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I was rummaging in my parents' basement for some old stuff of mine when I came across an old catalog from 1995 and saw a name I have not heard in a while: the Sony PlayStation. The system was always a bit of a curiosity to me since I never bought or received one as a gift (as I was a Sega fanboy since the Genesis), and I remember Sony and Sega traded between second and third place until Sega permanently stayed in second place at the end of the 32/64-bit era. I am just wondering how Sony could have been more successful with their console.

There are various reasons why it came short of expectation but the most common ones I hear today are:

-The PlayStation lacked a mascot like Mario or Sonic (though the Saturn did not see a proper Sonic game until Yuji Naka relented on letting STI use the Nights Into Dreams engine for Sonic Xtreme) and a reputable first-party developing house. I suppose Naughty Dog's Crash Bandicoot may qualify but the majority of the people I talk to think of Crash as an intellectually-stunted copy of Sonic in the vein of Bubsy.

-Sony irritated big name developers like Konami and Capcom by insisting on that they develop only 3D games for their platform. I heard that is the reason why Konami moved development of the acclaimed Castlevania: Symphony of the Night to the Saturn, and why Capcom released Mega Man 8, Mega Man X4 and their fighting games only on the Saturn. I do remember Capcom releasing a 3D game starring an iteration of the Blue Bomber, though I think they ported it to the Ultra 64 later.

-Sega deciding to release the Saturn in September 1995 instead of May like Tom Kalinske wanted. It gave Saturn more launch titles and recognizable names despite the higher price.

-Could that modem peripheral Sega released for the Saturn in 1997 have been another reason? It did help Sega get its foot in the door in online gaming.
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