FF1 actually sold surprisingly decent in the US for a really early console RPG, IIRC it was something like 700,000 copies sold. I know Nintendo Power hyped the game up and gave it a TON of coverage (plus its own strategy guide, free to subscribers)... I know that was at least what drew me to the game (though I was a veteran of DQ1 and Ultima: Exodus by that time).
But was NoAs plan with DQ1 "to compete with PCs" or just to try and recreate the magic of Japan? I still reckon that DQ3 would have been a much better first impression of the series, since that had already been out for a year in Japan by that time.
Nintendo's 3rd party strategy with the N64 was so confusing to me too. Like, when they revealed their "Dream Team" and it didn't have any of the companies I grew up with and loved on the other Nintendo systems... no Capcom/Konami/Square/Enix/Hudson... but Paradigm Simulations, Mindscape, and Acclaim (the latter who we all knew were shit we just liked them because they were the hometown company)?
Nintendo's acceptance of RPGs, weird simulations, even strategy and a lot of other titles that were at the time dominant on PC were to expand the market, not just FF and DW, but they essentially foot the bill for those titles to come over, FF was a big success, DW was a disaster. NP didn't just do strategy for that, they gave the GAME itself away to subscribers. And there's always been speculation that it was because they expected it to do like FF1, actually better as they spent gobs more in comparison on marketing it vs. Final Fantasy, and were left with a bunch of inventory. Something like 80% or more of the copies were acquired through Nintendo Power (a $20 subscription), not sold at retail (at $60 or more probably).
Remember, the whole thing about R.O.B., the Zapper, the never released keyboard and cassette drives, the NAME and design of the NES itself, were all to signal NOT VIDEO GAMES, BUT LIKE THEM BUT BETTER, NOT QUITE COMPUTERS BUT CLOSER. They couldn't get retailers interested without all this, so they were definitely looking at some of the more successful home PCs of the time that were big in gaming. Then they never needed all the accessories. (Which, speaking of speculation, I've heard many of which never truly existed as even working prototypes, Nintendo just stuck them under glass at shows.)
The funny part about Acclaim was that they more or less nearly killed off the 16-bit market single handedly with their insane orders of outright garbage like every movie licensed game that was a bad platformer, etc. they flooded retailers with this inventory as part of them also taking stuff like Mortal Kombat and NBA Jam. And Nintendo was going around touting them as their big partner in MORE high-priced cartridge inventory. (Even if Acclaim turned it around for a couple years.) Meanwhile, Sony is essentially trying to drive the price as low as it can go and setup all kinds of favorable buybacks. (Which they ported over from their experience with the music business.) It's not a surprise those were some rough years for the two legacy companies.
