| RolStoppable said:
Earlier in this thread, somebody mentioned Twilight Princess which sold more than 7m copies. You basically dismissed it. In case you haven't paid any attention (and apparently you haven't), it's mostly Western companies who got into serious financial trouble in the seventh generation. They sell more games than ever before, but somehow they manage to make not much profit off of it. Some of them even went bankrupt or are close to it. Meanwhile, Japanese companies (who largely fail to put out blockbusters like Western companies) are in a better financial state. The Xbox 360 is hovering around the break even point after seven years on the market. The PS3 is still deep in the red after six years on the market. Their software and hardware strategy went hand in hand. They wanted to appeal to the older teen crowd above everything else, so they made very powerful consoles. Neither company could afford to make more moderate hardware, because it would have resulted in dismissal by the older teen crowd. There's no money to gain here for Nintendo. In order to compete they would need to be willing to lose billions upfront in hopes to eventually make it back; and like Microsoft's and Sony's financials have shown, even success in appealing to the older teen crowd doesn't yield any notable profits or even profits at all. |
I have no idea what you're talking about with only Western developers and publishers having financial trouble. The Japanese video-game industry has been reeling for awhile now. Some great developers have shuttered their doors or switched to mobile, especially the latter. Japanese publishers have seen huge losses. Nintendo is getting Bayonetta 2, after all, because SEGA is in such bad shape. Developers are coming out of the woodwork to say that the Japanese industry needs to improve or its going to be in serious trouble.
Your generalizations about older gamers are also wrong and honestly sound kind of spiteful. Sony lost money on the PS3 mainly because they pushed Blu-Ray and the Cell processor. They could have made a traditional machine with plenty of kick for much less. The idea that older gamers won't play on anything unless it's a behemoth is absolutely wrong. It's like denying the PS1 and PS2 ever happened. The appeal isn't the hardware, it's the software. It's the games, pure and simple.
Nintendo actually knows this, even if you don't. That's why Zombie U exists. That's why they have Bayonetta 2. They want that demographic. Given what Nintendo has said and done, that goes without question no matter how much you want to deny it.
The question here, in this thread, is more about why Nintendo is depending on third parties for a core title aimed at older gamers rather than developing their own or purchasing a studio for that purpose. They absolutely could, and with their ability to invest, they could have something on the order of Gears or Uncharted without question, or at least a Tomb Raider.
The suggestion that older gamers won't purchase a Nintendo console because it's for kids is also nonsense. At least, Nintendo is now trying to prove that it's nonsense. Gamers go where the games that they like are; if Nintendo has them then they'll go to Nintendo. Tons of older gamers bought a Wii and only regretted it because the selection of mature games let them down. You're blaming the consumers, which is not a sensible position in business. If there are image problems then you work to change or expand that image, you don't sit there and whine about your customers being wrong.
No one is saying that Nintendo should stop doing what they're doing, they're just suggesting that they broaden their focus to include a demographic that they've let slip away. Like it or not, that's Nintendo's failing, not the consumer's for having tastes that have changed or expanded as they've gotten older, and Nintendo knows it.
