pokun
Gun-headed
Posts: 85
Homebrew skills: HuC6280 assembly
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Post by pokun on Oct 12, 2021 13:33:10 GMT
Didn't you have this thing called the North American game market crash going on at the time due to poor quality games pumped out on Atari systems? Nintendo quickly convinced people that games could still be made fun by producing high quality games with Super Mario Bros as the flagship. I don't doubt that it was the most important game that sold the system in Japan, Sweden and even in North America. It's still the most recognized NES game in Sweden and the game most people remember. The NES was released in 1986 so SMB had just been released. All other games were early NROM games like Donkey Kong, Mario Bros, Tennis and Ice Climber, and Nintendo's Swedish distributor Bergsala wanted to release SMB last, but Hiroshi Yamauchi personally told them that SMB is the game that will make the NES succeed in Sweden and preventing a game market crash like in America so they should make sure to release it at launch, and they followed his advice (Game & Watch had already been insanely popular in Sweden years before the NES came, but a TV-game was a new area for Bergsala). SMB2 and SMB3 didn't yet exist and Zelda only existed in Japanese at the time when the NES boomed.
I guess your feelings that SMB was generic is expected as it was a very common game ( 40 million copies sold, so no wondering why it was and still is so cheap) and you had probably already played it to death. Everyone felt like that after have played a game enough, and when new games like Mega Man or SMB3 came out people were excited about those instead. These later quality games of course made sure to keep the interest in the NES high, but no game could compare to the impact SMB made, not even SMB3 which was also a pack-in to a lesser degree.
I think the PC-Engine's main problem was a lack of quality titles in North America, plus they had much more competition than Nintendo had when they made their breakthrough. NES was already hugely popular, and then came the Mega Drive. I think they could have saved the situation if they started getting more quality titles localized (such as Street Fighter II'), but they didn't. According to interviews the main problem was the lack of money for advertising due to ordering too many TG16 units at launch.
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Post by dshadoff on Oct 12, 2021 14:41:17 GMT
The video game crash started in 1983 and was a full-fledged industry-wide problem in 1984, and continued until the NES excited people again. The NES faced challenges getting shelf space even 2 years later, and was a little slow to get traction initally - but that cleared up soon enough as soon as people saw that NES games were not comparable to Atari games.
turboxray's point was that everybody had already bought SMB by the time it came out as a pack-in. (I can't confirm, as I completely skipped that generation of console).
Yes, TurboGrafx's problem was the lack of good games localized. We got a lot of poor choices under NEC's stewardship. Street Fighter II wasn't available in Japan for the PCE until much later though - it probably wouldn't have sold more systems here (but it would have made owners happier).
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bonkzonkmcgonk
Gun-headed
Posts: 54
Fave PCE Shooter: Air Zonk
Fave PCE Platformer: Dragon's Curse
Fave PCE Game Overall: Bonk's Adventure & Revenge
Fave PCE RPG: Legend of Valkyrie
Currently Playing: Son Son II
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Post by bonkzonkmcgonk on Oct 12, 2021 15:57:49 GMT
I think the PC-Engine's main problem was a lack of quality titles in North America, plus they had much more competition than Nintendo had when they made their breakthrough. NES was already hugely popular, and then came the Mega Drive. I think they could have saved the situation if they started getting more quality titles localized (such as Street Fighter II'), but they didn't. According to interviews the main problem was the lack of money for advertising due to ordering too many TG16 units at launch.
Funny I read in an article that John Brandstetter had actually negotiated the rights to Mortal Kombat on the Turbografx 16, but was rejected by NEC. I'd only imagine they would include the great Johnny Turbo himself as a secret bonus character console exclusive...and possibly Tony too! Hey I can dream...
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Post by spenoza on Oct 12, 2021 17:50:44 GMT
Yes, TurboGrafx's problem was the lack of good games localized. We got a lot of poor choices under NEC's stewardship. Street Fighter II wasn't available in Japan for the PCE until much later though - it probably wouldn't have sold more systems here (but it would have made owners happier). If you believe what others have written, that was only half the problem. The other half is that NEC America blew almost all their budget over-manufacturing units, so there wasn't much left for proper advertising, outreach, and localization. This latter problem probably stemmed, at least in part, from the NEC America team feeling like they didn't have adequate control over software access from Japan. Despite the bad decisions NEC America made in selecting titles, they didn't really have carte blanche to pick whatever they wanted from the PCE's Japanese library. NEC Japan, particularly, proved an almost intractable barrier at times. When you have limited authority over your own software library, leaning into hardware manufacturing may start to look like a great idea.
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Post by dshadoff on Oct 12, 2021 17:52:03 GMT
I understood that those decisions - both the initial set of games, and the manufacturaing quantities - were dictated by the Japanese head office.
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Post by spenoza on Oct 12, 2021 20:44:31 GMT
I understood that those decisions - both the initial set of games, and the manufacturaing quantities - were dictated by the Japanese head office. That is possible. I am making an assumption about who made the decision to manufacture so many units. The US team didn't understand the games market well, that much is known. That also means they would not have been in a good position to counter-propose any alternative strategies.
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majors
Punkic Cyborg
Have cabs, will travel
Posts: 158
Fave PCE Shooter: Parodius
Fave PCE Platformer: Legendary Axe
Fave PCE Game Overall: Spriggian
Fave PCE RPG: Ys
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Post by majors on Oct 14, 2021 19:56:08 GMT
Looking at the PCE Daisakunsen list of JP HuCards in release date order (up to Aug 1989), the only games that I think could be a good choice are:
JJ Jeff or Pac-Land : Fun mascott platformers but I think JJ might be too cruel and punishing for younger kids, if NEC was thinking about that. There could have been rights issues with Pac-Land.
Legendary Axe or Vigilante : If they REALLY wanted a platformer, these work and Vigilante has some arcade presence. But both are not "fun and cute" like Mario.
R-type, Galaga or Blazing - We all know the Turbo was know for shooters, NEC could have embraced it early on!
(Namco) Baseball : I enjoyed Hang-on as a pack-in with my SMS, so sports games aren't too bad of a choice. Plus it's two players and could have beat Genesis to the sportsball market success. But not having a pack-in Tap included could have put off new buyers, maybe they could have made a pricey bundle with tap and extra pad?
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Post by spenoza on Oct 14, 2021 20:55:21 GMT
I think what we've all learned here is that NEC and Hudson simply didn't have a good response to a pack-in like Super Mario Brothers, and would definitely have to have chosen a different path regardless.
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Post by dshadoff on Oct 14, 2021 21:17:58 GMT
When they released the Turbo, they were thinking "pack-in.... hmm... like Nintendo did with Duck Hunt !" (not thinking of SMB at all).
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Post by turboxray on Oct 14, 2021 22:13:12 GMT
I think LA is a good choice (assuming the timing aligns up), but they would seriously need to have an option for easy mode. That game gets brutal in the last levels. Or rather, difficult without the fun factor.
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bonkzonkmcgonk
Gun-headed
Posts: 54
Fave PCE Shooter: Air Zonk
Fave PCE Platformer: Dragon's Curse
Fave PCE Game Overall: Bonk's Adventure & Revenge
Fave PCE RPG: Legend of Valkyrie
Currently Playing: Son Son II
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Post by bonkzonkmcgonk on Oct 15, 2021 5:35:35 GMT
Another great pack-in option would've been Wonder Boy in Monster Land AKA Bikkuriman World. It's a Hudson game (unlike Legendary Axe) and has the cute platformer appeal to it. Not sure why they didn't put this one out in the US. Seems like a no-brainer.
Dragon Spirit and Alien Crush might have worked too.
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Post by turboxray on Oct 15, 2021 15:30:19 GMT
Bikkuriman World looks like an NES game to me. Pretty sure they were trying to distinguish themselves from NES looks. Like I said before, Keith Courage might be a simple game with repetitive color slapped assets, but color wise it looked something beyond NES. Bikkuriman World doesn't.
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Post by spenoza on Oct 15, 2021 17:38:17 GMT
Those walking gun baddies were pretty bad-ass. The music wasn't so hot, however.
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bonkzonkmcgonk
Gun-headed
Posts: 54
Fave PCE Shooter: Air Zonk
Fave PCE Platformer: Dragon's Curse
Fave PCE Game Overall: Bonk's Adventure & Revenge
Fave PCE RPG: Legend of Valkyrie
Currently Playing: Son Son II
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Post by bonkzonkmcgonk on Oct 15, 2021 19:40:34 GMT
If it had come out a little earlier, Ninja Spirit would have been perfect to pack-in with the system.
It's funny that "Keith Courage" was named after the boss at the NEC company. I imagine that would be the only way to justify naming your hero "Keith" anything. That name is just so bad... (B.A.D.) that it gives me a migraine just to hear it.
If John Brandstetter had only been working there earlier, then maybe it could have been named "Johnny Turbo" instead. Oh well.
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Post by turboxray on Oct 15, 2021 20:30:44 GMT
Those walking gun baddies were pretty bad-ass. The music wasn't so hot, however. The nurse-missile-needle things looked cool (nice shading at the time). The underworld music was distinct and different, and I thought it was pretty good. The synth-y leads have this voice singing quality to them. That totally stood out compared to NES game music/instruments - which didn't have a whole lot of distinct sound range. That was one of the criteria I used to judge system sound by; the different types of sound it could replicate. FM can sound great, but it always felt like it had a more limited range in this respect. One of the reasons why owning more than just one system was nice haha. Early TG16 titles had pretty good distinction in range; Ninja Spirit, LA, Bonk, Keith Courage (underworld), Splatter House, Blazing Lazers, Bloody Wolf, Devil's Crush, Neutopia, R-Type, Paranoia, etc - they all had their own distinct sound to them IMO. But later hucard/cd-chip-music though started to get very same-y sounding, and even limited/generic on their instruments. The sound FX in the underworld part of Keith Courage are pretty nice too. As-in, they're not generic 'same-y' psg sounding FX. They're very unique to that game. Lately I've been looking at chip generated sounds FX, seeing how different games are unique in this area, and then comparing them to CD games (which usually have really generic/bad chip SFX). This game (in the underworld) did a pretty good job.
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