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[Geometric-Crusher]

First I agree with Sega Lord X



Second, there's a fact that isn't often explored: the Sega Saturn outsold the PlayStation in Japan in 1995, and although both sold similarly in 1996, it wasn't until 1997 that the Sony PlayStation surpassed the Sega Saturn. Yes, by the end of 1996, Sega had sold 7 million units worldwide and the PS1 10 million (for my analysis, this is the only relevant timeframe, from November 1994 to November 1996).What's the point? The point is that game sales didn't keep up with hardware sales. That is, the PS1 had a large number of games that surpassed 700,000 copies sold, while Sega only had four games that reached that number.

Third, let's analyze the games.

The Saturn and PS1 had similar games: racing games, airplane games, RPGs, fighting games, sports games, and 2D games. The difference here is that the PS1's RPGs sold three times more than the Saturn's RPGs, Fighting games sold twice as much, racing games sold three times as much. Hell, the PS1 only had a 30% increase in hardware installed base, but game sales averaged at least 150%.

This is the reason for the Sega Saturn's failure. Note that both the Saturn and PS1 invested in new IPs, a mistake on Sega's part. Sony had no IPs, while Sega had some well-known games. However, Sega misused these IPs.

 

[RetroGamingUK]

As to why it succeeded in Japan and not the west, despite Sega winning the 3rd and 4th console generations in Europe…

- Almost no price difference, ¥39,800 for PlayStation, ¥44,800 for Saturn

- Virtua Fighter was huge in Japan while the west was gripped by Mortal Kombat fever

- Japan didn't care as much for Sonic, so his absence was felt more in the west

- JRPGs were successful on Saturn, they almost never released in Europe due to requiring multiple translations (we never got the Square SNES games). For many in Europe FF7 was their introduction

- 2D shmups were huge in Japanese arcades, most never saw the light of day in the west

- Many of Saturn's big games were arcade ports, the decline of the arcades started earlier in the west than Japan

- Japan got a controller with the GOAT d-pad, the west got the below piece of shit

 

[Horseganador]

Just seeing the development odyssey that Sonic Xtreme had for Saturn, which in the end had to be cancelled and Sonic 3D ported from Genesis to have some Sonic in 1996 while Nintendo released Super Mario 64, you realise how screwed Sega was internally.

 

[Nintendo's Witch]

Best CPS2 machine ever

 

[nkarafo]

For me it's very simple.

This generation of console would make textured 3D graphics the norm. So the performance and look of those 3D graphics was very important. Basically, the console that has the best 3D graphics would win.

The early games pretty much showed the world the PS1 will have better graphics. Tekken/Toshinden looked better than Virtua Fighter. And Ridge Racer looked better than Daytona. Doesn't matter if Saturn could do better, doesn't matter if the games were rushed. People didn't know that stuff back then.

So there you have it. Once the rumor the PS1 has better 3D graphics took off via word of mouth or magazines, it was over for the Saturn.

 

[RetroGamingUK]

Despite everything I posted above, many Sega fans still see the Saturn as a success for them…

 

[Geometric-Crusher]

As to why it succeeded in Japan and not the west, despite Sega winning the 3rd and 4th console generations in Europe…

- Virtua Fighter was huge in Japan while the west was gripped by Mortal Kombat fever

- Japan didn't care as much for Sonic, so his absence was felt more in the west

- JRPGs were successful on Saturn, they almost never released in Europe due to requiring multiple translations (we never got the Square SNES games). For many in Europe FF7 was their introduction

- 2D shmups were huge in Japanese arcades, most never saw the light of day in the west

- Many of Saturn's big games were arcade ports, the decline of the arcades started earlier in the west than Japan

- Japan got a controller with the GOAT d-pad, the west got the below piece of shit

you almost closed the thread, the fate of the Sega Saturn was sealed when Sega decided that the money would be put into creating games for Japanese consumers.

 

[RetroGamingUK]

For me it's very simple.

This generation of console would make textured 3D graphics the norm. So the performance and look of those 3D graphics was very important. Basically, the console that has the best 3D graphics would win.

The early games pretty much showed the world the PS1 will have better graphics. Tekken/Toshinden looked better than Virtua Fighter. And Ridge Racer looked better than Daytona. Doesn't matter if Saturn could do better, doesn't matter if the games were rushed. People didn't know that stuff back then.

So there you have it. Once the rumor the PS1 has better 3D graphics took off via word of mouth or magazines, it was over for the Saturn.

Going into Christmas 1995 (or January 1996 in Europe) Saturn had the 3 most impressive 3D games money could buy

However the high launch price and ugly launch ports of Virtua Fighter and Daytona had done too much damage by then

 

[Holammer]

Afaik retailers earned more for every sold PS1 than the Saturn & N64 and Sony had vertical integration for the CD medium which Sega lacked.
The machine had the odds stacked against it.

 

[RAIDEN1]

Let's face it outside of being the most affordable way to play Neo-geo like games, the Saturn didn't have all that much going for it...difficult to develop for from the get-go...a machine that was a mesh transparencies specialist, and games of the calibre of Virtua Fighter 2, too few and far between... so much for Sega being state of the art in the arcades, but when it came to the domestic scene they were behind the curve... Also the late-Bernie Stolar didn't help matters much either..

 

[nkarafo]

Going into Christmas 1995 (or January 1996 in Europe) Saturn had the 3 most impressive 3D games money could buy

However the high launch price and ugly launch ports of Virtua Fighter and Daytona had done too much damage by then

Right. If the launch games were VF2, Sega Rally and Virtua Cop (i assume those are the games you refer to) things would be different for the Saturn.

But it was too late.

 

[RetroGamingUK]

you almost closed the thread, the fate of the Sega Saturn was sealed when Sega decided that the money would be put into creating games for Japanese consumers.

Sega of America created excellent MegaDrive games like Sonic 2, 3 & Knucles, Kid Chameleon and Comix Zone.

On Saturn they produced shit like Ghen War.

 

[Geometric-Crusher]

Just seeing the development odyssey that Sonic Xtreme had for Saturn, which in the end had to be cancelled and Sonic 3D ported from Genesis to have some Sonic in 1996 while Nintendo released Super Mario 64, you realise how screwed Sega was internally.

pay attention to the cut from 1994 to 1996, if Sega cared about Sonic, there would be a Sonic Saturn in 1995. Sega only gave value to Sonic after Sonic Adventure, it was at this time that Sega realized that it depended on Sonic to exist as a company.

 

[RetroGamingUK]

pay attention to the cut from 1994 to 1996, if Sega cared about Sonic, there would be a Sonic Saturn in 1995. Sega only gave value to Sonic after Sonic Adventure, it was at this time that Sega realized that it depended on Sonic to exist as a company.

Sonic & Knuckles launched in winter 1994, which gave Sega a reasonable 2 years to get a 3D Sonic out to go toe to toe with Mario 64 in America.

Instead the Sonic X-Treme project collapsed and they went into Christmas 1996 with good titles like NiGHTS, Fighting Vipers and Virtua Cop 2 which didn't really resonate with the non-existing customers.

Come 1997 and UK retailers like Virgin Megastores were already emptying their shelves of Saturn stock to make way for the new N64 (which launched late here and didn't stand a chance against the PlayStation).

 

[NeverYouMind]

The early games pretty much showed the world the PS1 will have better graphics. Tekken/Toshinden looked better than Virtua Fighter. And Ridge Racer looked better than Daytona. Doesn't matter if Saturn could do better, doesn't matter if the games were rushed. People didn't know that stuff back then.

They both had Toshinden.


Original Tekken looked like this:

Virtua Fighter Remix was shipped to registered Saturn US owners for free and looked like this:

Sega Rally was better than Ridge Racer:

 

[Horseganador]

pay attention to the cut from 1994 to 1996, if Sega cared about Sonic, there would be a Sonic Saturn in 1995. Sega only gave value to Sonic after Sonic Adventure, it was at this time that Sega realized that it depended on Sonic to exist as a company.

The logical thing would have been to put the Sonic team at full capacity with Sonic for Saturn since 1994 (if Yuji Naka didn't want to be fired, what a clown) and not put a team of rookies in the USA to do it, but hey, it was Sega in the 90s, they did senseless things.

 

[RetroGamingUK]

Excellent analysis from an excellent channel

 

[Parazels]

 

[nkarafo]

They both had Toshinden.


Original Tekken looked like this:

Virtua Fighter Remix was shipped to registered Saturn US owners for free and looked like this:

Sega Rally was better than Ridge Racer:

You missed the word "early" when i said "the early games".

 

[RetroGamingUK]

PlayStation had polygonal backgrounds, character lighting and transparencies, Saturn did not



PlayStation

Saturn

 

[NeverYouMind]

You missed the word "early" when i said "the early games".

All of these came out in 1995 on their respective systems...

 

[SkylineRKR]

VF Remix and SR looked good but the damage had been done already. Saturn launched at a higher price, had with VF1 and Daytona worse graphics than PSX. On top of a bad marketing campaign and haphazard launch in the west. Sony just released games, and also secured MK3 which was a big deal in fall 1995.

There was little reason to choose the Saturn, even though I had a 16-bit Sega console. It was more expensive, there wasn't a Sonic game. PSX generally showed better 3d and performance, which was what gamers wanted at the time. 2D being superior is a plus now since it holds up better, but back then not too many cared about that fact. Gamers were into it for the jump to 3D.

 

[Geometric-Crusher]

1994
Saturn PS1
VF1 Ridge Racer
Gale Racer Motor toon
clockworknight Kings Field

1995
Panzer Dragoon Battle Arena Toshinden
Astal Bug! Jumping Flash
Daytona Tekken
Shinobi X Arc the Lad
Virtual Hydelide
VF Remix Ace combat
Magic Knight Rayearth
Wing Arms warhawk
Victory Goal NFL GameDay

PS1 launch in the USA with all those games

1996
Sega Saturn Playstation
Guadian Heroes Resident Evil
It's enough
Note how Sega games came later like Magic Knight Rayearth compared to Arc the Lad or had a technological disadvantage like VF1 compared to Battle Arena Toshinden, or in some cases were games with no commercial appeal like Panzer Dragoon.

 

[RetroGamingUK]

VF Remix and SR looked good but the damage had been done already. Saturn launched at a higher price, had with VF1 and Daytona worse graphics than PSX. On top of a bad marketing campaign and haphazard launch in the west. Sony just released games, and also secured MK3 which was a big deal in fall 1995.

I'd never played Virtua Fighter before but I remember seeing Virtua Fighter running on a big rear projection screen in a shop window and thinking this looks so bad compared to MK3 on my MegaDrive

It was VF2 that sold me on the Saturn. AM2 used a lot of cool trickery to make the Saturn version look great like using a warped VDP2 background layer for the floor and parallax background layers for a 3D effect.

That meant all the VDP1 quads could be spent on character models.

All that mattered was the end result, but obviously this technique couldn't be replicated on fully 3D games like Tomb Raider.

 

[nkarafo]

All of these came out in 1995 on their respective systems...

When the consoles launched in the west, every magazine would compare Daytona USA with Ridge Racer. And shortly after it would be VF1 vs Tekken/Toshiden (the Saturn version came later).

The good looking Saturn games like Sega Rally were "second generation" made by new tools, etc.

I thought you were there.

 

[Geometric-Crusher]

2D being superior is a plus now since it holds up better, but back then not too many cared about that fact.

except the 20 million who bought Donkey Kong series games right?
It's not about 2D or 3D, it's about famous and good games vs new and bad games.

 

[diffusionx]

Sega did a poor job of catering to the American market. It's not just Sonic. The NFL game they released was a pile of shit, which is crazy considering they made great NFL games on Genesis. Meanwhile Sony made the best NFL game up to that point. Their baseball game was good, but that's probably because Japanese people like baseball too.

Launching with a good NFL game would have done wonders for Saturn in 1995 and maybe kept American buyers happy until VF2/VC/SR arrived.

VF Remix and SR looked good but the damage had been done already. Saturn launched at a higher price, had with VF1 and Daytona worse graphics than PSX. On top of a bad marketing campaign and haphazard launch in the west. Sony just released games, and also secured MK3 which was a big deal in fall 1995.

There was little reason to choose the Saturn, even though I had a 16-bit Sega console. It was more expensive, there wasn't a Sonic game. PSX generally showed better 3d and performance, which was what gamers wanted at the time. 2D being superior is a plus now since it holds up better, but back then not too many cared about that fact. Gamers were into it for the jump to 3D.

VF2 on Saturn was great. Nobody denies it. But PSX got Tekken that same year and anyone who had a PSX and wanted a 3D fighter could play that. Tekken was good, maybe not VF2 good but good (unlike BAT). Tekken 2 was great, though, and launched the following year. So even something like VF2 wasn't essential.

 

[Parazels]

PlayStation had polygonal backgrounds, character lighting and transparencies, Saturn did not

Ok

 

[RetroGamingUK]

The good looking Saturn games like Sega Rally were "second generation" made by new tools, etc.

I thought you were there.

Graphics evolved so fast back then.

Sega Rally just about surpassed Ridge (but not WipEout)

But then Rage Racer and Porsche Challenge released and Saturn never caught up.

 

[RetroGamingUK]

Ok

I was on about Toshinden

But those mesh shadows prove my point so thanks.

 

[Geometric-Crusher]

The logical thing would have been to put the Sonic team at full capacity with Sonic for Saturn since 1994 (if Yuji Naka didn't want to be fired, what a clown) and not put a team of rookies in the USA to do it, but hey, it was Sega in the 90s, they did senseless things.

It's all a matter of choice, if they had teams to make Astal, Clockworknight, Bug!, Shinobi X and Panzer Dragoon, they could certainly make Sonic. Or do you doubt that Sonic 2D would help the Saturn more than these games above?

 

[Parazels]

The logical thing would have been to put the Sonic team at full capacity with Sonic for Saturn since 1994 (if Yuji Naka didn't want to be fired, what a clown) and not put a team of rookies in the USA to do it, but hey, it was Sega in the 90s, they did senseless things.

Was a proper 3d Sonic even technically possible on the Saturn?

 

[nkarafo]

Was a proper 3d Sonic even technically possible on the Saturn?

The hub in Sonic Jam looks good but it's small, empty and probably already squeezed the Saturn of everything it had.

Maybe something with 2D sprites and a DOOM like engine like this:



This is the 32X port of Robo Blast. So the Saturn version would be higher-res and slightly faster.

 

[diffusionx]

Was a proper 3d Sonic even technically possible on the Saturn?

No, probably not.

It seems like Sega themselves had a lot of trouble figuring it out too.

 

[Geometric-Crusher]

It was VF2 that sold me on the Saturn. AM2 used a lot of cool trickery to make the Saturn version look great like using a warped VDP2 background layer for the floor and parallax background layers for a 3D effect.

That meant all the VDP1 quads could be spent on character models.

It wasn't all quads, it was almost all quads that can be used at 60fps, the Saturn has theoretical potential for games like Soul Edge at 30fps

All that mattered was the end result, but obviously this technique couldn't be replicated on fully 3D games like Tomb Raider.

The technique can be used for fully 3D games, with the camera on the character's back etc but the nature of the rendering of the Tomb Raider map or racing games needs to be done with VDP1.

 

[PlayStaytion]

It's the Steven Spielberg box, c'mon! glad he's still around with us.

 

[SkylineRKR]

except the 20 million who bought Donkey Kong series games right?
It's not about 2D or 3D, it's about famous and good games vs new and bad games.

In 1995 it was. Barely anyone bought Parodius at PSX launch. These weren't the games that sold the system and converted gamers. In that era SF sold much worse than Tekken as well.

 

[RetroGamingUK]

except the 20 million who bought Donkey Kong series games right?
It's not about 2D or 3D, it's about famous and good games vs new and bad games.

After 1995 no one wanted 2D games (DKC 2 and Rayman being the last big sellers in the west for the 90s).

Great 2D games like Castlevania SOTN like Street Fighter Alpha 2 flopped in the west in terms of sales, people ignored Street Fighter 3 in favour of VF3 and Tekken 3 in arcades.

2D wouldn't make a comeback in terms of popularity in the west until New Super Mario Bros and Street Fighter IV in the mid 00s.

 

[Crayon]

It got crushed in the us because it was $100 more, reputational damage from 32x/cd. Those along with the surprise launch made it impossible to pin it out of the gate.

Sony came on strong. Surprisingly so. They had cash and tons of experience with electronics, manufacturing, distribution and entertainment. Tekken, Wipeout, Twisted Metal, NBA itz, and NFL Gameday were available in the launch window and the battle for mindshare was over very quickly. Sega had no chance.

 

[nkarafo]

reputational damage from 32x/cd

People still had more faith on Saturn compared to Playstation initially (before they were released) because it's Sega and Sega is a videogame company. Sony is a Hi-Fi and TV company just like Philips and Panasonic so the Playstation would most likely be the next CD-i or 3DO.

 

[roosnam1980]

from wiki..........................
"Development of the Saturn was supervised by Hideki Sato, Sega's director and deputy general manager of research and development. According to project manager Hideki Okamura, the project codenamed Saturn started over two years before its announcement at the Tokyo Toy Show in June 1994. It was developed by the same team that developed the System 32 arcade board. Sato regrets that he did not go with the Model 1 arcade hardware as a base, as he was too concerned of leaving all the developers behind that were focused on sprites rather than 3D, which were the majority of developers."

 

[Crayon]

except the 20 million who bought Donkey Kong series games right?
It's not about 2D or 3D, it's about famous and good games vs new and bad games.

If you had just bought a new $249-$699 32-bit console, you wanted to see it work and that meant 3D games.

I was 13 or 14. I still wanted and needed yoshi's island. I saw that as an exceptional late 16bit game worth as much or more than anything on ps1. But in general, I was over 2d games.

In fact, I considered something like panzer dragoon to be more 2d than 3d. It played too closely to space harrier for me. It wasn't just about graphics. I wanted to play games in 3d space.

 

[Crayon]

People still had more faith on Saturn compared to Playstation initially (before they were released) because it's Sega and Sega is a videogame company. Sony is a Hi-Fi and TV company just like Philips and Panasonic so the Playstation would most likely be the next CD-i or 3DO.

I think you are right but it that doesn't conflict with sega losing consumer trust. Epecially because a lot of spending was parents buying almost totally on the testimony of their kids. Just bought a 32x last year. And a sega cd the year before that. And now the next sega thing is $399. That's bad.

And it has to be considered that those buying parents, who were actual boomers, saw sony as a trustworthy and respected brand while sega and nintendo were toy companies. I don't really hear that talked about but I remember it being like that. How much of an effect did that have in parent's buying decisions, i don't know.

 

[Parazels]

 

[nkarafo]

And it has to be considered that those buying parents, who actual boomers, saw sony as a trustworthy and respected brand while sega and nintendo were toy companies. I don't really hear that talked about but I remember it being like that. How much of an effect did that have in parent's buying decisions, i don't know.

I think parents who decided their kid needed a Playstation in 1995 were a minority. Without kids informing them what exactly they want, parents usually go for the cheapest thing. So in 1995 most likely a 16bit console bargain pack or something. I remember my parents bought me an Atari 2600 in 1989 because it was the cheapest console in the store at the time and it had a cart with 32 games so that was the best deal!

The only comparison that mattered though was Daytona USA vs Ridge Racer.

 

[Parazels]

The only comparison that mattered though was Daytona USA vs Ridge Racer.

Maybe. But... Right now I'm collecting PSX games for emulation and NFS 1 is the only NFS I've picked.

 

[Crayon]

The only comparison that mattered though was Daytona USA vs Ridge Racer.

Disagree on this. That was the fight in print media and did set a tone. But from my memory, it was more like Daytona vs Wipeout.

Ridge Racer was not terribly popular among my friends and I and we were early adopters. RR, like daytona, was a port of a game we'd already played in the arcade. Even if it was a more faithful one. Twisted metal, wipeout, destruction derbey, warhawk, kings field, jumping flash - These were exciting new things and I'm confident saying they very quickly overshadowed daytona or rr.

 

[RetroGamingUK]

Disagree on this. That was the fight in print media and did set a tone. But from my memory, it was more like Daytona vs Wipeout.

Ridge Racer was not terribly popular among my friends and I and we were early adopters. RR, like daytona, was a port of a game we'd already played in the arcade. Even if it was a more faithful one. Twisted metal, wipeout, destruction derbey, warhawk, kings field, jumping flash - These were exciting new things and I'm confident saying they very quickly overshadowed daytona or rr.

The Ridge Racer vs Daytona comparisons go back to pre launch with magazines comparing Japanese versions.

No one gave a shit about either series in the UK, games like WipEout, Sega Rally, F1, TOCA were far more popular.

I had Ridge Racer 4 and loved it, no one else cared for it.

 

[kevboard]

the Saturn was essentially dead on arrival in germany. the first time I ever saw either a Saturn or a Saturn game in any store was in the early 2000s, when a game store tried to get rid of unsold old stock, and had tons of old stuff at low prices.
I never actually saw a single Saturn related product sold in stores while it still was officially supported.

it essentially never got off the ground in europe in general it seems. kinda weird tbh.

 

[Geometric-Crusher]

After 1995 no one wanted 2D games (DKC 2 and Rayman being the last big sellers in the west for the 90s).

the important is 1995, Arc the Lad and Namco Museum Vol. 1, Rayman and MK3 are games from 1995 as well as Astal, Golden Axe The Duel and Shinobi X. Do you realize that if Namco Museum Vol. 1 and Arc the Lad sold more than 1 million copies, would it be too much to ask for Sega's 2D games to also sell 1 million copies? On the Sega Saturn, only three games (Sega Rally, Daytona, and VF2) outsold Sonic 3D Blast, a game that sold 700,000 copies.