Turbo Duo...What went wrong?

[bob]

Does anybody else think that a big mistake was made when the Duo launched with all the killer apps?
To give away Bonk 1 and 2, GOT, Y's, a chip (in my case Ninja Spirit), and pre-load Bomberman really was a nail in the coffin.
One of those games, (my vote would be GOT) alone could have been packed in, but all those was just crazy.  It's hard to understand what the purpose of the Duo was in the first place.  Same tech as 4 years prior, the brand bleeding cash, and still nothing invested in localizing the games which I think ultimately posed too wide of a gap for the spoon fed "radical" generation of kids.
Also, I HATE the damn coupon book.  Too many turbo boxes hanging around out there with a cut out UPC.   

What else do you think accelerated the Duo's demise?

[SignOfZeta]

The SNES and Genesis cost $200 less. That's pretty much all that mattered.

[MrFlutterPie]

Not to mention they were true 16 bit systems with a large 3rd party support.

[nectarsis]

Not to mention they were true 16 bit systems

People STILL try and throw this around  

[Tatsujin]

Not to mention they were true 16 bit systems

People STILL try and throe this around 

ROLF. where's just that uber ultra long thread about that debate again? 

[bob]

The SNES and Genesis cost $200 less. That's pretty much all that mattered.

Honestly, I bet if Turbo was the ONLY system on the market, they still couldn't get out of their own way.

[spenoza]

Honestly, I bet if Turbo was the ONLY system on the market, they still couldn't get out of their own way.

Methinks you've caught on.

[spenoza]

Not to mention they were true 16 bit systems with a large 3rd party support.

The former means nothing. The latter is important.

[motdelbourt]

I think the Duo was actually a good idea. It eliminated any ambiguity about whether a game would work with whatever system you have, and eliminated the need to buy anything else, at least until the Arcade Card came out. It was made by and for Japan, where the PCE was successful and worth developing for. For America, it's fair to say they needn't have bothered releasing it, but at least they gave it a shot. They could have tried selling the hardware at a loss for a lot cheaper, and make it back on those games, but most of the pack in games were like "Greatest Hits" at that point, so they already made their money on those. With so many pack ins, you do have to wonder if it slowed software sales.

[kazekirifx]

Although it was probably doomed from the beginning, and they did some things wrong, I think TTi also did some things right when releasing the Duo too.

Generally the rebranding was good. Look at the packaging for the Turbo Duo vs. the TG16. The slick grey and black box of the Duo was a huge improvement over those two smiling 80's dudes on the TG16. The design of the system itself looked less like a toy than the TG16 did too. As motdelbourt pointed out, the system being able to play all available software released the confusion to the uninitiated consumer. Having built-in AV and back-up support was obviously good (though another controller port couldn't have hurt either).

The mascot change to Zonk was intended to be more 'badass' looking than Bonk, but I think overall this wasn't such a good idea. Both Sega and Nintendo had highly recognizable mascots by that point, so TTi switching at that point felt a little bit like a cop out. Zonk, a relative of Bonk, looked similar, but the similarity to Bonk made him seem all the more confusing to me. "Is Bonk still the mascot, or is this similar-looking character now replacing him?" As an early teenager at the time, I honestly didn't know what was going on. By changing the mascot, they wasted any small brand recognition they had managed to build up with Bonk up to that point. Bonk wasn't exactly a household name known even to parents like Mario and Sonic was, but he was pretty well recognized by gamers - maybe more so than the hardware was. His character was a unique and recognizable concept that I'd always thought Hudson, NEC, and TTi could have taken more advantage of.

I think I will play devil's advocate and say that giving away so many good games as pack-ins was a GOOD idea. What TTi needed to accomplish more than anything was to expand the user base for their hardware. That's why they included such an enticing array of quality games with the system - to get people to just buy it in the first place. They knew that if they couldn't do that, they were certainly even more doomed than they already were. And, by showing the customers what their new system was really capable of from the beginning they instilled an immediate love for the hardware for almost every one who bought one. Just look how many fans are still here on this board today. By contrast, sadly I'm willing to bet there were more than a few who bought a TG16 with only the pack-in game, thought Keith Courage was lame, and neglected or sold the system to focus on Sega or Nintendo's products instead. Personally, my first experience with the Turbo was renting a TG16 with Keith Courage and Blazing Lasers in 1992(?). I thought both games were pretty ho-hum. I already had an SNES at the time, and was unimpressed by the graphics and sound. I love Blazing Lasers now (and Keith Courage is not bad either), but at the time I was uninitiated into the world of shmups, and wasn't exactly blown away. Anyway, I am fortunate that I still decided to give the system another chance soon after.

And, at least not EVERY killer app was included with the Duo. If the Duo customer liked GoT and Bonk, LoT and Bonk 3 were just around the corner (though in quantities much too low in the case of Bonk 3, of course). Obviously, most Turbo fans can list plenty of other non-pack-in titles that would make their list of killer apps too. TTi was also probably hoping that establishing a user base would also lead to plenty more killer apps being produced for the system in the future. Keep in mind that they still didn't know at the time how many more potential killer apps were in the cards for the system thereafter.

[PunkCryborg]

Honestly I like it better being the underdog and obscure. It adds to the allure of the console.

[esteban]

I think I will play devil's advocate and say that giving away so many good games as pack-ins was a GOOD idea. What TTi needed to accomplish more than anything was to expand the user base for their hardware. That's why they included such an enticing array of quality games with the system - to get people to just buy it in the first place. They knew that if they couldn't do that, they were certainly even more doomed than they already were. And, by showing the customers what their new system was really capable of from the beginning they instilled an immediate love for the hardware for almost every one who bought one. Just look how many fans are still here on this board today. By contrast, sadly I'm willing to bet there were more than a few who bought a TG16 with only the pack-in game, thought Keith Courage was lame, and neglected or sold the system to focus on Sega or Nintendo's products instead. Personally, my first experience with the Turbo was renting a TG16 with Keith Courage and Blazing Lasers in 1992(?). I thought both games were pretty ho-hum. I already had an SNES at the time, and was unimpressed by the graphics and sound. I love Blazing Lasers now (and Keith Courage is not bad either), but at the time I was uninitiated into the world of shmups, and wasn't exactly blown away. Anyway, I am fortunate that I still decided to give the system another chance soon after.

And, at least not EVERY killer app was included with the Duo. If the Duo customer liked GoT and Bonk, LoT and Bonk 3 were just around the corner (though in quantities much too low in the case of Bonk 3, of course). Obviously, most Turbo fans can list plenty of other non-pack-in titles that would make their list of killer apps too. TTi was also probably hoping that establishing a user base would also lead to plenty more killer apps being produced for the system in the future. Keep in mind that they still didn't know at the time how many more potential killer apps were in the cards for the system thereafter.

Agreed. Including all those great games as a pack-in was brilliant.

[NightWolve]

The SNES and Genesis cost $200 less. That's pretty much all that mattered.

What he said.

To attribute its failure in part to "too many pack-in games" is silly... That was a way to make up for the high price relative to the other systems on the market at the time - it was no detriment, it simply just wasn't appealing enough to get past the $299 price tag... I'll use myself for an example: When TTi was shutting down in '93 and running a closeout/clearance sale, selling whatever TurboDuos were left at $99 bucks, I did what I had to do to raise the money and bought one!! Dying system, yes, but 5 games all at $99 bucks, I'm sold! Changed my life, got hooked on Ys Book I&II, went on to fan translate Ys IV:DOY and the PC versions of the series, etc. ;) But yeah, every time I saw $299 or $399 back when the CD unit came out, I'd cringe... Even as someone who had loyalty to NEC (the result of winning a TurboGrafx-16 with Keith Courage and Bloody Wolf thanks to a Chicago Sun Times contest in 1990), who had done a lot of HuCard renting, who was very interested in seeing what the CD format could do after learning about their CD console system (the first), I still, even with that history, wasn't willing to spend up to $299 - I couldn't... They should've taken the hit on hardware as was suggested.

[DragonmasterDan]

The six pack-in games was a repsonse to Sega who had priced the original add-on Sega CD at 299.99 and included six pack-in games (A 4 in 1 disc featuring Columns, Revenge of Shinobi, Golden Axe and Streets of Rage, Sol Feace and Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective). I don't think it hurt the Duo at all, if anything it was a nice incentive for people who didn't previously own NEC hardware to pick it up.

Added in edit: As far as what went wrong, the system came out at a time when video games in the United States were still largely regarded as children's toys. And at 300.00 the Duo was triple the price of a SNES or Genesis.  The platform had very little domestic third party support, and by 1992 was limited in distribution under TTI compared to when it was run by NEC. It had become relegated to a niche, and there wasn't a large enough audience to keep it afloat in the US.

[CrackTiger]

Does anybody else think that a big mistake was made when the Duo launched with all the killer apps?
To give away Bonk 1 and 2, GOT, Ys, a chip (in my case Ninja Spirit), and pre-load Bomberman really was a nail in the coffin.
One of those games, (my vote would be GOT) alone could have been packed in, but all those was just crazy.  It's hard to understand what the purpose of the Duo was in the first place.  Same tech as 4 years prior, the brand bleeding cash, and still nothing invested in localizing the games which I think ultimately posed too wide of a gap for the spoon fed "radical" generation of kids.
Also, I HATE the damn coupon book.  Too many turbo boxes hanging around out there with a cut out UPC.   

What else do you think accelerated the Duo's demise?

So are you suggesting that the pack-ins caused the Duo to fly off the shelves and the only problem was a lack of software sales in comparison to the record hardware sales, because there was nothing worth buying after the pack-ins?

But if the packed-in software was as great as you make it out to be, then wouldn't it make people interested in Lords of Thunder, Ys III, Bonk 3, Bomberman '93 and if DE was included,  -Dungeon Explorer II?

If the coupons created a nuisance for today's uber collectors, that's fine by me. I never found that it affected the gameplay of the games and I can't see how it discouraged game/hardware sales.

Not to mention they were true 16 bit systems with a large 3rd party support.

Wouldn't their inferior graphics, sound and gameplay make them look that much worse in comparison then?

[futureman2000]

I only vaguely recall the duo being released, and I was knee-deep in video game magazines back then. I think I remember seeing one on display at Toys R Us, but the fact that I already had a Genesis made a $300 console a no-go. I also remember being confused by it.  At the time, the only other console that I knew of that used two kinds of media was my Master System, and I had never even used the card slot on it.

[soop]

1) Compare the number of Japanese games to the number of Japanese games.  Then the number of games that were made by American software houses.  It's gonna be a problem.
2) The system is UGLY.  Why they felt the need to change something that totally wasn't broken, I will never understand.

I have no doubt that some people would have bought into, say the Japanese RPGs if translated, maybe enough to give it a small niche, but not enough.  And there are some OBVIOUS titles which should have been regionalised but never were, but the lack of American 3rd party support is probably the main problem.  Why THAT occurred, is another kettle of fish, which is covered elsewhere (thread: What would YOU do differently)

[turbokon]

I agreed with the price killing it. I remember every time we went to the mall, the first thing we would do was go to EB just to see and hold the turbo duo box. I would fantasize about playing the games because that was all I could afford. We wouldn't even dare asking our parent for it!!! If they would have excluded the packin games, maybe except for one, and drop the price in half,  I think it might of have a fighting chance.

[jlued686]

What killed it? It was too late. Period. I think it had less to do with price than it had to do with the fact that the Turbo brand had already lost the race in America. It was a sexy console, it had (then) cutting-edge media, and a killer pack-in deal. But, it wasn't Sega or Nintendo.

[GohanX]

I agree with jlued. By the time the Duo came out here, the Turbo was done, and the duo with the packins was kind of like a hail mary that didn't work out.  That doesn't mean I wouldn't have bought one if I had $300 at the time, but I was in high school.

[DragonmasterDan]

Yep, TTI wasn't swinging for the fences like NEC was.

They realized they were marketing the platform to a niche, while the TG16 was trying to be like the NES and have a system in as many American households as possible. The Duo was really more of a "if you are really into video games, this is the hardcore system for you" product. Not to the degree that the Neo-Geo was, but really... that's a whole different business plan.

[thesteve]

i could no more swing the $399 then the $250 for the express
the TG16 was only $35 at the time and i bought a few.

[VestCunt]

The Duo was: 1) too late, 2) too expensive.

The concept, aesthetics, and pack-ins were brilliant.

The mascot change to Zonk was intended to be more 'badass' looking than Bonk, but I think overall this wasn't such a good idea.

I think I got into this with someone else recently, but Zonk wasn't a mascot change.  He looked like Bonk, rhymed with Bonk, was advertised as "Bonk's cousin from the future" or somesuch, and relied on Bonk's name recognition.  It was nothing like Sega's changes from Opa Opa to Alex Kidd to Sonic.  While Zonk was advertised heavily and featured on the Duo box, TTI never abandoned Bonk - they were busy with two different versions of Bonk 3 and were working on Bonk 4: RPG.

They realized they were marketing the platform to a niche, while the TG16 was trying to be like the NES and have a system in as many American households as possible. The Duo was really more of a "if you are really into video games, this is the hardcore system for you" product. Not to the degree that the Neo-Geo was, but really... that's a whole different business plan.

I disagree.  The Duo was very much an attempt to remain competitive in the mainstream 16-bit wars.  While the original CD-ROM2 attachment did initially cater to high-end gamers, technology was catching up by 1992, hucards were starting to look dated, and NEC needed their Super CD games to compete with the new SNES and the upcoming Sega CD. Consumers weren't interested in an unpopular, four-year-old system, an attachment, and an upgrade card, so NEC needed a sleek, all-in-one solution.  TTI certainly hyped their fancy media and superior audio, but everyone does that - the SNES box brags about its 32k colors and the Genesis plastered "16-bit" across the deck.  As for the price, again, $300 was too much, but I can see TTI's reasoning: it played two different media formats, CD players were still expensive, and it wasn't that much more than $200 for a SNES.

i could no more swing the $399 then the $250 for the express

The CD-ROM was $399, the Duo was $299.

[CrackTiger]

I don't think that the TurboDuo or the Turbo brand died early or declined prematurely. It plateaued early on and continued on for a total lifespan of about one console generation. The Duo brand was just a continued support of the Turbo fan base. Even if the TurboDuo launched with exclusives of Super Mario, Sonic, SFII, etc, it was never going to shoot up and overtake the Genesis and SNES with a year or two.

[DragonmasterDan]

I disagree.  The Duo was very much an attempt to remain competitive in the mainstream 16-bit wars.  While the original CD-ROM2 attachment did initially cater to high-end gamers, technology was catching up by 1992, hucards were starting to look dated, and NEC needed their Super CD games to compete with the new SNES and the upcoming Sega CD. Consumers weren't interested in an unpopular, four-year-old system, an attachment, and an upgrade card, so NEC needed a sleek, all-in-one solution.  TTI certainly hyped their fancy media and superior audio, but everyone does that - the SNES box brags about its 32k colors and the Genesis plastered "16-bit" across the deck.  As for the price, again, $300 was too much, but I can see TTI's reasoning: it played two different media formats, CD players were still expensive, and it wasn't that much more than $200 for a SNES.

By Summer 1992 (months before the Duo came out in October 1992) the SNES was no longer 200.00. Both the SNES and Genesis were 99.99 with core sets. Sega dropped Sonic out of the package and offered a Genesis core system for 99.99. Nintendo dropped the second controller and Mario World and countered with a 99.99 SNES shortly thereafter.

[NightWolve]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure I bought my SNES for $99 with just Super Mario World. I don't remember ever seeing it for $199.

[DragonmasterDan]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure I bought my SNES for $99 with just Super Mario World. I don't remember ever seeing it for $199.

At launch and until June or July of 1992 it was 199.99 with Super Mario World and two controllers. After that they released a core unit with one controller for 99.99 and I believe lowered the price of the Mario World unit.

[VestCunt]

By Summer 1992 (months before the Duo came out in October 1992) the SNES was no longer 200.00.

My point is that $299 wasn't that much more than the standard set by the SNES for a new system at launch.  (The Sega CD came out right after the Duo and was also $299, without a core console).  Most likely, the Duo was fairly expensive to manufacture and TTI thought they could keep their profit margins up and justify the price by including a bunch of pack-ins, coupons, and the trade-in/rebate offer.  In hindsight, of course, they crossed the line of affordability and it didn't work, but there's no way TTI was aiming for older or high-end gamers.

TTI was trying to pry kids away from the other 16-bit consoles.  Here's proof:
 

Likewise, all of their software advertising was standard fair.  If they were trying to appeal to a niche market in anyway it would have been obvious.

At launch and until June or July of 1992 it was 199.99 with Super Mario World and two controllers. After that they released a core unit with one controller for 99.99 and I believe lowered the price of the Mario World unit.

Correct.  Mario World dropped to $130 or $150 or something.

[xcrement5x]

Was that trade in offer run by TTi?  What would they have done with a bunch of SNES and Genny consoles if everyone had started taking advantage of this?

[futureman2000]

Price points aside, there were no Turbo game rentals available in my area. That alone made buying the console a gamble, even if the price was close to a genesis/ snes.

[NightWolve]

A videostore called "Ken's World of Video" in Illinois had most of the HuCard library available for renting. Can't say I ever saw the CDs available for rent anywhere, though...

[BigusSchmuck]

Price had nothing to do with it IMHO, just think not even 3 years later the Playstation 1 came out and it had a $300 dollar price tag and it sold like crazy. Again, as many people have pointed out, if we saw half of the killer apps the Japanese were getting we all would be singing a different tune.

[NightWolve]

You can't go that far and say that price had "nothing" to do with it, but bringing up the Playstation is a good point I guess. Of course, I'm the guy that always waits around for the price drops, so I had to sit it out a few years before buying one. At this point, the TurboDuo had achieved underdog status in my eyes and I remember feeling a little jealous/surprised at how easy it was for Sony to just swoop down into the videogame market and become so successful in such a short time having watched the TurboDuo struggle. I believed in the CD format as the future as opposed to expensive carts (so I ditched N64 and stuck with Sony after years of loyalty to NES/SNES especially when I heard that Squaresoft would only develop for Sony), so why didn't the first CD console system do better? Why didn't NEC/TTi get that kind of marketing and 3rd party support that Sony got just as soon as they arrived on the scene? I suppose Sony's brand recognition had a lot to do with it, but this was their first entry into the videogame market and they handled it like experts, all the right moves right out of the batter's box!

[spenoza]

I suppose Sony's brand recognition had a lot to do with it, but this was their first entry into the videogame market and they handled it like experts, all the right moves right out of the batter's box!

They had also worked with Nintendo for a time. Sony's decision to enter the console market followed Nintendo's surprise decision to partner with Philips instead of Sony for a CD add-on (which never materialized). I doubt Sony was working with Nintendo without attempting to learn something from the experience.

[esteban]

Was that trade in offer run by TTi?  What would they have done with a bunch of SNES and Genny consoles if everyone had started taking advantage of this?

It was a very limited trade-in campaign (promoted via a couple of ads with limited audience).

Here are some of my thoughts (from eons ago): It's Like Getting 50 bucks to have fun. I won't repeat myself in this post, even though I'm tempted



This advertisement originally appeared in TurboForce #3 (which had very limited distribution, to, essentially, the Turbo-faithful)).

[Tatsujin]

lol, the old US of A trade in your old used car and get a new one for cheaper sales strategy. I think it didn't quite work as well in the video game segment.

[kazekirifx]

I can see why the price would be a limiting factor if comparing to the SNES or Genesis, but why would you compare it to those? I never saw the price as unreasonable. I was a kid at the time, but $300 seemed like the appropriate price to me. At the time, CD drives were still quite expensive to make; and I understood the hardware difference between a cartridge and CD rom system and was willing to pay a lot more for CD-rom technology.

After all, it was cheaper than buying the required TG hardware separately, or buying a Genesis and Sega CD. A combination cartridge/CD-rom unit from Sega had yet to be released, and when it was, the Sega CDX was priced at $399 (high price partly due to the compact size and portable CD player functionality). The CDX pack-in software was Sonic CD, Ecco the Dolphin, and Sega Classics Arcade Collection. JVC had also released a Genesis/Sega CD combo called X'Eye a bit earlier, and this was priced at $499.99 including only one game (Prize Fighter), and encyclopedia and karaoke discs.

Looking back, even taking inflation into consideration, I think the Duo was a steal at $299. And the included software is still the most appealing pack-in of any console ever made. If I had been an adult with a job at the time, I would have bought it on the release date. As a kid, I had to wait until Christmas and chip in my allowance to help Santa pay.

[DragonmasterDan]

I can see why the price would be a limiting factor if comparing to the SNES or Genesis, but why would you compare it to those?

You would compare it to those, because those were the primary 16-bit era game consoles. I was reasonably fortunate in that I owned all three platforms, plus eventually a Duo and Sega CD shortly after both of those released. Most kids got A Genesis or A SNES. By the time the Duo was released the core hardware, regardless of what games it came with was triple the price of the core model Genesis and SNES. That was a big problem and greatly limited its appeal to kids who had parents with greater financial resources, teenagers who had jobs and their own money to buy one, and adult hardcore gamers who were at the time a much much smaller segment of the marketplace than today.

[thesteve]

the price is definatly what kept me out of DUO, 3DO and NEO at the time.
the TG16 was cheap, and much better then is comp

[jlued686]

To expand upon the "too late" and "too expensive" thoughts, we can also look at it this way: The Duo took one product that nobody was buying (TG16) and combined it with another product nobody was buying (TGCD) and expected people to buy it...for a premium. Yes, it was "only" $100 more than the SNES (at least for a time), but it's still $100 more than the "it" item.

I'm not saying that the Duo wasn't awesome. It was. I had one right after it launched and it's still my favorite system. But I think even TTi had to have known it would be a niche product at best. I think they did a decent job with the resources they had, but there was no way the Duo was going to break out.

[DragonmasterDan]

To expand upon the "too late" and "too expensive" thoughts, we can also look at it this way: The Duo took one product that nobody was buying (TG16) and combined it with another product nobody was buying (TGCD) and expected people to buy it...for a premium. Yes, it was "only" $100 more than the SNES (at least for a time), but it's still $100 more than the "it" item.

I think we already established this. By the time the Duo came out, the SNES was 99.99 for a core model. And at most 150.00 for a model bundled with two controllers and Super Mario World. So it was 2 to 3 times as expensive depending on which bundle you bought.

[SignOfZeta]

Price had nothing to do with it IMHO, just think not even 3 years later the Playstation 1 came out and it had a $300 dollar price tag and it sold like crazy. Again, as many people have pointed out, if we saw half of the killer apps the Japanese were getting we all would be singing a different tune.

The PCE had no "killer apps" in Japan. What it had was a very diverse library of B grade titles. Unfortunately Americans in the days before FFVII were still very reluctant to read in a video game, and also had not developed the lolicon scene enough to appreciate most of these titles. Example: try selling one of those shitty WWII or Arab killer fps games to people in Saudi Arabia. They just won't want it. Another factor is that the PCE started out strong, but the popularity trickled down as the games got more otaku-based and the hardware improved. In the US the TG-16 was never successful, so asking people to pay more for a derivative of a 3/4 year old machine that nobody gave a shit about to begin with...wasn't going to work. All of those B grade RPGs and sims in Japan worked with each other to solidify a very devoted fan base. The audience got smaller, but it also became way more hardcore. We didn't have that here.

As for price...at the risk of conflicting with several hard core fans' reality distortion field, the Duo wasn't worth the money to most people. Bonk is not as technically impressive as Sonic the Hedgehog. The same can be said for Y's versus Chrono Trigger, Final Lap Twin versus Super Mario Kart, or Neutopia versus Zelda: A Link to the Past. Don't get me wrong, I actually did buy a US Duo in 1992. I loved it. I mainly bought it for the Japanese imports that none of my friends were interested in.

As for the PS being the same price three years later, well, come on. Are you just quoting wikipedia or are you only 20 years old or are you just senile? Don't you remember how much the the PS fucking AMAZED people back then? "Three years later" was post-polygon. The PS was doing nearly arcade perfect version of stuff like Ridge Racer, which was still a nearly state of the art game and a top earner at a lot of arcades. The PS was the hottest shit on the planet from the time it was launched until the DC came out 5 years later. It was the first polygon-based affordable mainstream console.* You could also buy it at a lot more places. The Duo was never anything like that. You show people the opening for Kabuki Den and they go "wow!". Then they see the game actually begin and they say, "Um...is this a NES? Why is the sprite so fucking small?" Lords to Thunder blew people's minds, but Ninja Spirit...did not.

$300 for a console you've never seen run in person was a lot. Minimum wage was $5.25/hour then. This was before everyone had a $100 monthly bill for their iPhone and the overriding lust for technology. Hell, people still paid for music back then, that's expensive. Twenty years of inflation ago...$300 meant more to teenagers then.

I love the PCE because its like a NES, but with no flicker, way more color, and endless storage capacity. The Duo was the ultimate 8 bit system, but that's all it was. I love it specifically because of that, but most people don't. People who had been playing Comic Zone, F Zero, Mortal Kombat, etc were not impressed by Exile or Parasol Stars. And its not just the big time games, its the small stuff as well. Wild Guns...Wild Guns is really beautiful. I'm sure somebody can show me an bunch of screen shots and write out some technical stuff about how Wild Guns could easily be done better on TG16, but it doesn't change the fact that it wasn't. Neither was FFVI (or FFIV, for that matter), Out of this World, Yoshi's Island, Virtua Racing, Phantasy Star IV, etc etc. I know you guys don't care about that stuff. That's why we are here. I know the SNES is "gay" or whatever, but that's irrelevant. What matters is that people won't pay twice as much for a system that appears to be half as powerful. They think Wonder Boy is fucking SHIT.

The CDROM was amazingly underutilized. It might as well have been a 1TD HD since you can only hold one microscopic portion of whats on the CD in memory at any given time and then play songs of the CD, usually really bad songs.

I just don't see how there is any way the Duo could have succeeded in 1992. American's simply weren't into that.

* Shove it up your ass, 3DO fans. Nobody wants your garage sale piece of shit system. The controller sucks and the library is terrible.

[Nazi NecroPhile]

The PCE is nothing but a slight improvement over the NES and its library is entirely second rate, eh? Go fuck yourself.

[DragonmasterDan]

The PCE had no "killer apps" in Japan. What it had was a very diverse library of B grade titles. Unfortunately Americans in the days before FFVII were still very reluctant to read in a video game, and also had not developed the lolicon scene enough to appreciate most of these titles. Example: try selling one of those shitty WWII or Arab killer fps games to people in Saudi Arabia. They just won't want it. Another factor is that the PCE started out strong, but the popularity trickled down as the games got more otaku-based and the hardware improved. In the US the TG-16 was never successful, so asking people to pay more for a derivative of a 3/4 year old machine that nobody gave a shit about to begin with...wasn't going to work. All of those B grade RPGs and sims in Japan worked with each other to solidify a very devoted fan base. The audience got smaller, but it also became way more hardcore. We didn't have that here.

A lot of the reading part has to do with the audience video games were marketed to at the time. The perception was that video games were a toy for children. And outside of the Neo-Geo  no one attempted to market at an older audience, platformers, fighters and action based games were more popular than RPGs at the time because RPGs required reading and there was a perception that grade schoolers didn't want to come home from school and homework and do more reading.

As for the PS being the same price three years later, well, come on. Are you just quoting wikipedia or are you only 20 years old or are you just senile? Don't you remember how much the the PS fucking AMAZED people back then? "Three years later" was post-polygon. The PS was doing nearly arcade perfect version of stuff like Ridge Racer, which was still a nearly state of the art game and a top earner at a lot of arcades. The PS was the hottest shit on the planet from the time it was launched until the DC came out 5 years later. It was the first polygon-based affordable mainstream console.* You could also buy it at a lot more places. The Duo was never anything like that. You show people the opening for Kabuki Den and they go "wow!". Then they see the game actually begin and they say, "Um...is this a NES? Why is the sprite so fucking small?" Lords to Thunder blew people's minds, but Ninja Spirit...did not.

Here's two other things about the Playstation, the target audience wasn't children. It was teenagers and young adults, I think when they launched the system the target audience was 18 year old males in the US. Also... the Playstation didn't sell fantastically that first holiday season, it and the Saturn were neck and neck in the US until that spring when it dropped in price to 199.99 in May 1996, that's when sales really started to rocket.

[spenoza]

Need I remind you, Zeta, that there was a time when the NES was getting long in the tooth and the SNES wasn't yet out that the PCE outsold the declining NES? Also, regardless of how well Sega's titles sold the Genesis in the US, the Mega Drive never really stood out in Japan. In the 16-bit race, the Mega Drive was 3rd place. So even without a "killer app", it appears the PCE was more than enough to take on Sega.

[VestCunt]

* Shove it up your ass, 3DO fans. Nobody wants your garage sale piece of shit system. The controller sucks and the library is terrible.

Damn.  Zeta, that was one heck of a post.

[NightWolve]

Good post, Zeta! I didn't think too much of this thread at first, it started with a faulty premise (too many pack-in games a bad thing) but it's gotten a bit interesting since.

[jeffhlewis]

My 2 cents about the Duo's demise given that I grew up during the 16-bit wars.

For full disclosure I was a Sega child but I grew up with a Master System, so I can relate to the underdog status.

1.) Zero traction at retail. My local EB Games and Babbages' relegated anything Turbo to a small aisle in the back of the store that faced away from the entrance. You had to know where it was to even know it existed.

2.) Marketing that really only existed in gaming magazines and barely any TV spots. No visibility outside of the gamer demographic.

3.) Slightly pricey for the time and a lack of any killer apps. We all know how awesome the Duo pack-in deal was, but to your average joe - they had no clue what Gate of Thunder was or why they should care.

4.) There was already a general perception that the Turbo market was dying when the Duo was released. Seemed like a last ditch effort.

5.) Similar to my early days with my SMS, I literally knew NO ONE out of all of my friends between home, activities and school that owned a Turbografx of any kind. I never even saw one in action aside from Toys R Us, which had Keith Courage on display when the system was released. Kids buy the systems their friends have, plain and simple

But hey, we might not be here talking about the PC Engine if it wasn't an underdog here in the states!

[kazekirifx]

I agree with everything Zeta said, though yes many Turbo fans won't admit it.

I can see why the price would be a limiting factor if comparing to the SNES or Genesis, but why would you compare it to those?

You would compare it to those, because those were the primary 16-bit era game consoles.

I don't think TTi ever intended to take on the SNES and Genesis (sans Sega CD) with the Duo. That's what's important to me. It was produced and priced as what I would call a 'low-end premium' system. Premium because of the exclusivity factor, and the fact that it had a CD-rom drive, which was a big deal at the time (and personally the CD audio was enough to impress me at the time), and low-end because it used the same 8-bit technology as the TG16, and was cheaper and less powerful than the Neo Geo (the high-end premium system of the time). The Duo was marketed primarily at specialty stores and through mail order, which I think was appropriate since it had no chance of succeeding as a mass produced system available at every Target and Kmart alongside the SNES and Genesis. TTi knew who its audience was, and the audience knew who they were: serious gamer adults who could afford it, and spoiled rich kids. So where did TTi go wrong? I guess there weren't quite as many serious gaming adults and spoiled rich kids out there who wanted to buy this thing as TTi had hoped.

But hey, we might not be here talking about the PC Engine if it wasn't an underdog here in the states!

And there you go. The Turbo's underdog status is almost directly responsible for getting me into purchasing import games, and ultimately leading me to learn Japanese and move to Japan. The history of the Turbo is an integral part of my life.

[BigusSchmuck]

Price had nothing to do with it IMHO, just think not even 3 years later the Playstation 1 came out and it had a $300 dollar price tag and it sold like crazy. Again, as many people have pointed out, if we saw half of the killer apps the Japanese were getting we all would be singing a different tune.

The PCE had no "killer apps" in Japan. What it had was a very diverse library of B grade titles. Unfortunately Americans in the days before FFVII were still very reluctant to read in a video game, and also had not developed the lolicon scene enough to appreciate most of these titles. Example: try selling one of those shitty WWII or Arab killer fps games to people in Saudi Arabia. They just won't want it. Another factor is that the PCE started out strong, but the popularity trickled down as the games got more otaku-based and the hardware improved. In the US the TG-16 was never successful, so asking people to pay more for a derivative of a 3/4 year old machine that nobody gave a shit about to begin with...wasn't going to work. All of those B grade RPGs and sims in Japan worked with each other to solidify a very devoted fan base. The audience got smaller, but it also became way more hardcore. We didn't have that here.

As for price...at the risk of conflicting with several hard core fans' reality distortion field, the Duo wasn't worth the money to most people. Bonk is not as technically impressive as Sonic the Hedgehog. The same can be said for Ys versus Chrono Trigger, Final Lap Twin versus Super Mario Kart, or Neutopia versus Zelda: A Link to the Past. Don't get me wrong, I actually did buy a US Duo in 1992. I loved it. I mainly bought it for the Japanese imports that none of my friends were interested in.

As for the PS being the same price three years later, well, come on. Are you just quoting wikipedia or are you only 20 years old or are you just senile? Don't you remember how much the the PS fucking AMAZED people back then? "Three years later" was post-polygon. The PS was doing nearly arcade perfect version of stuff like Ridge Racer, which was still a nearly state of the art game and a top earner at a lot of arcades. The PS was the hottest shit on the planet from the time it was launched until the DC came out 5 years later. It was the first polygon-based affordable mainstream console.* You could also buy it at a lot more places. The Duo was never anything like that. You show people the opening for Kabuki Den and they go "wow!". Then they see the game actually begin and they say, "Um...is this a NES? Why is the sprite so fucking small?" Lords to Thunder blew people's minds, but Ninja Spirit...did not.

$300 for a console you've never seen run in person was a lot. Minimum wage was $5.25/hour then. This was before everyone had a $100 monthly bill for their iPhone and the overriding lust for technology. Hell, people still paid for music back then, that's expensive. Twenty years of inflation ago...$300 meant more to teenagers then.

I love the PCE because its like a NES, but with no flicker, way more color, and endless storage capacity. The Duo was the ultimate 8 bit system, but that's all it was. I love it specifically because of that, but most people don't. People who had been playing Comic Zone, F Zero, Mortal Kombat, etc were not impressed by Exile or Parasol Stars. And its not just the big time games, its the small stuff as well. Wild Guns...Wild Guns is really beautiful. I'm sure somebody can show me an bunch of screen shots and write out some technical stuff about how Wild Guns could easily be done better on TG16, but it doesn't change the fact that it wasn't. Neither was FFVI (or FFIV, for that matter), Out of this World, Yoshi's Island, Virtua Racing, Phantasy Star IV, etc etc. I know you guys don't care about that stuff. That's why we are here. I know the SNES is "gay" or whatever, but that's irrelevant. What matters is that people won't pay twice as much for a system that appears to be half as powerful. They think Wonder Boy is fucking SHIT.

The CDROM was amazingly underutilized. It might as well have been a 1TD HD since you can only hold one microscopic portion of whats on the CD in memory at any given time and then play songs of the CD, usually really bad songs.

I just don't see how there is any way the Duo could have succeeded in 1992. American's simply weren't into that.


* Shove it up your ass, 3DO fans. Nobody wants your garage sale piece of shit system. The controller sucks and the library is terrible.

Wow dude, take a deep breath. You can't really compare YS to Chrono Trigger as they were like separated by a few years between release dates and Chrono Trigger wasn't out until mid 1995. As for all the hype surrounding the ps1, yes I do remember that and my parents made the mistake of getting one (man that playstation broke down *even called upsidaisium playstation at one point* and repaired more times than I could count) in Christmas of 95. I vaguely recall the playstation 1 sold like 100,000 units the first month it was out here in the U.S, but I could be wrong. At any rate, saying that there was no killer apps for the duo is just wrong, if we saw Ys 4 and Dracula X come out in 93 here in the U.S this discussion would be over. But who really knows for certain? There are some who say a Mortal Kombat exclusive would have saved the system (as said many times over in other posts) but releasing Street Fighter 2 Dash here in the U.S probably would have at the very least had people picking up Turbos just to play that version of that game as many kids (while I was growing up) picked up a snes just for the original Street Fighter 2. Call me crazy, but I got my Duo back in 94 just to play Ys books 1 and 2 after of course, I read a old EGM review "The Best game ever just happened" (and smirked when it was in the top 100 games a few years later) and did some serious begging/convincing to my folks that the system wasn't a sinking ship and it would last me a lifetime. 18 years later, I still enjoy it and even went as far as repairing my old Duo so now I have a Duo of working Duos!