What is the best-selling classic console?

[tom]

Extending carts was already done to VCS (Atari's Sara, CBS RAM), so Megadrive could have done that if needed.....hold on Sega done that too (V.R. Virtua Racing).

The SNES colour difference wasn't noticeable when compared to Megadrive either. Same with the sound, there was no issue with that.

Mode 7. Megadrive beat that with speed.


The sales numbers are documented, oh well I got old mags and books too.....as I said the documented book Game Over mentioned Nintendo over exaggerated their sales figures (That book had input from NCL, Yamauchi, Miyamoto and numerous other people from Nintendo), all companies lie to make them look better.

Look around on the internet....sure, on the internet I'm a hunk with dozen girlfriends.

[Ryudo]

Extending carts was already done to VCS (Atari's Sara, CBS RAM), so Megadrive could have done that if needed.....hold on Sega done that too (V.R. Virtua Racing).

The SNES colour difference wasn't noticeable when compared to Megadrive either.

Mode 7. Megadrive beat that with speed.

I can tell you don't know much how chips works or anything to do with computing.
Speed really doesn't mean a thing. Efficiency does. Genesis allowed 64 colors and SNES 256.

Mode-7 is widely known as the most amazing feature SNES had outside it's sound chip. Genesis didn't have Mode-7 Which allowed multiple scaling moving background. Contra III & Terramigma are some good examples of using it in a unique way. Genesis had a 4 channel sound chip. Less advanced than SNES however Genesis was better with bass. SNES 8 channel sound ship from Sony allowed more well channels of sound. It also allowed and he admitted loving the SNES for the first time Nobuo's compositions sounded as intended for the first time. Skip a gen go to PSone vs N64. N64 had a 93MHz CPU yet was lousy at textures and had a lower poly count than PSone. Saturn in all technical aspects had a beast of a powerhouse. (look at the Shenmue Saturn footage to see what the system was capable of) PS2 Vs DC While DC only lasted 2 years so to devs never fully unlocked it's secrets and PS2 had a faster CPU DC was actually better with color and textures reflections and shadows than PS2. In fact just ask my buddy at R* but Shenmue would actually be impossible on PS2. PS2 could not handle it. Sure a screenshot war should show PS2 games looking better than almost any DC game but the architecture was different PS2 was Open GL & DC was Direct X 6.1(to compare Xbox was 8.1) There is another example. GCN was capable of a few things Xbox could not. It was better with load times thanks to it's TSRAM. GCN is also one of the most efficient pieces of hardware ever made in terms of consoles. Also if you go by speed alone PSP's 333MHz was more powerful than PS2? Nope not even close. (PS2 is 294 and 299 in later models)


Also don't forget Nintendo had 2 full years to work on SNES after Genesis launched. You could not pull Yoshi's Island off on Genesis Hardware. It just isn't capable. Same with StarFox(Lylat Wars)

Yeah long blabby post. Also not a fanboy as I love Sega far more.(Fave system is a Sega console and own nearly all of them)

Also that last comment had to be bad sarcasm or else comes off as desperate with a side if insecurity and false machoism.

[madman77]

Not really, the SNES had a CPU which was more 8-bit than 16-bit

That doesn't even make sense. The 65816 is a 16-bit CPU. It's not more 8-bit than 16-bit. It's 16-bit.

[A Black Falcon]

Extending carts was already done to VCS (Atari's Sara, CBS RAM), so Megadrive could have done that if needed.....hold on Sega done that too (V.R. Virtua Racing).

It could somewhat, but not quite to the same extent the SNES could, and as the fact that only one game used an addon chip shows, it wasn't really planned for. In comparison, Nintendo planned for addon chips on the SNES from the beginning, as you can see from the design including those two extra sets of pins on the sides of the cart port that are initially unused.

The SNES colour difference wasn't noticeable when compared to Megadrive either. Same with the sound, there was no issue with that.

The SNES color advantage is VERY noticeable. While the Genesis is running from a small, limited palette, and can only put a small number of colors on screen, the SNES"s huge palette and 256 color graphics give it an advantage the Genesis can never match. In addition, the SNES has a significant audio advantage over the Genesis as well, with a better, higher quality, more capable sound chip.

If you dislike the SNES you're free to your opinion, but don't say things like that as facts when they are not. It's like people who say that the PSX or Saturn are more powerful than the N64 -- no, they of course are not. Don't let your dislike for the system in question blind you to the fact that it IS more powerful!

Mode 7. Megadrive beat that with speed.

Certainly not. Show me the Genesis's answer to F-Zero... oh right, it doesn't have one.

The sales numbers are documented, oh well I got old mags and books too.....as I said the documented book Game Over mentioned Nintendo over exaggerated their sales figures (That book had input from NCL, Yamauchi, Miyamoto and numerous other people from Nintendo), all companies lie to make them look better.

Look around on the internet....sure, on the internet I'm a hunk with dozen girlfriends.

I think it's probably safe to assume that everyone exaggerates their sales figures. Is there any reason to belive that Sega's are any more accurate? I mean, particularly considering that Sega never even GAVE an overall worldwide sales number, and the number we have ("low 40 million range, probably") is far from specific.

N64 had a 93MHz CPU yet was lousy at textures and had a lower poly count than PSone.

That's not really true, when pushed the N64 could do as many polygons as most anything on the PSX. The issue is that the N64 was actually doing effects on its polygons, like Z-buffering, triple buffering, etc., so of course it had a reduced maximum. Its vastly superior polygons more than make up for their slightly reduced number in most titles.

Saturn in all technical aspects had a beast of a powerhouse. (look at the Shenmue Saturn footage to see what the system was capable of)

The Saturn had power, sure, and I like the system quite a bit, but it clearly wasn't as powerful overall as the Playstation, much less the N64.

While DC only lasted 2 years so to devs never fully unlocked it's secrets and PS2 had a faster CPU DC was actually better with color and textures reflections and shadows than PS2.

The Dreamcast IS less powerful than the PS2, and though you're right that the overall graphics level on the system would have gotten better with time -- the system has far too many games ported from the PS1, most notably -- it could never have matched the PS2 overall, much less the Gamecube or Xbox. I do agree that the DC does do some things better than the PS2 (it has better image quality, most notably), but the PS2 is the more powerful system overall.

Oh, and because of how easy the DC is to develop for, a lot of its power WAS pushed by games, much more so than was true for the Saturn on average. At least Sega did learn that lesson.

There is another example. GCN was capable of a few things Xbox could not. It was better with load times thanks to it's TSRAM. GCN is also one of the most efficient pieces of hardware ever made in terms of consoles. Also if you go by speed alone PSP's 333MHz was more powerful than PS2? Nope not even close. (PS2 is 294 and 299 in later models)

That's true, and the Gamecube is pretty close to the Xbox overall for sure... not quite its match, but not far behind! It's closer to the Xbox than the PS1 or Saturn are to the N64, certainly.

That doesn't even make sense. The 65816 is a 16-bit CPU. It's not more 8-bit than 16-bit. It's 16-bit.

Good point, that's true. It's the Turbografx that has the 8-bit CPU.

[Ryudo]

I was just saying Saturn was more powerful than often credited for. Again Check Shenmue footage for it.
Also I know that about PS2 & DC however I was just saying due to different architecture and some limits PS2 had Shenmue would be impossible to put on PS2. Shenmue IIx was more of a remake than a port as they had to do almost everything all over again. However even though Xbox was a PC in a console shell it had a couple familiar things for Sega.
However yes DC I think with full effects in terms of raw power it's limit was 7 million polys. One of the better cases hown what DC could do is again Shenmue but it's Passport disc. GCN was I think 12 million with full effects. I only mention the game as it's just good for technical examples

PS2 I don't know as Sony way inflated the numbers to over 60. I'm only making a total guess but maybe 9-10.
Xbox not sure maybe close to GCN but Xbox was better with shaders I believe. Actually don't think GCN or Wii has shaders.

[tom]

That won't work saying one console is capable of doing something the other console is not capable of. That's what they said about the VCS and it performed wonders. All doable via software.

[Rob2600]

Actual in-game graphics with lighting, texture effects, physics, etc. (not bogus, meaningless theoretical maximums):

1. PlayStation- roughly 180,000 texture mapped and light-sourced polygons per second max. (roughly 360,000 flat-shaded polygons per second max.)

2. N64- roughly 300k texture mapped and light-sourced high-accuracy polygons per second max. (with N64's hardware effects enabled and custom microcode)

SGI's Turbo3D microcode: 500,000–600,000 low-accuracy polygons per second (no hardware effects, similar looking to PlayStation games, Nintendo never allowed this mode to be used in finished games)
SGI's Fast3D microcode: ~100,000 high-accuracy polygons per second (hardware effects enabled, most N64 games used this mode)
custom microcode: ~300,000 high-accuracy polygons per second (hardware effects enabled, relatively few N64 games used custom modes)

3. Dreamcast- roughly 5-6 million polygons per second max.

4. PS2- roughly 12-15 million polygons per second max.

5. GameCube- roughly 25 million polygons per second max.

6. Xbox- roughly 35 million polygons per second max.

(Keep in mind, the number of polygons per second doesn't necessarily represent all of the graphical capabilities on a console.)


And the SNES's much larger color palette, transparency effects, and advanced sound capabilities were definitely noticeable to me. The slowdown seen in some 1st generation SNES games was gone after a year, once developers mastered the hardware.

[chrisbid]

The thing that finally pushed SNES past Sega was Street Fighter II. It was a SNES exlusive for a s short while and had very good sales. Not to mention as few remember it was supported by Xband. So you could take it online. When the Genesis version came out it also supported by Xband

That's not quite right, Sega was number one in sixteen bit sales in 91, 92, and 93. Nintendo took a small lead in 94, and Sega effectively killed the genesis in 95 and handed the still robust 16 bit market over to Nintendo.

The 91 SNES launch was mediocre... Super Mario World did not light the industry on fire like Nintendo had hoped. Meanwhile Sega dropped the price of the Genesis and released Sonic the Hedgehog. You can argue about whether Sonic or SMW was a better game, but at the time Sonic was fresh/new/original/exciting and Mario was getting a bit stale.

Street Fighter II was a defibrillator for the SNES. It got the machine off the mat. It was Nintendo's first strong counterpunch that turned the sixteen bit market into a full fledged war. It would be a year before SFII would come to the genesis, but by that point Mortal Kombat had become the it title, and Nintendo crapped the bed with their content restrictions, giving the genesis another boost.

[Rob2600]

The thing that finally pushed SNES past Sega was Street Fighter II.

Not quite. SFII was very popular on the SNES, but what helped push it past the Genesis in terms of sales was Donkey Kong Country in late 1994.

Sega was number one in sixteen bit sales in 91, 92, and 93. Nintendo took a small lead in 94, and Sega effectively killed the genesis in 95

I thought the Genesis wasn't officially discontinued in North America until 1997?

[Gamevet]

Not quite. SFII was very popular on the SNES, but what helped push it past the Genesis in terms of sales was Donkey Kong Country.

DKC came out near the launch of the 32-bit consoles. It was the superior port of MKII that pushes the SNES past the Genesis. It was also around that time when AAA titles like Super Metroid and Starfox came out.

I thought the Genesis wasn't officially discontinued in North America until 1997?

Sega had moved software support to the Saturn. It was pretty much 3rd party from 94 on.

[Rob2600]

DKC came out near the launch of the 32-bit consoles. It was the superior port of MKII that pushes the SNES past the Genesis. It was also around that time when AAA titles like Super Metroid and Starfox came out.

Donkey Kong Country, Super Metroid, and Mortal Kombat II were all released in 1994 (and Donkey Kong Country and MKII were toward the end of '94). So again, it wasn't until late 1994 that the SNES overtook the Genesis in terms of hardware sales.

I say it was mainly because of DKC, but I'm sure MKII helped as well. According to vgchartz.com, MKII on the SNES = 1.9 million copies, while DKC = 9.3 million copies.

[Gamevet]

Yeah, but in North America MKII was the hottest game going. The SNES version made it cool to own the Nintendo console again. The uncensored Mortal Kombat kept the Genesis ahead and forced Nintendo to rethink about their policies on violent games.

[tom]

I can tell you don't know much how chips works or anything to do with computing.
Speed really doesn't mean a thing. Efficiency does. Genesis allowed 64 colors and SNES 256.

Mode-7 is widely known as the most amazing feature SNES had outside it's sound chip. Genesis didn't have Mode-7 Which allowed multiple scaling moving background. Contra III & Terramigma are some good examples of using it in a unique way. Genesis had a 4 channel sound chip. Less advanced than SNES however Genesis was better with bass. SNES 8 channel sound ship from Sony allowed more well channels of sound. It also allowed and he admitted loving the SNES for the first time Nobuo's compositions sounded as intended for the first time. Skip a gen go to PSone vs N64. N64 had a 93MHz CPU yet was lousy at textures and had a lower poly count than PSone. Saturn in all technical aspects had a beast of a powerhouse. (look at the Shenmue Saturn footage to see what the system was capable of) PS2 Vs DC While DC only lasted 2 years so to devs never fully unlocked it's secrets and PS2 had a faster CPU DC was actually better with color and textures reflections and shadows than PS2. In fact just ask my buddy at R* but Shenmue would actually be impossible on PS2. PS2 could not handle it. Sure a screenshot war should show PS2 games looking better than almost any DC game but the architecture was different PS2 was Open GL & DC was Direct X 6.1(to compare Xbox was 8.1) There is another example. GCN was capable of a few things Xbox could not. It was better with load times thanks to it's TSRAM. GCN is also one of the most efficient pieces of hardware ever made in terms of consoles. Also if you go by speed alone PSP's 333MHz was more powerful than PS2? Nope not even close. (PS2 is 294 and 299 in later models)


Also don't forget Nintendo had 2 full years to work on SNES after Genesis launched. You could not pull Yoshi's Island off on Genesis Hardware. It just isn't capable. Same with StarFox(Lylat Wars)

Yeah long blabby post. Also not a fanboy as I love Sega far more.(Fave system is a Sega console and own nearly all of them)

Also that last comment had to be bad sarcasm or else comes off as desperate with a side if insecurity and false machoism.

I also have a twelve inch penis

[Rob2600]

in North America MKII was the hottest game going. The SNES version made it cool to own the Nintendo console again.

Star Fox (1993)
worldwide: 3 million copies
North America: 1.6 million copies

Super Metroid (1994)
worldwide: 1.4 million copies
North America: 0.6 million copies

Mortal Kombat II (1994)
worldwide: 1.9 million copies
North America: 1.5 million copies

Donkey Kong Country (1994)
worldwide: 9.3 million copies
North America: 4.4 million copies


You're right- MKII was very successful on the SNES, especially in North America. But Donkey Kong Country outsold it by 3-to-1 in North America. So again, DKC is what really gave the SNES a big sales boost...bigger than MKII.

[j_factor]

sorry, double post

[j_factor]

Mode-7 is widely known as the most amazing feature SNES had outside it's sound chip. Genesis didn't have Mode-7 Which allowed multiple scaling moving background.

Mode 7 only allowed one background layer. Mode 7 is nice, but it's a feature, it does not contribute to how powerful the SNES is.

Genesis had a 4 channel sound chip.

The Genesis had two sound chips and a total of 10 channels.

The slow CPU is pretty unimportant compared to the great power of the system in every other way. You seriously would say that the Genesis and Turbografx are more powerful than the SNES, really? It's just not true. They have faster CPUs, but are worse in every other way, and those other ways amount to being worse in far more ways than the one that they are better at.

The phrase used was "more powerful", not "overall technically better". A better color palette is a technical advantage, but it does not constitute more power. The Commodore 64 is not more powerful than the original Macintosh.

Actual in-game graphics with lighting, texture effects, physics, etc. (not bogus, meaningless theoretical maximums):

PlayStation- roughly 350-500k polygons per second max.
N64- roughly 350-500k polygons per second max.

You've got to be joking. It's more like 100k on N64 and a little higher on Playstation. The Playstation's "meaningless theoretical maximum" is 360k according to Sony. It certainly wasn't doing that in-game.

Dreamcast- roughly 5-6 million polygons per second max.
PS2- roughly 12-15 million polygons per second max.
GameCube- roughly 25 million polygons per second max.
Xbox- roughly 35 million polygons per second max.

The difference between these consoles isn't that large.

DKC came out near the launch of the 32-bit consoles. It was the superior port of MKII that pushes the SNES past the Genesis. It was also around that time when AAA titles like Super Metroid and Starfox came out.

The SNES version of MKII was better, but the Genesis version still outsold it, due to more Mortal Kombat fans already owning the console. However, the difference in sales wasn't nearly as large as with the first one. I don't think it contributed to SNES gaining over Genesis.

[Gamevet]

DKC was a pack-in game. The numbers for DKC2 would be a more accurate number to make a comparison.

The SNES version of MKII was better, but the Genesis version still outsold it, due to more Mortal Kombat fans already owning the console. However, the difference in sales wasn't nearly as large as with the first one. I don't think it contributed to SNES gaining over Genesis.

It should, because the Genesis still had more units at that time.

The combination of Nintendo's recently released titles, Sega's focus on 32-bit software and SFII/MK2 being on the SNES created a sales shift for the consoles.

[Rob2600]

You've got to be joking. It's more like 100k on N64 and a little higher on Playstation. The Playstation's "meaningless theoretical maximum" is 360k according to Sony. It certainly wasn't doing that in-game.

When developers used SGI's standard microcode on the N64, you're right, games pushed roughly 100,000 polygons per second (including texture filtering, perspective correction, Z buffer, etc.). However, the N64 was capable of up to roughly 600,000 polygons per second using other microcode. By comparison, Sony PlayStation games pushed roughly 180,000 texture mapped and light-sourced polygons per second (360,000 flat-shaded polygons per second). I've updated my previous post to be more accurate.

According to Boss Game Studios, who developed Top Gear Rally, Twisted Edge Snowboarding, Stunt Racer 64, and World Driver Championship on the N64, they were pushing roughly 300,000 polygons per second on the N64 in World Driver Championship.


More info:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_64:

"Some developers noted that the default SGI microcode ("Fast3D"), which allowed more than ~100,000 high accuracy polygons per second, was poorly profiled for use in games (it was too accurate), and performance suffered as a result. "Turbo3D" microcode allowed 500,000–600,000 normal accuracy polygons per second. However, due to the graphical degradation, Nintendo discouraged its use. Several companies, such as Factor 5, Boss Game Studios, and Rare, were able to write custom microcode that ran their software better than SGI's standard microcode.

...some of the most polygon-intense Nintendo 64 games, such as World Driver Championship, frequently pushed past the Sony PlayStation′s typical in-game polygon counts.

One of the best examples of custom microcode on the Nintendo 64 was Factor 5's N64 port of the Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine PC game. The Factor 5 team aimed for the high resolution mode (640 × 480) because of the crispness it added to the visuals. The machine was taxed to the limit running at 640 × 480, so they needed performance beyond the standard SGI microcode. ... Factor 5's microcode allowed almost unlimited real-time lighting and significantly boosted the polygon count."


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Driver_Championship:

"One of the last racing simulations to be released for Nintendo 64, this graphically intensive title used custom microcode optimization and high polygon count modelling. The development team was able to optimize the usage of the various processors within the N64 to allow far draw distance (reducing the need for fog or pop-up), high detail texturing and models, Doppler effect audio, and advanced lighting and fog effects for realistic weather conditions. Impressively the game has a high resolution 640x480 mode that does not require the add-on N64 RAM Expansion Pak."

[j_factor]

When developers used SGI's standard microcode on the N64, you're right, games pushed roughly 100,000 polygons per second (including texture filtering, perspective correction, Z buffer, etc.).

Which the vast majority of games used.

However, the N64 was capable of up to roughly 600,000 polygons per second using other microcode.

Yes but you said you were talking about actual in-game graphics, not theoreticals.

By comparison, Sony PlayStation games pushed roughly 180,000 texture mapped and light-sourced polygons per second (360,000 flat-shaded polygons per second).

I doubt any actual games got that high.

According to Boss Game Studios, who developed Top Gear Rally, Twisted Edge Snowboarding, Stunt Racer 64, and World Driver Championship on the N64, they were pushing roughly 300,000 polygons per second on the N64.

Cite?

[Rob2600]

Yes but you said you were talking about actual in-game graphics, not theoreticals.

Right. N64's in-game maximum, with all effects turned on and running in hi-res mode, was roughly 300k polygons per second according to a programmer at Boss Game Studios. I'll try to find the site where he posted that info. Of course, I won't be able to find it now...