What is the best second Generation console?

[Vic George 2K3]

I'd say the two best were the Atari 2600 and the ColecoVision. But then I wouldn't place the ColecoVision, the Atari 5200, or the Vectrex in the same "generation" as the Atari 2600, the Intellivision, and the Odyssey 2. It was the Atari Generation Part 2, which started in 1982 and ended in 1984.

[desiv]

From the initial list, I'd say Colecovision, but I don't put it in the same (generation, epoch, era, whatever) when I think about them.

I grew up with an Odyssey 2...

While I love it, I'd have to go with Intelivision for that early era just after the pongs...

 

desiv

[youki]

From the initial list, the choice is very hard for me. I love them all.

 

Colecovision : For its graphics capabilities and Turbo Module!

Atari 2600 : for the numbers of games with terrific gameplay!. (mainly all the first generation of Activision games i love!!!).

Intellivision : for ...in fact , i don't why... its soul. Interresiting games, I like graphic style..

 

So to choose one, i would say the Colecovision because technically it is a superior console and very easy to program (in comparison of VCS and Intellivision).

[Vic George 2K3]

To re-cap my definition of generations:

 

Pong Generation (mostly hard-wired self-contained game systems) was from early to late 1970s (1976-77)

Atari Generation Part 1 (Atari 2600, Intellivision, Odyssey 2) was from late 1970s to 1982

Atari Generation Part 2 (Atari 5200, ColecoVision, Vectrex) was from 1982 to 1984 (1985 in other parts of the world apart from America where the Crash didn't happen)

The Crash was from 1984 to 1985, America mostly (not technically a generation)

Nintendo Generation (NES, Sega Master System, Atari 7800, Atari XEGS) was from 1985 to late 1980s

16-Bit Generation (Super NES, Sega Genesis/Mega Drive, TurboGrafx-16) was from the late 1980s to the mid 1990s

Playstation Generation (PlayStation, Sega Saturn, Nintendo 64) was from the mid 1990s to late 1990s

Xbox Generation (Dreamcast, PlayStation 2, Xbox, Gamecube) was from the late 1990s to around 2005

Wii Generation (Nintendo Wii, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360) was from 2005 to 2012

Current Generation (Nintendo Wii U, Sony's and Microsoft's successor systems) began in 2012

[Emehr]

Jeez, are we doing this again?

 

Arcade Generation (Pong, 2600, O^2, Intellivision, Vectrex, 7800, etc.)

Platform Generation (NES, SMS, TG-16, Genesis, SuperNES, SegaCD, etc.)

3D Generation (Saturn, PS1-3, N64, Dreamcast, GameCube, Xbox, etc.)

 

There. That was easy.

[desiv]

There. That was easy.

Yep...

 

...

 

Being wrong usually is...

 

:-) :-)

 

Kidding...

 

Sorry...

 

desiv

[Manoau2002]

Jeez, are we doing this again?

 

Arcade Generation (Pong, 2600, O^2, Intellivision, Vectrex, 7800, etc.)

Platform Generation (NES, SMS, TG-16, Genesis, SuperNES, SegaCD, etc.)

3D Generation (Saturn, PS1-3, N64, Dreamcast, GameCube, Xbox, etc.)

 

There. That was easy.

 

I like how you have it divided. Makes a lot of sense.

[youki]

Fun Generation (Pong , Odyssey 2 , Atari VCS , Intellivision, Colecovision, 5200, 7800 , Dreamcast )

Less fun but still pleasant generation (NES, SMS , TG-16, Genesis, SuperNes..etc...)

Boring Generation ( PS1 , N64, Xbox, PS2, PS3...etc...)

 

[BydoEmpire]

Fun Generation (Pong , Odyssey 2 , Atari VCS , Intellivision, Colecovision, 5200, 7800 , Dreamcast )

Less fun but still pleasant generation (NES, SMS , TG-16, Genesis, SuperNes..etc...)

Boring Generation ( PS1 , N64, Xbox, PS2, PS3...etc...)

 

Hah, nicely done!

[Vic George 2K3]

Jeez, are we doing this again?

 

As long as there are still idiots who don't know what generation a game system falls under...need I say more, or do you get the point?

[godslabrat]

Just curious... at what point did we decide we needed these rigidly-defined "generations"? It seems like a wikipedia mentality. In the 90s, we had a tendency to define a "generation" by the dominant platform, and whatever were its primary competitors.

 

You had...

"The Pong Era"

"The Atari Era", which also included the 5200, Coleco, and Inty.

"The Nintendo Era", including the SMS and 7800

"The 16-Bit Era", which was the current generation and was essentially just the SNES and Genesis,

 

And there were always systems that were just released late enough in the generation that they were understood to be in-betweeners. Examples would be the Saturn and TG-16.

 

I dunno, it just seems like since The Internet became a thing, we're all arguing over these "generations" like they're a long-standing idea that should be understood by all, when in actually they're a very new concept that's very open to individual perspective.

[Atariboy]

The Saturn is a in-betweener? Didn't it beat the Playstation and Nintendo 64 to market (It's prime competitors and pretty much undeniably part of the same generation)?

 

I don't know who dreamed this up. But categorizing things seems to be part of human nature and you see this in other areas as well. American and Canadian diesel locomotives are categorized by generations for instance even though it's even less ambiguous and unclear than game consoles. And for something a bit closer, look at mobile cellular phones.

 

So I suppose all of this was inevitable.

Edited May 13, 2013 by Atariboy

[godslabrat]

The Saturn is a in-betweener? Didn't it beat the Playstation and Nintendo 64 to market (It's prime competitors and pretty much undeniably part of the same generation)?

 

Exactly. The Saturn beat both the PS and N64 to market, but was unable to give either a solid run. I'd argue that it was already fizzling VERY early in the Playstation's lifespan and was essentially gone when the N64 was picking up steam. I remember the Saturn sharing space with the SNES more than the N64 (though to be fair, the SNES was milked for way longer than it should have been).

[cimerians]

Colecovision is in the same category as Atari 2600? My god.

Jeez, are we doing this again?

 

Arcade Generation (Pong, 2600, O^2, Intellivision, Vectrex, 7800, etc.)

Platform Generation (NES, SMS, TG-16, Genesis, SuperNES, SegaCD, etc.)

3D Generation (Saturn, PS1-3, N64, Dreamcast, GameCube, Xbox, etc.)

 

There. That was easy.

 

The best. This should be the official definition of "generations'.

[Atariboy]

Exactly. The Saturn beat both the PS and N64 to market, but was unable to give either a solid run. I'd argue that it was already fizzling VERY early in the Playstation's lifespan and was essentially gone when the N64 was picking up steam. I remember the Saturn sharing space with the SNES more than the N64 (though to be fair, the SNES was milked for way longer than it should have been).

 

While I think your memories pretty much match mine in regards to its sales performance over here, I still don't think I follow you.

 

I understand the PC Engine/Turbografx-16 since it first released in Japan in something like 1987 and its capabilities seemed to straddle the NES/SMS/7800 era and the upcoming consoles like the Genesis and Super Nintendo. But I'm not following you with the Saturn. It released after the earliest entries in the generation (If you subscribe to the Jaguar and 3DO being part of this generation) and just before the Playstation did. And it seemed able to give the Playstation a run for its money in the 3D area before mainstream developers left and was superior in the 2D area (Although I'm sure there wasn't room for much growth in 3D games like the Playstation had when things started to wind down around 1997).

 

I'm not sure I see not having a particularly healthy or long-life (Especially outside of Japan) should demote it in some way from being a part of the same generation. To me, an in-betweener would be something like the Sega Dreamcast. It was released well before the competition started to come online and when the previous generation, outside of the Saturn which was all but dead outside of Japan, was at its height of success in 1998/1999.

 

But maybe that's just me. I think technical capabilities & particularly the timing of the release are the criteria that should be used here if we insist in defining generations. Not the end of the lifecycle of a console since I think that introduces problems with several consoles like the Dreamcast.

Edited May 13, 2013 by Atariboy

[+pboland]

Here is how I would group things based upon the timing of their release and their capabilities (With perhaps the exception of the Neo Geo where I'm almost strictly looking at the timing of its release since it had advanced 2D capabilities than even consoles of the following generation couldn't match).

 

Generation 1: The dedicated gaming era.

Generation 2: The first wave of reprogrammable gaming consoles including the Atari 2600, Odyssey 2, and Intellivision (Which while more advanced and slightly later was still going head to head against these consoles during its heyday, was significantly weaker than the systems that would start to be released a few years later, and was slated for replacement by a more advanced but backwards compatible console to compete against the likes of the 5200).

Generation 3: The Vectrex, Atari 5200, Colecovision, etc.

Generation 4: The NES, 7800, & SMS.

Generation 5: The Neo Geo, Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis, TurboGrafx-16 (There's an argument here for it being a generation 4 console, particularly from the point of view of Japanese gamers, but it's significantly more powerful, was released at the very end of the 1980's over here, and was viewed as a competitor of the new 16 bit consoles).

Generation 6: The Atari Jaguar, the 3DO, the Playstation, the Saturn, and the Nintendo 64.

Generation 7: The Sega Dreamcast, Playstation 2, Xbox, and GameCube.

Generation 8: The Wii, Xbox 360, and Playstation 3.

Generation 9: The Wii U, Xbox 720, and Playstation 4.

 

 

This too is how I pretty much break down the generations for home video gaming. With that is mind my favorite Gen 2 system is the Odyssey 2. I'm probably the only one with this choice, but this was the first game system our family got after having one of those dedicated Radio Shack pong units. I remember more people having the Atari 2600, but I always preferred our OD2.

[Atariboy]

The Saturn is a in-betweener? Didn't it beat the Playstation and Nintendo 64 to market (It's prime competitors and pretty much undeniably part of the same generation)?

 

Just for the record, I'm not sure why I apparently was thinking that releasing first was somehow evidence against your opinion. Obviously if there's a case for it straddling the 16 bit and the following generation, releasing before its two prime competitors is hardly evidence against that line of thought. So disregard that bit of my post.

 

But for what it's worth, when I think of Sega's competitor to the Nintendo 64 and Playstation, it's always going to be the Saturn.

 

If anyone gives a hoot about my opinion, with a bit more of thought I think I'd be inclined now to categorize the XEGS as the same generation as the NES. If it's viewed as a previous generation console despite its 1987 release date just because similar guts were in the Atari 5200, then you're opening a can of worms with other consoles. The Nintendo Wii in particular is an example where outside of its controller, it's technologically much closer to the previous generation of consoles than the current generation.

Edited May 14, 2013 by Atariboy

[Unbeliever]

Atari 2600, purely for the amount of games that I loved (and still do love) to play, namely Berserk, Asteroids, Missile Command, and Space Invaders. Bright, colorful boxes, fun game play, and ease of use.

[BydoEmpire]

As long as there are still idiots who don't know what generation a game system falls under...need I say more, or do you get the point?

Lighten up, Francis. There's no governing body that has rigidly defined these generations.

 

Edited May 21, 2013 by BydoEmpire

[Unbeliever]

I've played most of the older console systems (Vectrex, Intellivision, Atari 5200, etc. etc.), and still find that out of all the systems, I prefer the Atari 2600. It's the only system I've kept, and still have a love for. I liked them all, but for me, the Atari 2600 has the staying power.

[Clock]

I think I have finally discovered the correct console generations breakdown...

 

#1. The gaming generation 1970s - date

 

#2. ....

 

that is all.... now move along.

[Skud]

And for something a bit closer, look at mobile cellular phones.

brick generation

small generation

flip generatioon

slide generation

smart generatioon

 

and to answer the op, the 2600

Edited May 25, 2013 by Skud

[Mister-VCS]

 

3) Colecovision - too many games play choppy to me, and the stock controllers are second worst only to the 7800. The Super Action Controllers are great, though. Definitely some good games, but I'd almost always rather play other systems.

 

 

Same here. Many CV games plays choppy (Cosmic Avenger, Zaxxon, Defender...), but there are some fine games which feel right like River Raid, Space

Panic H.E.R.O even with the standard controller. But the 16-colors are a major stepdown in comparison with the 2600.

BTW. I have no problems with the 7800 Prolines. Not the best joystick, but average!

[Andromeda Stardust]

To re-cap my definition of generations:

 

Pong Generation (mostly hard-wired self-contained game systems) was from early to late 1970s (1976-77)

Atari Generation Part 1 (Atari 2600, Intellivision, Odyssey 2) was from late 1970s to 1982

Atari Generation Part 2 (Atari 5200, ColecoVision, Vectrex) was from 1982 to 1984 (1985 in other parts of the world apart from America where the Crash didn't happen)

The Crash was from 1984 to 1985, America mostly (not technically a generation)

Nintendo Generation (NES, Sega Master System, Atari 7800, Atari XEGS) was from 1985 to late 1980s

16-Bit Generation (Super NES, Sega Genesis/Mega Drive, TurboGrafx-16) was from the late 1980s to the mid 1990s

Playstation Generation (PlayStation, Sega Saturn, Nintendo 64) was from the mid 1990s to late 1990s

Xbox Generation (Dreamcast, PlayStation 2, Xbox, Gamecube) was from the late 1990s to around 2005

Wii Generation (Nintendo Wii, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360) was from 2005 to 2012

Current Generation (Nintendo Wii U, Sony's and Microsoft's successor systems) began in 2012

You forgot Neo Geo, also a notable part of the "16-bit" generation although it was technically 32-bit. NES lasted well beyond late 80s.

 

My vote for coolest second generation console is Vectrex, even though I have little hope for owning one due to cost and reliability issues. It's got a lot of similarities to the Virtual boy in that it's totally different from everything else out there. I think Vectrex would have lasted longer had the supply of overstock CRT monitors not dried up.

Edited May 26, 2013 by stardust4ever

[Jess Ragan]

The 5200, ColecoVision, and Vectrex are the next generation consoles of their era, but you could also make an argument that they are of the same generation as the NES, Master System, and Atari 7800. Keep in mind that the Famicom was launched in Japan in 1983, and the 7800 was originally scheduled for release in 1984, before Warner sold the company to Jack Tramiel. The crash does complicate matters, but that was an American invention... it never happened anywhere else.