By What is your very first memory of video games? For me, this is not the 92nd or 93rd year. Winter. Our small living room. Father, only a little older than me today, with a gamepad at the ready, overcomes Bibop in the first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles In the Chinese clone Famicom. The four -year -old I, unable to take out the tension, squint my eyes and squeeze my fists, trying in vain to help … Happy were the times, which is already there.
Father is no longer alive, and the console of that, of course, no, and TMNT I never passed. But still sometimes I blow off the dust with Nintendo Classic Mini. Just to recall the chemical taste of YUPI in the language ubiquitous Tamagochi, the TURBO chewing gum, comics about Bamsi Bear, the animated series about mice-rockers from Mars-all this strange, chaotic, but full of hopes of the era of their childhood. And one of her main mascots – Dandy's elephant.
"Curse of a gray elephant", a cult film on the topic
Everything was the first time and again
It was this cartoon beast, which triumphantly folding the fingers with the letter V, made the company Steepler famous, but it all started not at all with him. At the end of 1990, when the new limited liability partnership was just starting its way, its founders, mathematicians-graduesmen of Moscow State University, and did not think about some toys there. Despite the youth of the founders (General Director Andrei Cheglakov was at that time about 23-24 years), everything was most serious as possible.
Since none of the Steepler leadership in business understood absolutely anything, they built the future IT-imperial literally from scratch-but according to all Western canons. The market analysis quickly revealed the most promising direction of business in the country, suffocating from lack of computers, and explanatory software for them. Steepler began its life path as a purely software company.
Perhaps in our latitudes Steepler with their Cyrwin made for the formation of the type of “secretary behind the solitaire” only a little less Microsoft
It all started with the development of software for Windows 3.x, then still a young and rapidly developing operating system. And already here Steepler was waiting for the first big commercial success. The Cyrwin Russifier for the first time forced the American "axis" to speak the great and mighty – and gained well -deserved popularity.
In general, everything was fine. But on one software in the context of gang capitalism it was impossible to exist for a long time. Therefore, Steepler was spinning as they could: they sold laser printers of NR, Xerox and IBM equipment, created automated jobs to State Duma deputies, collaborated with banks and did a lot of interesting things. But all these were goods and services very specific, not mass demand.
And in 1992, Viktor Savyuk came to the company and offered to sell the consoles, for which he received a laptop, a chair (but not a table) in an Open-pass and the position of head of the video game department, in which he was at first the only employee.
Victor Saveluk (photo: dtf.RU) and Ivan Maksimov: Fathers of the Dendy console and the elephant dandy, respectively
Viktor Avksentievich – DJ, programmer, investor, manager and generally damn interesting person – can be safely called by the father Dendy. It is this versatile master that belongs to both the name and the very thought to do the console business. Specifically: to carry from Taiwan hardware clones "eight -bit" Nintendo Entertainment System , that under the Micro Genius brand, TXC Corporation, has ropped there since the eighties, and sell them already in independent Russia. And not anyhow, but under the guise of real licensed products.
For that time – not that completely new, but still little promoted idea. What kind of choice of consoles in the USSR, of course, existed (and I did not even write about this for this), but it was impossible to call it wide. The world console giants from the former union for obvious reasons turned their noses, and the gamers from the CIS fell down at best clones Atari 2600 called Rambo , Yes, single prefixes are more hit than those who were randomly brought by luck. Played mainly on ZX Spectrum and still rare “IBM-compatible PCs”-that is, devices created primarily for work. Neither the concept of video games, nor the concept of "video game" were actually familiar to the general public. It is not surprising that in this dull desert the slogan “everyone plays!»Blinking louder than the seventh Shostakovich Symphony in the middle of the besieged Leningrad.
One of the first Dendy commercials. Not suddenly and you will understand what exactly is advertised here
The image of the elephant in a dashing baseball cap, Nabekhore, would be quite worthy of a place in the Pelevin "Generation" "" – so organically it fit into the advertising canvas of the nineties. This long -nosed charming overshadowed both the flexible superhero of Boomer, and the fashionable cheetah Chester, and even the winning German alcoholic Rasputin. Appearing on the screen under an attacked jingle from the group “Accident”, which is tasted in the memory that your bee in honey, the dandy immediately made it clear: the games ended, the games began.
The author of the Elephant, the artist, director and teacher Ivan Maksimov, for his time became a figure no less significant than Viktor Chizhikov, the creator of the Olympic bear, for the eighties. By the way, Dandy is not the only work of Maksimov related to games. In the future, he will take part in the development "Complete pipe" -one of the few truly interesting Russian quests, the world of their dust.
The promotion worked on all fronts. In addition to conventional advertising, Native and the young gamers were processed in full. And not to say that we were against!
Steepler did not skimp on advertising: even the only specialist in neurolinguistic programming in Russia was engaged in texts
Yellow "tulips" – symbols of the era
In 1993, the first issue of Video-Ass Dendy magazine was released, almost completely dedicated to the Games for "Family". The publication was very specific. Say, in one issue they could publish an extremely serious interview with the founder of Steepler, an article under the air heading “Learning Computer Games Technique” and a transcript of communication between a plumber Mario with a character from a preference simulator Pref Club , And then call it Galaga "Galaza", and racing action Mach Rider – the game based on the Mad Max, which, of course, had nothing to do with it. Truly, the youth of Russian game journalism gave rise to strange things – with a very specific language, a modernist mile and crazy illustrations.
And let the controllers often call the “remote controls”, and the cartridges are “cassettes”. There were almost no alternatives at that time, so they read, and even enjoyed. In fairness, I must say that the official printed body Nintendo Nintendo Power heading was not so much different from Steepler.
The cover of the first number "Dendy is a new reality". It was no better inside
Therefore, they were continued to read and after in 1995 “Video-Ass Dendy” broke up in two: on “Dendy-New Reality” and “Video-Ass Great Drakon”. Unfortunately, the history of the first has only six numbers. But the "Great Drakon", already completely independent, survived until the end of 2003.
With a little lag behind the magazine, in 1994, on the 2×2 television channel, the program “Dandy is a new reality”, which he led, I am not afraid of the word, the great Sergey Suponev. Starting next year, the program began to go to ORT (at that time it was called “Channel One”). In my hometown, 2×2 was then not broadcast, but I remember the second season on ORT perfectly. Like we, minor geeks, were waiting for new episodes, sitting right on the floor in front of the TV. How checked codes and secrets that the host talked about. How they looked at a fantastic 16-bit graphics with admiration, which then seemed the top of technology. As the novelties just shown on TV were looking for in stores, most of which came out before our birth ..
Pilot production of "new reality" for ORT. So far, everything is very at home: in a cool studio with giant gamepads, the show will move only from the tenth episode
For us, Supone was a real idol. Although now it is clear that in the games he understood, to put it mildly, mediocre, he was mistaken a lot (the story of how Sergey Evgenievich confused the Robokop with Darth Vader has long become a lady in the tongue), and he improvised in places at all. But the transfer, conceived as a purely advertising product, really looked at the window in another, new reality. It’s a pity that the window was quite soon closed – only one season lasted on the orth show.
And his diligent Bastard “World of Dendy” got neither the effect of novelty, nor the charisma of Suponev, nor, as a result, folk love. Somehow stretching on the air for a couple of months, the program has sunk into oblivion. There, in general, and the road.
And about Dandy was a good cartoon. Shura Karetnaya is easily recognized in the voice of the main villain, in the gaming environment the most famous for the role of the commander Chapaev from the quest series "Petka and Vasily Ivanovich"
To overshadow the "new reality" for me personally was able to only the legendary "from the screw!", To the creation of which Steepler also had a hand (more precisely – a wallet). Well, after it, nothing is equally significant in cultural plan on Russian TV never appeared. Sorry, of course. After all, let the magazines and programs look damn naive and generally amateurish by today's standards, they did their job regularly, and even about the games they told me how it seemed to me then, it’s completely gorgeous.
And what were the games! Almost the entire eight -bit classic was at our service. True, the most popular were not some kind of wise JRPG, but more folk Beat 'Em Up and platformers. Contra , Super Mario Bros., Darkwing Duck, Aladdin, Chip ’n dale and other games in Disney cartoons. Battle City – Real World of Tanks our childhood. My loved ones Double Dragon And Kyatto Ninja Teyandee..
At one time, Dendy cartridges were produced in Russia. Electronics products looked scary, met infrequently and is now considered a collection rarity (photo from the GBX forum.ru)
Moreover, about any licensed cartridges at the cost of half a console, of course, there was no question. Therefore, everyone joyfully played pirate copies, and even in khaki, clones and even Dawngrays of games that never at all came out on eight -bit. Yes, these cartridges did not, for example, of constant memory, which allowed to maintain progress in large and complex projects. Therefore, the post -Soviet players did not hear about many masterpieces of that time: did not hear: The Legend of Zelda, Metroid or Final Fantasy We didn’t even let out the ubiquitous pirates.
But on Dendy there was something that never was on the original Famicom : for example, eight -bit versions EarthWorm Jim, Mortal Kombat or The Lion King. And often it was quite playable things, the origin of which we did not even know. And remember Somari -RIP offf Sonic the Hedgehog, but with a sprite of the same mario in the place of a blue super -speed hedgehog? Or cartridges, on which not one game was placed, but several at once – or even several thousand?
On the "licensed" cartridges from Steepler, even "Printing qualities"!
In general, they loved the dandy not only for advertising – on this platform there really was a lot of excellent games, from which it is quite possible to enjoy in the 21st century. It is not surprising that everyone wanted to have Dendy.
Serious business
And this despite the fact that the prices were some completely wild. According to Kommersant, in late 1992-early 1993, Steepler forced all dealers to keep the retail price for Dendy Classic (first brand model) at 39,000 rubles (slightly less than $ 100)-that is, two or three official average monthly salaries! There were: cartridge with four eight -bit masterpieces, gamepads and a coupon that needed to be filled and sent to the manufacturer. In response, a catalog came with new games. At the same time, for new cartridges, it was necessary to lay out from one to five thousand rubles. The five was worth the light gun. It seems that about the same number was asked for a new gamepad.
Dendy Classic – the first and, due to technical complexity, the most expensive model in a small family
Despite the rampant poverty and the devastation of the nineties, when the money is working (!) people were not enough for bread, sales grew faster than bamboo in a wet tropical forest. Steepler in the year implemented about one and a half million consoles. Moreover, unlike most consolers, who make the main money not on the prefixes themselves, but at games, the lion's share of arrivals to their owners was brought by Dendy and accessories to it. Especially after the market entered the market Dendy Junior – A seriously simplified and, most importantly, cheaper version of Dendy Classic, fully hardly compatible with it.
It is not surprising that the successful sales of the prefixes greatly influenced the company. The company had its own office in Taiwan and branded stores in the center of Moscow, near the Kremlin itself. The transfer of production to Russia began, to the Dubnensky instrument factory "Tenzor". Hundreds of official dealers worked in the CIS, and the revenue increased simply with indecent pace: “From 1991 to 1994, the financial year of the Steepler revolution (in a million dollars.) grew in the next steering: 1, 12, 48, 140 ".
The prefixes played the decisive role in this rise. Soon, the Steepler gaming unit was allocated to an independent business, 30% of which was owned by Inkombank – the Dandy joint -stock company, commercially already much more successful than its slowly decrepit parent. It’s not so bad for the “children's” direction, which in the solid B2B-contester of Steepler was at first even ashamed that they forced to move to a separate office.
Dendy Junior II is a simpler, cheap, and therefore much more popular console modification
Perhaps the most unexpected moment in the biography of this office can be called an agreement with the Nintendo itself, which finally saw the potential in the Russian market and descended to negotiations with arrogant Hiji. Under this agreement, Dandy refused to promote products Sega , For which she acquired exclusive rights to distribute consoles in Russia and the CIS Super nes And Game Boy. In fact, at the end of 1994, a legalization of the absolutely pirate in essence of the office occurred.
Moreover, the funny thing here is that, even legalized, Dandy JSC continued to pierce the consoles of the same “Big N” and cartridges for them. The official indulgence on this subject included a contract with Nintendo of America. Moreover, this condition was concerned not only of past, but also future sins. What is the only 1995 agreement with the Chinese Subor on the sale of their eight -bites – all the same clones of the same Nes!
In short, Steepler's “daughter” was a real console queen for Russia and her closest neighbors. It is not surprising that she also fought with competition in the most obvious way – dumping. In just a couple of years of active sales, the price of dollars was reduced three times, and at the end of the Dendy life, Dendy was sold literally for twenty green – as much as five times cheaper than at first.
LIFA, one of many NES pirate copies that quite successfully competed with Dendy. I had exactly the same
But at any Dendy prices were considered a real elite – most had to be content with simpler devices. For example, I had a Chinese Lifa, and the next console was some unknown Nes Clone without a Latin on the box and body. Fortunately, by the second half of their nineties, the sea has already bred, there was something to choose from. Of course, no constant level of quality of speech was not even underway. It is not surprising that against their background Dendy was perceived as a completely respectable and company device. So respectable that soon even fake Dendy appeared in the markets. Pirates pirated pirates – truly, it was not America that it was worth calling the country of opportunities!
Steepler for Russia at that time was a kind of Apple today. In the best years, the company controlled 70-80% of the Russian gaming console market. Yes, if we continue the analogy with the company from Cupertino, it turns out that many of us, especially in the province, owned, at best, fake "iPhones" in peeling plastic corps, but with three SIM cards and a built-in TV tuner. Nevertheless, the term “dandy” for the former USSR began to mean the same thing as “Famiclone” for the rest of the world. When the name of the brand becomes a household name, is this not a success?
Subor sold not only ordinary game consoles in Russia, but also eight -bit “training computers”: with a full -fledged keyboard and a set of educational games and applied programs (photos with Pikabu.ru)
Unfortunately, it could not continue for a long time. Steepler's collapse was even more rapid than takeoff. In 1996, one of the successful IT companies in Russia simply ceased to exist, as if oxygen were blocked with one movement.
What has become the iceberg who sunk this Titanic, now you can’t say for sure. Most likely, there were several reasons. There are eight -bites that have finally exhausted themselves to the second half of the nineties. And the growth of competition in an actively growing console market – but they knew how to dump not only in Dandy. And a sharp drop in oil prices, due to which important counterparties-economical oil workers turned away from Steepler. And bankruptcy of partner banks … But in 2004, Forbes published an article that indicates a completely different reason.
A completely terrible https://fortune-clock-gb-casino.co.uk/ story with corruption around state contracts, now nonexistent FAPSI (Federal Agency for Government Communications and Information) and quite ordinary for the dashing nineties attempts on the life of the Steepler leadership today causes a random. Now you can’t tell how much this is true. However, this may well be true – and here, I admit, it becomes creepy.
The last page of the last issue "Dendy is a new reality". "Dandy" traded not only the consoles of the third generation. Super Nes with their price list with Sega Mega Drive , And even "elite" Panasonic 3DO , Sega Saturn And Sony PlayStation
Be that as it may, Steepler went to the bottom, drawing her own game business. For a while, the retail network was still trembling: it was re-profiled, sold children's toys, but soon this agony ended.
Yes, you can buy Dendy without any problems today, and not only used. The new prefix with all the gasters and cartridge of the 999 in 1 format is sold for just a couple of thousand rubles. And we are talking about any emulator on a mobile gland and in a nostalgic corps. Authentic processor Motorola 6502 with a clock frequency of 1.79 MHz, two kilobytes of RAM, 16 colors on the screen … Even a light pistol and AV cable with the very yellow "tulips" are included. Unfortunately, these devices have nothing to do with the real Steepler.
From the company itself, except for the memorable name, only a couple of subsidiaries remained: “Apostrophe”, yes Steepler Graphics Center – it is precisely it is found by search engines at the request of “Steepler” today.
Micro Genius IQ-1000 with a wireless controller. So Dendy Pro could look, but it never came to her (photo from ebay.com)
We have not completely appeared our game consoles, and probably will not appear. Fortunately, the Russian console market now is a full -fledged part of the global and nothing but size is inferior to Japanese or American. Thanks for this, it is worth saying to the pioneers from Steepler. It was their Dendy that turned out to be the key that revealed to Russia the world of video games in all its splendor. And the smiling elephant with a crafty Lenin squint has rightly became a symbol of not only its console, but the entire generation of gamers of the nineties. My generation.
Eh, after all, do not go to the head company at one time, who knows what Dandy would have achieved today? Dreams, dreams ..
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