| Soleron said: With Mario, I don't think that complex 3D games actually work on a small screen. Not in any genre. That is, I believe there is a small core of gamers willing to buy them and able to have fun with them, but the wider market will reject them. I remeber playing SM64 for the first time and it was near impossible to control. Add to that the camera issues that I think are inevitable and I don't think it's cut out for the handheld. The top-selling DS and PSP games that make use of exploring a detailed 3D world are Super Mario 64 DS, Spirit Tracks, Phantom Hourglass, GTA, Monster Hunter, Dragon Quest IX and Crisis Core. Except for SM64DS they all have <5m sales; in Mario's case there was a drought of other good software on the DS and I'm not sure it's repeatable. There are a LOT of other games for the DS that have sold more than this. But the flagship games of 3D Mario and 3D Zelda ought to be in their place, as they are recieving the most attention and funding from Nintendo developers. Now, addressing your actual point, I think there IS a market for 3D Mario. On the home console. It'll never sell as well as 2D Mario, but they are seperate series and on its own merits 3D Mario is worth continuing. -- With Zelda, I'd like to ask: what do people like in Zelda games? A lot of people on this board would say puzzles, sure. A lot of people say story but don't really mean it, I think they mean world-building and exploration rather than cutscenes and dialogue. I think two things sell Zelda, and a lot of other games: fast paced action, and a sense of development as you go through the game. I feel Zelda has been going away from that ideal for a long time, and it's only what's left of these elements that is selling it. But people aren't vocal that that's the case. Here's my test. How long is it before Link gets a sword and the freedom to use it? In Z1 it was immediately. In Ocarina it was a fair while. In WW it wasn't until Dragon Roost Island like 2 hours in! I was so frustrated at not being able to do what's advertised on the box. I feel many gamers would get bored well before that point. TP wasn't much better - you only got to roam around with the sword after the visit to the Twilight realm for the first time and being a wolf. If Nintendo gives you a sword and a world to cut it up with out of the box I withdraw all my reservations. |
Thank you for the honest post. It goes without saying, but I will say it anyway: attempts to define what makes a game series appeal to a wider audience are, at best, shots in the dark.
For Mario: I would only suggest you look at the sales trends for Mario 64 DS, which (for a while) I thought would outsell the first Galaxy and which will definitely outsell Galaxy 2. It had a number of months where it was the only "good" game on the system, but look at its sales pattern. Even after the DS's library became great, the game went on to sell millions more units. Millions. It took years, but the game has been selling at a moderate and steady rate since its release. This is a big deal, since the game is (in many ways) terrible in comparison to every other 3D Mario.
For Zelda: Trying to pin down what makes Zelda popular is pointless, which was my point; Twilight Princess has some of the most egregious pacing of any game in the series for the first ten or fifteen hours, but it will be the best-selling game in the franchise by the end of the year.
Applying one's own desires and assuming them to be the desires of others is a logical fallacy.
That's all.
