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Soundwave on 22 August 2016
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RolStoppable said:
Soundwave said:

Point remains, I'm fine with Nintendo making accomodations for other audiences, my gripe is that we as experienced gamers or whatever term you want to use (go ahead and make one up) are the ones being asked to make every sacrifice. 

We used to get perfectly reasonable technology in line with the other systems on their day from Nintendo, now basically every aspect of their modern systems are really design first and foremost for beginner/non-gamers. I'm sorry if you don't like the distinction but it clearly exists. 

And basically for all these trade offs, what we're told is "shut up and accept the inferior hardware which is still pretty expensive and accept little to no third party support so we can make our hardware this way to suit this other crowd, but we're giving you Mario and Zelda, you should be happy enough with that."

Well you know what? The NES/SNES/N64/GameCube had Mario and Zelda too, saying "you're getting Zelda aren't you" isn't good enough. 

If Nintendo was genuine in this whole "we're making hardware for everyone" then the system would be legitimately designed for everyone's needs. Which the Wii and Wii U clearly were not, they were designed primarily for a beginner audience and their needs were put first in virtually every design decision, but we got a nunchaku or dual analog for core players, whoopity doo. 

Nintendo is being disingenious in making these kinds of statements. They are not making hardware with "everyone" in mind, they're making hardware very clearly for beginner/casual players in mind, and traditional/experienced players are the ones being asked to sacrifice on their expectations (don't expect good graphics anymore, don't expect great developer support, don't expect good online, don't expect a HDD storage standard, you have to pay extra for a traditional controller, you should be happy with Nintendo Land as your pack-in title, we don't need to give New Super Mario good graphics because casuals don't care about graphics, etc. etc. etc.). These aren't imaginary trade-offs, they are real and tangiable, since Nintendo went this "blue ocean" direction, Nintendo players who are enthusiasts have been asked to sacrifice their expectations while still paying top dollar. 

You are a dudebro. Definition = Places high importance on gaming to be manly and mature, quickly dismisses anything that doesn't fit that mold. Consequently, plays only games of a few selected genres. Suffers from the teenager complex that the world should revolve around them, so they are incapable of viewing any given subject from the point of view of somebody else.

That you like a few selected Nintendo games doesn't change that you are a dudebro at heart. There are already two consoles that cater to the demands of dudebros, but that is apparently not enough because the world should revolve around them, so all consoles have to be the same.

So you do like categories, just when it suits your agenda, lol. 

I don't like Call of Duty or Grand Theft Auto or Elder Scrolls or Battlefield. I'd rather watch paint dry than play a car racing simulator like Forza. I think I played Assassin's Creed for like 20 minutes and had an OK time, but have no intention of playing that for more than an hour. But I don't like Wii Sports, or Wii Fit, or Wii Party, or Mario Party either. 

My favorite franchises are Mario 3D, Mario 2D, Mario Kart, Advance Wars, Splatoon, F-Zero, Street Fighter, old-school Final Fantasy (SNES-to PSOne era), Donkey Kong Country, Killer Instinct, Fire Emblem, Ridge Racer, Punch-Out!, Soul Calibur, Zelda, (though I don't think Zelda is the be-all, end-all either), some Star Wars games, and uh ... I guess maybe the Batman games? Does liking Batman make me a "dudebros"? I've liked Batman for 30+ years. Star Fox used to be on my list but the last one while not entirely terrible has kinda soured me. I do like some sports games, like NHL and NBA and tennis but nope to Madden NFL and helllllllllll no to UFC (pretty sure that alone revokes my "dudebros" card). 

Maybe all consoles shouldn't be the same, but Nintendo is not plausibly making consoles for "everyone". They are clearly making almost every hardware decision for one group of people, while basically asking the other group to just suck it up and accept things when this is not how they ran their hardware business for almost 20 years. 

Making a console for beginners in basically every design decision, but saying "hey we're giving you Zelda, so shut up" isn't a balanced hardware design philosophy. That isn't "making a console for everyone". It's not wrong to want hardware that isn't 6-10 years behind the industry standard and still being asked to pay up $250 or more. I'm not even asking for a PS4 Neo speced Nintendo console, but would even 1 TFLOP (this is below even an XBox One, which was a poor piece of hardware for 2013) in 2017 kill them? How low of a bar do we need to set for Nintendo?