Nintendo vs. Sega: The Console War: Part One

October 24, 2007

by: Lucas DeWoody

When you boil things down, you begin to realize that we live in a relatively peaceful era. Is there a console war going on? Yes. Wii is out there kicking casual ass, Xbox 360 is pulling no punches with the hardcore, and the PS3 is starting to recover from its weak launch. This is a pretty clean cut affair. Companies compete, make polite statements against each other, carefully wording their prewritten PR responses and trying to differentiate themselves from the pack. They don't want slander to work its way into their back-and-forth remarks found in interviews across the web and print for one simple reason. They remember all too well just what happened between the years of 1989-1994 when the current entertainment world powers of the era met face to face with their pocketbook and their egos in full swing. 

An interesting article, four pages long, and well worth the read.

Hahhahaha awesome. Thank you. Great find. Would buy from again.

Seriously, gamers who weren't around for the SNES vs. Genesis console war don't know what console wars are. Today we have puny little console skirmishes. I killed a kid in the early 90's for preferring the Genesis version of NBA Jam.

Justifiable homicide 

Very interesting read. I loved the Genesis DOES commercial!!! Those were the good old days. (Even though I had no part of that generation "SNES/Genesis era".)

Funny, reading that still gets me upset... I hated Sega back then. I even had a Mega Drive for a year or so, but I always thought it was... awkward. The control pad was ugh, the games I played (platformers, e.g. Sonic, World of Illusion, Quackshot) had an imprecise, muddy feel to them. Sold it when the SNES was finally released.

As terrible as Sony's PR problems have been, at least they're not making claims as absurd as "Blast Processing" and slinging mud left and right the way Sega did in that era.

Just the other day, I got to talking about Genesis vs. SNES (the only console this guy had ever owned was a Genesis with 32X) and he revealed that he thought the Genesis had more powerful hardware. I, shall we say, set him straight.

I might show him the breakdown on Page 4 of this article, though; it explains why he thought Genesis was better (if you only look at processor speed, or if you compare it to the NES) and why the SNES is better in every other way.

nope just "Emotion Engine" and "4-D gaming" and "Cell Processing" claims

I remember those days very well indeed. What's amusing is how a lot of the younger folks seem to think that just because there was no Internet in the early 1990s, the console arguments were somehow less fierce. If anything, things were more real since you had to insult the other guy in person, to his face! Heh. We had so many grade-school Genesis vs. SNES arguments, it wasn't even funny.

The article does a good job of showing how the Genesis only managed to get a foothold in the American marketplace due to Nintendo's extreme arrogance, and the system's enormous 18-month launch edge over the SNES. (Let this be a lesson to all when comparing "align launch" sales between the 360 and PS3 - launching early makes a big difference!)

What's interesting is that the Genesis only managed to become a success in the US when Sega of America blew off the corporate heads in Japan and went their own way with advertising/marketing. That worked out wonderfully in 1990-92, but it eventually proved disastrous, because by 1995 Sega of America and Sega of Japan literally were not talking with one another, and pursuing different business strategies. (SoJ pushing all resources to Saturn, while SoA was focusing on the 32X. Now that's a recipe for disaster!)

I'm looking forward to the next in this series. There's a lot of ignorance about these years for those who grew up in the 5th or 6th generations, so it's worth a read from pretty much anyone.