GAME customers: 1996 best year for gaming, Wii best console

[Andrew]

GAME customers name 1996 as gaming's 'golden' year; Names Wii as best ever console

Top Five Years for Gaming

1. 1996 (14%): Tomb Raider and Crash Bandicoot on the PlayStation and Nintendo 64 launched. We were singing along to Baddiel and Skinner’s Three Lions and Brit Pop was at its height

2. 2002 (13%): Halo and Elder Scrolls III on the Xbox and Grand Theft Auto Vice City. BBC 6 Music arrived on our airwaves and Arsenal won the FA Cup

3. 1991 (12%): Street Fighter II and Super Mario World on SNES and Lemmings was out on the PC. It was the start of the Iraq war and the year Bryan Adams made history when (Everything I Do) I Do It For You entered its 15th successive week at number one

4. 1985 (11%): Super Mario Bros, Duck Hunt and Donkey Kong Jr on the NES and Ultima IV and Oregon Trail on the PC. It was the year Eastenders went on air and the mullet was considered the most desirable hairstyle for men and women alike

5. 1980 (10%): Pac-Man and Centipede in the arcade, Space Invaders on the Atari 2600 and Zork on the PC. It was the year John Lennon was shot dead and David Bowie was at number one with Ashes to Ashes

The Top Consoles of All Time

1. Wii (15%)
2. Xbox 360 (10%)
3. PlayStation 3 (9%)
4. PlayStation 2 (8%)
5. Sega Mega Drive (7%)
6. PlayStation 1 (6.5%)
7. Super Nintendo (6%)
8. Game Boy (5%)
9. N64 (4.5%)
10. Nintendo DS (4%)

Agree? Disagree? Thoughts?

[benji]

I thought it was commonly accepted the best gaming years were on a three year cycle: 2001, 2004, 2007, etc.

There's so much wrong with this:

Tomb Raider and Crash Bandicoot on the PlayStation and Nintendo 64 launched.

I won't even discuss this Wii nonsense. (Or the 360/PS3 runner up situation. Which seems to indicate familiarity and recentness being a major factor.)

[[Q]]

i agree with 91 and 85.

I tihnk SNES & PS1 should be higher. NES didn't even crack the top 10?

[Andrew]

Agreed, I felt it should be there and both the SNES and N64 should be higher, but I'll admit that could be the residual traces of 90s Nintendo Fanboy talking.

[benji]

Why would anyone rank PS1 higher? (Even if you corrected the order.) The PS1 and N64 are part of the hardest generation to return to and always be so.

The SNES escapes this fact and then doubles down by having some of the greatest games of all time.

Try to make a case that the NES should be higher than the others that doesn't rely on its place in time.

Sure you can kick the Game Boy out, but that doesn't let the NES in. It lets the Game Boy Advance or GameCube or Xbox or Dreamcast in.

[deihatein]

Why would anyone rank PS1 higher? (Even if you corrected the order.) The PS1 and N64 are part of the hardest generation to return to and always be so.

Elaborate. Good sir.

[shadowgrin]

Because minus nostalgia most of the best PS1 games suck compared to the current consoles or even to the SNES.

[benji]

3D is primitive. Frame rate is generally shoddy, world design is bare. Controls have and make no sense of 3D navigation. Many games don't have design that goes beyond "IN 3D" as their core principal. Due to these issues many of them have incoherent or underdeveloped mechanics.

Take most any N64 or PS1 game, iterate it into the PS2 era and it's 90% of the time superior in every way regarding these issues.

This is not to say that there aren't very good games* from that era, some of which you can easily return to. But if you've consumed modern gaming and I give you five random games from that era you're going to have a much harder time sitting down with them than if I gave you five random GEN/SNES games.

The lone exception is the sports and racing genres almost entirely because of the collision and physics benefits from polygons.

*Blast Corps, Star Fox 64, The two Zeldas for N64; Twisted Metal 2, Symphony of the Night, Spyro series, Tony Hawk 1 and 2, Crash 2 and 3, Syphon Filter 1-3 for PS1.

[deihatein]

So basically the PS1 and the N64 is a tech demo? Sure, most of the games are hard to return/play now because of the obvious limitations. I think the reason they are putting the PS1/N64 higher is because in my opinion they are unique systems I guess? They are also responsible for many of the game series we have today even if some of them are from the SNES/GEN/NES era but was revive or done better justice because of the PS1/N64 technology back then(MGS comes to mind, Final Fantasy series as well although as shadow said it might be because of the Nostalgia factor kicking in)

[Andrew]

I guess there is a tendency to overrate them a little due to nostalgia, with their best titles being the clearest in mind and the view that they were a step forward in gaming and so influential. That makes them significant and in some cases revolutionary, but not necessarily the best, so fair point.

[shadowgrin]

Syphon Filter

Forgotten about that until now. Makes me want to play it again.

[Cpt(K)]

Disagreed with the WII being on the top, honestly I think about all those systems listed have a case for being in the top 10. I'm a 90s baby and wasn't able to get most of the older systems. However, I would definitely have listed the N64 higher. Though that's probably just because of Star Fox 64 (loved that game). Call me crazy, but I don't think the 360 belongs at the 2 spot at all - lower.

[Andrew]

Any particular reason?

[Cpt(K)]

Hmm, well I never really liked it at all. Especially since the Xbox360 and Ps3 have their own respective motion games, I have the PS3 with some PS3 move games now. I have played the WII before though. Maybe it's just because for the generation it was released in, it should have had more features to it. You look at the Xbox360 and especially the PS3 and they can do much more in the entertainment department. I also just "do not want" something that it's other competitors have implemented too. The WII might've been good when it was initially released at least, but now it's just meh.

[NovU]

Here's my list. I think more of you can agree to mine than GAME customers rank.

(1) Super Nintendo
(2) PS 2
(3) Nintendo
(4) PS 1
(5) PS 3
(6) Dreamcast
(7) PS 4(?)

[Andrew]

Hmm, well I never really liked it at all. Especially since the Xbox360 and Ps3 have their own respective motion games, I have the PS3 with some PS3 move games now. I have played the WII before though. Maybe it's just because for the generation it was released in, it should have had more features to it. You look at the Xbox360 and especially the PS3 and they can do much more in the entertainment department. I also just "do not want" something that it's other competitors have implemented too. The WII might've been good when it was initially released at least, but now it's just meh.

I was referring to the Xbox 360, which you said you'd ranker lower than second.

[benji]

Here's my list. I think more of you can agree to mine than GAME customers rank.

Here's the thing how do we pick the best console (and correspondingly I suppose the best year)? Is it the very peak? Then it's the SNES because it has Chrono Trigger and we're done, discussion over forever.

Is it the entire library? The PS1 and PS2 and Wii have so much abject shit in their multiple thousands of titles it drags down any quality titles.

Is it exclusives? Or is it also superior versions of multiplats? (This last part for example turns the Xbox from a non-entity probably into a legitimate threat.)

Or is it console "features"? Everything before the Dreamcast kinda collapses because all they did was play games, in one location. (Xband doesn't count.)

[NovU]

Here's the thing how do we pick the best console (and correspondingly I suppose the best year)?

Objectively speaking, you can't.

Fudge trying to sound smart when it comes to console debate because it's all about whose voice is louder. Like tell me one good reason why xbox360 is better than ps3. Absolutely no evidence supports that. Better exclusive titles? Fudge that, PS3 still a better console, it's not PS3's fault the developers fucked up PS3 exclusive titles despite superior specs. xbox360 has better online that is xbox LIVE. Fudge that too cuz PS3 provides free online gameplays. Xbox Kinnect is better tha Move? How about shove that up ur ass cuz only people who plays on kinnect are fat ladies who are actually too lazy to exercise outside their living room. Xbox360 is more affordable? No kidding especially with that red ring of death. And it looks ugly as ur gf w/o make up.

There you have it. I still think my argument has been just as awesome as anyone's in this thread.

[Cpt(K)]

The only reason I can think of for the xbox360 to have been ranked 2nd is because the PS3 was released after it, I personally think there's a general bias in favor of the 360 in the market. As stated above the way games are developed for both 360 and PS3 appear to be xbox ports, if you look at some of the games like NBA2k11 it had some missing features on the PS3. Xbox users had the privilege of not having the problem PS3 users have when importing their own music. My Player was still enjoyable, but you had to have had a fresh new my player in order to have your own custom music play without errors. That's just 1 example, but theirs many more of developers shorthanding PS3 users. Skyrim comes to mind, had to wait about a year or so for the bug fixes and DLC to be released and/or fixed.

I'm sure the Xbox360 is a joy to have and play with, with it's exclusives it has (Halo, Gears, etc) I'd want to get one eventually too. However, the PS3 has satisfied me more than enough - though the developers haven't always come through. I'd put the xbox360 probably anywhere from the 5th to 10th spot, not sure.

[shadowgrin]

Xbox Kinnect is better tha Move? How about shove that up ur ass cuz only people who plays on kinnect are fat ladies who are actually too lazy to exercise outside their living room.

The Kinect and Move are meant for playing?...

Using Microsoft Kinect as a Rehabilitative Assessment Tool

phpBB [video]

Nuclear Reactor Simulator using Microsoft Kinect (KReS)

phpBB [video]

Virtopsy - Potential use of gesture control in medicine using the Microsoft Kinect camera

phpBB [video]

Tedesys Uses Kinect in Hospitals

phpBB [video]

Microsoft Kinect used as seeing eye dog

phpBB [video]

Move, pwned.

[Andrew]

The only reason I can think of for the xbox360 to have been ranked 2nd is because the PS3 was released after it, I personally think there's a general bias in favor of the 360 in the market. As stated above the way games are developed for both 360 and PS3 appear to be xbox ports, if you look at some of the games like NBA2k11 it had some missing features on the PS3. Xbox users had the privilege of not having the problem PS3 users have when importing their own music. My Player was still enjoyable, but you had to have had a fresh new my player in order to have your own custom music play without errors. That's just 1 example, but theirs many more of developers shorthanding PS3 users. Skyrim comes to mind, had to wait about a year or so for the bug fixes and DLC to be released and/or fixed.

I'm sure the Xbox360 is a joy to have and play with, with it's exclusives it has (Halo, Gears, etc) I'd want to get one eventually too. However, the PS3 has satisfied me more than enough - though the developers haven't always come through. I'd put the xbox360 probably anywhere from the 5th to 10th spot, not sure.

Fair enough, but then where do you rank the PS3? It sounds like you'd rate them fairly close together on an objective list. Personally, I'd rank them in a tie or one spot apart somewhere in the top ten, separated by some minor detail with all other things being more or less equal.

[Cpt(K)]

I'd rank the PS3 higher than the 360, but the two would be relatively close. My full perspective is limited due to my experience, as I've stated I'm a 90s baby. The Ps3 has the nod in my opinion because it actually came out after Sony decided it was appropriate to due so - that is after determining their system's specifications were superior to it's competition. They even released a statement, in regards to just that. If I remember, it was something like this: they might release it after the xbox720, they don't want Microsoft to make adjustments that make their system (the PS4) inferior to the Xbox720.

Sure, initially the sales will be in favor of the Xbox. Maybe that is why the market is so Xbox driven now (and by that, I mean the lousy ports). Only time will tell what the systems live up to be though. I have a very rough idea of how the ranking would go, as I am not sure. But I am certain that the 360 was overrated.