what would change if the saturn was on par with the ps1 in terms

>>4005710
>saturn was on par with the ps1 in terms of graphical power
graphics are not what killed the Saturn (although that certainly contributed), lack of third party support, no Sonic, and questionable corporate decisions did.

>n64 used cds
possibly quite a bit; cheaper medium means more customers in the long run. Also might have gotten Final Fantasy and some other games which would have been a huge plus. Nintendo's treatment of third parties would probably have remained though, giving the PSX an advantage.

>>4005710
>saturn
very little, Saturn's issues were nonsensical and brought on by sheer idiocy (like there being only 200 western releases despite there being 1000+ JP releases (even if we cut out all the completely unmarketable Japanese shovelware stuff, there's still hundreds of games that should have been released in the west, like Bulk Slash and a bunch of the RPGs), the early launch, etc)

It doesn't change much because sure, the Saturn was totally weaker than the PS1 visually, but not by a massive margin.
It had hardware features on VDP2 that could bring performance up dramatically in many cases, like hardware tilemapped skies and a mode 7 style ground layer instead of spending hundreds of polygons drawing a flat floor.
straight ports would almost always be worse because of quads and because of the lower fillrate on Saturn, but with a bit of optimization, it could be close

>N64
loads, Square might have stuck with Nintendo, along with other companies
hardware design would have had to change a tad, since the machine is built around loading data from cart immediately instead of grabbing it from RAM

>>4005710
Saturn was ahead of the PS1 in several areas. It failed for different reasons that your ignorance of who had better hardware (tip, it was not the ps1)

If the 64 used cd's, then we would never have had a PS2. Simple as that. The 64 was 4-5 times as powerful in so many areas there just isn't even a debate worth having.

>>4005710
>n64 used cds
Nintendo would've won, but not sure by how much. PS1 had a lot going for it besides CD and FF. Better treatment of third parties, Psygnosis, good advertisement and more adult oriented games.

>>4005719
>graphics are not what killed the Saturn (although that certainly contributed), lack of third party support, no Sonic, and questionable corporate decisions did.

Not having proper 3d graphics also killed it for a lot of devs, the hardware was simply not attractive enough.

If it was on par with the PSX in polygon power and effects, that alone would've improved third party support a lot. And if has a VDP1 as powerful as the Playstations gpu, then it could also afford to manually copy graphics to VDP2 RAM and do absurd special effects on it that looks a generation ahead of its time.

And then they wouldn't need to look high and low about doing a successor as early as 1996, which would also put more trust in the brand and increase third party support.

>>4005760
>only 200 western releases despite there being 1000+ JP releases

Majority of those were VNs and Mahjong. Outside the shmups, puzzlers, and the 2d fighters, there were like a handful of actual 3d titles and RPGs. Hell if you combined all the JP releases worth playing that got no English release, I don't think you'd get more than a hundred or two at most.

>>4005710
Saturn would've been superior to the PS1, but Sonys attractive developer deals would still make them a major player. I'd say 40/60 between Saturn and PSX.

N64 would've had shittier graphics, less open areas and texture variety, and shitload of loading time, in exchange for CD quality audio, FMVs, more voice acting, more expensive base console, but games not costing an arm and a leg. Ultimately it would've had the same popularity as before, but less quality games.

>>4005760
>the Saturn was totally weaker than the PS1 visually, but not by a massive margin.
Practically, it is weaker by a very large margin. Even though theoretically the two SH2s and SCU DSP can match or exceed PS1's GTE, in practice it's virtually impossible. You'd be lucky to get 50% out of the second SH2 or 10% out of the DSP all at once.

Also VDP1 overdraws way too much and requires too many cycles to do even basic operations so its 28 MPixel/s fill rate next to PS1's 33 MPixel/s fill rate is actually much MUCH lower than it looks in comparison.

>It had hardware features on VDP2 that could bring performance up dramatically in many cases
Mostly only in 2D games. It's virtually impossible to make good use of VDP2 in 3D games except fighters and maybe rail shooters.

>>4005710
If N64 used CDs it probably would also need a 1MB CD caching RAM. The hardware is not as cartridge dependent as people think - the console won't let you run code straight off the cartridge for instance. That quote from Factor 5 about the cartridge being like RAM is highly misleading...it's more like a mass storage device (think hard drive or fast USB stick).

CD would certainly have been doable on the console. It just would have cost more. At least $100 more.

Don't forget n64 cut CDDRIVE out to low the price too.CDDRIVE St that time was very hight price.
powerful hardware+CD = very expensive

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>>4005852
Even excluding the CD drive, the Saturn has like double (or higher) the manufacturing costs of the N64. There's a stupidly large number of components in the Saturn. So many components that even the PCB has to be specially layered to support all of them. Plus the motherboard has a fucking second level.

It's not just about power but design, and the Saturn's design is convoluted as fuck. N64's motherboard has like 3 main components + DAC and that's it.

If the N64 used CDs it would've won, at least in America.

>>4005710
saturn was superior in terms of graphical power to both systems, go home sonygger

>>4006719
>>4005867
>>4005852
>>4005820
>>4005787
>>4005781
>>4005719
>>4005710
>kids think a good CD drive in 1996 was cheap
The N64 would had cost closer to $400 instead of $200 with a proper CD drive and audio support. In order to beat the PS1 it had to have at least a 8x CD.

>>4006746
Not even in 1996 would a mass produced CD drive cost $200. It would only need to be 4X to be faster than PS1 and Saturn. Shoving 1 MB of cheap DRAM for caching and a little CD controller would have been fairly cheap too. The N64 already has the audio capabilities to handle streaming redbook (programmable DSP).

>>4006791
>Just throw the cheapest pile of shit in with static on the CD audio out
That PS1 and Saturn were $299+ at launch for a reason.

>>4006797
PS1 was $300. I contend N64 would have been the same price had it included a CD drive. The PS1 doesn't have "static" on its CD audio out (that doesn't even make sense, CD is digital, static would depend on the shittyness of a DAC ...the N64 as it stands already includes a DAC).

There's good reason to believe that the N64's hardware was cheaper to manufacture than the PS1's hardware (minus CD drive) anyway despite being newer.

>>4006801
>just throw a DAC at it!
You need to stop

And who would Nintendo use for their CD drives?
Can't use Philips
Can't use Sony.
Pretty much just have JVC left for relatively cheap but quality CD drives unless Nintendo somehow sucked Panasonic's dick.

what would change if the saturn couldn't do 3d and the ps1 could only output Magic Eye paintings and the n64 ould only handle models of mario's head

>>4006806
The N64 already has a DAC you fucking idiot. As it stands, the console can handle digital samples up to 48 KHz.

>unless Nintendo somehow sucked Panasonic's dick.
Who do you think supplied the mini DVD drive for GameCube?

>>4006815
That's years later.

>>4006806
Why couldn't they use Sony or Philips?

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>>4006850
>Why couldn't they use Sony or Philips?

Saturn was far more powerful than the PlayStation. I want generation Z posters to leave.