zorg1000 said:
I think it is very narrow-minded to block everything into two categories, "casual" & "core", the gaming world is not that black & white and does not take into account various demographics. On PS4/XBO, there really is not alot of diversity in who the major software releases are aimed at, almost all of the big releases cater to teenage & adult males. According to the game database on this site, nearly 80% of retail software sales come from the shooter/sports/action genres. Basically Sony/Microsoft have found their niche in the gaming market and dont seem to be doing a whole lot to appeal to other demographics, thats where Nintendo can potentially do well. The demographics that arent being catered to by Sony/Microsoft include children, families & females. With the exception of Minecraft & a few Lego games, there really isnt any big hits this generation with strong appeal to these demographics. As Aquamarine's data showed in the most recent NPD thread, the Toys-to-Life market seems to have saturated, Disney is calling an end to Disney Infinity & Skylanders has been declining for a couple years. Just Dance continues to see massive declines year after year and the return of Guitar Hero/Rock Band were not met with commercial success. Some people may see this as a sign that these demographics are no longer interested in playing on dedicated gaming devices and are forever lost to free games on smartphones, I do not see it that way. I believe there is still a lot of potential to get interest from these demographics, but developers arent going to get it by releasing sequels/reboots to 5-10 year old franchises that are dead/declining. Guitar Hero debuted in 2005, Rock Band in 2007, Just Dance in 2009, Skylanders in 2011. People got their fill of these games and are ready for new experiences. If Nintendo can find a way to release products that have strong appeal to children, families & females, in addition to their dedicated fanbase than they can create a strong userbase that is very different from that found of PS/XB devices. I'm not saying that they should completely turn their backs on the teenage/adult male demographics but it cant be their primary focus. As for the bolded, 3DS has sold about 60 million which shows that there are alot more than just 10 million people who are willing to buy Nintendo hardware. |
Shouldn't Nintendo have a higher share of the children's market at least then? The Wii U has proportionately far more "kid/family friendly" games than the XBox or Playstation brands, yet I'd bet the XBox and Playstation have actually more kids buything their consoles.
I think you're kinda selling XBox/PS short too, there are enough family friendly titles on those platforms and things like Minecraft, which is a bigger new IP than anything Nintendo has come up with in like almost a decade.
You have indie games like Cuphead that look brilliant and fill the niche for people who want quirkier types of games to balance off big budget traditional style games. There are games like Shovel Knight.
Nintendo is the one who is not providing diversity within their library, Sony/MS are bringing more of everything to the masses and they simply have more of what people want in a home console. Case in point, "kids" should love Disney Infinity, right? The publisher was surprised to find that more kids chose Star Wars Battlefront instead of Disney Infinity 2 (which was counting on a big bump from the addition of Star Wars characters). Guess which of the three platform providers didn't have Star Wars Battlefront.
I'd say the casual market is actually overserved today too, just because Just Dance is the last console casual franchise hit and things like Nintendo Land and Sing Party failed to materialize for Nintendo, doesn't mean that the casual market actually has had probably the majority of the new hit IP. Angry Birds (now a movie), Boom Beach, Candy Crush, Geometry Dash, Minecraft, Puzzles & Dragons, Clash of Clans are all huge global phenmonenons, seems like there's a new hit casual IP every 6-12 months.
Maybe casuals simply realized paying $250+ for a game console + $40+/game and not having the flexibility to play where ever they want just to be able to play video games for a couple of hours a week was not that great of a bargain? People used to drive to Blockbuster Video every Friday to physically rent movies too, then Netflix and Video On Demand happened, when you offer something better/more convienant people often move on. What Apple/Android have done is something similar I think, they offer a better product for casual tastes, even than the Wii/DS at its peak. There are more people who play video games regularily today than at any point in gaming history most likely.
