![]() Starting in 1996, 3D video games began to take off with releases such as Virtua Fighter 2 on the Saturn, Tomb Raider on the PlayStation and Saturn, Tekken 2 and Crash Bandicoot on the PlayStation, and Super Mario 64 on the Nintendo 64. Early efforts from then-industry leaders Sega and Nintendo saw the introduction of the 32X and Super FX, which provided rudimentary 3D capabilities to the 16-bit Genesis and Super NES. While there were games prior that had used three-dimensional polygon environments, such as Virtua Racing and Virtua Fighter in the arcades and Star Fox on the Super NES, it was in this era that many game designers began to move traditionally 2D and pseudo-3D genres into 3D on video game consoles. The 32-bit/ 64-bit era is most noted for the rise of fully 3D polygon games. The fifth generation ended with the discontinuation of the PlayStation (specifically its re-engineered form, the "PSOne") on March 23, 2006, a year after the launch of the seventh generation. There was considerable time overlap between this generation and the next, the sixth generation of consoles, which began with the launch of the Dreamcast in Japan on November 27, 1998. There were also two minor updates of the original Game Boy: the Game Boy Light (released in Japan only) and the Game Boy Pocket. Nintendo's Game Boy Color (1998) was the most successful handheld by a large margin. The Neo Geo Pocket was released on October 28, 1998, but was dropped by SNK in favor of the fully backwards-compatible Neo Geo Pocket Color just a year later. Both of them were discontinued before the other handhelds made their debut. The Apple Pippin, a commercial flop, was the first system to feature on-board internet capabilities.įor handhelds, this era was characterized by significant fragmentation, because the first handheld of the generation, the Sega Nomad, had a lifespan of just two years, and the Nintendo Virtual Boy had a lifespan of less than one. ![]() This was also the first generation to feature internet connectivity: some systems had additional hardware which provided connectivity to an existing device, like the Sega Net Link for the Sega Saturn. This era is known for its pivotal role in the video game industry's leap from 2D to 3D computer graphics, as well as the shift in home console games from being stored on ROM cartridges to optical discs. ![]()
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