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Soundwave on 21 August 2015
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zorg1000 said:
Soundwave said:


Why does there have to be a middle ground? 

As far as I can tell right now core/casual core players are very happy with their home consoles and casuals/novice level gamers are very, very happy with the simpler but fun experiences that can be had on a smartphone or tablet for little/no money. 

Today you can play games regardless of your skill level in a variety of different forms very easily. 

The problem for Nintendo is they're not really offering the best on either spectrum. Sony does the core aspect better and Apple/Google do the casual thing much better than even the Wii did. More people play games today probably than ever really. I see old men in the business suits and women playing games on their tablet on flights or at the airport, 10-12 years ago the only time you saw people playing games in public were kids playing on their Game Boy. 

$60 isn't even that bad to be honest. I grew up with $60-$80 NES, SNES, and N64 games.

Why is there a middle ground between pop music and death metal? Or a middle ground between animated kids movies and gory horror movies? Because there are other demographics interested in things that don't fit into those categories.

There is a market for gaming that falls between free mobile & AAA console games. Most of the type of games Nintendo creates fall between these 2 categories and despite all the flaws made this generation, Nintendo has sold close to 65 million units of hardware and 300 million units of software, that sorta shows there is a market for games that fall between the two ends of the spectrum. That number could very well be higher had Nintendo not made multiple mistakes this generation.

There is already a middle ground just by virtue of all the different types of games. Even on an iPad you can get more "deeper" types of experiences if you want (Final Fantasy and the like) and on a home console you can get simpler/cheaper experiences if you want (I can play indie games on my PS4 for example for $10 a pop). The way you're framing it is just patently false, it's not like the PS4 only has death metal on it, and someone needs to make something else so people can enjoy other genres. 

That shouldn't be confused with needing an entire new format as a middle ground. Movie goers are not asking for a middle format in between the movie theater and the home video/digital release market. 

Truthfully too, Nintendo largely makes core games. Just because they have a candy coated exterior with cute mascots doesn't mean they're not, even during the Wii era, they made may be two or three Wii Fit/Wii Sports type game a year centrally, but most of their games were basically the same thing they've been making since the 90s (3D Mario, 2D Mario, Donkey Kong, 3D Zelda, Metroid, Punch-Out!, etc. etc.). 

The only thing that's really changed is Nintendo simply got beat for those mass casual/very simple to play games by Apple/Google who simply offer a better place for those types of games than even the Wii ever did and Nintendo has as a result basically regressed back to where they were in the GCN/GBA days (though they have lost some of the kids market to tablets/phones too).