Orange Lounge Radio

With the 360 soon coming out and the rest of the generation next year I think it's time to reflect. Systems usually get a really crappy launch but there are those few occasions where one is good.

I really don't know what was the best for me since I started at the SNES launch and remember getting mario and U.N. Squadren. I'm kind of stuck between the psp, the GBA, and the Dreamcast. Many of the psp games that came out the same day were ones I wanted like vampire cronicles, lumines, twisted metal, and metal gear. But the GBA definately beat that in june 2001 with games like mario advance, chu chu rocket, tony hawk, dodge ball, and circle of the moon. And who could forget 9/9/99 (no not the day that chris rock hosted the VMA's and not the day that Final Fantasy VIII came out) Dreamcast day! People were going crazy to pick up a DC with sooooooo many good titles like sonic adventure, soul caliber, marvel vs. capcom, and power stone. I guess that kind of does it for me, the Dreamcast wins by a little bit and I'm still not sure. As for the 360 it looks like an ok launch, the only thing I really care about is Perfect Dark Zero. DOA4 looks good but I can wait for that one, and Kameo doesn't interest me.

I'm voting N64, because first out of the gate was Mario 64. A deep game with great graphics, faithful to Mario, and pretty much defining the entire 3-D platform genre. Mario 64 is still one of the best 3d platformers of all time.

yeah that was really good and I remember going to my friend's house playing all day long on the 1st day. I don't remember the exact date but I know it was on a Sunday. I like variety though, have quality and quantity. Just get some more 3rd party stuff put in and it would be ok. Pilotwings64 wasn't too great of a game.

I can't think of any launch that was really that great. At most there were only a couple of decent launch titles for the system and you know they'll be $20 titles a few months down the road anyway because they suck compared to the later stuff and everyone has surplus copies with everyone loading up on launch titles. Are you sure all that was available for the DC right out of the gate? I just don't remember seeing those right away.

Yeah there was more for the DC also including Blue Stinger (I think), that game where you race on ice, mortal kombat gold, House of the Dead 2, and I think Virtua Fighter 3tb. There was more too but I'm not sure where the original demo is that came with it, I even have the official Dreamcast Magizine #0 somewhere.

Wow memories of playing sonic adventure trial edition over and over.

I remember the months after the N64 came out.
Sony ran commercials, (or was it Saturn? I seem to remember seeing Nights...) of "Do you want to play all these games?" <show clips of ~15 or so different new games> "or just two?" <show mockups of N64 and cartridges>.

I laughed.

Remember the ones where the system would be destoyed somehow? Like the one with the 64 is tossed in the air and is shot with a shotgun.

Sega's "Nintendon't" commercials were the best.

Well here's something interesting, now 1up has a thing comparing the launches. I think it is good but they didn't include the other handhelds in there and they really bash the gamecube

Gamecube did have a crappy launch though.

Yeah it did but if you count Pikmin and SSBM it wasn't too bad. I think they missed the launch by like 2 weeks and they were very hard to find since they were sold out everywhere at release.

What I was actually saying was they made it sound like the cube is bad all around and that made me upset. I swear only hardcore gamers understand why the gamecube is so great and NOT the xbox.

Ah, yeah, I should've gone to read the article. I forgot SSBM was a launch title. Unfortunately, everything else was pretty weak. I love my GC though, but the XBox is great too. Gotta love the online play, and nobody else supports it as well.

Idk nothing beats the SNES launch... I think it was Super mario bros world, Final Fight, F Zero and Street fighter 2 if im not mistaken... The DC launch was good with Sonic, Power stone, Soul Caliber and Marvel VS Capcom.... Meanwhile the Playstation launch wasent great at all... NBA Jam TE, Ridge Racer (only good one), Street Fighter the movie... But Sony did a much better job with the PS2 launch... Madden 2001, SSX, Tekken Tag and NHL 2001 (yeah that right... 3rd game i got and i thought it was the best sports game i ever had).... But with all of those the SEGA CD launch was the best.... COME ON you cannot top Sewer Shark and Night Trap or even Making the Video: Marky Mark and the Funky bunch....

As much of a gamer as I am / have been, launches have never been my "thing".

I vividly remember the Dreamcast and PS2 launches, and a smidge of the N64 launch, but nothing else.
I do not remember the original playstation launch, nor the saturn, nor jaguar, nor the XBox launch, nor the Gamecube launch.

Of them all, I'd honestly say that the Dreamcast launch was by far my favorite, and have a GOOD selection of games.
While the launch parties/features/news makes me prefer the Dreamcast.
The launch titles and overall smoothness makes me prefer the PS2. Armored Core owned my SOUL for a few months there...
(It's too bad I still suck at it ;_; )