Well, to my credit that was like more than 20 years ago. And I'm still not fool enough to believe the DC was strong enough to push 60 fps in the vast majority of games. I could have sworn Sonic Adventure was a 60 fps game, though. Not that I even know what that meant back then. Like I said, it simply looked fast. My adult mind looking back assumed that meant it must've run at 60 fps.
EDIT: Yep, must of the time Sonic Adventure ran at 30 fps, except for the menus and some exceptions here and there. I stand corrected.
It's not like I'm going to lie to you and tell you that a small-profile console running a PowerPC GPU was some sort of graphical powerhouse. But it did a lot with what it had. I will tell you that though the PS2 had sheer muscle over the DC, it took quite a while for the PS2 to match the console it had defeated. But I chalk that up to artstyle. DC games tended to favor bright, happy colors, which had to me a much greater appeal than the muted greens and browns that defined most of the PS2 library.
Hmmm...I'd say PS2 started matching DC's quality both in terms of visuals and game quality by mid 2001. In fact, games like GT3 were just plain ahead of any equivalent sim racer on Dreamcast by that point. Now going by the Japanese launch that'd of been well over a year 'till, but that's still early/mid '01 for a gen that lasted until at least 2005.
So I'd say PS2 managed to catch up to/exceed Dreamcast in visuals quite early. But that's just my personal opinion perhaps, and I'm only speaking in terms of technical visual features. I can see why maybe for someone who preferred the art style of a game like Sonic Adventure 2, why it maybe took a little longer to feel PS2 offered anything on that level such as when Jak & Daxtar released in late '01.
Still finding hidden gems decades after release. Very few consoles are able to do this just due to the sheer depth of the PS2's library. Just the other year we finally got an English fan translation of Boku no Natsuyasumi 2:
I should pick this game back up sometime. It's a nice little experience to chill out with.
They were at it with the original Playstation certainly. There were interviews with the Digital Foundry guys when some of them were on Sega Saturn Magazine and they had devs and retailers confirm Sony execs were swanning into retailers and offering discounts on wholesale prices for preferential displays in stores. Same for publishing houses, Sony were flying journalists all over the world to trade shows, putting them up in hotels, etc. I'm sure that didn't contribute to the frankly unbelievable level of bias towards the Playstation in print and online publications though. And of course we all know how they went about securing exclusivity deal after exclusivity deal back in the day. That $ony chequebook took one hell of a pounding.
Uh...Digital Foundry? Richard? Yes, I know Richard was a writer & editor on SSM back in the day, but in case the name wasn't obvious, the mag was very SEGA-biased and because of that (plus the Saturn's market position in general that gen), had a fanboyish slant. Nothing wrong with that: Nintendo and PS-exclusive magazines at the time also had fanboyish biases to their platforms of choice. I'm just saying using SSM interviews (that you haven't even posted images from...that would be nice to back up these claims) as a gold standard to prove underhanded Sony tactics during 5th gen isn't a strong position to stand on.
Also insofar as Sony flying out journalists...uh, SEGA and Nintendo did that as well. Maybe not to the same degree, but they provided accommodations for journalists at times so that the journalists could do interviews with staff and cover the things they wanted to show off. They'd have lounges for media at toy show and CES events prior to E3 being a thing. All big companies in gaming at the time did this to some extent, it's just the nature of doing business. Trying to call that out as the reason PS got favorable coverage over the Saturn instead of, well, the PS1 just being a better product for the market and Sony having a much better advertising & marketing team, is a reach.
Is it Sony's fault SEGA retired the SEGA Scream & Pirate TV ads in favor of klansmen parodies and bald-headed chicks voguing in front of the camera? Is it Sony's fault that SEGA rushed Saturn to America so fast they alienated KB Toys who in turn refused to carry or advertise any Saturn stock for the entirety of that generation? You have to stop blaming Sony for SEGA's mistakes with the Saturn. Things you can try accusing Sony of doing as being "unfair", like acquiring companies (SEGA acquired a SDK company prior to Sony acquiring Psygnosis for (in part) SN Systems. Also acquired Visual Concepts) or exclusivity deals (SEGA got a timed six-month exclusivity deal on Tomb Raider 1, and Nintendo did a 1-year timed exclusivity deal for SF2 back in the day), you can find examples of SEGA having done them too.
"We all know" is really more like "I want to pretend thinking", or exaggerate how much Sony did this or that vs. ignoring how SEGA and Nintendo did this and that as well.
Basically I fucking loathe Sony, the Playstation brand and especially the warrior aspect of its fanbase. And yes, I'm am rather bitter!
Well that's obvious
This is the PR version of events imo.
Sega probably only ordered 150,000 units out of fear of lack of demand. They chose this conservative number because the Saturn was selling so few units each month that it was dead. When Sega realized they had sold out so quickly, they regretted not risking a larger quantity, so they used this narrative of blaming NEC, while ordering more units (which they failed to sell in a timely manner).
Uh, well that is certainly a version of the events, for sure. Can't say I've heard it anywhere else; maybe there is some truth to it or maybe there isn't. I know the Saturn itself was quite successful in Japan (vs other parts of the world), but looking up its Japanese sales, it definitely did seem to sell the vast majority of its units between '95 and '97, as the '98 amounts were paltry.
Coincidentally, that's right after PS1 got FF VII and now looking at the '97 sales, those had a massive drop-off in Japan compared to '96, so there could be some credibility in what you're claiming. '97's also the year SEGA decided to shift hardware development over to the Dreamcast, so maybe there's credence in the idea them pushing Dreamcast in Japan for '98 was less cutting Saturn off at the legs vs. hoping to revitalize the dramatic slowdown of their console sales after 1997 because, again, the Saturn Japanese sales in ''98 are very paltry (only 150K sold the whole year), whereas '97 was 800K, and '96 was 2.3 million.
Still tho, a bit odd they'd take them undershooting demand as a means of blaming NEC for GPU shortages, because I'm sure there were at least a couple trades back in the day which corroborated the supply issues. Maybe NEC just took the PR hit? It's not like things were going perfectly fine for them by then, either (and their own console platform ventures died with the PC-FX).
The goal you know was to sell over 1 million units in 90 days, but they sold less than 900,000 to make matters worse, people were asking for refunds.
at launch Dreamcast was priced at just ¥29,000 and the PS1 ¥15,000 six months after its launch, the Dreamcast would cost ¥19,900 and after March sales simply drop to almost zero. The Japanese really hated Sega back then only hatred can explain that.
units sold 2.42M from November 27, 1998 to some date of 2002.
Well TBH, the games rollout for Dreamcast in Japan was pretty bad the first few months, and it never got "substantively" better in time before PS2 hype kicked off. VF3 had a gimped port (no 2-player option), Sonic Adventure was delayed like a month and was buggy, games like Blue Stinger just weren't impressive, and in the face of PS1 & N64 hits that came out in '99 it was just tough for Dreamcast to get a foothold.
Once Sony started publicly talking about the PS2 and showing demos off, Dreamcast's fate in Japan was already sealed, and that was months before the American launch happened.
Something profound happened to Sega at some point in 1997 I don't have the answer this requires a more scientific approach, as Sega went from being viewed fondly between 1993 and 1997 to being hated from 1997 onwards, evidently this mind change was built from the outside in.
Also TBF, SEGA hardware in general (console-wise) was never too popular in Japan outside of the Saturn, so if we're talking just that region, '94-'96 would be better time periods to say they were viewed fondly. Of course arcade-wise they've always been popular in Japan and that reached its peak with Virtua Fighter, that thing just dominated Japanese arcades for a long while.
Now that I've looked at those sales numbers, I think it's probably the same thing which happened with PC-Engine in Japan. New system from a well-known player that had a big hit(s) in a booming genre at the time (shmups for PC-Engine, 3D fighters for Saturn), that cashed in well during a transitionary period between Nintendo generations (Famicom > Super Famicom for PC-Engine, Super Famicom > N64 for Saturn). And in both cases, launched slightly earlier than their direct other rivals (MegaDrive for PC-Engine, PlayStation for Saturn), by like a week or two.
However, in both cases, they simply failed to build up a strong enough library ahead of the next Nintendo system and, in Saturn's case, against the PS1 since that would also go on to dethrone Nintendo's console in Japan (something that hadn't happened up to that point). PC-Engine sales actually fell off pretty hard once the Super Famicom came out, so it sold the bulk of its 8 million before it launched. PC-Engine also benefited from the booming '80s Japanese economy of that time.
Conversely, Saturn sales likely took a big hit in Japan in '96 due to N64 (SEGA shipped the most units that year but the huge drop-off in '97 suggests they likely overshipped vs. demand), and a massive one in '97 due both to N64 but also PS1 seeing big growth thanks to games like FFVII (though I'd argue, for sold-through it's very likely PS1 outsold the Saturn in Japan in 1996 as well). By then I'd say the honeymoon of Saturn benefiting from being the first "real" next-gen system to launch, early 3D novelty at home & VF1/VF2 home port fever, had more or less worn off. After VF2, SEGA didn't have any big games for Japan that'd appeal the same way, and that's right before Super Mario 64 and, later, FF VII came out.
As to why I'd speculate PS1 outsold Saturn in Japan in '96, well it's not like FF VII was the first big hit on PS1. In '96 they got Resident Evil and smaller-but-successful games like Parappa, and Tekken 2 also came out that year. I could argue Saturn owners who wanted another big 3D home fighter to play after VF2, took to Tekken 2 and probably bought PS1s for it (and smaller 3D fighters like Toshinden and Tobal). Also while the King's Field games probably weren't mega-sellers, they had been building up a sizable audience in Japan even by '96. The combination of all those and other games, combined with the ridiculously low Saturn numbers sold in Japan in '97, just lead me to think PS1 very likely outsold it in sold-through, even if Saturn probably had a slight sold-in lead due to the amounts shipped in '94 and '95.
