What if the NES failed?

[7800Lover]

In a past thread, I brought up what it might have been like had Atari marketed the Famicom (NES) in the USA.

 

But now there is a bigger question on my mind. I've been thinking about this for the week and I'm not sure if it was ever considered. When the NES was being pitched to stores in 1985-1986, there was much skepticism. This was not long after the Great Video Game Crash of 1984 and stores that had lost money on video games were reluctant to stock the NES. Nintendo of America somehow managed to convince retailers to carry the product, even offering to buy back unsold merchandise. That in itself was quite a risk as it would have hurt or even bankrupted the fledgling NOA. But it didn't. After test marketing in New York in 1985, it went nationwide in 1986 and became a hit. The rest is history.

 

But consider this. The NES and its success in the market was largely considered to have resurrected the video game industry after the crash. What if the NES had failed? What if the system sold poorly and NOA went under?

 

I view that as having two possible results:

 

1. The video game market failed to revitalize and computer gaming goes on to supplant the place in modern/pop culture that video games once held.

 

2. The video game market fails to revitalize, but a future console comes along that resurrects the video game industry.

 

The second result may not be as likely as many would think video games would be unprofitable given the scenario of an NES failure. Would anyone have even tried if the NES failed? The NES was instrumental in helping the market as it provided a platform from which to improve up on the console and game technology. Had some console come along later to become a big seller after a possible NES failure, would video game technology have reached the level it has today?

 

What's your thoughts on all this?

[AtariJr]

The sega master system would be used by people hehe. joking.

 

I dont think that the gaming world would be the same.. everything has been effected by nintendo from dpads, to joysticks, to trigger buttons. Its a good question but i doubt youll ever get a satisfying answer...

[Student Driver]

I was going to suggest that your scenario would probably be similar to what happened in the UK: NES was unpopular, the SMS was a moderate success, but the games market belonged mostly to the inexpensive home computers-- Sinclair Spectrum, Commodore 64, and Amstrad CPC.

 

But, I have a feeling it wouldn't be so cut-and-dried. The UK computer games market was dominated by cheaper action titles on cassette, the US by more expensive, complex games on disk. The need for a disk drive drove the cost of computer gaming up in the US (at the time of the NES's release, a Commodore 1541 was still around $300 IIRC; a bare-bones set up of a C64, disk drive, and single joystick would have been around $500), so there was an open market for a less-expensive games player that could play relatively complex games. My personal feeling is that, had the NES failed, this would have been filled by Commodore lowering the prices on their hardware (64/128 or Amiga).

 

As an aside... one of the reasons I think the NES took off, at least originally, was the Vs. Unisystem. Most people still interested in computer and video games after the crash continued to play arcade games, which were still located everywhere (grocery stores, convenience stores, pharmacies), and the Nintendo Vs. Unisystem was a common sight before the release of the NES. It was pretty obvious that the NES was pretty much the same system as the Nintendo arcade cabinet, which was a revelation. We could finally play the games at home as God intended them to be played! (Granted, there was arcade hardware similar to SMS, but it wasn't a common sight, and it was obvious that most SMS arcade translations had been scaled back in order to be ported...)

[Kid Ice]

IMO the landscape would have been unimaginably altered. It would be easy to say "The Genesis would have brought everything back", but the Genesis succeeded on the shoulders of Sonic, which was (for the most part) based on Super Mario. I don't think you would have seen a commercially successful console until the 90s. In what form, with what kind of controllers, what kind of games, very hard to say.

[Dusk2600]

if the nes failed, atari,coleco and intv would still be out today, only higher graphics, but nintendo played a huge part in where video games r today

[+RandomPerson]

I think computer gaming would have stayed bigger for a few more years before someone differen than Nintendo tried to market another console here in NA. Hell who knows, maybe we would all have owned an FM Towns Marty...lol..

[NovaXpress]

Simple answer. If the NES hadn't won, it would have been the SMS. If Sega had blown it, the TG-16 would have scored.

 

Both pro and amateur game historians need to get it into their heads that the 83 crash was caused by the companies and retailers, not by the consumers. People still wanted games. The next system to become widely available was guaranteed to be a hit. Nintendo had a far better marketing plan than the competition, so they took the prize.

 

Many people were smart enough to know that video games were more than ready for a comeback. Someone would have done it, but Nintendo was the first and the best at it.

[AtticGamer]

Without NES would side scrolling platform games and battery saved games exist? And gamepads?

Possible situations:

 

1-Games are no longer played at home, and arcades rule.

2-Another company or Atari itself would release a joystick based console.

3-Microcomputers like Zx Spectrum and Commodore Amiga would dominate the videogame market.

Edited April 30, 2006 by Atari_kid

[NovaXpress]

Nintendo didn't invent side-scrolling games, battery saves or gamepads for that matter. The first system with a gamepad tried to do too much and ended up being really shitty as a reult. It was called the Intellivision.

 

1-Games are no longer played at home, and arcades rule.

Arcades were as screwed up as game systems were at the time.

 

2-Another company or Atari itself would release a joystick based console.

The only reason that Atari got back into the business is because of Nintendo's success.

 

3-Microcomputers like Zx Spectrum and Commodore Amiga would dominate the videogame market.

These were far from being mass-market items. I hear people talk a great deal about PC gaming replacing console gaming. It could never happen because they are two entirely different things. The two computers which won out by the end of the 80s were Apples and MS-DOS compatibles, both too expensive to be owned by the tens of millions who bought an NES.

[Flojomojo]

Both pro and amateur game historians need to get it into their heads that the 83 crash was caused by the companies and retailers, not by the consumers. People still wanted games. The next system to become widely available was guaranteed to be a hit. Nintendo had a far better marketing plan than the competition, so they took the prize.

I think this is true. I kinda shook my head when I first saw the NES in Kay-Bee stores (I believe I was scrounging for $1 Atari and Intellivision games). "What are they thinking? This fad is over!" I was right for a little while, until I realized that Super Mario Brothers was just good enough to sell me a console. Along with Duck Hunt, and the promise of Zelda and Spy Hunter.

 

Nova's right -- if they failed, and even if consoles died out for a while, cheap dedicated computer game machines belong in the toy store and would have resurfaced long before Sony's Playstation came thundering in. Jakks and the Flashback machines are testament to that.

[ninjarabbit]

The console video game market dies as no retailers are willing to take a chance on another system and the video game market shifts completely to PCs.

[Flojomojo]

The console video game market dies as no retailers are willing to take a chance on another system and the video game market shifts completely to PCs.

For a little while, maybe. However, it wouldn't take the market long to figure out that:

 

The couch is more comfy than an office chair;

Joysticks and gamepads are easier to use than keyboards and mice;

Kids can mess up a computer;

Almost everyone has a TV set, but computer monitors are relatively expensive;

Developers like machines with a single set of hardware characteristics;

Consumers want more for less money.

 

The obvious answer is to make another game console. A console is just a computer specifically dedicated to games on the TV.

 

Here's another question: Did the NES kill the arcades, or were they going to die anyway?

[Godzilla]

The console video game market dies as no retailers are willing to take a chance on another system and the video game market shifts completely to PCs.

For a little while, maybe. However, it wouldn't take the market long to figure out that:

 

The couch is more comfy than an office chair;

Joysticks and gamepads are easier to use than keyboards and mice;

Kids can mess up a computer;

Almost everyone has a TV set, but computer monitors are relatively expensive;

Developers like machines with a single set of hardware characteristics;

Consumers want more for less money.

 

The obvious answer is to make another game console. A console is just a computer specifically dedicated to games on the TV.

 

Here's another question: Did the NES kill the arcades, or were they going to die anyway?

 

 

yea, but everything you mention did not apply to the succesful computers of the day. the c64 WAS a single set of hardware that couldnt be messed up, the OS was in ROM and the system is 100% stable and solid (out side of power supplies,) as were most of the other computers back then. and they usually played games that worked with one stick and one button, and could easily be played on a couch. I really do think that at least for a time, they would have dominated as THE video game machines.

 

its funny u mention the new york test market. I was there, as a kid in brooklyn. I still remember nintendos giant displays in the mall. and how their baseball game looked so much worse than intellivision ecs world series major league baseball :-) Anyway, where I lived the Nintendo test market bombed. Most of the kids I knew were going nuts happy (like I was,) buying intys and colecos and vectrexs for dirt cheap and the games were 50 cents each everywhere and we were trading c=64 and atari 800 disks like mad too... And the stuff nintendo was showing didn't look any better than the coleco, c=64 etc. (in some cases worse,) I remember one kid offering me a complete nes action set in the box (with rob and all the games out at the time,) for an old beat up skateboard of mine and I knew that it wasn't worth the trade, if that tells you anything.

[darklord1977]

things would have been different thats for sure...Sega would have come to the rescue..with the master system...then later kicking it up a notch with the genesis. nec would later show up with their tg -16 since nintendo would have not been around..the tg would have had a better chance( and hopefully better marketing ) also , lets not forget that atari would make a comeback with the 7800 or even a better system ( and im not talking about the xegs or even the jaguar..it was still, early for that one ) and the neo geo would still be a cult favorite

 

so the big 3 would be sega, nec,and atari..all 3 systems would do better than they did before because there was no greedy nintendo grabbing everything in sight due to uber aggressive marketing and their "questionable" business tactics etc..there were rumors..that they intimidated developers to work for them only etc

 

who would you rather play? a short italian plumber hopping over mushrooms?(mario) or a ninja warrior kicking ass all over the place (from the shinobi series)?? for me it was shinobi hands down...

 

as for coleco and intv they probably would have just went out of business or been bought up by atari or sega

 

but things would change later of course when sony enters the picture ..them microsoft .

 

 

dont get me wrong nintendo has great games etc..but growing up back in the day you got sick and tired of seeing Nintendo everyplace!( i know i wasnt the only one back then sure, i had a nes but i was more into sega and nec..and still thought the atari 7800 was great ) from that super mario bros super show, to captain N the game master..and lets not forget the nintendo cereal system!! for breakfast.. which tasted like crap LOL the batman cereal tasted much better..and they gave you this cool bank with the box

Edited May 3, 2006 by darklord1977

[darklord1977]

if the nes failed, atari,coleco and intv would still be out today, only higher graphics, but nintendo played a huge part in where video games r today

intellivision still around now?? thank god it isnt LOL..it wasnt even great back then and i can only shudder to see what woud they would come up with now..

[chrisbid]

it didnt fail... why ponder this?

[jbanes]

This is really a silly topic. The NES would have succeeded, period. There was never any question or poor sales figures to suggest it. In short, Atari's collapse left a huge gaping hole in the market that Nintedo was able to exploit.

 

Looking at the market of the day:

• Atari was out of the market
  
• Intellivision was dead (now supported only by INTV's mail order)
  
• Colecovision was dead (they stopped shipping it in 1984, and sold their assets to Telegames)
  
• The SG-1000 had the same type of games and controllers as competing consoles, and would not have differentiated itself
  

Nintendo came in with something completely different, and that was why they were successful. The only way the Nintendo could have failed in the US market was to not have existed. Given the market vacuum that existed, Sega and Nintendo were the best bets for new market entries, and Sega just wasn't different enough.

 

If we assume that Nintendo simply didn't exist as a video game company, then we run into a whole host of problems trying to find a replacement. The SMS would have never been developed, because there was no competition and no controllers to copy. (Sorry.) Whatever game consoles remained would have been severely lacking direction.

 

So what would have happened had Nintendo never entered the game market? Not a whole hell of a lot. The home market was already moving where they wanted to go: Toward home computers. If anyone remembers, both Apogee and Epic were well established by the early 90s. It's questionable if their games would have been so focused on side scrolling if Nintendo hadn't shown them the way, but the direction of arcade games by the time of the crash would have likely provided the necessary inspiration. The only difference is that there may have been a larger market for inexpensive computers that hooked up to your television. Also, keep in mind that pretty much every game console of the 80's was trying to become an inexpensive home computer. (Oddly, the market settled on expensive home computers, so go figure.)

 

Basically, Nintendo created a market that didn't need to exist at the time. Without them, it's possible (perhaps likely) that the Playstation and XBox wouldn't exist today.

 

Here's another question: Did the NES kill the arcades, or were they going to die anyway?

Arcades killed the arcades. As the machines got more expensive, they began to get too costly to support on a quarter per game. This drove per-game prices up, which in turn created revenue to make games more expensive. The market eventually plateaued, and then began to rapidly decline.

 

intellivision still around now?? thank god it isnt LOL..it wasnt even great back then and i can only shudder to see what woud they would come up with now..

Thems fightin' words there boy. You better be ready for a showdown... (insert The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly music)

[8th lutz]

If nes failed, I think there wouldn't be a game system in the states for a couple more years. The Master system came out because the nes was sucessful to my understanding.

[Warriorisabouttodie]

I hate to say it, but with Atari's luck and business practices in those days the only way

the NES could of failed is if Atari had agreed to market the NES. They would of found

a way to drive it into the ground.

[darklord1977]

it didnt fail... why ponder this?

still ,its interesting to think about

[7800Lover]

I only suggested this topic to consider what might have been. Keep in mind that video games were not liked by retailers after the Crash considering the money they lost. It was difficult to get them to carry the NES and any number of things could have gone wrong.

[Atariboy2600]

Its like saying

 

WHAT IF: The South won then the North.

WHAT IF: We failed in the D-Day Invason.

WHAT IF: The New Coke was very good.

 

We may never know if we keep asking our selfs the age old Q on Thw What If World hell even Mavel Comic made a What If comic series if Spiderman was a woman or the Hulk becomes the Hulk when he gets happy its one of thouse things that may never have the filnal anser.

[darklord1977]

I only suggested this topic to consider what might have been. Keep in mind that video games were not liked by retailers after the Crash considering the money they lost. It was difficult to get them to carry the NES and any number of things could have gone wrong.

this is true..and it was a good topic..

[darklord1977]

Its like saying

 

WHAT IF: The South won then the North.

WHAT IF: We failed in the D-Day Invason.

WHAT IF: The New Coke was very good.

 

We may never know if we keep asking our selfs the age old Q on Thw What If World hell even Mavel Comic made a What If comic series if Spiderman was a woman or the Hulk becomes the Hulk when he gets happy its one of thouse things that may never have the filnal anser.

that what if series was great...there was one issue with ' what if wolverine became lord of the vampires'..and another was 'what if iron man lost the armor wars'..and my fav.."what if spider-man have kept his cosmic powers" great reading all around

 

the point is, sometimes its interesting to think about what if? but always remember to look ahead ..

 

by the way new coke was nasty

 

side note: if we failed the D-Day landing at normandy, we would still win the the war in europe anyway(remember we were the allied forces after all and at that time the axis powers were starting to crumble), it would have taken longer though... all you would have to do is unleash general george s. Patton and his forces on Hitler (remember the line from the movie patton.."where you going general?".."Berlin,im going to personally shoot that paper hanging son of a bitch"..) it was also rumored that if the war in europe lasted longer we would have tested the atomic bomb on germany and the european conflict would be over, then of course,we turn our attention to the pacific theater

Edited May 6, 2006 by darklord1977

[The_Laird]

More interesting would have been "What if Atari had had quality control on the 2600?"