This week, IGN Retro is featuring a series of articles about the debut of the Nintendo 64 and its industry legacy. Today, we look at the games the defined the Nintendo 64.
Defining Moments
Every console is defined by its games. For example, games like Halo 3 and Gears of War have defined the Xbox 360 as a hardcore gamer's machine, something Microsoft is trying to combat with an influx of family titles like Viva Piñata. But once a reputation starts to coalesce, it's difficult to shake it. The Nintendo 64 was defined by its games, too, such as Super Mario 64 and Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. These were quality games and they certainly helped the Nintendo 64 as it struggled in a shifting videogame marketplace, but being defined by these games was not a universal positive for Nintendo. How is it possible that earning a reputation for superlative first-party games could ever be construed as a negative?
When the Nintendo 64 launched in America in 1996, it was flanked by only two games: Super Mario 64 and Pilotwings 64. Super Mario 64 is now a touchstone videogame, thanks to expert direction from Nintendo mastermind Shigeru Miyamoto. Super Mario 64 was not just an excellent platformer that more than lived up to the expectations set by previous entries such as Super Mario Bros. 3 and Super Mario World, but it became a template for 3D adventures thanks to its smart camera system. The game sold phenomenally well, upwards of 11 million cartridges, and continues to be enjoyed today on the Nintendo DS and the Virtual Console.
But Super Mario 64's partner, Pilotwings 64, is also notable as a springboard for a philosophy later embraced by Nintendo in games such as Nintendogs -- challenge without competition. The game was almost entirely focused on exploration and trying new things without any hard goals or objectives bearing down on you.
There were a handful of games released during the holiday season on 1996, but Wave Race 64 stood out. How many racing games at this point were just high-octane circles? That's not a slam against quality racers like Daytona USA and Ridge Racer, which each debuted alongside the Saturn and PlayStation in 1995, respectively. But Wave Race 64's combination of precision analog controls and the realistic physics of racing/fighting through the water chop (which changed with each lap) gave the game a unique feel.
1997 was the year the Nintendo 64 struggled to get its sea legs. One of the biggest games for the console slipped out of the year -- Ocarina of Time -- leaving Nintendo scrambling for a rescue title. It turned to Rare, which had created the blockbuster Donkey Kong Country series for the SNES. Rare's Diddy Kong Racing may have launched in the same year as Mario Kart 64 (February 1997), but it was a better kart racer than Nintendo's own entry. Diddy Kong Racing sold remarkably well, blunting the impact of Zelda's absence. Diddy was not Rare's only game in 1997. Blast Corps was a clever action-puzzle game that never got the attention it deserved, but remains one of the Nintendo 64's most satisfying plays and a celebrated cult classic. However, neither of these games made the same level of impact as Rare's third 1997 game: GoldenEye 007. This game not only helped define the Nintendo 64, but it also shaped the first-person shooter on consoles as a whole. One could even argue that it also raised the bar on licensed games, too, with not only its production values, but detailed attention to remaining true to the spirit of the source material.
The Nintendo 64's banner year was undoubtedly 1998. The lead game of the year was Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, a game which revolutionized the adventure genre while outright dazzling gamers. Innovations like the automatic jumping and Z-targeting were stolen wholesale by dozens of competitors in Ocarina's wake. Thanks to the storage limitations of the cartridge, Nintendo bucked the trend of including full orchestra music, voice, and cutscenes, but the gameplay more than made up the difference. And even if the game lacked symphony, the themes of Ocarina are undoubtedly remembered by more gamers today than 99% of the soundtracks on the rival PlayStation.
Nintendo's 64-bit entry in the F-Zero series, F-Zero X, was a sharp racer that wowed fans, but was not a breakout hit. But 1080 Snowboarding, on the other hand, was a monster influence that is still checked to this day. Every single snowboarding game that followed 1080 borrows from Nintendo's formula, such as flapping clothes and audio effects while jumping.
In 1998, Nintendo published a pair of games that also helped move systems: Star Wars: Rogue Squadron and Banjo-Kazooie. Factor 5's Rogue Squadron completely revived the Star Wars license for consoles with its well-paced tour through the highlights, such as the Battle for Hoth, and its push into canon territory, such as the excellent Mon Calamari and Sullust missions. Coupled with the 4MB Expansion Pak, Nintendo's memory booster, Rogue Squadron was one of the generation's top stunners. Rare's Banjo-Kazooie filled an important hole in Nintendo's line-up left by the lack of a proper Super Mario 64 sequel.
1998 also hosted two smaller games that went largely overlooked, but were gems for Nintendo 64 owners that took a risk: Body Harvest and Space Station Silicon Valley. Already, the Nintendo 64's reputation as system without much third-party support was taking firm hold, but these adventures proved that good things could happen on the Nintendo 64 without the Nintendo pedigree.
While the Nintendo 64 peaked in 1998, the following year was hardly a disaster -- more of a cool-down period defined by some good games that were still unable to reverse market trends. The PlayStation was the undisputed winner of the generation, but at least Nintendo had avoided the Saturn's flagging fate. Banjo-Kazooie proved that good platforming without Mario was possible, and Ubisoft's Rayman 2: The Great Escape underlined that fact. It remains a brilliant and beautiful 3D platformer. The same goes for Sucker Punch's Rocket: Robot on Wheels, which achieved far less success than Banjo or Rayman. Perhaps if the game had done better, Sly Cooper may have found a different home in the following generation.
Rare weighed in again in 1999 with Donkey Kong 64, a 3D platformer that was a big success, but it also shackled Rare with the reputation of producing scavenger hunts. But the two biggest games for Nintendo in 1999 were franchise starters: Mario Party and Super Smash Bros. Both were serious hits that could have had a greater effect on the fate of the Nintendo 64 had they come out sooner in the console's lifespan. Mario Party launched a prolific series that's already up to chapter eight. Super Smash Bros. looked like fanboy service at first glance, but a little time with the game revealed a genius cocktail of fighting and platforming with incredible depth. The franchise has not been exploited by Nintendo over the years, either. Each generation has entertained only one volume of the series, and each has been one of the host system's top sellers.
By 2000, Nintendo was already looking to the future. The Dreamcast had a big launch at the end of 1999 and Sony was preparing its PlayStation 2 onslaught. Support for the Nintendo 64 was drying up. Midway stuck with the system and released the best San Francisco Rush to date, San Francisco Rush 2049. But it was a pair of Nintendo games that propped up the system for the majority of the year. Rare tried to recapture the magic of GoldenEye 007 with Perfect Dark and Nintendo directly challenged the PS2 launch with the dark Zelda sequel Majora's Mask. Neither sold as well as their previous counterparts, but both played extremely well to the base. By the end of the year, enthusiasm had mostly shifted to the new generation, helped in no small part by Nintendo's reveal of the GameCube and footage of a grown-up Link clashing with Ganondorf.
2001 was a whimper year for the Nintendo 64. The games that would shape the console's legacy were already out and the GameCube was locked for a November launch. Nintendo published two final games for the system that year. The first, Paper Mario, was a sorta-sequel to Super Mario RPG. The action-adventure was well-reviewed and well-received, and it also launched a new series for Nintendo. But the last game, Conker's Bad Fur Day, was the real surprise. Rare was eager to buck expectations after early derision of the sweet-looking Conker, and Bad Fur Day was an adult-oriented romp that the console really could have used in earlier days to combat the encroaching "kiddie system" reputation earned by comparing the Nintendo 64 library to the PlayStation, which had games like Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy, and Gran Turismo.
But the Nintendo 64 can also be defined as much by the games it didn't host, such as Metal Gear Solid and the original Resident Evil. With a distinct lack of third-party support compared to the PlayStation, the Nintendo 64 sold primarily on the strength of games developer and/or published by Nintendo. Conventional wisdom became that only Nintendo games did any business on Nintendo systems, a reputation that extended into the following generation and hung over the GameCube. Third-party publishers used this as an excuse to keep clear of Nintendo systems and continued supporting the wildly successful PlayStation line and soon it became a self-fulfilling prophecy. If third-party software is not going to appear on the Nintendo 64 or GameCube, then naturally Nintendo games are going to sell better.
This conventional wisdom followed Nintendo into the current generation. However, the numbers simply do not support the theory. Third-party publishers that bring quality software to the Nintendo Wii -- or software that understands the Wii's twin audiences of hardcore Nintendo fans and casual gamers intrigued by the Wii's accessibility -- do indeed do brisk business, like Take-Two's Carnival Games. It has taken Nintendo two generations to shake the reputation earned by the Nintendo 64, a console that shook the company to the core and but later helped it reinvent itself.
Tomorrow, Nintendo 64 week continues with the RetroCity podcast, where I will recap some of the Nintendo 64's legacy discussed this week, but also talk about my time at Nintendo in 1998-99.