Lord Spencer's Gaming (and other stuff) Blog

With the impending start of the fifth generation of videogame consoles, The 3DO Company wanted to revolutionize the console market with their new 3DO console. Of course, the 3DO Company realized they needed a mascot character to compete with Mario and Sonic, and Crystal Dynamics obliged that need with Gex. A green gecko mascot to rival Sega's blue and Nintendo's red. It can be surmised that the failure of the 3DO is then in part, a failure of Gex . Yet, that would be a very unfair conclusion. Even though Gex is as dead a mascot as he can be, his debut was not bad at all. In fact, it puts him square in the running for best failed mascot of the '90s. 97: Gex: Year: 1996. Genre: Platformer. Publisher: Crystal Dynamics. Developer: Crystal Dynamics, Beam Software.

Sega obviously rushed the release of the Saturn. Hearing about Sony's upcoming console, they wanted to be first in the scene to try and imitate their early console advantage in the 16-bit era. Maybe that is why they didn't have their big guns ready at the start. Specially missing was their newly iconic mascot, Sonic the Hedgehog. Which is why Bug, the titular character of Bug! , was actually conceived and developed as a possible mascot for the Saturn. Both the character and the game were made to represent the capabilities of the new console. That was a big mistake. Chucking the entire thing into the ocean would have been a better demonstration. 100: Bug!: Year: 1995. Genre: Platformer. Publisher: Sega. Developer: Realtime Associates.