Comments 288

Re: "Not A Funko Pop In Sight" - Step Back In Time With This Amazing '90s Electronics Boutique Footage

Deuteros

I am just reading through 4 really early issues of Game Zone and first advert I see is for this company from an early 90s magazine nearly forgotten about...

Has Time Extension done an article on Special Reserve by any chance?

Actually seeing a full page Console Concepts from Newcastle Under Lyme advert plus listings with a shop front photo has brought back loads of memories.

Please do a large feature on the grey import scene in UK in 90s at some point in future...

Shekhana, Raven Games, Console Concepts, Dream Machines, Whizz Kid Games all the rest...

Re: "Not A Funko Pop In Sight" - Step Back In Time With This Amazing '90s Electronics Boutique Footage

Deuteros

@Sketcz Agreed the past was better not just nostalgia.

Just wasted 0.5 days of working week doing chasing around admin for a minor issue that would be solved on phone in 10 mins before smartphones...

I lived in South America in 2010s and it was like being transported back to the 90s. Malls of different varietys full of everything, game stores like this layout filled with modern and retro titles, indies and music plus vinyl shops...I loved it.

The difference, no online equivalents like Amazon carving out physical stores..

Re: "Not A Funko Pop In Sight" - Step Back In Time With This Amazing '90s Electronics Boutique Footage

Deuteros

In the UK I recall the likes of Comet, Virgin Megastores and Game Centres, Future Zones, Electronics Boutique, GAME, and Dixons plus tons of indies in the 90s...

In the USA you had KB Toys, Babbages Funcoland, EB, Tandy, Tower Records I am sure, Toys R Us and many others as well...

Games were everywhere way into mid 2000s

Golden era of physical retail now passed as UK consolidated into monopoly killing Gamestation through GAME and America mainstream contracted into Gamestop.

Such is retail with Amazon/Shopto/Play and modern commercial trends unfortunately...

Re: "Thanks To Everyone Who Played" - Donkey Kong Country And Banjo-Kazooie Designer Gregg Mayles Leaves Rare After 36 Years

Deuteros

@Masacheez

There is an excellent GI Biz article from Charles Cecil on maintaining Revolution's financial viability over the last 25 years and he made this quote I thought it was really insightful...

""I remember going to Develop last year, in 2024, and the old expression was, 'Just survive to '25'. And I remember standing up – and I made myself very unpopular – and I said, 'Why do you think we're going to go back to how it used to be?' It was so extraordinarily benign with Game Pass putting in millions and millions and millions, pumping up the industry. I said, 'Honestly, we have to find a new way to do business, because it's just not going to be the same.' And huge numbers of developers who did very well from the vast amounts of money being pumped into the industry just hoped it would return – but it won't."

Source: GIBZ

Maybe the age and more importantly viability of the AAA games industry is coming to a slow end?

Broken Sword 6 development also mentioned and current status.

Re: It Was "Helpful" That Nintendo Killed The SNES PlayStation - Otherwise Sony Would Have Been "Stuck", Says Shuhei Yoshida

Deuteros

@Johnny_Arthur

I think you are right SNES CD would have been a success as Nintendo's console was hugely popular for the time in Japan and USA, it was still being sold in 1999 in mainstream stores like KB Toys with games.

Plus more importantly the software creators Square, Konami, Capcom, Hudson, Enix plus others and Nintendo themselves importantly really knew how to make it work and create amazing experiences...

Nintendo would have learned from Mega CD and PCE CD as well as kept an eye on 3DO...

The industry would have needed it to be a success...

This link has it all explained regarding real licensing issues with Nintendo/Sony..in comments the full Sam Pettus section/extract...

https://www.timeextension.com/news/2024/12/nintendo-left-us-standing-at-the-altar-shawn-layden-on-the-vengeful-birth-of-playstation

This was the key inflection point

"Sony intends to broadly license it to the [whole] software industry]." This was anathema to Nintendo CEO Hiroshi Yamauchi, who had no intention of letting Nintendo losing control over any part of the process. He conspired [tactically orchestrated I would argue = Deuteros] with Sony's rival Philips to publically humiliate Sony the following day at the show."

Re: It Was "Helpful" That Nintendo Killed The SNES PlayStation - Otherwise Sony Would Have Been "Stuck", Says Shuhei Yoshida

Deuteros

@retrophilion It's probably still the biggest videogame counterfactual there is, for sure the industry might be different.

If SEGA had more of a free ride early years SATURN style against 3D0 version 1.0 and Playstation and SONY went SOLO after breaking with Nintendo one hardware cycle down the line, in say 1997-99 it could be a totally different landscape if Dreamcast emerges against a 1st Gen 128 bit SONY machine and they are still learning to be a hardware provider...

Then again the security and learning experience of working with Nintendo from 92-95/96/97 could make SONY jump out gates even stronger in late 90s not 1994...

That extra motivation to broadside Nintendo was a key factor in getting everything up and running then doing things differently with licensees then using professionalism of their consumer divisions to strengthen the launch...

You might even be looking at a less strong Nintendo in terms of cornering their market right now...

Would SEGA have lasted past mid 2000s as a hardware manufacturer still given the issues between SEGA USA and SEGA Japan plus business sense, plus what would a 360 Era SEGA console even resemble?

Certainly a sliding doors moment for industry if SEGA were first to market over 360 and possibly Microsoft buy SEGA outright to kickstart own entry even (See 2000/2001 rumours)

Re: It Was "Helpful" That Nintendo Killed The SNES PlayStation - Otherwise Sony Would Have Been "Stuck", Says Shuhei Yoshida

Deuteros

@mganai77 Thanks for link.

That's a pretty good breakdown from what I recall from era especially the bit about CD caddies and I had forgotten not just Secret of Mana but Chrono Trigger was a CD title at first stage.

The whole "obfuscating paradigm" plus vaporware aspect as a marketing tactic to impede Mega/Sega CD sales while Nintendo worked out just exactly what they were going to do...and with which partner to side with if anyone is on the money...

Little bit pro SONY but cannot have everything...🫠

Re: It Was "Helpful" That Nintendo Killed The SNES PlayStation - Otherwise Sony Would Have Been "Stuck", Says Shuhei Yoshida

Deuteros

@MegaMel86 Never really heard much about this theory through decades...but it is an interesting one.

Do you have any links or is it just a theory?

Found this...from 80s

"In 1985, Nintendo, a rising star in the home video game console space, fought against Magnavox’s volley of lawsuits with the claim that Baer’s patent was invalidated by prior art. Years before Baer developed his idea, William Higinbotham at the Brookhaven National Laboratory built what is now believed to be the first video game, Tennis for Two, to run on an analog computer. Tennis for Two is clearly similar to Table Tennis in many respects, but the court found one crucial distinction: Higinbotham’s oscilloscope-based game—which actually dated back to 1958 and an era that no one would associate with video games—did not involve television signals, which was a key component of Baer’s patent and the video games at issue."

Pretty good summary

https://www.thinkbrg.com/thinkset/ts-case-of-the-video-game-lawsuit-racket/

Specific...

https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/707/717/1574608/

Although I see Phillips were still after Nintendo in 2014 for Wii and Wii U motion control patents...

Re: It Was "Helpful" That Nintendo Killed The SNES PlayStation - Otherwise Sony Would Have Been "Stuck", Says Shuhei Yoshida

Deuteros

Re: "Nintendo Has Made Serious Objections" - Last Ninja Collection Delayed On Consoles

Deuteros

Here is the gumpf over the recent Streetfighter 2 E Honda stage alteration and reason...

"No official reason has been announced for the change, but the most likely explanation is that Capcom wants to avoid a negative reaction in other parts of Asia to the rising sun imagery. Particularly in China and Korea, vocal groups associate the symbol with the Imperial Japanese Army and World War II-era occupation. The issue is a complex one for many reasons, not the least of which is that although the Rising Sun flag was flown by the Imperial Japanese military, the symbol was neither created for nor exclusively used by the armed forces, and so it doesn’t have a necessarily militaristic or imperial feel to most Japanese citizens. Capcom, though, has apparently decided it’s not worth the risk of risking a backlash over Honda’s background, and so the sun has been scrubbed out of the mural entirely, even from the for-sale-in-Japan version of the games."

https://japantoday.com/category/entertainment/rising-sun-removed-from-%27street-fighter-ii%27-background-in-game%E2%80%99s-latest-rerelease

Re: Anniversary: Mean Machines, The UK's Greatest Console Magazine, Turns 35 Today

Deuteros

@h3s

I hold Amiga Format, Power, A.C.E., early Edge up to about a decade after 1993 launch under Brookes, Games X, Super Play and Mean Machines plus CVG and EGM then a few others as well like CU Amiga and PC Zone/Gamer, N64 magazine plus Zero, in high regard from that decade also...

Super Play is definitely the very best single format magazine though...

Re: Anniversary: Mean Machines, The UK's Greatest Console Magazine, Turns 35 Today

Deuteros

Still need Turtles, The Megaman and Final Fight, an NFL one plus original Sonic then Star Wars plus Sonic 2 final edition of magazine. Curses!

But have a mint copy of SF2 Legendary review and pull out poster now and issue zero!

Still devestated let a complete set of Games X from Europress fall through fingers last month as well, as bad timing!

That era of early 90s gaming is still unmatched.

Plus here is a good link.

https://www.forgottenworlds.net/mean-machines-history

Re: Company That Cleared Sega's Offices Of "Stolen" Nintendo Dev Kits Is A Charity, New Evidence Reveals

Deuteros

Did they use a variant of the "Blast Processing" strategy to open the doors of the said house that is all I want to know!

To be this good really does take ages!

Puts a new spin on "Do Me a Favour plug me into a Sega" and the "Sega Scream" though presumably created by said individual, or raiding squad on entry...

I assume the guilty party is sentenced to a Cyber Razorcut!

Genesis does what Nintendo don't most certainly!

I'll stop now.

Actually would have been perfect if raid was on 9th Sept as well. [Dreamcast 9.9.99]

Re: Here Are The Best-Selling Dreamcast Games Of All Time (In The US)

Deuteros

@The_Nintendo_Pedant I loved the Dreamcast more as a second console to Gamecube for depth and variety of classics the Nintendo and SEGA combo was brilliant from 2001-2005

PS2 had MGS2/3, Gradius V, ICO, Last Guardian, Fantavision as stand outs or classics, and a few others eventually got sold in 2006/7, but held onto DC for 20-25 odd years...

Re: Here Are The Best-Selling Dreamcast Games Of All Time (In The US)

Deuteros

@Damo Gamecube for me for same reasons nearly entirely. Dreamcast, PS2 and Gamecube combo having missed out on Sega Console from 98-2001 was amazing range, library and variety.

Getting Gamecube in Los Angeles one month after launch Christmas 2001 with Pikmin, Smash, Bluestorm and Rogue Squadron 2 was a spectacular launch line up from Nintendo.

I strangely want to get into collecting for OG XBox in the present though, having missed that console totally...especially more obscure gems like Crimson Skies.

Re: "Can You Believe We Got Away With This?" - The Complete History Of Toy Biz's Video Game Superstars Line

Deuteros

Great article, appreciate the concept art designs...

ToyBiz is fascinating piece of pop culture history due to the Mavel Link and Avi Arad...

"Toy Biz partially acquired Marvel Entertainment Group. In the late 1990s, Marvel Entertainment Group filed for bankruptcy and became the subject of a battle for control in bankruptcy court."

"The company was salvaged in 1997 and merged with Toy Biz in 1998. The new company became Marvel Enterprises, and Toy Biz became a division of the new company."

"He became the CEO of Toy Biz in the 1990s, was the chief creative officer of Marvel Entertainment and is the founder, former chairman and former CEO of the latter's successor, Marvel Studios."

"Since then, he has produced and sometimes written a wide array of live-action, animated, and television comic book adaptations."