# Did Nintendo give birth to the Playstation?



## EnigmaXtreme (Jul 17, 2009)

A few of you have seen my Unboxed review of WiiSX

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BeKuGbJLCrA

However at the beginning I said an unscripted, off the cusp comment saying



			
				QUOTE said:
			
		

> Nintendo pretty much gave birth to the Playstation and if you disagree with me you're an idiot
> 
> Now im starting to get negative comments concerning that statement like;
> 
> ...



I mean am I wrong. Wasnt the Playstation originally going to be a SNES Addon


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## antonkan (Jul 17, 2009)

EnigmaXtreme said:
			
		

> A few of you have seen my Unboxed review of WiiSX



For those who don't go to the YouTube website:


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## Deleted User (Jul 17, 2009)

Don't worry, you're right. Nintendo indirectly gave birth to the Playstation.

SONY was in fact developing a CD-ROM add-on for Nintendo. However, in 1991 Nintendo decided to team up with Philips and the SNES-CD developed by SONY was abandoned. After that, SONY decided to create a stand alone console based on their researched technology and called it the Playstation.

Source


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## UltraMagnus (Jul 17, 2009)

by that logic atari gave birth to the NES, and Charles Babbage gave birth to the atari


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## Golfman560 (Jul 17, 2009)

UltraMagnus said:
			
		

> by that logic atari gave birth to the NES, and Charles Babbage gave birth to the atari



Charles Babbage is god? FINALLY I know who to worship!

Edit: Lol worhsip


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## vergilite (Jul 17, 2009)

lol i can't wait to tell my brother he is a playstation fanboy and i am a nintendo fanboy (it begins 
	

	
	
		
		

		
		
	


	




)


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## spinal_cord (Jul 17, 2009)

UltraMagnus said:
			
		

> by that logic atari gave birth to the NES, and Charles Babbage gave birth to the atari



Not really, Nintendo and Sony worked together to build the hardware and software, so in every meaningful sense of the question, Nnitendo did in fact give birth to the playstation...


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## toguro_max (Jul 17, 2009)

Yep, the Playstation is some kind of Nintendo's bastard son.
In fact, the "name" PSX cames form the time Sony and Nintendo worked together (if I recall correctly, it stands for Play Station Xpander / Xpansion, but it can be totally wrong and my mind may be playing pranks on me. But i'm *sure* that PSX e not the abreviation of Playstation alone).


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## EnigmaXtreme (Jul 18, 2009)

UltraMagnus said:
			
		

> by that logic atari gave birth to the NES, and Charles Babbage gave birth to the atari



Charles Babbage never worked with Atari to make the 2600 or pong

and Atari never worked with Nintendo to make the NES (they infact were offered to distribute the NES in the USA originally though they refused)


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## dinofan01 (Jul 18, 2009)

Wait you care about youtube comments? Youtube has some of the stupidest people ever posting there. The lack of braincells on that site is disturbing. Don't worry your right.


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## DeMoN (Jul 18, 2009)

dinofan01 said:
			
		

> Wait you care about youtube comments? Youtube has some of the stupidest people ever posting there. The lack of braincells on that site is disturbing. Don't worry your right.


This.  People are wrong on the internet all the time.  Don't fret over it.


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## Elritha (Jul 18, 2009)

The Snes also has a sony sound chip in it for sound and music. I believe Sony and Nintendo did work closely side by side before this incident.


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## jackdanielchan (Jul 18, 2009)

Awww... If they still worked together, we'd have a Blu-Ray, HD, Six-Axis, Motion Control, Dual-Shock, Backward Compatible, 80GB Wii/Playstation 3...


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## MissingNo._ (Jul 18, 2009)

jackdanielchan said:
			
		

> Awww... If they still worked together, we'd have a Blu-Ray, HD, Six-Axis, Motion Control, Dual-Shock, Backward Compatible, 80GB Wii/Playstation 3...



I wouldn't be so sure...

"The Sony PlayStation began as the SNES PlayStation, an add-on peripheral for the Nintendo SNES, but after a dispute between Sony and Nintendo over control of licences, Sony was dropped from the project. Ken Kutaragi, the Sony researcher who had worked on the SNES PlayStation (and the sound chip for the SNES) did not want to give up. He wanted to continue working on this project and so, after some debate, Sony President Norio Ogha approved the start of the Sony Computer Entertainment Division, which would one day account for around half of Sony's revenues. This was Sony's entry into the world of video game consoles and would also mean competition for Nintendo.

Kutaragi worked on this secret project to create a new 32-bit console that was simple yet powerful, easy to program for and cheap. His original concept was first shown at the Tokyo International Electronics Show in October 1991 and due for release in January 1993 for a price of US$200. The system was still going to allow the play of SNES games (just like the SNES CD-ROM that Nintendo and Philips were currently working on) and it was scheduled for release 6 months before the SNES CD-ROM. Sony's PlayStation was presented as a console for both games and educational software, with titles such as: Compton's Enemy Encyclopaedia, Software Toolworks World Atlas, Microsoft BookShelf 1991, Languages of the World, National Geographic Mammals of the World and Mixed up Mother Goose. There were no games announced yet, but with Sony's money and connections within the video game industry, they were able to get third party support a little later down the track. Namco was one of the earliest third party companies to join. They too wanted to get back at Nintendo for their dispute in 1990. Other third party companies soon joined as well.

The PlayStation (a.k.a. PSX) as we know it today is much different. A lot of development was undertaken between 1991 and it's release date of December 2nd 1994 (for ?39 800) in Japan. It was then released in North America on September 9th 1995 (for US$299), selling over 100 000 units in the first weekend of sale, followed by Germany (21st September 1995), the rest of Europe (September 29th 1995) and then Australia (October 13th 1995). Its release was not good news for Sega, whose Saturn console had only just been released. The PlayStation is better than the Saturn in some ways, but the Saturn still has some technical advantages over the PlayStation such as the capability to handle more polygons and better sprite handling in 2D games. But the PlayStation's main edge over the Saturn was that it was much easier to program for, thus developers could make great games very easily for the system and therefore more sales would be made. Unlike the Saturn, the PlayStation has no built-in memory for saving games. Instead, it relies on Memory Cards (sold separately, thus making even more money).

The PlayStation was hugely popular due to its huge library of games (almost 1000) and its cheap price. Just before Sony released the PlayStation 2, they also re-released a newer version of the PlayStation called the PSone. The PSone (released 1999) was a smaller, cheaper version of the system (both cheaper to buy and cheaper to produce - the system has no parallel or serial ports), which allowed people who could not afford the more expensive PlayStation 2 to still get a piece of the PlayStation action (much like what Nintendo did with the NES in 1994 and what Majesco did with Sega's Genesis in 1997). Games for the PlayStation were still continuing to be produced even after 8 years since the release of the original PlayStation."

Taken from here: *snip*

I was almost finished typing when I said, "Screw this," and just copied it from Rom Hustler


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## Domination (Jul 18, 2009)

[BnC said:
			
		

> Mitchell]
> Taken from here: Rom *snip*



ROM site link!


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## MissingNo._ (Jul 18, 2009)

Oops.  *SLAPS HIMSELF IN THE HEAD* Hehe...  Just deleted it.

Anyways, I wonder what Sony would be like if it was still with Nintendo today, but it certaintly wouldn't be all the things we have now combined, like jackdanielchan said.


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## Hadrian (Jul 18, 2009)

Sony was intending to enter the console business anyway.  The SNES add on was them just testing the waters a bit and getting a rep in the console world.  Also Sony wanted a deal where they had some rights to a few Nintendo franchises in return for this device.

A lot of people reckon that Nintendo dropping Sony was Nintendo's dumbest decision, but come on who would allow Sony to co-own their famous licenses only for them to use them on their own console?

At the end of the day, Nintendo still made a shit load of money from its handhelds and games while the Playstation consoles were popular and now their console is in the lead.  I doubt they regret doing what they did.


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## CyberFish (Jul 18, 2009)

As stated, Nintendo worked with Sony and Phillips to make a SNES add on. Phillips did however get the rights to the characters Zelda, Link, and Gannon from Nintendo and made their own Zelda games. They blew ass.


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## Joe88 (Jul 18, 2009)

well nintendo just going behind sony's back and leaving them in the dust is considered one of the worst business decisions in history

the PS1 was born which took the market by storm, then PS2 also took the market by storm taking down everything that dared to challenge it, and became the best selling console in gaming history to date

the tides has changed now, nintendo is way in the lead ahead of everyone
im not too sure why though, I dont know when the last time I played my wii besides playing old GCN games, just got bored of it and focused on the PS3/360 and PSP/NDS instead


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## Zav (Jul 18, 2009)

whiles nintendo and sony never got it together...  Sony had multiple failed PSones before the one we came to know and love so Sony's experience leading up to PSone was there and it allowed for a competitive system with the N64   then when microsoft joined the fray they had more experience than you would think because of the gaming revolution that took place with windows 98... and now the xbox 360 although weaker than the PS3 is a better system and the wii is just for casual gaming


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## CyberFish (Jul 18, 2009)

Zav said:
			
		

> whiles nintendo and sony never got it together...  Sony had multiple failed PSones before the one we came to know and love so Sony's experience leading up to PSone was there and it allowed for a competitive system with the N64   then when microsoft joined the fray they had more experience than you would think because of the gaming revolution that took place with windows 98... and now the xbox 360 although weaker than the PS3 is a better system and the wii is just for casual gaming



What do you mean never got it together?? You mean actually create something or not work together? The Playstation came from the work that Sony and Nintendo did while trying to create a SNES add on.


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## MicShadow (Jul 18, 2009)

Dont worry, you are right.


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## CyberFish (Jul 18, 2009)

MicShadow said:
			
		

> Dont worry, you are right.



Didnt need assurance of that. I just wanted to know what he meant. The comment was hard to understand.


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## MissingNo._ (Jul 18, 2009)

Also, Nintendo hated Sony for creating the PSX without them, so they made a new console: The N64.  They noticed how slow PSX games' loading times are, so they made a console that had virtually no loading times, but this proccessed quite a bit of memory and power to execute, resulting in the bad (take Super Mario 64 for instance) 3-D models, high-priced sytem you could buy.

While it did have some fun games, overall it could not beat the PlayStation.


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## toguro_max (Jul 18, 2009)

Whether Nintendo's dismiss of Sony was their worst decision or not, it sure created a whole new market for videogame systems.
Follow me: at te begining, there was Atari (oohhhh) and their rivals (Matel, Coleco...). Then Nintendo came with the Famicom (here comes a new challenger) and the industry were never the same again. Sega wanted to compete, and then they created the Master System and, later, the Mega Drive (Genesis). Then, Super Famicom came, and 32X appeared, and Super FX, and Mega CD (the ands are on purpose). To end it all, Sega made the Saturn.
Can't you see? For some years, the videogame market were ruled by Sega and Nintendo (I do not take in consideration Neo Geo). When the big N decided to drop the PSX with Sony, the latter entered in the market, changing the whole aspect of it.
My point is, Nintendo, with this decision, "created" the videogame market as it is today.
Ok, maybe I went a little too far, but that's my thoughts...

Just a side note, my thoughs on the videogame market were always like this:
Sega: Innovates the hardware, being the best for some time (for being the first).
Nintendo: Learns "from" Sega, impove some things and competes (also innovates some times).
Sony: See what everyone else create, and try to create something better.
Microsoft: I think it's taking the same steps as Sega at the beninning....

That's all.


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## Perseid (Jul 18, 2009)

You are correct in saying Sony and Nintendo attempted to co-develop a CD addon, but to say Nintendo "gave birth" to the Playstation is a bit silly. If you're going to say that Sony and Nintendo developed a system using optical discs and thus the Playstation was birthed by Nintendo because it uses optical discs I could also say the Gamecube was birthed by Sony because it uses optical discs and Sony and Nintendo developed a system using optical discs. But that would be silly of me.


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## antonkan (Jul 18, 2009)

Well, Sony's PlayStation 3 is so popular in Japan. PlayStation 2 is now popular in world. So PlayStation franchises became a successful market in history.

Nintendo gave brith to the PlayStation? That's curious. The history of a PlayStation starts with Nintendo and Sony to develop SNES-CD. It was an add-on to the SNES, but it's unreleased. In 1994, Sony Computer Entertainment, a video game company that makes the PlayStation franchises, was formed. On December 1994, the original PlayStation (also known as PSX and PlayStation 1/PS1) was released in Japan. That's the history, eh?


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## toguro_max (Jul 18, 2009)

The idea behid the "giving birth" do Playstation is, in my opinion, that if Nintendo had not broken up "relations" with Sony, then *maybe*, and only maybe, the Playstation we know today would not exist.
Back that time, the Playstation project was ignited a little bit from the anger Sony felt of Nintendo after the break up (of course Sony would enter the videogame market anyway).
What [BnC]Mitchell said is correct, Nintendo *did* disign the N64 to use cartidges becaus of the slow loading times. I used to read a lot of videogame magazines back that time, and I remember someone from Nintendo saying that "The faster loading of the cartidges will compensate the lesser amount of memory (read megabytes) to work (compared to the CD)".
Of course nobody will never, ever, admit any bit of this "conspiration theory"...

Just in time, this is what it's supposed to be it. Wheather it is true or not, it's up to you all.


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## DARKSHIDARA (Jul 19, 2009)

the truth is yes but many of you "new gamers" may not know or are sony fanboys to accept it
but yes nintendo indeed gave birth to the once called "super nintendo playstation" hence the name "playstation" and the similarities with the snes pad and the original ps1 controller


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## seanvol (Jul 19, 2009)

QUOTE said:
			
		

> if you disagree with me you're an idiot



and you're wondering why you got negative comments?

Anyway, this


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## DARKSHIDARA (Jul 22, 2009)

SEANVOL
there is a big mistake in that article it didnt became an immediate success the games that made the playstation sell where namco's ridge racer and (at that time squaresoft) final fantasy seven in 1997
(on a side note ff7 sold well but many of the people that bought it took it back because it was an rpg and the name final fantasy was only known by those that played them before on the snes)


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## MissingNo._ (Jul 23, 2009)

Some people also think the PlayStation controller is built off of the SNES controller, just two more shoulder buttons, and two different designs have two analog sticks and the other one, while also having two analog sticks, also contained a rumble feature.  Go figure.

Another fact to support this is that both Start and Select buttons are made of a soft material, and the shoulder buttons are called L and R, but are numbered for each one.  Go figure again.


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## Bninja1v (Jul 23, 2009)

even though it's kind of confusing but i agree that Nintendo gave birth to the PSX.


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## MissingNo._ (Jul 23, 2009)

Bninja1v said:
			
		

> even though it's kind of confusing but i agree that Nintendo gave birth to the PSX.



They didn't exactly give birth to the PlayStation, they set off a chain reaction that ended up having SONY give birth to the Playstation.


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## legendofphil (Jul 23, 2009)

[BnC said:
			
		

> Mitchell]
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Whilst Nintendo didn't figuratively give birth to the Playstation they did conceive its existince.

In a similar way that Nintendo forced the Xbox to exist.
MS wanted a part of the home console market and tried to buy out Nintendo (for those that can't see the plot, Nintendo turned them down).
After this event MS set about designing the Xbox around what they know, hence the modified Windows 2000 Kernel built on x86 architecture.


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## toguro_max (Jul 23, 2009)

[BnC said:
			
		

> Mitchell]
> Some people also think the PlayStation controller is built off of the SNES controller, just two more shoulder buttons, and two different designs have two analog sticks and the other one, while also having two analog sticks, also contained a rumble feature.  Go figure.
> 
> Another fact to support this is that both Start and Select buttons are made of a soft material, and the shoulder buttons are called L and R, but are numbered for each one.  Go figure again.



You know, this is a somewhat common misconception of "new" gamers... The original Playstation controllers did not have two analog sticks... In fact, it did not even have one! This is the first Playstation controller.
Only on a side note, take a look at these prototype playstation controllers and see for yourself...
Also, even though it might not be that accurate, take a look at this...

In time, if this amount / kinf of links are not allowed, please say so and I'll remove'em.


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## Eternal Myst (Aug 22, 2009)

So as you can see, Nintendo created it's competition, and rivals.


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## EnigmaXtreme (Aug 22, 2009)

Eternal Myst said:
			
		

> So as you can see, Nintendo created it's competition, and rivals.



And you know what? thats a good thing! Competition is what keeps the industry improving, cut throat competition brought the wiimote and the ds


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## daknight (Aug 22, 2009)

The reason they cut the ties with Sony was over royalty control. Appearntly when they sign the papers they didn't notice that any game made for the add-on will give royalties to Sony (more than to Nintendo). Royalties for games being Nintendo's most important asset was a big NO, so they found a loophole to escape and this of course made Sony mad that they said they HAD to take Nintendo down.

Maybe for those now it might had been a 'bad' move, but in Nintendo's eye it never was since they manage to keep control of royalties, which was most important to them...and they still made lots of money anyway.


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## shakirmoledina (Aug 22, 2009)

i think it can go both ways cuz u may say they just "helped" though i didn't know about this at all... thanks for the info


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## metroid lover 2n (Aug 22, 2009)

PharaohsVizier said:
			
		

> [BnC said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Oracina of Time is enought to end the debate.


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## deathfisaro (Aug 22, 2009)

I'm not sure if "give birth to" is the right expression.

Say, I tease a kid. That kid trains like hell to take revenge and after some turn of events he becomes the world champion of some martial art competition. 

Can I take credit for creating an ultimate fighter?


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## jan777 (Aug 22, 2009)

deathfisaro said:
			
		

> I'm not sure if "give birth to" is the right expression.
> 
> Say, I tease a kid. That kid trains like hell to take revenge and after some turn of events he becomes the world champion of some martial art competition.
> 
> Can I take credit for creating an ultimate fighter?




somehow, yeah!

why'd you tease the poor kid?


lol jk


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## toguro_max (Aug 22, 2009)

deathfisaro said:
			
		

> I'm not sure if "give birth to" is the right expression.
> 
> Say, I tease a kid. That kid trains like hell to take revenge and after some turn of events he becomes the world champion of some martial art competition.
> 
> Can I take credit for creating an ultimate fighter?



Like it was already said, yep, pretty much.
Isn't this the basic principle of super villains? That heroes create'em somehow? Batman / Joker, Mr Incredible / Syndrome, Spiderman / Venon, G-Girl / Professor Bedlam, Bill / The Bride, and so on...


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## Tokiopop (Aug 23, 2009)

Hahah, ker-pwnt 
	

	
	
		
		

		
			





They gave birth to the loss of their own sales, how ironic


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## deathfisaro (Aug 23, 2009)

toguro_max said:
			
		

> Like it was already said, yep, pretty much.
> Isn't this the basic principle of super villains? That heroes create'em somehow? Batman / Joker, Mr Incredible / Syndrome, Spiderman / Venon, G-Girl / Professor Bedlam, Bill / The Bride, and so on...



I think it's because "you made me a villain!" is such a no-brainer story to write.


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## Veho (Aug 23, 2009)

deathfisaro said:
			
		

> Say, I tease a kid. That kid trains like hell to take revenge and after some turn of events he becomes the world champion of some martial art competition.
> 
> Can I take credit for creating an ultimate fighter?


This isn't the case here. It's more like you become the kid's trainer and manager, teach him everything you know, in exchange for a cut of his profits on tournaments, and then the day before the big match, you dump him for another fighter. The kid goes on to win, you get left behind.


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## razorback78 (Sep 23, 2009)

please check this link it has information on gaming console history including how was playstation developed by nintendo and sony.

a brief history of the home video game console


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## boof222 (Oct 14, 2009)

toguro_max said:
			
		

> You know, this is a somewhat common misconception of "new" gamers... The original Playstation controllers did not have two analog sticks... In fact, it did not even have one! This is the first Playstation controller.
> Only on a side note, take a look at these prototype playstation controllers and see for yourself...
> Also, even though it might not be that accurate, take a look at this...
> 
> In time, if this amount / kinf of links are not allowed, please say so and I'll remove'em.



note the + and - buttons on the prototype controler no.4 AKA controller^^^^
wii much?


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## Veho (Oct 14, 2009)

boof222 said:
			
		

> note the + and - buttons on the prototype controler no.4 AKA controller^^^^
> wii much?


Please tell me you're joking.


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## Deleted_171835 (Oct 14, 2009)

Veho said:
			
		

> boof222 said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Thou foolishness lives through everyone. Anyways............wha! ........or is it true!


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## Seek01 (Oct 16, 2009)

Its only considered a bad business decision because Nintendo didn't use optical discs as a format for almost a decade. 700mb per disc compared the the 120 something mb (IIRC, not sure) cartridge really hurt them with 3rd parties because CDs were MUCH more economically and technologically superior. Easy to produce and a bunch of space makes it look fantastic compared to the dieing cartridge market (at least for home consoles). N64 cartridges were more expensive to make which really hurt anyone who wanted to emerge on the market on the 64. 

This is why 95% of the good games for the N64 were 1st or 2nd party, OR by major game devs such as capcom or namco. Meanwhile the PS1 had a very extensive 3rd party library.


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## Veho (Oct 16, 2009)

Seek01 said:
			
		

> This is why 95% of the good games for the N64 were 1st or 2nd party, OR by major game devs such as capcom or namco. Meanwhile the PS1 had a very extensive 3rd party library.


I thought the "second party" in business were the customers. In this case the console owners. First party: Nintendo, second party: us, third party: independent developers.


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## berlinka (Oct 16, 2009)

I still have the C+VG (Computer & Videogames) issue where they announced the Playstation for the Snes, together with a picture. It was a CD-drive for the Super Nintendo. All I know is Nintendo ditched the project and then Sony went and created their new console. It's a s simple as that.


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## antonkan (Oct 17, 2009)

boof222 said:
			
		

> note the + and - buttons on the prototype controler no.4 AKA controller^^^^
> wii much?


Well, the plus and minus buttons on the prototype PlayStation controllers seemed to be based on L2 and R2 buttons on the final one.


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