Favorite "failed" consoles?

[Stupid Bunny]

I have a Sega Dreamcast, and many fond childhood memories to go along with it, so that’s my obvious choice. I never played Shenmue, probably the clearest microcosm of both why it was great and why it failed at the same time, but I loved the Sonic Adventure games, and Toy Commander, and all the funky things you could do with the VMU. (Fuck, I even like Sonic Shuffle.)  I won’t go into any technical analysis of the console since a lot of much more knowledgeable and clever people than me have hashed that out over the last quarter century.

 

I’m also always fascinated from the preponderance of also-rans from the first decade of home video gaming, all the strangely designed yet often dull devices made largely by chip manufacturers who were more interested in selling their chips than in understanding games, devices that all looked and were named like this:

 

 

They typically failed for a reason but it’s interesting to see what hardware manufacturers thought game systems should look like in an era before Nintendo and Sony standardized controllers as we know them and console design was still clearly in the hands of people who were used to making VCRs and FM radios.
 

Honorable mention to the Atari Jaguar for supposedly being a great challenge for masochistic homebrewers (as frankly is the Atari 2600, that I know from experience)

 

Oh yes and I won’t name a certain other console that is what all true warriors strive for 

Edited June 24, 2023 by Stupid Bunny

[Rudolph]

I admit I am really not familiar with the TurboGrafx-16 at all. Somehow, it manages to look weirder than the Sega Genesis and its add-ons!

[Noiser]

1 hour ago, Rudolph said:

I admit I am really not familiar with the TurboGrafx-16 at all. Somehow, it manages to look weirder than the Sega Genesis and its add-ons!

I don't get why people think this is a failed console. It was very sucessful in Japan.

[Rudolph]

It is disappointingly ugly, however. Even the dreaded CD-I looks better than it. :S

[FecalMystAche]

Maybe this doesn’t count since it was never officially released, but the Atari 2700 could’ve been quite revolutionary had it been released. It would’ve been one of if not the first console to come with wireless controllers. Apparently it was cancelled because the controllers could potentially interfere with other electronics up to 1,000ft (300m) such as electronic garage door openers and other 2700 systems due to lack of pairing technology. It is just one of Atari’s many failed replacements for the Atari 2600, but I find it to be the most interesting of the bunch.

Edited June 24, 2023 by FecalMystAche

[Eurisko]

The Amiga CD32.

Nothing I could say could top what is in this video so I’ll just leave this here. Enjoy.

 

 

[lazygecko]

5 hours ago, Individualised said:

The Amiga wasn't a failure at all though? Also "PC" refers to IBM compatibles and their descendants, it's not a catch-all term for all home computers.

 

Financially, I think it was? That's what I remember reading numerous times. When it first launched in the mid 80s I think it failed to reach any significant market penetration due to its prohibitive pricing, and after the inevitable price cuts there couldn't have been much left for profit margins in spite of becoming a rather popular home computer for Europe. And as we know Commodore as a company did not last after PC and Mac further proliferated the home computer market in the 90s.

 

[Herr Dethnout]

2 hours ago, Noiser said:

I don't get why people think this is a failed console. It was very sucessful in Japan.

Same for the Saturn and even the Dreamcast (the reason for discontinue was anything but poor sales, it still got a lot of support years after that)

[FecalMystAche]

As far as the Saturn and TurboGrafx-16… Not everyone lives in Japan. Perhaps that’s the reason they’re often considered failed consoles anywhere else outside of Japan?

Edited June 25, 2023 by FecalMystAche

[Biz!]

I love the Enterprise line of computers, it has amazing graphics and sound quality much comparable to the Amstrad CPC, second favorite is the later Amiga line of computers.

[silentzorah]

Atari 5200.  I liked it.  Granted, it was the first console I ever owned, but still.  The games on there were a lot closer to their arcade counterparts, and it had Star Raiders.  That game was so cool.

[TasAcri]

The Nuon is the most interesting to me.

 

It's like an Atari Jaguar 2. It has Tempest 3000, which is the trippiest looking in the series and Iron Soldier 3 also looks pretty great.

[Herr Dethnout]

3 hours ago, FecalMystAche said:

As far as the Saturn and TurboGrafx-16… Not everyone lives in Japan. Perhaps that’s the reason they’re often considered failed consoles anywhere else outside of Japan?

Yup, it was like the Vita, a complete failure in the west, but sucessful in Japan.

[vyruss]

Not a failure in the sense of everyone else's low-hanging-fruit entries in this topic but by proxy from the period, but the Colecovision comes to mind for me.  Yes, if you sit on sales figures and units moved and other blah blah blah it was actually a very good console - with the caveat that it was engulfed and consumed by the great videogame crash that we all utter about in hushed tones.

[UnrealClock]

I put hundreds maybe even thousands of hours into my Ouya. That thing owned so hard.

[roadworx]

the halcyon, of course. i'm not even sure if it fits this thread because it was never even released, but it's so stupidly outlandish and bizarre that i can't help but love it

 

the thing was a hybrid laserdisc and cartridge based system that would use laserdiscs to store video and audio, and cartridges to store all the game data. you could play games with its weird keyboard controller, !! OR !! , you could play games using a headset that let you control stuff using your voice. you had to train the console to recognize your voice first and you could only have a limited amount of commands due to memory limitations, but it was an option. an option that wasn't very good, mind you, but it was in fact an option. it could also talk to you, which must've been neat for the time. it could call you by your name n stuff if you entered it in.

 

the single weirdest part about the console, though, was the fact that it was designed to exclusively play fmv games.

 

 

[eanasir]

3 minutes ago, roadworx said:

the halcyon, of course. i'm not even sure if it fits this thread because it was never even released, but it's so stupidly outlandish and bizarre that i can't help but love it

 

the thing was a hybrid laserdisc and cartridge based system that would use laserdiscs to store video and audio, and cartridges to store all the game data. you could play games with its weird keyboard controller, !! OR !! , you could play games using a headset that let you control stuff using your voice. you had to train the console to recognize your voice first and you could only have a limited amount of commands due to memory limitations, but it was an option. an option that wasn't very good, mind you, but it was in fact an option. it could also talk to you, which must've been neat for the time. it could call you by your name n stuff if you entered it in.

 

the single weirdest part about the console, though, was the fact that it was designed to exclusively play fmv games.

 

 

FMV in 1985?

[Herr Dethnout]

21 minutes ago, roadworx said:

the halcyon, of course. i'm not even sure if it fits this thread because it was never even released, but it's so stupidly outlandish and bizarre that i can't help but love it

 

the thing was a hybrid laserdisc and cartridge based system that would use laserdiscs to store video and audio, and cartridges to store all the game data

 

Funny, because that's how the PC Engine CD/Turbografx-CD worked too. lol

 

 

21 minutes ago, roadworx said:

you could play games using a headset that let you control stuff using your voice. you had to train the console to recognize your voice first and you could only have a limited amount of commands due to memory limitations

The AI before AI! (?)

 

17 minutes ago, gamingcooler said:

FMV in 1985?

Not really strange, Dragon's Lair was released in 1983.

Edited June 25, 2023 by Herr Dethnout

[eanasir]

Just now, Herr Dethnout said:

Funny, because that's how the PC Engine CD/Turbografx-CD worked too. lol

 

 

The AI before AI! (?)

 

Not really strange, Dragon's Lair was released in 1983.

True

[MundyC]

I might like the Philips CD-i a bit too much.

[Rudolph]

@Eurisko A bit disappointed that James covered Gloom and not the much-better Alien Breed 3D. Still, what a mess of a console.
 

5 hours ago, roadworx said:

the halcyon, of course. i'm not even sure if it fits this thread because it was never even released, but it's so stupidly outlandish and bizarre that i can't help but love it

I trust you have seen H.Bomberguy's Halcyon Dreams documentary?

 

Reportedly, Rick Dyer himself - no, not the Bigfoot enthusiast - got to see it after his son told him about it and reportedly loved it.

[Howerton]

I would say the Atari Jaguar and one that that is not mentioned here, the Atari ST. I know what you are thinking. Its a cheap amiga alternative and the trained games are all on the amiga. But the compilation disk are great. Also the Jaguar has a Gamedrive which lets you put roms on a sd card and play them on the Jag.

 

There is a guy on the Atariage forums making ST to Jag conversions for the Gamedrive. Including Beast Busters(which runs on 1meg STs while the amiga version only runs on 512k amigas unless you use a softlock) and TMHT the arcade game, that is better than the amiga version beacuse it has music. Both of these games and more are now for the Atari Jaguar.

[SuperPIter_DoomWorldthe2nd]

The Virtual Boy, home to Virtual Boy Wario Land, Mario Clash, and nothing else of actual note.

[Rudolph]

7 minutes ago, SuperPIter_DoomWorldthe2nd said:

Virtual Boy Wario Land

I definitely would not mind checking that one out. It looked kind of cool, actually!

[SuperPIter_DoomWorldthe2nd]

1 minute ago, Rudolph said:

I definitely would not mind checking that one out. It looked kind of cool, actually!

Hell, the whole FG/BG thing was even brought back for Super Mario Bros. Wonder, so, y'know.

[Goody]

[neubejiita]

The Sega Saturn Doom prototype ran at 60 fps, but ID Software made them rewrite it to use the CPU and run the game in software mode and therefor it runs at 13 fps now.

https://lostmediawiki.com/Doom_(lost_prototype_of_Sega_Saturn_port_of_first-person_shooter;_1996-1997)

 

If Jim Bagley had stood his ground, we could have had fullscreen 60 fps Doom on the Saturn.

Edited June 26, 2023 by neubejiita
Grammar.

[scalliano]

Sega Saturn, by a country mile. Kneecapped in the West by horrible mismanagement and denied the very thing it was good at - kickass arcade ports. Most of my Saturn games are JP imports running under a Replay cart - Chase HQ, Night Striker S, Galaxy Force 2, Radiant Silvergun (yes, I have that, it's well-loved but it works), Power Drift, all these and more are excellent on the Saturn and before the Switch it was the only place you could get Thunder Force AC. None of the games I've listed ever left Japan because Bernie Stolar was an idiot.

[FecalMystAche]

I would also like to mention the Sega 32X. Honestly, I think it should’ve been released as the Sega Neptune instead of being an attachment for the Genesis. I think they could’ve easily released it alongside the Sega Saturn, especially if they marketed the Neptune as another iteration of the Genesis, which it basically would’ve been anyways since it would also play Genesis games. Sega and Nintendo did this with their older consoles a few times with a version 2 that would be made slightly smaller, cheaper, etc as a more budget friendly alternative to their current system. I think Sega definitely could’ve worked something like that out. 

[Gibbitudinous]

It's funny how three of my favorite-looking consoles can all be considered "failed".

 

 

 

 

There's just something about a box that's clearly trying to look as cool as possible while also embracing the fact that it is very much a box.