Talk:Fifth generation of video game consoles/Archive 1

Casio Loopy
It may not have had any major impact on console gaming, but it was a unique and interesting machine that should be mentioned.Alcy 04:39, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Most of these console articles only focus on Western demographics. Do your research before writing an article. -marvelvsdc

In the article it says that the notion of describing consoles as x-bit comes from colour depth - isn't this rubbish? Surely the reason that they were called 8 bit consoles was because the word size of the processor was 8 bits, and 16 bit consoles had word sides of 16bits.

Case in point: For the mega drive/genesis (always called 16bit)

Main CPU: 16-Bit Motorola M68000 16 bit processor running at 7.61Mhz Palette: 512 Colors - 2^9 not 2^16!!!

For the NES (always called 8bit) CPU: Nintendo 2A03 8 bit processor based on MOS Technology 6502 core, running at 1.79MHz Palette: 48 colors and 5 grays in base palette; red, green, and blue guns can be individually darkened somewhat on a particular scanline - this is not 2^8!

I'm 100% sure I'm right about this, and unless anyone tells me otherwise I'll change all the x-bit articles to remove the rubbish about colour depth.

That is indeed total BS. The mega drive only 16 colours? LOL. It is due to the main processsor. Hence the reason there is no 128 bit. -josquius

"Tomb Raider featured a supposedly sexy female lead." -Disagree with supposedly, just an objective point, but this was basically the selling point of the game and Eidos did what they could with the polygons they had, gameplay was a secondary issue from the press coverage in the UK
 * Why not try "voluptuous" instead? Not everyone finds the same things sexy. Plenty of gamers aren't even attracted to women. Alcy 01:36, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Saturn is ignored on the Consoles of the 32-bit / 64-bit era section of the page, bout halfway down.

Yes, why is PlayStation and Saturn not featured in the "overview"? Hornpipe2 (talk) 20:34, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Arcade Games

 * The Nintendo 64 was announced as "Ultra 64" and two arcade games (Killer Instinct and Cruis'n USA) were released claiming to use the hardware. A famous TV ad showed a gamer chainsawing open the Killer Instinct arcade cabinet so he could take out the N64 console inside. This caused many gamers to abstain from buying systems like the 3DO, Saturn, and PlayStation, because they saw that what they thought was the Nintendo 64 hardware was clearly superior to any of those systems. In the end, the system was completely different from that used for Killer Instinct and Cruis'n USA.

If I'm not mistaken, the commercial described was actually for the SNES. In fact both Killer Instict and Killer Instict 2 were released before the Nintendo 64.--AlphaTwo 19:16, 23 February 2006 (UTC)


 * My understanding is also that the above ad referred to the upcoming N64. The arcade games were created as "preview" type games so you could go to the arcade and play N64 titles before the release of the N64. I do believe a watered-down version of killer instinct was released for the SNES --Measure 23:32, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

Market share
Does anyone know of a source we can use to verify what kind of market share each of these consoles got? Even just total units sold for each? The opening paragraph says the PlayStation was the most successful console of the generation... is there a source to back up that claim? I'm positive the PlayStation was the most successful, but can we verify this? I don't know where to look. --Measure 23:36, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

It's all bullshit. Don't believe the hype, we wanna see some figures.

I took some figures from the Console Wars page. Don't know the sources, but they're there.

Franchises?
Should we be listing PC-based franchises on this list at all? Unreal didn't come to consoles until the sixth generation, Diablo had a PlayStation version, but it isn't very important to the console market and Doom, besides its PC origins had had a console release on the SNES. Ace of Sevens 10:59, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Mainstream
I think a major section that needs to be added here is that it was during the 32 bit era that computer games truly entered the mainstream.--Josquius 13:25, 10 July 2006 (UTC)


 * The sales data doesn't really support that. The 8-bit era sold approximately 80 million units.  16-bits were around 100 million.  The PS1/N64 era sold around 130 million.  Yes there's growth, but the probable explanation is due to natural population growth (example: U.S. increased from 200 to 300 million citizens; a 50% jump in potential buyers), rather than any sudden change in consumer habits.


 * Furthermore from my own observations over the last 30 years: nothing's changed.  Gaming in the 1980s was a hobby mostly-populated by kids, teens, and young adults (20s/30s), and the same was true in the 1990s.   The demographic didn't change.


 * In other words, "games entered the mainstream in the 90s" is an urban legend neither supported by Sales Data nor observation. -  Theaveng 16:00, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

once again how are handhelds included in this
....and the game boy pocket is just a redesign its like saying the ds lite is a new generation of system...Owwmykneecap 18:34, 21 August 2006 (UTC).

It is a new generation of system! Two screen, touch screen, microphone and some dangley bolocks.


 * I think he's actually talking about the ds LITE compared to the DS.

Saying GameBy Pocket is of the fifth generation is like saying the DS Lite is one or two generations ahead of the normal DS. While there is in fact no real hardware change.

Emulation
It's not just FFV which made people want to emulate the NES and SNES during this epoch, but PCs finally became possible to emulate the 8 (and 16) bit processors of a generation before and the internet made it possible to find ROMs (or as I like to think of them, tape images.) The rise of emulators (eg jpp, z80, xspect for the ZX Spectrum alone) during this time has little or nothing to do with the fact that one particular game was popular because it was translated into English, but because people were bored with the same old crap gameplay with fancy graphics. I will edit the main article in a day or two to reflect this viewpoint, unless what I've just written can be proven incorrect.

[User: I'm not actually a user, but would like to believe in wikipedia. 01:50, 22 September 2006 (BST)

I think the explanation is fine at simply "PCs were now able to keep up with the games" and "the Internet made distributing ROMs much easier". No nostalgic opinionating required. Hornpipe2 (talk) 20:38, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Here's my question: the Xbox 360 is able to play 25 year old games? Is this through Live Arcade? Examples? 81.58.34.171 12:51, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

I believe the direct correlation between roms and the 7th generation is highly speculative. Companies during this generation and prior began releasing compilations of old games through standard disk or cartridge distribution. The paragraph should be deleted, as it is more relevant to the subject of piracy than the continuity of video game history. (BJV) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.77.39.51 (talk) 01:27, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Ape Escape: a milestone?
I'm of the opinion that Ape Escape doesn't really deserve to be listed as a milestone game. It may have been one of the first "show off" titles for the DualShock but it wasn't remarkable in any other department and earlier games (e.g. Porsche Challenge) made effective use of both thumbsticks even if they were only really Dual Analogue titles. — ThomasHarte 18:30, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Ape Escape is a milestone, it was soon followed by sequels and an animated TV series. At one point it was destined to be Sony's Mario, but Sony mishandled the brand. --89.147.0.109 (talk) 10:03, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Panzer Dragoon Saga
As arguably the most significant saturn game as well as a pioneer of early 3D RPG's, I feel that Panzer Dragoon Saga deserves to be included in the list of milestone games. It was the last great piece of output for the console before the saturn fell into obscurity. Am I in the minority here? - Heihachi 17:38, 3 January 2007 (GMT)


 * I am going to insert PDS, though I will remove it if anyone has a valid argument against it or if there is a consensus against this decision Heihachi 01:24, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Ape Escape
From the milestones section: "Ape Escape is the very first game to use the dualshock analog controller on the PlayStation. The games requires two analog sticks to play with. The left analog stick to move the character and the right analog stick to use the gadget." - I though Gran Turismo was the first game to use the dualshock feature. A.E. was the first game on the PSX to REQUIRE an analogue (or dualshock) controller IIRC (that is it didn't just utilise the analogue feature but could be played without it). Alexj2002 21:19, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

32-bit?
Are they really in the same 'generation' as 64-bit? I mean, 32-bit games were pretty durn separate from 64-bit, weren't they? I remember at the end of the 16-bit era, it seemed like there were all these new consoles coming out and none of them were showing up at anyone's house.. sega cd failed, sega 32x failed.. nintendo didn't even put one out.. it seemed almost like its own very short-lived crappy generation or something before 64-bit picked up again.


 * The PS1 was 32 bit, and it sold ~110 million units. Not exactly a "crappy" console.  Furthermore, the Xbox & Nintendo GameCube also used 32 bit CPUs, and I wouldn't describe them as "crappy" either.   -  Theaveng 15:37, 13 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Hey and the Atari Jaguar was 64 bit, at that falied to oust the PS1 and Saturn in either graphics or sales. mcjakeqcool Mcjakeqcool (talk) 20:19, 23 December 2008 (UTC)
 * The number of bits is meaningless. --89.147.0.109 (talk) 10:01, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

GoldenEye and Perfect Dark
I can't believe that GoldenEye and Perfect Dark are not discussed here, these 2 were always in the top 3 or 5 games of this generation of consoles. And their impact on gaming in general, in particular the advancements to first person shooters and their multiplayer modes. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.190.193.125 (talk • contribs)
 * Please start new discussion at the bottom and sign your posts.
 * Personally I didn't care for either of the games. They were popular but AFAIK newer FPS titles do not seem to borrow much from them.--Anss123 (talk) 08:07, 23 April 2008 (UTC)
 * I'd say there were some minor mood-related issues taken from Perfect Dark, but I can't find anything that was truly passed on from Golden Eye. That's not to say it wasn't an enjoyable game, just that it didn't change the industry. Doom brought us multi-player vs AND co/p LONG before these two games. Beyond their fan-base there isn't much more to say about them. Lostinlodos (talk) 00:03, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * GoldenEye, to its credit, is one of the few good games based on a movie. I’ve heard that the Splintered Cell and Rainbow games have similarities, but I didn’t care for those games either so I can’t say for sure.--Anss123 (talk) 05:36, 24 April 2008 (UTC)
 * GoldenEye was a HUGE success, one of the killer apps for the N64, and almost certainly worthy of a mention as it was one of the pioneering FPS games on a console. PD maybe not so much needing a mention except in passing - it was the sequel after all.  Hornpipe2 (talk) 20:40, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
 * GoldenEye was pretty much the pioneer in objective-based FPS, rather than just run-and-gun, if I'm not mistaken. Useight (talk) 20:46, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Edit console Knowledge roundup
Ok i would like to clarify for future refrence that the Amiga CD32 was the world's first 32 bit console in Europe and North America and therefore should be listed first in the console comparison list not the 3do, and that the Amiga CD32 was first releaced in September 1993 and the 3do a month later, in October 1993. Not both in the same month of that year (September 1993) also well the 3do selling 2 million units was clarified which i am happy about along with it being clarified that the Atari Jaguar sold 500,000 units which i am also pleased about it but what was not clarified was that the Amiga CD32 sold 100,000 on the console round up which it did as there are many sources to back that up. I do feel that for the more obscure consoles in fifth generation (also other generations that i will later write about in some more wiki discuss pages that is already talked about on my talk pages)have in general not had enough infomation around wiki, and that i would also like to have it written back in place that the best Selling game on the Amiga CD32 was Simon the Sorcerer, also being that on the 3do it was Return Fire and on the Atari Jaguar the best selling game was Alien VS Predator, i have no clue why these articles have instead been relplaced by just saying unknown when there are many reliable to back up these games as being the best selling games on these platforms. I would like to issues before reporting them in this generation roundup.Thankyou Mcjakeqcool Mcjakeqcool (talk) 11:38, 20 September 2008 (UTC)
 * This is what people call a "wall of text", if you want people to read it you should space it out. That said, if you have sources for your claim then feel free to list them.--Anss123 (talk) 16:51, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

update? repley?
Can someone please give me an update or repley, as i am wondering if people check this talk page as i posted that comment (above) some time ago, can someone please repley to my question. thankyou mcjakeqcool Mcjakeqcool (talk) 15:56, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

fifth gen add ons
I would say, since the Neo Geo CD is 16 bit, and is a forth generation add on, it should not be on here at all, well the 32x should be because it is 32 bit, and the HyperGeo 64 should also be on here because it is 64 bit and is a fifth generation add on. Also I am not sure whether or not that the Amiga CD32's Peripherals should be on here (e.g floppy, etc) altough if I could get help with that one it would be much aprechiated and also the same applies with the Sega Saturn cartridge slot, whether or not that is a fifth generation add on, would be a much aprechiated answer. That's about all I have to say, but I am working on extensive edits revolveing around video games. Regards mcjakeqcool Mcjakeqcool (talk) 13:19, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

My edits
I have edited this article, and before a wikipedian edits my changes, I would like to say my changes are verifiable, and I have cituations and links of the web to vertifty my changes. mcjakeqcool Mcjakeqcool (talk) 20:16, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Key games
Would'ent games like Alien VS. Predator and Tempest 2000 on the Jaguar, games like Return Fire on the 3do and games like Simon the Sorcerer on the Amiga CD32, be key games through this generation as they were key games for those fifth generation consoles, would be good to know. mcjakeqcool Mcjakeqcool (talk) —Preceding undated comment was added at 11:01, 26 December 2008 (UTC).

CD32 came out before 3DO
Can some one please change this article if possible because the it says the Amiga CD32 came out after the 3do but the Amiga CD32 indeed came out before the 3do. Thankyou, mcjakeqcool Mcjakeqcool (talk) 20:12, 8 March 2009 (UTC)
 * The article claims the CD32 came in September and the 3DO in October. October comes after September so that means the CD32 came first.--Anss123 (talk) 21:23, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Error!
It says right in the article that the Saturn sold 17 million units (I wish it had, they would be easier to find!) but then the source that that figure sites states only 9.5 million units. Aside from that, other articles on Wikipedia (such as the Console wars article) site the same source but display the 9.5 million figure. I guess I'll change it for now, but I'm not from around here so I just thought I should let anyone watching this article know. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.169.72.161 (talk) 00:47, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

You are right, the Sega Saturn sold 9 million units worldwide. mcjakeqcool Mcjakeqcool (talk) 10:42, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Life Time?
It says the ps1 sould 70 million more units than the n64. Thats because it lasted oh.. lets say about 5 more years after the n64 was disncontinued. Does anybody know how many units the ps1 sold buy 2001? just so we can compare ps1 and n64 sales... fairly? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.233.100.129 (talk) 14:36, 22 June 2009 (UTC)


 * 79.61 million by the start of 2001, 89.29 million by the end of 2001. Dancter (talk) 15:00, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

N64 logo
It had a logo. 98.14.15.12 (talk) 00:07, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Gamate
I think this handheld belongs in History of video game consoles (fourth generation), not History of video game consoles (fifth generation). First of all, the Gamate was released in 1991 and discontinued in about 1994, whereas the other handhelds in the fifth generation, and most home consoles as well, weren't even released until 1995. Second, it was marketed as a cheap alternative to the Game Boy, which is listed on WP as fourth generation. Third, in terms of technological advancement it is much closer to fourth generation handhelds than the fifth generation ones, and in fact is pretty low-tech as far as fourth generation handhelds go.

So, any counter-arguments? If not, anyone know how to properly remove the Gamate from this article and enter it into the table in History of video game consoles (fourth generation).--Martin IIIa (talk) 00:06, 18 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I agree - I was thinking the exact same thing. I'll move it into the 4th gen page. Sengokucannon (talk) 16:19, 26 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Awesome, thanks! I'm still getting the hang of the formatting here, so it's nice to have this taken care of by someone who's sure what they're doing.--Martin IIIa (talk) 20:30, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Milestone titles
This listing in the article seems to need considerable trimming. To be specific, below is a list of titles that I propose be removed, and why:
 * Ape Escape - The only distinction named is that it is "the first game to explicitly require the use of Sony's DualShock controller's analog sticks." Sounds pretty trivial to me.
 * Panzer Dragoon Saga - This one was released at the end of the Saturn's life, and thus hardly any gamers at the time even heard of it, much less played it. Aside from obsessive retro gamers such as myself, PDS has not the slightest significance to gaming.
 * PaRappa the Rapper - The listing itself admits that this was "only a modest success at its time of release".
 * Perfect Dark - This is just a spiritual sequel to Golden Eye 007. I don't see how it did anything to the industry that hadn't already been accomplished by its predecessor.
 * Tekken 3 - Maybe it's just me, but I've never heard of this title being particularly significant. And the fact that the listing for it consists almost solely of POV commentary salted with weasel words makes me very suspicious of its inclusion.
 * Return Fire - While it sold well amongst 3DO titles, I don't think most 3DO gamers would call it a "defining title". The fact that it is also listed as the 3DO's top-selling game - a claim I find even more questionable - makes me suspect someone with a Return Fire bias was editing the article. But most important of all, is there any question that if any 3DO game should be listed under "Milestone titles", it's The Need for Speed?
 * Doom - This was a milestone title for the PC, no question. For consoles, not so much. 1st person shooters didn't really break into consoles until Golden Eye. Sure, PlayStation Doom was a big seller, but only in the same way that any decent home port of a hit PC game becomes a big seller. If we're listing Doom as a milestone console game, then we should definitely add Myst and Sim City 2000 as well.

In the event that there's no discussion of this topic in the next couple days (and this talk page certainly doesn't get much activity), I'll go ahead and remove the proposed games from the list.--Martin IIIa (talk) 14:19, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I would agree with your pruning except for PaRappa. The game was actually quite popular in Japan and really began the whole rhythm gaming thing.  The others are definately not particularly significant. Indrian (talk) 14:34, 23 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Sounds good to me; PaRappa was the one I was the least certain about deleting. Thanks for the input. I think it would be a good idea for you (or anyone else who knows much about the game) to rewrite the summary for PaRappa, though. The current explanation sounds a bit weak.--Martin IIIa (talk) 17:38, 25 February 2012 (UTC)

After giving it more thought, I think Aliens vs. Predator should be removed as well; it's an exclusive for a console with less than 150,000 units sold at the time. If anyone has objections, please post them here.--Martin IIIa (talk) 19:23, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Why is spyro on the list? What did it bring to the platform genre that Mario didn't do already? SixtyHertz (talk) 22:52, 17 June 2013 (UTC)

Vandalism?
It looks like a bunch of these Generation pages had their Nintendo console prices vandalized. The Nintendo 64 was NOT $600 at release, nor was the SNES $400. Looks like an angry anti-Nintendo troll trying to revise history. Who knows what other things they vandalized on these pages. I recommend a user comb through the pages or find the poster who vandalized the pages in the history and undo their handiwork. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.176.142.25 (talk) 10:48, 31 March 2013 (UTC)

Fm Towns bit Question.
Statement is "However, the Intel 80386SX CPU is not a fully 32-bit processor as it only supports 16-bit bus addressing"


 * Now I know a lot of people do not know how bits work and such but this statement should probably be moved. Like the criticism of the Atari jaguar, people believe the bus is how Bits are determined, except that has never been the case (especially with Home Computers) If I am not mistaken, the Fm Towns actual receives and sends out 32 bits of data WHOLE. This is different from the debated TG16, where the CPU sends 16 bits of data but at 8-bits at a time as one example. It works kind og like the Jaguar, that, while having many processes (and CPU's) can move 64bits of data around as a whole and not in pieces. It can take a whole 64bit Graphical and CPU data without doing what the TG16 does of which would be moving around 16bits of data, 8-bits at a time.

Thus I think that this information trying to imply that it was not a real 32-bit system (although i still don't believe it's the first bu that's another day) is inaccurate.Leeroyhim (talk) 01:38, 3 February 2014 (UTC)

This article may need to be cleaned.
This article has a lot of unverified info without having any form of reference. Although some of it is general information, I would say over a 3rd of the article is not. I think that we should look over the article carefully and remove information that is out of context, unrelated, or makes a claim without having a reference. Especially if it is written as a factual statement. KombatPolice (talk) 23:01, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

I will be starting soon. If you see any corrections that should be made feel free to edit them or revert if you believe that the original text is accurate. I am only removing the standout content that may need source or to be removed. The debated issues, and the info with sources that are related to the information with no altering, will stay to be discussed. KombatPolice (talk) 23:29, 8 February 2014 (UTC)