Plus arcade perfect ports of Capcom fighting games that were heavily compromised elsewhere, a treasure trove of amazing 2D shmups, TONS of Japan only games...
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Wii U vs Sega Saturn, which “failed console” was worse for its company?
- Thread starter Deleted member 249
- Start date
Plus arcade perfect ports of Capcom fighting games that were heavily compromised elsewhere, a treasure trove of amazing 2D shmups, TONS of Japan only games...
It's the main reason, Dreamcast was awesome in most all respects. The problem is their image was irrefutably damaged by Sega CD > 32X > Nomad > Saturn. They could have released it at 99.99 with 4x the power of the PS2 and it wouldn't have mattered. Developers, retailers and the overall supply chain wasn't having anything to do with it as a whole. Customers still loved it though.
The Saturn had hundreds of games, certainly hundreds more than the N64 and a lot of them are amazing.
You should be ashamed for posting this.
Thread should maybe be changed to which console was the worst, or failed to live up to its potential or something, because the answer to the thread question is incredibly obvious. The Saturn did WAY more damage to it's parent company. Nintendo recovered really well with the Switch. Despite a decent showing with the Dreamcast the damage was already done to Sega in terms of being a console maker that people could trust.
No, Saturn was a complete failure in America and Europe. Like Vita level bombing, I believe it only sold around 2m total in the US.
Even still Sega cut support too soon in those regions and basically went 1-2 years with zero home console presence as a result given they'd decided to hold back western DC launch in order to lower manufacturing costs and build up it's library.
The Wii U is clearly one of Nintendo's biggest disappointments, but the way Sega tainted their hardware legacy with the Sega CD and 32X and then followed it up with a hilariously bungled launch of the Saturn is on whole different level of failure.
Yeah I know, I have tons of them and have argued in this thread and others that it is potentially the GOAT software library. Did you quote the wrong person?
No, your post made it sound like the Sega CD shouldn't be viewed as a failure because it had a lot of good games. I thought that was an odd metric given the quantity and quality of games on the Saturn, especially compared with the competition at the time.
Dreamcast has a lot of fan driven goodwill in retrospect but it was still a complete commercial failure. I mean yes it outsold Saturn in America and Europe, but to put things in perspective it also also worse than Wii U in those same markets. Saturn at least was a legit success in one market (Japan) and lost Sega less money overall than DC did.
My post was literally asking if the Mega CD was a financial failure because I knew it wasn't a failure from my end, so that's the only way it could have been viewed as one. Someone else posted that they sold tons of them, so I don't even know if it was a failure by any metric.
Right, but I still get enjoyment from my Saturn, that's definitely not the metric most use to determine if it was a failure. I wasn't arguing the Sega CD was a failure for consumers. I'm not sure how it did financially, but I know the general sentiment at the time was that Sega kept releasing hardware and then abandoning it - the Sega CD, whether a success or not, helped push that narrative.
The Sega CD was pretty much abandoned by Sega of Japan before it was by third-parties/SoA.
Got you. I've always thought the narrative that the Mega CD was a failure was an unfair one soley created because of the 32X, which was a failure in every conceivable way.
Saturn was the better console and has a better library but yeah obviously it was far worse for Sega than the Wii U was for Nintendo.
I was about to invest in a mega sg and MegaSD and when I asked people what limits there would be with that, people mentioned 32x games....which I still have no idea what I would want to play in that library. Knuckles Chaotix? And....?? I honestly don't know.
I always felt MCD was really a squandered opportunity by SOJ given how well NEC did with the CDROM2/Duo and how it gave PCE a second lease on life in the region. I feel like MCD could've transformed MD the same way but SOJ still threw all their prime stuff on carts and basically let the CD format die. Maybe because of how big MD was overseas they still prioritized carts?
To me Wii U was a bigger failure given it came after a huge success as the Wii and Nintendo completely misread the market. The Saturn was a better console too with much better third party support. Today a lot of people are fond of it, which will likely never happen with Wii U in the same way.
But on the other hand, Saturn was devastating for Sega while Nintendo, although losing money, were able to make a comeback.
But on the other hand, Saturn was devastating for Sega while Nintendo, although losing money, were able to make a comeback.
That and PCE-CD launched at 32,800 in 1988 with price drops/hybrid units to follow. The Sega CD in Japan launched at a whopping 49,800 in 1991. By the time of its release, it was competing with both a much cheaper CD system with an established fanbase of niche games and the Super Famicom both.
The good shit is:
Shadow Squadron
Virtua Racing DX
Kolibri
Chaotix is ok but I think it's the special stages that are really the best part of it. The main game is definitely a case where the whole is less than the sum of its parts.
Also a consolation prize to Zaxxon's Motherbase 2000, because it's kind of neat.
It's hard to say Saturn because that has a much better library than the Wii-U exclusive games. I love it to death.
I voted Wii-U because I think the 32X+Mega CD did more damage to Sega than the Saturn did. I believe Dreamcast's downfall was Sony's genius marketing. Not so much the Saturn.
I voted Wii-U because I think the 32X+Mega CD did more damage to Sega than the Saturn did. I believe Dreamcast's downfall was Sony's genius marketing. Not so much the Saturn.
how is this even a question? the saturn left sega with almost no money left for the dreamcast and tarnished sega's reputation even more. the wii u might have failed but nintendo made a ton of money with the wii and still managed to sell a lot of copies of their games on the wii u which helped offset any losses they might of had early in the wii u's life.
Yeah, it was a bit late and way too expensive but it also never got the 1st party software backing that their CD format did from Hudson and NEC Ave/Interchannel. Like imagine if Sonic 2, SOR2, Shinobi III, Phantasy Star IV, Puyo Puyo, etc had been CD games or at least gotten enhanced CD versions. Or even to draw a comparison to Nintendo with FDS, SOJ really just never committed to the format in way it needed imo.
GameCube was such a huge failure, Iwata said that if Wii hadn't been successful, Nintendo would have pulled out of the home console business. But Wii was a success (one of the most successful consoles of all time). And then WiiU was an even bigger failure than GameCube. But then Switch was a huge success.
Saturn was a failure, but it was followed up by the Dreamcast, not the Wii or Switch.
Nintendo's failures have been bailed out by successes. I know Dreamcast fanboys love to say that Dreamcast was a super-console which only failed because Saturn undermined it before it could launch (among other excuses), but that's not really true. Dreamcast was absolutely the wrong console to use to follow Saturn's failure. One only has to look at it's strategic placement against PS2 (after the PSX killed the Saturn) to see how bad of an idea the Dreamcast was (but it's not like Sega had any better ideas).
Saturn was bad for Sega, while WiiU was even worse for Nintendo. Switch saved Nintendo, while Dreamcast did not save Sega (quite the opposite, Dreamcast's failure provided the finishing blow to Sega).
Saturn was a failure, but it was followed up by the Dreamcast, not the Wii or Switch.
Nintendo's failures have been bailed out by successes. I know Dreamcast fanboys love to say that Dreamcast was a super-console which only failed because Saturn undermined it before it could launch (among other excuses), but that's not really true. Dreamcast was absolutely the wrong console to use to follow Saturn's failure. One only has to look at it's strategic placement against PS2 (after the PSX killed the Saturn) to see how bad of an idea the Dreamcast was (but it's not like Sega had any better ideas).
Saturn was bad for Sega, while WiiU was even worse for Nintendo. Switch saved Nintendo, while Dreamcast did not save Sega (quite the opposite, Dreamcast's failure provided the finishing blow to Sega).
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Star Wars Arcade, friend. That was a pretty sweet game. DOOM on 32X is also a decent version.
Tempo's an underrated platformer.
Space Harrier and After Burner were awesome at the time because it was the first time they were so close to the arcade originals but they have had even better ports since. They're still worth checking out if you want to play with a Genesis controller.
For the time:
After Burner Complete
Virtua Racing Deluxe
Virtua Fighter
Shadow Squadron
Zaxxon's Motherbase 2000
Wrestlemania : The Arcade Game (though this is a double edged sword, looks much nicer then snes/md, but at 30fps)
NBA Jam : Tournament Edition
Toughman Contest
Obv some of those ports aren't so hot compared to later ones.
Another reason I reckon this equivalency doesn't work is the financial size of the companies, even at the respective times. I can't find specific data for Sega at the time, but in 2014 -- in the midst of the Wii U's struggles -- Nintendo still had $14 billion in liquid currency. I remember it being reported back then that the company could sustain the type of losses it took for that year or two (out of its, at the time, 125-year history) for something like 50 consecutive years before it had to start selling assets.
Again, I don't know what Sega was working with circa 1995, but I think it's safe to assume the company was in nowhere near as good a position to sustain a failure as Nintendo, let alone the string of failures leading up to the Saturn. It's hard to compare a one-time market failure from a larger company -- who had a simultaneously successful hardware on the market, and even managed profitability during the Wii U era -- to a sustained streak of market failures from a smaller company.
Again, I don't know what Sega was working with circa 1995, but I think it's safe to assume the company was in nowhere near as good a position to sustain a failure as Nintendo, let alone the string of failures leading up to the Saturn. It's hard to compare a one-time market failure from a larger company -- who had a simultaneously successful hardware on the market, and even managed profitability during the Wii U era -- to a sustained streak of market failures from a smaller company.
Wow, you spent all that time writing that up, I mean one of these companies is still making consoles... 🤔
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Sega was worth $3.5 billion in 1994, so a $1 billion hit was obscene.
Sega killed Sega.
First-party games that couldn't match Nintendo first-party games' sales, weaker capacity to attract third-party support than Sony, access to the best hardware available at the time in the arcades but inability to create a good performance/cost effective for consumer space.
Many of the Sega management's decisions concerning their consumer division were very bad.
It's kind of hard to understate how royally Sega as a whole was screwed by Sega of Japan. All of Sega's biggest, most devastating blunders were because of them.
I've heard that too. Nintendo got to leave the Wii U era mostly in the black, and with two shiny new franchises (Splatoon and SMM) that begat best-selling sequels. That was more important to them than hemorrhaging money to sell a ton of hardware.
I've heard that too. Nintendo got to leave the Wii U era mostly in the black, and with two shiny new franchises (Splatoon and SMM) that begat best-selling sequels. That was more important to them than hemorrhaging money to sell a ton of hardware.
The Dreamcast would have been a success if it was launched by literally any other Manufacturer , even someone who had never released a console before.
Sega had built up far too much negativity from their mistakes.
The Saturn was a great system for the Japanese market and it performed really well there. But it fking up big time in the west and Sega of Japan literally didn't give a shit because "they" were winning.
Yeah, there you go. That's massive, relative to their size.
It's gamerankings top game for saturn. I'm all for discussing the topic and being corrected and learning from the topic. N64 has some of the best games of all time, and yes so does the PSX. Wii U also has some really damn good games, even if they have almost entirely ended up on Switch, it still has a great library.
Sega Saturn was the system that failed when Sega needed them the most. That was right when gaming was going to stop being "a toy" and become much more mainstream.
Sega needed a console that outputted 3D graphics, played the most of their popular arcade games, and brought their previous franchises into the third dimension, that was reasonably priced. What they got instead was a system that was a 2D powerhouse but was in practice horrible for 3D, played niche arcade games from other companies that nobody cared about, and didn't even migrate Sonic the Hedgehog, let alone their other franchises to the third dimension or even on the console at all.
Sega fixed almost all of this with the Dreamcast but it was too late. The console market already was established and Sony stole their audience. Contrary to popular belief the Sega Dreamcast was making some headway in the holiday of 2000 and even beyond, but Sega simply ran out of money to support it. If Sega launched a Dreamcast equivalent in the Saturn's place Sega could possibly be making consoles to this day.
The Wii U was also a disaster as it failed to answer the giant elephant in the room which was "what will Nintendo do now to keep up people's interest that the casual audience have ditched the Wii and handhelds?" To make things worse Nintendo also launched the Wii U in an awkward date, making the successor having to launch in the middle of the generation. Nintendo, being Nintendo, decided to take their lemons and make lemonade by making a hybrid console that could have its cake and eat it too.
That said, Nintendo had the time and money to make that R&D as while they were bleeding money during the Wii U era, it was just that...bleeding. Sega in contrast was gushing out blood from all of its limbs in debt. And a lot of that had to do with the failure of the Saturn and their arcades no longer being successful enough to cushion their blow.
This just highlights how timing mattered. When the Wii U hit, Nintendo was massive company thanks to being relevant throughout all gaming consoles to that point. Including the massive growth gaming had during the latter half of the 90s. Sega completely dropped the ball right when the market was about to explode, and tried to break back through after the market had grown so much. Yes the Dreamcast lost a lot of money, but if you want to go back after the 16-35 year old male market that was necessary. I mean look what Microsoft had to do just to make a DENT into the PS2 just in America. And again, the Dreamcast WAS technically not sinking anymore in January 2001. But Sega ran out of money. The Dreamcast sold more than the Wii U adjusted for dates as well if I recall, and that isn't taking into account of world population differences between the periods.
Sega needed a console that outputted 3D graphics, played the most of their popular arcade games, and brought their previous franchises into the third dimension, that was reasonably priced. What they got instead was a system that was a 2D powerhouse but was in practice horrible for 3D, played niche arcade games from other companies that nobody cared about, and didn't even migrate Sonic the Hedgehog, let alone their other franchises to the third dimension or even on the console at all.
Sega fixed almost all of this with the Dreamcast but it was too late. The console market already was established and Sony stole their audience. Contrary to popular belief the Sega Dreamcast was making some headway in the holiday of 2000 and even beyond, but Sega simply ran out of money to support it. If Sega launched a Dreamcast equivalent in the Saturn's place Sega could possibly be making consoles to this day.
The Wii U was also a disaster as it failed to answer the giant elephant in the room which was "what will Nintendo do now to keep up people's interest that the casual audience have ditched the Wii and handhelds?" To make things worse Nintendo also launched the Wii U in an awkward date, making the successor having to launch in the middle of the generation. Nintendo, being Nintendo, decided to take their lemons and make lemonade by making a hybrid console that could have its cake and eat it too.
That said, Nintendo had the time and money to make that R&D as while they were bleeding money during the Wii U era, it was just that...bleeding. Sega in contrast was gushing out blood from all of its limbs in debt. And a lot of that had to do with the failure of the Saturn and their arcades no longer being successful enough to cushion their blow.
This just highlights how timing mattered. When the Wii U hit, Nintendo was massive company thanks to being relevant throughout all gaming consoles to that point. Including the massive growth gaming had during the latter half of the 90s. Sega completely dropped the ball right when the market was about to explode, and tried to break back through after the market had grown so much. Yes the Dreamcast lost a lot of money, but if you want to go back after the 16-35 year old male market that was necessary. I mean look what Microsoft had to do just to make a DENT into the PS2 just in America. And again, the Dreamcast WAS technically not sinking anymore in January 2001. But Sega ran out of money. The Dreamcast sold more than the Wii U adjusted for dates as well if I recall, and that isn't taking into account of world population differences between the periods.
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Yeah I also don't really see the Saturn on the same level as Playstation or N64. It may be the superior console for fans of a certain niche but overall the competition had the vastly superior lineups. And the same goes for the Dreamcast. It couldn't rival Playstation and N64 when they were already old and it sure as shit was no match for PS2/Gamecube/XBox either.
