Visuals for Wii U Zelda: My Serious Problem with the Fandom

[Soleron]

Aielyn said:

Soleron said:

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Nintendo has always prided itself on creating new experiences that people will come to love.

THIS attitude is horrible. They can make what they want because people will "come" to love it eventually?

Miyamoto tried to get people to love 3D Mario for years. When he gave up and allowed another 2D Mario, it sold out the Wii. The market knows what it wants and attempts to shape it will backfire.

See: Wind Waker. It has always taken the attitude that surprising the gamer is more important than giving them what they say they want, because when it comes down to it, people don't know what they really want, and so they ask for the obvious rather than the best.

he reception to Wind Waker has not improved from 2001 to now. It didn't sell enough to drive hardware then, and WWHD didn't sell enough to drive hardware now.

Individual forum members don't know what they want, sure, but Malstrom's whole point is to look at broad sales trends to decide what to make. Whether the developers like it or not.

The Wii itself, which Malstrom praised as Nintendo's greatest idea since the NES, was based on this idea - sure, they could have just ramped up the power. Nobody was asking for motion controls, before they revealed the Wii.

The Wii was a product of forced change. Core games and high power didn't work on the GC. So Nintendo CHANGED strategy.

With Zelda, they've been a broken record on "surprise" for games and games now. To no success. A change is needed, but Aonuma is still forcing this direction apparently until it works or people like it. That's not good.

Now, what is Aonuma doing with Zelda? He's aiming to make an experience that you can't get anywhere else. And that means leveraging the Wii U's hardware to make a game with a unique feel - which includes the visuals. They could, alternatively, go with graphics that seek out realism... in which case, the game would age rapidly.

On the contrary. The things that Zelda does different are rapidly disappearing to anime visuals, quirky characters, heavy story, puzzles and cutscenes. None of which are in any shortage in other Japanese games. You know what the world is short of? Games where you pick up a sword, explore and grow and feel like a hero. Skyrim came close but it wasn't Nintendo polished.

Note that he never said there wouldn't be a realistic feel to the graphics. He said it's going to have its own feel. This could mean that it'll end up looking much like the Tech Demo, only with more of a, say, futuristic feel to it. Or it might end up looking like a cross between Okami and Epic Mickey. Or like Rayman Legends with a hint of Mario 3D World. Or like Grand Theft Auto crossed with Xenoblade. It could end up great. It could end up simply not looking that good. But the greatest games usually come out of making an effort to do something different, going the more challenging route and refusing to copycat something just because it was successful.

Success actually comes from copying, but better. Games out of left field (Wonderful 101) tend to crash and burn. Wii Sports had abolsutely solid fundamentals: intuitive controls, familiar games (even copying NES Golf course), local multiplayer and minimalist presentation.

When it comes down to it, I'd love for there to be some new Zelda titles made by other producers than Aonuma... but every one of the games he has made so far have been top-notch (yes, including Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks).

And were the sales of those games good? Did they justify the massive time and energy commitment by Nintendo to the series? Zelda should be treated like the niche game it is, OR restored to the mainstream with a strategic change. The current path is not sustainable.

I'll give him free rein to guide things for now, and see where it takes the franchise. This isn't like Sakamoto and Metroid: Other M, we're not talking about a developer trying to insert his grand vision into the game,

His son wanted trains in the game no matter how little sense they made, so he made Spirit Tracks. That's just as arrogant as anything Sakamoto did.