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/vr/ - Retro Games

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3929992 No.3929992[DELETED]  [Reply] [Original]

Why did Americans give up on console game development so hard after the Atari 2600? I don't accept "video game crash" as a believable long term answer in a free market.

>> No.3930008

>>3929992
Because arcades were a thing.

Less home consoles, less competition for arcades.

Besides, everyone was kinda spooked that the great Atari fell, who looked pretty infallible until they mismanaged the company into the ground.

>> No.3930040

>>3929992
I think you are right to not accept the video game crash story.

I think the real reason was the rise of the home computer. It seemed more serious and actually was more versatile. A home computer was a new idea, not just another toy. And you could play different kinds of games on it. Most people probably thought all gaming would migrate to it faster than it did.

So anyone with enough money to buy a 6502 would be more likely to spend it on a C64 than a mere console.

>> No.3930043

An industry that was almost completely destroyed doesn't have the capital or manpower to compete against against industries that weren't.

>> No.3930070

But it was the crash. It created a vacuum that Japanese consoles filled and American developers were understandably less eager to develop for them.

If you want a broader more racist answer, Asians are more comfortable rehashing and refining winning formulas so making genre games on limited console platforms was more up their alley while the flexibility of arcade hardware and the depth of computer storage allowed more freedom anyway.

>> No.3930086

Did corporatism cause the American home console market crash?

>> No.3930258

>>3930086
No, just plain american stupidity, hypocrisy and laziness. You see, if you buy japanese licensed game, at worse it will be mediocre, and at average it will provide decent experience for fans of franchise.
If you buy american licensed game, it's guaranteed to be steaming pile of garbage.

>> No.3930451

>>3930040
>underage makes an uneducated stab in the dark
The post. What you're talking about didn't even remotely begin to happen with American perception of computers until the early 90s. Pretty much every other post in this thread has a better explanation.

>> No.3930454

>>3930451
I'm 47 you dope. This is exactly what happened, at least among my peers.

>> No.3930512

>>3929992
The video game crash is the answer though. In the short term, American companies wouldn't want to take a risk on what had proven to be an unreliable market. Once Nintendo moved in, they were just too monolithic to compete against.

>> No.3930532

>>3930512
American game-designers suck. It is well-known fact. They get recruited from QA or minor level designer positions, stay for project or 2, and then get kicked after tiniest fail because their skills are not perceived as something of worth by suits. Japanese game-designers, due to life-time employment policy, inevitably gain at least basic proficiency. Then japanese industry had videogame petri dish in form of arcades. When home consoles happened, they already knew how stuff works, rushed in and took over new market, while american companies were still experimenting with fundamentals.

>> No.3930661

>>3930454
You must have come from a pretty wealthy family to have expected computers to successfully compete against consoles as home gaming devices.

>> No.3930665
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3930665

>>3929992
Because most of the development turned to PCs. There was still a ton of game development in the US, it just wasn't so much for consoles.

It's part of why console and PC games were so different for so many years. Really it wasn't until the 360 that the two began to merge again.

>> No.3930668

>>3930040
This guy is pretty much on the money.

>> No.3930724

Selling software is a safer and better business decision. Margins on consoles are not too great and there are several case where they were essentially loss leaders to sell software. Japanese companies have always focused on long term products and the long payoff while US businesses and shareholders expect large immediate returns on investment.

>> No.3930865

>>3930724
Margins on all computer hardware in 80s were like Apple margins today

>> No.3931010

>>3930724
Why US so shit when it comes to investment

>> No.3932506

>>3931010
Because it's less family oriented so there's less focus on legacy and longevity.

>> No.3932575

>>3930454
You didn't live like typical Americans. Rise of the home PC wasn't until the mid-to-late 90's, long after the crash. If your view was correct, Nintendo wouldn't have succeeded the way they did.

The crash was poor game quality and saturation. Nintendo "revived" it by branding tactics (calling it an Enetertainment System and making it look like a VCR) as well as a review process to boost consumer confidence (Seal of Approval)

Consumer computers didn't factor in at all for lower and most middle class families.

>> No.3932610

>>3932575
>Consumer computers didn't factor in at all for lower and most middle class families.

Not him but we were lower middle class but had a computer since '84 or so.

>> No.3932674

>>3929992
it is the correct answer though

>> No.3932683

>>3932674
It's a shortsighted, simplistic view.

>> No.3932717

>>3929992
PC market. Specifically, the IBM compatible market.

No seriously, like all the US-developed games of worth post-crash have been for the PC (at the very least, all of them in the /vr/ time period)

>> No.3932773

>>3932683
It's also reality.

>> No.3932781

>>3932773
Reality isn't anywhere near that simple. At least try not to be stupid for once.

>> No.3932785

>>3932781
It really is that simple. The crash was responsible for the dip in hardware development the OP was referring to, and nothing else.

>> No.3932795

>>3932785
You are childish and ignorant.

>> No.3932797

>>3932795
And you have little else but insults. Regardless, you haven't managed to rewrite history yet. Keep at it.

>> No.3932802

>>3932797
It's already been explained in this thread. Why would I re-write what has already been said? What you are saying is partially true, but it's also not the whole story. Claiming it is, is just stupid. That's not an insult, it's a simple accurate description.

>> No.3932804

>>3932802
>but it's also not the whole story.
Yes, it is.

>> No.3932813

>>3932804
You can stick your head in the sand and pretend the world is that simple, but that attitude and your insistence just makes you look more foolish.

So either you're genuinely just not that smart or this is purposeful bait. Either way what you say is worthless.

>> No.3932824

>>3932813
>You can stick your head in the sand and pretend the world is that simple,
We're discussing the well-documented history of the American video games industry, this isn't some /pol/ topic or moral dilemma. Take it down a notch.

This entire thread is revisionism, and it's not even well thought out. The product of poorly educated guesses made by people who, quite literally, weren't even alive during the time period in question.

>> No.3932834

>>3932824
>The product of poorly educated guesses made by people who, quite literally, weren't even alive during the time period in question.

I was going to say that I bet you're going to try and pull the "I disagree with you so you must be a kid" line. /vr/'s favorite shitty, worthless tactic when they have nothing else to say.

I was very much alive, thank you. But thanks even more for confirming the kind of person I was talking to. You are worthless.

>> No.3932839

>>3932834
>I was going to say that I bet you're going to try and pull the "I disagree with you so you must be a kid" line.
No, you weren't. You just have absolutely no way of proving any of the nonsense posted in this thread, whether it's yours or anyone else's. Hence the constant need to not actually say anything refuting and continue with the lame insults.

>> No.3932860
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3932860

>>3932839
Nice try, but your whole argument is that a complex situation dealing with different markets, the rise of personal computers and influence of arcades and the Japanese game industry exploding was actually super simple and that the Atari crash made them all just "give up".

You've said nothing of any value or added anything at all really, other than to insist that the situation is simple.

Then you pull out the classic "you must be young" card. You're basically a joke, how else am I supposed to respond?

>> No.3932862

>>3932860
>Nice try, but your whole argument is that a complex situation dealing with different markets, the rise of personal computers and influence of arcades and the Japanese game industry exploding was actually super simple and that the Atari crash made them all just "give up".
Yep. That's about right.

>> No.3932885

>>3932575
>Consumer computers didn't factor in at all for lower and most middle class families.

That is patently false.
There was something like 135-145 million PCs floating around the US consumer market in the mid 1980s, and it grew to 250-260 million by the early 90s.

We don't have conclusive sales numbers before 1996, but in 1996 alone, 70 million Personal Computers were sold.

The first King's Quest game sold over 1 million copies over its lifespan (including the SCI remake in 1990)

>> No.3932894

>>3932862
So you're either stupid or you're pretending to be stupid. Okay I guess.

>> No.3932898

That's /v/ tier shit in this thread, mods pls delet it

>> No.3932915

>>3932898
Go be stupid somewhere else, weak bait troll.

>> No.3932918

>>3929992
They never did, Americans have been consistently dominating the industry since the 80s.

>> No.3932950

>>3932894
>i can't actually defend or prove any of the asinine assertions i'm making
>everyone else is stupid, though

The other faggot was right. You are a kid.

>> No.3932954

>>3932575
>You didn't live like typical Americans

kek

>> No.3932967

>>3932950
>everyone else

Not everyone. Just the guy insisting the situation was a simple case of developers "giving up" after Atari imploded. It got more and more obvious it was just bait the longer he went on though.

>> No.3932969

>>3932967
By my own recollection, they basically did. At least as far as home hardware went. Who was even prototyping, let alone actually releasing, new home hardware in the interim between the Crash and the debut of the NES?

>> No.3932994

>>3932969
It's not that they didn't move away from developing dedicated gaming consoles, it's that the crash wasn't the only reason for it. Saying it was is an oversimplification. That's what the trolling was over.

>> No.3933018

>>3932885
> There was something like 135-145 million PCs floating around the US consumer market in the mid 1980s, and it grew to 250-260 million by the early 90s.

Very interesting. Source? The US population was just under 250 million in 1990. That means that there was about one computer per person in the early 90s. Not arguing, I just want to learn more about that.

>> No.3933035

>>3932994
So then what would these other reasons have been? The home computer market, maybe, but home PCs weren't anywhere near as prolific during the Crash. The Japanese industry? Nah, not until around 1986.

>> No.3933042

>>3933018
Not him, but some info you might find interesting

http://jeremyreimer.com/m-item.lsp?i=137

Everything Reimer writes is fascinating to me.

>> No.3933048

Because the genres the westerners are good at, First person shooters, real time strategy, etc, are natively PC games, some of them had ports in consoles, but consoles were mostly japan-dominated, until Xbox introduced Halo and FPS became the lead genre in both consoles and PC, thankfully not /vr/.

>> No.3933059

>>3929992
>free market

>>>/pol/

>> No.3933067

>>3933035
>The home computer market, maybe, but home PCs weren't anywhere near as prolific during the Crash

They're talking about after the crash though.