Nabbit
Heading to Lorule? Rent your equipment here!
We got a free trial to Paramount+ this month, so last night we took the opportunity to watch Console Wars, a movie from a couple years ago that originally premiered on the CBS All Access service that has since been folded into Paramount+.
I've been interested in this movie for a long time. It's been on a book and at some point they were making a live action adaptation, too, with the same Rogen/Goldberg production team. I'm not sure if that's still in the works.
On the whole I found this to be a worthwhile doc, a little less nuanced than the episodes of High Score (Netflix) that I most enjoyed, but still the focus here on Sega and Nintendo was more in my wheelhouse, especially compared to the last episode of two of High Score that focused on stuff like Doom.
This movie was strongly biased toward Sega, in a way that mostly made sense. But I should say it was super focused on the marketing and mindshare battle between Sega and Nintendo specifically in America in the 90's. The main folks interviewed are Sega alums, especially Tom Kalinske. No doubt Kalinske positioning Nintendo as being for kids was a marketing masterstroke that echoes to this day. The film details how Sega's Genesis marketing hit the 90's edgy zeitgeist in a big way and how Nintendo with the Play it Loud campaign, and later PlayStation, attempted the same strategy.
Unfortunately the movie is so focused on Sega of America that it paints Sega of Japan as mismanaged (with insufficient credit for hits to the game developers IMO) and Nintendo of America as malevolent. I would have really appreciated some focus on game developers at both companies, as well as a more balanced approach drawing on Master System, Sega CD and some focus on Dreamcast and the legacy of Sega. But I enjoyed it a lot nonetheless and definitely recommend a watch.
If you're looking for even better documentaries about games, I can't recommend King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters strongly enough, and I also greatly enjoyed Ecstasy of Order. These films are about the competitive Donkey Kong and Tetris scenes. The former is one of my favorite documentaries ever, and the Tetris one is really good also.
I would greatly appreciate any other video game development movie or series recommendations, and welcome impressions about the Console Wars book or film, and especially about your own real life experiences of this time in gaming. I'm really interested in the perspective also of users like @Tailzo who came up with Sega in the 90's in a country outside of America, where I don't know what the marketing or environment for Sega was like.
I've been interested in this movie for a long time. It's been on a book and at some point they were making a live action adaptation, too, with the same Rogen/Goldberg production team. I'm not sure if that's still in the works.
On the whole I found this to be a worthwhile doc, a little less nuanced than the episodes of High Score (Netflix) that I most enjoyed, but still the focus here on Sega and Nintendo was more in my wheelhouse, especially compared to the last episode of two of High Score that focused on stuff like Doom.
This movie was strongly biased toward Sega, in a way that mostly made sense. But I should say it was super focused on the marketing and mindshare battle between Sega and Nintendo specifically in America in the 90's. The main folks interviewed are Sega alums, especially Tom Kalinske. No doubt Kalinske positioning Nintendo as being for kids was a marketing masterstroke that echoes to this day. The film details how Sega's Genesis marketing hit the 90's edgy zeitgeist in a big way and how Nintendo with the Play it Loud campaign, and later PlayStation, attempted the same strategy.
Unfortunately the movie is so focused on Sega of America that it paints Sega of Japan as mismanaged (with insufficient credit for hits to the game developers IMO) and Nintendo of America as malevolent. I would have really appreciated some focus on game developers at both companies, as well as a more balanced approach drawing on Master System, Sega CD and some focus on Dreamcast and the legacy of Sega. But I enjoyed it a lot nonetheless and definitely recommend a watch.
If you're looking for even better documentaries about games, I can't recommend King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters strongly enough, and I also greatly enjoyed Ecstasy of Order. These films are about the competitive Donkey Kong and Tetris scenes. The former is one of my favorite documentaries ever, and the Tetris one is really good also.
I would greatly appreciate any other video game development movie or series recommendations, and welcome impressions about the Console Wars book or film, and especially about your own real life experiences of this time in gaming. I'm really interested in the perspective also of users like @Tailzo who came up with Sega in the 90's in a country outside of America, where I don't know what the marketing or environment for Sega was like.
