What was second to the NES?

[NovaXpress]

Warner killed the 5200 after Xmas 1984. The reamining stock was available from a couple of mail order companies, possibly a retailer or two up until around 1988. I got Choplifter off such a mail order catalog.

 

The TG-16 occupied a dead zone between 8 and 16 but systems. Like the 3DO, it was a financial failure in both generations.

[Paranoid]

Yeah, the 5200 was long since a dead concern when the 7800, NES and SMS showed up on the market.

 

For my part, I remember seeing the 7800 all over, and just rolling my eyes. I think the add-on modules for the Intellivision, 5200, and Colecovision, as well as the not-quite 100% compatibles like the Gemini were part of the problem. I just didn't have faith in the 7800s backwards compatability and as a 7800 itself their library just wasn't compelling at all. During that period I had a C=128 and a NES... but even when the Atari 7800 started showing on DEEP discount I walked right by it. I'm not sure where it was... JC Penny's, or Sears, or KayBee, or Toys R Us... but I have a vivid memory of walking by an end-aisle just LOADED with 7800 systems that were basically being given away and having a *moment* of weakness before some cynical bastard inside of me went, "you would be better of buying a single GAME for your NES than wasting a dime on that dinosaur".

 

My buddy had a SMS... and... it basically sucked. It looked cheap, the games were mostly really "BAD Engrish" ports... a lot of them seemed more like interactive demos than actual games... I guess the graphics were ok... some rudimentary cut scenes and graphics somewhere between a C=64 and VGA... but, it just felt flat. It was just *odd*. I know for sure I never played a game that made me go, "man, I MUST have one of these at home".

[Danno]

The NES sold more, due to better/more marketing but that's the only advantage it had. The SMS was clearly a better machine in every sense, graphically, audibly, and complexity of games. NES was a cheap redux of Colecovision. Flickering graphics, terrible sound, and too damn many horrible games. Oh yeah - and after about 2 months of use, you needed to use a cleaning kit on it every time you used it just to get it to start.

[vdub_bobby]

The NES sold more, due to better/more marketing but that's the only advantage it had. The SMS was clearly a better machine in every sense, graphically, audibly, and complexity of games. NES was a cheap redux of Colecovision. Flickering graphics, terrible sound, and too damn many horrible games. Oh yeah - and after about 2 months of use, you needed to use a cleaning kit on it every time you used it just to get it to start.

[jbanes]

NES was a cheap redux of Colecovision.

How odd. As it so happens, I was just amusing myself over the fact that the SMS was nothing more than a ColecoVision with a souped up VDP and sound system.

[Foxsolo2000]

At the risk of sounding a total dunce what was the Tg-16?

[vdub_bobby]

TurboGrafx16 (spelling may be way off).

[Bruce Tomlin]

I was just amusing myself over the fact that the SMS was nothing more than a ColecoVision with a souped up VDP and sound system.

"nothing more than"? After looking over documentation about it, I think they did quite a nice job of "souping it up". 16-color mode everywhere, more sprites per line (and no need to overlay multiple 1-color sprites), and a full bus on the cartridge port to support bankswitching and RAM. All of which were major improvements over the ColecoVision.

 

The problem wasn't the technology; technically I don't see anything to call the NES better than the SMS. And it looks to me like it would be easier to program, too. It was all a matter of software and marketing that cause the NES to win.

[DracIsBack]

I was just amusing myself over the fact that the SMS was nothing more than a ColecoVision with a souped up VDP and sound system.

"nothing more than"? After looking over documentation about it, I think they did quite a nice job of "souping it up". 16-color mode everywhere, more sprites per line (and no need to overlay multiple 1-color sprites), and a full bus on the cartridge port to support bankswitching and RAM. All of which were major improvements over the ColecoVision.

 

The problem wasn't the technology; technically I don't see anything to call the NES better than the SMS. And it looks to me like it would be easier to program, too. It was all a matter of software and marketing that cause the NES to win.

 

 

I'm pretty sure the NES has superior sound to the SMS>

[Bruce Tomlin]

I'm pretty sure the NES has superior sound to the SMS>

Unless the sound was just totally bad in the first place, like the 7800, it shouldn't matter much. It doesn't do much for the gameplay. And neither had FM sound in their US versions.

[jbanes]

After looking over documentation about it, I think they did quite a nice job of "souping it up".

No argument here. My only point is that it's silly to support the SMS by calling the NES a ColecoVision ripoff, when that was exactly what that SMS was. The NES was a custom design that had a lot more in common with the Ataris than it did with the ColecoVision.

[Bruce Tomlin]

No argument here. My only point is that it's silly to support the SMS by calling the NES a ColecoVision ripoff, when that was exactly what that SMS was. The NES was a custom design that had a lot more in common with the Ataris than it did with the ColecoVision.

Ah, I missed the reference up there. The SMS was much closer to the ColecoVision than the NES could ever hope to be. And in fact, with a bit of work (mostly changing ports and copying ROM routines), and no effort toward PBC compatibility, CV games can be directly ported to the SMS. It's even got the same sound chip.

 

The NES PPU was clearly inspired by the TMS9918 design, but they went off and did their own thing.