If the SNES-CD had released in 1993, what would gaming be like today?

[courtlyhades296]

For one, if Nintendo and Sony released the SNES-CD, the PlayStation line wouldn't exist, whereas if Nintendo and Philips released the SNES-CD, the PlayStation would still exist.

[bikingjahuty]

Given how massive Sony is, I think they would have entered the console business regardless, but whether they would have become the household name they are today, or just another company that had a short run in the video game business is up for debate. Still, I think a lot of classic PS1 titles would have likely been Nintendo games, such as FF7 which was originally in development for the N64. I also think that it's possible Sega may have held on a bit longer, maybe even have released a successor to the Dreamcast had the PS2 never been made. Definitely a fun thing to think about.

[ferraroso]

That's something I'd never considered about and you got me thinking a lot about it these last few days...
There's an infinity of possible outcomes, but, for me, one interesting flow of events would be:
- The SNES CD is released late and overpriced and ends up flopping even harder than the Mega CD.
- Sony abandons the development of video game hardware (without even properly entering it) and the PlayStation is never released.
- Without the threat of the immanent release of the PS1, Sega never releases de 32X and invests much more time in the development of the Saturn. It ends up focusing a lot more on 2D.
- Without any major competition in the 3D gaming market, the 3DO fares a lot better than in our reality. To the point that we have a console war between the 3DO M2 and the Nintendo Ultra 64 in the late 90's.
- Microsoft either buys out or join forces with Sega for the release of the DreamBox (or some other name).

It's pretty hard to predict what would happen in the next 20 years or so, but if things followed a path similar to that of our world, I'd say that by 2023, the three major video game console manufacturers would be Panasonic/3DO, Microsoft/Sega and Nintendo.

[pzeke]

I think that would be the timeline where gaming is seen as a lower form of entertainment ranked below rockhounding and numismatics, but slightly above philately. Or maybe that other one where it rocked the world out of its central socket when the console wars were taken literally, and the world became a dystopia just like in "Ready Player One".

Probably the former.