If you belong to the lucky many who haven’t bought a Phillips CD-I during the short time of its commercial existence – congratulations, you’ve successfully avoided the stigma of having purchased one of the worst gaming consoles ever created.
Unfortunately, this means you’ve also missed out on some of the worst games ever created, including the indubitably worst entries in the ‘Legend of Zelda’ and ‘Super Mario Bros.’ franchises – licenses which Nintendo apparently granted to Phillips in exchange for being allowed to opt out of the whole mess…
Thanks to YouTube, however, you can at least ‘enjoy’ the legendary cutscenes from those games – legendary for being cheaply produced in Russia, based on an animation model that seems to assume human anatomy to be akin to Silly Putty. Aside from the original versions, YouTube hosts countless re-cut/re-arranged versions (see above sample) which usually constitute marked improvements over the original plot. Here’s another one, and this one features music and mild profanity.
In conclusion, the CD-I has proven at least all those people wrong, who predicted it would disappear without legacy…
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