Nintendo’s decision to stick with carts on the N64 is the slight winner, but it was good to see a well rounded mix of opinions. It should be noted that most “other” voters furthered the concern of sticking with carts; Nintendo ditched the cd drive thus helping Sony make the decision to enter the console market and become Nintendo’s biggest direct competitor.
Thanks to all those that voted and be sure to place your vote on this week’s genre survey.
[Source: Infendo]
Metaldave
Yep, the cart choice was what did it. Also not having a true sound chip in the N64 didn’t help either. I liked the carts in the N64, I just wish Nintendo found a way to make them more useful for the system. I remember Turok being $79.99 when it first came out, and it sold like wild fire because it was a good game with incredible graphics for the time. The SNES was the real reason for the early success of the N64. People were thinking that the SNES was so good that the N64 was going to be the God of gaming. They were right at first with Mario 64 and then it was down hill from there, with only Goldeneye and Zelda being the two big stand outs for the system. Damn that cartridge storage! Also, the kiddy image really started with the N64 too, its sad because the SNES never had that problem and everyone loved it. Bing back the good old days Nintendo, with the Revolution! I can’t wait for the redemption.
MrHaze
I voted for the fact Nintendo did’t use the Cd rom instead of Cartridge, but honestly speaking most of the best games in the two past generatios (psx and N64, just to understand) did not came from cd rom…but were on cartridge
Nintendo demonstrated that a cartridge could be a limitation, but only if the developer has limitations in mind
Ocarina of Time were 32 Megs of pure joy
for example…
babble
I don’t believe the cartridge was responsible for so much. It’s really their 3rd party licensing that sent every game distributor (and developer) running for the next best thing, a.k.a. PlayStation when it came out.
They were fed up by Nintendo’s attitude and I don’t blame them. Nintendo had to bring their ego back down.
They are now ready to again conquer the world.
Anonymous
I think the only mistake they made, other then VB, was releasing their consoles ridiculasly late. If the N64 released the same time as PS, carts or not, I think the pS would have gone the way of 3DO.
Rollin
Carts did a big deal. But it wasn’t that alone. When Squaresoft looked at the 32 bit gen, they decided on PS because of Yamauchi’s attitude towards them and PS’s CD storage capacity. I think royalty fees played a part in that, too. But hey, at least it had Quest 64! :/
I picked other because i think the way they’ve treated the American market after and probably during the SNES did the most damage to their reputation and integrity. Something i’m positive has changed with Iwata.
vakerorokero
THe cartridge was the main problem for Nintendo, because developers had to spend $15 for a blank card from nintendo and $3 for a blank cd from nearly 20 brands.
Nintedo kiddie image was way before n64. Ask any Mortal Kombat fan about it.
The Virtual boy was a mistake for not being portable. had they released it as a helmet, maybe we would be playing Virtualboy Advanced (with Colors!). Nintendo likes little updates every once in a while, not jumping generations of technology to get the best, and I think they are right. Look at all the Gameboy competitors. DEAD. The all even look a like Gamegear, Lynx, Turbografx Express, even the PSP looks like that Black, Big LCD, somekind of tv mode, expensive, NO GAMES, except for the neogeo pocket (white) which curiously has been the most sucessful one…
Anonymous
The only downfall of the cart was its expense.
its funny that right above this article is another article talking about no load times. well that is why there was no load times.
id rather have no load times anyday, virtual boy is nintendo biggest mishap by far.
God Bless Gunpei
mo
I appreciate what people are saying about Carts as compared with CDs but I really don’t think its as simple as that.
Square, specifically, would have probably gone with Sony no matter what (even if the N64 used CD-ROM). They wanted all the FMV extras and going down the story-driven interactive entertainment route. Square also wanted to go with use Sony Pictures as a vehicle for promoting their Final Fantasy films.
I don’t need to tell people here that RPGs are huge in Japan and how damaging the Square episode was, but what was even more damaging was that the N64 arrived just too late.
In Japan, the N64 actually missed not one but TWO ‘Xmas seasons in a row. And as groundbreaking as they were, two games for a launch just weren’t enough (even if they were Mario 64 and Pilotwings 64). Nothing matched the brilliance of Mario 64 for literally months and years to come.
If you still don’t think timing was a factor, consider this: the PS had already built a commanding lead of 10 million units sold even before even one N64 unit had been sold.
The rest is history.
Incidentally, Nintendo repeated the same mistake with GC: it also arrived a full year-and-a-half after PS2.
Rollin
Idaknow Vakero, the MK made Nintendo seem more soft than kiddie. When N64 came, Pokemon was hitting its stride and they were releasing that colorful stuff, like Yoshi’s Story. So that worsened the family oriented stigma and took em down to kiddie.
VB wouldn’t have been successful had it been portable. The eye strain was too much. So if u make it portable, u’ll have eye strain AND vertigo.
The timing issues are really due to Sony’s planning, not Nintendo’s.
bryan_3089
I’ve read everyone’s comments, but I still don’t see the HUGE problem you’re all talking about with cartridges. Sure it cost a bit more, but cartridges had practically no loading times! (If any at all!) And regardless of specs, I swear the 64 had much better than the PlayStations. I always had an N64 at my house, and my friend had a PS. I remember going there and playing 5 minutes of coolboarders, getting bored, then playing Mario64, Smash Bros., Mario Kart, Bond — Endless!
My favorite Nintendo systems were the SNES and the 64 – both with cartridges! And look at the Nintendo system that did the worst? The one with discs! Though, I love my GC and its loading times, graphics, controller, and gameplay. Still.
Oh and about third party stuff, you’re all right; the GC had poor third party support. But the N64?! There were ENDLESS games on that thing!!
The Revolution is going to kick MAJOR ass, even if the new controller sucks, cuz I’ll be able to play all my Nintendo classics.
Rollin
“Oh and about third party stuff, you’re all right; the GC had poor third party support. But the N64?! There were ENDLESS games on that thing!!”
Anyone have a tranq gun?
vakerorokero
“VB wouldn’t have been successful had it been portable. The eye strain was too much. So if u make it portable, u’ll have eye strain AND vertigo.”
I don’t know, no one reality said anything when the Gameboy was all different tones of green. I remember when I played one the main problem was the backache, not the red lcd. But that’s my opinion.
“Square, specifically, would have probably gone with Sony no matter what (even if the N64 used CD-ROM). They wanted all the FMV extras and going down the story-driven interactive entertainment route. Square also wanted to go with use Sony Pictures as a vehicle for promoting their Final Fantasy films.”
Square, was working on Final Fantasy 7 fpr the N64 but the main problem was rom size was to small for such a big game (without video which came way later), and nintendo was reluctant to develop such a big cart for for this game. Also Sony offered to Give some money for advertisement so the rest was history.
Nintendo always said loaing was it’s main advantage but, gamers didn’t care about it. They wanted full motion video, so they got it. remember Resident Evil intro? That’s was the first time I tought a video game was low budget. Even today, the main games carry a big portion of fmv instead of real-time like most gamecube games used.
Anyways. Let’s hope Nintendo has a 24x dvd on their Revolution or they might have some loading.
Rollin
Well u don’t play with ur GB actually on ur face so it’s a diff story. Red is harsher on the eyes than green, too.
“Square, was working on Final Fantasy 7 fpr the N64 but the main problem was rom size was to small for such a big game (without video which came way later), and nintendo was reluctant to develop such a big cart for for this game. Also Sony offered to Give some money for advertisement so the rest was history.”
If that’s true i did not know it.
“Let’s hope Nintendo has a 24x dvd on their Revolution or they might have some loading.”
I believe that’s what the Flash drive is for. Load time reduction.
mo
The internal flash-ram in the Rev console is for game saves and the storage of downloaded games.
It has nothing to do with “Load time reduction”.
Also, please get your terminology right. What is a “Flash drive”?
Mo
Rollin
Flash memory, sorry. Although it’s clear u understood what i meant so idaknow what i’m apoligizing for.
So is RAM not used for streaming data? Idaknow if it’s flash ram, but some form of RAM is used for loading up levels while the CPU and GPU did the rest so u wouldn’t have to stream from disc constantly.
mo
I didn’t “know” what you meant but I “thought” I knew what you meant. Which is why I asked for clarification.
Don’t take it personally, but when people don’t take the time and care to think about what they’re writing, it leaves it open to confusion and doubt (and God knows the internet forums are full of that). :o)
I believe (and don’t quote me on this) the Rev will use similar (though more powerful) architecture to the GC. ie data will be streamed from the disc into the video and the main system RAM. I believe Nintendo will still be using Mo-sys one transistor S-RAM.
Mo
Rollin
I didn’t say “know”. I sed “understood” cause u seemed to understand and clear up my confusion perfectly.
I take care in my writing. There’s a difference between careful writing and being tech savvy, and i am not tech savvy. Sorry if i snapped but u should be careful in how u phrase things. “Get your terminology right” aint exactly polite, regardless of the “please”.
Thanks for clearing up the RAM issue.
Dex
Carts are the reason you dont have to worry about scratches or long-ass load times.
Ungrateful punks.