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Product Facelift: Difference between revisions
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Thus the company gets those late adopters who want to dive into a huge established library without paying the sometimes-exorbitant prices of a brand new console. On the other hand, they run the risk of alienating those fans who bought the old version six months before the spiffy new model came out.
Not just limited to consoles, '''Product Facelifts''' can happen to many other kinds of goods like cars and toys, often for similar reasons.
{{examples}}
* [[Nintendo]] is well known for their console redesigns. It possibly invented the practice in its modern form with its late-life redesign of the [[SNES]], and raised it to an art form with the [[Game Boy]] ([[Game Boy Pocket]], Game Boy Light [Japan], [[Game Boy Color]]), the [[Game Boy Advance]] (GBA SP, GBA Micro), and the [[Nintendo DS]] (DS Lite, DSi) -- not to mention the conversion of the NES from a toaster to a console with dog bone controllers.
** The DS systems are a rather bizarre form of this- first, the DS was released, then it was updated to the DS Lite, which was a smaller version of the same thing. Then came the DSi, which was about the same size as the DS Lite but with different features- and finally the DSi XL, which is a ''larger'' version of the DSi. So, is bigger better or not?
*** The [[D Si]] XL was made predominately for use by [[Cool Old Guy|seniors who could benefit from a bigger screen, and different lighting]]. It's an interesting sign of the change in Nintendo's target demographic from the time of the DS Lite release to the XL's.
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* [[Sony]] released slim versions of the [[PlayStation|PlayStation 1]] & [[PlayStation 2|2]], with the new version of the Playstation (rechristened PSone) being so small that, with a portable LCD screen add-on, it makes for a decent portable system.
** In Japan, the [[PlayStation 2]] also got a 'media hub' makeover as the PSX.
** After 2 months as the industry's worst-kept secret, the slimmer, cheaper [[
* The [[PSP]] was redesigned as the ''PSP Slim & Lite'', gaining a better screen and TV-Out capability along with losing some weight. A second revision has been announced, the main changes apparently being a better analog stick and a microphone for Skype.
** And now, PSP Go, which removed the UMD slot, making it the first portable console that does not use physical games.
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** Consoles were often more upgradable and PC-like in the '80s. An example of this was Sega's earlier Master System, which was really just the latest iteration of their first multi-game console, the SG-1000.
*** And the [[Sega Master System|Master System]] itself had three versions, similar to the NES. The first two were ordinary consoles; the third was portable, retitled Game Gear, and it coexisted with the Genesis as a [[Daddy System]].
*** Cartridge ports were in most cases a direct connection to the console's main bus, not unlike various PCs expansion slots, and were widely used as such. Aforementioned Master System was in fact a major inspiration for the [[
* Although their aesthetics remain mostly the same, both the [[
** The newer versions of the XB360 are also desired by some simply because their revised design supposedly means less of that console's infamous overheating failures.
** To clarify: The new [[Xbox]] 360 (commonly referred to as the "[[Xbox]] 360 Slim", although it's official name is "Xbox 360 Elite"... [[Name's the Same|just like the version it replaced]]) is a bit slimmer, much quieter, has a huge vent on one side of it for cooling, and also includes built-in wifi and an internal hard drive. [[Most Wonderful Sound|And it beeps when you use the buttons on the console to open and close it.]]
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:Videogame Culture]]
[[Category:
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