What are the top 4 consoles of all time?

[Tanooki]

I would base it not just on total hardware sold. There have been enough cases in history where a piece of crap (for whatever reason being crap) still sold the most, yet in time won't be remembered as fondly or have more made of it. Also a top 4 is just weird.

I would base it partly on sold numbers sure of the hardware, but also go with attach rate, and survivability beyond its life where sustained popularity make it still retain some forefront status up against even the new(er) stuff on the market.

Take for instance the old SNES or Genesis. The market then was dramatically smaller than the possible buying pool now. They sold like crazy and made historical figures in the 90s, but if you look at them in total hardware sold against the Nintendo very high points like the DS and PS2, or the strong numbers of a 3DS or the even numbers of the GBA and PSP, it must be a pretty crappy system and nothing considered of top value if you base it on numbers alone. Yet when you see people look back fondly, and they buy, and rebuy and yet again more times certain games those 2 systems come up like crazy (as does the NES too which sold only moderately better.) Annoyingly feelings have to play into it, but also the staying power of quality games made possible due to the hardware that can still well and grand now.


I did like the original list until the xbox came up, much of what was nice there hit the PC too, and the system was plagued by horrible failure rates only mitigated by a freely expanded to 3 years warranty over the RROD fun it produced. How many would look back on that system in another 15-20 years and just marvel how awesome it and its unique titles were. Doubtfully that many. You almost have to go by the generational gaps as he did with the VCS, NES, and PSX. They opened some huge doors to progress and excellence that stuck with people. I'd ditch that 360 and put the SNES/Genesis as a tossup in there based on taste because the doors that era opened up in that console war of war periods was phenomenal.

[Ack]

I can do this:

1. Odyssey
2. Channel F
3. Intellivision
4. TurboGrafx-16

Why? Easy.

Odyssey is considered the first game console, Channel F is the first game console to use cartridges, Intellivision was the first game console to adopt a digital distribution service with the PlayCable in 1980, and TurboGrafx-16 was one of the earliest adopters of CD-ROMs via the CD-ROM² System released in December 1988.

[Exhuminator]

1. Dreamcast
2. Saturn
3. Nintendo Switch
4. Xbox One

[marurun]

I guess from a historical perspective, here are my top 4:

Famicom/NES
PC Engine
Playstation 2
Playstation 4

The Famicom was the juggernaut from Japan that saved the US video games market from itself. Early video game consoles may have shown that video games were a thing you really could have at home, but the NES made video games a true commonplace phenomenon.

The PC Engine was the system that threatened Nintendo by shaking Nintendo's hold on the Japanese market, at one point even outselling the aging Famicom. It is also the first console CD-ROM drive and quite possibly the first affordable consumer CD-ROM peripheral. The CD-ROM2 expansion debuted in 1988. To put this in perspective, the first Mac with a CD drive was the IIvx in 1992. While Microsoft had issued a single CD-ROM title as early as 1987, the Green Book CD-ROM standard wasn't finalized until 1989. According to an article in the NY Times from 1989, Headstart, a division of Philips, co-creator of the compact disc with Sony, was introducing at Comdex that year the first consumer CD-ROM drive that finally cost only $300-$400. That was, conveniently enough, the cost of the CD-ROM2 unit released by NEC for the PC Engine at the end of 1988.

The Playstation 2 brought DVDs to the masses several months before much better dedicated players became cheaper. It also proved that Sega wasn't the only company capable of making a beast of a system that was really screwy to develop for. Thankfully, Sony was a whiz at creating development environments and meaningful documentation, which went a long way toward remedying this.

The Playstation 4 is the herald of consumer-grade VR. It wasn't the first, and it's not the cheapest, but it exists, and the Playstation brand is about as mainstream as they come these days, so support for VR is an important step.

[Nintendork666]

1. PC
2. O.G. Xbox
3. Gamecube
4. PS2

PC probably doesn't count but screw it. As a platform, it has absolutely altered the way I view video games. So much so, that I've since sold off everything I own apart from my O.G. Xbox. Even my childhood NES got the boot after over 25 years of owning it. Nostalgia means very little to me. I wasn't playing it, and if I wanna boot up an NES game... well, I play it on my PC. Same goes for everything up to PS2/Wii.

O.G. Xbox rules. I just love the sixth gen in general. Best games since the SNES/Genesis days. Nobody really cares about the old Xbox though so all the games are insanely cheap, tbh Gamecube had the better niche library (my fav Nintendo console)... and PS2 had more games... but there's something about the Xbox I love. It has a ruggedness to it, and Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic... which I could also play on PC. Man, PC rules.

[32-bit Fan]

My top four:

Sega Saturn - Not historically important, but scratches a lot of my gaming itches. Would have been more significant if Sega had marketed it competently and if it hadn't come along as the marketplace was swinging away from 2D and "simple" arcade games. Great library of 2D fighters and shmups. Just enough of the other genres to be appealing. Console is my go-to pick when I'm looking for something colorful with hand-drawn sprites. Quality of library is greatly dependent on gamer's willingness to import.

PS1 - Took gaming mainstream and led the way to more "grown-up" gaming. Technically, the console had some flaws and a lot of games don't hold up graphically, but the catalog on the whole holds up far better than it should. Catalog has something for almost every genre. Good system for puzzlers, 3D platformers, 2.5D platformers, rpg's, shooters, shmups, etc. PS1 was historically important and boasts a great library.

PS2 - Competent technical machine that became a sales powerhouse. Library deep in every category and is probably unmatched.

Sega Genesis - I'd probably put the N64 in this position, but the N64 was a great console for platformers and average to mediocre in every other category. Genesis had a mascot that caught fire and a good-to-great catalog. Deep catalog for platformers and shooters. Catalog is probably deeper than SNES, but lacked SNES' beloved IP's and "killer app"-level titles (You can say the same thing about the Saturn in comparison to the N64).

[ElkinFencer10]

Oh, this is hella easy. It's obviously:

4. N-Gage
3. Virtual Boy
2. R-Zone
1. Game.com

In all seriousness, though, I'd say:

4. PS2
3. Vita
2. DS
1. Wii

I'm personally not the biggest fan of the PS2, but one can't deny the overwhelming variety of games on the system. Literally everyone can find at least a few games they'd enjoy on PS2 no matter their tastes. The Vita may have been a bit of a commercial flop, but it was the first pseudo-HD handheld, the wide support for PS1 and PSP games via PSN, the genre variety, and how exceptionally import-friendly it is makes it a truly fantastic machine. The DS, with the ability to play the entire DS and GBA libraries - arguably two of Nintendo's best libraries - along with revolutionizing handheld gaming with the clamshell design, sleep function, and dual screens finally took handheld gaming from an inconvenient pastime if you only had a few minutes here to there to the perfect way to spend a lunch break or bathroom break. And finally, the Wii - the underpowered black sheep of the 7th generation that still managed to beat the pants off its opponents in sales. It's approachability, it massive game library, its immersive motion controls, its Gamecube compatibility, its fantastic Virtual Console, and its near-perfection of arcade shooters solidifies it, in my opinion, as the definite greatest console so far (although the Switch may well dethrone it in my book in a few years).

[Xeogred]

Super Nintendo
Nintendo Entertainment System
Everything with Souls games on them
Sony Playstation

[Scooter]

Genesis (encompassing the Sega CD in the Genesis cloud)
Saturn
PS1
PS2

[SpikeSlania]

A top 4? Man everyone has been doing it wrong.
1. PS1
2. PS2
3. PS3
4. PS4
We can do a top 5 when the PS5 launches.

Now if I were to do a list in what I think was important for gaming history, it would go like this.
1. NES - Saved gaming as we know it after the crash.
2. Genesis - Proved you don't have to be Nintendo to be successful.
3. Xbox - Made internal storage mainstream and launched the first modern successful online gaming service. Sega did do online gaming before them, but Xbox Live set the standard for online gaming, which Nintendo still hasn't figured out.
4. Ouya - Proved that people would throw money at anything