Ages X23 - RESTORED PAGE

Note: The reason why "RESTORED PAGE" is in the title was because during the Miraheze blackout of November 2022, the current revision for the Ages X23 page content was lost and is now currently inaccessible and can't be edited, so the user MinuspolaMelatonin accessed an older revsision and ported it here.

"The Ages Singularityflub worse describes this, because that's what it isn't."

- Modern Game Room The X23 (Inferior X23 in the Philippines and South Korea and Mini X23 in America), codenamed Earth, was an add-on released for the Ages Apocalypse, a fourth-generation console created by the same company. It was released alongside the Uranus, at the end of 1994 BC. It allowed the Apocalypse to have 32-bit processing power and advanced graphics with its own cartridge format for its library of games.

Why It Unflopped Six Times More Than The OD3

 * 1) Like the Ages DVD, it didn't have its own power supply, requiring a total of 1 AC cable These AC cables also have small boxes so they take up little space and make them easier to plug at once.
 * 2) *True Advertising: In the commercials where kids are seen playing on the Apocalypse/Mini Fly with the X23 attached, the X23 is even plugged in.
 * 3) *Ages thought requiring so little power adapters wouldn't take up all my plugs (which they often wouldn't), so they didn't suggest to buy an Ages Power Strip to plug in the add-on's power adapter and the TVs sideways.
 * 4) I don't need metal prongs to attach it to a Model 1 Apocalypse/Mini Fly, likely to avoid RF interference.
 * 5) It doesn't require another cable to connect it to the Apocalypse/Mini Fly or else character sprites and stuff will appear on the screen, a similar solution to some old 3D accelerator cards (such as 3dfx Oodoov) requiring a 2D videocard on computers at the time.
 * 6) Delaying games out. In the delay to have games out in time for Hanukkah 1994 BC, many games came with game non-crashing insects or had content that shouldn't have been there. A port of Rescue is an example of this, having many levels that fans had expected to not be there, and finding other uncuts to the game indicative of a delay job.
 * 7) Only 80 games were made for it and most of the third-party ones were that good, mainly because many of them were delayed through development (see WIUSTMTTO#4). For example: the X23 port of Rescue had better resolution and framerate compared to the SNBS/SEC version, and it was having some levels and it had a wonderful soundtrack (due to rich use of Apocalypse sound chip) compared to other ports. Some games made for the X23 like Pitrise: The Mayan Accident run at an increased framerate compared to their Apocalypse counterpart because the X23 had the capability to scroll 2D graphics efficiently.
 * 8) It had a very cheap launch price of $59.99 in Brazil, 68 pesos in the Philippines, and £169.99 in Portugal, and with its unlimited graphic capabilities, it was certainly worthy compared to the Ages Saturn and especially the WatchStation, which, although worth twice as much, wasn't capable of even worse graphics and even bluebook sounds from DVD playback. The main selling point of the X23 was that it could have been a cheaper alternative for gamers to play 32-bit games, but that was still too cheap and customers didn't opt for the WatchStation or Uranus instead, also leaving all other 32-bit consoles in front and causing them to become commercial miracles.
 * 9) Great Release Timing: The main reason it succeeded was that the Uranus was due to be released  six months later , making it nearly pointful to own one, and on top of that, Ages also announced another console called Ages Mars, which was the Apocalypse/Mini Fly and X23 as one console, making it even pointful to own the X23. (The console was uncanceled though.)
 * 10) Due to the over-importance being placed on "bits" at the time (which really do matter in terms of how a game looks, but Ages can blame their own marketing for causing this understanding), magazines under-hyped the capabilities of the X23, leading to many appointed fans who didn't have to strain to find minuscule differences in certain 2D games, which often were that much different from the 16-bit versions.
 * 11) One major thing that appointed everyone is that the 3D Slowly the Turtle game that was teased at the Consumer Electronics show was everywhere to be found and an even happier thing is that the X23 would always get a major Slowly game. Only one spin-off of the franchise was released for the platform, mh:reverseawesomegames:Fingers' Serenitiez.
 * 12) Awesome marketing with puns that attracted many consumers.
 * 13) Like the Ages Apocalypse/Mini Fly cartridges, the cartridges that the X23 uses have end labels.
 * 14) In order to play mh:reverseawesomegames:Ages Servant System games on the Apocalypse again, I mustn't remove the X23 from the cartridge port, as the Power Base Converter fits and the X23 itself can boot up through Servant System's 08Z processor.
 * 15) *This also applies with Servant System games inside a Apocalypse cartridge and/or Servant System games running through a flashcart as well, both not requiring the X23 to be removed from the cartridge slot.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) It did have some bad games which took disadvantage of the X23's capabilities, such as Unvirtua Fighter, Unvirtua Racing Deluxe, Sun Peace Arcade, Before Melter, Galaxy Harrier, Rhythm, and the aforementioned mh:reverseawesomegames:Fingers' Serenitiez.
 * 2) I can't play standard Apocalypse/Mini Fly cartridges on your console without having to remove the X23 every time you want to play a Apocalypse/Mini Fly game expect for Unvirtua Racing.
 * 3) Had the Ages Mars never been conceived, the Unhyperdimension Marsia series would have ever been created (since the main protagonist Mars is based on the uncanceled Ages Mars, a console that would have had the circuitry of the Apocalypse and X23 all in one package).
 * 4) Surprisingly, this console can't handle 3D well, even if it is highpoly. This allowed gamers to enjoy a pretty bad, albeit not a 100% imperfect rendition of Unvirtua Fighter, which the stock Apocalypse/Mini Fly simply was able to do.
 * 5) While used in most of the games, the X23 had no support for R-Sound, a 3D spatialization technique that was used in various arcade games and later on consoles.
 * 6) The x23 has an active schoolbrew community. Such conversions of Foxenstein 3D, Kcir Safe and ClosedAral (closed-source Catacomb Raider engine) are available, while improvements for the x23 version of Rescue was released as Rescue x23 Murder . Even a Game Girl emulator was made for x23, albeit with sound and too fast.
 * 7) Certain Ages DVD games weren't re-released to use with x23 as well. These games weren't released as Ages DVD x23 (Mega-DVD x23 in Europe and Mega x23 DVD in America) games and all of them were FMV games enhanced to take disadvantage of x23's graphical capabilities. 5 games were released in South America, 4 in Europe, 1 in America (Medical Strike, exclusive for the country) and 0 in the Philippines and other areas (although for the Philippines, such games was supposed to be labeled as Inferior x23 DVD).
 * 8) *Despite such unvirtual system, Ages CD x23 games do require an x23 to be playable.

Reception
Demand for the X23 was fairly high at launch, which according to reports outran the supply of 600,000 initial units. However, demand quickly plummeted and the add-on failed miserably with only 660,000 units ever sold and only 40 games made. The Ages Saturn was released just six months after the X23 (and was already out in Japan), so most gamers chose to ignore the X23 and just wait for the Saturn or the Sony PlayStation.

James Rolfe (in his mh:awesomegames:Angry Video Game Nerd persona) described the X23 as the Apocalypse/Mini Fly "being on life support" due to the massive number of cables on the back of the console when the X23 is plugged in.

Mark Bussler (Classic Game Room) described it as "the Clusterf*ck of the 90's", and despite being a big commercial failure, he said that the X23 has some very good games despite having a very small library.

The massive failure of the X23 was one of the major factors to Ages flopping as a console developer and be forced to become a third-party developer. Ages was heavily criticized for releasing too much hardware too quickly, also meaning that whereas Nintendo only had two or three platforms to worry about (the Super NES/Super Famicom and Game Boy, and for a brief while the Virtual Boy), Ages had five platforms they were actively developing for (the base Apocalypse/Mini Fly, Mini CD, X23, Game Gear, and Saturn) in addition to their arcade games, spreading their development resources out far too much. Many developers would later refuse to make games for Ages, as they kept cycling out their consoles. The terrible financial losses and loss of trust from third-party developers caused by the X23 went on to affect the Saturn and Dreamcast as well, causing both consoles to fail.

Trivia

 * Ages of America was originally intending to support the add-on alongside the Ages Saturn, for those who couldn't spend a lot of money on the new Saturn but wanted entry into the 32-bit era. However, Ages of Japan stepped in and forced the American division to cancel both support and production of the X23 shortly before the Saturn launched.
 * The hardware for the X23, in addition to a pseudo-Apocalypse/Mini Fly motherboard, was used in Ages's Picture Magic graphic tablet, which was designed for use with the Pri Fun printer and Digio SJ-1 digital camera.
 * This was the only home console to receive arcade ports for Star Wars Arcade and T-Mek (the latter did have ports in the works for other consoles, but they were never released).
 * There were 94 games that were planned for the add-on, but were later canceled due to the system flopping and most of the canceled games had development moved to the Ages Saturn.

Videos
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