What would you have done differently?

[guyjin]

There is a knock at your door. You answer, and are met by Doctor Who.
(Pick your favorite version.* If you don't know who Doctor Who is, Just assume it's that weird blonde mullet guy that's been done to death on YTMND. )

He tells you that he needs your help to save the world from certain destruction: Life on earth will inevetably end in nuclear holocaust - Unless the TG16 wins the US console wars.

He will take you back in time and ensure you are put in the right place at the right time at NEC - you have complete control over everything NEC does in the US from December 1987 onward.

: What do you do :


*: The correct answer is Tom Baker. Any other doctor is a compromise at best, or a blasphemy at worst.

[TurboXray]

Well... it would have to be Tom Baker or it's no deal!

[PC Gaijin]

1. Get it out the door earlier. The software selection would have been a lot smaller, but a year headstart on the Genesis would have helped.

2. Much more aggressive third party licensing. I've touched on this before, but NEC had almost no third parties the entire life of the Turbo.

3. Better Western software support. This ties into the third party situation, but what little Western software NEC funded arrrived too late (most of it arrived in 91 and 92, by which time it was over for the Turbo in the US). Better sports games in particular would have helped.

Most people will probably say marketing, but I think NEC's marketing was okay. Sure, the box art was horrible, but so was most of the box art for NES and Genesis games. The ads, both print and on TV were okay and about on par with Genesis ads, at least until Sega started the "Nintendon't" stuff. People often forget that the Genesis wasn't exactly a huge hit right out the gate either. It didn't really start taking off until 91 when Sonic arrived, and the SNES came out which really kickstarted the 16-bit era. By 92 the Turbo was pretty much done for as far as being a mainstream success. The SNES and Genesis were obviously locking up the 16-bit market, which is why I think NEC bailed and formed TTi. And TTi was nothing but niche from the beginning.

[Keranu]

I agree with PC Gaijin a lot. I didn't find the marketing a big problem with it's failure really, I just think it could've used more advertising, especially on TV. The quality of the advertising itself I thought was decent enough and personally love it.

[Digi.k]

I would have gotten the western release of the machine a lot out sooner.

although the 'black' colour change is fine I would probably have just called it 'Turbografx' and given it a better font and kept the size the same as the japanese.

I would also have pushed the cartridge size to a minimum of 8meg and tried to have pushed the size higher to maybe 32 or more if possible.. and if price was too much.. make a limited production run on HuCARD followed by general release on super CD-ROM.

I would also have stressed the importance of graphics and sound once the 'kick ass' gameplay concepts were in place. and I would probably lisence out our sound libraries and what other libraries needed.....

I would also liked to have seen more movie tie in's and more disney characters appear in their own games.

plus... more driving games in 3rd person style...

[Seldane]

I'd fire whoever drew all the cover pictures (they're all ugly; the same person must've drawn them all).  

I'd also remove the cardboard boxes, so that it would be easier to get ahold of "complete" games in the future.  

[torgo]

They needed more sports games. When I worked at EB, that's what sold systems, good sports games.

[guyjin]

Most people will probably say marketing, but I think NEC's marketing was okay.

There just wasn't nearly enough of it. I remember the Genesis in TV ads in 1990. I never, ever, saw a TV advertisement for the TG16. The only reason I knew it existed was from a sunday morning TV show on Nickelodeon that reviewed videogames(among other things) and from reading EGM/Gamepro. which is when I became infatuated

[PC Gaijin]

I must have lived in a really weird area, because not only was the Turbografx-16 sold at Wal-Mart (that's where I bought mine), Turbo games were available at rental, and the Turbo was actually advertised on TV here.   The TV stations were I saw most Turbo ads were in the Houston area BTW. Usually syndicated stations and the commercials aired in the afternoon in the time block where TV stations used to have shows aimed at kids after school (back when they still gave a damn about kids, now it's all stuff like Judge Judy and The Tyra Banks Show). The commercials were about as common as Genesis commercials were, at least in 1989-1990. NEC also (rarely) advertised on prime-time network TV. One in particular I remember is that they showed some commercials during the miniseries Stephen King's It, which was broadcast on ABC in 1990. That was actually kind of a strange choice on NEC's part, I remember being really surprised when a Turbo commercial popped up during that broadcast. You'd think they would advertise Splatterhouse during a show like that, but the commercial was mainly for Bloody Wolf.  

[guyjin]

I must have lived in a really weird area, because not only was the Turbografx-16 sold at Wal-Mart (that's where I bought mine), Turbo games were available at rental,

Really? Just the cards, or CDs too?

Also, just checking on my Galaga 90 and Cosmic Fantasy, both games have 'rental prohibited' clauses in the manual. Was this true for all US games?

incidentally, I thought that Nintendo had similarly tried to prohibit rentals years before, and was defeated in court. Why did NEC try again?

And back to the subject of advertising: I remember seeing an Infomercial  about the CD-I late one night in the early 90s. That alone was more than I ever saw about the Turbo (advertising or otherwise) on TV.

[PC Gaijin]

This place rented both HuCards and CDs. They carried pretty much the entire Turbo library up until 92 or so. They also rented out Sega Master System software, which was unusual too. And they rented out consoles, including the CD player. That was my first exposure to the CD attachment, before I was able to buy one.

I never noticed the "rental prohibited" line in the manuals before. I just checked a couple of games, both early (Legendary Axe) and late (Parasol Stars) and it's in both. Weird because I'm pretty sure Nintendo had already lost their case against Blockbuster by that time (where they were able to get BB to stop including manuals with rentals, but weren't able to stop the actual renting of software). Sticking the verbiage in there doesn't make it illegal; maybe, the lawsuit was still ongoing and NEC wanted to cover themselves either way? Everyone and their dog was renting games by that point though (hell, even supermarkets).

[GUTS]

Yeah when I was a kid there was a really cool little video store that rented TG16 and Master System games, they were the only ones in town.  Then Hollywood video came in and ran them out of business, the fat greedy fuckers.  At least hollywood rented Sega CD though, that was nice, but I missed that little shop like nobody's business.

[Keranu]

Small video stores from the 80's are the greatest and they are the best spots to check for cheesy movie hunting, if you're like me that is . I totally miss Video Circle .

[esteban]

I don't think TG-16 would have won any war, but I do think they could have been much more successful if they positioned TG-16 as a console for "niche" games:


1. NEC never exploited the shooter genre. They should have taken a page from Hudson's Caravan and Naxat's Carnival and promoted shooters via contests (in the pages of mainstream gaming magazines) and possibly held events in major cities / malls / college campuses. The key thing would be to promote the sense of community around the shooter genre and make everyone feel as if they were a part of it (so, even if folks couldn't get a high-score, they were involved in the shenanigans nonetheless). I think magazine-only campaigns would have been sufficient.

2. RPG's: Bring over more Japanese titles and port existing domestic computer titles. Tons of great PC games, like the early TSR D & D games, *might* have made a decent translation to the TG-16. Think "Eye of the Beholder", but bigger, better and more ambitious. I like EotB a lot, but it represents a starting point. As many of you know, many classic PC RPG's  appeared on the PC Engine (i.e. Wizardy), but I think that sexier titles would have been necessary to capture folks attention... (like Wasteland, which was an EA property and thus had no chance of appearing on TG16). Well, even Wasteland was dated at this point, but you get the idea...

3. Racing RPG's: Create more of them, especially for the CD/SCD format. Create a national campaign around Final Lap Twin. In time, NEC could have a monopoly on the sub-genre.

4. "Party" games: Develop the world's first 3+ player shooters (where folks can choose to play as the enemy... I imagine a "boss rush" scenario). This would simply be a bonus mode of play in addition to the normal 1-2 player mode.

5. Exploit Zonk mascot further: Zonk should have starred in a bunch of fun platformers, perhaps even sharing the stage with Bonk occasionally (through the magic of time machines). Zonk becomes a household name and soon even breakfast cereals bear his likeness...

[PC Gaijin]

I'm still trying to figure out if steve's post was in jest or not. More successful and niche seem contradictory. Some of those suggestions seem like a recipe for making the Turbo even more obscure than it was.

Funny you mention car RPGs. I've been thinking of creating a "CARPG" website to highlight some of these games. I've played a lot of them over the years for some reason. From Autoduel through more recent games like Car Battler Joe and Pro Racer Driver. Lately I've been messing around with Code R and Zero 4 Champ Doozy J Type R (now that's a mouthful!) on Saturn. Only the Japanese could mix a racing game with a dating sim. They're interesting nonetheless. Been debating whether to get Wangan Trial Love. My proposed CARPG site wouldn't be complete without it...yet, I've heard it's crap and the "Pack-In-Soft" on the front cover scares me. Is Pack-In-Soft the demon spawn of Pack-In-Video? I'm afraid to find out, even if the game is dirt cheap.

[Seldane]

They should've kept the PC___________Engine name. Yeah, with a space in there, of course.

[Keranu]

I think keeping the PC Engine name would've been a bad idea because that's the kind of name that won't stick to Americans because it's too strange. Japanese people love to combine English words like that, so it works with them but on the other side of the world, no . Some might disagree about the name they did use in America (Turbo Grafx 16), but I happen to love it and it was fitting for it's time, so it was something that Americans could get customed to.

[esteban]

I'm still trying to figure out if steve's post was in jest or not. More successful and niche seem contradictory. Some of those suggestions seem like a recipe for making the Turbo even more obscure than it was.

I like to be silly at times . But I'm serious when I tell you that I would love to see a CARPG site like the one you proposed in your post. Awesome.

[Metalslug]

Here's what I would do:

Release the pc-engine in the same shape here, but black.

Include Bonk- They needed a mascot sooner

Wait for the Genesis launch and release the TurboDuo- skip the turbo-cd

More 3rd party support and major titles like mortal kombat

More advertising

Take advantage of Japanese titles and release more of them in the USA

Sell a 32X like add on and then release the pcengineFX in the states a year later- Just kidding.

[guyjin]

I've been reading all your input, and doing a little of my own research on this subject, and I've come to the conclusion: releasing the TG16 earlier in the US would not have helped.

Nintendo didn't let its 3rd parties loose until 1990. Releasing the turbo before that is futile. It only worked for Sega because their in-house games (especially arcade games) were so popular at the time.

So, given this scenario, I would actually wait until the Supergrafx came out in Japan, and release THAT stateside as soon as possible.

This would have 3 benefits:
1) none of that 'it's only 8-bit' nonsense (not to mention the edge in specs)
2) Can release back library in 'compilations' or with SGX upgrades (more value for money in the eyes of parents vs. Genny and SNES)
3) gives Japanese developers a reason to develop for the SGX.

Also, to pre-empt the whole videogame violence controversy in '94, I would have the US SGX have a built in rating system. Parents set the rating of games that are allowed to play. This lets us get away with releasing risque titles stateside, and still look like the good guys.

Finally, I'd build in the things NEC wanted to release as accessories; the system has a 5 player tap and File cabinet built in. (the built in file cabinet would be almost a neccesity to accomodate storing the 'allowed rating' info.)

The CD system, however, would still be separate.

What do you all think? am I crazy?

[takashirose]

Wasn't the SuperGrafx "8-Bit"?  I thought it had the same PC-Engine CPU.  I really don't care about that argument anyway.  I am just in love with the Turbo Duo design.  That is what Turbo gaming was meant to be.  Too bad that if they made it in 1987 or 1988, it would have probably cost as much as a PS3 now because of the new drive.  

NEC should have released the Turbo Grafx 16 earlier.  It would have been good because the name would be recognised later on.  Look at the Xbox 360 now, but it is a different market now than before.  It would still be tough for 3-rd party support in America because of Nintendo.

[guyjin]

Was I that off-base, or has this topic just gotten boring?

[GUTS]

The should have made the system card an entire system so you had to triple stack the Turbo, System card, and CD.  That way when people saw the Sega CD only DOUBLE stacked they would assume the Turbo was better.  Plus they should have included some of that Ninja Turtles ooze or a Mad Ball since they were so popular back then, kids would have ate that up.

[Keranu]

Very good points. Hell, any kind of Ninja Turtle advertising for the Turbo alone would've made it a huge seller back then.

[Joe Redifer]

Back here in Denver, they rented following games which were unusual to see for rent:

Sega Master System
TG-16 (card and CD)
Mega Drive (from Japan)
Sega CD
3DO
32X
Super Famicom (playing Castlevania 4 before the US release was awesome)

and crap like that.

If I were in charge of the US release of the TurboGrafx, I would have gone after EA to make games.  Since I am from the future I know that they'd make lots of $$$ with John Madden Football.  I'd give them a super sweet deal to make games.  I'd also have my own in house sports games made.  And maybe, just maybe I'd let Cinemaware get away with that "TV Sports" nonsense.  I'm not a huge sports game fan, but they do sell systems.  I'd keep the system the same size as the Japanese unit and all, but I'd add an RGB out to the expansion connectors.  All video and audio connectors would plug into it.  It would kick much ass and people would be happy.  This alone would sell at least a billion units.  Oh... I'd also include the Supergrafx chipset in all US machines and demand that Japan make more games for it or I would go over and give them such a pinch!  All new PC Engines would have the SuperGrafx chipset in it as well.  Not only that, but I'd add 10 or 12 extra colors to the graphics (grafx?) chip to REALLY blow people away.  The CD-ROM would play DVDs and BluRays and HD-DVDs and all of that (I'm from the future, remember?).  Also Halo would be on the system... BEFORE the Wolfenstein 3D/Doom craze.  It would be playable online via the built in broadband adaptor.  The Halo HuCard would include an Xbox360 chipset.

I would release Shinobi in the US.  The PC Engine simply was not powerful enough to handle level 2 in the game, so it was removed.  But since I added so much power to the system, I am betting it might be able to handle that missing stage.  The world would rejoice.

[guyjin]

The should have made the system card an entire system so you had to triple stack the Turbo, System card, and CD.  That way when people saw the Sega CD only DOUBLE stacked they would assume the Turbo was better.  Plus they should have included some of that Ninja Turtles ooze or a Mad Ball since they were so popular back then, kids would have ate that up.

Are you mocking me?  

[esteban]

The should have made the system card an entire system so you had to triple stack the Turbo, System card, and CD.  That way when people saw the Sega CD only DOUBLE stacked they would assume the Turbo was better.  Plus they should have included some of that Ninja Turtles ooze or a Mad Ball since they were so popular back then, kids would have ate that up.

I can envision TG-16 commercials with "Go ninja, go ninja, GO!!!!!" blaring as the soundtrack ... so I would have liked to see Vanilla Ice as the first musician (and actor!) to officially endorse the TG-16. TMNT + Vanilla Ice = unstoppable. Oh, the millions of TG-16's that would have sold...