Nintendo treated third party developers, the Dream Team was an effort by Nintendo that only allowed select developers to make games for the N64. This following years of bullying and manipulating third party developers lead to a market eager for multiplatform viability and an alternative other than Nintendo. Thus many developers were eager to support Sony’s new PlayStation brand fueling a great exodus from Nintendo’s ranks and crippling them as games like Final Fantasy 7, Resident Evil and Tomb Raider made the Playstation a must have.
2. Virtual Boy – Eager to get the Virtual Boy project out of the way so that they could begin focusing on the upcoming N64 game console, Nintendo’s pressured Gunpei Yokoi, its creator, to release the device as best could be managed in its current state. While its questionable that the Virtual Boy could have ever been a viable gaming device given that affordable blue and green LEDs were still more than half a decade away, the device’s failure forced Gunpei Yokoi to resign from Nintendo costing the company not only an invaluable gaming visionary but Miyamoto’s mentor. Going on to create the Wonder Swan, a competitor to Nintendo’s Gameboy, which Yokoi created himself while in Nintendo, he had become an asset to Nintendo’s competitors. Unfortunately Gunpei Yokoi’s life ended tragically in a hit and run car accident leading to industry rumors that the Yakuza or Nintendo had a hand in his death. Needless to say the validity of such claims remains questionable. The Virtual Boy would not only result a shameful black eye for Nintendo beginning their fall from grace, but cost themselves and the gaming world the visionary talent of Gunpei Yokoi.
3. Proprietary N64 Cartridges – While not just defaulting on the cartridge format many developers were eager to move on beyond in the fifth generation, Nintendo insisted on themselves being the only one able to produce the cartridges forcing developers to buy through them. Limited space in the N64 Cartridge may have helped push compression technology in the gaming industry, but it ultimately limited the cross platform versatility of the N64 and made development expensive for third party developers and gaming on the N64 expensive for Gamers. All in all, the Cartridge may have been the largest contributing factor to why Sony’s Playstation was able to take the lead.
4. Nintendo's dealings with Sony - Nintendo perhaps single-handedly created its own greatest competitor in working with Sony on a disc system for the SNES then abandoning it based on matters that should have been established or dealt with ahead of time. Thus was born the Sony Playstation, the first console to ever usurp Nintendo's dominance over the market.
5. Nintendo's dealings with Philips - It was Nintendo's foolish dealings with Philips for a CD peripheral for the SNES that resulted in the misserable CD-I and Nintendo relinquishing the properties of several key franchises to be turned into just flat out awful games. This was part of the drama that led to Nintendo's poor business deal with Sony that bred the Playstation.
6. Outsourcing & Reprioritizing of First Party Titles – In response to Third Party developers complaining of Nintendo’s near impossible to compete against first party line up Nintendo licenses out several franchises to third party developers during the Gamecube days to try and bring favor back to their brand. In addition Nintendo also tried its hand at letting lower tier talent within the company try their hand at franchises such as Mario. The Gamecube generation was perhaps the worst generation for Nintendo’s first party titles ranging from the Miyamoto absent Super Mario Sunshine to Namco’s uninspired Starfox Assault. It was this trend that led to many calling Nintendo's first party games rehashed and done to death.
7. Gamecube - The Gamecube's design was a severe shortcoming for Nintendo in trying to recover from the N64. The Disc Format, while novel drew scrutiny and limited game size despite its impressive graphical capacity. The box-like shape was unnapealing to many and the controller seemed to lack direction and, like the gamecube itself, seemed as if it was trying to do everything the competition had already done a day late and a dollar short.
8. N64 Disc Drive – The laughable peripheral for the N64 never released outside of Japan, the N64DD seemed almost like an attempt to make viable the original vision of the Famicom Disc System peripheral for the Famicom (NES). This new peripheral again featured a unique disc format that promised to take N64 gaming further, but in the end it only lasted briefly and did little more than bring expanded versions of games already on the N64. This no doubt added to Nintendo’s weakening favor in Japan setting an ominous tone for the Gamecube.
9. Famicom Disc System – An expensive and unpopular peripheral to the original Famicom (Nintendo Entertainment System) that used floppy discs to enable game saving… just as new battery technology was making batteries viable for Famicom (NES) Cartridges. It was an idea doomed by circumstance and poor planning and could be the signature culprit in why the Legend of Zelda and Metroid (two titles featured exclusively on the peripheral in Japan) never became mainstream franchises in Japan. To add insult to injury, the instruction manual for the Famicom Disc System was sold separately.
