By using this site, you agree to our Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use. Close
Soundwave on 06 July 2014
Edit Thread
RolStoppable said:
Soundwave said:

I'd go even further and say trying to replicate or continue the Wii especially in 2012 in any way was a mistake. 

Nintendo was never going to repeat the success of the first Wii, the thing is in a lot of ways what Nintendo never really understood is that a lot of people don't want anything more complex than Wii Sports. 

And that iPhone/Android serves their needs far better. Nintendo had a nice window of oppurtunity from 2006-2009 but that was about it. These people don't want to play a Zelda game, I have a cousin who is pretty much a textbook definition of a casual player, and she asked me to list her some good games to buy for her new Wii and I suggested Mario Galaxy as the best game on the system. 

I remember the look on her face like a week later, lol, she was so frustrated with the game and couldn't even make it past like the first couple of levels and was upset that I had suggested it. I think we wrongly assume that the Wii broke down all barriers ... not really. Wii Sports did, but the thing is many Wii gamers wouldn't be able to play a game like Skyward Sword or Metroid Prime or even Mario Galaxy, it doesn't matter what controller you give them either (short of maybe brain control).

They want games with extremely stripped down play mechanics (ie: in tennis you don't even need to worry about moving your player). Nintendo's hope that they could get this crowd to graduate to different games was ill-founded. It was like assuming the person who likes Transformers movies may eventually become a fan of art house films for example ... and maybe that might even happen once in a blue moon, but the odds are that audience simply likes what they like and want nothing different. 

And in that scenario, Nintendo was always doomed against Apple, because they can't beat Apple for simple/easy to play games on volume, price, or hardware sexiness. 

The bolded cracks me up.

You need to look at games from another angle. These "casual" gamers don't want to put up with bullshit. I wrote a thread about Super Mario Galaxy's failure, but Google search doesn't retrieve it; anyway, the point is that SMG's start is really, really, really bad. The same goes for Skyward Sword, so I wouldn't blame anyone for putting the game down before motion controls come into play. Nevertheless, Nintendo got those people to graduate to other games. Mario Kart Wii and New Super Mario Bros. Wii sold really well; pretty much a mirror image of the DS success where MK and NSMB also greatly benefited from the influx of new gamers.

So Nintendo's problem isn't that said audience doesn't want anything other than Wii Sports, it's that Nintendo's developers don't want to make such games. And by that I don't just mean timely sequels, but also new IPs that are made in the same spirit. Where's the story in MK and NSMB? It doesn't exist. People's time isn't wasted with bullshit, so they like those games more than the titles you consider masterpieces.

MK and NSMB also have higher game purity than 3D Mario and modern Zelda; by that I mean that winning/losing (the very core concept of a game) is clearer defined and happens on a more frequent basis. The same obviously holds true for Wii Sports. Meanwhile, you can spend minutes walking around in 3D Mario and modern Zelda without anything of real interest happening; and that equates to boring.

My cousin who bought the Wii doesn't even like Mario Kart by the way. "Too hard". Even Wii Sports Resort was pushing it (she prefers the original Wii Sports by far). She likes the Wii in the same way Charades or Twister is fun ... it's fun to have your friends get up and look foolish infront of others. That's the "party" appeal of it. Shockingly she got tired of the Wii after about 2 years (I guess this is Nintendo's fault too). 

What's wrong with Nintendo not wanting to make games like Wii Sports (with stripped down mechanics) forever? That's not Nintendo, anymore than asking Wes Anderson or even Steven Spielberg to make nothing but Micheal Bay style movies because that's what a portion dumb general movie going public wants (robots and some tits and ass and explosions, minimal to no story, lots of special effects). 

Nintendo Land isn't any more complex than Mario Kart, so why isn't that successful? It's not like the Wii U doesn't have a crapton of mini-game style titles either. Casual gaming fads are not based on merit or quality ... is Flappy Bird really a better game than some of the Wii Fit U mini-games? Nope. What's so special about Candy Crush Saga? This is just the epitome of throwing a bunch of crap at a wall and having some of it stick. 

Nintendo was always going to lose this audience unless they completely sold out their prinicipals as who they are and gave into what that audience wants -- simple to play, stripped down, mini-games for $1 (or better yet free). And tons of them, with little to no regard for actual quality. "Quality" is actually bad because it can make the games unneccessarily complex/hard. That's what that audience wants now and Nintendo cannot oblige that without destroying what makes them Nintendo in the first place. 

I'd rather Nintendo fail being themselves than sell out trying to be something they aren't. If the mass public doesn't want to buy an entire console just for Nintendo franchises anymore, than so be it, Nintendo will find some other ways to make money, and at least Nintendo can say they went down being themselves, not some shadow or joke of a company pretending to desperately chase every fad.