Soundwave said:
A Nintendo third party box maybe when they launched with Wii U in 2012, they had a window, but not now. Absolutely now, it's not like this part of the cycle has ended for 3rd party, it's just beginning for Nintendo and it has the potential to open up the Nintendo handheld audience as a part of that platform to sell to, which really hasn't happened before, there's never been a time like this where Nintendo could make one platform, with multiple devices, that could potentially have as big a volume of software coming to it as this and the console could easily benefit the most out of this. Sony and Microsoft are oversaturating the market for that market by releasing basically 2 systems each, there's no room for Nintendo to operate. Microsoft aren't launching until Holiday 2017, no one knows exactly when Sony are, just that they have an updated version of PS4. There's room for Nintendo, they actually have proper exclusives, unlike Microsoft, most of who's supposed "exclusive" games are also releasing on PC, that isn't the case for Nintendo, so there's something unique in their platform, that puts them more in a similar position to Sony, if they can entice 3rd party and prove they can sell their games, which requires a few things, most importantly games that you can't get anywhere else, that cater to the audience in question. I just don't think it would be huge, talk to Sony/MS buyers, they are not sitting around waiting for Disney-esque Nintendo to give them a "Nintendo PS4" that audience left Nintendo a long time ago. Doesn't need to be huge, Xbox One isn't huge compared to PS4, but it still gets it's share, Nintendo could take that if they were serious. It's not about Nintendo making a Nintendo PS4 (no need to use red herrings), it's about catering to an audience that was abandoned, they didn't leave Nintendo, they were ignored. The GameCube did everything basically that you're asking for. Gamecube was better than Wii U for sure, but it still lacked, yet that as a console sold better than Wii U has, considerably so, which is important here. FYI Gamecube didn't have a unified ecosystem with it's handheld brother, which more recent rumors say is still a thing for NX and Iwata himself did say Nintendo wanted to cater to a wider audience, by breaking down the boundaries between their systems. Where is it going to sit too ... would it be more powerful than a Neo? Or Scorpio? Probably not, it would just end up being the neglected step-child of home consoles again. Value for the console, with reasonable performance, big range of games and flexible options for how you play, that's where it sits. There's a definite market for all of that, hell a console with an RX 470 could still be very cheap and powerful enough to sit close to the rumored Neo specs, it would only get ignored if Nintendo didn't support it, see Vita in the case of basically being abandoned by 3rd party soon after launch and Sony not putting many of their many sellers on it, along with failing to make new IPs that really spoke to the very audience I'm talking about here. I bet actually NX will see the best third party support potentially since the Super NES days for a Nintendo console *if* it can run PS4/XB1 ports on the go. Well if it's a unified platform, like the OS approach I've mentioned in the past I can see that, but it will depend on Nintendo making games to appeal to that audience, globally targeted exclusive games that appeal to a diverse region of the people that buy 3rd party would show people that there's a reason to have one of these devices, whether it's all a tablet/portable console thing or that and a dedicated console/dock device that amps things up or stands by itself, yet able to play everything. In those cases I can see 3rd party all over giving some support to test the waters, if those games sell well enough then Nintendo would be back in external publisher's good graces. Even at a reduced resolution like 960x540. They are going to get a shit ton of support from Square-Enix, Capcom, Namco, with things like the *real* Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts and Dragon Quest games I would bet, not just spin-offs like the Wii got. Probably, but it's not just about getting those games, those appeal to people in japan and the more niche audience worldwide, but they need to Watch Dogs, Destinies, GTA, Witcher, etc to really hit hard. It will be interesting to see if they can pull that off though. The problem in the past is developers liked the userbase that Nintendo had on portable, but the portable couldn't run current generation games. Even Rockstar was willing to give the DS a Grand Theft Auto game, but it couldn't run a 3D one. At the end of the day though it doesn't really matter what anyone thinks, Nintendo is the one that makes the calls and it looks like they've decided to go in this direction. I'm just going to enjoy the games, at a minimum for me it will be nice to just buy one Nintendo hardware instead of spending $400-$600 on two and be able to play all the games even things like the new Zelda anywhere, anytime. That's going to be cool, sorry if it doesn't float your boat. It's entirely possible for NX to be anything really, just because the rumors say one thing, that doesn't mean it's not something else. Personally I'd be surprised if there wasn't a standalone console device, because Nintendo has always made one, sure sales have diminished, but that doesn't mean they can't be improved or even skyrocket. Clearly there's still a very big console sales market, customers are still buying PS4s and XB1s, they were even still buying 360s and PS3s until recently, that's a big reason why I don't think Nintendo will give up on that and having one OS, one API, catered to easy development on more than one device would make that easy to get games on anything within a certain range.
BTW I never said that I'd hate it if NX was just the weaker tablet device or portable console that even sits in the Wii U performance range and gets every bit of software from Nintendo, along with a decent selection of indies and some 3rd party, I just don't think that will sell very well. I don't think that can compete in the tablet space and Nintendo's handheld market sales will likely decline, with only a small measure of the console side of the market will get one, compared to this generation. Nintendo needs to talk already, hopefully when "leakers" say that's happening soon they don't mean in October or like the VGAs, I hope it does happen either by the end of this month or September, they need to get people interested before the holidays and start marketing it. |
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