its probably because only a few companies (namely Technosoft, Treasure and a couple others) wanted to take the risk in developing for the console, so you have these really nice games but very few of them, and many companies didn't want to take that risk for multiple reasons: needing a computer genius to be able to even code the game, due to the Saturn's crazy hardware, it ended up being hard for companies to even find the right amount of programmers so that one guy didn't have to do all the work. Looks like even Sega had that issue; Burning Rangers and Sonic Xtreme in particular stand out as really terrible developmental nightmares, with the latter even almost causing the death of a couple employees.
Seems like Sega said "go" on hardware that didn't really work right (similar to the Jaguar), and then stubbornly worked their asses off to make their games work on the system. The western branch (who were in charge of the 32X) tried to warn them. I think they did the two-processor setup because they could easily get the hardware? IIRC Sony made their own chips for the PS1 and Sega was just using aftermarket chips.
The Saturn's architecture wasn't really any harder to program than its contemporaries. Sega's dev kits just sucked ass and they kept all their highly-optimized libraries in-house so third-parties couldn't crank out the same quality of games as Sega did.
The N64 had the same problem where Nintendo and Rareware games looked and performed great because they had access to secret documentation on how to rewrite the N64's microcode to optimize performance. Meanwhile, third party devs could only really manage souped-up PS1 games most of the time.
Sony was really the only console maker offering a good experience for devs and not trying to cuck third-parties.
This is mostly true, but its not the only thing that sold many Saturns in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. Arcade ports were still popular, along with some RPG titles like Lunar and Shining force were there, too.
>outsells the psx for years
did you even read your own chart. Dreamcast came out in 1998. saturn had a short lifespan and was a healthy software market.
Ironically Sega killed the Saturn in Japan when it was just hitting it's stride there. They were better off going the NEC route and doubling down on the region instead of trying to chase the American dragon.
I think this way too. Bernie was a moron. Instead of taking a huge loss to switch to DC, should've just continued focusing on Japan. could have squeezed another 2-3 million consoles there—probably would be more profitable than DC.
Sega forgot about the Western market in favor of Japan, then they went and killed their Japanese market share in favor of the West.
>outsells the psx for years
did you even read your own chart. Dreamcast came out in 1998. saturn had a short lifespan and was a healthy software market.
Dreamcast didn't kill the Saturn in Japan, FF7 did
Saturn was basically the PC-Engine of 5th gen + VF2 machine. It served as a niche for all the smaller weeb devs that made RPGs / VNs and coomer games. But also it had Sega's decent arcade games output.
The similarity is more that they were both massively successful in Japan and did pretty poorly everywhere else. This did result in a fair amount of weebshit in the libraries, especially Saturn. But there were a lot of good games as well, especially Saturn. Most people don't realize quite how large that library is. Even wikipedia is missing a buttload.
its probably because only a few companies (namely Technosoft, Treasure and a couple others) wanted to take the risk in developing for the console, so you have these really nice games but very few of them, and many companies didn't want to take that risk for multiple reasons: needing a computer genius to be able to even code the game, due to the Saturn's crazy hardware, it ended up being hard for companies to even find the right amount of programmers so that one guy didn't have to do all the work. Looks like even Sega had that issue; Burning Rangers and Sonic Xtreme in particular stand out as really terrible developmental nightmares, with the latter even almost causing the death of a couple employees.
Seems like Sega said "go" on hardware that didn't really work right (similar to the Jaguar), and then stubbornly worked their asses off to make their games work on the system. The western branch (who were in charge of the 32X) tried to warn them. I think they did the two-processor setup because they could easily get the hardware? IIRC Sony made their own chips for the PS1 and Sega was just using aftermarket chips.
The Saturn's architecture wasn't really any harder to program than its contemporaries. Sega's dev kits just sucked ass and they kept all their highly-optimized libraries in-house so third-parties couldn't crank out the same quality of games as Sega did.
The N64 had the same problem where Nintendo and Rareware games looked and performed great because they had access to secret documentation on how to rewrite the N64's microcode to optimize performance. Meanwhile, third party devs could only really manage souped-up PS1 games most of the time.
Sony was really the only console maker offering a good experience for devs and not trying to cuck third-parties.
Nothing. Japanese spoke Japanese, not zoomlish.
it wasn't
the saturn was a virtua fighter and sakura wars machine in japan
This is mostly true, but its not the only thing that sold many Saturns in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. Arcade ports were still popular, along with some RPG titles like Lunar and Shining force were there, too.
>outsells the psx for years
did you even read your own chart. Dreamcast came out in 1998. saturn had a short lifespan and was a healthy software market.
Ironically Sega killed the Saturn in Japan when it was just hitting it's stride there. They were better off going the NEC route and doubling down on the region instead of trying to chase the American dragon.
Doubling down on the PC-FX?
I think this way too. Bernie was a moron. Instead of taking a huge loss to switch to DC, should've just continued focusing on Japan. could have squeezed another 2-3 million consoles there—probably would be more profitable than DC.
Sega forgot about the Western market in favor of Japan, then they went and killed their Japanese market share in favor of the West.
Dreamcast didn't kill the Saturn in Japan, FF7 did
I rest my case.
So DCgays, were those extra controller ports really worth the 400 fewer games? Checkmate.
>1000 shmups, dating sims and inferior psx ports
yawn
Even with the highest number of games, it's still the shittiest of the bunch?
Amazong how SEGA really managed to frick up everything
>saturn has more games than n64
>dreamcast has more games than cube
how did nintendo get so mogged by a dying hardware maker?
Ackshually the Gamecube has more games than the Dreamcast. 651 to 620.
Saturn was basically the PC-Engine of 5th gen + VF2 machine. It served as a niche for all the smaller weeb devs that made RPGs / VNs and coomer games. But also it had Sega's decent arcade games output.
Also not in the least it was helped by ports of arcade 2D fighters as well as Super Robot Taisen.
>Saturn was basically the PC-Engine of 5th gen
wouldn't quite go that far. the pc engine managed to last the entire 16-bit gen
saturn was dropped in its own home country as soon as the Dreamcast released. it didn't really have a decent end of its life-cycle
>dropped
blame Sega, they forced it despite the console doing fine.
The similarity is more that they were both massively successful in Japan and did pretty poorly everywhere else. This did result in a fair amount of weebshit in the libraries, especially Saturn. But there were a lot of good games as well, especially Saturn. Most people don't realize quite how large that library is. Even wikipedia is missing a buttload.
easy better games and 1:1 ports of arcade games something not even the ps1 was able to pull off.
No arcade ports are 1:1 on the Saturn