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The forgotten losers of the console wars
History is written by the victors, but for all those generations of console wars we've managed to weather through, what about the other guys? Opening this week, a new games museum in southern Japan houses 56 different consoles of varying fame (or infamy). For every NES/Famicom, there are curiosities like the huge "Pocket Home PC," failing on the very definition of its name. Remember the Sega Game 1000? We didn't, but we should probably cut these (mostly) beige consoles some slack. While most of the devices toured here weren't a commercial success, each helped gently push gaming toward its current state -- if only by firmly demonstrating what we didn't want. And yeah, we wish the Dreamcast was still around too. Here's to the games consoles we've loved and lost over the last 40 years.
Caturday: Pippin's iMac house
Some cats just hang out on the furniture provided by their owners, others have nice and cozy pet beds. Pippin, however, has one of the best cat domiciles we've seen so far -- a strawberry slot-loading iMac G3 that's been outfitted with some nice cushions. Pippin's owner, Ian Cobb, named his feline companion after Apple's ill-fated gaming console. There's a box for a non-feline Pippin in this photo as well; see that box marked "Atmark"? Ian also has a nice Mac Portable, what appears to be a PowerBook 170, a Newton MessagePad 2000 (or 2100), and an eMate. So this week, you're not only getting treated to a really cute feline, but also one of the best Apple collections I've seen in a long time. We'd love to see photos of your favorite feline soaking up the warmth of an Apple product, chasing a Magic Mouse, or just being a general nuisance while you're attempting to work on your Mac, iPad, or iPhone. Please let us know via our feedback page and please remember that your cat photo has to have some sort of connection to Apple or its products. For security reasons we can't accept inbound attachments, so you should host the photo (Dropbox, Flickr, iPhoto Journals, etc.) and send us the link. Many thanks to Ian Cobb for sharing this photo with us.
PC World says Apple's Pippin is the "worst"
PC World magazine listed Apple's ill-fated game console, the Pippin, 22nd on their list of the "25 Worst Tech Products of All Time," writing:"Apple had an Internet-capable game console that connected to your TV. But it ran on a weak PowerPC processor and came with a puny 14.4-kbps modem, so it was stupendously slow offline and online. Then, too, it was based on the Mac OS, so almost no games were available for it. And it cost nearly $600--nearly twice as much as other, far more powerful game consoles."Of course, we recognize the Pippin not only for its contribution to the annals of also-ran consoles, but also as fodder for years of subsequent rumors of another Apple game console. Of course, it also lets Mac zealots everywhere point and stomp, claiming gaming consoles as yet another area where Apple beat their arch-nemesis Microsoft to the proverbial punch. Might want to let this one die fellas, it's just better that way. [Via TUAW]
