With Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games and Super Smash Bros. Brawl either in stores now or hitting in February, it may be hard for younger gamers to remember that there was a time when Mario and Sonic were the bitterest of enemies. Over at Advance Media Network, Lucas DeWoody presents a sweet history of the mother of all console wars: the battle between Sega and Nintendo that ran from roughly 1989 to 1994. This battle climaxed with the epic sales-figure struggle between the Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo, and that's a story every gamer should know as much as possible about. The fallout from that battle made the gaming industry what it is today.
You can check out parts one and two of DeWoody's history here and here (respectively). Each part offers a ton of reading, so set aside some time this weekend to settle down with a cup of your favorite beverage and go through everything that's been posted thus far. Be sure to watch all of the embedded videos included in the article-- they're absolutely priceless!
It brings back a lot of memories for an old gamer like me, who ended up owning both a SNES and a Genesis during the height of the wars. Most kids my age, though, didn't come from families that would indulge a young gamer with two different super-expensive gaming consoles. Most kids back then had to pick one or the other, and would defend their choices vociferously on playgrounds and in the letters pages of their favorite gaming magazine. It was a matter of honor, because nothing was worse than realizing you owned a cruddy game system, and probably couldn't get anything else for a year or two at least! It was the perfect environment for Sega's aggressive, name-calling advertising campaigns, come to think of it... or for something like Donkey Kong Country to create such turnaround.
If you're still curious about the Sega/Nintendo war, we recommend checking out Andy Eddy's updated version of David Sheff's great Nintendo history, Game Over. This tells the story with great depth but a noticeable Nintendo bias (complete with slams at Sonic the Hedgehog's gameplay). If you're curious about those Sega Master System games that no one paid attention to, why not head over to the Virtual Console? The SMS wasn't a fantastic system by any stretch of the imagination, but still hosted some memorable stuff like the vastly under-appreciated Alex Kidd games.
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