Nintendo does it again!
Han Lee
This article was recently posted on the rec.games.video.nintendo, and I
thought it was rather funny.
Enjoy it!:
From nntp.crl.com!howland.reston.ans.net!gatech!newsfeed.pitt.edu!szm Fri May 5 15:38:45 PDT 1995
Nintendo Ultra-64 Technology Completed
Exclusive Games Set for April, 1996 Launch
Redmond, WA (May 5, 1995) --- Nintendo of America Inc. today announced that
the final chipset for its revolutionary Nintendo Ultra 64 home video game
system has been completed by Silicon Graphics, Inc. (NYSE : SGI) and Nintendo
Co. Ltd. The company also announced that it will launch the industry's only
true 64-bit platform in April of 1996, in both North America and Europe, with
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
a number of revolutionary new games, all exclusive to Nintendo Ultra 64.
Nintendo will officially unveil Nintendo Ultra 64 at its annual Video Game
Exhibition on November 24, 25, and 26, 1995 in Makuhari, Japan and at the
Consumer Electronics Show on January 5, 1996 in Las Vegas, Nevada.
"After 19 months of intense development, we have attained our two main goals
for Nintendo Ultra 64; to develop a chipset capable of delivering the world's
best video game experience, and to do it at a price that can deliver a
hardware set below $250 retail," said Howard Lincoln, chairman of Nintendo of
America.
"However, we have made a conscious decision not to rush Nintendo Ultra 64 to
market. Instead, we've decided to give our software developers additional
time to maximize the power of this system in their game creation."
"We're dedicated to delivering games which are a quantum leap beyond any that
have preceded them. In fact, we believe that at the E3 trade show next week
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
in Los Angeles, the world will discover once again that the best new software
for any video game system this year will again be available exclusively for
play on Nintendo's 16-bit Super NES -- just as it was last Christmas with
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Donkey Kong Country," Lincoln added.
Tom Jermoluk, president and CEO of Silicon Graphics, Inc., said, "We agree
with Nintendo's decision. from the start, SGI has had a vision of what we
could do if we dedicated the power of our technology and our experience
creating computer graphics solely to the purpose of making video games. With
what's coming off of the final chipset, I'd say that even we're amazed. Now
this breakthrough 3D graphics technology needs to be translated into video
games which take full advantage of the power of the SGI chipset."
Nintendo Ultra 64 will set new standards in power, efficiency, and elegance.
At its heart is the industry's only true 64-bit processor coupled with a
single custom graphics chip which will manage all visual and audio functions.
Supplemented by the technology of Rambus, Inc., the central processor will
communicate with memory at an unprecedented 500MHz, meaning an order of
magnitude increase in graphics realism.
"The story of our industry is the never-ending search for better and better
game play and game graphics," said Peter Main, Nintendo of America vice
president, marketing. "Once a masterpiece is created, like last year's
Donkey Kong Country, the bar is raised for all game developers. We think
Nintendo will move that bar even higher by the end of this year with
surprises we'll unveil next week. And by the end of April of next year, game
players will see what true 64-bit processing really means -- with a number of
games from the world's top software developers that will set the bar far
higher than most people thought possible -- with games that will be available
only for Nintendo Ultra 64."
Last Christmas, the world's game players made the Super NES game Donkey Kong
Country the fastest-selling game of all time. During the second half of this
year, two new Super NES games and two new Game Boy titles -- to be unveiled
next week at E3 -- will debut, featuring the same Advanced Computer Modeling
(ACM) of Donkey Kong Country. In addition, Nintendo will launch Virtual Boy
this summer with the first true three-dimensional games ever developed for
any home video game system.
"As the developer perhaps most experienced with Nintendo Ultra 64, we fully
support this new release schedule," said Tim Stamper, managing director of
Rare, Ltd., and creator of worldwide hits Donkey Kong Country and Killer
Instinct. "We have again clearly raised the software standard with new
16-bit games to be unveiled at E3. But, I can assure you that once the
world's video game developers spend time exploring the power of this
incredible Nintendo Ultra 64 chipset, you'll see gaming jump far beyond
anything that currently exists on any platform."
Nintendo Co., Ltd., of Kyoto, Japan, is the leader in the worldwide $15
billion retail video game industry. As a wholly owned subsidiary, Nintendo
of America Inc. based in Redmond, Washington, serves as headquarters for
Nintendo's operations in the Western Hemisphere, where more than 40 percent
of American homes own a Nintendo system.
[end article]
Cap Scott
--
Scott McCall (Cap Scott) E-Mail: caps...@aol.com [or] sz...@pitt.edu
Cap Scott's Ultra 64 Web Page: http://www.pitt.edu/~szm/nu64-cap.htm
Author of the "Online People's Choice Awards for the <-- '95 Edition:
Best/Worst Video Games of All Time!" <-- Oct, Nov, Dec.
So what happened to Marty Chinn's famous statement,
"Come May, you'll see how real Ultra 64 is" ?
Han Lee __
President of RFC (Rutubo Fan Club) " / / /_/ / "
han...@crl.com /_/ /| o - Terry Bogard
David Aldridge
In a previous posting, nukulkij poom (pnuk...@ux4.cso.uiuc.edu) writes:
> [Much stuff about Nintendo's U64 1996 release deleted.]
>
> This was rather enlightening, wasn't it? If Nintendo doesn't, in fact, make
> any presentation of U64 or its software at E3, they've just lost a shitload
> of credibility. Listen to all the Nintendo advocates screaming, "just wait
> till E3--then Sega and Sony are in deep shit." Too bad it's not gonna happen,
> if this post is correct.
I keep thinking back to how someone would say that the Ultra 64 might be
less than 100% of all that's been promised. Someone else would always
respond with "but Nintendo's been promising those abilities and a
last-quarter 95 release date for two years now. There's no way they will
change their story after all this time." (Please excuse my punctuation
here. :) )
> Let's see--what could they possibly have at E3 for the SNES that'll blow us
> all away so badly? Doom? Ooh played the hell out of that one two years ago.
> Another SGI-rendered game? Great--maybe they could add some new play
> mechanics this time around instead of recycling Super Mario World.
According to Dead Head Game Fan, one of those SNES titles "will
unequivocally be the most impressive looking game ever, even beyond
CLOCKWORK KNIGHT, TOH SHIN DEN and all other Saturn and PlayStation
games". (May 95, "Other Stuff", page 120. I don't believe it either.)
Whatever Nintendo has, I hope it's not another "Super Donkey Kong World"
type game.
???
poom) writes:
>
>han...@crl.com (Han Lee) writes:
>(snip) (snip) etc
Bottom line fellow gamers: The Ultra 64 delay is just big "N's" way of
giving the little "S" a handicap head start, cuz come April that'll be
all she wrote for saturn. Enjoy the 4 months as much as you can!
--
==================================================================
"I like my women like my coffee.....hot and bitter"
===================================================================
nukulkij poom
recall which one) have the two new SGI-rendered games being Diddy Kong,
the sequel to DKC and a 64 meg Killer Instinct for SNES. So much for that
"exclusively on U64" crap.
Poom!
(sorry to waste bandwidth in a Sega group about this)
nukulkij poom
>Bottom line fellow gamers: The Ultra 64 delay is just big "N's" way of
>giving the little "S" a handicap head start, cuz come April that'll be
>all she wrote for saturn. Enjoy the 4 months as much as you can!
And I suppose the year's gap between SNES and Genesis was to give Sega a
handicap head start too, right? Only this time, the competition's much
stiffer, so if we look at things from your perspective, Nintendo just made
the dumbest business move ever--look at how Genesis claimed near 50% of
the gaming market in its year lead. And if the same thing happens with
Saturn, PS, and the other next generation systems, Nintendo's in for a world
of trouble.
Poom!
Han Lee
>Sorry to burst your bubble, but rumors in another r.g.v. newsgroup (can't
>recall which one) have the two new SGI-rendered games being Diddy Kong,
>the sequel to DKC and a 64 meg Killer Instinct for SNES. So much for that
>"exclusively on U64" crap.
>
>Poom!
>(sorry to waste bandwidth in a Sega group about this)
>
Hahahahahahaha! Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!
The evil empire is collapsing... never to rise up again. Uhahahahaha!
Joselito Tagarao
: In <3oeogc$1...@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu> pnuk...@ux4.cso.uiuc.edu (nukulkij
: Bottom line fellow gamers: The Ultra 64 delay is just big "N's" way of
: giving the little "S" a handicap head start, cuz come April that'll be
: all she wrote for saturn. Enjoy the 4 months as much as you can!
Whatever...Sega and Nintendo are always head to head ('cept back in the 8
bit years). I don't care which system is "better", but if it is anything
like the 16 bit wars, neither will die out, and certainly Sega won't!
Maybe they've learned something from before when the Gen. came out before
the SNES, but good games didn't really start to come out 'till after the
competition really heated up...as for the Saturn only having 4 months to
live because of the U64, well, that has got to be one of those moronic
things I've ever heard. Even total U64 advocates know that the Saturn
won't be destroyed immediately by the U64, if at all. Personally, I
don't give a shit which system is destroyed or not. I want good games,
not hyped up eye candy only systems, and i don't care what platform
they're on.
nukulkij poom
>Fellow Sega gamers,
>This article was recently posted on the rec.games.video.nintendo, and I
>thought it was rather funny.
>Enjoy it!:
[Much stuff about Nintendo's U64 1996 release deleted.]
This was rather enlightening, wasn't it? If Nintendo doesn't, in fact, make
any presentation of U64 or its software at E3, they've just lost a shitload
of credibility. Listen to all the Nintendo advocates screaming, "just wait
till E3--then Sega and Sony are in deep shit." Too bad it's not gonna happen,
if this post is correct.
Let's see--what could they possibly have at E3 for the SNES that'll blow us
all away so badly? Doom? Ooh played the hell out of that one two years ago.
Another SGI-rendered game? Great--maybe they could add some new play
mechanics this time around instead of recycling Super Mario World.
>So what happened to Marty Chinn's famous statement,
> "Come May, you'll see how real Ultra 64 is" ?
Hmmm...maybe he meant May 1996. I'm not going to pick on Marty here, as
easy as that might be given this situation. He's not the one who's been
pulling the wool over everyone's eyes--it's Nintendo that deserves a shredding
here.
I don't know. After hearing this, I think Nintendo just lost a lot of
credibility. Even though I'm a happy Sega gamer, I'd be more than willing to
give U64 a chance, particularly when you consider how SoA works. But I see
Nintendo isn't too interested in giving us facts, just covering up to protect
their own butts from steep competition.
Poom!
Thomas Peng
>Sorry to burst your bubble, but rumors in another r.g.v. newsgroup (can't
>recall which one) have the two new SGI-rendered games being Diddy Kong,
>the sequel to DKC and a 64 meg Killer Instinct for SNES. So much for that
>"exclusively on U64" crap.
Where did you hear about KI for the SNES?? I have a hard time believing
this one. Talk about a losing proposition for Nintendo. If they do an
awesome home version of KI on the SNES people will be wondering what the
heck is the U64 for. If they do a terrible version of it then the whole
year's profit is shot. That is...if this is one of the two "better than
DKC" game they're counting on.
STP
Mike S Reynolds
??? <jum...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>
>Bottom line fellow gamers: The Ultra 64 delay is just big "N's" way of
>giving the little "S" a handicap head start, cuz come April that'll be
>all she wrote for saturn. Enjoy the 4 months as much as you can!
>
OK, first it's wait till Christmas, U64 will blow away Saturn and PSX, now
we have to wait till April? Get real. By April Saturn(and PSX as well)
will have huge libraries, and will already be in their 3rd or 4th generation
of titles. Compare that to a start-up U64 library, which looks to be very
small given N's questionable U64 exclusive policy, along with games made
by programmers who are just learning the system and it all adds up to what is
IMO a very stupid move on Nintendo's part. I know *alot* of people who were
really looking forward to the U64 this Christmas(I was also), who will be
very pissed. When people see stuff like Panzer Dragoon and Toshinden, do
you honestly expect them to wait till April for a system that for all we know
could be delayed yet again? And if Nintendo thinks they can compete with the
SNES, I'm sorry but they are out of their minds. Honestly I cannot figure out
what the heck Nintendo was thinking. They really should have pushed to get it
out by Christmas. Now they will once again be playing catch up, this time
not only to Sega but to Sony as well. Furthermore, I have a really hard time
believing the Saturn and PSX can't come very close to the U64's $250 by next
April.
Mike Reynolds
Frank Provo
I imagine it will become long.
In the first article, the author is obviously wrong in his assumption
that Nintendo is "giving" a headstart... when Nintendo has to reverse
plans for a new system rollout, you know that their reasons are very
important ones (lack of software, lack of a system, etc). You know they
aren't happy about having to release the U64 late, but as is always the
case they will persevere and let their Ad machine do its own magic for
damage control.
As for the second article... I found it to be baseless and well, simple
wrong. For the first point, Mr' Reynolds states that the Saturn and PSX
will be in their 3rd or 4th generation of titles. Sorry, but the current
crop right now is still the 1st generation, and it will still be the
first generation most likely up to or through christmas. Admittedly they
look nice, but for the most part they will be unrefined and show much
room for improvement for awhile. The 2nd generation softs (called thusly
because they are less rough, have less complaints, and more development
time) will be emerging just around the time of the U64 at the earliest
most likely.
The second point, that the Saturn and PSX will have huge software
libraries. I have 3 rebuttals to this. The first, look at the 3DO, it
has a huge software library. Having tons of software doesn't make it
good software. Secondly, I wouldn't call a game library of around 15-20
huge, which is most likely what each system will have in the US come
Christmas time. And finally, yes indeed the U64 will probably have a
small number of softs at first, but ya have to face facts... it's
Nintendo. You know that developers will develop for it, and you know
that Nintendo will do its part to put a few must have's on the system.
So it won't have many games, if one is a new Mario or Zelda, or a KI2,
that's bound to garner alot of attention.
To the third point, as in what the hell is Nintendo thinking trying to
run the SNES against the Saturn or PSX this christmas. (to paraphrase)
Hell, they are thinking wisely. First, if they can put out great games
on the SNES, some people will be glad to wait on buying a new system,
effectively postponing a purchase until the U64 is a factor. Secondly,
They then keep their SNES system alive, continue the enthusiasm for the
games, and foster alot of revenue for a longer time period than they
would have had if dumping the SNES for the U64 around Christmas. And
thirdly, the discredit factor... if they can put a good Doom and KI, and
a DKC sequel on the SNES, it will make the Saturn and PSX's jobs alot
tougher... again making them harders sells... I mean alot of people will
be thinking, "Why spend $400 for this when I can get this on my SNES" or
"SNES is $100 and has this, and it looks so good, why should I buy
that?" See what I mean... while it isn't the best plan, nor the safest,
they discredit the competition, give themselves time to produce games for
the U64, keep their 16 bit system alive for another year, and make
another huge chunk of revenue (DKC sold like 7 million... think they
can't do it again?)
And to the final point of Mr, Reynold's response, how will systems that
debut in July drop a full $100 to $150 in price over a period of 8
months? I seriously doubt such a competitive price drop will take place,
but I admit it is plausable...
Okay, to sum up I just want to say that those who think Nintendo is being
dumb are not facing reality. First and foremost they know business, and
they have the quality and reputation to back it up if they have to. To
think they won't be a major force to contend with when the 32 bit systems
debut is to delude oneself. The fact that they have the SNES competing
against Next generation machines is amazing, but you can;'t help but to
admit that they have the guns to do it.
I am by no means biased towards Nintendo (in fact I have played more Sega
in the past 6 months than any system), but I know what they are capable
of. The Saturn and PSX will not crush them, and they will weather the
late release of the U64. Oddly enough, pitting the SNES against the
Saturn this Christmas could work out in their favor.
Who's the winner in all this? We are, because Nintendo will force Sega's
hand, the Saturn will have to have softs which break new bounds and
deliver a much more enjoyable experience. (Gonna have to do better than
Daytona and VF that's for sure) The SNES will be getting 64 meg carts
with chips in them to make the games even better looking and sounding,
and the U64 will be better preparedd when it launches. In short, the
SNES lives on, Sega and Sony are forced to make higher quality software,
Nintendo will have to do miraculous things to market the U64 in April,
and we gamers can pick and choose from our method if sensory candy.
Shit, why complain? Good stuff for SNES, better stuff for Saturn, Sony's
system gets a better chance to survive, and the U64 comes out better
prepared. Hell, we can basically decide the fate of these companies, and
they know it, and the software will show it. (That rhymed)
Hell, Nintendo Company Limited may have stuck their foot in their ass one
more time, but you have to admit that NOA's backup plan covers alot of
bases as it is. Of course if it backfires they are screwed, but hey,
that's their problem, not ours :)
Frank
Frank Provo - mos...@u.washington.edu "Frank, You're a Love Machine"
http://weber.u.washington.edu/~mosaic - 2 KBVR (Corvallis) DJ's
Dustin Cushman
> jum...@ix.netcom.com (???) writes:
>
>>Bottom line fellow gamers: The Ultra 64 delay is just big "N's" way of
>>giving the little "S" a handicap head start, cuz come April that'll be
>>all she wrote for saturn. Enjoy the 4 months as much as you can!
>
based systems can do. What the hell is this nintendo cartridge based crap. They
can't posiibly hold the amount of info it takes to do what sony and sega are
doing.
Dustin--
Dustin Cushman CAUTION
Rcus...@vms1.gmu.edu NEW SIGNATURE UNDER CONSTRUCTION
George Mason University THIS AREA IS TEMPORARILY CLOSED
Christopher Mermagen
one thing about all this.. I'm not an economics major, but let's
say for the sake of argument that the U64 will come out at $250.
With it's release date now moved back to April, will this mean that
Sega and Sony can now breath a collective monetary sigh of relief
and keep the retail prices of their systems higher? just a thought
Chris
Yawng Seong Suh
Sony will try to go under $299. They probably want to capture as much of
the market share as possible to make Nintendo's life harder. In order
to capture market share they will need to keep the price down for the
consoles. Ideally, I would want for $299 a Saturn, two controllers, and
VF2. Keeping in mind that I am a VF2 freak I can't see anyone else who
would even consider paying even more than $299. I have heard of the
arguments that the next-gen systems are not catered for kids but Sega's
revenue for the future is tied to Saturn so they have to go after the
kid's whose money is limited. I think Sony and Sega will see this as a
golden opportunity instead of trying to maximize the bottom line for
the short term grace period of 6 months when the Ultra comes in at $250.
For a six month wait, I want the price to be under $200 with a pack-in(Zelda
hint hint).
--
Steve Suh
gt7...@prism.gatech.edu
Georgia Institue of Technology
nukulkij poom
>pnuk...@ux4.cso.uiuc.edu (nukulkij poom) writes:
It was posted by someone in r.g.v.nintendo or r.g.v.advocacy, not sure which.
I don't know about the reliability of the source, although if Nintendo's
gonna try and save their butts after the U64 debacle, this would be the way
to go. I actually think SNES could do a decent conversion of KI, and if this
is the case, a lot of people are going to be very happy (myself not included).
:)
Poom!
mcg...@acavax.lynchburg.edu
They are pretty reliable..
And yah, SNES could do a port of KI, the sprites would be smaller, but i'm sure
they would look pretty good.. and they sure could implement that horrible combo
system on a Snes..
As for diddykong, get some playability and technique, then talk to us.
Latrix,
-Mike
Han Lee
I don't think the delay announcement of Ultra64 would change any Sega or
Sony's plan. Because they had known all along that Nintendo was lying.
David Aldridge
In a previous posting, Han Lee (han...@crl.com) writes:
>>one thing about all this.. I'm not an economics major, but let's
>>say for the sake of argument that the U64 will come out at $250.
>>With it's release date now moved back to April, will this mean that
>>Sega and Sony can now breath a collective monetary sigh of relief
>>and keep the retail prices of their systems higher? just a thought
>
> Sony's plan. Because they had known all along that Nintendo was lying.
Let's not forget that Sega and Sony will still be competing with each
other, too. Sony knows that Sega has a huge, dedicated user base, and
Sega knows that the public knows about the edge the PlayStation has on 3D
games. A price war is still imminent, IMO.
AEB (Go UConn Huskies)
>>
>>>Bottom line fellow gamers: The Ultra 64 delay is just big "N's" way of
>>>giving the little "S" a handicap head start, cuz come April that'll be
>>>all she wrote for saturn. Enjoy the 4 months as much as you can!
a lot of money (maybe not as much) and this "little" company has earned
more in system sales and software sales last year then the "big N". Check
the Wall Street Journal Article if you don't believe me. Plus, with the
rumors of the Saturn coming out in July, I think that leaves us with
around 9 months of a head start. But hey, the Saturn will have over a
year head start in Japan. Then we'll see what kind of an effect this
head start has. And, umm, I don't think the U64 will roll over the saturn
AND PSX....hell the SNES barely got even with the genesis!
*@*@*@*@*@*@@**@@*@*@*@**@*@*@*@**@*@@@*@**@*@**@
! GQtip /
! \
! MML...@UConnVM.UConn.Edu ยบ
! \
! %% Step off the GQtip %% /
=================================================
Journeyer
>In the first article, the author is obviously wrong in his assumption
>that Nintendo is "giving" a headstart... when Nintendo has to reverse
>plans for a new system rollout, you know that their reasons are very
>important ones (lack of software, lack of a system, etc). You know they
>aren't happy about having to release the U64 late, but as is always the
>case they will persevere and let their Ad machine do its own magic for
>damage control.
>etc. etc. etc......
Frank, I couldn't agree with you more there. You hit everything right on the money.
-J-Man...
-The Journeyer-
-@-
ju...@aloha.com
***********Adventure is no more than discomfort and annoyance************
===***********recollected in the saftey of reminiscence.**************===
==============*********************@@@******************=================
+
Journeyer
>In article <3oghmn$c...@vixen.cso.uiuc.edu>, pnuk...@ux4.cso.uiuc.edu (nukulkij poom) writes:
>> jum...@ix.netcom.com (???) writes:
>>
>>>Bottom line fellow gamers: The Ultra 64 delay is just big "N's" way of
>>>giving the little "S" a handicap head start, cuz come April that'll be
>>>all she wrote for saturn. Enjoy the 4 months as much as you can!
>>
>based systems can do. What the hell is this nintendo cartridge based crap. They
>can't posiibly hold the amount of info it takes to do what sony and sega are
>doing.
You don't get what Nintendo is up to yet do you? First, they are going to make the
most powerful video game system available to everyone at the fantastic price
of around $250. Granted, a cartridge based system can't hold as much info
as a CD based one, but EVERYONE will be able to afford one! That's why
the PSX and the Saturn are going to be so expensive when they come out; its
because of the CD-ROM drives that are built into them. Sega and Sony are going to
be hard pressed to match the $250 base price of the Ultra64. And you know what?
(laugh, chuckle, laugh..) I'd bet my entire computer system (For what its worth..:) ) that
Nintendo is going to offer an add on CD-ROM system for around $200. I wouldn't
even BEGIN to doubt that. And you wanna know something else? (laugh, chuckle, laugh..)
I'd bet you my hi-fi stereo system (Again, for what its worth..;) ) that that CD-ROM drive
will be at least a QUAD!!...HA HA. At the rate the prices of quad drives are dropping,
the big N will easily be able to substitute the current double-speed standard on
video game system drives for a quad standard. Or who knows, they may even
come out with a CD machine that has writable technology.
Granted carts can't hold as much as a CD-ROM, but they're faster, easier to take
care of...and..and...well, they don't blind you when you hold them up to the light!..
There!, that showed you didn't it? :) Don't get me wrong..I would rather have
a CD-ROM system, but this is the ULTRA-64 we're talking about here!!
P.S. Yes, I do plan on buying a PSX , now that the Ultra won't be coming out until next
year. :P Time to box up your SNES's and Genesis's folks!! The 32-bit!! machines
are on their way!! YESS BAABYY!!
Douglas Palma
: In article <3oip7m$1...@cville-srv.wam.umd.edu> cme...@wam.umd.edu (Christopher Mermagen) writes:
: >
: >one thing about all this.. I'm not an economics major, but let's
: >say for the sake of argument that the U64 will come out at $250.
: >With it's release date now moved back to April, will this mean that
: >Sega and Sony can now breath a collective monetary sigh of relief
: >and keep the retail prices of their systems higher? just a thought
: >Chris
: I don't think the delay announcement of Ultra64 would change any Sega or
: Sony's plan. Because they had known all along that Nintendo was lying.
: Han Lee __