Gaming in 1995
The year 1995 marked the point where the Console Wars exploded from a heated rivalry between two companies in an all-out war thanks to the introduction of a new competitor to the ring, Sony Corporation. Taking the original plans for the SNES-CD, they released the console on September 9, a week after Sega's Saturn console. Specs on the PS1 are the same as OTL and the Saturn specs are more comparable to
@Nivek's technical specs.
Nintendo, meanwhile, stuck with the SNES-CD, not wanting to rush out the Ultra NES just to compete. The SNES was still making sales, the CD add-on brought it to its full potential and they were raking in millions from their theme park deal with Disney and the box office success of
Zelda II. Big releases of that year include
Chrono Trigger,
Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island,
Killer Instinct,
Mortal Kombat 3,
Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy Kong's Quest, and
Dragon Quest VI.
Along with that, a series of SNES and SNES-CD remakes were launched. These included
Final Fantasy Origins: I-III (remakes of the first three Final Fantasy games for the SNES-CD),
Sword of Mana (a vanilla SNES remake of the Gameboy
Final Fantasy Adventure, sold as a prequel to
Secret of Mana),
Earthbound (a remake of NES'
Mother RPG) and
Legend of Zelda I-II (released for the vanilla SNES) all hinting towards next year's releases (
Origins IV-VI,
Trials of Mana,
Earthbound 2 and
The Legend of Zelda: War of Gamelon)
For the Saturn, they launched with
Virtua Fighter,
Myst,
Daytona USA,
Panzer Dragoon,
Street Fighter: The Movie,
Castlevania: Rondo of Blood X,
Clockwork Knight,
Knuckles Chaotix, Virtua Cop,
Sega Worldwide Soccer, and
Megaman X and
X2.
PS1, meanwhile, launched with a port of
Castlevania: Rondo of Blood X, ports of
Megaman X and
X2, a port of
Street Fighter: The Movie,
Rayman,
NBA Jam Tournament Edition, Ridge Racer,
Wipeout,
Battle Arena Toshiden, and
Twisted Metal.
1995 became one of the biggest holiday seasons for gaming, with parents scrambling to get their kids either a Saturn, PS1 or one of the new SNES-CD games released that year as the three companies began to fight for the top spot. Meanwhile, Atari got utterly decimated, losing out even with the release of the Jaguar CD.