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Forums - Nintendo Discussion - Nintendo sucks at marketing its older-teen blockbusters

 

Does Nintendo suck at marketing its older-teen blockbusters?

Yes 72 75.00%
 
No 24 25.00%
 
Total:96
happydolphin on 30 November 2012

^Jejeje

pokoko said:
Nintendo absolutely needs better marketing if they want to win back some of the core audience that have strayed over the years. Metroid seems like it would be the perfect IP for that. There is potential depth there that they should be able to capitalize on. I think Nintendo can be more than a little arrogant in that regard. They almost seem to have the attitude that all they need to go is make the hardware and the game and then sit back while the money piles up.

Keep in mind that I'm one of those who drifted away, beginning with the PSOne. After playing Final Fantasy VI on the SNES, I started craving games with more complex plots and characters, which ultimately led me away from Nintendo first party games and to the much more varied third party offerings on the Sony platforms. Before someone gets offended, that's not a slight against Nintendo, it's just a statement of taste. Characters and story are important for me, which is why I care nothing about Mario.

As far as multi-player goes, if you create an intriguing and immersive universe, then it's not necessary at all. BioShock Infinite isn't going to have multi-player and it's going to sell like hotcakes. Neither did God of War 3 or the Fallout games. Dead Space did quite well without it.

Personally, I'm interested to see if Nintendo openly markets Bayonetta 2 or if they sit back and pretend to the mainstream that they have nothing to do with it. I think that might tell us a bit about how serious they are. I honestly see no reason why Metroid cannot become a large, important IP. Quite honestly, along with Zelda, it's one of the few Nintendo has that really makes me want Nintendo systems.

Same here, adding the Mario 3D series and Smash.

I find it sad that either Nintendo or some people think that if Nintendo markets games targetted to the older teens, that they will lose marketshare on the casual/non-gamer front. What ever happened to branding and product lines? Can't Nintendo have two fronts at once? Sony does it, Microsoft does it, why not the big N?? We would take them more seriously when all is  said and done, in both markets, since they become an indusputably serious contender on all markets.



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miz1q2w3e on 30 November 2012
happydolphin said:
miz1q2w3e said:

cuz she's still a girl.

The only other female VG leads I can think of are Tomb Raider and Bayonetta. One's a suped up sex symbol of a character (hello teen demo), and the other is an exaggeration/parody of that.

But most people don't know that haha, just like people call Link Zelda, they have no idea.

Let's take Halo for example again. It developed a strong following and probably got around by word of mouth. Don't you think a following like that would know about her being a girl? Then, we go right back to the coolness factor argument. Girl = not cool (plus the other cool factors its lacking) --> no strong word of mouth.



happydolphin on 30 November 2012

@Pez. The lead engineer at Retro was gone and I think they were exhausted and wanted to work on something else. There was nobody able to pick up from where they left off. Other M was made in Japan, and its wasn't a Prime game, so that kind of supports the theory.

miz1q2w3e said:

Let's take Halo for example again. It developed a strong following and probably got around by word of mouth. Don't you think a following like that would know about her being a girl? Then, we go right back to the coolness factor argument. Girl = not cool (plus the other cool factors its lacking) --> no strong word of mouth.

The mainstream is dumb though, they wouldn't know she was a girl as much as people don't know Link is called Zelda (as per word of mouth), despite the following the game gets.

And like you said, Girl=not cool is not a correct formula.

Back when Tomb Raider was a hit blockbuster, here were its sales:

Pos Game Platform Year Genre Publisher North America Europe Japan Rest of World Global
1 Tomb Raider II PS 1997 Adventure Eidos Interactive 2.30 2.46 0.20 0.28 5.24
2 Tomb Raider PS 1996 Action Eidos Interactive 2.29 1.97 0.13 0.24 4.63
3 Tomb Raider III: Adventures of Lara Croft PS 1997 Adventure Eidos Interactive 1.66 1.58 0.12 0.18 3.54


miz1q2w3e on 30 November 2012
pezus said:
Metroid Prime just lacks something...advertising is probably one factor. Why did they only release one MP on Wii? They should've used it for some of the years where they sorely lacked games.

...coooolness? :3



miz1q2w3e on 30 November 2012
happydolphin said:

The mainstream is dumb though, they wouldn't know she was a girl as much as people don't know Link is called Zelda (as per word of mouth), despite the following the game gets.

And like you said, Girl=not cool is not a correct formula.

Back when Tomb Raider was a hit blockbuster, here were its sales:

Pos Game Platform Year Genre Publisher North America Europe Japan Rest of World Global
1 Tomb Raider II PS 1997 Adventure Eidos Interactive 2.30 2.46 0.20 0.28 5.24
2 Tomb Raider PS 1996 Action Eidos Interactive 2.29 1.97 0.13 0.24 4.63
3 Tomb Raider III: Adventures of Lara Croft PS 1997 Adventure Eidos Interactive 1.66 1.58 0.12 0.18 3.54

hello teen demo



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pokoko on 30 November 2012
happydolphin said:

^Jejeje

pokoko said:
Nintendo absolutely needs better marketing if they want to win back some of the core audience that have strayed over the years. Metroid seems like it would be the perfect IP for that. There is potential depth there that they should be able to capitalize on. I think Nintendo can be more than a little arrogant in that regard. They almost seem to have the attitude that all they need to go is make the hardware and the game and then sit back while the money piles up.

Keep in mind that I'm one of those who drifted away, beginning with the PSOne. After playing Final Fantasy VI on the SNES, I started craving games with more complex plots and characters, which ultimately led me away from Nintendo first party games and to the much more varied third party offerings on the Sony platforms. Before someone gets offended, that's not a slight against Nintendo, it's just a statement of taste. Characters and story are important for me, which is why I care nothing about Mario.

As far as multi-player goes, if you create an intriguing and immersive universe, then it's not necessary at all. BioShock Infinite isn't going to have multi-player and it's going to sell like hotcakes. Neither did God of War 3 or the Fallout games. Dead Space did quite well without it.

Personally, I'm interested to see if Nintendo openly markets Bayonetta 2 or if they sit back and pretend to the mainstream that they have nothing to do with it. I think that might tell us a bit about how serious they are. I honestly see no reason why Metroid cannot become a large, important IP. Quite honestly, along with Zelda, it's one of the few Nintendo has that really makes me want Nintendo systems.

Same here, adding the Mario 3D series.

I find it sad that either Nintendo or some people think that if Nintendo markets games targetted to the older teens, that they will lose marketshare on the casual/non-gamer front. What ever happened to branding and product lines? Can't Nintendo have two fronts at once? Sony does it, Microsoft does it, why not the big N?? We would take them more seriously when all is  said and done, in both markets, since they become an indusputably serious contender on all markets.

One possible solution for Nintendo, if they really want that family-friendly image, is to pull a Disney and create a new publishing arm for anything shading toward the adult side.

I also don't buy the idea that Metroid requires too much thought for the core audience.  Yeah, there are games like CoD, but as I mentioned, titles like BioShock and Dead Space became classics on the other platforms.  It also doesn't matter if a protagonist is female, as long as they kick ass.  No one shies away from Resident Evil, Portal, or Mirror's Edge.

I think the biggest problem with Metroid is that it seems like an IP with a conflicted direction.  Compare that with something like Halo or Uncharted, where the direction and form are concrete.  People know exactly what they're getting.

What if Nintendo were to reboot Metroid with a definitive direction and an emphasis on storyline?



miz1q2w3e on 30 November 2012
pezus said:
miz1q2w3e said:
pezus said:
Metroid Prime just lacks something...advertising is probably one factor. Why did they only release one MP on Wii? They should've used it for some of the years where they sorely lacked games.

...coooolness? :3

I wouldn't call it that. Or maybe...How were the trailers for MP3? Every CoD, AC, Halo trailer is epic/cool/amazing and I remember the very first trailer for AC1 getting immense hype even though it was CGI.

Yes.



happydolphin on 30 November 2012
pezus said:
miz1q2w3e said:
pezus said:
Metroid Prime just lacks something...advertising is probably one factor. Why did they only release one MP on Wii? They should've used it for some of the years where they sorely lacked games.

...coooolness? :3

I wouldn't call it that. Or maybe...How were the trailers for MP3? Every CoD, AC, Halo trailer is epic/cool/amazing and I remember the very first trailer for AC1 getting immense hype even though it was CGI.

Compare for yourself the Metroid Prime and Halo CE, original commercials:

Metroid Prime:

Halo CE:



miz1q2w3e on 30 November 2012

hmm maybe you have a point there, happyD. The games you mentioned all have had trailers/commercials with all that cool action/epic stuff. I guess that would fall under 'marketing'. I don't see Nintendo do that very often.

Yes, even Zelda trailers are epic for a different reason. It's more of a 'respected' type of epic.



happydolphin on 30 November 2012
miz1q2w3e said:
pezus said:
miz1q2w3e said:
pezus said:
Metroid Prime just lacks something...advertising is probably one factor. Why did they only release one MP on Wii? They should've used it for some of the years where they sorely lacked games.

...coooolness? :3

I wouldn't call it that. Or maybe...How were the trailers for MP3? Every CoD, AC, Halo trailer is epic/cool/amazing and I remember the very first trailer for AC1 getting immense hype even though it was CGI.

Yes.

Dude, you're wrong. They have no idea who's behind the suit, even with word of mouth... That's the kind of detail that gets lost in translation.

And even then, there are female characters that have succeeded, no matter what kind of reason you give for it.