Overview

• Yoshida says Nintendo’s late pullout meant Sony’s team was not locked into a Nintendo platform, which he calls “almost helpful.”
• He recounts that Ken Kutaragi had multiple final working units that were nearly ready for manufacturing, with a few games already finished.
• Yoshida describes playing a space shooter on the prototype and says the add-on was constrained by 16-bit tech, similar to the Sega CD.
• Nintendo instead worked with Philips, resulting in a handful of poorly received CD-i games featuring Mario and Zelda.
• Sony turned the abandoned concept into the standalone PlayStation, which sold more than triple the N64’s total, and rare prototypes have sold for over $300,000.