Being amezed that the nes won the 3th gen console wars

[Tanooki]

@zzip I mean I do agree, there are generations still, they're just blurred.

 

When the Gamecube did great for half its life, then got burned by the trolls on the back half as a mix of petty revenge and legitimately at times lack of storage capacity Nintendo was like F this, I'm taking my toys and leaving and never came back.  They went into doing something admittedly smart but stupid for the core gaming types with Wii, and it worked insanely well beyond expectation.  And then the other guys did their own normal generational jump with the PS3 360 era since.  Then you have a third tier the ios/android mobile/touch/phone market that do their generational jumps as well now and again.

 

Nintendo they now jump in the middle of the other guys stuff when the Wii, PiiU, and Switch arrived they did their own thing, increasing trajectory of power and so on but independent.

[zzip]

14 hours ago, Tanooki said:

Nintendo they now jump in the middle of the other guys stuff when the Wii, PiiU, and Switch arrived they did their own thing, increasing trajectory of power and so on but independent.

It kind of makes sense though.     When you look at Nintendo's popular franchises-   do you need 10 Teraflops of GPU power and hardware ray tracing to make a good Mario/Animal Crossing/Zelda game?    Not really, it's overkill.     The Switch is doing just fine with the power spec it has.   Sony and Microsoft go after the gamers who want high levels of realism 

[Tanooki]

42 minutes ago, zzip said:

It kind of makes sense though.     When you look at Nintendo's popular franchises-   do you need 10 Teraflops of GPU power and hardware ray tracing to make a good Mario/Animal Crossing/Zelda game?    Not really, it's overkill.     The Switch is doing just fine with the power spec it has.   Sony and Microsoft go after the gamers who want high levels of realism 

No I agree, and it took a little stumbling with the Wii to get back in some developers good graces, and a hard face plant reminder with a return to utter arrogance with that PiiU to learn a valued lesson what to do right in a balanced way.

 

Make a unique enough piece of hardware with a good design that isn't relegated to a gimmick (like the WiiU's resource pig of a controller) that has well liked, well known parts, and that can be easily setup to have all the popular game engines port games to it if developers choose to.  That's what Switch did.  You get a handheld but it can be used as a console secondarily (or primary if you hate handhelds) and get good quality parts from a key industry leader in GPU/Memory tech (nvidia), and then work with game engine designers so your hardware can scale those engines to get a version of the game that still works great if not amazing.  That's what Switch did, and it won hand over fist going that route.  They found something that works and need to stick with it again and again until it becomes a burden.  They don't need to re-invest and re-invent the wheel.  They just need to semi-play it safe, have a system with a punch, with a fair budget price, that can take the modern mobile games(ios/android) and some console/pc titles too in a scaled back format people can take on the go or use on the big screen.  Give that hardware enough oomph to do this and not fall too many generations behind it gets ignored, and you have a winner.  Couple that with the 1st/2nd party IP they can peddle, which never really strayed into the weeds of hyper-realism, and you're in a good place not needing all those teraflops etc.

 

If this was a bad idea going into it, by now it would be evident, Nintendo would be at an end of life sunset back at year 4-5 seeing peak potential, yet here we are in year 6 now and it's now slowly, not bleeding money, not lacking for releases.  There's sustainability and some growth with the titles still rolling out.  That's just outside of old Gameboy (into Color) that lasted nearly 15 years unheard of (1989-2003.)  Switch won't make 15 years I imagine, but if they did a true to Nintendo history handheld 1.5 bump with like double to quadruple the CPU, GPU, MEMORY it could easily stretch it close to that.  GB went 9 years until 1998 with the GBC bump to give it another 5 years.

[zzip]

1 hour ago, Tanooki said:

Make a unique enough piece of hardware with a good design that isn't relegated to a gimmick (like the WiiU's resource pig of a controller) that has well liked, well known parts, and that can be easily setup to have all the popular game engines port games to it if developers choose to.  That's what Switch did.  You get a handheld but it can be used as a console secondarily (or primary if you hate handhelds) and get good quality parts from a key industry leader in GPU/Memory tech (nvidia), and then work with game engine designers so your hardware can scale those engines to get a version of the game that still works great if not amazing.  That's what Switch did, and it won hand over fist going that route.

It also showed that mobile gaming devices weren't dead after all.    Lots of people assumed that smart phones/ tablets killed them, and nobody was going to buy a dedicated gaming device anymore.    

 

1 hour ago, Tanooki said:

Couple that with the 1st/2nd party IP they can peddle, which never really strayed into the weeds of hyper-realism, and you're in a good place not needing all those teraflops etc.

It also doesn't seem like hyper-realism is important to the younger generation.   Plenty of games become popular with them that don't need high-end graphics, including pixelated games that would look at home in the 80s or 90s.   Deltarune, Minecraft, Among Us,   etc.

 

1 hour ago, Tanooki said:

If this was a bad idea going into it, by now it would be evident, Nintendo would be at an end of life sunset back at year 4-5 seeing peak potential, yet here we are in year 6 now and it's now slowly, not bleeding money, not lacking for releases.

that sounds like an understatement.  I read recently that it passed 120 million units sold, making it one of the best selling consoles of all time, putting it slightly ahead of the PS4

[Tanooki]

@zzip So so correct on that.  I remember all the whining and finger pointing how Nintendo handheld sales were declining from the DS period due to the rise of Android and iOS.  I mean sure they were, but they were also super healthy profitable.  Nintendo still was in their own island, a non-compete really, because almost all phones and tablets didn't have tactile support (dpad, stick, buttons) so it was just inferior.  Nintendo could still deliver unimpeded play, the other needed hoops of a wireless controller to be carried with which most just won't do.  I mean now you do have your Anbernics, Odins, Retroids, but they can't do what the Switch even can do largely on the upper end of things, steam deck can, but then you're into a 600 plus handheld which sucks quite frankly.

 

People want it easy sure on the go, but the games just so many want it to work right and mobile touch won't do it.  That's why these retro android style handhelds and Switch do so well, it gives the core experience as intended, not slapped together with fickle touch disasters.

 

And you know thinking about it, you're right, in the last decade I've seen that the ones coming up now, unless they wnat to dive into that VR stuff, many want the more colorful detached from levels of reality play we enjoyed (largely due to hardware limits) in the past.  That whole push towards HD and UHD and uncanny valley realism is being pushed back against pretty badly.  Maybe it's the sickening budgets and nickel and dime antics to fund it, or maybe people want a real break from normal wanting the more imagintive stuff once again, but it is what it is.  As you said the retro or faux retro(terraria, minecraft, etc) seem more up to it.  My 11 year old, she loves her Switch lite, but what does she play?  Colorful stuff, there are a few almost phone like games like Stardew Valley and Pocket Stables, but more you have the Mario, Pokemon minecraft, terraria, spyro etc stuff that's far more interesting.  And when it's not that, she love to use the DS and GBA games she has, or even a few older since I do let her use one of my spare GBA SPs for the things the DS can not touch.

 

Maybe you misread my intent, but that was sarcasm pointing out how wrong it was to discount Switch and what it does even now 6 years in.  If it were a console the old norms were 5 years and you sink into the pit for replacements, or get a Pro thing like Sony/MS did in the PS4 era to drag it out.  Nintendo hasn't had to do either, and its gobbling up the sales as you said it's over 120M.

Here's a fun link I just found on dumb luck.  Nintendo has put their global hardware sales on their investor jp site, but it goes quarterly and Q1 2023 isn't up yet, so this ends 12/31/22 --  122.55M units https://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/en/finance/hard_soft/

So who knows, maybe it's at 130+ now in another 90 days since.

 

Gameboy/Color did 118.7M, Nintendo DS did 154.02M, PS2 did 155M supposedly.  This puts the Switch at #3 in less time than the others took to get there and the data is nearly 100 days out of date.  It has to be closing pretty well on the DS at this rate.

[zzip]

1 hour ago, Tanooki said:

So so correct on that.  I remember all the whining and finger pointing how Nintendo handheld sales were declining from the DS period due to the rise of Android and iOS.  I mean sure they were, but they were also super healthy profitable.  Nintendo still was in their own island, a non-compete really, because almost all phones and tablets didn't have tactile support (dpad, stick, buttons) so it was just inferior.  Nintendo could still deliver unimpeded play, the other needed hoops of a wireless controller to be carried with which most just won't do.  I mean now you do have your Anbernics, Odins, Retroids, but they can't do what the Switch even can do largely on the upper end of things, steam deck can, but then you're into a 600 plus handheld which sucks quite frankly.

 

People want it easy sure on the go, but the games just so many want it to work right and mobile touch won't do it.  That's why these retro android style handhelds and Switch do so well, it gives the core experience as intended, not slapped together with fickle touch disasters.

Yeah I've been beating that drum about how mobile phones are insufficient for gaming for awhile, but I usually hear from people "touchscreen is just fine for gaming, what are you talking about?" 

 

But it's not just the lack of buttons and sticks,  phone-based gaming is fully of micro-transactions, annoying ads,  they penalize you for not playing every day they can rapidly drain your battery.

 

I'd rather pay more upfront for a game and not be bombarded with ads or microtransactions. 

 

One thing that's amazing (amezing?) about the GBA and DS how long their batteries hold a charge.   I can turn on a GBA that's been sitting in a drawer for years,  and it still plays with a healthy charge!   On the other hand, I have an iPhone on my desk that I only use for testing some things at work, and I might only turn it on once a month for a few minutes at a time,  and it is always dead,  Always!  Doesn't matter that it got a full charge and was only used 10 minutes, it stilll drains the battery when it is supposedly switched off.

 

2 hours ago, Tanooki said:

And you know thinking about it, you're right, in the last decade I've seen that the ones coming up now, unless they wnat to dive into that VR stuff, many want the more colorful detached from levels of reality play we enjoyed (largely due to hardware limits) in the past.  That whole push towards HD and UHD and uncanny valley realism is being pushed back against pretty badly.  Maybe it's the sickening budgets and nickel and dime antics to fund it, or maybe people want a real break from normal wanting the more imagintive stuff once again, but it is what it is.  As you said the retro or faux retro(terraria, minecraft, etc) seem more up to it.  My 11 year old, she loves her Switch lite, but what does she play?  Colorful stuff, there are a few almost phone like games like Stardew Valley and Pocket Stables, but more you have the Mario, Pokemon minecraft, terraria, spyro etc stuff that's far more interesting.  And when it's not that, she love to use the DS and GBA games she has, or even a few older since I do let her use one of my spare GBA SPs for the things the DS can not touch.

It might be that my generation grew up from Pong and there was always better tech around the corner, so we were always looking for the next big advancement, so we still get excited by tech specs. 

 

Gen Z grew up in a world where graphics were already pretty good, and sound chips stopped advancing for the most part, so maybe they just don't get caught up in the tech hype as much?

 

Or it could be like when I was a kid,  kids liked cartoons, adults liked realistic TV shows.   But instead today,  younger people like the more cartoony games, and adults want games so realistic that Digital Foundry can make a video where they zoom in on a videogame character's hand and determine whether Xbox or PS5 rendered the dirt under the characters fingernails more realistically

[Creamhoven]

On 4/3/2023 at 2:57 PM, johannesmutlu said:

I still found it amezing why the nes was so successful of the following reasons,

Hello Johannes,

 

thank you for sharing your insights and reasoning on this subject.

On 4/3/2023 at 2:57 PM, johannesmutlu said:

1,the nes was not the first 3th gen console,the sega SG1000 did come along aside with it,
2,there were other competitors with their own 3th gen game consoles like the atari 7800 and the sega mastersystem etc,,,
3,while supermariobros were also responsible for the success of the nes,BUT supermariobros was not the first side scrolling platformer,that belongs to pac land and zelda was not the first rpg adventure game,that belongs to hydlide,
4,also both sega & atari did eventually had their own mascots with their own platform games for their systems such as alex kidd and scrappyard dog etc,,,
5,the nes was not the first console to be called an entertainment system,that may belongs to the atari 5200,
6,the nes was not the first console with a frontloading zif systems,that belongs to the astrocadia game console and there was also the channel f console with a frontloading system albeit non zif system,

 

You seem to link success to the idea of coming up or realising ideas first. While this can be a contributing factor for success for sure, it is only a secondary quality of a successful endevour. Nintendo brought alot of good elements together so beautifully, that they were able to dominate the market. Alot of this was clever marketplacment for sure, but they needed a good product to make that work for them. Brilliant design is not necesserily linked to new ideas but the way the ideas are put together.

On 4/3/2023 at 2:57 PM, johannesmutlu said:

7,the nes was not the most advanced system,atleast not all the way because the intelevision had a 16bit cpu while both the atari 2600 and the 5200 had a 128 colorpallet,

Yes, better hardware is a selling point, but it secondary as well. It is a whole be more than the sum of its part kind of thing. You can imagine a dog with all kinds of benefitial traits, but if they don't come together in a harmonious way, the dog can still be inferior to a dog with less desirable traits that just work better together.

On 4/3/2023 at 2:57 PM, johannesmutlu said:

8,many nintendo games were also on other systems like the atari 2600 and 5200,the colecovision and even on the 3th gen atari 7800 among other systems etc,,,

That may be true, but having ports is not a downside on its own. There are NES exclusive titles that were in a class of their own.

On 4/3/2023 at 2:57 PM, johannesmutlu said:

 

9,the nes was not per se alway’s cheaper then it’s competitors,some competitors did sold their console for a much lower prince,

I see. Again, pricepoint and power on their own are not determinate factors on their own. It is important to contextialise these aspects and look at the whole.

On 4/3/2023 at 2:57 PM, johannesmutlu said:

10,the nes was not compatible with other games while both the sega mark 3 and the atari 7800 were compatible with their previous generation games,
11,the nes was not the first system with a D pad and the D pad wasn’t even invented by nintendo itself,that belongs to the tiger electronic’s playmaker handheld,
12,the nes was not the first console to resamble another electronic device,a device such as the vcr deck,no,that belongs to the astrocadia wich more resambles a frontloading cassette tape player.
13,while sega and atari had created their own sports games for their 8bit systems such as soccor,f1 racing and tennis etc,,, but so did nintendo for their nes as well.
14,the nes is not the first console to use mappers or expansion addons,the atari 2600 used mappers along with extra ram to expand the capabilities of their system and there was also the super charger addon for it.
15,the nes is not the first system with a lockout system,that belongs to the atari 7800 because that system was sneakingly already released in late 1984 but fully rereleased in 1986.
16,,while mario was all the rage and so nintendo did advertised the nes system alot with mario as the fore front character but so did atari too with posters or they put screen shots of mario games on the pakage of their game consoles,
17,the nes was not the only console with a lightgun with games such as duck hunt,because atari did it too atari 7800 with games such as bug hunt and they had also qwak in the arcades back in 1976 and sega came up with their lightgun among it’s games for it as well so you may wonder if duckhunt was really something original from nintendo or something inspirated from atari’s qwak? Some goes for nintendo’s excitebike,was that game not also sneakingly inspirated from atari’s stunt cycle from 1976?
18.there were also many game consoles released in japan before,alongside or a few month’s released after the japanese nes such as the atari 2600,the cassette vision  & super cassette vision etc,,,
Same in the us,so it was not that the famicom or nes was the only choice.
19,the us nes might be the first with composite out but the french super cassette vision had rgb out for french territory,
etc,,,

 

There were competitors with advantages compared to the NES. Nintendo did not invent every idea that was realised in the NES, they, however, were able to offer a package at the right price that was compelling. You pick out points and spotlight them and thats all fine, still look at the design and the marketplacement, it is a meta kind of thing.

On 4/3/2023 at 2:57 PM, johannesmutlu said:

And these are the reasons why i am sooo amezed that the famicom/nes became a huge success,

Sure the nes might come with a robot called ROB the robot to trick retailers and consumers that the nes is just more then an entertainment system along with a special toy for it,But that robot eventually became obsolete after other games took over.
Also sega did had already an idea about a robot back in 1982 were you could play games on it but it was cancled,

But putting it in such perspective,it became sometimes hard to imagine why the nes did became such a huge success.

sure it’s normal that game companies such as nintendo also have to take inspirations from other game companies,BUT the saddest part is ,what other game companies did become forgotten over the years,as a result,most people will think that most early nintendo games become fully original ideas from nintendo itself and most people will only remember the nes and think that it was an fully original idea from nintendo,BUT once you will dive deeper into the history of videogames before 1985 and 1983, you will know otherwise,

does this mean that i am no longer love nintendo? WRONG, i will alway’s love and remember nintendo for what they were,BUT i can’t denie that since i discovered that for instance nintendo games were also on other systems such as atari game consoles,i will look with a different glass at the history of gaming,

 

Fair enough.

[Tanooki]

No doubt about Nintendo batteries as they’re nuts.  Done the same not having touched some SPs for awhile and boom just fine. 
 

More on point I outright dismiss anyone who challenges touch gaming is ok on control as it’s a deluded lie when the game wasn’t sourced for touch only or minimally came there first.  Converted control with no sense of hand position for buttons and stick are just neither good or as accurate. And yup. Selling bits of gsmes and Iap etc is terrible. I get the why but I’d argue make a better game and try harder. 

[johannesmutlu]

For decades i never knoew that atari games appeared on the nes and that nintendo games also did appear on atari systems including the atari 7800,

 

also i never knew that atari games appeared on the sega mark 3/master system,such as paperboy,however sega games never appear on the atari 7800(probably becayse sega wanted to compeat against them and nintendo)

BUT i still found it remarkible why atari’s paperboy did at average appear on both the nes & master system but not on the atari 7800,may ask why,did atari gave up too fast on their 7800 system?

 

 

[johannesmutlu]

And Last but not least now let’s put into a different perspective and imagine if you only played atari games on a nintendo nes and nintendo games only on a atari 7800 system,am curious what kind of experience that would,ve be,would you have liked the atari 7800 more or would you still have liked the nes more,even if you didn’t knew any better about other games on the nes??

i am sure that if i only played atari games on the nes and played nintendo games on the atari 7800 and didn’t knew any better,i probably would,ve liked the atari 7800 over the nes😁🤣

[Austin]

13 hours ago, johannesmutlu said:

i still found it remarkible why atari’s paperboy did at average appear on both the nes & master system but not on the atari 7800,may ask why,did atari gave up too fast on their 7800 system?

At this point in time, Atari the *arcade* company was completely separate/unrelated to Atari the *console/computer* company. Don't get the two confused.

[johannesmutlu]

7 hours ago, Austin said:

At this point in time, Atari the *arcade* company was completely separate/unrelated to Atari the *console/computer* company. Don't get the two confused.

 

19 hours ago, johannesmutlu said:

And Last but not least now let’s put into a different perspective and imagine if you only played atari games on a nintendo nes and nintendo games only on a atari 7800 system,am curious what kind of experience that would,ve be,would you have liked the atari 7800 more or would you still have liked the nes more,even if you didn’t knew any better about other games on the nes??

i am sure that if i only played atari games on the nes and played nintendo games on the atari 7800 and didn’t knew any better,i probably would,ve liked the atari 7800 over the nes😁🤣

 

[johannesmutlu]

On 4/3/2023 at 11:13 PM, mbd39 said:

The SG-1000 was originally supposed to compete against the Famicom and was underpowered being like a Colecovision.

 

The Sega Master System was technically superior but didn't have the games when it came to the American market. I know that anti-competitive practices from Nintendo had something to do with this. Nintendo got there first after the crash and made the rules.

 

Atari 7800 had shitty sound, low resolution graphics, shitty controllers, and few decent games compared to the NES or even SMS. At least there's Atari 2600 backwards compatibility.

 

Being first doesn't always mean best. Hydlide compared to Zelda is lol. Why even bring up stuff like the Atari 5200 unless you're just trying to cram as much into a shitty post as possible.

 

 

 

 

That’s indeed true,what comes first doesn’t mean to be always best,it can flop either too,but even if a game dies flop for whatever reason,it still can lead to inspirations by other companies, redefine it’s concepts and turn ‘their rip off’ of it to become the best ‘alternative’ game,but still,i think all those flopped or forgotten games whose leaded to inspirations by other companies, do deserves their place in gaming history in my opinion,whether it’s space panic,sega head on,hydlide,pac land etc,,, because those games formed the inspiration for the better games of it in retrospect,

[r_chase]

Did you really just necro this thread 9 months later?

Why are you still mad? It's just game console.

[johannesmutlu]

2 hours ago, r_chase said:

Did you really just necro this thread 9 months later?

Why are you still mad? It's just game console.

Well i don’t really have to and i am not mad or anything at all, but i do like to ansure some unansured old questions often times, also i do find it interesting to find massages in my treats wich slipped from my radar, just to find out how other peoples do think about it whether they are in line with me or not at all or discovering my oversights in my unreversible sentences or spelling issues etc,,, Just out if curiousity, that’s all,nothing more nothing less🤣 

[r_chase]

13 minutes ago, johannesmutlu said:

Well i don’t really have to and i am not mad or anything at all, but i do like to ansure some unansured old questions often times, also i do find it interesting to find massages in my treats wich slipped from my radar, just to find out how other peoples do think about it whether they are in line with me or not at all or discovering my oversights in my unreversible sentences or spelling issues etc,,, Just out if curiousity, that’s all,nothing more nothing less🤣 

Okay, if you say so.

[Atariboy]

Do you often find massages in your treats?

[+GoldLeader]

10 hours ago, Atariboy said:

Do you often find massages in your treats?

 

I think it's the other way around 🫢

[khaibitgfx]

NES had Mario Bros, Legend of Zelda, all that really mattered.

[dudeguy]

A lot of a company's success comes down to marketing. I wasn't around when the NES came out but maybe they just ran a really good ad campaign. I look at all those pre-NES consoles and just go "blecccchhh!!!" To me, the system just made sense. Simple design, sleek exterior, good graphics (for its time)

 

Nintendo basically dominated the market from 1985 until 1991 or so when the Genesis picked up steam with Sonic. And id argue still basically stayed the market leader until the Playstation came out

[Tanooki]

I was, in 1985 I was 7 going on 8 by the time I got it for Christmas that year.  The 1985 period was basically quiet, like history has shown since as overly written about they didn't pitch to consumers, they pitched to deceive largely to retailers going so far as to make it a VCR looking front loader with a trojan horse named ROB since robots were the hottest thing at the time, and as a toy which they'd fully refund if it didn't sell.  There were a few brochures and print ads in papers parents would largely alone see, it wasn't until 1986 and into the depths of it and leading into that Christmas it got you wanting to be Playing with Power on those TV spots, ads in kids mags, store displays, etc.  Coupled with their at the time wise choice of limited releases, checking (somewhat) for utter 1983 causing re-hash level of turds, and making contracts to keep third parties loyal up to X time period with content drove home a feeding frenzy of it was Nintendo or you kind of sucked as a kid who wanted home games.  Despite the Sega snark, then umitigated lies eventually in ads going into the 90s, you're right @dudeguy in the NA region they still were king, king enough even if you had something else odds are the unknowing mom would tell you still to turn your Nintendo off and wasn't until PS1 they got nailed out of that top spot.  Sega for a window had them by the balls as far as market share goes and going hard on them earlier on despite some utter bangers, but when 1994 came into swing and beyond with Super Metroid, Final Fantasy III, DKC1, KI, and so on...Sega's ticket was punched and they just went more into a sustain and survival mode making even better stuff for their even more looking/sounding aging hardware.  I enjoy both, use both, but I never did drink Sega's kool-aid and came in on that in the late 90s and ever since.

[dudeguy]

2 hours ago, Tanooki said:

I was, in 1985 I was 7 going on 8 by the time I got it for Christmas that year.  The 1985 period was basically quiet, like history has shown since as overly written about they didn't pitch to consumers, they pitched to deceive largely to retailers going so far as to make it a VCR looking front loader with a trojan horse named ROB since robots were the hottest thing at the time, and as a toy which they'd fully refund if it didn't sell.  There were a few brochures and print ads in papers parents would largely alone see, it wasn't until 1986 and into the depths of it and leading into that Christmas it got you wanting to be Playing with Power on those TV spots, ads in kids mags, store displays, etc.  Coupled with their at the time wise choice of limited releases, checking (somewhat) for utter 1983 causing re-hash level of turds, and making contracts to keep third parties loyal up to X time period with content drove home a feeding frenzy of it was Nintendo or you kind of sucked as a kid who wanted home games.  Despite the Sega snark, then umitigated lies eventually in ads going into the 90s, you're right @dudeguy in the NA region they still were king, king enough even if you had something else odds are the unknowing mom would tell you still to turn your Nintendo off and wasn't until PS1 they got nailed out of that top spot.  Sega for a window had them by the balls as far as market share goes and going hard on them earlier on despite some utter bangers, but when 1994 came into swing and beyond with Super Metroid, Final Fantasy III, DKC1, KI, and so on...Sega's ticket was punched and they just went more into a sustain and survival mode making even better stuff for their even more looking/sounding aging hardware.  I enjoy both, use both, but I never did drink Sega's kool-aid and came in on that in the late 90s and ever since.

I don't feel like the market at the time could sustain 3 major competing consoles. It was either the kiddie console (Nintendo) or the grown up console (Sony). Where did Sega fit into that equation? They competed with Sony and Sony was just able to dominate the market with better third party support. It's amazing that even today there are still 3 competing consoles. Though I think these days it seems to be coming down to Nintendo and Sony, once again. Most people I talk to are Playstation gamers, and most casual gamers have the Switch.