Iwata tries to explain platform droughts

[gumby_trucker]

RolStoppable said:

Nintendo isn't widely successful anywhere anymore. Japan crumbled first and everything else followed. Same thing happened with the DS, because third parties moved over to the PSP. The whole argument is complicated and thus there are a lot of holes that need to be patched.

Nintendo won't get many Japanese games, if they don't have a strong presence in Japan. Western publishers focus on the blockbuster model and for that reason they need to port their games to as many platforms as possible out of necessity. Japanese publishers so far only have adopted this model partly, hence why there are still plenty of titles that remain exclusive to one platform, most especially when it comes to handhelds. Trailing in America and Europe wouldn't mean losing out on many games, but trailing in Japan most certainly does.

That's that.

Now that doesn't mean that the way Nintendo has been handling their business on a worldwide level in the last couple of years was any good or a direction they should continue to pursue. They made a lot of mistakes and just about everything they did was wrong. Every region needs to be supplied with regular releases of noteworthy games. There should have also been more investments from Nintendo themselves into games that can reach as large of an audience as possible. Instead they are/were putting the most money and time into titles like Super Mario Galaxy 2, Metroid: Other M and Skyward Sword.

Nintendo's business has been nothing short of a trainwreck lately, but at least the way they are going to treat Japan in the latter half of this year shows that they finally realized that there's a serious problem and releasing games is the correct measure to combat it. In America the Wii hasn't hit rock bottom yet, so that's probably why NoA is still in denial mode. You know how Reggie keeps reinforcing that the Wii is doing fine and all the talk about a natural console lifecycle.

I am all for firing Iwata, Reggie, Miyamoto and replacing them with people who can run a successful business for more than four years without losing track of the things that really do matter. I wouldn't fault a new management for putting more focus on Japan either, because as I've explained before, succeeding in Japan would result in more quality games for all regions (unless a subsidiary pulls off what NoA does right now, of course). Having more good games certainly never hurts.

You bring up some good points, but allow me to ask some difficult questions:

Why is success in Japan important to begin with?
I realize that for many years the industry operated under the assumption that the Japanese market was a good model for the global one, as far as demand goes. I also understand there was an assumption that western gamers needed time to adapt to the "more sophisticated" tastes of the Japanese gamer. During the past fifteen years I think these assumptions have out-stayed their welcome, to the point that the opposite is becoming closer to the truth.

Why is it important to have many releases that are exclusive to Japan?
Nintendo's support of Wii in Japan is in accordance with Japan's failure to adapt to the western market, IMO, but two wrongs don't make a right. Ideally Japanese developers and publishers would realize this and go after the biggest global market, and stop treating Japan as a bubble. If that were the case (as it should be) Wii would receive plentiful support in Japan as part of its support worldwide! Games like ToG or TvC or whatnot would be planned as multi-region releases from day one, and not as an afterthought.
The idea that such games are more successful in Japan and therefor more suited to it has also been proven wrong with almost every single Japanese game to make it to Europe and America. The cost of localization, as high is it may be, does not compare to the cost of developing the game to begin with. Furthermore, if games were treated like this from the start, you wouldn't need to waste so much time ridiculously hacking away at a Japanese ROM in order to replace textures and dialogs, since you would be working with the original development tools and not like some amateur modder, thus making localization even more worthwhile financially.

Final question (this one is rhetorical since it logically follows from the other two)
What is the price you pay for losing ground on the Japanese front vs. losing ground on the global front?