By using this site, you agree to our Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use. Close
Soundwave on 07 June 2014
Edit Thread
RolStoppable said:
Soundwave said:

So explain to me exactly what would've been a blue ocean strategy for the Wii successor? Because it seems like a vague, magical maguffin.

Spell it out exactly and explain to me why a person who can get their  casual-centric/easy-to-play/intuitive interface gaming fix for free or for $1 a pop would chose to run to a store and buy the Nintendo alternative to what they have already in their pocket at all times. 

I think any strategy undertaken by Nintendo to aim at casuals this generation was simply going to be a dead end no matter what. There was no controller invention that would change that because the hold of Apple/Android on the potential market for a machine that relies on people who prefer casual/bright + colorful/easy to play games was such that nothing could shake it by the time 2010 dawned. 

Apple and Android not only ruined Nintendo's blue ocean by turning it blood run, they took a giant sh*t in the middle of it too making it red-brown, lol, by destryoing the business model that Nintendo relied on. Once you could get games for 99 cents/free, suddenly Nintendo's proposition, whatever it was was always going to fall on deaf ears. That was something Sony/MS never did, they may have "beat" Nintendo, but they always agreed upon Nintendo's rules in doing so. Apple/Android are much more of a stab through Nintendo's heart. 

Not to say that the opposite would've been much easier of a path for Nintendo, but then again, in real life, there's no gauruntee of an "easy path", perhaps the reality is Nintendo had two hard paths this generation, and it was going to be hard for them either way. 

Like I already said in this thread, Sony ceased to compete because Move had failed to gain any traction and Microsoft's Kinect was destined to be a fad like the PS2 EyeToy; it wouldn't take long until the limitations became apparent; aside from minigame compilations, dancing and fitness, there's really nothing else that can be done with controller-free gaming; on the other hand, the Wii was versatile as Mr Khan explained in a post in this thread, it's not limited to motion gaming or only one type of controller. Plus third parties would neither support Sony's or Microsoft's devices which would create a battle between first party talent; a battle that plays strongly in favor of Nintendo. As for smartphones and tablets, they have no motion controller and no local multiplayer on the same screen. Put all of this together and you are looking at a situation where Nintendo gets a lot of market space on their own.

Why would people who play free games pay for Nintendo products? For the same reason they bought a Wii, even though flash game portals on the PC were already a popular thing before the launch of the Wii. The PC didn't offer what the Wii did, so the Wii was worth buying. You still have trouble to grasp that not everything you label as casual games is equal. Maybe it begins to click when I tell you that not every hardcore gamer plays FPS games and JRPGs, not everyone likes both. Or what if I tell you that playing one kind of game doesn't rule out playing another kind of game? Would it also be so hard to believe that people can play games on more than one device?

But since this response will inevitably lead to you screaming about how people didn't buy the Wii U despite the console having all that Wii stuff, let me once again point out that the Wii U is the Gamepad. People don't want it. And beyond that, the Wii U doesn't scream upgrade over the Wii; the Wiimotes and Nunchuks are the same, sequels were more often than not phoned in; that kind of treatment doesn't send the message that the Wii gamer is valuable to Nintendo. Take Wii Sports: It was the biggest IP on the Wii; on the Wii U it got relegated to a remake that was released in pieces as a digital-only title to test a new pricing model. That's not how you handle a flagship game. Imagine Microsoft breaking Halo down like that, or Sony doing the same to Gran Turismo; they would be called nuts for doing such an insane thing, but when it comes to Nintendo, the blame gets directed at the lowly casuals for not putting up with that shit.


I think the idea to you that the game industry is only Microsoft-Sony-Nintendo and there is nothing else to it other than that is kind of a comfortable box that you like, but sadly I don't think it's the reality of the business. It would so much simpler if that was the case. 

Smartphones/tablets have impacted the industry far more than flash games on the PC. Which blockbuster IP originated from the flash browser market?

Candy Crush Saga, Angry Birds, Plants Vs. Zombies, and many others are worldwide phenemons from the smartphone market. We can't deny smartphone games have had phenomonal success. Why? I don't know if it can even be explained entirely. I think it's obvious people have a very strong emotional attachment to their phone that goes beyond other electronic devices. Try and take someone's phone away from them for even 10 minutes and they will flip out. 

And you're right some people do play different types of games, however the problem still is still this ... for "core" games like the COD that they enjoy they buy a PS4 for that. But for the casual gaming fix, simple, arcade games ... why buy a seperate console for that? Smartphones/tablets have filled that consumer need. And for people who don't care about 'core' games period, even moreso. The game industry is becoming much more segmented where you have "blockbuster" games on one end and small-scale low budget phenoms on the lower end (Candy Crush), and the "middle" game is getting squeezed out. It's becoming more like the Hollywood model all the time. 

The formula of a game relying on A) intuitive controls to snare a wide audience base B) simple, easy to play gameplay harkening back in many ways to the NES/Atari era or even simpler is simply not a blue ocean anymore by any definition. It doesn't matter if Sony/MS are doing something different or not, they triopoly of these three companies being the be all, end all of the gaming universe has been broken whether people want to admit it or not.

The market today is more accurately the blockbuster/low end model I described above. If you have a 360/PS3/PS4/XB1 and a smartphone you basically have all your bases covered, sadly Nintendo just doesn't factor into the equation anymore.