
Generation Nintendo - danso
http://www.filfre.net/2016/04/generation-nintendo/
======
nzonbi
I remember the first time that I played Super Mario bros on the NES. I was so
absolutely blown away, that words don't make justice. I had previous
experience with many consoles and computer games. But this thing -Mario Bros-
was so incredibly well designed, that it was beyond unbelievable. This little
box, packing this strange, exotic world, full of inexplicable, surprising
creatures and devices. With many different areas full of mysteries. Reinforced
by the perplexing, hypnotizing music. I still can clearly hear it. The amazing
sound effects. I can still clearly hear the sound of entering a pipe, and
descending into the underground. The amount of engaging and continually fresh
motion, required to overcome the always changing obstacles, was absolutely
unequaled at the time.

There were moments that I would be idle, pondering how it was possible to pack
so much brilliant design on a thing. I would then be also tremendously
impressed by other games of the time, notably Zelda and Super Mario Bros 3.
That I would become a big fan of Japanese game design for life. Investigating
and following the individual game creators. Since then, I slowly noticed that
the Japanese, and some Asians, have a unique sensibility that gives their
games a peculiar flavor. Many people -mainly westerns- don't resonate with
this peculiar uniqueness, that rarely exist in western games. And that is ok,
just interesting. It is like they can achieve a laser focus on a particular
set of simple, essential human emotions. It can be found on how they draw
things, the stories that write, etc. That particularly inspires some people.

For many people, Nintendo games of the time were so dramatically better
designed, compared to the standards of the time, that they were like gold
compared to the others dirt. That was an important factor, possibly the
biggest, in the creation of the generation Nintendo. It is very interesting to
know what were the conditions and events, that allowed Nintendo the company,
to come up with these absolutely brilliant products at the time. That allowed
it to achieve legendary status among so many people.

~~~
Danieru
There is a risk of oriential mysticism when talking about japan's game design
sense. Yet it is a real thing. Japan has a different game design culture which
grew during the 80's and 90's. Japan's game designers almost never speak or
read english. Entire companies are isolated. So you have isolated game
designers working in an isolated country. This has led to several unique
understandings of how games should be developed.

Some of the ideas just seem wrong to my foreign experience. A designer might
say "this is easier for the player to understand", as he suggests something
which seems to me 100% opaque and blackbox. There are fundamental differences
to how a japanese mega-corp develops a video game.

~~~
wingerlang
> Yet it is a real thing.

Doesn't seem like a "game design sense" anymore than the fact that they have
an isolated culture and their games simply resonate within this culture.

We all know the 'asian websites' thing which is spoken about a lot. Their
websites look like shit to use, but to them it is simply the better way.

Nothing "mystic" about it, it is simply how they do stuff.

At least this is what I think.

~~~
unabst
> Their websites look like shit to use,

No no no... It's just that good web design is simply hard to find. No one is
proud of these "asian websites". And it takes a while for updated good design
practices to make it across the shore. Here is a decent site:

[http://www.jp.playstation.com/psnow/](http://www.jp.playstation.com/psnow/)

And for the record, a shitty "asian" one:

[http://www.rakuten.co.jp/](http://www.rakuten.co.jp/)

~~~
lmm
That second one looks a lot more usable. Reminds me of the old Ebay or Amazon
homepages back when they were growing really big - lots of links making it
easy to find whatever you wanted, maybe not beautiful according to some
arbitrary aesthetic but very functional.

~~~
unabst
Regardless of whether it's usable, "reminds" is right. Rakuten is a huge
modern forward-looking company, yet this is the best they can do. It's
basically a classifieds of clickbait.

------
0x0
The lockout chip mentioned is detailed in wikipedia:
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIC_(Nintendo)#10NES](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/CIC_\(Nintendo\)#10NES)

Some highlights include unlicensed cartridges using a "voltage spike" to knock
out the chip, and the patent expiring in 2006.

------
chipsy
W/R to "What If's", I think the big one is "What If Atari Were Stronger/More
Focused". They tried to grow into a "manufacturing conglomerate" rather than a
"consumer design" company. It misused their original branding and culture. For
this the Warner acquisition deserves a large share of the blame, even as it
seemed necessary for financing the VCS launch. Either way, by the time the
company was at its most profitable, it was already rotten from mismanagement.

Had they found a path towards a more contemporary-Apple-like management style,
and some foresight for the third-party situation and the console lifecycle,
they would have broken away from the scattershot focus, released a good, DRM-
protected, backwards-compatible update to the VCS in the early 80's instead of
the half-baked 5200/7800 efforts, insulated themselves from the arcade crash
with original console software, and starved Nintendo's air supply at retail.

They might have even still released computers, just of a different sort -
perhaps they would have kept Jay Miner's team and had an Atari-branded Amiga,
with a console version released soon after(c. 1985-86) instead of 8 years
later(CD32 - 1993).

------
nickpsecurity
This is amazing. It's one of those moments where actions of a single person
change the course of history in a better way. I mean, I'm sure American
companies might disagree. ;) Yet, I'm glad they showed up knocking down our
industries' garbage with higher quality or effectiveness. It was a nice,
reality check whose individual cases could've been endured and/or countered
earlier if American executives weren't so arrogant. For auto's and such, that
is, as Nintendo's offering was pretty forward-thinking.

More amazing is the founder also invented the Raman concept and motels
dedicated to pimping in a small span of time. Plus, really cool toys.
Innovative guy and company. Very unique.

EDIT: Forgot to add a piece about absolutely hating Nintendo for their
contribution to DRM and lock-in. Sometimes I want innovators to think less.
Bunch of A-holes. ;)

~~~
teknologist
With no/weak DRM you get the fate of the Dreamcast!

~~~
nickpsecurity
I thought it died because it was weak technically and in terms of publishers
vs next gen stuff right around the corner. Nobody I knew wanted a Dreamcast
with PS2 and Nintendos about to come out plus hardly any good games. May just
be anecdotal though.

~~~
ZenoArrow
> "plus hardly any good games"

Of course this is purely subjective, but in my opinion the Dreamcast had one
of the strongest game line ups of any console, especially considering that it
was only a mainstream platform for a couple of years. Shenmue 1+2, Soul
Calibur, Power Stone 1+2, Crazy Taxi 1+2, Jet Set Radio, Virtua Tennis 1+2,
Street Fighter 3 (all three versions), Marvel Vs Capcom 2, Phantasy Star
Online, Rez, etc... Was a great system, particularly if you enjoyed arcade-
style gaming.

~~~
nickpsecurity
Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy, Mario, WWF No Mercy/Smackdown, Mortal Kombat,
the sports games... What genre defining and blockbuster games did it have? We
don't need better-looking versions of a few good ones. It had those but
couldn't justify price on that. Playstation and N64 had way more value for
money in terms of content, esp original.

Plus, did it play _all your old games_? That was a nice selling point of PS2's
although not strictly necessary.

~~~
ZenoArrow
> "What genre defining and blockbuster games did it have?"

When you say 'genre defining and blockbuster', are you referring to the
quality of the games or how much they sold?

If you base quality on how many copies were sold, then you're not going to
find what you're looking for. If you base them on the quality of the
experience, then you will find what you're looking for.

Consider the fighting game genre. What games in the 3D fighting genre were the
equal of Soul Calibur at the time of release? The N64 had very limited choices
in this regard (I had an N64 too, so I remember this well, best option was
probably Fighters Destiny). The PlayStation had some decent 3D fighters, but
again nothing I would favourably compare to Soul Calibur. Even the Playstation
2 didn't have anything I'd put above it within its first year (Tekken Tag
Tournament was okay, as was Dead or Alive 2, though the Dreamcast had Dead or
Alive 2 as well).

I could go through a bunch of other high quality games that the Dreamcast had,
but unless you've played them I doubt you'll believe me about how good they
were.

~~~
nickpsecurity
"If you base them on the quality of the experience, then you will find what
you're looking for."

Maybe both given nobody buying it might say something. Spreading like wild
fire with people buying the consoles just to play the game... as was common
with Nintendo and Playstation... would definitely say something. So, quantity
matters. We can focus on quality, though.

"What games in the 3D fighting genre were the equal of Soul Calibur at the
time of release?"

My memory problem is hurting me here as it's a gap. I do recall playing it and
even bought strategy guide for artwork. I used to collect them for best games
even if I couldn't afford the system/game. I recall really liking it. Tekken,
esp Tekken 2, was the genre-definer in that one having come first, done 3D,
and versatile style of gameplay. I played the crap out of Tekken 2 but did
marvel at Soulcaliber's weapons and extra gameplay.

Note: Interesting enough, the same team developed Tekken and Soulcalibur.

"I could go through a bunch of other high quality games that the Dreamcast
had, but unless you've played them I doubt you'll believe me about how good
they were."

Less imagination than usual, buddy. It's called YouTube and Google. :P Just
list a few in different categories along with their predecessor or mainstream
alternative on other consoles. I can see Dreamcast (or just coding)
improvements by looking at both. Then, I can assess whether it was barely
better, a substantial improvement, or gamechangingly better.

To start with, I looked up Tekken 2 and Soulcalibur on Youtube on original,
release consoles. Nice nostalgia moment. Tekken 2 looked like it ran on a
system with barely any 3D hardware and tiny CPU. ;) Did have strong variety in
fighting styles, particle effects, difficult gameplay, and some 3D movement.

Now, Dreamcast was 128-bit instead of 32-bit, had almost 10x CPU speed, 15x
polygons/sec, 8x RAM, 8x VRAM, and extra dedicated hardware. This was quantum
leap in performance. Just the character screen shows the difference. To fight,
characters look 3D for real with smooth animations and extra particle effects.
Movement, plus cameras, in 3D was better. Use of combinations was smoother.
Characters seemed to have less variety but seems to replace it with weapon use
variety.

Doing comparisons, Soulcaliber looks like a team started with Tekken on way
better hardware then improved a few parts of its gameplay. It looks like a
Tekken expansion pack rather than a gamechanger. A beautiful expansion that
corrects significant deficiencies. Gotta pass on this one, though. Tekken's on
PSX were game changers for 3D given style that continued to be imitated,
number of original aspects, and sales volume. I'm impressed that Soulcaliber
perfecting that style got it perfect scores by reviewers.

What else you got? Whether I agree or not on impact it might be fun looking at
them. Especially those I never got to play. Like when I watched Nightwarrior
videos for the Saturn wishing I had it given all the neat artwork and moves.
:)

~~~
ZenoArrow
> "It looks like a Tekken expansion pack rather than a gamechanger."

> "What else you got?"

I have a feeling anything I can come up with you will call an expansion (or
something along those lines) to an older game you liked. It's a cop out. For
example, Tekken wasn't the first 3D fighter, Virtua Fighter came first, so you
could say Tekken was a variation on Virtua Fighter rather than looking at it
on its own merits. Do you see why this type of historical argument can rob
games of their own merits? For example, Soul Calibur pioneered 8-way running
in fighting games, previous games relied on sidesteps and other small
movements, even the previous game in the series (Soul Edge, a.k.a. Soul
Blade). However, this style of movement completely changes the dynamics of the
gameplay. In other words, if you boil a game down to its basic appearance, you
can miss the wood for the trees.

To give another example of this, consider the party system in the Street
Fighter 3 series (Street Fighter 3: 3rd Strike is the most polished of this
series, but the previous two had the same mechanic). This apparently simple
change to Street Fighter radically changes the tactics available in game. On
the surface it looks inconsequential, but instead it was the biggest change to
Street Fighter gameplay since the invention of the combo.

If you want some more trips down memory lane, look up Shenmue, Phantasy Star
Online and Rez. A simple explanation of Shenmue is 'Virtua Fighter RPG', but
again that misses the point of the experience. I believe Phantasy Star Online
was the first ever online console RPG. Rez is a rails shooter, a lot of the
pleasure comes from the way the sound and visuals are synchronised with each
other.

~~~
nickpsecurity
"I have a feeling anything I can come up with you will call an expansion (or
something along those lines) to an older game you liked. It's a cop out. For
example, Tekken wasn't the first 3D fighter, Virtua Fighter came first, so you
could say Tekken was a variation on Virtua Fighter rather than looking at it
on its own merits."

Memory loss kicked in here: forgot Virtua Fighter's details since I didn't
play it. Further research showed it wasn't just the first (knew that). It had
all the key innovations in it that others, including Tekken, copied. So,
Virtua Fighter is the game-changer or prime innovator here with Tekken's
improvements how it went very mainstream. Soulcaliber improved on Tekken 2 to
make it the first one with totally smooth experience. Correction accepted. :)

EDIT: Another in this lineage, same company and year as Soulcalibur, was
Ergheiz. It came out before or right with Soulcalibur on PSX limited hardware.
It was a bit weird but quite unique. It had Final Fantasy characters on top of
others, weapons, 3D environments, moving levels, use of environment as weapon
MAYBE (memory...), upper floors, and movement all over. Also, RPG built into
it from Square. Movement and blocking sucked. Really weird. 1st fight shows
style & range of movement with 3rd showing multiplatform. Talk about ultra-3D.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSvLCDxvcrU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSvLCDxvcrU)

"Soul Calibur pioneered 8-way running in fighting games"

I gave it credit for that. This affect was already in other kinds of games,
including my first one for PSX: WCW vs the World. You could run toward any
corner or any rope (8 ways). Applying and enhancing something in other games
to a new genre is clever. Definitely changed the dynamics a lot. It wasn't
going from Street Fighter or Mortal Kombat to Virtua Fighter or Tekken. Or
going from 2D wrestling matches with 4-way movement to WVWvW with 3D graphics
and 8-way movement. See the difference?

EDIT: Remembered Ergheiz after I wrote the above. So, maybe Soulcalibur
pioneered multi-way movement and maybe other one did. You could run, jump, or
fly about anywhere in Ehrgeiz just not as smooth mechanics. Soulcalibur
improved on and mainstreamed it either way. Both were published by Namco. So,
who knows on that.

"consider the party system in the Street Fighter 3 series (Street Fighter 3:
3rd Strike is the most polished of this series, but the previous two had the
same mechanic). This apparently simple change to Street Fighter radically
changes the tactics available in game. "

I agree. That's a bigger one. Wrestling games, a variant of fighting games,
had Tag Team matches going back to the Wrestlemania games in early 90's. They
get the innovation there. It was also a distinctly wrestling concept, too,
given you would get a WWF or WCW reply if you said "match where teams fight
and you tag them in one at a time" to average person watching TV or playing
games. So, you've listed two that came out of 3D and 2D wrestling games
respectively.

"I believe Phantasy Star Online was the first ever online console RPG."

Diablo, which it drew on, is the prime innovator in that space. Consoles
didn't have internet at all or worth a damn before Dreamcast. Nonetheless, you
chose a great example here because nobody believed online RPG's were worth it
on consoles. They both delivered one and got console gamers into the online
service model. Plus expanded market huge for Diablo-like games into consoles.
I give this one credit as a game-changer in its niche. Maybe in industry in
general tying in consoles to online services. Baby steps toward Xbox Live and
such, wouldn't you say?

"Shenmue and Rez"

Out of time for today given fair videos take time to dig up and watch. ;)
They're on my list. I plan to get some vids on Phantasy Star, too, as I forgot
the visuals. You got any others you heard were game-changing or way ahead of
their time on Dreamcast?

~~~
ZenoArrow
> ""consider the party system in the Street Fighter 3 series (Street Fighter
> 3: 3rd Strike is the most polished of this series, but the previous two had
> the same mechanic). This apparently simple change to Street Fighter
> radically changes the tactics available in game. "

I agree. That's a bigger one. Wrestling games, a variant of fighting games,
had Tag Team matches going back to the Wrestlemania games in early 90's. They
get the innovation there. It was also a distinctly wrestling concept, too,
given you would get a WWF or WCW reply if you said "match where teams fight
and you tag them in one at a time" to average person watching TV or playing
games. So, you've listed two that came out of 3D and 2D wrestling games
respectively."

Sorry, this is a misunderstanding due to autocorrect on my phone. When I said
party I meant parry. Here's a famous video showing the parry system at work,
as you can see it has nothing to do with wrestling games.

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JzS96auqau0](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JzS96auqau0)

Also, regarding 8-way run coming from wrestling games, they aren't the same
mechanic. In early wrestling games you need to press a run button to run, and
when you do your potential moveset changes. Furthermore, your run is not
relative to the other player but rather relative to the ring. This all gives
it a completely different feel.

Lastly, Soul Calibur is not in the same lineage as Tekken. As I've already
said, Soul Calibur was the sequel to Soul Edge. It's a completely different
game series.

>"You got any others you heard were game-changing or way ahead of their time
on Dreamcast?"

Before I answer that question, please answer this, do you know of any games
that were game-changing or way ahead of their time on PlayStation 1?

~~~
nickpsecurity
"When I said party I meant parry. Here's a famous video showing the parry
system at work, as you can see it has nothing to do with wrestling games."

That was an awesome vid. The parry system did change the fighting game dynamic
a lot. Wrestling games, including WCW vs World, had counter moves for various
strikes and grapples. I don't recall them making opponent go backward to
deliver arbitrary, normal move. So, SF3's parry's are either original or an
enhancement on wrestling counters. Definitely innovative for that kind of
audience.

"Also, regarding 8-way run coming from wrestling games, they aren't the same
mechanic. In early wrestling games you need to press a run button to run, and
when you do your potential moveset changes. Furthermore, your run is not
relative to the other player but rather relative to the ring. This all gives
it a completely different feel."

That is true. It's why I added Ehrgeiz whose movement makes Soulcalibur look
really limited. Maybe I'm misremembering it, though. Look at link below.
Scroll past character descriptions to section IV: "basic moves and fighting
techniques."

[http://www.gamefaqs.com/ps/197216-ehrgeiz/faqs/4749](http://www.gamefaqs.com/ps/197216-ehrgeiz/faqs/4749)

You'll see it had full, 8-way, arbitrary movement with 360 degree attack
angles possible. Also crouching behind stuff in level, jumping on level,
weapons, rolling, ground attacks, counters, tech hits, and instant 180's. It
lacked the smooth flow and ease of use of Soulcalibur as players had to, a la
Tekken, face the opponent's attack and direction precisely to counter it. So,
you felt mastery when gameplay looked like a Soul game.

"Lastly, Soul Calibur is not in the same lineage as Tekken. As I've already
said, Soul Calibur was the sequel to Soul Edge. It's a completely different
game series."

The old making of soulcalibur writeup said the Tekken 2 team helped make it.
It's why I thought it was a sequel to Tekken at first. The SC and TK2 team
worked together on it. Presumably reused techniques in codebase from TK2 since
they clearly weren't doing the artwork. That's speculation but SC was a team
effort that included TK2 team. It's a joint lineage even if separate mechanics
and artwork. Don't know why it bothers you as it's more like a good FOSS
partly forks or works with another good FOSS to create a perfect-rated FOSS. I
plan to replay it in future just cuz you had me look it up.

"Before I answer that question, please answer this, do you know of any games
that were game-changing or way ahead of their time on PlayStation 1?"

Metal Gear Solid. Whole volumes written about playing in a movie, enemies'
reactions to things, clever ploys by designers, stealth aspect... whole
package. Landmark work that only a few tried (and failed) to copy.

WCWvsWorld or WCWvsNWO. Came out same year with similar mechanics including
8-way movement (ring-based as you said), grappling system, counter moves, team
matches, weapons from crowd, and so on. NWO probably the innovator here. No
Mercy and others copied it. WWF Smackdown would later take 3D wrestling back
to fast-moving, high-flying, crazy roots in arcade games. Then, PSX vs N64
debates re their various games were more accurately New PSX vs Old PSX styles
but N64 people pled ignorance of WCWvNWO or WCWvW. ;)

Twisted Metal. There's racing games. There's destruction games. There's 3D
world games. This combined all three into what I guess was a new genre as
people acted like they never saw it before.

Final Fantasy VII. I never played others before it on console so can't say
anything to mechanics. Yet, combo of deep story, character development, and
custom, classical score matched to events in game made a powerful impression I
had never encountered in another game. That combo seems unique, esp leveraging
classical for emotional impact. So, it's a maybe but I'm not certain.

Resident Evil. Characters, interesting plot, puzzles, unusual game mechanics,
and scary kills pioneered survival horror genre in consoles.

Sports. I recall Playstation had some of first, sports games like NBA that
mimicked life-like stuff instead of arcade stuff. I'm not sure if it was first
on this but it was first I saw that reminded me of real-life.

Alright. There's a start. Feel free to accept or shoot them down with
counterexamples.

------
studentrob
Wow cool, so Nintendo survived because the US didn't bomb Kyoto.

I hope we never see that kind of destruction again.

BTW, I bicycled around Kyoto once and could not find any trash, even a straw
wrapper. The Kyoto protocol is aptly named. I highly recommend visiting there
if you have a chance.

~~~
ekianjo
Its not just kyoto that does not have trash. Most of places in Japan are very
clean (if you dont look too much)

~~~
joshschreuder
I'm visiting at the moment and agree. For a place with so few trash cans it's
remarkably free of trash.

------
silveira
Kyoto was spared from the atomic bomb because there was the place where the
secretary of war, Henry Stimson, stayed during his honeymoon.

[http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-33755182](http://www.bbc.com/news/world-
asia-33755182)

------
tboyd47
One thing I've appreciated more about Nintendo as I've grown older is the
culture war that was going on over Mario.

For example, no Mario game ever features Brooklyn, even once. Yet the American
movie and cartoon show are all about Mario being from Brooklyn. Then when
Mario 3 came out, not only is he not from Brooklyn, but he wears a cat suit
and turns into a Buddhist statue. That's a big f __*-you message to America
from Japan if I ever saw one. Pretty hilarious.

