Way, way back in January, a company called 3DO publicly opened its doors with the promise of a revolutionary new "interactive multi-player" that, among other things, would revolutionize the video game market. We were promised by none other than CEO Trip Hawkins that there would be "half a dozen" manufacturers of this miracle box and plenty of titles by the time Christmas rolled around. Well, Halloween is behind us and the Christmas shopping season is relentlessly here. Has he delivered?
Yes and no. As of October, partner Panasonic is selling the 3DO Multiplayer for a cool US$699, and they're even bundling it with the thoughtfully titled Crash and Burn, a car shoot-'em-up from star 3DO developer Crystal Dynamics. But so far there are no other manufacturers, and 3DO is only promising about ten titles at rollout, with "twenty by Christmas." If you're a last-minute shopper, you're in luck.
Meanwhile Nintendo, Sega, Atari, and Commodore, a few pretenders to the amusement throne, have all made reservations at the Christmas feast. Chief Spoiler award goes to Nintendo, which is hoping to dowse the 3DO hype with the announcement of "Project Reality," a US$250, 64-bit, 100-MIPS game machine based on SGI-chip technology. The only problem: It won't be out until 1995. "We have a two- to three-year head start," says 3DO Senior VP of Marketing Robert Faber.
Sega isn't pre-announcing any hardware (although any kid who hasn't heard rumors of the 32-bit Saturn machine hasn't been getting out enough), but it is pushing its year-old CD system with several "groundbreaking" interactive video titles, including Switch, starring Deborah "Blondie" Harry and Corey "Lost Boys" Haim. Also coming in time for Christmas: the much-anticipated Sonic CD game which, coupled with a new Sonic cartoon series, should push half a million new Sega CD systems into American living rooms.
And two hoary but persistent gaming companies have pulled up seats to the Christmas table: Once-dominant Atari Games will sell its powerful (but software-scarce) new Jaguar system in test markets (New York and San Francisco), and Commodore (creators of the Amiga and the unsuccessful CDTV format) is rolling out the Amiga CD32, a 32-bit game console, which, we were promised us back in September, would include at least 30 titles in time for the Christmas season.
So which should you buy? If you have kids, the answer will be obvious: the one they think is the coolest. If you don't have kids, you might want to wait for the after-Christmas fire sales. With all these machines on the market, there's bound to be excess inventory. - John Battelle
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