4 ms·

But review magazines, and word of mouth, would have helped identify the good games?

• dylan604 3y ago
  review magazines were not universally available. a proper bookstore with a large enough selection of magazines was at least 45 minutes away from me during this time when i was too young to drive. word of mouth has a broadcast radius that is pretty limited as well. hell, i remember the first time i went to a mall with a computer store that actually had magazines dedicated to games. it's also something different from now where you might be into the games/computers, but your parents very well might have held the idea that you were rotting your brain with that stuff. it's probably pretty hard to imagine compared to what is available today. the 80s and early 90s were pretty much the dark ages if not stone age compared to today.
  • Aardwolf 3y ago
    Atari is before my time, but regarding SNES and gameboy, here the popular games went very much through word of mouth (and seeing) on the school playground. I'd imagine this also be the case for Atari if multiple kids had Atari 2600's. Of course if it was rare, then that wouldn't work.
• Tiktaalik 3y ago
  Review magazines barely existed. Nintendo coming along later and creating it's Nintendo Power official magazine (based heavily on Famitsu) to help direct consumers to the good games was yet another piece of the puzzle that Nintendo laid in creating a vibrant games industry.