The Insanely Great Story of the Apple Newton

One thing to keep in mind is that of cost. For those that like numbers:

IOTL the Newton development + marketing cost roughly $500 million dollars and made perhaps $100 million net. However Apple investment in ARM (Newton's CPU supplier) eventually made them $792 million dollars[1].

ITTL Newton development will cost something like $700 million to 1996, although TTL Apple will own something like 60%[2] of ARM so they should make a lot of money off that. However the end Newton will be a lot different to OTL, and should do much better.


IOTL the combined total of Pink/Taligent/CommonPoint & Copland is somewhere (well?) north of $1000 million with no payback.

Add to that the cost of Apple's Open Collaboration Environment, QuickDraw GX & 3D, and OpenDoc and that's easily $300-500 million more still with no payback.

Add to that $400 million to buy NeXT, and 6 years and at least $1000 million to develop NeXTSTEP into OS X to version 10.3 (the first truly usable release, relative to the competition, I'd argue). Perhaps a few $100 million in payback (though, really, OS X is what gets people to buy Macs so it's made a lot more indirectly).

So around $3000 million spent (perhaps $3500 million) although the last third of that is the only reason Apple still exists as a company so that was worth it.

ITTL the cost of building Pink from 1987 to 1996 (that is, 9 years) is likely in the $2500 million range. 150% as long as OS X, and the Open Collaboration Environment, and QuickDraw GX & 3D. Further they built a new file system (none of OTL's projects did) which has to be expensive. Plus they basically took an in-progress research operating system and commercialized it which isn't cheap. And NuKernel (since OS X already had Mach) which is another hit.

Heck the next 6 years of Pink will probably cost more than OS X (i.e. more than $1000 million). The overall rate of spending on Pink will likely have to be higher than OS X (since it uses less open source software) and eventually OS X of OTL will have wound up cheaper than Pink—though I still think my Pink beats OS X.


So Pink might seem to follow a long path with everything but the kitchen sink thrown in[3], but it's roughly $500 million cheaper to start and 7 years earlier[4] which is invaluable in selling computers. Sure OS X has prettier graphics but in other respects I'd argue that TTL's Pink is far superior and the eye candy can be built in later as hardware advances.

The main thing OS X would win in is frameworks & open source use: OS X is used in the iPhone for example and TTL's Apple cannot use Pink below a personal computer level and so will have to continue to develop NewtonOS. The open source (against Pink's mostly proprietary tech) software parts of OS X will also keep OTL's OS X ongoing development cheaper than ATL's Pink.


So that's the money.



[1] If they had timed it perfectly they could have made $3300 million dollars.

[2] IOTL they eventually owned 37.4% of ARM.

[3] IOTL Pink basically closeted themselves for four years and re-developed the equivalent of QuickDraw GX, Open Collaboration Environment and so forth before being spun off to become Taligent and transforming into CommonPoint, eventually.

ITTL they basically look at the cool Apple technology of the late 80s/early 90s (that all fell apart IOTL) and incorporate it.

[4] Given that NeXTSTEP/OS X began in 1986-7 and Pink began in 1987, both OTL & ATL Macs in 2007 are running a twenty-year old OS. However Pink has a different user interface metaphor and radically better underpinnings (kernel, file system, etc…) in most areas.

Of course NeXTSTEP is released in 1990 OTL, and Pink 1996 ATL but OS X isn't until 2001 (2003 for a good version) OTL.
 
Ok. So real life and the lack of seeming interest in the timeline have slowed down updates. University and a girlfriend I could find time for this timeline, but add my shiny new Nintendo Wii to the picture equals no time left for detailed timeline postings. (Comments, perhaps, could change my mind :).)

Still sitting on the agenda is Apple up to 1996, the Newton up to 1996, and the industry up to 1996. I have the broad outlines of where I'm going already down, but the detailed in-depth thing will have to wait upon time to write it up.

Post 1996 is pretty much empty space. I have a couple interesting ideas, but nothing beyond that.


In honour of my new Wii though, I am going to cover the video game section. To some extent it's based on my posts in Nintendo keeps its deal with Sony (specifically here and here) with the caveat that Atari surviving—albeit as part of Sun Commodore—will change some things.

I am, however, interested in killing Sony as the both the PS2 & PS3 proves they suck at hardware design, and (IMO) having one dominant player each generation (Sony from 1996-2006, roughly) sucks.

So. Butterflies. They nudge the 1988 contract between Sony & Nintendo, leading to an eventual SNES Playstation add-on (4 years of higher Mac sales in Japan have presumably had some effect on the video game market) and thus I achieve something similar to that outlined in the other thread referenced above.

The post itself is up next.
 
Next Generation Magazine, Volume I, Issue #1 (January, 1995)

A Look Back: The 16-bit Generation

Welcome to NextGen's special report on the 16-bit generation. As February's issue will contain a detailed look at the 32-bit consoles and their launch games, we thought that this issue—our very first issue—should give a brief overview of the our current generation. From the heady days of 1988's pair of new consoles to the 1990 interim struggle, to Nintendo's hammer in 1991; we look at the ups and downs of the 16-bit generation.

In North America it all begin in August of 1988. That month saw the limited launches of NEC's TurboGrafx-16 and the Sega Genesis. To be sure the TurboGrafx-16 really used a pair of 8-bit processors, a legacy that would handicap its performance, but we still consider it a 16-bit/fourth generation console. They launched in the shadow of the still formidable Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) and both faced rough going at first. Commodore's Atari Jaguar followed in July of 1990, and the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) was released on September 1st, 1991. With that, the fourth generation line-up was complete.

(Of the add-ons the TurboGrafx-CD was released in 1990 and the TurboDuo—the combination of the CD add-on and the regular console—in 1992. The Nintendo Play Station CD-ROM add-on was released in alongside the console in 1991 in North America, and early 1991 in Japan. Of note is the cancelled Sega add-on: the Sega CD[1] aborted in early 1992 as the failure of both the TurboGrafx-CD and the Nintendo Play Station became clear.)


NEC TurboGrafx-16/CD/Duo
Although NEC's TurboGrafx-16 had been first on the scene in both Japan—where it is known as the PC Engine—and North America it faced slow sales outside of Japan. In large measure this was because of Nintendo, exerting their influence to prevent important Japanese developers such as Namco, Konami, and Capcom from releasing their games on non-Nintendo consoles outside of Japan. This mean that while in Japan the TurboGrafx-16 had games from Japanese developers, it lacked them in North America until 1992 as the Sega Genesis's strong sales compelled Japanese developers to move games to the Genesis. Of course, by 1992, the TurboGrafx-16 was a weak fourth in North America and it was too late.

On launch the TurboGrafx-16 was also competing against the sheer dominance of the NES, still going strong in its waning days, and when combined with poor marketing and distribution outside major cities it was simply unable to do well.

The sales of the TurboGrafx-16 were not good outside of Japan, and it is was considered a failure—having been beaten by the Sega Genesis before the SNES even arrived on the scene. It is important to remember, however, that the TurboGrafx-16/CD did achieve a narrow second place victory in Japan.

The TurboGrafx-CD is widely seen as both a successful platform in Japan with a number of historic RPGs like Ys Books I + II and Lunar, and as having some of the worst Full Motion Video (FMV) games ever made. Looking back it seems clear that the TurboGrafx-CD and the Nintendo Play Station (hopefully) saved the fifth generation systems from a wave of horrible games by people unused to the format. The CD-ROM add-ons were the training ground, so to speak, for the 32-bit consoles.

Did NEC learn any lessons? Perhaps, they've decided to partner with other companies for the next round.

Nearly ten million TurboGrafx-16's have been sold in North America and Japan, along with around four million TurboGrafx-CDs (the vast majority in Japan) and under a million TurboDuos. They still some in Japan, but it's off the market elsewhere.


Sega Genesis
The Sega Genesis, though, is that of the true success story. Released around the same time as the TurboGrafx-16 in North America strong marketing combined with breakout games like Sonic The Hedgehog propelled the system to the lead in both North America and Europe (it continues to trail the TurboGrafx-16/CD in Japan). Although the arrival of the SNES changed the market, as did the Atari Jaguar, the Genesis continued to do very well.

Of note is the lessons Sega learned from this era. The anti-competitive behaviour of Nintendo—as they used the NES's dominant marketshare to control third-party developers—brought Sega to realization that they needed developers, no matter what. The fracturing brought about by Nintendo Play Station and TurboGrafx-16 convinced them that add-ons were foolhardy.

For lessons learned witness both the easy to develop for design of their forthcoming new console, and their several launch games in North America from Japanese developers. Couple that with the cancellation of the completed Sega CD in 1991 and it appears Sega has done an excellent job of learning their lessons from the 16-bit generation, which could bode well for them in the upcoming 32-bit console war.

Roughly twenty-five million Genesis's have been sold worldwide, primarily in North America, Europe, and Brazil and they continue to sell decently.


Atari Jaguar
The Atari Jaguar was a rush job. With the failure of the Atari 7800 the company had considered exiting the console market. However the Atari-Commodore merger brought a new outlook to the company, and so Jaguar was hastily launched (essentially a rapidly reworked computer) along with the Amiga—able to play Jaguar games—and the Amiga Jaguar add-on for their more upscale computers.

The Jaguar was probably the best looking of the fourth generation consoles. Its half-size cube shape resembled the NextCube a great deal, and looked much nicer than any competing console. It looked, interestingly, the least like a toy and, oddly, quite a bit better than its companion Amiga computer. Anecdotally I can say that a number of the people I know who bought one got it simply because it didn't look like a toy.

The Jaguar did decently in North America and Europe (and was never offered in Japan). The fact that their third place finish, well behind the Sega Genesis in North America and SNES in Europe, was considered good while similar overall sales for the TurboGrafx-16 was considered poor is for two main reasons: the Jaguar continued to sell decently in later years while the TurboGrafx-16 didn't (outside of Japan), and the Jaguar launched two years later and had generally poorer game support than the others.

The main problem the Jaguar faced, like the Sega Genesis, was that of games. Sega, at least, had a robust first-party development group on par with other Japanese software developers like Namco and Konami, though behind Nintendo. Therefore the Atari Jaguar relied heavily on the American Electronic Arts, as well as the fairly large computer game developer community that had previously made games for the Atari ST, the Atari XE & 2600s, the Commodore Amiga, and—especially—the Commodore 64.

To be sure Atari had done many things to make third-party developers wary but Commodore did its best to make up for this, and when Sun bought Commodore the situation improved further. Like Sega Atari has been working hard to get Japanese developers on board for the upcoming 32-bit generation.

Has Atari learned their lesson? Certainly the relative weakening of Nintendo means they can get Japanese games, but it's still an American system in third place that was twenty million units behind the second place finisher. Sun Commodore, Atari's parent company, is taking a new approach. They've formed 4DO, an umbrella group consisting of Sun Commodore, Sony, Panasonic, and NEC; all using the Atari brand. Each of the four companies is making hardware and games, and they're splitting the proceeds of software licensing from third parties.

Around ten million Atari Jaguar's have been sold in North America and Europe and sales are rapidly slowing in anticipation of the new Atari console.


Super Nintendo
Now we come to the Super Nintendo. It's hard to see it as anything but a success with a massive first place victory in Japan, a slight but expanding first place pin North America, and a decent second in Europe, but in some ways it was a failure. Most of that can be attributed to the Nintendo Play Station.

The Super Famicom launched in Japan in 1990 and the CD-ROM add-on followed in early 1991. Rapidly the development base fractured but it took until early 1993 before Nintendo realized the problems presented by having two development platforms with one's sales (the Play Station, of course) dropping rapidly forcing developers to switch back to the regular Super Famicom.

The Super Nintendo launched in 1991 in the United States, with the Play Station also available at launch, and games for both. For an entire year Nintendo sold them side-by-side with consumer confusion and a weird mix of games between them. Finally by 1993 Nintendo faded out the Play Station—although this angered developers who had liked the CD-ROM and had been used to it since they also made TurboGrafx-CD games—and used their Japanese developer exclusives (outside Japan) to rapidly increase sales. It took them until the middle of 1993 to match the Genesis's North American sales, and they have only conclusively pulled ahead now—Christmas 1994. They have won a slight, but not conclusive, victory in North America but given that they still have games like Donkey Kong Country coming out and a massive install base it seems clear they will outpace the Genesis in the home stretch.

Has Nintendo learned their lesson? Certainly they won't be making an add-on for their upcoming console, but unlike the competition they aren't using CD-ROMs for it, either. Their attitude to developers has probably improved, but will developers prefer CDs to disks?

The Nintendo Play Station sold roughly five million units, mostly in Japan, and the SNES has racked up forty million so far in worldwide sales. Like the Genesis the SNES continues to move units, although the arrival of multiple new consoles through 1995 and 1996 should slow down SNES sales.


Handhelds
The handheld market is simpler. The Nintendo Gameboy has roughly 90% of the market and the Atari Lynx, the Sega Game Gear, and the NEC TurboExpress fought over the remainder.


Outcome
All in all the SNES won, the Genesis did good, and the Atari Jaguar did good—on meagre expectations. The TurboGrafx-16/CD/Duo lost, badly, except in Japan where they did quite well. However doing well in one market is simply not enough, it seems clear you need at least two good markets.

In retrospect the SNES Play Station was the deciding factor in hurting Nintendo. Although the TurboGrafx-CD had helped NEC in Japan, it hurt them outside Japan. The Play Station, on the other hand, hurt Nintendo everywhere—though some of that was fallout from their abrupt yanking of support for it.

Sega in not launching a CD add-on was spared a great deal of trouble, and it's certain developers appreciated that given their support for Sega's new console.

The Atari Jaguar was too little, too late; but nevertheless did pretty well. The obvious focus on games (even if they lack Japanese developers) for the new Atari console speaks to the problems they had this generation.

The new Nintendo console will eschew CDs, almost certainly because of their bad experience with the Play Station. But, given Sega and Atari's use of CDs, is that the right move? Will the Play Station continue to haunt Nintendo? Certainly they are working to repair damaged developer relations and didn't go so far as to use cartridges for their next console, but will it be enough?

More on everything next issue.



Next Generation Magazine, Volume I, Issue #2 (January, 1995)

32-bit Videogame Report: A Look Around, A Look Ahead

Welcome to NextGen's special report on the 32-bit/fifth generation consoles. It's the beginning of 1995 and two 32-bit consoles are launching this year, with another coming out next year. We're excited to talk about the systems, their current game line-up and upcoming games, and of course their prospects in the marketplace. If you didn't read last issue that was our coverage of the history of the 16-bit consoles so as to provide some background on this generation. We'll wait well you read that issue… done? Ok, now we'll jump straight into our coverage.


Atari Panther

The sleek black or white Atari Panther[2] is, like last generation, the best looking console in the field and, interestingly, there are four different console hardware versions to be had.

Unlike last generation and unlike their competitors the Atari name is now a virtual name, used as a console gaming brand by the 4DO group. The 4DO group is an alliance of four major companies, Sun Commodore and their newly renamed Amiga games division (formerly Atari, of course), NEC, Sony, and Panasonic. Essentially the losers of the last round (NEC's PC Engine/TurboGrafx-16/CD/TurboDuo, Sony's Play Station add-on for the Super Nintendo, and Sun Commodore's Atari Jaguar) plus Panasonic have joined forces.

All four companies will contribute first party games, will manufacture hardware, and will pay advertising costs evenly between them to the 4DO group. In return they will split the proceeds of third party licensing and anything they make or lose off of the hardware is their own deal—as long as they meet certain agreed upon standards like price in the market and quality. It's an attempt to bring more computer style licensing to the console world, and whether it succeeds or fails it is very interesting.

In Japan NEC, Sony, and Matsushita (Panasonic) all make the Engine FX (as the Panther is known in Japan, to leverage NEC's PC Engine brand) with NEC's model upright like a PC proper in white, Sony's version sideways in white, and Panasonic's version sideways in black. In the rest of the world Sony, Panasonic, and Amiga (Sun Commodore's games division) all make fairly similar looking sideways models with Sony's in white and the others in black—though the Panasonic model is top loading for the CD-ROM drive and the others are slot loading.

The console, regardless of who makes it, is named the Atari Panther (Engine FX in Japan). On the side of the unit is the name of the company who makes it (Amiga, Sony, Panasonic/Matsushita, NEC) along with the 4DO logo: Sony 4DO, for example.

Additionally Sun Commodore makes the Amiga Panther PC, an add-on part for Reference Consortium (NextStep operating system) computers (although some come with the ability built in), allowing them to play Atari Jaguar games. This is similar to the Amiga Jaguar add-on/built-in part made for the previous generation of Commodore computers.

Ok, but what about the processing hardware? Like Reference Consortium computers the Atari Jaguar uses SparcLite processors, two of them actually, running at 28 MHz each. Combined with video, math, and audio coprocessors that makes up the main board. It has 2MB of RAM, 1MB of VRAM, and 512KB of audio RAM. Although dual CPUs make it harder to program for, there are a number of benefits in performance and the 4DO group has done its best to provide both documentation and tools to make dual CPU programming as easy as possible.

The Atari Panther was intended to be released in the fall of 1994 to get a jump on its competitors, but delays (read: lack of games) pushed it back to the spring of 1995 in North America and so we're all waiting to play the official unit. Of course we've played the pre-release versions (and reports about its games are in both this and last issue) and we can tell you a bit.

We like the controller[3]. We don't love it, but we like it. It has four coloured face buttons and a d-pad, along with your standard shoulder buttons and a pause button. It has an interesting shape, and fits fine in our hands. The d-pad is a little mushy though that could be fixed by the time of release. The main weakness is no analog stick, though they'll almost certainly have to release a new controller at some point.

We love the looks of the console. Different, modern, sleek, glossy; the adjectives go on. It's just a great looking piece of hardware. You can argue over white or black, tray or top, and even sideways or upright (if you're in Japan), but overall the Atari Panther just looks fantastic.

Our brief thoughts on games are below, but we'll tell you the main weakness of the Atari Panther upfront: Little Japanese game support yet. It should come if the console is a success, but only a couple Japanese developers are currently making games for it.

Launch/Near Launch Games

Need For Speed is a great looking racing game also being developed for NextStep, MacOS, and Windows. It has a physics engine, cop cars, and realistic audio along with video clips and magazine style descriptions of the cars. It's a lot of fun with close attention to detail, solid gameplay, and great course design. We'd say the main downside is the graphics which are simply not very good.

Alone in the Dark I+II is a combination and update of 1992 and 1994 PC games ported to the Atari Panther. You assume the role of a private detective investigating an apparent suicide and is a combination of puzzle solving and combat against various paranormal monsters. The first is a great PC game and second is mediocre, but the second is also rumoured to have been heavily updated for the console version.

Star Control II is a mix of ship-to-ship space combat, and a grand adventure game covering an interesting and detailed story as you explore the universe, contact alien races, and gather resources to keep fighting. The PC version was excellent, and the Atari Panther version has updated graphics and enhanced multimedia presentation.

Tempest 2000 is a tube shooter with very finely tuned gameplay and a fantastic techno soundtrack. It's hard to describe, but for fans of shooters is absolutely worth checking out.

Pulstar is another shooter, this time a more traditional side-scrolling kind and is an excellent arcade port. If you like shooters, this one is a must-try with an interesting focus on strategy instead of just blasting everything in sight.

Alien vs Predator is much like the classic Wolfenstein 3D and is an engaging and solid first-person shooter—if you like them, you'll like this one. Graphically it looks a great deal like the movie—allowing for the limitations of technology—and the ability to play through the game from three separate characters (Alien, Predator, Space Marine) makes for very interesting gameplay.

Maybe our favourite game of the launch bunch is Return Fire. Helicopters, tanks, APCs, and jeeps in a multiplayer free-for-all. Tons of fun with friends the basic premise is capture the flag with vehicles and explosions galore.

Samurai Shodown is the Atari Panther's 2D fighting game (sorry 3D fans, you'll have to try the other consoles for a 3D fighting game at the moment) and—being from Neo Geo—is a stand-out entry in that field.

EA Sports is the full roster, but all seem rushed. Nevertheless sports fans will like the graphical upgrades.

Upcoming Games to look forward to
  • Immercenary: A combination computer role playing game and first person shooter.
  • Super Street Fighter II Turbo: A better-than-arcade quality version.
  • Gex: A gecko platform game. Like Rayman on the Jupiter just a very solid, very fun standard platform game.
  • Jurassic Park Interactive: A strategy based action game based on the Jurassic Park movie.
  • Twisted Metal: A multiplayer demolition derby with projectiles.
  • Warhawk: A futuristic arcade-style flight-combat game
  • D: Survival horror brilliance.
  • Castlevania: Symphony of the Night: A direct sequel to a PC Engine game, somehow 4DO has managed to get ahold of it as an exclusive for a few months.

The Atari Panther launches April 2nd in North America, July 2nd in Europe and Australia, and November 2nd in Japan. We don't know exact dates for other regions, but expect them to follow when they line up distribution and sometimes translated games. They have a pretty tight looking 3 months to each region launch window, but we don't know know if they can meet it.

Price? $399. Ouch.


Sega Jupiter

Solid black is the first impression that comes to mind when you view the Jupiter[4]. The various Asian models differ a little (Samsung in South Korea, Hitachi, JVC, and Sega in Japan) but the Sega model outside of Japan is the same solid black console. It doesn't have the sleek good looks of the Atari Panther, but offers a much more substantial looking experience.

Sega makes most of the consoles, although some will be made by their hardware partners mentioned above, unlike the Atari Panther. All designs are currently top-loading for the CD-ROM drive, but that could of course change.

The console uses a single CPU, running at 40 MHz, which incorporates a math engine for 3D games, along with video and audio coprocessors. Therefore it's much simpler to design for than Atari Panther with 1 CPU versus 2, and the math coprocessor incorporated as part of the CPU instead of separate. Overall performance is likely lower than the Atari Panther, but easier to get. It has 2MB of RAM, 1.5 MB of VRAM, and 512KB of audio RAM. The additional VRAM over the Atari Panther likely makes for better looking 2D games/background though which should prove popular with certain kinds of games such as RPGs arcade games, and 2D fighters.

The controller is great[5]. It has an analog stick, a d-pad, six face buttons, two shoulder buttons, a start button, is large and round, and feels good in the hand. The analog stick is for 3D games, and we like it a lot. Perhaps the best aspect, though, is that the shoulder buttons are really analog triggers, great for racing games at least.

The console itself is black and solid with good quality plastic. Unremarkable, perhaps, but it feels and looks both durable and long lasting. We like it.

Launch/Near Launch Games

Sonic Blast is the best Sonic game ever made. Everything great about Sonics 1-3 & Knuckles has been made even better. The game is just as fast with fantastic 3D backgrounds and characters and long interesting and challenging levels. Unlike Super Mario 3D it's not in true roaming 3D, but it looks great and plays great and is a fitting end to what is likely the last side-scrolling Sonic game.

Virtua Fighter. A 3D fighting game? Amazing. If you like fighting games, buy this one.

Virtua Cop. It's like the arcade version, but better. Basically your standard light gun game, but well done and the multiplayer makes it a fun title when you have friends over.

Eternal Champions 2: Challenge From The Dark Side. Sure it's another fighter, but it's one of the best you'll ever play. A sequel to the equally great Sega Genesis game.

Sega Rally Championship is a game that we can highly recommend if you like racing games in any fashion, with superb graphics to boot.

Blackthorne resembles Super Metroid the most and although cannot compare to that classic, certainly beats out all the other imitators. Sure it's a SNES remake, but with all new graphics we can forgive Blizzard.

NBA Jam Tournament Edition is a frenetic and fun basketball game from the arcade that looks and plays great on the Jupiter. If you like basketball, or sports games, this one is more than worth a play.'

NHL All Star Hockey is a solid and unassuming hockey game, but since EA's plethora of sport titles won't be at launch this will have to tide you over.

Rayman is your ordinary platform game, but it's a fun and well made one with a great soundtrack.

Panzer Dragoon is an on-the-rails shooter, but with dragons. Tremendous fun

Upcoming Games to look forward to
  • NiGHTS Into Dreams: We've only heard bits and pieces about this game, but what we've heard we love.
  • Sonic Adventure: That 3D Sonic game you've all been waiting for, but Super Mario 3D is sure to beat it to market.
  • Panzer Dragoon 2: More dragons breathing fire on stuff, NextGen fails to see how this could be bad.
  • Virtua Fighter 2: Like the first one, but better.
  • Sega Worldwide Soccer '97: Soccer done right, from what we see.
  • EA Sports: The full selection is coming, and should look better than the Panther versions given the extra development time.
  • Tomb Raider: Third person action-adventure game is a lot of fun.
  • RPGs: Sure, we're not being specific, but there are a lot of great looking and playing RPGs coming up for the console.

The Jupiter launches the May 15th in Japan, September 2nd in North America and Europe, and spring 1996 in Australia, Brazil, and other regions.

Price? Again, $399. Again, ouch.


Ultra Nintendo

Curvy. The first thing you think of when you look at the Ultra Nintendo[6] is curves. There are a of lot curves. The console itself is a smoky grey made of plastic with a wide front tapering somewhat towards the back, albeit with curves.

In Japan the Ultra Nintendo will follow tradition and be the Ultra Famicom, making the Sega Jupiter the only console with the same name all over the world.

The console[7] uses a single CPU, running at 70-90 MHz, along with graphics and audio coprocessors. Note the graphics coprocessor, unlike the video coprocessors on the other two consoles (which cover 2D graphics) it handles both 2D and 3D graphics and runs at 50-60 MHz. This allows it to incorporate the math processor that the Panther has separate and the Jupiter makes part of the CPUs and as such free the CPU from some work. Unlike the other two systems it uses a unified memory pool of 4MB of RAM. The main advantage is flexibility (as the Jupiter has a comparable amount of memory).

The other main difference is that the Ultra Nintendo does not use CD-ROM technology. Instead it uses magnetic disk technology, specifically that used by Zip drives. Disks start out holding 100MB (versus 650MB for CDs) but eventually scale up to 750MB. Two key advantages, to compensate for their smaller initial storage, are that they have cartridge like loading times and are rewritable allowing dynamic worlds for games. However they are more expensive to make than CDs (though much cheaper than cartridges), but do have similar lead times for gearing up to make more unlike the several weeks cartridges take to be made. Not using CD-ROMs is an interesting move, but it is very unclear whether it will work out for them.

The controller is very good[8]. It has an analog stick and a d-pad, four face buttons, two shoulder buttons, a trigger button, and a start button. One less than the Jupiter controller, one more than the Panther controller. It seems, at this point, that the Panther controller is going to need a redesign for one or two more buttons and an analog stick. The most interesting thing about the controller (now that Sega copied the analog stick) is the rumble function; the controller contains a small motor that vibrates the controller when things happen in-game. We like it.

The console itself is perhaps the boldest stylistically against the minimalism of the Panther, and the solidness of the Jupiter, in smoky grey and curves. Of course, and this is important, the Ultra NIntendo is the only console with four controller ports. It looks like multiplayer games are coming to the console fast and hard.

Launch/Near Launch Games

Super Mario 3D. This may be the best game ever made. Although Sonic Blast is an excellent Sonic platforming game transformed into 3D, Super Mario 3D is an excellent platforming game rethought from the ground up for 3D. You have to play it to believe it.

Mario Kart Ultra. Imagine four people all racing around the track in 3D fling multi-red shells at each other, blue kill the leader shells, and bunches of banana's scattering the tracks.

Star Wars: Shadow of the Empire takes place during the Star Wars trilogy and features racing, space combat, and action-adventure in 3D. It's a lot of fun, though sometimes awkward, and—most importantly—it feels like Star Wars.

Pilotwings is a hard game to explain. Basically you're just flying around doing things. It's fun and weird, and gives us hope for a Kid Icarus sequel. You listening, Nintendo?

Ridge Racer is one of the best racing games we've ever played, and looks like a real showcase for the Ultra Nintendo's graphics.

Tekken is the fighting game. It looks a lot like Virtua Fighter but plays quite differently. As both are in arcades we already have Tekken Vs. Virtua Fighter groups lined up against each other, with the 2D fighter crowd mocking both of them. Speaking of 2D fighters, none are on the Ultra Nintendo yet.

Upcoming Games to look forward to
  • Zelda: We have no idea when it will be out, but we're all eagerly awaiting 3D Zelda.
  • Final Fantasy VII: Again, no idea when it will come out but Final Fantasy in 3D is something to look forward to.
  • Earthbound 2: A sequel to the weirdest RPG ever made? We're sold.
  • Metal Gear Solid: 3D Metal Gear stealth game. Amazing.
  • Resident Evil: It goes up against Alone In The Dark and D, but looks like it might be even better.
  • Disruptor: On a quest for sleeper hit of the year this is a great looking first person shooter.

The Ultra Nintendo isn't coming out until the spring of 1996 in Japan, and summer in North America and Europe. Well behind the other consoles, to be sure.

Price? Unknown. We're guessing $299, if only because the Atari Jaguar and Sega Jupiter should be down to that price by the time Ultra Nintendo comes out.


Market Outlook

All three consoles have strengths and weaknesses. The Atari Panther is first with some good games, though lacking in Japanese games and RPGs, but has to compete with the waning days of the Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo both still intent on a last couple of games to buy them time until their own console launch. The other knock is that it's not really a Japanese system, but hopefully Sony/NEC/Panasonic will help on that front.

The Sega Jupiter is probably the best rounded of the three systems and in all honesty the only weakness besides price may be, quite simply, the lack of anything that measures up to Super Mario 3D.

The Ultra Nintendo is something of a gamble. Not using CD-ROMs and a late launch could kill it, but we're confident Nintendo can pull it out. To do so they'll have the brilliant multiplayer Mario Kart Ultra combined with the revolutionary Super Mario 3D. However developers aren't entirely happy with Nintendo, which explains Sega's great line-up, and EA Sports has their hands full with the Panther/Jupiter at the moment leaving the Ultra with no sports titles aside from racing.


We don't really make predictions, but it's hard to see a winner. The Atari Panther should do at least PC Engine numbers in Japan, and pretty good in North America & Europe. However we still see it coming in third everywhere.

The Sega Jupiter will likely be first or second in all three major markets and the Ultra Nintendo will also likely be first or second in all three major markets.

One area where the Ultra Nintendo has weakness is RPGs. Yes Earthbound 2, Final Fantasy VII, and Zelda are a strong line-up but it looks like the Sega Jupiter will have much more breadth of RPGs—at least in the first year or two. This may give the Jupiter a chance to pull ahead in Japan.





[1] Not OTL Sega CD, but rather the proposed Sega CD that added a decent performance boost something like the Sega 32X of OTL.

[2] Think OTL 3DO crossed with ATL Atari Jaguar, which was kinda like a squashed ATL NextCube which resembled the OTL NeXTcube. Add the 3DO's four pillar things to rectangle like main frame. Some differences exist (colour, tray or top-loading, little details) but the only real exception is the NEC version, which is a regular slab upright like a PC (albeit with design cues from the regular sideways positioned models).

[3] The Atari Jaguar controller looked like the OTL Jaguar controller minus those bottom buttons. The Atari Panther controller looks a lot like OTL Commodore Amiga CD32 controller. No analog stick, though, which they'll have to add.

[4] A much better designed version of the OTL Saturn although the outside look is similar. In OTL Saturn was for the CD-ROM version, Jupiter for the cartridge version. ITTL that's switched, but as with OTL they go with the CD-ROM version.

[5] OTL Saturn 3D/Nights controller minus the selector switch.

[6] A lot like OTL Nintendo 64, except that the cartridge and bottom expansion slots are gone, and the four controller ports are split: two to each side of the disk drive in the middle. Oh, and like the Atari Panther and Sega Jupiter the memory card plugs into a slot on the console: in this case four slots arranged above the corresponding controller ports on the top of the system.

[7] The Ultra Nintendo, as it uses disks instead of cartridges, will not suffer from the blurry texture limitations of the N64. Furthermore a proper audio chip and better RAM mean the system overall will be much easier to program for, and produce better looking graphics (though the N64 likely has theoretically better graphics).

[8] Chop off the middle prong and move the analog stick and z-button to the far left prong and decrease overall width. Also remove the expansion slot as rumble is built-in and memory cards go in the console. (A little like the Virtual Boy controller, except analog/d-pad on the left, four face buttons on the right—plus z-trigger and shoulder buttons.)
 
Last edited:

giroton

Banned
It would be a good developemtn in technonlgy but it would have to be sunsequently released with newer version inm order to beat the compettiors.
 
It would be a good developemtn in technonlgy but it would have to be sunsequently released with newer version inm order to beat the compettiors.

The Newton?

Anyway, absolutely. The original Newton was groundbreaking but Apple failed to exploit it. They didn't make a smaller model, they didn't make a built-in cellular 'smartphone' model, they didn't scale up to tablet size.

ITTL the Newton is going to far later than OTL and thus some PDA-like things are going to be on the market already, but in terms of handwriting, software, and hardware the ATL Newton will (like OTL Newton except for the handwriting) be in a class of its own.
 
I just finished reading this TL (Thanks for bumping, Constantinople!) and I really liked it! I'm sorry i don't know enough to give you feedback on the techincal stuff.

Most of it read believable to me, like the way things could have, maybe should have, happened. Except for post #40, the part under Macworld San Francisco, January 1996. Is that all part of Apple Confidential 2.0? It's a rather disconcerting change in tone and content from the above timeline; so if it is part of the same book, well even if not, it needs some sort of brief explanation/introduction. It kind of ambushed me, and it took me a little whille to get what was going on. Also, it doesn't quite read like a speech (that is what it's supposed to be?), it's too conversational in tone, a bit rambling. IMHO, a good speaker would be more focused, so as to keep his audience's attention.

Anyway, enjoyable. Too bad there's no more.

P.S. One of my first thoughts was to wonder if a larger Newton would become a PowerBook replacement.
 
Except for post #40, the part under Macworld San Francisco, January 1996. Is that all part of Apple Confidential 2.0? It's a rather disconcerting change in tone and content from the above timeline; so if it is part of the same book, well even if not, it needs some sort of brief explanation/introduction. It kind of ambushed me, and it took me a little whille to get what was going on. Also, it doesn't quite read like a speech (that is what it's supposed to be?), it's too conversational in tone, a bit rambling. IMHO, a good speaker would be more focused, so as to keep his audience's attention.

I was trying something different.


P.S. One of my first thoughts was to wonder if a larger Newton would become a PowerBook replacement.

Nah, the regular Mac OS would probably remain a lot more viable than the NewtonOS for a full size notebook. But if you think of the eMate Apple can probably kick off a netbook trend earlier.
 
Top