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Post by virtualscot on Feb 7, 2012 0:53:27 GMT
This is not to say the NES was a bad. It is a great system, despite the graphics and sound being rather poor for the most part. What i wish to raise is the question, that by illegally forcing 3rd party developers to make games only for the NES.
Did Nintendo kill the 8 Bit era by having such a monopoly on the market? Thus not allowing many great games to be made for the SMS . I truly believe that had these games been made for the SMS.
Many of them would have been superior to there NES counter parts.
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Post by frankfjs on Feb 7, 2012 2:16:30 GMT
Yep, no doubt about it in my mind, Nintendo did stifle the competition and prevent other great things from happening. They even put a patent on their d-pad, which in case you're wondering, is why no other control pad of the time had a nice cross shaped d-pad on it.
They killed innovation and stopped us seeing many great games and hardware developments.
At least they received a taste of their own medicine when Sony whooped their arse.
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Post by virtualscot on Feb 7, 2012 10:14:09 GMT
Yep, no doubt about it in my mind, Nintendo did stifle the competition and prevent other great things from happening. They even put a patent on their d-pad, which in case you're wondering, is why no other control pad of the time had a nice cross shaped d-pad on it. They killed innovation and stopped us seeing many great games and hardware developments. At least they received a taste of their own medicine when Sony whooped their arse. Really? Never knew they put a patent on the d-pad Did they also do the same with the pause button?
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Post by meu2 on Feb 7, 2012 11:11:14 GMT
Nintendo have the patent on the D-pad as they, or rather Gunpei Yokoi, invented it. The Donkey Kong Game & Watch was the first game to use a D-pad. It makes complete sense for Nintendo to patent it since it was their intellectual property. Not that it stopped everyone from copying it anyway using slightly alternative mechanisms.
The first Pause button was on the Atari 5200, but I don’t believe there is a patent on it. I believe Sega’s decision to include the pause button on the console was a culture issue, i.e. the Japanese often kept their console close to them so controls on the system would have been accessible.
I don’t believe it’s fair to say Nintendo killed the 8 Bit era. For a start the 8 bit era stretched for nearly 20 years, starting with the “Atari” era in the late seventies and continuing until the mid/late nineties before all the systems were discontinued. It’s even longer if you count handhelds, with the Game Boy lasting into the new millennium. On top of that there was a very strong home computer market throughout Europe that dwarfed the NES in the region. Of course the SMS lasted longer than the NES in some markets too.
You could even make the case that Nintendo revitalised the 8 Bit market in the US after the fall of Atari. What they did do was monopolise the 8 Bit console market though, which made it very difficult for others to compete. It is a shame that developers got locked into those agreements with Nintendo, but at the end of the day they signed the agreement as they felt it was the best way to make money. Clearly they didn’t think that either Sega or Atari were the way to go. Having said that I do think it was unfortunate that other developers weren’t able to develop for the SMS due to the exclusivity agreements.
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Post by virtualscot on Feb 7, 2012 11:14:20 GMT
Nintendo have the patent on the D-pad as they, or rather Gunpei Yokoi, invented it. The Donkey Kong Game & Watch was the first game to use a D-pad. It makes complete sense for Nintendo to patent it since it was their intellectual property. Not that it stopped everyone from copying it anyway using slightly alternative mechanisms. The first Pause button was on the Atari 5200, but I don’t believe there is a patent on it. I believe Sega’s decision to include the pause button on the console was a culture issue, i.e. the Japanese often kept their console close to them so controls on the system would have been accessible. I don’t believe it’s fair to say Nintendo killed the 8 Bit era. For a start the 8 bit era stretched for nearly 20 years, starting with the “Atari” era in the late seventies and continuing until the mid/late nineties before all the systems were discontinued. It’s even longer if you count handhelds, with the Game Boy lasting into the new millennium. On top of that there was a very strong home computer market throughout Europe that dwarfed the NES in the region. Of course the SMS lasted longer than the NES in some markets too. You could even make the case that Nintendo revitalised the 8 Bit market in the US after the fall of Atari. What they did do was monopolise the 8 Bit console market though, which made it very difficult for others to compete. It is a shame that developers got locked into those agreements with Nintendo, but at the end of the day they signed the agreement as they felt it was the best way to make money. Clearly they didn’t think that either Sega or Atari were the way to go. Having said that I do think it was unfortunate that other developers weren’t able to develop for the SMS due to the exclusivity agreements. I also read somewhere that Nintendo tried to patent jumping
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Post by meu2 on Feb 7, 2012 11:18:54 GMT
I highly doubt that since many games had jumping prior to Donkey Kong.
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Post by virtualscot on Feb 7, 2012 11:39:14 GMT
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Post by meu2 on Feb 7, 2012 11:53:02 GMT
It’s reasonable to think that an idea that is uncommon (probably unique around the time of development) at the time, such as jumping in a world of space shooters, could be patented. However, even if they had tried this most likely would not have succeeded (or in the extreme case and it did succeed it wouldn’t stand as there was prior art). On top of that software patents pertaining to concepts are very weak and rarely stand up to scrutiny. For example, I believe Sega have a patent on the moveable camera in Virtua Racing. That sort of patent could have been used to try and stop other developers using dynamic camera pans. Nintendo, Sega & Co. have thousands of patent concepts and technologies, but very few offer any practical protection (the D-pad is a good example of this).
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Post by Maxim on Feb 7, 2012 14:53:23 GMT
The D-pad patent covers the specific implementation in Nintendo consoles - the contiguous "+" shape and the angles at which the surfaces slope. If you compare a Wii D-pad to a NES or even Donkey Kong one, they are remarkably similar. And you'll find very few D-pads with the exact same designs in those respects - hence the square and circular pads on Sega consoles, and the split, flat "+" shape on Sony consoles. Only on dodgy clones (e.g. Famiclone-in-a-pad consoles) will you see it closely copied.
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Post by playgeneration on Feb 7, 2012 15:27:09 GMT
I believe Sega’s decision to include the pause button on the console was a culture issue, i.e. the Japanese often kept their console close to them so controls on the system would have been accessible. Not just a Japanese thing, most kids at the time did their gaming on a 14" 'portable' TV, which you'd be sitting right in front of. I never though of the pause button on the console as being an issue, I rarely pause an SMS game anyway. And Nintendo didn't kill the 8bit era, its still going! Tec Toy still make SMS consoles Besides they gave up on the Nes before Sega did on the Master System. The last licensed Nes game came out in 1994! so much for the Nes being more popular, people didn't even want to buy games for it ;D
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Post by grolt on Feb 10, 2012 5:48:52 GMT
Interesting read - I never knew Nintendo patented the D-pad, but looking back now it makes sense. I always wondered by other companies didn't copy it since it worked so well; it also makes sense why Sony's close facsimile differs the way it does with the little indents.
As for the topic at hand, it's a catch 22 - if Nintendo hadn't streamlined, simplified and perfected the common video game concepts and controls we know today then there's a chance the 8-bit genre wouldn't have lasted near as long as it did, but even greater, that video games might not have continued on to be the artform they are today. Before the NES-era the common conception was that video games were seasonal flashes in the pan that didn't have any longevity by design.
Then on the other side, had they allowed all developers to develop on their consoles with whatever numbers they'd like, then there would have been less need to develop viable rival consoles like the PC Engine or the Genesis that effectively signaled the end of the 8-bit era by forcing Nintendo to throw in their hand and start anew with the SNES. When video rentals first started it was very much a console war between VHS and Beta, but once that one system won out, everyone adopted a uniform format and ran with it for 20 years. While the NES had the lion's share of the market, they could have created a similar environment for the NES - this notion of competing consoles very much could have been one that died with the Atari-era.
Or could it have gone the other way - with no monopoly the rival systems on the market - the SMS, the various Atari formats, etc. would have had more of a market share, and with that much fragmentation the video game market could have very likely crashed like it did in the early 80s (and again, some say, in the mid-90s when Sega fragmented the market further with the CD/32X along with all those other consoles, Jaguar, 3D0, etc.).
Tough to really say without having history play out in front of you, but regardless I think it is safe to say that Nintendo's actions definitely did have major repercussions on the gaming industry, for better and worse.
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Post by ShadowAngel on Feb 15, 2012 3:42:36 GMT
Nintendo did a lot of faeces, i actually despise the company (still like SMB3, SMW, SMB 1, Zelda 1 & 3 and stuff) but with their monopoly they strangled the industry. Imagine a situation like we have today: Developers can choose the platform or release games on every platform, i think the Master System would be the winner, it was more powerful than the NES and the Atari 7800 and until the arrival of the PC Engine would be the Nr. 1 platform. Also: I doubt that Sega would've ever started the regional locking crap (it was a invention of Nintendo) and without Nintendo strangling the indutry there wouldn't have been the need for Palcom, Ultra Games, LJN and other faux companies to get beyond the "5 games per year" limit Nintendo thought was a good idea.
Another thing is: Without Nintendo and their "we rubber duck all companies" behaviour, there would never been a Sony Playstation. I wonder how the video game world would've turn out without it. Of course Sega propably would've developed the "Neptune" and later relased a 3D System while Nintendo probably would've tried to ride the SNES Bandwagon till 1998 (Virtual Boy was always a failure) and how would Atari have faired? I guess the Jaguar would've been a lot more successful.
Of course also there's the rumour that Nintendo started the whole "Anti-Violence" campaign and where the initiating force behind the campaign against violent games and the targeting of Night Trap.
As the Master System still managed to kick NES ass in most european countries, the more interesting question would be: What if the contract between Nintendo and Atari about the NES in the USA went trough? Nintendo wanted Atari as publisher for the NES on the North American market. What would have happened? I doubt that Atari would'v been as extreme about censorship and not releasing certain games as Nintendo USA later turned out to be.
Edit: as for game inputs: There were Analog controls, control sticks and all the stuff before, the things we use today and take for granted were known back then (Vectrex, Atari 5200, Intellivision) i would go so far to say that with the D-Pad Nintendo held the industry back. I think that vertical and horizontal shooters would work a lot better with analog controls even in the 8-bit era than with that 8-way d-pad.
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Post by Transatlantic Foe on Feb 15, 2012 18:58:22 GMT
No Playstation? I like the sound of that alternate reality. In my opinion the way the popular market went with Sony had a far worse impact than anything Nintendo did. Although they at least got it right by not going with regional lockout (the single most retarded concept to grace gaming)!
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Post by ShadowAngel on Feb 29, 2012 20:44:13 GMT
No Playstation? I like the sound of that alternate reality. In my opinion the way the popular market went with Sony had a far worse impact than anything Nintendo did. I don't think so First off all: The Video Game market was going downhill in the 16-bit Era. We can blame a certain company and it's blue Hedgehog for a state were hundreds of companies wanted to copy the success and released their own "animal jump n' run Hero" (Zoo, Bubsy, Awesome Possum, Zero the Kamikaze Squirell) Sony never did anything bad, in fact they helped small developers and supported them, gave them a chance, why else was their so much weird stuff on the Playstation? Most People only remember the Hits by ignoring those games that propably would've never existed without Sony like Vib Ribbon, Parappa the Rapper, Ape Escape, Hot Shots Golf, Jumping Flash (First 3D Jump N' Run, way before the mediocre Mario 64), MediEvil and others. To this day, Sony is a publisher that actually gives indy developers and weird games a chance. Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, Ruin, Primal, Dog's Life, Lair, Little Big Planet, FantaVision, Siren and many others. They also brought some european games to japan like Discworld. I think Sony gets undeserved hate, they unlike Nintendo give everyone a chance, while Nintendo is only interested in pushing the same 5 franchises for 20 years without doing something new. I think the Playstation and the Playstation 2 are the only 2 consoles that feature a lot of creative and interesting games, stuff you won't find anywhere else, as stated above in some cases even published by Sony themselves (and nobody expected Vib Ribbon to be a great game, it was a niche game for a niche audience)
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Post by robocod on Mar 8, 2012 15:41:21 GMT
As far as i am concerned a gaming era is ended by an advance in technology,nothing else.Sure Nintendo has tight restrictions in many things from being reluctant to let designers name themselves in games to various licences but i am not sure about it chocking the video game market to death. The Sony playstation along with the Megadrive had a higher number of good game titles than any other home systems i can think of,they were both very good for the industry.
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