The Jaguar version of Rayman Conspiracy

[Bill Loguidice]

 

 

Well that's not helping the argument that a 2D game of Raymans magnitude wouldn't have helped the Jaguar had it come out a year earlier. Or that it didn't matter to Sony.

 

Just sayin'.

 

How could Sony have known that it would have mattered until it actually sold that amount? There were a LOT of platformers without Mario or Sonic that tried for success, but fell far short. Rayman also sold what it sold over the LIFETIME of the PS1 because the PS1 sold over 100 million units. The Jaguar struggled to sell 100 thousand units prior to going on clearance. Big difference, which is why it's a reasonable assumption to say that Rayman, even with a year (or more like 6 - 8 month at best) headstart would have done much for the Jaguar platform. On the PlayStation, Rayman was just one game among a great many that sold in the millions. On the Jaguar, what exactly was the best selling game outside of pack-in Cybermorph? At absolute best, we're probably talking in the 40 - 50 thousand unit range, which would make for an absurdly high 50% attach rate.

[JagChris]

 

How could Sony have known that it would have mattered until it actually sold that amount? There were a LOT of platformers without Mario or Sonic that tried for success, but fell far short. Rayman also sold what it sold over the LIFETIME of the PS1 because the PS1 sold over 100 million units. The Jaguar struggled to sell 100 thousand units prior to going on clearance. Big difference, which is why it's a reasonable assumption to say that Rayman, even with a year (or more like 6 - 8 month at best) headstart would have done much for the Jaguar platform. On the PlayStation, Rayman was just one game among a great many that sold in the millions. On the Jaguar, what exactly was the best selling game outside of pack-in Cybermorph? At absolute best, we're probably talking in the 40 - 50 thousand unit range, which would make for an absurdly high 50% attach rate.

 

Specious argument.

 

Rayman was high profile from the beginning. Good high profile 2D games were still selling well. High powered 3D had not yet really arrived.

 

Majority of the sales usually happen in the first year.

 

The Jaguar failed due to, among other things, a lack of good games. Rayman is a good game.

 

Rayman with a year of Jaguar exclusivity may have boosted console sales.

[Andromeda Stardust]

 

 

Well that's not helping the argument that a 2D game of Raymans magnitude wouldn't have helped the Jaguar had it come out a year earlier. Or that it didn't matter to Sony.

 

Just sayin'.

That's like a medic on the battlefield tending to the injuries of a mortally wounded soldier. The Jag was already dying. Raymond, even if released a year earlier, would not have been the console's saving grace, but only prolonged it's agony.

 

Best to just give that mortally wounded soldier his final dose of morphine, so at least he goes out happy.

Edited June 23, 2015 by stardust4ever

[Lost Dragon]

:-) Forget it....

 

Going around in utter circles.

Edited June 24, 2015 by Lost Dragon

[+madman]

Let's assume that Rayman did come out in September of 1994. Now the killer apps are that, Tempest and Wolfenstein. Let's get really crazy with the fumes and say Rayman sells 50,000 consoles by itself. A couple months later AvP comes out. It's now November 1994, the Jag has never looked stronger, developers realize Jag rules (because of 4 good games) and sign up to develop for the system. Bad news, inhalers: Club Drive still comes out. Checkered Flag still comes out. WMCJ still comes out. The pathetic CD-ROM still comes out, it's unlikely a killer app for the CD attachment would've been developed in time for launch after Rayman kept the system afloat. As posted elsewhere, it sounds like Atari knew their time was up when the CD was launched. I don't see how Rayman would've postponed the death, let alone helped save the system from its fate.

[Austin]

 

Rayman was high profile from the beginning.

 

In your mind, maybe.

[JagChris]

 

In your mind, maybe.

 

whatever dude

[JagChris]

That's like a medic on the battlefield tending to the injuries of a mortally wounded soldier. The Jag was already dying. Raymond, even if released a year earlier, would not have been the console's saving grace, but only prolonged it's agony.

 

Best to just give that mortally wounded soldier his final dose of morphine, so at least he goes out happy.

 

Yeah we are going round and round. People aren't paying attention. Once again I never said saving grace. But I think it would have made a difference. Maybe a year. A few more months.

 

High Voltage Software was on the verge of unveiling to Atari and pitching to them the new development framework they had setup based on the Atari SDK. I think it would have changed the landscape quite a bit. But Atari tanked before this could happen.

 

Maybe a couple years more life. Perhaps enough for 3rd party peripherals to come out for the jaguar. Different controls etc etc. More games. Perhaps made it more on-par with the 3do as far as success goes. Those people perhaps could have had jobs and fed their families a year longer. Who knows.

 

 

It would have made a difference. How much, who knows.

[Austin]

 

whatever dude

 

No, whatever to you, dude.

[JagChris]

 

No, whatever to you, dude.

 

ah you got me

[phoenixdownita]

.... I keep on coming back for more .... I just can't get enough.

 

I am a fatalist, things happens the way they do because that's supposed to be the way they always did.

 

We're asking here to Rayman to kick off at least a 5x increase in Jag sales .... it's a good game but not that good.

 

That is asking to it to sell what ~1M copies? Well it turns out in its first 2 years across all platforms it sold ~900K according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rayman_(video_game)#Reception, and even on PS1 it sold a grand total of 4M or 5M on a 102M console base.

 

That is at best a 5% attachment according to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_PlayStation_video_games

...so we are saying that every single Jaguar ever sold times 5 would have had Rayman ... the only title to reach such a high attachment (not 100% mind you) was Wii Sports because it was bundled (not in Japan).

Edited June 24, 2015 by phoenixdownita

[108 Stars]

A game like Rayman did not sell Systems anymore at that Point imo. The 16-bit era had been flooded with mascot jump'n runs, People were getting sick and tired of them by that Point. Rayman became successful because it was launched on a System that would sell more than 100 Million Units, and it was released early in the console's lifespan. It benefit from a small selection of games at start and accumulated substantial sales through Long availability in the Budget range.

 

There's just a big difference between "I want this game so badly I'll buy the console" and "I have the console and I am in the mood for a jump'n run again, this is one of the few available".

[Lost Dragon]

Games like Virtua Fighter and Bladeforce really pushed the 32X and 3DO, but did nothing to 'change the landscape' for either.

Both fell by the wayside in front of the onslaught that was the Saturn and Playstation arriving.

Had High Voltage or anyone else for that matter, released a development system that let Jaguar games run with more plain polygons, faster or more stable frame rates, it would'nt of been any kind of Magic Bullet for the system.Publishers had already signed upto Sega and Sony for Saturn and PS1 development en mass and as we saw with the Saturn, where Sega kept releasing fresh development tools and developers got to grips with the hardware, numerous projects fell by the wayside once it was clear the Playstation was simply steam rollering over all in it's path.

It's been said ad inf..that Sony were busy signing up publishers behind closed doors when Jaguar had hit, developers being wowed by demo's of hardware running on a system only 30% finished at that time.

[AtariORdead]

Bloody hell, have Jag fanatics gotten so desperate that they are even considering the argument that Rayman as an exclusive would have made any difference whatsoever.

[Lost Dragon]

For the Playstation hardware to cause the massive change of direction, it did for the plans of both Sega (who did'nt have time to redesign the Saturn hardware from scratch, hence adding a second SH-2 to the hardware) and Atari, who suddenly decided games simply had to be fully textured, no matter what the cost (look at Supercross 3D or comments from Imagitec, ATD, etc etc....)

 

 

Then i really do have to question why people think Sony would have needed to delay a 2D game like Rayman......

 

 

And what difference a timed exclusive on Jaguar would of made.

 

Likes of Sega, Atari, 3DO etc, let alone the publishers knew as soon as Playstation hardware was detailed that that 3D simply was the way forward and they were caught napping.

 

In early interviews about 3DO, Trip Hawkins etc seemed keen to downplay importance of 3D, but then by time of M2/3DO Bulldog, were quick to stress the theoretical 3D performance of their future hardware, in order to dwarf the Playstation specs.

[Lost Dragon]

We also simply cannot ignore the very fact that Atari's own marketing dept had lost all interest in 2D.Only to look at developer of Deathmatch talking of how (gorgeous) 2D backdrops were no longer of interest to Atari, they wanted 3D Enviroments....

 

 

I don't see a timed exclusive on Rayman doing anything more for Jaguar than likes of:

 

Toki Goes Apeshit/Green-Thang/Waterworld/EWJ/Deathmatch/Tiny Toon Adventures/Indiana Jag/Conan etc actually arriving on Jaguar would of done.

 

Yes, they were all ideally suited to Jaguar hardware, being as it was in effect an 'Uber SNES'-Really powerful 2D hardware which could handle early polygon 3D (plain polys) with ease (no need for DSP chips on carts), but industry simply had shifted to 3D in a big way.

 

Atari saw this, realised Jaguar was'nt competing in a market they'd originally planned for, but had to make do with what they had and basically try and survive long enough to get Jag 2 finished and out to compete with Playstation etc.

Edited June 24, 2015 by Lost Dragon

[Bill Loguidice]

Atari saw this, realised Jaguar was'nt competing in a market they'd originally planned for, but had to make do with what they had and basically try and survive long enough to get Jag 2 finished and out to compete with Playstation etc.

 

Great post. Quoting just the part I quoted though, I wonder what Atari's genuine end-game was (not the PR nonsense we all read) when it was clear the Jaguar was a failure after year one and Atari was already running out of what little money they had? Surely they must have realized that there was no scenario where they were getting to a Jaguar 2 and obviously no resources to properly develop such a system, let alone release and support it. I wonder if things like the release of the CD add-on and development of VR and the Jaguar 2 were just "smokescreens" as it were to seem like a viable company (from a technology and IP standpoint) for either a merger or buyout? Either way, it obviously didn't work as the JT Storage reverse takeover was hardly one of the better outcomes.

[Schmudde]

 

Great post. Quoting just the part I quoted though, I wonder what Atari's genuine end-game was (not the PR nonsense we all read) when it was clear the Jaguar was a failure after year one and Atari was already running out of what little money they had? Surely they must have realized that there was no scenario where they were getting to a Jaguar 2 and obviously no resources to properly develop such a system, let alone release and support it. I wonder if things like the release of the CD add-on and development of VR and the Jaguar 2 were just "smokescreens" as it were to seem like a viable company (from a technology and IP standpoint) for either a merger or buyout? Either way, it obviously didn't work as the JT Storage reverse takeover was hardly one of the better outcomes.

 

This is a good question. More than anybody else, I would be interested in talking to Ted Hoff. When he came on as president in 1995, he undertook several initiatives that seemed to improve Atari's image in its core community. I'm only working off of memory, so please forgive me, but I believe he worked on the light rebranding, retail availability, and customer communication, among other things.

 

Mr. Hoff came in so very late in the game, he had to have some belief that the cause wasn't totally hopeless. Otherwise, why bother? So you can preside over the demise of one of the world's most beloved brands?

 

The great Gary Kildall once opined on Jack Tramiel's approach thusly - "Jack's strategy has always been to flood the market with product and drive out the competition. He did it with the $10 calculator and he did it again with the Commodore 64." Sam was using the same playbook. Although it might seem naive in hindsight, announcing a product like VR, ginning up interest, and then delivering had worked for for 20 years. If you operate on low margins and with small teams, you might just get that product that hits at the right place at the right time. The Tramiel playbook had worked with typewriters, adding machines, digital calculators, personal computers, graphically driven personal computers... so why not VR? Why not the the next big thing in gaming, the Jaguar 2?

 

We know the answer in hindsight, but at the time, this may have been what Ted Hoff was working with when he ran Atari for its last full year.

 

~ü

[Atlantis]

 

I wonder if things like the release of the CD add-on and development of VR and the Jaguar 2 were just "smokescreens" as it were to seem like a viable company (from a technology and IP standpoint) for either a merger or buyout? Either way, it obviously didn't work as the JT Storage reverse takeover was hardly one of the better outcomes.

Great post on a great post.

I think it is possible that Atari hold the illusion together as long as possible. To be faithful to your company you have to keep it up till the very end. If they said they were out on cash, without future projects - that would NEVER be produced, just said to be - then all rats would have left the ship, with the result of an even faster crash.

 

This way they kept their nose above the surface for as long as possible, maybe getting some more money in their pockets through salaries until the bubble cracked, that the treasure chest was empty.

 

It is how all empires fall, fast and only the inner circle knowing its last years predestination. When you think on other companies going down, it's always the same way; maybe the Enron crash is an extreme and speaking example of what I'm trying to imply here.

[Goochman]

 

Great post. Quoting just the part I quoted though, I wonder what Atari's genuine end-game was (not the PR nonsense we all read) when it was clear the Jaguar was a failure after year one and Atari was already running out of what little money they had? Surely they must have realized that there was no scenario where they were getting to a Jaguar 2 and obviously no resources to properly develop such a system, let alone release and support it. I wonder if things like the release of the CD add-on and development of VR and the Jaguar 2 were just "smokescreens" as it were to seem like a viable company (from a technology and IP standpoint) for either a merger or buyout? Either way, it obviously didn't work as the JT Storage reverse takeover was hardly one of the better outcomes.

 

I think Jack was happy to let Sam ride it out as long as he could - success or not and when he had his heart attack Jack organized the merger to exit completley.

[Lost Dragon]

People on here/elsewhere can think what they like about myself/my posts etc but it's honestly nothing more than looking at the Jaguar in the cold light of day.

 

Atari with the Jaguar, delivered a very impressive jump in technology over the existing systems like Mega Drive/Mega CD/SNES etc and put it out at an impressive price, but the industry was simply moving at a far faster pace than they and indeed 3DO and Sega had expected and as a result, Jaguar technology (and indeed the original design of the Sega Saturn) was simply eclipsed in a very short space of time.

 

Sony's Playstation made a gigantic leap in performance over say the SNES and SFX Chip and Sony had the money to take the hit and put the hardware out at a price that would of been impossible for Atari etc to do.

 

 

Sony simply spoiled the party as it were for Atari, 3DO, Sega and Nintendo and the industry was thus changed fundamentally as a result.

[phoenixdownita]

... and they met the consumer demand that was heavily switching towards 3D!!

 

I got sold the day I saw Toshinden and Tekken and Ridge Racer. None of them aged particularly well but they hit the sweet spot when it was needed.

3D fighters for Saturn were subpar at the beginning (later fighters were fine, VF2, Fighting Vipers etc..) and the first Daytona USA (although fun) did not bode well as a comparison item with PS racers (the CE )

[Lost Dragon]

:-) You and me both.

I paid for my day 1 Playstation (from Silica Shop) and had Ridge Racer and Toh Shin Den with it and they truely were showcase games.

Jaws literally dropped when i showed the hardware to my mates, plus it took bloody ages just to get through on phone to Silica Shop in order to phone through the order, they said phones had been engaged pretty much all day due to customers pre-ordering the Playstation, that's how much UK demmand there was for it.

As for earlier point of Rayman being a 'High Profile' release by Ubisoft..never saw any signs myself...

Nintendo were hyping the proverbial backside off Donkey Kong Country on SNES (and rightly so, incredible visuals for the SNES), Ubisoft's approach with Rayman always seemed more along lines of....we also have this rather splendid looking platformer being worked on...

I.E it was part of a much bigger line-up they were showcasing, rather than being highlight/center piece of the line up.

Might have been different story elsewhere though...

[NeoGeoNinja]

Might have been different story elsewhere though...

 

No. I remember it the same.

 

Rayman got one of those small windows in the 'currently under development' section of gaming magazines, periodically. It was touted as a cartoonquality graphics based platformer, which it was tbh.

 

But it was never hyped. Just respectfully anticipated.

 

No one bought a PS1, just for Rayman. T'was a nice, high-quality/next-gen throwback to what you'd been playing all along, in the 16-bit generation.

 

We ALL wanted/craved 3D gaming experiences at this point though.

 

Rayman is a nicely crafted game, but not a system seller imo...

[Atlantis]

Today Rayman has evolved into a massive IP. The relatively massive success of Rayman came after a couple of successful titles Rayman 1 and Rayman 2, maybe especially the part 2 in 3D gave some wind under his wings (with part 1 in the back). It's more of a post-Jag hype based on earlier successes that newer Rayman games get, than before part 1. That's how I see it.

I think the "conspiracy" has evolved pretty late around the success of Rayman, trying to track the root of the success. Somehow some people have to see evil motifs behind every success. Maybe it explains success to be something evil, and at the same time explain their own individual non-successes as something of a good motif (or at least not evil), I don't know... It's all very silly.