Why did video game magazines back in the mid-'90s try to force a rivalry between Super Mario 64 and Nights into Dreams? Did they not realize what a horribly ill-conceived gambit that was? One features an iconic household video game character entering TRUE 3D for the first time and completely revolutionizing 3D games thereafter, and the other one is an entirely new and unproven character that kind of looks homosexual and only features 3D in the form of graphics; the gameplay is still limited to a 2D plane and just has an arcade score attack mode where you fly around collecting balls.
What the frick? What was the endgame here? Was Sega/Naka paying these magazine outlets or something? Wouldn't it have made more sense to headline the Saturn with a 3D Sonic instead to combat Nintendo? It just makes very little sense in the grand scheme of things.
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They were released at the same time and were defining titles for their respective platforms
sega vs nintendo and mascot vs mascot both sold a lot of magazines and there was no sonic on the saturn so the journalists had to make do.
They knew Nights was too powerful for the feeble brains of America so they had to set the game up with Mario to give the plumber a chance.
Samegay.
Honestly as much I despise the Saturn, Nights was infinitely better than Mario 64. It's only weakness was that Americans are too dumb to appreciate good games and are enslaved by the nintendo branding.
Are you drunk? You sound like you don't know if you want to whine about the magazines or Sega. The magazines just wanted to keep writing about Nintendo vs Sega like they had been doing for years because that shit sold issues, and they had to latch onto Nights because Sega was too incompetent to make a 3D Sonic game for the Saturn. That's all.
Tomb Raider, Super Mario 64, and Crash Bandicoot are top tier games.
Nights was some weird niche arcade stuff that didn't stand a chance. SEGA should've had the foresight to make games for their Americhad audience and not weird Japs.
Sonic Adventure was amazing and I love the Dreamcast's library as-is but I do wish that SEGA could've made that game in 1995-6.
These.
Mario vs. Sonic sold well as a headline but then Sega didn't make a new Sonic game for the Saturn so they had to use Nights instead.
All they had to do was make a 3d sonic at least on the level of Spyro or something
>implying Sonic X-treme would have been any better
From what little that exists of the game online, its not impressive in the slightest compared to NiGHTs.
>its not impressive in the slightest compared to NiGHTs.
I'd be inclined to believe you if pic related was the only prototype that you had seen, because this was the prototype (accidentally) shown off to the CEO of SoJ the day of cancellation. I'll post a different picture explaining the situation a bit better in a second.
This was the prototype they had intended to reveal to the CEO, however when attempting to show this prototype to the CEO, the CEO flat out said he would not give it another chance and that his cancellation was final.
Sorry for taking so long, wanted to find higher quality footage of this stuff, but I couldn't. Appears this is the only medium that exists that housed this footage.
Adding some more footage because a friend of mine found where the image came from.
Still looks like moronic anal vomit, Yuji Naka was right to shut this homosexualry down.
Yuji Naka shut down the project because it was using his 3D engine and he didn't authorize that.
While tastes are subjective, what Yuji Naka did was objectively wrong, as his 3D engine was Sega's property, not his, and he had no say in the matter. Forcing the developers to delete literal fricking months, if not years of work, over a fricking graphical engine of all things, was bullshit.
And you're being harsh to a prototype. I suspect that you'd have the same thing to say about your favorite retro game if you had looked at with the same low quality footage.
I get taste is subjective, and you probably never would've liked the game, but claiming Yuji Naka, who even the fricking wasn't the CEO(Hayao Nakayama) was right to shut the project down is fricking disingenuous.
>who even the fricking wasn't the CEO
I meant to say "who wasn't even the fricking CEO" but apparently I had a stroke
He saw a shitty western game and he nipped it in the bud before it contaminated the Saturn library. It was based, nothing of value was lost, and best of all, it makes dumb ppl seethe decades later.
>Shitty western game
Ah, so you must not like Sonic 2 and 3 then. I bet you're a big fan of CD(actually I am too, but holy frick that one is a flawed as hell title.)
Sonic was primarily successful in the West, so no wonder it was tailored as a Western game, despite being made entirely in Japan(unlike 2, and 3&K).
The only main Sonic game with western STI involvement was Sonic 2 and Yuji Naka found the experience so unpleasant he only agreed to make Sonic 3 under the explicit condition of Japan Onry, so the american side split off to make Spinball
Uh, no? Sonic 3 had HEAVY Western involvement. I mean, really. Just look at that soundtrack. The gameplay builds off of Sonic 2 specifically, not Sonic CD(Japan's attempt at a Sonic 2).
That is a Western game.
It's a western game because the soundtrack was done by pop music celebrities?
Metal Gear Solid is also a western game series going by your moon logic
>The gameplay builds off of Sonic 2, the most western Sonic, instead of Japan's attempt at Sonic 2, Sonic CD.
Did you ignore my whole gameplay argument intentionally?
>The gameplay builds off of a game designed by japanese
Dude, you are arguing that a game that had no influence from Sonic of Japan was Japanese, and not American. Not to mention, STI was still strictly involved with Sonic 3&K, although there is something to be said about the Americans and the Japanese parting ways, with the exception of Roger Hector overseeing both projects.
If anything, that image applies to you.
GOD DAMN IT I MEANT SEGA OF JAPAN! I type too fricking fast for my brain to catch errors sometimes.
KWAB
>Why did video game magazines
QUI?
I want to know why ANY FRICKING SANE PERSON thought Mario 64 was anything but complete goddamn shit.
When I was a kid I had great wonder and mystery about nights (and panzer dragoon)
But getting a Saturn was impossible. Could barely even ask for n64
Why doesn't some autist just port robo blast 2 to saturn?
Aye, I'm on board with that. I'll consider it later, bit busy atm.
Don't forget about Crash Bandicoot.
> NiGHTS into Dreams: 20 August 1996 (NA)
> Crash Bandicoot: September 9, 1996 (NA)
> Mario 64/ N64 Launch: September 29, 1996 (NA)
Mario 64 was a really big deal going into the 1996 Holiday season. It was launched with the N64 and treated like a 'next gen' leap over games on the PS1 or Saturn. Sony's plan was to combat this with Crash Bandicoot, which targeted Mario 64 directly:
?t=6
Sega of America really wanted Sonic Xtreme to compete with Mario 64 for holiday 1996. But that was a pipe dream, given Sonic Xtreme's troubled development. So, all they had was NiGHTS, which did come packaged with the Saturn 3D gamepad. I would say that it was more the magazines that were pitting these games up against each other. Mario vs NiGHTS vs Crash, etc.
?t=6 [Embed]
Here's Sega of America's commercial for NiGHTS. They honestly targeted Sony and the Playstation with the advertising. the game was released earlier than Mario 64 or Crash.
here's a clip from a Canadian TV show called Anti Gravity Room. The show covered comics/ movies/ games etc in the mid-late 90's. They did this segment, where they went to Sega of America, and Sega showed off a demo of Sonic Xtreme. Their PR people were telling them that the game would be out by Christmas 1996.
[Remove]
the version of Sonic Xtreme that is being shown off in this video, doesn't look like the fish-eye lens build. But only shows a small 3D arena with Metal Sonic floating around.
>One features an iconic household video game character entering TRUE 3D for the first time and completely revolutionizing 3D games thereafter, and the other one is an entirely new and unproven character that kind of looks homosexual and only features 3D in the form of graphics;
Sega of America were probably hoping that NiGHTS could catch on like Sonic did in the 16bit generation. The first Sonic the Hedgehog game was released a month before the launch of the Super Nintendo and Super Mario World in America. Sega soft relaunched the Genesis at a lower price point than the SNES launch price, and marketed Sonic like crazy. Which did cause Sonic to gain a lot of popularity in a short period of time. Sony actually used the same tactic with Crash Bandicoot, that Sega did with Sonic. But I have a feeling that SOA knew that NiGHTS really wasn't going to catch on in the same way Sonic did. Sonic was really well calculated and focus tested by Tom Kalinske for the US market.They knew they had a hit before the game even launched. Crash was pretty well executed too. But lacked the mass mechanising of Sonic. I bet Sega of America's marketing had no idea what to do with NiGHTS. But gaming publications and such used NiGHTS and Crash to compare with Mario 64. Since they were all so close to each other. 1996 also saw the release of Tomb Raider, which was another big 3D release, and also compared to Mario 64.
>completely revolutionizing 3D games thereafter
Them nintoddlers are amazingly delusional.
Before the launch of Mario 64, gaming magazines were putting Crash, Mario and Sonic up against each other. Magazines were still convinced that Sonic Xtreme would be released in the same time frame.
A good example of why what SoJ did was fricking moronic. Sure, it could've been delayed, but at least it would've released and make them seem less stupid for all of this.
>A good example of why what SoJ did was fricking moronic. Sure, it could've been delayed, but at least it would've released and make them seem less stupid for all of this.
Sonic Xtreme was a real clusterfrick. It was hyped by magazines as Sonic's big 32bit debut. Sega of America made claims that they would hit a Holiday 1996 release date. As if the game was on track internally. Sonic team seemed pretty checked out with Sonic. NiGHTS, and Burning rangers were their two big Saturn games. Sonic Jam was neat with its 3D engine, but was a compilation of the 16bit games. Sonic 3D Blast was a port of a Genesis game. Sonic R was apparently made on a short time frame, to just get a 3D Sonic game out there. It was released in late 1997, when the Saturn was toast in retail. They tried to reboot Sonic with Sonic Adventure. Which wasn't as big of a hit on the original Dreamcast, but did have legs with the DX ports and a Fox satAM anime series. Sonic and Crash have a weird relationship. neither character ever competed with each other directly. Crash was big when Sonic was AWOL. Sonic returned and Crash was owned by Vivendi, and being outsourced to Travellers Tales. Who did Sonic R and Sonic 3D Blast.
Yeah, I don't really know entirely who to blame. Whoever, chalking it up to SoJ seems fair. I think the Saturn could've survived early 1997 without a Sonic game, and then have some form of Xtreme release. Seriously, look at this demo, it looks like it could be an enjoyable game. Bad quality because it's old as hell footage, but still.
The fish-eye lens is an interesting idea, and the engine looks smooth enough. I don't mind that they used a 2D Sprite for Sonic in this version. The level design looks rough and the gameplay seems very twitchy.
>The level design looks rough and the gameplay seems very twitchy.
To be fair, it is a somewhat early prototype. No doubt, it would've gotten serious refinements over the years.
Keep in mind, the fisheye lens prototypes came after the Nights 3D engine was scrapped because of Yuji Naka, and prior they were having issues trying to develop a 3D engine, so while this prototype is clearly a lot of jank, it's a miracle how far it managed to get.
Overall, again, I chalk it up to the lack of reasoning on part by SoJ. The wrong prototype was shown, and the team tried to correct their mistake, but Nakayama refused to see the correct prototype.
Sonic X-Treme had two engines by the cancellation of the project. The main engine was the one shown in the video, and the one shown off here appears to be known as the "boss engine", which is believed to have been used in... well, the boss stages.
A lot of this is some SERIOUS speculation, but from the prototypes we have, this appears to have been the case.
Oh, the room with Metallica looks like the boss engine. That would clear things up.
>Metallica
Weird spell check. I meant Metal Sonic
Magazine publications were generally convinced that Sonic Xtreme was on track to be released up against Crash Bandicoot and Mario 64. But I think once it became obvious that Sonic Xtreme was looking at delays (or cancellation), the gaming media switched from Sonic to NiGHTS, because of Sonic Team. It was Sega's biggest release for 1996.
I don't remember anyone ever doing what op said. Can they provide any proof?
>I don't remember anyone ever doing what op said. Can they provide any proof?
I would imagine that some gaming magazines did compare Mario 64 to Nights. Mario 64 was released in june1996 in Japan, while Nights was released in July 96. Nights has some janky 3D gameplay when you are not on rails as Nights. It did come with a comparable 3D gamepad. Crash and Tomb Raider were released September/October. Magazines would compare the two. But for the NA launch, it was more Mario vs Crash, or Mario vs Crash vs Nights.
Nights and Balan Wonderland are just proof that Yuji Naka is an absolute hack
Even if Yuji didn’t dip his balls into the X-treme batter, the game still would’ve likely been total shit
>NiGHTS
Poster child for Sega's direction at the time: Weird mad doctor experiments that go over people's heads and financially bleed the company dry, though appreciated by non-casual video game enthusiasts.
>Crash Bandicoot
Poster child for Sony's direction at the time: Cool, slick, and edgy- though not exactly reinventing the wheel, lots of mass market appeal.
>Super Mario 64
Poster child for Nintendo's direction at the time: Ambitious, visionary, soulful, and timeless- pushing the boundaries of console hardware.