by Richard Winterton

Created on: November 05, 2009

Nintendo Company Limited was almost a century old when it released the Famicom, it's first home gaming console, in 1983. A huge success in Japan, Nintendo originally had trouble licensing the Famicom in American due to licensing issues with Atari, whom Nintendo originally intended to have back a North American release. The gaming crash of 1986 changed all that, however, as Atari as a company went under, taking out the only competition on North American shores.

On October 18th, 1986 Nintendo released the Famicom as the Nintendo Entertainment System to New York as a test market and later to Los Angeles in February of 1986. By the end of that year, Nintendo broadened their release to a national level.

What set the NES apart was the insistence on quality in its games. While consoles like Atari and Intellivision had no quality control for their games, Nintendo insisted on a Seal of Quality, which represented an expectation of quality from all games playable on the console. This represented a major shift in the philosophy of game development, as the focus shifted from quantity to quality. This allowed Nintendo to hold onto their core titles, such as Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda.

Nintendo moved into the 1990s with the development of the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES). The SNES was released on November 21, 1990 in Japan, while being released in August 1991 for the United States. The new console sported a 16-bit processor, allowing for crisper graphics and sound. Core Nintendo franchises, such as Mario and Zelda, also joined the company for the next generation with their own respective next-gen titles.

Not all was smooth in the 90s, however. Nintendo encountered its first taste of competition in North America with rival company SEGA, who also released their own Sega Genesis around the same time. Although Nintendo eventually sold more consoles than SEGA worldwide, the two companies held a fierce rivalry that continued through the 90s.

Even with competition from rival game companies and a few ill-fated business decisions such as 1995's Virtual Boy, Nintendo continued to thrive. And in 1996, Nintendo released the Nintendo 64 worldwide. Although the most advanced console graphically of its time, the N64 still suffered from its share of flaws. For one, the system still used cartridges as its chosen medium. While this mostly eliminated loading screens (the bane of contemporary CD based systems such as the Playstation and Sega Saturn); it also limited

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