Is Nintendo focusing to much on Japan?

[Joelcool7]

padib said:

Joelcool7 said:

archbrix said:

Joelcool7 said:

Monster Hunter is a critical blow to the Vita in Japan. Japan had Sony with a stronger share of the market then North America. However PSP sales were still higher in North America. Monster Hunter did not push hardware in Sony's biggest market, include the rest of the world and Monster Hunter contributed very little to Sony's success outside of Japan.

As I have said multiple times the Japanese market is the smallest for Nintendo and it was also for Sony. While MH definitly helped Sony secure a larger marketshare in Japan it did not help at all globally. Not saying Japan isn't important but it makes up less then one third of Sony's market.

Infact Sony sold more units in the EMEAA then America or even Japan.

Also I agree the titles I mention AC for example did not make DS conquer Sony in the west or Japan. Neither did MH help Sony conquer the west. It did squat outside of Japan.

But the AC that was coming to 3DS was not a cheap cash in, it was being developed internally by some of the best developers UbiSoft has. Unlike the two DS games that were developed cheaply by GameLoft. Also if you note AC on PSP sold over a million copies in the west which made it more influential on American and European sales then Monster Hunter did.

You also have to realize that GTA also sold more copies in the West then Monster Hunter did in Japan. You may be right Monster Hunter did wonders for Japan, but without GTA you can bet Sony would have lost about 5-6 million in hardware sales in the west. Also look at software sales for PSP in Japan they do not match up with software sales in the rest of the world.

Software sales for PSP show that of the top 50 titles on PSP EMEAA lead the pack with 40.54 million copies while America was second most important with 36.55 million in software sales with Japan trailing at a distant third with only 17.85 million. Of that Monster Hunter made up 11.38 million.

So yes if MH4 succeeds and Sony doesn't replace Monster Hunter with another big game, they can consider Japan lost. However with no third party support in the West. Nintendo will have a much harder time fighting Sony off there.

If you read the thread as me saying Japan was not important you misread it. I said that the West is the larger market and more important then Japan. I said if Nintendo was going to invest so much efforts into Japan it should do likewise in the rest of the world.

Say Monster Hunter does amazing, Nintendo crushes Sony in Japan and gains about a 90% market share there. What about the west? Nintendo's software sales for their top fifty titles show that EMEAA and America are at a virtual tie at 115 million copies. The West's market is far larger then Japan's.

Now of course we all know that Nintendo's software dominates in all regions. However in the west , American software is dominant. Check the EMEAA records and the American records of software sales and you will note that western publishers dominate those markets. Those markets also make up a majority of Nintendo's software sales.

So yes I think a domination in Japan is possible with all this Japanese support. But what about the West? Look at Vita's market that they are targetting? They are aiming at their largest market EMEAA and America second. With the titles that are popular in the west. Nintendo might be able to strike Sony down in Japan by compromising the West. But Sony might make tons of gains in the Western market that weren't present last generation.

Although I guess Nintendo's headquarters are in Japan and dominating Japan is a personal issue. Nintendo's titles will no doubt sell well in North America as well. However they could loose marketshare in North America and software sales, right now with 3DS selling at a loss its software sales that will help Nintendo return to profitability.

Lets face it even with Nintendo dominant in Japan, the software that sells in Nintendo's largest markets (America/EMEAA) is western made. So a cut in software sales in the West followed by a cut in hardware sales. Is not a wise decision.

Nintendo is simply trading market share in the west for market share in Japan. If you look at it as how much damage it will do to Sony then its obviously going to do alot of damage. If you look at it as how much hardware will a few Japanese titles push and how much software profit will be generated your looking at far worse outcome.

You can argue all you want that Monster Hunter is a more important title then AC, your right it is. But the west is more important to Nintendo's profit margins then Japan is. So you have to wonder is Monster Hunter more important to western sales then western support? Because AC isn't the only title that has been cancelled, several titles from other publishers like Activision were also dropped.

Focusing entirely on Japan and not at all on North America is very dangerous. Sony could totally capatalize on this get an exclusive Assassins Creed, CoD and Grand Theft Auto and you will see them increase share in North America. Will Sony win the war loosing Japan and such, no. Will there market share globally fall? Possibly but if Sony played its cards right and got alot of western support they could probably hold on!

Don't believe me check the stats on software sales in America or EMEAA for PSP. You'll note that western titles dominate. If Nintendo wants to crush Sony globally the way it intends to crush them in Japan. Then they need to focus heavily on the West.

Of course through all this research I have come to realize, if Nintendo can get MH3G and MH4 exclusively to 3DS they will crush Japan. If Nintendo gets exclusive RockStar support and the support of the publishers they already had for DS. Sony doesn't have a chance in hell anywhere on the globe.

Vita will be dead if Nintendo gives equal attention to the west.

 

You're right about the software sales being higher in NA and EMEAA than Japan, simply because Japan has a smaller population than either of those other markets individually, much less combined.  And if we were speaking of console sales, I'd totally agree with what you're saying.  The ironic thing about the handheld market is that despite Japan having less people (i.e. sales), it is more important for Sony and Nintendo to ensure success there.  Like you said, GTA may very well have sold more copies in the west than MH did in the east (again, more consumers there) but what you're not realizing is that MH did far more for the PSP's success as a system in the east than GTA did for it in the west.  Far more.

The software that sold the most for the DS and moved the most units in the west was not western software.  It was Nintendo's games, which is software from Japan.  The slew of games from Ubisoft that you mentioned previously may have sold a lot of copies based on pure volume, but those games (Petz, etc) sold in the first place because of the way that was paved by Nintendo's games.  Again, Japanese software.  You're right that MH sold squat outside of Japan, but conversely, GTA sold squat in the east, and Japan is more important to handhelds.

Having said all of that, I do agree with you that it is to Nintendo's advantage to do well with western software on 3DS, too.  Like I said before, the more games, the better, and it would certainly help to secure things like GTA exclusively for 3DS, no doubt.  But you are applying the principals of the console market to the handheld market, which is actually the opposite; securing western support for consoles is more important than software from Japan (save for many of Nintendo's games, of course), as Japan is handheld land and consoles are bigger in the west.

Well I have had my mind changed in a way, I now believe Nintendo would be smart to pay for MH to be exclusive. I still think that in doing so they should make similar moves to maintain western support. I do think that there neglect of the west could definitely hurt them in the long run.

Why did I change my mind, fact is yes Monster Hunter's sales are mind blowing for Sony. In comparison with the leading DS titles MH games do perform decently. I think the loss of Monster Hunter could do serious damage to Sony. MH could have the potential of selling up to 5-million 3DS units in Japan. So yes as a form of attack on Sony MH is a very big attack.

The real question is, will all this damage to Vita pay off in anywhere but Japan? Yes it will strike a deadly blow to Sony's capabilities to compete in Japan. At least I'm sure that's what Nintendo is aiming at, but what about the rest of the world?

The thread's purpose was to talk about Nintendo's neglect of the west in favor of Japan.

Now you say that Japan is the home of handhelds, but neither hardware nor software sales reflect that as true. Per capita yah Japanese spend way more on handhelds based on the population size. But per capita means squat, over all sales come from North America and EMEAA. As for Nintendo titles selling the hardware , yah everyone's right Nintendo titles do shift hardware in North America.

However even Nintendo's titles in the past have proven incapable of getting the results DS did. Look at GBA its life cycle was a tad shorter but it also had no competitor. Yet with no competitor GBA  didn't come close to DS success, with all of Nintendo's biggest titles the GBA did not dominate (PSP and DS combined sold over twice as many units).Also yes lets bring up GameCube now on the home front, all of Nintendo's best titles failed to shift hardware and 3DS's current performance is going the way of GCN's!

At the moment 3DS is doing worse then GBA did on a global scale. Only difference is that 3DS now has not only Vita to compete with but smart phones and tablets. A quick look at the software that sells in America and the EMEAA show that while Nintendo does dominate the third parties contribute a ton to that domination.

All I'm saying is that if Nintendo is going to strike Japan so hard, they can't do so at the cost of American and European support. At the moment with all the cancellations from UbiSoft and Activision among other Western publishers. Show that Nintendo is relying to heavily on the Japanese developers.

Japanese developers will not shift hardware outside of Japan, and while this blow to Sony will definitely help Nintendo take back Japan it does very little outside. If Nintendo was smart they would secure every single big publisher Sony had supporting PSP. Which leaves RockStar and ensuring the other western publishers remain on board.

If Nintendo can get RockStar and MH and maintain DS's support then they can dominate the whole globe. Hopefully 3DS sales would pick up by the end of 2012.

Also just wondering while Sony can take a direct hit and serious damage. How can Nintendo do harm to Apple? Do you think they know which Apple titles sell strongest in Japan, America and the EMEAA and would steal some exclusives. If they did steal some exclusives would it even put a scratch on Apple?

I think the days of Sony being the biggest threat to Nintendo are over. Sony has no chance in winning , in fact Sony Vita dying could damage developer confidence in handhelds which could have adverse effects on Nintendo themselves. How can Nintendo strike at Apple with 3DS?

Focusing on Japan will also not help Nintendo take on Apple. Japanese dominance without success in the west is useless. Especially if Nintendo wants to turn the 3DS around! They need to sell 3DS's in EMEAA and America pronto! North American developers definitely can shift more hardware in the west then the Japanese titles Nintendo is getting.

I love the last points your bring regarding Apple and Nintendo needing Sony to maintain a healthy portable market equilibrium and diversity. I know for a fact that Nintendo has in its philosophy to look 12 years down the road when developing their present projects, all for a healthier business strategy. So this may not just be speculation but the actual truth. Nintendo has also hinted at their foresight of Apple as their competitor here and there so I can buy this.

Regarding the Cube and the GBA, in that day Nintendo's reach to a broader market hadn't yet transpired into their software development and marketing. That's the main reason why Nintendo's current success did not exist in that era. Their games were fun, really, but they were niche, just like Smash is today. Though it sells alot, it doesn't sell as much as say Mario Kart, which is a more Family Friendly game and is less limited to the appeal of asian male pre-teens. I say this as a huge smash fan, I'm middle-eastern and 27 lol, there are always exceptions. Nintendo's failure in that era will probably not exist for a while, as they are still on the "wider" mentality, despite shifting mildly back to the deeper mentality.

As for Japan's success not affecting the western markets, I can only disagree. Japan is a source of rich gaming content and culture. It is one that feeds creativity within the market and is the spice of video gaming. Without it the market would become stale extremely quickly. Look at america, the content we make here is often lacking in depth and rarely captures our imagination (obviously there are exceptions to this). To secure a place of respect in Japan gives Nintendo that place it needs to be taken seriously globally (not just Japan, not just the West). To gain credibility in one region (wherever it may be) is a step closer towards Nintendomination, and I believe Iwata knows this. I think he sees the problem we all see. I think he's trying to fix Nintendo's image in the eyes of serious gamers and developers. To obtain MH is a giant step in that direction. Now if only they could get a true FF. 

I agree Nintendo is always developing products with the future in mind big time. I am very sure that they realized back before N-Gage was released that smart phones would be future competitors, though I doubt they knew Apple would be their main competitor. I'm not sure how they plan to counter Apple, but I know Sony is not their main concern anymore and with MH the only threat to Nintendo in Japan is iOS and Android. I am unsure about how Nintendo could land a blow against Apple since its software sales aren't really public and games are not its main selling feature.

Nintendo cannot convince gamers to buy a 3DS instead of a phone like they can with Vita. Fact is everyone needs a phone, so what can Nintendo do to harm Apple?

As for the GCN and GBA, both consoles had MarioKart on them. GBA had side scrolling Mario games just like DS and Wii do. Nintendo's first party software was amazing on both platforms, though it did target the niche Nintendo fan market. The thing that caused Wii and DS to succeed was rappid growth in the industry caused by bringing in non-gamers. Only problem is Nintendo hasn't shown a single 3DS title to date aimed at these non-gamers and Monster Hunter isn't going to appeal to the market Nintendo had with DS.

Essentially 3DS is a niche product just like GCN and GBA were. Until Nintendo gives consumers BrainAge: Train your brain in 3D, 3DSports and other games targetting the non-gaming demographic they will have trouble. Actually if Animal Crossing fails and so does Nintendo's first party titles then Nintendo's ability to compete in NA and EMEAA will be severly compromised.

Thats personal opinion that Japanese games are more imaginative and cultural. However I was refering to sales wise and none of those Japanese developers have produced DS games that sell more then a million copies in the West. Even MH failed to break the two million mark in the west. Japan might be the cultural center of the gaming world, but its games don't sell well out here and aren't going to make 3DS successful outside Japan.

Now yah if Nintendo dominates Japan, its a good start but if they don't dominate NA or EMEAA next then they will fall flat on their faces. Dominating the smallest region is going to boost company moral, its going to increase Japanese software sales. However it won't do squat to help Nintendo in NA and EMEA.

Any way you look at it, Nintendo can't neglect the west. With 3DS or even next year with WiiU. Japan is not the largest market for games, its large yes but its not the largest. The games that sell well in Japan don't sell as well in North America (Outside Nintendo's own software) just like Western software doesn't sell well in Japan. The markets are drastically different and if you win Japan at a cost of the west, your going to loose profit and marketshare!