JAGUAR, 3DO, AND THE CDI

[phoenixdownita]

They are afloat just alright ... like a brick you know.

I believe that CJ has recently and single handedly doubled the Jag CD library.

 

I wonder what if Atari would have decided to do what he did and "rip 68000 games" from their ST library just as a way to reach critical mass of available software in the market .... wait that happened to the CD32 ... nevermind!!!

 

 

On a different note I wonder if the 3DO got lucky and had enough juice on the 3D department at almost the right time so that its library is more extensive and it's 3D not so primitive when compared the our beloved Jag.

In the end the 3DO fared much better than the Jag (at ~10 times the sales by some account) but nowhere near the critical mass needed to lead the next gen (maybe because it wasn't).

 

Likely the fact that the gamers taste moved to 3D and the PS1 fit the bill so well is the only real reason that all the "next gen" consoles around tha time time got overwhelmed. The Sat put up a fight (10M units), the N64 in spite of being late did much better (30M units) but still nowhere near the winner (100M).

In hindsight a lot of the PS1 software was a rehash of the same genres (so many 3D fighters it is hard to keep count, and a slew of 2.5D adventure it's mind boggling) but it also had so many gems (bound to happen once so many developers jump onto the bandwagon) that clearly it worked out the way it did.

Edited March 16, 2015 by phoenixdownita

[Rubio80]

 

Again, you are both trying to rewrite history to state the Neo Geo wasn't a commercial failure. It clearly was. SNK collapsed ultimately from the failure of its Neo Geo hardware. There has been hardware with far longer lives that have sold millions more in hardware than Neo Geo which are still considered commercial failures like the Sega Master System and Sega Dreamcast. Perhaps the scale of its failure was smaller compared to machines like Jaguar or CD32.... But ultimately the Neo Geo, Amiga CD32, Dreamcast and Jaguar were all responsible for the ultimate financial implosions of their respective companies = that is the definition of a commercial failure. Atari, Commodore, SNK Playmore and Sega have all bounced back in one form or another (with 3 out of the 4 now focusing on software exclusively).

 

If I had to rate my Top 20 favorite consoles of all time -- the Neo Geo and Jaguar make my list. Probably about 70% of my favorites were commerical failures (I really liked the Atari 5200). It doesn't change how much I like any of them, but I just think I have a better grasp on the reality of the commercial environment in which they existed.

No, you're confused, SNK lived their last 14 years thanks (as hardware seller) to Neo Geo hardware, the reasons of the bankrupt were the end of the arcades in most of the world and the fails that were the Neo Geo CD, Hyper 64 and Neo Geo Pocket. Developing those systems was the true financial failure but, again, they did that development thanks to the profit they had selling MVS and home formats.

 

As has been written before in this thread SNK and Sega went bankrupt because of bad past moves, neither the Neo Geo or Dreamcast had nothing to do with that.

 

TBH, this is the first time I ever read or heard the Neo Geo was a commercial failure, if you want to think it was it's fine though.

[Bill Loguidice]

The key here is that the Neo Geo AES/CD/MVS platform can't be separated from its arcade and home versions. It's all one in the same, which is one of the key aspects of this aberrant platform. So while it clearly didn't set the market ablaze in its home versions, it was a dominant, long-lived, and influential arcade platform. Taken as a complete platform, from its longevity to overall quality, and yes, software depth, it's hard to look at it as anything but a success. On the other hand, if someone were to argue that the Neo Geo Pocket series was a failure, that's easy enough to agree with for very practical reasons (not for anything other than the side comment, but the Neo Geo Pocket Color d-pad is probably my favorite on a handheld).

 

Again, as long as we're using more or less the same basic metrics and taking care to note relevant context, I think the vast majority of us can generally agree with what or was not a failure relative to other platforms during its particular era. In fact, that was a lot of the thought process that went into the decision making process when deciding upon the 20 platforms to include in my book, Vintage Game Consoles, where "failed" platforms like the Dreamcast made the cut, because, by several metrics (software library, influence, continued relevance, etc.), it can in fact be considered a success. At the same time, there are some platforms where they fail in most areas, from sales to software to quality to longevity, etc., and there's really little room for debate. That doesn't mean we can't love certain aspects of them, however, and enjoy the overall platform with little qualification.

[Bill Loguidice]

On a different note I wonder if the 3DO got lucky and had enough juice on the 3D department at almost the right time so that its library is more extensive and it's 3D not so primitive when compared the our beloved Jag.

In the end the 3DO fared much better than the Jag (at ~10 times the sales by some account) but nowhere near the critical mass needed to lead the next gen (maybe because it wasn't).

 

Likely the fact that the gamers taste moved to 3D and the PS1 fit the bill so well is the only real reason that all the "next gen" consoles around tha time time got overwhelmed. The Sat put up a fight (10M units), the N64 in spite of being late did much better (30M units) but still nowhere near the winner (100M).

In hindsight a lot of the PS1 software was a rehash of the same genres (so many 3D fighters it is hard to keep count, and a slew of 2.5D adventure it's mind boggling) but it also had so many gems (bound to happen once so many developers jump onto the bandwagon) that clearly it worked out the way it did.

 

There were several early mistakes that the 3DO consortium made early on that pretty much doomed the long term prospects of the platform. First and foremost was the launch price, with the flawed thinking being that it should be priced like high end electronics rather than at game console levels. Second was the early focus on edutainment and multimedia titles. There's absolutely nothing wrong with having that stuff round out your library and helping to expand the user base, but the reality is flashy game titles (like FIFA, Need for Speed, etc.) would have done quite a bit more to move systems when it would have mattered most. Arguably, with a far lower launch price and a better early focus on getting flashy game software out, it had enough technical sizzle (and thanks to the CD format, enough storage and cost-effective production capacity) to make an impact before the PS1 really took off, helping provide the necessary bridge to get to the M2.

 

The other thing in the 3DO platform's favor over competitors like the Jaguar was that it was backed by companies with substantial resources. Of course the downside of having a consortium of backers is that not every one of those companies is as committed to long-term success as the others, meaning early success is quite important to keep interest behind-the-scenes.

[Rubio80]

The key here is that the Neo Geo AES/CD/MVS platform can't be separated from its arcade and home versions. It's all one in the same, which is one of the key aspects of this aberrant platform. So while it clearly didn't set the market ablaze in its home versions, it was a dominant, long-lived, and influential arcade platform. Taken as a complete platform, from its longevity to overall quality, and yes, software depth, it's hard to look at it as anything but a success. On the other hand, if someone were to argue that the Neo Geo Pocket series was a failure, that's easy enough to agree with for very practical reasons (not for anything other than the side comment, but the Neo Geo Pocket Color d-pad is probably my favorite on a handheld).

 

 

Again, perfect description.

 

The Pocket was a failure on sales and lifespan, the console itself is great and has several top games. I have a B/W Pocket since it was released and it's a platform which deserved much more but the Game Boy Pocket/Color was a very tough competitor with an enormous fan base from the original Game Boy, and backwards compatibility. I also agree the NGP d-pad is excellent, specially for fighting games, no other handheld plays that genre as well as the NGP.

[Lost Dragon]

@Bill:In an interview with Edge a while back, Mark Cerny seemed to lay the blame on the 3DO's high launch price, firmly at the feet of the amount of Ram it had on-board, did marketing then hike price up again, just to make it seem a more high-end product?.

 

From what i recal of Commodore's CDTV (again over-priced) marketing appeared to promote and price the unit as a 'high-end' device, thinking it'd attract a certain market, it did'nt and price drops followed.

 

What ever the reasons, the eye-watering price did pretty much kill of the 3DO's early chances...

 

There seemed to be just enough 'flashy' software (Road Rash, Madden, Fifa etc) doing the rounds in the early days, but the cost of the machine itself just put it way out of the average consumers pocket over here.

[Bill Loguidice]

@Bill:In an interview with Edge a while back, Mark Cerny seemed to lay the blame on the 3DO's high launch price, firmly at the feet of the amount of Ram it had on-board, did marketing then hike price up again, just to make it seem a more high-end product?.

 

From what i recal of Commodore's CDTV (again over-priced) marketing appeared to promote and price the unit as a 'high-end' device, thinking it'd attract a certain market, it did'nt and price drops followed.

 

What ever the reasons, the eye-watering price did pretty much kill of the 3DO's early chances...

 

Even though I did read that the price was set higher than it had to be for what, as you say, amounts to marketing reasons, I absolutely wouldn't be surprised if the technology inside the 3DO was also a liability in terms of keeping costs under control, making for a deadly combo. Assuming that at least a portion of the high price was marketing-related, even at $200 less from the launch price it would have likely been too much to make many inroads, particularly when combined with the split focus on gaming and multimedia. The first platform I can recall that truly sold well at a higher-than-expected price was the PlayStation 3, and that of course struggled (relatively speaking) in the beginning because of it.

It's fascinating to think that every attempt at a multimedia box (RDI Halcyon, VIS, CDTV, CD-i, etc.) until the modern era more or less went in with a high (cost) barrier to entry before either failing or retooling into something more generally affordable (albeit almost always too late to regain lost momentum). Most of those boxes hoped to establish some type of standard, a la the VCR, when the reality in retrospect was the only standard that could replace the VCR was something even simpler, a straight DVD player. It's obviously hard to sell a single "everything box," both then and now.

[JagCD]

No, you're confused, SNK lived their last 14 years thanks (as hardware seller) to Neo Geo hardware, the reasons of the bankrupt were the end of the arcades in most of the world and the fails that were the Neo Geo CD, Hyper 64 and Neo Geo Pocket. Developing those systems was the true financial failure but, again, they did that development thanks to the profit they had selling MVS and home formats.

 

As has been written before in this thread SNK and Sega went bankrupt because of bad past moves, neither the Neo Geo or Dreamcast had nothing to do with that.

 

TBH, this is the first time I ever read or heard the Neo Geo was a commercial failure, if you want to think it was it's fine though.

 

Again, look at the metrics. Hardware sold, the bankruptcy of its parent company, marketshare within the industry. Every actual owner of Neo Geo hardware that I've met already knows this (and not the rabid fanboys who've never owned one but are clearly more knowledgeable in their own minds.....). I spoke to my best friend who also collects this morning (and has a massively larger Neo Geo collection than I do) and he laughed for a good 2 minutes when I told him people on the Atari forums were trying to convince me the Neo Geo was a commercial success.

 

To paraphrase his response, "You've got to be completely clueless to try to claim a game console than never broke 1% for marketshare was a commercial success." He continued, "But I guess compared to the rousing sales success of the Jaguar (he was in full blown sarcasm mode), I guess the Neo Geo did gangbusters." He and I both collect Neo Geo's based on its relative failure..... It's that exclusivity/rarity of said hardware that makes owning them so damn special.

Edited March 16, 2015 by JagCD

[JagCD]

No, you're confused, SNK lived their last 14 years thanks (as hardware seller) to Neo Geo hardware, the reasons of the bankrupt were the end of the arcades in most of the world and the fails that were the Neo Geo CD, Hyper 64 and Neo Geo Pocket. Developing those systems was the true financial failure but, again, they did that development thanks to the profit they had selling MVS and home formats.

But again -- the AES (home format) never made money, either. SNK only turned a profit from their arcade machines.... The entire lineup of Neo Geo home machines were all money losers. The Neo Geo CD and later derivatives were cost reduced attempts to try to right the ship (and increase market penetration) -- but it never worked for them. Look at how much money Sony and Microsoft lost on their hardware -- but they were giant multinational corporations that could afford that writeoff.... SNK never had those deep pockets.

[JagCD]

 

Sorry, it's not that simple. One platform does not a failed company make except when said company created one single platform, e.g., RDI with the Halcyon, Tiger Telematics with the Gizmodo, etc.

 

 

 

Actually, it is that simple when talking about commercial success or failure. Sales, marketshare and profits/losses (and bankruptcies) can all be easily quantified. Quality is completely irrelevant. Seriously, last generation -- the Nintendo Wii was the biggest commercial success of its generation. Are any of you seriously going to now claim that it had higher quality hardware (than PS3 or Xbox 360) and a better quality game library (Wii is notorious for its stacks of shovelware)? Quality and Commercial Success are not dependant on each other. They can clearly exist in a vacuum seperate from one another.

 

But to claim that any of the Dreamcast, Neo Geo, Jaguar or CD32 were commercial successes -- you'd flunk out of business school for your first semester. The balance sheets completely prove it to be wrong. This isn't subjective, this is hard data. Companies that operate in the red (losses) are by definition never a commercial success.

Edited March 16, 2015 by JagCD

[Papa]

I wish I could play said fighting games on my Neo Geo stuff, but that would require ripping at least one daughter off of Puzzle de Pon or Neo Bomberman. I will just play Samurai Showdown on my 3DO, or Ultra Vortek on my Jaguar. I would think that part of the reason for all those fighting games was their competitive stance alongside Capcom. Does Playmore count in their success category? I really just love the SNK art and style of games. It's so different than the three systems in question that it's kinda hard to compare them. The Neo Geo AES/MVS is not CD based (unless you waited and got their CD systems, and waited and waited..) whereas the 3DO (FMV and 3rd party lure), CDi (VCD FMV hokey game VCR), and Jaguar CD (toilet) all had a feeling of bringing you things all new and better than ever before (not that the Neo Geo didn't sport this idea a little as well). The Neo Geo was all about taking your card to the arcade and saving, competing with friends, and having a near identical arcade experience at home. If your into hardware, it looked like the Sega Mega Drives big brother.

Edited March 16, 2015 by Papa

[JagCD]

I wish I could play said fighting games on my Neo Geo stuff, but that would require ripping at least one daughter off of Puzzle de Pon or Neo Bomberman. I will just play Samurai Showdown on my 3DO, or Ultra Vortek on my Jaguar. I would think that part of the reason for all those fighting games was their competitive stance alongside Capcom. Does Playmore count in their success category?

 

I really would qualify SNK Corporation and SNK Playmore as 2 different entities. It's a lot like when Jack Tramiel bought Atari. They kinda carried on the existing legacy, but with a very different structure. To those who do not know the history: Aruze bought SNK Corporation in the late 1990's and starved it of money moving forward. So the original founder of SNK, Eikichi Kawasaki, grew disgusted and left with several of his co-executives and founded a new company called SNK Playmore. After his absence, the original SNK collapsed by 2001. Playmore then re-aquired as much as they could from the original SNK (rights / intellectual properties, etc). Actually if you think about it, Kawasaki is a lot like the Japanese Jack Tramiel. Aruze pushed Kawasaki out, very much like the Commodore board of directors pushing Jack out. So Jack / Kawasaki went and founded new companies (Tramiel Tech morphing into Atari Corp / SNK Playmore) -- to more or less inflict financial revenge against those that hurt them (Commodore Computer / SNK Corporation -- with both of those companies collapsing after their exits). There is definitely some similarity to their respective histories.

Edited March 16, 2015 by JagCD

[+madman]

To paraphrase his response, "You've got to be completely clueless to try to claim a game console than never broke 1% for marketshare was a commercial success." He continued, "But I guess compared to the rousing sales success of the Jaguar (he was in full blown sarcasm mode), I guess the Neo Geo did gangbusters." He and I both collect Neo Geo's based on its relative failure..... It's that exclusivity/rarity of said hardware that makes owning them so damn special.

Oh, your friend said those things? Well clearly those are facts and not opinions. Keep ignoring the fact the system was supported for 14 years.

 

Porsche has been making cars since the late 1940s. In 2014 they had less than half a percent of the market share in North America. Therefore Porsche is a failure of a company according to your logic. Makes sense to me.

[Sapicco]

About the CDi I would recommend you acquire it later on, it's expensive to get decent controllers and the light gun, and you need to appreciate FMV games (shooter on rails on the CDi are always FMV based).

 

The 7800 is cheaper to acquire and likely, compared to the other 8 bits, quite enjoyable, nothing mind blowing but fun nonetheless.

 

I acquired the CDi as one of the last consoles and as I didn't expect much and had some leftover dispensable income to pay for the outrageous prices for a decent controller and the gun I was pleasantly surprised. The rest of the genres (non FMV/adventures) do not fare too well, they are curiosities, mildly entertaining, but nothing you would care to play extensively (again with the exception of a couple of titles).

Thanks for the advice. As soon as a find a good deal on a 7800 cib and ready to hook up via coax, and a ton of games in a lot; I will scoop one up!

Edited March 16, 2015 by Sapicco

[JagCD]

Oh, your friend said those things? Well clearly those are facts and not opinions. Keep ignoring the fact the system was supported for 14 years.

 

Porsche has been making cars since the late 1940s. In 2014 they had less than half a percent of the market share in North America. Therefore Porsche is a failure of a company according to your logic. Makes sense to me.

 

The criteria was commercial failure -- you are now moving the goalposts.

SNK Corporation went bankrupt = the definition of commercial failure.

 

Porsche has never been bankrupt.

Edited March 16, 2015 by JagCD

[+madman]

 

Of course it was... Or not. You clearly don't realize that SNK Corporation and SNK Playmore were seperate companies -- so it is technically impossible for the Neo Geo to have been continuously supported for 14 years (the system debuted in 1990 with SNK Corporation closing down in 2001... So yet another distortion from reality). Seriously, if you are going to talk about something -- at least try to know what your talking about.

How can it be technically impossible when it actually happened? Two companies or not, games were officially released for 14 years. Your attempt at logic is truly mind blowing. But let's pretend that SNKP means the games that came out under them didn't come out (because you said it's impossible for those games to have been released), that means the Neo Geo was supported for 11 years. That's a failed system?

[JagCD]

How can it be technically impossible when it actually happened? Two companies or not, games were officially released for 14 years. Your attempt at logic is truly mind blowing. But let's pretend that SNKP means the games that came out under them didn't come out (because you said it's impossible for those games to have been released), that means the Neo Geo was supported for 11 years. That's a failed system?

 

Two completely different companies.... So yeah, 14 years is an impossible statement. When the parent company goes bankrupt, yeah it's a failure. To reinterate, there are systems that sold ten times (Dreamcast) the hardware of the Neo Geo that were still considered commercial failures.

 

SNK Playmore bought the assets of a dead company. It was just like Hasbro buying the dead remnants of Atari.

 

Do you not understand what the definition of a commercial failure?

Edited March 17, 2015 by JagCD

[+madman]

 

Two completely different companies.... So yeah, 14 years is an impossible statement. When the parent company goes bankrupt, yeah it's a failure. To reinterate, there are systems that sold ten times (Dreamcast) the hardware of the Neo Geo that were still considered commercial failures.

 

SNK Playmore bought the assets of a dead company. It was just like Hasbro buying the dead remnants of Atari.

 

Do you not understand what the definition of a commercial failure?

How is it when you're presented with logical arguments backed by facts on here you respond with opinions (LOL my friend laughed for 2 minutes!) or nonsense logic (1990 - 2004 isn't 14 years)? Allow me to prove my point while using your debating skills:

I told my friend about your friend laughing for 2 minutes and my friend laughed for THREE minutes. Therefore the Neo Geo was a success.

[JagCD]

How is it when you're presented with logical arguments backed by facts on here you respond with opinions (LOL my friend laughed for 2 minutes!) or nonsense logic (1990 - 2004 isn't 14 years)? Allow me to prove my point while using your debating skills:

I told my friend about your friend laughing for 2 minutes and my friend laughed for THREE minutes. Therefore the Neo Geo was a success.

Logical arguments, that's definitely LOL.... So a completely different company (SNK Playmore) took over support for a console when its actual parent company went out of business (Atari 1996 / SNK 2001). By your (failed) logic, Telegames, Delphine and Songbird Productions supported the Jaguar for many years after Atari collapsed (1996) -- so the Jaguar was now a system supported through 2013 using your same slippery slope (when the game Another World was released for the Jaguar). Bottom line, none of that is actually true. 14 years is impossible because SNK Corp. was dead at 11 years after the Neo Geo was introduced.

 

Both Atari Corporation and SNK Corporation are now dead and their final game consoles are considered commercial failures.

 

By the way, How many Neo Geo games and Consoles do you personally own?

Edited March 17, 2015 by JagCD

[+madman]

Both Atari Corporation and SNK Corporation are now dead and their final game consoles are considered commercial failures.

SNK Corporation is now dead and their final game console is considered a success.

[AtariORdead]

I would give up, he clearly is an idiot.

 

1. Commercially available means available to buy, whether that is Arcade owners or Private owners.

 

2. As the MVS and the AES are the same system they are interlinked in terms of sales. You can't differentiate between them. Its just like an NES and Famicom, same hardware and software seperated by simply being available in 2 different configurations

 

3. The Neo Geo did not Fail, it kept SNK in profit for over a decade, SNK's troubles began in 2000, three years after stopping production of the neo geo and trying to move on with the Hyper Neo Geo 64 and Neo Geo pocket. They were still doing ok when they ditched the original Neo Geo hardware.

 

4. The Neo Geo CD, while not selling brilliantly, did ok for SNK. They already had the hardware and only needed to add a cd drive so the R&D costs were kept to a minimum and they already had a large library of games ready to port to CD so the outlay was minimal compared to your average new console release as was the development costs of the games due to them just being ported over.

 

5. What was the end was in fact when they were bought out by some Pachinko company who were only interested in using SNKs popular games as a basis for pachinko versions and they vastly underfunded the videogame side of things.

 

The NeoGeo hardware was actually the platform they built their sucess on, it had little to do with the comapany failing.

Edited March 17, 2015 by AtariORdead

[+remowilliams]

Commercially the Jag was a dismal failure, and the NeoGeo platform was a wild success. Period. These are non debatable facts.

[AtariORdead]

Commercially the Jag was a dismal failure, and the NeoGeo platform was a wild success. Period. These are non debatable facts.

apparently there are some people stupid enough to dispute blatently obvious facts.

[phoenixdownita]

No point in getting too upset, he refuses to consider other points of view, likely because he thinks they are as extreme as his.

 

Obviously NeoGeo was never console number one in the world, it never even tried, so that fact plus that the parent company went belly up after 11Y really is conducive for HIS logic to say that it is the cause. For me the fact that a company managed to keep going for 11Y on the same design (albeit it is a lazy decision) is a testament to the capability and success of said platform

 

He said it himself "the last console of a game company that went belly up IS a commercial failure".

 

Simple logic, I don't agree with it but to each his own, no point in beating this anymore, let him and his friends laugh to their heart' content, it's a free world.

 

Two wrongs don't make one right, in time he will mellow and start considering "50 shades of grey", and although "the winner takes it all" still does not make all the contenders failures ... commercially I mean.

[Bill Loguidice]

"Failure" means different things to different people. As long as the parameters of how you define a failure are clear, then there shouldn't be much to argue about. I would, for instance, accept the idea that the Neo Geo platform as a home console was a commercial failure, though I would in turn argue as I have earlier that we need to look at the totality of the platform, which includes its clear success in the arcade, which in turn translated to a solid library of titles for the home. But again, if for some reason we were to ignore the arcade component of the platform, we can say that SNK failed to make many inroads into the home and was one of a litany of failed platforms in that environment.

 

For the standards of the era in which they were released, the 3DO, CD-i, and Jaguar were commercial (sales) failures. The 3DO as a platform sold approximately two million consoles (about a half dozen models) in its three years on the market, with approximately 300 games, multimedia, and edutainment titles. The CD-i as a platform sold approximately one million consoles (over a dozen models) in effectively six years (although I'd argue about four of those were relevant in any way) on the market with approximately 150 or so games, multimedia, and edutainment titles (not counting the Video CD stuff, of course). The Jaguar in its one console version sold approximately 225,000 units in just under three years on the market with approximately 80 games if you include the additional handful made for the CD add-on (I don't recall ever seeing reliable numbers for the number of CD add-ons sold, but my guess (and that's all it is) is probably less than 25,000).

 

Although I have no way of corroborating the numbers (although they seem reliable), and these were mostly from sales in Japan, it seems the entire Neo Geo HOME platform (not arcade), which includes the AES and the CD variations, sold over 900,000 units (with the split approximately 60/40 CD to AES), though almost certainly under a million. That puts the HOME systems at about half the number of 3DO units, roughly the same as the CD-i platform (acknowledging that a not insignificant portion of those sales were likely for non-game uses), and roughly about four times greater than that of the Jaguar console.

 

Clearly where the arcade foundation of the Neo Geo comes into play (and a big reason why we CAN'T separate it out from the platform proper) is in mindshare. Of the platforms mentioned, clearly far more "average" people recognize the Neo Geo stuff than all of the other platforms combined, and a lot of that software is still rather sought after in the form of ports to new platforms (it of course helps that you generally only have to license it from one company, but still, these games are sought after and recognizable). That's part of the reason why we got the Neo Geo X Gold portable/TV game and why we'll never get a new "TV game" version of the 3DO, CD-i, or Jaguar, i.e., fare fewer people remember those platforms and their games. It absolutely doesn't hurt that you're still likely to see Neo Geo multi-game arcade units kicking about either, nor, as stated does the regular release of ports on today's systems.

 

So, to summarize my long-winded point, there are clearly different ways to detail "failure" and in turn to detail "success," which is probably what most of us were getting at in this thread. I've even heard some people elsewhere say that they define a successful platform by having at least 25 games they find fun to play on it. While I'm not sure I'd agree with that metric, at least it give a clear idea of what they're talking about.