Bayonetta and Devil's Third are a good start.

[Pristine20]

Soundwave said:

I'm not really convinced this is all that different from any previous Nintendo gen though.

Nintendo had Perfect Dark, GoldenEye, and Conker's Bad Fur Day on the N64 and financed things like Starcraft 64, Star Wars: Rogue Squadron, etc. too for the older crowd.

GameCube had Eternal Darkness, NBA Courtside, 1080, Geist (ugh), Metroid Prime, Metal Gear Solid: Twin Snakes, aimed at older players and they grabbed Resident Evil exclusivity that gen.

Wii had Metroid Prime 3, Xenoblade, Fatal Frame IV, The Last Story, Dynamic Slash (Zengeki), Sin & Punishment 2, for the older crowd, unfortunately NOA bailed on supporting some of these projects in favor of just riding the Wii Sports/Fit fads and telling us to be happy with Animal Crossing Wii and Wii Music.

So Wii U has Bayonetta 2, Xenoblade X, and Devil's Third as kind of the "hardcore" games. Hopefully we get Fatal Frame V too.

But I'm not sure if this represents a legitimate movement towards a new direction or if its Nintendo's token 4-5 games per gen aimed at an older crowd that they've kinda maintained since the second half of the SNES days.

I won't necessarily call the crowd that want something different from the ninty traditional "older". One may even argue that a good proportion of the ninty crowd is the oldest of the bunch since they have a significantly nostalgia-driven business. I'd a better definition is folks who'd rather play something that doesn't have all the colors in the rainbow with accompanying disproportionately drawn characters.

Now to be fair to nintendo, not all their series are like that. Fire Emblem being a notable exception but that is not the game that gets people buying ninty consoles. It's more like  a niche title for the fringe unfortunately.