title: Reality television

text: The Chinese singing competition "Super Girl" (a local imitation of "Pop Idol") has similarly been cited for its political and cultural impact. After the finale of the show's 2005 season drew an audience of around 400 million people, and eight million text-message votes, the state-run English-language newspaper "Beijing Today" ran the front-page headline: "Is Super Girl a Force for Democracy?" The Chinese government criticized the show, citing both its democratic nature and its excessive vulgarity, or "worldliness", and in 2006 banned it outright. It was later reintroduced in 2009, before being banned again in 2011. "Super Girl" has also been criticized by non-government commentators for creating seemingly impossible ideals that may be harmful to Chinese youth.


title: Reality television

text: In Indonesia, reality television shows have surpassed soap operas as the most-watched broadcast programs. One popular program, "Jika Aku Menjadi" ("If I Were"), follows young, middle-class people as they are temporarily placed into lower-class life, where they learn to appreciate their circumstances back home by experiencing daily life for the less fortunate. Critics have claimed that this and similar programs in Indonesia reinforce traditionally Western ideals of materialism and consumerism. However, Eko Nugroho, reality-show producer and president of Dreamlight World Media, insists that these reality shows are not promoting American lifestyles but rather reaching people through their universal desires.


title: Reality television

text: Reality television has also received criticism in Britain and the United States for its ideological relationship with surveillance societies and consumerism. Writing in "The New York Times" in 2012, author Mark Andrejevic characterised the role of reality television in a post-9/11 society as the normalisation of surveillance in participatory monitoring, the "logic of the emerging surveillance economy", and in the promise of a societal self-image that is contrived. An LSE paper by Nick Couldry associates reality television with neoliberalism, condemning the ritualised enactment and consumption of what must be legitimised for the society it serves.


title: Reality television

text: VH1 executive vice president Michael Hirschorn wrote in 2007 that the plots and subject matters on reality television are more authentic and more engaging than in scripted dramas, writing that scripted network television "remains dominated by variants on the police procedural... in which a stock group of characters (ethnically, sexually, and generationally diverse) grapples with endless versions of the same dilemma. The episodes have all the ritual predictability of Japanese Noh theater," while reality television is "the liveliest genre on the set right now. It has engaged hot-button cultural issues – class, sex, race – that respectable television... rarely touches."


title: Reality television

text: Television critic James Poniewozik wrote in 2008 that reality shows like "Deadliest Catch" and "Ice Road Truckers" showcase working-class people of the kind that "used to be routine" on scripted network television, but that became a rarity in the 2000s: "The better to woo upscale viewers, TV has evicted its mechanics and dockworkers to collect higher rents from yuppies in coffeehouses."


title: Reality television

text: In a 2021 interview, filmmaker Mike White (who had previously competed on "The Amazing Race" and "Survivor") said that reality competition shows like "Survivor" accurately conveyed how, in real life, "so much of self is situational", so that, as circumstances change, "the oppressed becomes the oppressor, the bully becomes the bullied." In contrast, he felt that in scripted drama "there's a lot of religiosity around humanity."


title: Reality television

text: Reality television has the potential to turn its participants into national celebrities, at least for a short period. This is most notable in talent-search programs such as "Idol" and "The X Factor", which have spawned music stars in many of the countries in which they have aired. Many other shows, however, have made at least temporary celebrities out of their participants; some participants have then been able to parlay this fame into media and merchandising careers. Participants of non-talent-search programs who have had subsequent acting careers include Lilian Afegbai, Jacinda Barrett, Jamie Chung, Stephen Colletti, David Giuntoli, Vishal Karwal, NeNe Leakes and Angela Trimbur; though Barrett and Trimbur were already aspiring actresses when they appeared on reality television. Reality TV participants who have become television hosts and personalities include Nabilla Benattia, Rachel Campos-Duffy, Kristin Cavallari, Colby Donaldson, Raffaella Fico, Elisabeth Hasselbeck, Katie Hopkins, Rebecca Jarvis, Jodie Marsh, Heidi Montag, Tiffany Pollard and Whitney Port; some of them have had acting careers as well. Reality TV participants who have become television personalities as well as successful entrepreneurs include Gemma Collins, Lauren Conrad, Jade Goody, Bethenny Frankel and Spencer Matthews. Several cast members of MTV's "Jersey Shore" have had lucrative endorsement deals, and in some cases their own product lines. Wrestlers Mike "The Miz" Mizanin and David Otunga got their start on non-athletic reality shows.


title: Reality television

text: In Australia, various reality TV personalities have later served as radio hosts, including Fitzy and Rachel Corbett from "Big Brother", Mick Newell from "My Kitchen Rules", Heather Maltman from "The Bachelor", and Sam Frost from "The Bachelorette".


title: Reality television

text: Several socialites, or children of famous parents, who were somewhat well known before they appeared on reality television shows have become much more famous as a result, including Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie, Kelly Osbourne, Kim Kardashian, and many of the rest of the Kardashian family.


title: Reality television

text: Reality television personalities are sometimes derided as "Z-list celebrities". Some have been lampooned for exploiting an undeserved "15 minutes of fame". The Kardashian family is one such group of reality television personalities who were subject to this criticism in the 2010s, Kim Kardashian in particular.


title: Reality television

text: Two international franchises, "The Apprentice" and "Dragons' Den", are notable for having some of the business people who appeared there as judges and investors go on to win political office. The prime example is former U.S. President Donald Trump: his stint as host of the original "The Apprentice" from 2004 to 2015 has been credited by some commentators as a factor in his political success, since it greatly increased his fame, and showcased him as a tough and experienced authority figure. Lado Gurgenidze, who hosted the Georgian version of "The Apprentice" in 2005, was appointed Prime Minister of Georgia from 2007 to 2008. Harry Harkimo, who hosted the Finnish version of "The Apprentice" from 2009 to 2013, has been a member of the Parliament of Finland since 2015. João Doria, who hosted seasons 7-8 of the Brazilian version of "The Apprentice", "O Aprendiz", from 2010 to 2011, served as Mayor of São Paulo from 2017 to 2018 and is currently Governor of São Paulo. Bruno Bonnell, who hosted the short-lived French version of "The Apprentice" in 2015, has been a member of France's National Assembly since 2017. Israeli tech entrepreneur Nir Barkat, who appeared in 2007 as an investor on "HaKrishim", Israel's version of "Dragons' Den", was Mayor of Jerusalem from 2008 to 2018. "Dragon's Den" investors who have unsuccessfully run for office include Serhiy Tihipko of Ukraine, Kevin O'Leary of Canada and Seán Gallagher of Ireland.


title: Reality television

text: In a rare case of a previously unknown reality television alumnus succeeding in the political arena, "" cast member Sean Duffy was a U.S. Representative from Wisconsin from 2010 to 2019.


title: Reality television

text: In 2006, four of the ten most popular programs among viewers under 17 were reality shows. Studies have shown that young people emulate the behavior displayed on these programs, gathering much of their knowledge of the social world, particularly about consumer practices, from television. Some critics have decried the positive representation of sexually objectified women in shows like "The Girls Next Door".


title: Reality television

text: In 2007, according to the Learning and Skills Council, one in seven UK teenagers hoped to gain fame by appearing on reality television.


title: Reality television

text: A number of studies have tried to pinpoint the appeal of reality television. Factors that have been cited in its appeal include personal identification with the onscreen participants; pure entertainment; diversion from scripted TV; vicarious participation; a feeling of self-importance compared to onscreen participants; enjoyment of competition; and an appeal to voyeurism, especially given "scenes which take place in private settings, contain nudity, or include gossip".


title: Reality television

text: A 2012 survey by Today.com found that Americans who watch reality television regularly are more extroverted, more neurotic, and have lower self-esteem than those who do not.


title: Reality television

text: A number of fictional works since the 1940s have contained elements similar to elements of reality television. They tended to be set in a dystopian future, with subjects being recorded against their will and often involved violence.


title: Reality television

text: A number of scripted television comedy and satire shows have adopted the format of the documentary-type reality television show, in "mockumentary" style. The first such show was the BBC series "Operation Good Guys", which premiered in 1997. Arguably the best-known and most influential such show is the BBC's "The Office" (2001), which spawned numerous international remakes, including a successful American version. Other examples include "People Like Us" (BBC UK, 1998), "The Games" (ABC Australia, 1999), "Trailer Park Boys" (2001), "Reno 911!" (2003), "The Naked Brothers Band" (2006), "Summer Heights High" (2007), "Parks and Recreation" (2009), "Modern Family" (2009), "Come Fly With Me" (2010), "Real Husbands of Hollywood" (2013), "Trial & Error" (2017) and "Abbott Elementary" (2021). The genre has even encompassed cartoons ("Drawn Together" (2004) and "Total Drama" (2007)) and a show about puppets ("The Muppets", 2015).


title: Reality television

text: Not all reality-television-style mockumentary series are comedic: the 2013 American series "Siberia" has a science fiction-horror bent, while the 2014 Dutch series "The First Years" is a drama.


title: Reality television

text: The 2013–2015 American sketch comedy series "Kroll Show" set most of its sketches as excerpts from various fictional reality television shows, which one critic wrote "aren't far off from the lineups at E!, Bravo, and VH1", and parodied those shows' participants' "lack of self-awareness". The show also satirized the often incestuous nature of reality television, in which some series lead to a cascade of spinoffs. "Kroll Show" executive producer John Levenstein said in an interview that reality TV "has so many tools for telling stories in terms of text and flashbacks and ways to show things to the audience that it's incredibly convenient for comedy and storytelling if you use the full reality show toolkit."


title: Reality television

text: Some feature films have been produced that use some of the conventions of reality television; such films are sometimes referred to as reality films, and sometimes simply as documentaries. Allen Funt's 1970 hidden camera movie "What Do You Say to a Naked Lady?" was based on his reality-television show "Candid Camera". The series "Jackass" spawned five feature films, starting with "" in 2002. A similar Finnish show, "The Dudesons", was adapted for the film "The Dudesons Movie", and a similar British show, "Dirty Sanchez", was adapted for "Dirty Sanchez: The Movie", both in 2006. The producers of "The Real World" created "The Real Cancun" in 2003. The Chinese reality show "Keep Running" was adapted for the 2015 film "Running Man".


title: Reality television

text: The 2003 BBC film "The Other Boleyn Girl" incorporated reality TV-style confessionals in which the two main characters talked directly to the camera.


title: Reality television

text: In 2007, broadcaster Krishnan Guru-Murthy stated that reality television is "a firm and embedded part of television's vocabulary, used in every genre from game-shows and drama to news and current affairs."


title: Reality television

text: The mumblecore film genre, which began in the mid-2000s, and uses video cameras and relies heavily on improvisation and non-professional actors, has been described as influenced in part by what one critic called "the spring-break psychodrama of MTV's "The Real World". Mumblecore director Joe Swanberg has said, "As annoying as reality TV is, it's been really good for filmmakers because it got mainstream audiences used to watching shaky camerawork and different kinds of situations."


title: Cookie

text: A cookie is a baked or cooked snack or dessert that is typically small, flat and sweet. It usually contains flour, sugar, egg, and some type of oil, fat, or butter. It may include other ingredients such as raisins, oats, chocolate chips, nuts, etc.


title: Cookie

text: Most English-speaking countries call crunchy cookies biscuits, except for the United States and Canada, where biscuit refers to a type of quick bread. Chewier biscuits are sometimes called "cookies" even in the United Kingdom. Some cookies may also be named by their shape, such as date squares or bars.


title: Cookie

text: Biscuit or cookie variants include sandwich biscuits, such as custard creams, Jammie Dodgers, Bourbons and Oreos, with marshmallow or jam filling and sometimes dipped in chocolate or another sweet coating. Cookies are often served with beverages such as milk, coffee or tea and sometimes "dunked", an approach which releases more flavour from confections by dissolving the sugars, while also softening their texture. Factory-made cookies are sold in grocery stores, convenience stores and vending machines. Fresh-baked cookies are sold at bakeries and coffeehouses.


title: Cookie

text: In many English-speaking countries outside North America, including the United Kingdom, the most common word for a crisp cookie is biscuit. The term cookie is normally used to describe chewier ones. However, in many regions both terms are used. The container used to store cookies may be called a cookie jar.


title: Cookie

text: Cookies that are baked as a solid layer on a sheet pan and then cut, rather than being baked as individual pieces, are called in British English bar cookies or traybakes.


title: Cookie

text: The word dates from at least 1701 in Scottish usage where the word meant "plain bun", rather than thin baked good, and so it is not certain whether it is the same word. From 1808, the word "cookie" is attested "...in the sense of "small, flat, sweet cake" in American English. The American use is derived from Dutch koekje "little cake," which is a diminutive of "koek" ("cake"), which came from the Middle Dutch word "koke". Another claim is that the American name derives from the Dutch word "koekje" or more precisely its informal, dialect variant "koekie" which means "little cake," and arrived in American English with the Dutch settlement of New Netherland, in the early 1600s.


title: Cookie

text: According to the Scottish National Dictionary, its Scottish name derives from the diminutive form (+ suffix "-ie") of the word "cook", giving the Middle Scots "cookie", "cooky" or "cu(c)kie". There was much trade and cultural contact across the North Sea between the Low Countries and Scotland during the Middle Ages, which can also be seen in the history of curling and, perhaps, golf.


title: Cookie

text: Cookies are most commonly baked until crisp or else for just long enough to ensure soft interior. Other types of cookies are not baked at all, such as varieties of peanut butter cookies that use solidified chocolate rather than set eggs and wheat gluten as a binder. Cookies are produced in a wide variety of styles, using an array of ingredients including sugars, spices, chocolate, butter, peanut butter, nuts, or dried fruits.


title: Cookie

text: A general theory of cookies may be formulated in the following way. Despite its descent from cakes and other sweetened breads, the cookie in almost all its forms has abandoned water as a medium for cohesion. Water in cakes serves to make the batter as thin as possible, the better to allow bubbles—responsible for a cake's fluffiness—to form. In the cookie the agent of cohesion has become some form of oil. Oils, whether in the form of butter, vegetable oils, or lard, are much more viscous than water and evaporate freely at a far higher temperature. Thus a cake made with butter or eggs in place of water is much denser after removal from the oven.


title: Cookie

text: Rather than evaporating as water does in a baking cake, oils in cookies remain. These oils saturate the cavities created during baking by bubbles of escaping gases. These gases are primarily composed of steam vaporized from the egg whites and the carbon dioxide released by heating the baking powder. This saturation produces the most texturally attractive feature of the cookie, and indeed all fried foods: crispness saturated with a moisture (namely oil) that does not render soggy the food it has soaked into.


title: Cookie

text: Cookie-like hard wafers have existed for as long as baking is documented, in part because they survive travel very well, but they were usually not sweet enough to be considered cookies by modern standards.


title: Cookie

text: Cookies appear to have their origins in 7th century AD Persia, shortly after the use of sugar became relatively common in the region. They spread to Europe through the Muslim conquest of Spain. By the 14th century, they were common in all levels of society throughout Europe, from royal cuisine to street vendors. The first documented instance of the figure-shaped gingerbread man was at the court of Elizabeth I of England in the 16th century. She had the gingerbread figures made and presented in the likeness of some of her important guests.


title: Cookie

text: With global travel becoming widespread at that time, cookies made a natural travel companion, a modernized equivalent of the travel cakes used throughout history. One of the most popular early cookies, which traveled especially well and became known on every continent by similar names, was the jumble, a relatively hard cookie made largely from nuts, sweetener, and water.


title: Cookie

text: Cookies came to America through the Dutch in New Amsterdam in the late 1620s. The Dutch word "koekje" was Anglicized to "cookie" or cooky. The earliest reference to cookies in America is in 1703, when "The Dutch in New York provided...'in 1703...at a funeral 800 cookies...'"


title: Cookie

text: The most common modern cookie, given its style by the creaming of butter and sugar, was not common until the 18th century. The Industrial Revolution in Britain and the consumers it created saw cookies (biscuits) become products for the masses, and firms such as Huntley & Palmers (formed in 1822), McVitie's (formed in 1830) and Carr's (formed in 1831) were all established. The decorative biscuit tin, invented by Huntley & Palmers in 1831, saw British cookies exported around the world. In 1891, Cadbury filed a patent for a chocolate-coated cookie.


title: Cookie

text: Cookies are broadly classified according to how they are formed or made, including at least these categories:


title: Cookie

text: Other types of cookies are classified for other reasons, such as their ingredients, size, or intended time of serving:


title: Cookie

text: Leah Ettman from Nutrition Action has criticized the high calorie count and fat content of supersized cookies, which are extra large cookies; she cites the Panera Kitchen Sink Cookie, a supersized chocolate chip cookie, which measures 5 1/2 inches in diameter and has 800 calories. For busy people who eat breakfast cookies in the morning, Kate Bratskeir from the "Huffington Post" recommends lower-sugar cookies filled with "heart-healthy nuts and fiber-rich oats". A book on nutrition by Paul Insel et al. notes that "low-fat" or "diet cookies" may have the same number of calories as regular cookies, due to added sugar.


title: Cookie

text: There are a number of slang usages of the term "cookie". The slang use of "cookie" to mean a person, "especially an attractive woman" is attested to in print since 1920. The catchphrase "that's the way the cookie crumbles", which means "that's just the way things happen" is attested to in print in 1955. Other slang terms include "smart cookie” and “tough cookie.” According to "The Cambridge International Dictionary of Idioms", a smart cookie is “someone who is clever and good at dealing with difficult situations.” The word "cookie" has been vulgar slang for "vagina" in the US since 1970. The word "cookies" is used to refer to the contents of the stomach, often in reference to vomiting (e.g., "pop your cookies" a 1960s expression, or "toss your cookies", a 1970s expression). The expression "cookie cutter", in addition to referring literally to a culinary device used to cut rolled cookie dough into shapes, is also used metaphorically to refer to items or things "having the same configuration or look as many others" (e.g., a "cookie cutter tract house") or to label something as "stereotyped or formulaic" (e.g., an action movie filled with "generic cookie cutter characters").


title: Cookie

text: Cookie Monster is a Muppet on the long-running children's television show "Sesame Street." He is best known for his voracious appetite for cookies and his famous eating phrases, such as "Me want cookie!", "Me eat cookie!" (or simply "COOKIE!"), and "Om nom nom nom" (said through a mouth full of food).


title: Sega Saturn

text: The is a home video game console developed by Sega and released on November 22, 1994, in Japan, May 11, 1995, in North America, and July 8, 1995, in Europe. Part of the fifth generation of video game consoles, it was the successor to the successful Sega Genesis. The Saturn has a dual-CPU architecture and eight processors. Its games are in CD-ROM format, and its game library contains several ports of arcade games as well as original games.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Development of the Saturn began in 1992, the same year Sega's groundbreaking 3D Model 1 arcade hardware debuted. The Saturn was designed around a new CPU from the Japanese electronics company Hitachi. Sega added another video display processor in early 1994 to better compete with Sony's forthcoming PlayStation.


title: Sega Saturn

text: The Saturn was initially successful in Japan but failed to sell in large numbers in the United States, where it was hindered by a surprise May 1995 launch, four months before its scheduled release date. After the debut of the Nintendo 64 in late 1996, the Saturn rapidly lost market share in the U.S., where it was discontinued in 1998. Having sold 9.26 million units worldwide, the Saturn is considered a commercial failure; the cancellation of "Sonic X-treme", planned as the first 3D entry in Sega's popular "Sonic the Hedgehog" series, is considered a factor in its performance. The Saturn was succeeded in 1998 by the Dreamcast.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Although the Saturn is remembered for several well-regarded games, including "Nights into Dreams", the "Panzer Dragoon" series and the "Virtua Fighter" series, its reputation is mixed due to its complex hardware design and limited third-party support. Sega's management has been criticized for its decisions during the system's development and discontinuation.


title: Sega Saturn

text: In the early 1990s, Sega had success with the Genesis (known as the Mega Drive in most countries outside of North America), backed by aggressive advertising campaigns and the popularity of its "Sonic the Hedgehog" series. Sega also had success with arcade games; in 1992 and 1993, the new Sega Model 1 arcade system board showcased Sega AM2's "Virtua Racing" and "Virtua Fighter" (the first 3D fighting game), which played a crucial role in popularizing 3D polygonal graphics. The Model 1 was expensive, so several alternatives helped bring Sega's newest arcade games to Genesis, such as the Sega Virtua Processor chip used for "Virtua Racing", and the 32X add-on.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Development of the Saturn was supervised by Hideki Sato, Sega's director and deputy general manager of research and development. According to the project manager Hideki Okamura, the project started over two years before the Saturn was showcased at the Tokyo Toy Show in June 1994. The name "Saturn" was initially only the codename during development.


title: Sega Saturn

text: In 1993, Sega and the Japanese electronics company Hitachi formed a joint venture to develop a new CPU for the Saturn, which resulted in the creation of the "SuperH RISC Engine" (or SH-2) later that year. The Saturn was designed around a dual-SH2 configuration. According to Kazuhiro Hamada, Sega's section chief for Saturn development during the system's conception, "the SH-2 was chosen for reasons of cost and efficiency. The chip has a calculation system similar to a DSP [digital signal processor], but we realized that a single CPU would not be enough to calculate a 3D world." Although the Saturn's design was largely finished before the end of 1993, reports in early 1994 of the technical capabilities of Sony's upcoming PlayStation console prompted Sega to include another video display processor (VDP) to improve 2D performance and 3D texture mapping. Sega considered making CD-ROM-based and cartridge-only versions of the Saturn, but discarded the idea due to concerns over the lower quality and higher price of cartridge games.


title: Sega Saturn

text: According to Sega of America president Tom Kalinske, Sega of America "fought against the architecture of Saturn for quite some time". Seeking an alternative graphics chip for the Saturn, Kalinske attempted to broker a deal with Silicon Graphics, but Sega of Japan rejected the proposal. Silicon Graphics subsequently collaborated with Nintendo on the Nintendo 64. Kalinske, Sony Electronic Publishing's Olaf Olafsson, and Sony America's Micky Schulhof had discussed development of a joint "Sega/Sony hardware system", which never came to fruition due to Sega's desire to create hardware that could accommodate both 2D and 3D visuals and Sony's competing notion of focusing on 3D technology. Publicly, Kalinske defended the Saturn's design: "Our people feel that they need the multiprocessing to be able to bring to the home what we're doing next year in the arcades."


title: Sega Saturn

text: In 1993, Sega restructured its internal studios in preparation for the Saturn's launch. To ensure high-quality 3D games would be available early in the Saturn's life, and to create a more energetic working environment, developers from Sega's arcade division were asked to create console games. New teams, such as the "Panzer Dragoon" developer Team Andromeda, were formed during this time. In early 1994, the Sega Titan Video arcade system was announced as an arcade counterpart to the Saturn. In April 1994, Acclaim Entertainment announced it would be the first American publisher to produce software for the Titan.


title: Sega Saturn

text: In January 1994, Sega began to develop an add-on for the Genesis, the 32X, to serve as a less expensive entry into the 32-bit era. The decision to create the add-on was made by Sega CEO Hayao Nakayama and widely supported by Sega of America employees. According to the former Sega of America producer Scot Bayless, Nakayama was worried that the Saturn would not be available until after 1994 and that the recently released Atari Jaguar would reduce Sega's hardware sales. As a result, Nakayama ordered his engineers to have the system ready for launch by the end of the year. The 32X would not be compatible with the Saturn, but Sega executive Richard Brudvik-Lindner pointed out that the 32X would play Genesis games, and had the same system architecture as the Saturn. This was justified by Sega's statement that both platforms would run at the same time, and that the 32X would be aimed at players who could not afford the more expensive Saturn. According to Sega of America research and development head Joe Miller, the 32X served a role in assisting development teams to familiarize themselves with the dual SH-2 architecture also used in the Saturn. Because the machines shared many parts and were being prepared to launch around the same time, tensions emerged between Sega of America and Sega of Japan when the Saturn was given priority.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Sega released the Saturn in Japan on November 22, 1994, at a price of ¥44,800. "Virtua Fighter", a faithful port of the popular arcade game, sold at a nearly one-to-one ratio with the Saturn console at launch and was crucial to the system's early success in Japan. Though Sega had wanted to launch with "Clockwork Knight" and "Panzer Dragoon," the only other first-party game available at launch was "Wan Chai Connection". Boosted by the popularity of "Virtua Fighter", Sega's initial shipment of 200,000 Saturn units sold out on the first day. Sega waited until the December 3 launch of the PlayStation to ship more units; when both were sold side by side, the Saturn proved more popular.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Meanwhile, Sega released the 32X on November 21, 1994, in North America, December 3, 1994, in Japan, and January 1995 in PAL territories, and was sold at less than half of the Saturn's launch price. After the holiday season, however, interest in the 32X rapidly declined. Half a million Saturn units were sold in Japan by the end of 1994 (compared to 300,000 PlayStation units), and sales exceeded 1 million within the following six months. There were conflicting reports that the PlayStation enjoyed a higher sell-through rate, and the system gradually began to overtake the Saturn in sales during 1995. Sony attracted many third-party developers to the PlayStation with a liberal $10 licensing fee, excellent development tools, and the introduction of a 7- to 10-day order system that allowed publishers to meet demand more efficiently than the 10- to 12-week lead times for cartridges that had previously been standard in the Japanese video game industry.


title: Sega Saturn

text: In March 1995, Sega of America CEO Tom Kalinske announced that the Saturn would be released in the U.S. on "Saturnday" (Saturday) September 2, 1995.<ref name="Saturnday/1:1"></ref> However, Sega of Japan mandated an early launch to give the Saturn an advantage over the PlayStation. At the first Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) in Los Angeles on May 11, 1995, Kalinske gave a keynote presentation in which he revealed the release price of US$399 (including a copy of "Virtua Fighter"), and described the features of the console. Kalinske also revealed that, due to "high consumer demand", Sega had already shipped 30,000 Saturns to Toys "R" Us, Babbage's, Electronics Boutique, and Software Etc. for immediate release. The announcement upset retailers who were not informed of the surprise release, including Best Buy and Walmart; KB Toys responded by dropping Sega from its lineup. Sony subsequently unveiled the retail price for the PlayStation: Olaf Olafsson, the head of Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA), summoned Steve Race to the stage, who said "$299", and then walked away to applause. The Saturn's release in Europe also came before the previously announced North American date, on July 8, 1995, at a price of £399.99. European retailers and press did not have time to promote the system or its games, harming sales. The PlayStation launched in Europe on September 29, 1995; by November, it had already outsold the Saturn by a factor of three in the United Kingdom, where Sony had allocated £20 million of marketing during the holiday season compared to Sega's £4 million.


title: Sega Saturn

text: The Saturn's U.S. launch was accompanied by a reported $50 million advertising campaign that included coverage in publications such as "Wired" and "Playboy". Early advertising for the system was targeted at a more mature, adult audience than the Genesis ads. Because of the early launch, the Saturn had only six games (all published by Sega) available to start as most third-party games were slated to be released around the original launch date. "Virtua Fighter"s relative lack of popularity in the West, combined with a release schedule of only two games between the surprise launch and September 1995, prevented Sega from capitalizing on the Saturn's early timing. Within two days of its September 9, 1995 launch in North America, the PlayStation (backed by a large marketing campaign) sold more units than the Saturn had in the five months following its surprise launch, with almost all of the initial shipment of 100,000 units being sold in advance, and the rest selling out across the U.S.


title: Sega Saturn

text: A high-quality port of the Namco arcade game "Ridge Racer" contributed to the PlayStation's early success, and garnered favorable media in comparison to the Saturn version of Sega's "Daytona USA", which was considered inferior to its arcade counterpart. Namco, a longtime arcade competitor with Sega, also unveiled the Namco System 11 arcade board, based on raw PlayStation hardware. Although the System 11 was technically inferior to Sega's Model 2 arcade board, its lower price made it attractive to smaller arcades. Following a 1994 acquisition of Sega developers, Namco released "Tekken" for the System 11 and PlayStation. Directed by former "Virtua Fighter" designer Seiichi Ishii, "Tekken" was intended to be fundamentally similar, with the addition of detailed textures and twice the frame rate. "Tekken" surpassed "Virtua Fighter" in popularity due to its superior graphics and nearly arcade-perfect console port, becoming the first million-selling PlayStation game.


title: Sega Saturn

text: On October 2, 1995, Sega announced a Saturn price reduction to $299. High-quality Saturn ports of the Sega Model 2 arcade hits "Sega Rally Championship", "Virtua Cop", and "Virtua Fighter 2" (running at 60 frames per second at a high resolution) were available by the end of the year, and were generally regarded as superior to competitors on the PlayStation. Notwithstanding a subsequent increase in Saturn sales during the 1995 holiday season, the games were not enough to reverse the PlayStation's decisive lead. By 1996, the PlayStation had a considerably larger library than the Saturn, although Sega hoped to generate interest with upcoming exclusives such as "Nights into Dreams". An informal survey of retailers showed that the Saturn and PlayStation sold in roughly equal numbers during the first quarter of 1996. Within its first year, the PlayStation secured over 20% of the entire U.S. video game market. On the first day of the May 1996 E3 show, Sony announced a PlayStation price reduction to $199, a reaction to the release of the Model 2 Saturn in Japan at a price roughly equivalent to $199. On the second day, Sega announced it would match this price, though Saturn hardware was more expensive to manufacture.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Despite the launch of the PlayStation and Saturn, sales of 16-bit games and consoles continued to account for 64% of the video game market in 1995. Sega underestimated the continued popularity of the Genesis, and did not have the inventory to meet demand. Sega was able to capture 43% of the dollar share of the U.S. video game market and sell more than 2 million Genesis units in 1995, but Kalinske estimated that "we could have sold another 300,000 Genesis systems in the November/December timeframe." Nakayama's decision to focus on the Saturn over the Genesis, based on the systems' relative performance in Japan, has been cited as the major contributing factor in this miscalculation.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Due to long-standing disagreements with Sega of Japan, Kalinske lost interest in his work as CEO of Sega of America. By early 1996, rumors were circulating that Kalinske planned to leave Sega, and a July 13 article in the press reported speculation that Sega of Japan was planning significant changes to Sega of America's management. On July 16, 1996, Sega announced that Kalinske would leave Sega after September 30, and that Shoichiro Irimajiri had been appointed chairman and CEO of Sega of America. A former Honda executive, Irimajiri had been involved with Sega of America since joining Sega in 1993. Sega also announced that David Rosen and Nakayama had resigned from their positions as chairman and co-chairman of Sega of America, though both remained with the company. Bernie Stolar, a former executive at Sony Computer Entertainment of America, was named Sega of America's executive vice president in charge of product development and third-party relations. Stolar, who had arranged a six-month PlayStation exclusivity deal for "Mortal Kombat 3" and helped build close relations with Electronic Arts while at Sony, was perceived as a major asset by Sega officials. Finally, Sega of America made plans to expand its PC software business.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Stolar was not supportive of the Saturn, feeling it was poorly designed, and publicly announced at E3 1997 that "the Saturn is not our future". While Stolar had "no interest in lying to people" about the Saturn's prospects, he continued to emphasize quality games for the system, and later said that "we tried to wind it down as cleanly as we could for the consumer". At Sony, Stolar had opposed the localization of Japanese games that he felt would not represent PlayStation well in North America, and advocated a similar policy for the Saturn, although he later sought to distance himself from this perception. These changes were accompanied by a softer image that Sega was beginning to portray in its advertising, including removing the "Sega!" scream and holding press events for the education industry. Marketing for the Saturn in Japan also changed with the introduction of Segata Sanshiro (played by Hiroshi Fujioka), a character in a series of TV advertisements starting in 1997; the character eventually starred in a Saturn game.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Temporarily abandoning arcade development, Sega AM2 head Yu Suzuki began developing several Saturn-exclusive games, including a role-playing game in the "Virtua Fighter" series. Initially conceived as an obscure prototype "The Old Man and the Peach Tree" and intended to address the flaws of contemporary Japanese RPGs (such as poor non-player character artificial intelligence routines), "Virtua Fighter RPG" evolved into a planned 11-part, 45-hour "revenge epic in the tradition of Chinese cinema", which Suzuki hoped would become the Saturn's killer app. The game was eventually released as "Shenmue" for the Saturn's successor, the Dreamcast.


title: Sega Saturn

text: As Sonic Team was working on "Nights into Dreams", Sega tasked the U.S.-based Sega Technical Institute (STI) with developing the first fully 3D entry in its popular "Sonic the Hedgehog" series. The game, "Sonic X-treme", was moved to the Saturn after several prototypes for other hardware (including the 32X) were discarded. It featured a fisheye lens camera system that rotated levels with Sonic's movement. After Nakayama ordered the game be reworked around the engine created for its boss battles, the developers were forced to work between 16 and 20 hours a day to meet their December 1996 deadline. Weeks of development were wasted after Stolar rescinded STI's access to Sonic Team's "Nights into Dreams" engine following an ultimatum by "Nights" programmer Yuji Naka. After programmer Ofer Alon quit and designers Chris Senn and Chris Coffin became ill, "Sonic X-Treme" was cancelled in early 1997. Sonic Team started work on an original 3D "Sonic" game for the Saturn, but development shifted to the Dreamcast and the game became "Sonic Adventure". STI was disbanded in 1996 as a result of changes in management at Sega of America.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Journalists and fans have speculated about the impact a completed "X-treme" might have had on the market. David Houghton of "GamesRadar" described the prospect of "a good 3D "Sonic" game" on the Saturn as "a 'What if...' situation on a par with the dinosaurs not becoming extinct". "IGN"'s Travis Fahs called "X-treme" "the turning point not only for Sega's mascot and their 32-bit console, but for the entire company", but noted that the game served as "an empty vessel for Sega's ambitions and the hopes of their fans". Dave Zdyrko, who operated a prominent Saturn fan website during the system's lifespan, said: "I don't know if ["X-treme"] could've saved the Saturn, but ... "Sonic" helped make the Genesis and it made absolutely no sense why there wasn't a great new "Sonic" title ready at or near the launch of the [Saturn]." In a 2007 retrospective, producer Mike Wallis maintained that "X-treme" "definitely would have been competitive" with Nintendo's "Super Mario 64". "Next Generation" reported in late 1996 that "X-treme" would have harmed Sega's reputation if it did not compare well to contemporary competition. Naka said he had been relieved by the cancellation, feeling that the game was not promising.


title: Sega Saturn

text: From 1993 to early 1996, although Sega's revenue declined as part of an industry-wide slowdown, the company retained control of 38% of the U.S. video game market (compared to Nintendo's 30% and Sony's 24%). Eight hundred thousand PlayStation units were sold in the U.S. by the end of 1995, compared to 400,000 Saturn units. In part due to an aggressive price war, the PlayStation outsold the Saturn by two to one in 1996, while Sega's 16-bit sales declined markedly. By the end of 1996, the PlayStation had sold 2.9 million units in the U.S., more than twice the 1.2 million Saturn units sold. The Christmas 1996 "Three Free" pack, which bundled the Saturn with "Daytona USA", "Virtua Fighter 2", and "Virtua Cop," drove sales dramatically and ensured the Saturn remained a competitor into 1997.


title: Sega Saturn

text: However, the Saturn failed to take the lead. After the launch of the Nintendo 64 in 1996, sales of the Saturn and its games were sharply reduced, while the PlayStation outsold the Saturn by three-to-one in the U.S. in 1997. The 1997 release of "Final Fantasy VII" significantly increased the PlayStation's popularity in Japan. The game helped push PlayStation sales ahead of the Saturn in Japan, after the PlayStation and Saturn had been very close in Japan prior to the game's release. As of August 1997, Sony controlled 47% of the console market, Nintendo 40%, and Sega only 12%. Neither price cuts nor high-profile game releases proved helpful. Reflecting decreased demand for the system, worldwide Saturn shipments during March to September 1997 declined from 2.35 million to 600,000 versus the same period in 1996; shipments in North America declined from 800,000 to 50,000. Due to the Saturn's poor performance in North America, 60 of Sega of America's 200 employees were laid off in late 1997.


title: Sega Saturn

text: As a result of Sega's deteriorating financial situation, Nakayama resigned as president in January 1998 in favor of Irimajiri. Stolar subsequently acceded to president of Sega of America. Following five years of generally declining profits, in the fiscal year ending March 31, 1998 Sega suffered its first parent and consolidated financial losses since its 1988 listing on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. Due to a 54.8% decline in consumer product sales (including a 75.4% decline overseas), the company reported a net loss of ¥43.3 billion () and a consolidated net loss of ¥35.6 billion ().


title: Sega Saturn

text: Shortly before announcing its financial losses, Sega announced that it was discontinuing the Saturn in North America to prepare for the launch of its successor. Only 12 Saturn games were released in North America in 1998 ("Magic Knight Rayearth" was the final official release), compared to 119 in 1996. The Saturn would last longer in Japan. Between June 1996 and August 1998, the Saturn sold a further 1,103,468 consoles and 29,685,781 games in Japan, giving the Saturn a Japanese attach rate of 16.71 games per console, the highest of that generation.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Rumors about the upcoming Dreamcast—spread mainly by Sega itself—were leaked to the public before the last Saturn games were released. The Dreamcast was released on November 27, 1998 in Japan and on September 9, 1999 in North America. The decision to abandon the Saturn effectively left the Western market without Sega games for over one year. Sega suffered an additional ¥42.881 billion consolidated net loss in the fiscal year ending March 1999, and announced plans to eliminate 1,000 jobs, nearly a quarter of its workforce.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Worldwide Saturn sales include at least the following amounts in each territory: 5.75 million in Japan (surpassing the Genesis' sales of 3.58 million there), 1.8 million in the United States, 1 million in Europe, and 530,000 elsewhere. With lifetime sales of 9.26 million units, the Saturn is considered a commercial failure, although its install base in Japan surpassed the Nintendo 64's 5.54 million. Lack of distribution has been cited as a significant factor contributing to the Saturn's failure, as the system's surprise launch damaged Sega's reputation with key retailers. Conversely, Nintendo's long delay in releasing a 3D console and damage caused to Sega's reputation by poorly supported add-ons for the Genesis are considered major factors allowing Sony to gain a foothold in the market.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Featuring eight processors, the Saturn's central processing units are two Hitachi SH-2 microprocessors clocked at 28.6 MHz and capable of 56 MIPS. It uses a Motorola 68EC000 running at 11.3 MHz as a sound controller; a custom sound processor with an integrated Yamaha FH1 DSP running at 22.6 MHz capable of up to 32 sound channels with both FM synthesis and 16-bit 44.1 kHz pulse-code modulation; and two video display processors: the VDP1 (which handles sprites and polygons) and the VDP2 (which handles backgrounds). Its double-speed CD-ROM drive is controlled by a dedicated Hitachi SH-1 processor to reduce load times. The System Control Unit (SCU), which controls all buses and functions as a co-processor of the main SH-2 CPU, has an internal DSP running at 14.3 MHz. It features a cartridge slot that allows for memory expansion, 16 Mbit of work random-access memory (RAM), 12 Mbit of video RAM, 4 Mbit of RAM for sound functions, 4 Mbit of CD buffer RAM and 256 Kbit (32 KB) of battery backup RAM. Its video output, provided by a stereo AV cable, displays at resolutions from 320×224 to 704×224 pixels, and can display up to 16.78 million colors simultaneously. The Saturn measures . It was packaged with an instruction manual, control pad, stereo AV cable, and 100 V AC power supply, with a power consumption of approximately 15 W.


title: Sega Saturn

text: The Saturn had technically impressive hardware at the time of its release, but its complexity made harnessing this power difficult for developers accustomed to conventional programming. The greatest disadvantage was that both CPUs shared the same bus and were unable to access system memory at the same time. Making full use of the 4 KB of cache memory in each CPU was critical to maintaining performance. For example, "Virtua Fighter" used one CPU for each character, while "Nights" used one CPU for 3D environments and the other for 2D objects. The Visual Display Processor 2 (VDP2), which can generate and manipulate backgrounds, has also been cited as one of the system's most important features.


title: Sega Saturn

text: The Saturn's design elicited mixed commentary among game developers and journalists. Developers quoted by "Next Generation" in December 1995 described the Saturn as "a real coder's machine" for "those who love to get their teeth into assembly and really hack the hardware", with "more flexibility" and "more calculating power than the PlayStation". The sound board was also widely praised. By contrast, Lobotomy Software programmer Ezra Dreisbach described the Saturn as significantly slower than the PlayStation, whereas Kenji Eno of WARP observed little difference. In particular, Dreisbach criticized the Saturn's use of quadrilaterals as its basic geometric primitive, in contrast to the triangles rendered by the PlayStation and the Nintendo 64. Ken Humphries of Time Warner Interactive remarked that compared to the PlayStation, the Saturn was worse at generating polygons but better at sprites. Third-party development was initially hindered by the lack of useful software libraries and development tools, requiring developers to write in assembly language. During early Saturn development, programming in assembly could offer a two-to-fivefold speed increase over higher-level languages such as C.


title: Sega Saturn

text: The Saturn hardware is extremely difficult to emulate. Sega responded to complaints about the difficulty of programming for the Saturn by writing new graphics libraries which were claimed to make development easier. Sega of America also purchased a United Kingdom-based development firm, Cross Products, to produce the Saturn's development system. Despite these challenges, Treasure CEO Masato Maegawa stated that the Nintendo 64 was more difficult to develop for than the Saturn. Traveller's Tales founder Jon Burton felt that while the PlayStation was easier "to get started on ... you quickly reach [its] limits", whereas the Saturn's "complicated" hardware had the ability to "improve the speed and look of a game when all used together correctly". A major criticism was the Saturn's use of 2D sprites to generate polygons and simulate 3D space. The PlayStation used a different design, based entirely on 3D triangle-based polygonal rendering, with no direct 2D support. As a result, several analysts described the Saturn as an "essentially" 2D system. For example, Steven L. Kent stated: "Although Nintendo and Sony had true 3D game machines, Sega had a 2D console that did a good job with 3D objects but wasn't optimized for 3D environments."


title: Sega Saturn

text: Several Saturn models were produced in Japan. An updated model in a recolored light gray (officially white) was released at ¥20,000 to reduce the system's cost and raise its appeal among women and younger children. Two models were released by third parties: Hitachi released the Hi-Saturn (a smaller model equipped with a car navigation function), while JVC released the V-Saturn. Saturn controllers came in various color schemes to match different models of the console. The system also supports several accessories. A wireless controller powered by AA batteries uses infrared signal to connect. Designed to work with "Nights", the Saturn 3D Pad includes both a control pad and an analog stick for directional input. Sega also released several versions of arcade sticks as peripherals, including the Virtua Stick, the Virtua Stick Pro, the Mission Analog Stick, and the Twin Stick. Sega also created a light gun peripheral, the Virtua Gun, for shooting games such as "Virtua Cop" and "The Guardian", and the Arcade Racer, a wheel for racing games. The Play Cable connects two Saturn consoles to for multiplayer gaming across two screens, and a multitap connects up to six players to the same console. The Saturn was designed to support up to 12 players on a single console, by using two multitaps. RAM cartridges expand the memory. Other accessories include a keyboard, mouse, floppy disk drive, and movie card.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Like the Genesis, the Saturn had an internet-based gaming service. The Sega NetLink was a 28.8k modem that fit into the cartridge slot in the Saturn for direct dial multiplayer. In Japan, a pay-to-play service was used. It could also be used for web browsing, sending email, and online chat. Because the NetLink was released before the Saturn keyboard, Sega produced a series of CDs containing hundreds of website addresses so that Saturn owners could browse with the joypad. The NetLink functioned with "Daytona USA", "Duke Nukem 3D", "Saturn Bomberman", "Sega Rally", and "". In 1995, Sega announced a variant of the Saturn featuring a built-in NetLink modem under the code name "Sega Pluto", but it was never released.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Sega developed an arcade board based on the Saturn's hardware, the Sega ST-V (or Titan), intended as an affordable alternative to Sega's Model 2 arcade board and as a testing ground for upcoming Saturn software. The Titan was criticized for its comparatively weak performance compared to the Sega Model 2 arcade system by Yu Suzuki, and it was overproduced by Sega's arcade division. Because Sega already had the "Die Hard" license, members of Sega AM1 working at the Sega Technical Institute developed "Die Hard Arcade" for the Titan to clear excess inventory. "Die Hard" became the most successful Sega arcade game produced in the United States at that point. Other games released for the Titan include "" and "Virtua Fighter Kids".


title: Sega Saturn

text: Much of the Saturn's library comes from Sega's arcade ports, including "Daytona USA", "The House of the Dead", "Last Bronx", "Sega Rally Championship", the "Virtua Cop" series, the "Virtua Fighter" series, and "Virtual-On". Saturn ports of 2D Capcom fighting games including "Darkstalkers 3", "Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter", and "Street Fighter Alpha 3" were noted for their faithfulness to their arcade counterparts. "Fighters Megamix", developed by Sega AM2 for the Saturn rather than arcades, combined characters from "Fighting Vipers" and "Virtua Fighter" to positive reviews. Highly rated Saturn exclusives include "Panzer Dragoon Saga", "Dragon Force", "Guardian Heroes", "Nights", "Panzer Dragoon II Zwei", and "Shining Force III". PlayStation games such as "", "Resident Evil", and "Wipeout 2097" received Saturn ports with mixed results. The first-person shooter "PowerSlave" featured some of the most impressive 3D graphics on the system, leading Sega to contract its developers, Lobotomy Software, to produce Saturn ports of "Duke Nukem 3D" and "Quake". While Electronic Arts' limited support for the Saturn and Sega's failure to develop a football game for late 1995 gave Sony the lead in the sports genre, "Sega Sports" published Saturn sports games including the well-regarded "World Series Baseball" and "Sega Worldwide Soccer" series.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Due to the cancellation of "Sonic X-treme", the Saturn lacks an exclusive "Sonic the Hedgehog" platformer; instead it received a graphically enhanced port of the Genesis game "Sonic 3D Blast", the compilation "Sonic Jam", and a racing game, "Sonic R". The platformer "Bug!" received attention for its eponymous main character being a potential mascot for the Saturn, but it failed to catch on as the "Sonic" series had. Considered one of the most important Saturn releases, Sonic Team developed "Nights into Dreams", a score attack game that attempted to simulate both the joy of flying and the fleeting sensation of dreams. The gameplay of "Nights" involves steering the imp-like androgynous protagonist, Nights, as it flies on a mostly 2D plane across surreal stages broken into four segments each. The levels repeat for as long as an in-game time limit allows, while flying over or looping around various objects in rapid succession earns additional points. Although it lacked the fully 3D environments of Nintendo's "Super Mario 64", "Nights"<nowiki>'</nowiki> emphasis on unfettered movement and graceful acrobatic techniques showcased the intuitive potential of analog control. Sonic Team's "Burning Rangers", a fully 3D action-adventure game involving a team of outer-space firefighters, garnered praise for its transparency effects and distinctive art direction, but was released in limited quantities late in the Saturn's lifespan and criticized for its short length.


title: Sega Saturn

text: One of the biggest killer apps for the Saturn in Japan were the "Sakura Wars" games. Co-developed by Sega and Red Entertainment, "Sakura Wars" mixed elements of tactical RPGs, anime cutscenes and visual novels. Despite games such as the "Sakura Wars" series and "Grandia" helping make the Saturn popular in its homeland, they never saw a Western release due to Sega of America's policy of not localizing RPGs and other Japanese games that might have damaged the system's reputation in North America. Despite appearing first on the Saturn, games such as "Dead or Alive", "Grandia", and "" only saw a Western release on the PlayStation. Working Designs localized several Japanese Saturn games before a public feud between Sega of America's Bernie Stolar and Working Designs president Victor Ireland resulted in the company switching their support to the PlayStation. According to the review aggregator GameRankings, "Panzer Dragoon Saga" is the most acclaimed Saturn game; it was praised for its cinematic presentation, evocative plot, and unique battle system. However, Sega released fewer than 20,000 retail copies in North America in what "IGN"'s Levi Buchanan characterized as an example of the Saturn's "ignominious send-off" in the region. Similarly, only the first of three installments of "Shining Force III" was released outside Japan. The Saturn's library also garnered criticism for its lack of sequels to high-profile Genesis-era Sega franchises, with Sega of Japan's cancellation of a planned third installment in Sega of America's popular "Eternal Champions" series cited as a significant source of controversy.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Later ports of Saturn games including "Guardian Heroes", "Nights", and "" continued to garner positive reviews. Partly due to rarity, Saturn games such as "Panzer Dragoon Saga" and "Radiant Silvergun" are noted for their cult following. Due to the system's commercial failure and hardware limitations, Saturn projects such as "Resident Evil 2", "Shenmue", "Sonic Adventure", and "Virtua Fighter 3" were cancelled and moved to the Dreamcast.


title: Sega Saturn

text: At the time of the Saturn's release, "Famicom Tsūshin" awarded it 24 out of 40, higher than the PlayStation's 19 out of 40. In June 1995, Dennis Lynch of the "Chicago Tribune" and Albert Kim of "Entertainment Weekly" praised the Saturn as the most advanced console available; Lynch praised the double-speed CD-ROM drive and "intense surround-sound capabilities" and Kim cited "Panzer Dragoon" as a "lyrical and exhilarating epic" demonstrating the ability of new technology to "transform" the industry. In December 1995, "Next Generation" gave the Saturn three and a half stars out of five, highlighting Sega's marketing and arcade background as strengths but the system's complexity as a weakness. Four critics in "Electronic Gaming Monthly"s December 1996 "Buyer's Guide" rated the Saturn 8, 6, 7, and 8 out of 10 and the PlayStation 9, 10, 9, and 9. By December 1998, "EGM"s reviews were more mixed, with reviewers citing the lack of games as a major problem. According to "EGM" reviewer Crispin Boyer, "the Saturn is the only system that can thrill me one month and totally disappoint me the next".


title: Sega Saturn

text: Retrospective feedback of the Saturn is mixed, but generally praises its game library. According to Greg Sewart of 1UP.com, "the Saturn will go down in history as one of the most troubled, and greatest, systems of all time". In 2009, IGN named the Saturn the 18th-best console of all time, praising its unique game library. According to the reviewers, "While the Saturn ended up losing the popularity contest to both Sony and Nintendo ... "Nights into Dreams", the "Virtua Fighter" and "Panzer Dragoon" series are all examples of exclusive titles that made the console a fan favorite." "Edge" noted that "hardened loyalists continue to reminisce about the console that brought forth games like "Burning Rangers", "Guardian Heroes", "Dragon Force" and "Panzer Dragoon Saga"". In 2015, "The Guardian"s Keith Stuart wrote that "the Saturn has perhaps the strongest line-up of 2D shooters and fighting games in console history".


title: Sega Saturn

text: "Retro Gamer"s Damien McFerran wrote: "Even today, despite the widespread availability of sequels and re-releases on other formats, the Sega Saturn is still a worthwhile investment for those who appreciate the unique gameplay styles of the companies that supported it." IGN's Adam Redsell wrote "[Sega's] devil-may-care attitude towards game development in the Saturn and Dreamcast eras is something that we simply do not see outside of the indie scene today." Necrosoft Games director Brandon Sheffield felt that "the Saturn was a landing point for games that were too 'adult' in content for other systems, as it was the only one that allowed an 18+ rating for content in Japan ... some games, like "Enemy Zero" used it to take body horror to new levels, an important step toward the expansion of games and who they served." Sewart praised the Saturn's first-party games as "Sega's shining moment as a game developer", with Sonic Team demonstrating its creative range and AM2 producing numerous technically impressive arcade ports. He also commented on the many Japan-exclusive Saturn releases, which he connected with a subsequent boom in the game import market. IGN's Travis Fahs was critical of the Saturn library's lack of "fresh ideas" and "precious few high-profile franchises", in contrast to what he described as Sega's more creative Dreamcast output.


title: Sega Saturn

text: Sega has been criticized for its management of the Saturn. McFerran felt its management staff had "fallen out of touch with both the demands of the market and the industry". Stolar has also been criticized; according to Fahs, "Stolar's decision to abandon the Saturn made him a villain to many Sega fans, but ... it was better to regroup than to enter the next fight battered and bruised. Dreamcast would be Stolar's redemption." Stolar defended his decision, saying, "I felt Saturn was hurting the company more than helping it. That was a battle that we weren't going to win." Sheffield said that the Saturn's quadrilaterals undermined third-party support, but because "nVidia invested in quads" at the same time, there had been "a remote possibility" they could have "become the standard instead of triangles ... if somehow, magically, the Saturn were the most popular console of that era." Speaking more positively, former Working Designs president Victor Ireland described the Saturn as "the start of the future of console gaming" because it "got the better developers thinking and designing with parallel-processing architecture in mind for the first time". In GamesRadar, Justin Towell wrote that the Saturn's 3D Pad "set the template for every successful controller that followed, with analog shoulder triggers and left thumbstick ... I don't see any three-pronged controllers around the office these days."


title: Sega Saturn

text: Douglass C. Perry of Gamasutra noted that, from its surprise launch to its ultimate failure, the Saturn "soured many gamers on Sega products". Sewart and IGN's Levi Buchanan cited the failure of the Saturn as the major reason for Sega's downfall as a hardware manufacturer, but USgamer's Jeremy Parish described it as "more a symptom ... than a cause" of the decline, which began with add-ons for the Genesis that fragmented the market and continued with Sega of America's and Sega of Japan's competing designs for the Dreamcast. Sheffield portrayed Sega's mistakes with the Saturn as emblematic of the broader then-decline of the Japanese gaming industry: "They thought they were invincible, and that structure and hierarchy were necessary for their survival, but more flexibility, and a greater participation with the West could have saved them." According to Stuart, Sega "didn't see ... the roots of a prevailing trend, away from arcade conversions and traditional role-playing adventures and toward a much wider console development community with fresh ideas about gameplay and structure." Pulp365 reviews editor Matt Paprocki concluded that "the Saturn is a relic, but an important one, which represents the harshness of progress and what it can leave in its wake".


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Ecgberht (770/775 – 839), also spelled Egbert, Ecgbert, Ecgbriht, Ecgbeorht, and Ecbert, was King of Wessex from 802 until his death in 839. His father was King Ealhmund of Kent. In the 780s, Ecgberht was forced into exile to Charlemagne's court in the Frankish Empire by the kings Offa of Mercia and Beorhtric of Wessex, but on Beorhtric's death in 802, Ecgberht returned and took the throne.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Little is known of the first 20 years of Ecgberht's reign, but it is thought that he was able to maintain the independence of Wessex against the kingdom of Mercia, which at that time dominated the other southern English kingdoms. In 825, Ecgberht defeated Beornwulf of Mercia, ended Mercia's supremacy at the Battle of Ellandun, and proceeded to take control of the Mercian dependencies in southeastern England. In 829, he defeated Wiglaf of Mercia and drove him out of his kingdom, temporarily ruling Mercia directly. Later that year Ecgberht received the submission of the Northumbrian king at Dore. The "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle" subsequently described Ecgberht as a "bretwalda" or 'wide-ruler' of Anglo-Saxon lands.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Ecgberht was unable to maintain this dominant position, and within a year Wiglaf regained the throne of Mercia. However, Wessex did retain control of Kent, Sussex, and Surrey; these territories were given to Ecgberht's son Æthelwulf to rule as a subking under Ecgberht. When Ecgberht died in 839, Æthelwulf succeeded him; the southeastern kingdoms were finally absorbed into the kingdom of Wessex after the death of Æthelwulf's son Æthelbald in 860. Ecgbert's descendants ruled Wessex and, later, all of England continuously until 1013.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Historians do not agree on Ecgberht's ancestry. The earliest version of the "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle," the "Parker Chronicle," begins with a genealogical preface tracing the ancestry of Ecgberht's son Æthelwulf back through Ecgberht, Ealhmund (thought to be king Ealhmund of Kent), and the otherwise unknown Eafa and Eoppa to Ingild, brother of King Ine of Wessex, who abdicated the throne in 726. It continues back to Cerdic, founder of the House of Wessex. Ecgberht's descent from Ingild was accepted by Frank Stenton, but not the earlier genealogy back to Cerdic. Heather Edwards in her Online "Dictionary of National Biography" article on Ecgberht argues that he was of Kentish origin, and that the West Saxon descent may have been manufactured during his reign to give him legitimacy, whereas Rory Naismith considered a Kentish origin unlikely, and that it is more probable that "Ecgberht was born of good West Saxon royal stock".


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Ecgberht's wife's name is unknown. A fifteenth-century chronicle now held by Oxford University names Ecgberht's wife as Redburga who was supposedly a relative of Charlemagne who he married when he was banished to Francia, but this is dismissed by academic historians in view of its late date. Æthelwulf is their only known child.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: He is reputed to have had a half-sister Alburga, later to be recognised as a saint for her founding of Wilton Abbey. She was married to Wulfstan, ealdorman of Wiltshire, and on his death in 802 she became a nun, Abbess of Wilton Abbey.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Offa of Mercia, who reigned from 757 to 796, was the dominant force in Anglo-Saxon England in the second half of the eighth century. The relationship between Offa and Cynewulf, who was king of Wessex from 757 to 786, is not well documented, but it seems likely that Cynewulf maintained some independence from Mercian overlordship. Evidence of the relationship between kings can come from charters, which were documents which granted land to followers or to churchmen, and which were witnessed by the kings who had power to grant the land. In some cases a king will appear on a charter as a "subregulus", or "subking", making it clear that he has an overlord. Cynewulf appears as "King of the West Saxons" on a charter of Offa's in 772, and in 779, he was defeated in battle of Bensington by Offa, but there is nothing else to suggest Cynewulf was not his own master, and he is not known to have acknowledged Offa as overlord. Offa did have influence in the southeast of the country: a charter of 764 shows him in the company of Heahberht of Kent, suggesting that Offa's influence helped place Heahberht on the throne. The extent of Offa's control of Kent between 765 and 776 is a matter of debate amongst historians, but from 776 until about 784 it appears that the Kentish kings had substantial independence from Mercia.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Another Ecgberht, Ecgberht II of Kent, ruled in that kingdom throughout the 770s; he is last mentioned in 779, in a charter granting land at Rochester. In 784 a new king of Kent, Ealhmund, appears in the "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle". According to a note in the margin, "this king Ealhmund was Egbert's father [i.e. Ecgberht of Wessex], Egbert was Æthelwulf's father". This is supported by the genealogical preface from the A text of the "Chronicle", which gives Ecgberht's father's name as Ealhmund without further details. The preface probably dates from the late ninth century; the marginal note is on the F manuscript of the "Chronicle", which is a Kentish version dating from about 1100.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Ealhmund does not appear to have long survived in power: there is no record of his activities after 784. There is, however, extensive evidence of Offa's domination of Kent during the late 780s, with his goals apparently going beyond overlordship to outright annexation of the kingdom, and he has been described as "the rival, not the overlord, of the Kentish kings". It is possible that the young Ecgberht fled to Wessex in 785 or so; it is suggestive that the "Chronicle" mentions in a later entry that Beorhtric, Cynewulf's successor, helped Offa to exile Ecgberht.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Cynewulf was murdered in 786. His succession was contested by Ecgberht, but he was defeated by Beorhtric, maybe with Offa's assistance. The "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle" records that Ecgberht spent three years in Francia before he was king, exiled by Beorhtric and Offa. The text says "iii" for three, but this may have been a scribal error, with the correct reading being "xiii", that is, thirteen years. Beorhtric's reign lasted sixteen years, and not thirteen; and all extant texts of the "Chronicle" agree on "iii", but many modern accounts assume that Ecgberht did indeed spend thirteen years in Francia. This requires assuming that the error in transcription is common to every manuscript of the "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle"; many historians make this assumption but others have rejected it as unlikely, given the consistency of the sources. In either case Ecgberht was probably exiled in 789, when Beorhtric, his rival, married the daughter of Offa of Mercia.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: At the time Ecgberht was in exile, Francia was ruled by Charlemagne, who maintained Frankish influence in Northumbria and is known to have supported Offa's enemies in the south. Another exile in Gaul at this time was Odberht, a priest, who is almost certainly the same person as Eadberht, who later became king of Kent. According to a later chronicler, William of Malmesbury, Ecgberht learned the arts of government during his time in Gaul.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Beorhtric's dependency on Mercia continued into the reign of Cenwulf, who became king of Mercia a few months after Offa's death. Beorhtric died in 802, and Ecgberht came to the throne of Wessex, probably with the support of Charlemagne and perhaps also the papacy. The Mercians continued to oppose Ecgberht: the day of his accession, the Hwicce (who had originally formed a separate kingdom, but by that time were part of Mercia) attacked, under the leadership of their ealdorman, Æthelmund. Weohstan, a Wessex ealdorman, met him with men from Wiltshire; according to a 15th-century source, Weohstan had married Alburga, Ecgberht's sister, and so was his brother-in-law. The Hwicce were defeated, though Weohstan was killed as well as Æthelmund. Nothing more is recorded of Ecgberht's relations with Mercia for more than twenty years after this battle. It seems likely that Ecgberht had no influence outside his own borders, but on the other hand there is no evidence that he ever submitted to the overlordship of Cenwulf. Cenwulf did have overlordship of the rest of southern England, but in Cenwulf's charters the title of "overlord of the southern English" never appears, presumably in consequence of the independence of the kingdom of Wessex.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: In 815 the "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle" records that Ecgberht ravaged the whole of the territories of the remaining British kingdom, Dumnonia, known to the author of the "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle" as the West Welsh; their territory was about equivalent to what is now Cornwall. Ten years later, a charter dated 19 August 825 indicates that Ecgberht was campaigning in Dumnonia again; this may have been related to a battle recorded in the "Chronicle" at Gafulford in 823, between the men of Devon and the Britons of Cornwall.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: It was also in 825 that one of the most important battles in Anglo-Saxon history took place, when Ecgberht defeated Beornwulf of Mercia at Ellandun—now Wroughton, near Swindon. This battle marked the end of the Mercian domination of southern England. The "Chronicle" tells how Ecgberht followed up his victory: "Then he sent his son Æthelwulf from the army, and Ealhstan, his bishop, and Wulfheard, his ealdorman, to Kent with a great troop." Æthelwulf drove Baldred, the king of Kent, north over the Thames, and according to the "Chronicle", the men of Kent, Essex, Surrey and Sussex then all submitted to Æthelwulf "because earlier they were wrongly forced away from his relatives". This may refer to Offa's interventions in Kent at the time Ecgberht's father Ealhmund became king; if so, the chronicler's remark may also indicate Ealhmund had connections elsewhere in southeast England.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: The "Chronicle"s version of events makes it appear that Baldred was driven out shortly after the battle, but this was probably not the case. A document from Kent survives which gives the date, March 826, as being in the third year of the reign of Beornwulf. This makes it likely that Beornwulf still had authority in Kent at this date, as Baldred's overlord; hence Baldred was apparently still in power. In Essex, Ecgberht expelled King Sigered, though the date is unknown. It may have been delayed until 829, since a later chronicler associates the expulsion with a campaign of Ecgberht's in that year against the Mercians.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: The "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle" does not say who was the aggressor at Ellandun, but one recent history asserts that Beornwulf was almost certainly the one who attacked. According to this view, Beornwulf may have taken advantage of the Wessex campaign in Dumnonia in the summer of 825. Beornwulf's motivation to launch an attack would have been the threat of unrest or instability in the southeast: the dynastic connections with Kent made Wessex a threat to Mercian dominance.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: The consequences of Ellandun went beyond the immediate loss of Mercian power in the southeast. According to the "Chronicle", the East Anglians asked for Ecgberht's protection against the Mercians in the same year, 825, though it may actually have been in the following year that the request was made. In 826 Beornwulf invaded East Anglia, presumably to recover his overlordship. He was slain, however, as was his successor, Ludeca, who invaded East Anglia in 827, evidently for the same reason. It may be that the Mercians were hoping for support from Kent: there was some reason to suppose that Wulfred, the Archbishop of Canterbury, might be discontented with West Saxon rule, as Ecgberht had terminated Wulfred's currency and had begun to mint his own, at Rochester and Canterbury, and it is known that Ecgberht seized property belonging to Canterbury. The outcome in East Anglia was a disaster for the Mercians, which confirmed West Saxon power in the southeast.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: In 829 Ecgberht invaded Mercia and drove Wiglaf, the king of Mercia, into exile. This victory gave Ecgberht control of the London Mint, and he issued coins as King of Mercia. It was after this victory that the West Saxon scribe described him as a "bretwalda", meaning 'wide-ruler' or perhaps 'Britain-ruler', in a famous passage in the "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle". The relevant part of the annal reads, in the C manuscript of the "Chronicle":


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: "⁊ þy geare geeode Ecgbriht cing Myrcna rice ⁊ eall þæt be suþan Humbre wæs, ⁊ he wæs eahtaþa cing se ðe Bretenanwealda wæs."


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: And the same year King Egbert conquered the kingdom of Mercia, and all that was south of the Humber, and he was the eighth king who was 'Wide-ruler'.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: The previous seven "bretwaldas" are also named by the Chronicler, who gives the same seven names that Bede lists as holding imperium, starting with Ælle of Sussex and ending with Oswiu of Northumbria. The list is often thought to be incomplete, omitting as it does some dominant Mercian kings such as Penda and Offa. The exact meaning of the title has been much debated; it has been described as "a term of encomiastic poetry" but there is also evidence that it implied a definite role of military leadership.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Later in 829, according to the "Anglo-Saxon Chronicle", Ecgberht received the submission of the Northumbrians at Dore (now a suburb of Sheffield); the Northumbrian king was probably Eanred. According to a later chronicler, Roger of Wendover, Ecgberht invaded Northumbria and plundered it before Eanred submitted: "When Ecgberht had obtained all the southern kingdoms, he led a large army into Northumbria, and laid waste that province with severe pillaging, and made King Eanred pay tribute." Roger of Wendover is known to have incorporated Northumbrian annals into his version; the "Chronicle" does not mention these events. However, the nature of Eanred's submission has been questioned: one historian has suggested that it is more likely that the meeting at Dore represented a mutual recognition of sovereignty.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: In 830, Ecgberht led a successful expedition against the Welsh, almost certainly with the intent of extending West Saxon influence into the Welsh lands previously within the Mercian orbit. This marked the high point of Ecgberht's influence.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: In 830, Mercia regained its independence under Wiglaf—the "Chronicle" merely says that Wiglaf "obtained the kingdom of Mercia again", but the most likely explanation is that this was the result of a Mercian rebellion against Wessex rule.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Ecgberht's dominion over southern England came to an end with Wiglaf's recovery of power. Wiglaf's return is followed by evidence of his independence from Wessex. Charters indicate Wiglaf had authority in Middlesex and Berkshire, and in a charter of 836 Wiglaf uses the phrase "my bishops, "duces", and magistrates" to describe a group that included eleven bishops from the episcopate of Canterbury, including bishops of sees in West Saxon territory. It is significant that Wiglaf was still able to call together such a group of notables; the West Saxons, even if they were able to do so, held no such councils. Wiglaf may also have brought Essex back into the Mercian orbit during the years after he recovered the throne. In East Anglia, King Æthelstan minted coins, possibly as early as 827, but more likely c. 830 after Ecgberht's influence was reduced with Wiglaf's return to power in Mercia. This demonstration of independence on East Anglia's part is not surprising, as it was Æthelstan who was probably responsible for the defeat and death of both Beornwulf and Ludeca.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Both Wessex's sudden rise to power in the late 820s, and the subsequent failure to retain this dominant position, have been examined by historians looking for underlying causes. One plausible explanation for the events of these years is that Wessex's fortunes were to some degree dependent on Carolingian support. The Franks supported Eardwulf when he recovered the throne of Northumbria in 808, so it is plausible that they also supported Ecgberht's accession in 802. At Easter 839, not long before Ecgberht's death, he was in touch with Louis the Pious, king of the Franks, to arrange safe passage to Rome. Hence a continuing relationship with the Franks seems to be part of southern English politics during the first half of the ninth century.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Carolingian support may have been one of the factors that helped Ecgberht achieve the military successes of the late 820s. However, the Rhenish and Frankish commercial networks collapsed at some time in the 820s or 830s, and in addition, a rebellion broke out in February 830 against Louis the Pious—the first of a series of internal conflicts that lasted through the 830s and beyond. These distractions may have prevented Louis from supporting Ecgberht. In this view, the withdrawal of Frankish influence would have left East Anglia, Mercia and Wessex to find a balance of power not dependent on outside aid.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Despite the loss of dominance, Ecgberht's military successes fundamentally changed the political landscape of Anglo-Saxon England. Wessex retained control of the south-eastern kingdoms, with the possible exception of Essex, and Mercia did not regain control of East Anglia. Ecgberht's victories marked the end of the independent existence of the kingdoms of Kent and Sussex. The conquered territories were administered as a subkingdom for a while, including Surrey and possibly Essex. Although Æthelwulf was a subking under Ecgberht, it is clear that he maintained his own royal household, with which he travelled around his kingdom. Charters issued in Kent described Ecgberht and Æthelwulf as "kings of the West Saxons and also of the people of Kent". When Æthelwulf died in 858 his will, in which Wessex is left to one son and the southeastern kingdom to another, makes it clear that it was not until after 858 that the kingdoms were fully integrated. Mercia remained a threat, however; Ecgberht's son Æthelwulf, established as king of Kent, gave estates to Christ Church, Canterbury, probably to counter any influence the Mercians might still have there.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: In the southwest, Ecgberht was defeated in 836 at Carhampton by the Danes, but in 838 he won a battle against them and their allies the West Welsh at the Battle of Hingston Down in Cornwall. The Dumnonian royal line continued after this time, but it is at this date that the independence of one of the last British kingdoms may be considered to have ended. The details of Anglo-Saxon expansion into Cornwall are quite poorly recorded, but some evidence comes from place names. The River Ottery, which flows east into the Tamar near Launceston, appears to be a boundary: south of the Ottery the placenames are overwhelmingly Cornish, whereas to the north they are more heavily influenced by the English newcomers.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: At a council at Kingston upon Thames in 838, Ecgberht and Æthelwulf granted land to the sees of Winchester and Canterbury in return for the promise of support for Æthelwulf's claim to the throne. The archbishop of Canterbury, Ceolnoth, also accepted Ecgberht and Æthelwulf as the lords and protectors of the monasteries under Ceolnoth's control. These agreements, along with a later charter in which Æthelwulf confirmed church privileges, suggest that the church had recognised that Wessex was a new political power that must be dealt with. Churchmen consecrated the king at coronation ceremonies, and helped to write the wills which specified the king's heir; their support had real value in establishing West Saxon control and a smooth succession for Ecgberht's line. Both the record of the Council of Kingston, and another charter of that year, include the identical phrasing: that a condition of the grant is that "we ourselves and our heirs shall always hereafter have firm and unshakable friendships from Archbishop Ceolnoth and his congregation at Christ Church."


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Although nothing is known of any other claimants to the throne, it is likely that there were other surviving descendants of Cerdic (the supposed progenitor of all the kings of Wessex) who might have contended for the kingdom. Ecgberht died in 839, and his will, according to the account of it found in the will of his grandson, Alfred the Great, left land only to male members of his family, so that the estates should not be lost to the royal house through marriage. Ecgberht's wealth, acquired through conquest, was no doubt one reason for his ability to purchase the support of the southeastern church establishment; the thriftiness of his will indicates he understood the importance of personal wealth to a king. The kingship of Wessex had been frequently contested among different branches of the royal line, and it is a noteworthy achievement of Ecgberht's that he was able to ensure Æthelwulf's untroubled succession. In addition, Æthelwulf's experience of kingship, in the subkingdom formed from Ecgberht's southeastern conquests, would have been valuable to him when he took the throne.


title: Ecgberht, King of Wessex

text: Ecgberht was buried in Winchester, as were his son, Æthelwulf, his grandson, Alfred the Great, and his great-grandson, Edward the Elder. During the ninth century, Winchester began to show signs of urbanisation, and it is likely that the sequence of burials indicates that Winchester was held in high regard by the West Saxon royal line.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: Friends: The Reunion is a 2021 reunion special of the American television sitcom "Friends". The special is hosted by James Corden and executive produced by the show's co-creators, Marta Kauffman and David Crane, Kevin S. Bright, the show's main cast, and Ben Winston (who also directed the special). The special sees the main cast revisit the sets of the original show (such as the Friends' apartments, the Central Perk coffee shop, and the signature water fountain), meet with guests who appeared on the show as well as celebrity guests, do table reads and re-enactments of "Friends" episodes, and share behind-the-scenes footage.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: In November 2019, Warner Bros. Television was developing a "Friends" reunion special for their new streaming service, HBO Max. The special would feature the whole cast and co-stars. In February 2020, an unscripted "Friends" was commissioned with all original cast and co-creators returning.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: The special was executive produced by the show's co-creators, Kevin S. Bright, Marta Kauffman and David Crane, and the show's main cast, Jennifer Aniston, Courteney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, Matt LeBlanc, Matthew Perry and David Schwimmer. Ben Winston directed and executive produced through Fulwell 73. Warner Bros. Unscripted & Alternative Television (later Warner Horizon Unscripted Television) was also involved in the production of the special.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: The special was filmed in Los Angeles, California, at Stage 24, also known as "The "Friends" Stage" at Warner Bros. Studios, Burbank, where "Friends" had been filmed since its second season. The filming of the reunion began in April 2021. Filming of the special was delayed twice, first in March 2020, and second in August 2020, both due to the COVID-19 pandemic.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: The trivia game and talk show segments of the special, hosted by James Corden, were filmed in front of a live audience of "mostly union extras, [who were] COVID screened and hired for the gig". Representatives for Perry clarified that he had an emergency dental surgery prior to filming when viewers were concerned about his appearance.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: In an episode of Rob Lowe's podcast released in January 2021, Kudrow said she had only seen the rebuilt Central Perk set and filmed "a little something" which eventually became Lady Gaga's appearance recorded in November 2020. Director and producer Ben Winston stated the cast trivia game segment was being planned out in March 2021 while producing "The Late Late Show" and the 63rd Annual Grammy Awards.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: The three actors who portrayed the barbershop quartet in "The One With All the Jealousy" appeared in the trivia game segment. Show guest stars Danny DeVito, Ben Stiller, Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt and Sean Penn were mentioned and shown via archive footage. Actor Paul Rudd briefly appeared in the series finale curtain call. Appearances by director James Burrows and comedian Bob Newhart were cut from the special and used as bonus clips in the HBO Max release.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: The reunion special was originally set to be released with the launch of HBO Max on May 27, 2020, along with the 236 episodes of the original series that were available at launch; this was delayed a year later due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In May 2021, a teaser trailer was released announcing that the reunion special was scheduled to be released on May 27, 2021, on HBO Max. The HBO Max release includes five bonus clips that were cut from the special as extras.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: The special was also released internationally simultaneously with the U.S. release on Crave in Canada, Sky One and NOW in the United Kingdom, Ireland and Italy, Foxtel Now and Binge in Australia, TVNZ 2 and TVNZ OnDemand in New Zealand, ZEE5 in India, OSN in the United Arab Emirates, HBO Go and HBO Asia in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, the Philippines, Taiwan and Hong Kong, HBO Nordic in Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland, HBO España in Spain and HBO Portugal in Portugal.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: In China, the special was streamed on iQIYI, Youku and Tencent Video, although the scenes featuring Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber, and BTS have been removed. LGBTQ references and references to urine in the special were also removed. In Japan, the special was exclusively released on U-NEXT on May 31, 2021.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: In Vietnam, the special was streamed on FPT Play and VieOn with Vietnamese subtitles being hardsubbed. In South Africa, the special was aired on MNET(DStv) on May 30, 2021, and was released for streaming on Showmax on May 31, 2021.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: On Rotten Tomatoes, the special has an approval rating of 67% based on 52 reviews, with an average score of 6.4/10. The website's critics consensus is, "It may work best for die-hards, but when it cuts out the noise and focuses on the connections "Friends: The Reunion" is as warm and comforting as a night in the café." On Metacritic, the special has a weighted average score of 65 out of 100 indicating "generally favorable reviews" based on 27 critics.


title: Friends: The Reunion

text: In the United Kingdom, "Friends: The Reunion" aired on Sky One and became the channel's most watched programme in its history, with 5.3 million viewers tuning in.


title: Drishyam (2015 film)

text: Drishyam () is a 2015 Indian Hindi-language crime thriller film directed by Nishikant Kamat. It is a remake of the 2013 Malayalam film "Drishyam". The film stars Ajay Devgn, Tabu, Shriya Saran, Ishita Dutta and Rishab Chadha. It was released on 31 July 2015 and emerged as a critical and commercial success, earning over crores worldwide. A sequel titled "Drishyam 2" was released in 2022. Later in 2022, the film was released in China, earning $4.05 million pushing its worldwide total over ₹147 crores.


title: Drishyam (2015 film)

text: The film starts with a new policeman in the town called Pondolim, a fictitious village in Goa, joining the newly built police station in the town. While walking through the station with a constable, he notices a man, ostensibly named Vijay Salgaonkar, sitting at one far end. The newly joined policeman asks whether he is "Vijay Salgaonkar", to which the constable replies positively. The film then goes into a flashback as "Vijay" closes his eyes.


title: Drishyam (2015 film)

text: Vijay Salgaonkar is an orphan who dropped out of school after 4th grade. Now he is a content businessman running a cable TV service in Goa. He is married to Nandini, and they have two daughters, Anju, his adopted daughter, a class twelve student, and Anu, a class six student. His only interest is watching films. He has gained a lot of fame and support in his area for helping people with the help methods he learns from films.


title: Drishyam (2015 film)

text: During a nature camp which Anju attends, a hidden cell phone camera records Anju removing her clothes and showering in the bathroom. The culprit, Sameer "Sam" Deshmukh, is the son of Inspector General of Goa Police, Meera Deshmukh. Sam comes to blackmail Anju for sexual favours one day, turning up at her house the same night, when Nandini shows up too; her daughter informed her. Nandini pleads with Sam to leave their family alone, but Sam refuses to delete the video clip unless his sexual demand is fulfilled. Nandini begs him to leave Anju alone, and Sam says he will do it on one condition: Nandini should have sex with him instead. In an attempt to break the offending cell phone, Anju swings at Sam with a lead pipe, but she strikes him in the head instead, killing him immediately. They bury his body in a compost pit in the backyard, which Anu witnesses. In the morning, when he returns from work, Nandini tells Vijay about the incident and he devises a way to save his family from the police. He removes the broken cell phone and disposes of Sam's car, which is seen by the Sub-Inspector Laxmikant Gaitonde, who has a grudge against Vijay. The next day, Vijay takes his family out on a trip to Panaji, where they visit an Ashram, watch a film, and eat at a restaurant.


title: Drishyam (2015 film)

text: After a preliminary investigation, Meera calls Vijay and his family for questioning. Having predicted that the police would come calling eventually, Vijay coaches his family on how to face the interrogations without raising suspicion. When questioned individually, the family sticks to their individual stories and the police cannot find a crack in their alibis. Vijay produces bus tickets, movie tickets, lodging and restaurant bills as proof of the family's visit to Panjim. Meera questions the owners of the establishments they have been to and their statements prove Vijay's alibi. Meera realizes that on the day of the incident, Vijay had taken the tickets and the bill, made acquaintance with the owners and had gone for the trip with his family the next day, thus proving his alibi and making the owners unwittingly tell a lie.


title: Drishyam (2015 film)

text: Meera has the Salgaonkar family arrested, and Gaitonde uses brute force to beat the truth out of them though Vijay, Nandini and Anju resist. Meanwhile, Meera finds out about Sam and his video of Anju from Sam's friend, Alex. Eventually, Anu gives in and reveals that she has seen a body buried in the compost pit. After digging into the compost pit, the authorities find the carcass of a dog. Vijay reports to the media that Gaitonde physically abused both his daughters, causing an angry Gaitonde to attempt an attack on Vijay. Still, Vijay's in-laws retaliate, and a mob rises to beat up Gaitonde. Following the incident, Gaitonde is suspended, Meera resigns from her post, and the entire investigating team of the Police Station is transferred out, with the case now requiring authorization from the court. When Nandini asks Vijay about what he did to the body, he refuses to tell her, saying that the secret will remain within his mind and it must go with him without a trace.


title: Drishyam (2015 film)

text: Meera and her husband Mahesh meet Vijay at the seaside to ask forgiveness for the video clip and their son's rude and pervert behaviour, and to get a confirmation whether their son is alive or not. They also reveal they would leave for London to live with Meera's brother. Finally, Vijay cryptically confesses to killing Sam. He also asks for forgiveness and explains to them that he would go to any lengths to protect his family.


title: Drishyam (2015 film)

text: The film returns to the present day as Vijay opens his eyes. He signs the register in the newly constructed police station. While signing, the new inspector tells him that he can't be fooled and will definitely find out, at which point Vijay smilingly confides that he is sure the local police force and the police station will protect its townspeople.


title: Drishyam (2015 film)

text: A flashback plays along as Vijay exits the police station in the present day, revealing that Vijay buried the body under the new police station while it was under construction. As he looks at both sides of the road, the film suddenly closes with a blackout.


title: Drishyam (2015 film)

text: In October 2014, it was announced that Saif Ali Khan would take the lead role and reprise the role played by Mohanlal in the 2013 Malayalam predecessor. There were also reports that Akshay Kumar will take up the lead, but in November 2014, it was announced that Ajay Devgn would star in the Hindi remake of the 2013 film "Drishyam", which will be produced by Viacom 18 Motion Pictures in association with Panorama Studios and directed by Nishikant Kamat. Plans then were to have Devgn reprise the role played by Mohanlal in the 2013 film. Later it was announced that Tabu will be playing the role of Meera Deshmukh a cop and Shriya Saran will play the wife of Ajay Devgn's character.