Time Machine: MSX

The 'Japanese Xbox predecessor from 30 years ago' is a temptingly easy way to sum up the MSX in a nutshell.

But let's not, as people who only read the first sentence would be badly misinformed - oh, too late...



MSX was driven mainly by Japanese firms with Microsoft's involvement, but it wasn't a console; it was a standard adopted by a family of home computers built by more than 30 different companies, from Sony and Philips to Samsung and Yamaha.

A crazy hippy notion in this age of cutthroat capitalism, but intriguing at the time.

VHS was the example tossed around when Kazuhiko Nishi of Microsoft and ASCII Corporation pitched the MSX concept in 1981.

People assumed MSX meant 'Microsoft Extended' as it used a beefed-up version of MS BASIC, but Nishi later suggested he had 'Machines with Software Exchangeability' in mind. He was a riot at parties.

After the first MSX series in 1983, MSX2 took over in 1985 with an MSX2+ upgrade in 1988, while 1990's MSX Turbo R would be the swansong. Along the way just about every software format was supported: cassette, disk, cartridge, even laserdisc too.

MSXTINCTION
It was taken seriously in Japan and Korea, also surfacing across Europe, South America and the Soviet Union, but crucially MSX couldn't have been further from cracking the USA if it had done a duet with Robbie Williams.



http://cdn.medialib.computerandvideo...4_thumb300.jpg

Easy conversion from other systems meant it piggybacked on many game releases over here, despite only about seven people in Britain actually owning one.

By the time MSX went and hid in the kitchen as consoles barged into our living rooms with mud all over their shoes, five million units had been sold - a respectable result, if not quite a new universal standard. Chalk it up as a nice try for Mr Nishi then.