GamePro brings the past to life by selecting its five greatest console wars, disregarding the in-progress donnybrook between the Xbox 360, Wii and PlayStation 3, which is destined to crack such future lists.
The choice for No. 1 was easy: the early-1990s clash between the Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis. GamePro's McKinley Noble writes:
With initial sales in Japan turning up nothing, Sega USA used the success of Sonic the Hedgehog, along with an ad campaign that got more ridiculously campy as time went on, to start turning up the heat on Nintendo. Fans started digging trenches and hurling slogans at each other, while TV commercials told the public that Sega's Genesis could do "What Nintendon't". It was magical, and the war went on and on.
The story hardly scratches the surface of the Nintendo-Sega battle for youth gamer mindshare, including Sega's ridiculous "blast processing" ads. So effective were the respective marketing machines, daring you to choose a side and stick to it with ferocity, that it seemed almost sacrilegious to own or profess fandom of both. The ingrained fanboy bias grew up with a generation that refused to put away its childish things and continues to drive up the average gamer age.
As a lifelong Nintendo fanboy, only recently have I managed to separate myself from my taught, ignorant prejudices to respect the greatness of the Genesis classics. But I still hate Sonic the Hedgehog, Mario's spastic rival for the same unquantifiable reason I despise the Dallas Cowboys, and always will.
What about you, Consumerists? Which way did you swing — Nintendo or Sega?
The 5 Greatest Console Wars [GamePro]
@tawni: Are you single? Live in ohio? If so contact me.
I only had to stay in line for 9-10 hours for my wii on launch day. I was 1st in line at toys-r-us.
And I go with Nintendo, Zelda games are the best.
]]>@mazzic1083: And a pretty relative lack of loading time. Hooray instant door opening!
]]>It's not just about efficiency, the Genesis had a better and higher clocked CPU (a 68k running at 7.67MHz). The SNES had a cheaper processor based on the MOS Technology 6502 running at 3.58 MHz. Interestingly, the sound processor in the Genesis was identical to the CPU in the Master System (a Z80), which is why backwards compatibility could be achieved with little more than a glorified pinout adapter.
]]>@RecordStoreToughGuy_Has$240WorthOfPuddin': @dmuth:
Somewhere, I have a box of Monkey Island 2 (1991, around the same time as the launch of the SNES), complete with 5.25" floppies, and a LucasArts newsletter, on actual newsprint, where a couple of LA devs discuss the state of game development at the company - and point out that gamers would have a much better experience if the Big Dog, Nintendo, would adopt CDs instead of catridges.
And, of course, Nintendo's inability to handle CD-ROM in-house led to their botched contract with Sony and the Sony PlayStation.
]]>@Powerlurker:
SNES's GPU could hold a bigger color palette, 4 million vs. 256 colors; but that meant that while the SNES was prettier, the Genesis was more efficient - hence an extra level in the Earthworm Jim game. Genesis had its own sound processor, SNES didn't.
Also, Nintendo today is just not the same company as Nintendo of yesteryear. I loved Sega back in the day but of the current players in the market, Nintendo is clearly the best company...even though I only own Sony products...
]]>I also had a Turbograffix-16
Ah - to be young and have money....
]]>I'm a little suspect that this came from gamepro, as they have just about no credibility though.
But this console war will one day be summed up as follows: "The best company had the worst machine, and they one. The worst company had the best machine, and they lost. The last company's machine broke"
]]>Exceptions abound, of course, but this is the trend I see.
]]>Although I played both Genesis and SNES and liked both, I prefered Genesis.
Sonic > Mario
Anyday.
@BathroomDuck: Exactly, I remember in Street Figher there were six buttons for SNES (high kick/punch, mid kick/punch, low kick/punch), if I remember correctly you had to hit Start or Select as well as the button on Sega to use all the commands.
Dreamcast had a horrible controller, the wire came out the back for crying out loud, and the controller stunk besides that too. And didn't the Jaguar have like 28 buttons?
]]>Nintendo Kicks ass! these people have insoctrinated me I am so brand loyal to nintendo that I owned a game cube instead of an x box and I have a wii (which I only use for zelda) it was really ahrd to move to xbox 360 but if there is a wiii I'll be intline to buy it too
]]>Oh, and can't forget the Sega CD versions of Lunar and Lunar 2, which were far better than the Playstation remakes.
]]>Don't forget Skies of Arcadia and the Jet Grind Radio games, and the Panzer Dragoon franchise.
]]>The most unfortunate thing about Sega going software only is how much of their best talent left at that time (Yuji Naka, etc.) They've made a couple good games since, like the spectacular Valkyria Chronicles, but other than that most of it has been thoroughly mediocre.
]]>At the end of the day, software sells hardware and not the other way around, Nintendo's iron-fisted grip on developers made it difficult for most companies to be willing to give up the NES market to take a chance on the Master System. As long as Nintendo had developers making software for their system that's what people would buy. Also, referring to the Genesis or SNES as more powerful is somewhat problematic. The Genesis had a significantly faster and more capable CPU, but the SNES had a better graphics processor.
]]>@mazzic1083: true. The Dreamcast should have stood up to the PlayStation fairly well, but there just weren't enough titles for it, and not enough things to do with the VMU (although I do remember the knockoff of Mattel football that you could play on it with NFL2K1, I think it was). When the PS2 came out, game over.
]]>@BathroomDuck: Agreed, I'm old school so I like the 4 button or 2 button controllers. One of the reasons I hate XBOX and love PS2/PS3, so much easier for me to just go in and not think about which button to push.
Granted if I took the time to learn the controllers I would probably be fine but SNES/NES/PS2 are just so natural feeling.
]]>@dragonfire81: Got 2 NES and 1 SNES and 1 64 that all still work like tanks. A few games went ka-put but most of them are fine too.
Although everyone seems to hate cartridges you gotta give them props for reliability.
]]>@LadySiren: Mario Kart for the SNES was indeed a classic. I still have my original and play it from time to time althought I do enjoy mariokart 64 more.
]]>@futuresuperbowlMVPJayCutler: Sounds like you need those blinders removed, fanboy, haha
No Dreamcast wasn't bad at all but, damn, ps2 was SSSOOO much better it was a no brainer if you were looking to buy a (then) current gen console. Sony totally destroyed during those years.
]]>And then won* the Dreamcast vs. Xbox360 vs. PS3 vs. Wii war a few years later.
Heck, that makes it the dominant console in the industry*.
*in my heart.
]]>Oy.
]]>Could there be a danger to having four generations of consoles hooked up to one TV? ;-)
]]>Atari 2600 vs Atari 5200.
Poor kids vs rich kids.
You ColecoVision-ers can shut yer pie holes.
]]>The SNES was a wholesome, White Optimus Prime looking machine. The Genesis felt so murky and kind of filthy; like something that is played in a dimly lit smoke-filled room with a shadowy fat man standing in the doorway.
When Mortal Kombat came out for the consoles, and the Genesis version had all the blood and gore, hell literally broke loose and the console war was on.
It was a pretty fun time.
]]>I thought the SNES had the much better controller with its L and R buttons on the top.
The Genesis controller didn't make it easy to press more then two buttons at a time.
]]>I miss the console wars that never happened...
Dreamcast. Jaguar. The, um, Amiga thing. *sigh*
]]>@ngoandy: Genesis does what NintenDON'T!
]]>@bloggerX: Yeah, what he said! My Genesis (an early-ish one bundled with Sonic 2) is still kickin 18 years later as well!
]]>@italianscallion33: If you happen to own a N64 or GameCube, the Composite cables from either are all compatible between the SNES, N64 and GC.
]]>@korybing: Weeds of DOOOOOOM!
]]>Well, here's the crutch for me - Nintendo gave us the Final Fantasy series, especially FF 2 (USA) and also Secret of Mana/Secret of Evermore. But Sega gave us Phantasy Star III, Landstalker, and Shining Force 1 and 2.
So hard to choose....
]]>My SNES from 1991 STILL WORKS! Take that XBOX 360 failure rate!
]]>Oh well. I had emulation for that, eventually. It did convince me to get the N64, Gamecube and Wii systems eventually, which irritated me since none of them really had much of an RPG game library.
]]>Although the "Sega/Nintendo" war is kind of moot at this point. Poor Dreamcast.
]]>End of story.
]]>Nintendo, but I secretly coveted my cousin's Sega.
]]>I have been a life long Nintendo fan girl. I do end up purchasing most consoles that come out except sony but Nintendo is the only brand I have stood in line for hours for. 18 hours in line at a wal mart to get a Wii the day before they were first released.
]]>The Genesis rocked! It was a great console.
Sure, Nintendo survived and created the Wii and Sega does whatever they do now. I haven't heard a peep out of them in years.
]]>I had a Sega Master System, more powerful then the NES that was out at the time (that all my friends had)
I tried to explain how my system was more powerful then their NES, but they liked the underdog.
So then Sega Genesis came out..... which I got....
Then the Super Nintendo came out... and I then said, Hey - you like the underdog, so come and get a Sega Genesis... and of course they changed their tune saying they like the more powerful machine, Super Nintendo... Kids..... Stupid kids....
]]>Genesis vs SNES was awesome since it was the first I was part of.
PSX vs Saturn vs N64 was great since there was a newcomer (Sony) and it totally destroyed a company (Sega). It marked the end of cartridges.
I still see the GameBoy as dominating the handheld market, so I disagree with having those other handheld battles listed.
]]>