| Aeolus451 said: |
"Nintendo focuses on children and young teenagers while the rest of the big 3/ third party game devs focus on teenagers and adults."
Yeah but the only evidence you have for this is an ESRB system. If you look at the people buying the Switch - a lot, a lot of them are adults. Nintendo last generation had marketing almost entirely cattered to kids, which was a problem because so much of the Wii U audience was adults. The Switch's marketing rectifies that by showing Adults and teenagers. Honestly looking at gaming forums, pictures of people waiting outside for the system, the people commenting on the system and the games - almost all of them seem to be adults. Of course this is anecdotal and a gaming forum is hardly great evidence, but the social media following around the Switch has been so adult oriented, and not just the marketing from Nintendo. It's hard to argue that the Switch mostly appeals to adults when it's selling because of titles like Zelda(a game that is "accessible" by kids but nowhere near a kid game) and Splatoon, a shooter that is harder to play than COD or BF and doesn't have the instant gratification of either. I'm not going to say there aren't kids, but I think this is a case of looking at an art style and making false representation after that.
" Nintendo focuses on children and young teenagers while the rest of the big 3/ third party game devs focus on teenagers and adults. So you could word it as "nintendo games have a much wider demographic than any other and beyond that gamers take up on a majority of the gaming market" and you wouldn't be wrong. "
Uh.......yeah it would. Have you seen any gaming statistic in the last few years? Kids as a whole take up a minority of the gaming demographic , the majority are adults and the closest following are older teenagers. Which is another reason the "Switch gets sales from kids and young teens" just doesn't make a whole lot of sense. The mindshare of kids has gone down since what it used to be because gaming has become more accessible and acceptable. People under 18 have consistently only taken about 27-29% of the market for a few years now. Now obviously it's hard to know what are considered "games" but a lot of these studies specifically focus on computers and consoles titles , which is much better than including mobile titles.
"Pokemon is in a league of it's own with brand recognition and more importantly, people wanting to buy products in relation to it in comparison to the rest of nintendo's staple of games. It is the only IP nintendo has that has reach outside of the gaming market. Just the shows ensure kids everywhere know of it and like it. Zelda might be the closest to it though. "
You start off by making good points(although they aren't things I really disagreed with) but then things simply go off the rails from there. I'm really trying to see things from your perspective, because maybe there's a method to your madness, but saying stuff like "It is the only IP nintendo has that has reach outside of the gaming market" is not only completely wrong but verifiably false. Mario Kart, Smash Bros, Mario are all titles that have recognition beyond gaming and it's hardly up for debate. Yeah yeah everyone likes to bring up that 3D mario games sell worse but that doesn't change the fact that they're bought by a lot of people who aren't gamers. I really doubt that Galaxy got to 11 million because *just* gamers wanted it, if anything after Galaxy most gamers seemed tired of Mario until Odyssey was announced. Saying Zelda is the closest thing to Pokemon is also head scratching. While I do love that Zelda 2k17 has gotten to a wider audience than previous entries, Zelda is one of the most hardcore franchises Nintendo has and the only reason I can see Zelda going to 9-11 mil is because it increased it's mindshare with RPG/Open world fanatics(even if it isn't an RPG), a.k.a people who were already hardcore gaming fans. Consider that titles like Mario Kart and Smash bros are multiplayer phenomena and again I have to question where you're coming from. In what world do you suppose that every Nintendo title is niche except Pokemon? Sales aren't everything - there needs to be some context, which is why i'll agree that something like an Animal Crossing game is more for a specific audience than people beyond the gaming spectrum, because besides in Japan it doesn't push as much hardware as most Nintendo franchises and acts more like a companion piece to the hardware than a reason to buy it. But the other games I just don't understand how that can be applied to.
