The Buick Riviera is a personal luxury car that was marketed by Buick from 1963 to 1999, with the exception of the 1994 model year. As General Motors' first entry into the personal luxury car market segment, the Riviera was highly praised by automotive journalists upon its high-profile debut. The ground-up design that debuted for 1963 was also Buick's first unique Riviera model, and it pioneered the GM E platform. Unlike its subsequent GM E platform stablemates, the Oldsmobile Toronado and Cadillac Eldorado, the Riviera was initially a standard front engine/rear-wheel drive platform, only switching to front-wheel drive starting in 1979. While the early models stayed close to their original form, eight subsequent generations varied substantially in size and styling. The Buick Riviera was built in eight generations: 1st Gen (1963-1965), 2nd Gen (1966-1970), 3rd Gen (1971-1973), 4th Gen (1974-1976), 5th Gen (1977-1978), 6th Gen (1979-1985), 7th Gen (1986-1993), and 8th Gen (1995-1999).