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Forums - Nintendo - Nintendo sucks at marketing its older-teen blockbusters

 

Does Nintendo suck at marketing its older-teen blockbusters?

Yes 72 75.00%
 
No 24 25.00%
 
Total:96
Nem on 30 November 2012
happydolphin said:

Not too long ago I made an article comparing the success of Halo to the success of Metroid, among other interesting things.

Now we ALL know that Metroid Prime was a game without multiplayer and Halo was a game with online multiplayer support. However, is multiplayer the be all end all of sales?

A game like Assassin's Creed 1 will tell you the opposite. Solely catering to a single-player immersive experience, Assassin's Creed 1 had no online multiplayer support, no local multiplayer support.

Nonetheless, it went on to sell a total of 9.6m units across the PS and 360 platforms.

Pos Game Platform Year Genre Publisher North America Europe Japan Rest of World Global
1 Assassin's Creed X360 2007 Adventure Ubisoft 3.04 1.55 0.07 0.53 5.18
2 Assassin's Creed II PS3 2009 Action Ubisoft 2.19 1.92 0.21 0.83 5.16
3 Assassin's Creed II X360 2009 Action Ubisoft 2.74 1.57 0.08 0.50 4.90
4 Assassin's Creed PS3 2007 Adventure Ubisoft 1.77 1.84 0.09 0.77 4.47
5 Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood X360 2010 Action Ubisoft 2.43 1.43 0.03 0.43 4.32
6 Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood PS3 2010 Action Ubisoft 1.55 1.80 0.11 0.73 4.19
7 Assassin's Creed: Revelations X360 2011 Action Ubisoft 1.98 1.39 0.03 0.39 3.80
8 Assassin's Creed: Revelations PS3 2011 Action Ubisoft 1.23 1.76 0.07 0.69 3.76

Assassin's Creed II followed the same success, as well without multiplayer. It's only with Brotherhood (the non-numbered sequel to ACII) that multiplayer was introduced.

Comparing to Halo, we have:

Pos Game Platform Year Genre Publisher North America Europe Japan Rest of World Global
1 Halo 3 X360 2007 Shooter Microsoft Game Studios 7.64 2.69 0.13 1.17 11.64
2 Halo: Reach X360 2010 Shooter Microsoft Game Studios 6.59 1.76 0.08 0.83 9.26
3 Halo 2 XB 2004 Shooter Microsoft Game Studios 6.82 1.53 0.05 0.08 8.49
4 Halo: Combat Evolved XB 2001 Shooter Microsoft Game Studios 4.98 1.30 0.08 0.07 6.43
5 Halo 3: ODST X360 2009 Shooter Microsoft Game Studios 4.16 1.28 0.06 0.60 6.09

(Halo4 and AC3 removed for simplicity, since they're new releases)

Now why is it a game like Metroid follows this trend rather than Halo's or Assassin's Creed's?

Pos Game Platform Year Genre Publisher North America Europe Japan Rest of World Global
1 Metroid Prime GC 2002 Shooter Nintendo 1.96 0.67 0.10 0.09 2.82
2 Metroid Prime 3: Corruption Wii 2007 Shooter Nintendo 0.86 0.54 0.07 0.16 1.64
3 Metroid Prime 2: Echoes GC 2004 Shooter Nintendo 0.87 0.35 0.07 0.04 1.33

The answer is simple: Nintendo doesn't know how to advertise its core titles to the extent that the likes of MS and Ubisoft advertise their older-teen posterboys. Even Sony, which gets less sales overall for its 1st party offerings, puts a lot of advertising money into some  of its blockbusters, like Gran Turismo and Uncharted.

As far as I remember, Metroid Prime 3 had little to no advertising, as with Metroid Prime 2. The first prime had some advertising, it was a big new game with big potential. However, it got much less exposure than Halo.

The follow-up question is, even if they wanted to, COULD Nintendo support the advertising style MS gives to Halo, and if so, would it yield some kind of return on investment even if the game's sales didn't cover the cost?


WRONG, wrong, wrong! Your poll is wrong, your thread title is wrong. Replace the word Marketing with advertising.

Marketing is not Advertising. If you say marketing, you're saying Nintendo shouldnt make more metroid's.

As for the thread topic (without the word marketing), i agree. But i think Nintendo does it so it doesnt incur damage on their family friendly brand. Nintendo's marketing is actually really good and the Wii, for example was proof of that.



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NightDragon83 on 30 November 2012
Mr Khan said:
NightDragon83 said:
Wow, those are some sad numbers for Prime 3, arguably the best in the series. The Wii sold a bajillion units, yet MP3 couldn't even come close to 2 mil WW, and couldn't even break 1mil here in the US.

The OP is spot on about Nintendo's marketing and advertising. Unless you were a hardcore gamer or Ninty fanboy at the time, you had no clue that Prime 3 was coming out on the Wii prior to its release because there was NO advertising of any kind until the week of its release. Nintendo was even criticized for this point blank by many gaming journalists for years, and yet they still went ahead with their policy of 1: not revealing new games until it's within months of their release date (which means no hype buildup at all), and 2: not advertising their games at all unless it has Mario, Pokemon, or Wii in the title.

For further proof, just look at the Wii U. We didn't get any concrete info on the console's price, launch date and launch titles until TWO MONTHS before launch, and heading into 2013, aside from Pikmin 3 and Bayonetta, we have absolutely NO IDEA what Nintendo or even 3rd parties have planned for the Wii U after January or February. Meanwhile if you're a PS360 gamer, you know of plenty of AAA titles coming out for your console of choice in just the first half of 2013 alone, like new Gears, God of War, The Last of Us, Metro Last Light, Bioshock 3, GTAV, etc.

What the hell is Nintendo's PR and marketing department DOING???!?!?!?

I think the idea is to avoid Last Guardian/Versus XIII/Dragon Quest X/Agent type debacles. You don't want to create hype for a project, and then see it fall through for whatever reason, then have to deal with backlash. Better to wait until the game is really ready to go, in their mind.

I don't agree with it either, but i do think that's the justification. The problem with that strategy is that if you don't show people that you're doing something, they'll assume that you're doing nothing.

Well there hasn't really been that many high profile Nintendo games that were unveiled at some point and then delayed for years on end.  Most major releases going all the way back to the SNES days were only delayed for a year or two tops.  There were N64 launch games like Goldeneye that got delayed a year, Banjo was delayed from '97 to June '98, Paper Mario was shown earlier on in the N64's life as SMRPG2 in 98 or 99 (around the same time as the original version of Conker too), and both were delayed till early 2001.  Those are about the longest delayed 1st party Nintendo games that were officially unveiled at some point that I can remember, and that's nothing compared to some of the high profile delays we've seen just during this gen alone like the ones you mentioned.

I have no problem with Nintendo showing off games that are about a year or so away from release, but to not show off anything until mere months before they're set to launch doesn't help them at all, in fact it does alot more harm than good because "core" gamers not only look at the current software library of a particular console but upcoming titles as well when deciding on which console they should pick up.  Like lets say you were trying to decide between PS3 and 360, and you had no idea that exclusives like GoW and The Last of Us were coming out for the PS3, nor were you sure if it was actually going to get 3rd party games like GTAV and Bioshock 3, and these are the types of games that you enjoy the most over any other series or genres... which console do you think you'd be more likely to pick up in that case?

This is the dillema that many "core" gamers are facing when deciding on whether or not they should get a Wii U, because 1) they have no idea what exclusives are coming out for the system in the next 6-12 months aside from Pikmin and Bayonetta, and 2) they don't even know which major 3rd party games are coming to the system during that same period.  Sure 3D Mario, Zelda, Metroid, DK, Smash etc are eventually coming to the system at some point, but that could be anywhere from a year to as much as 5 or more for any one of those franchises... took 6 years between Zelda releases on the Wii for example, and it's been 5 years since the last Smash and Metroid and still no official sign of either one.



On 2/24/13, MB1025 said:
You know I was always wondering why no one ever used the dollar sign for $ony, but then I realized they have no money so it would be pointless.

happydolphin on 30 November 2012

@pezus. Melee, Prime (relatively speaking), Mario Sunshine (relatively speaking, sold 120k less than Halo:CE), Rogue Leader, Rogue Squadron III, REmake, RE:0, RE4, Sonic Adventure, Sonic Adventure 2, Wind Waker, twilight princess, tales of symphonia, Soul Calibur II, Star Fox Adventures, Final Fantasy: CC, Metroid Prime 2, DK: Jungle Beat, Need for Speed Underground 2, Naruto Clash of Ninja 2, Starfox Assault, and many more.

In reverse, how many non-core games sold on the cube? Then we'll compare SW totals.

Nem said:

WRONG, wrong, wrong! Your poll is wrong, your thread title is wrong. Replace the word Marketing with advertising.

Marketing is not Advertising. If you say marketing, you're saying Nintendo shouldnt make more metroid's.

As for the thread topic (without the word marketing), i agree. But i think Nintendo does it so it doesnt incur damage on their family friendly brand. Nintendo's marketing is actually really good and the Wii, for example was proof of that.

1)  Refer to item 8 of this thread.

2) I meant marketing. And by marketing, I mean Nintendo should properly target the Halo audience in the way it markets metroid, be it by advertising or anything else.

3) Just be quiet.

4) Your last sentece luckily cancels out the abnoxiousness of the rest of your post. In reply, I was not talking about the market Nintendo was successful to reach (casual/non-gamer), I was talking about the market they failed to reach (the PS360 crowd). Read the WRONG OP better next time.



happydolphin on 30 November 2012
Jon-Erich said:
If anyone looks at the sales history of all the Metroid games, they'll see that the first Metroid game and Metroid Prime are the best selling games in the series. Also, compared to most franchises, even in it's glory days, Metroid was never that popular. While I agree that Nintendo's marketing efforts for Metroid Prime 3 were not as great as Metroid Prime 1 or 2, I don't think the Metroid series has a marketing issue. I think when compared to Halo, it's not as accessible to gamers as Halo. Halo and other FPS's are easier for gamers to get into. Metroid requires patience and a certain kind of discipline that many gamers simply do not possess. It's the reason why back in the day, Mario was the big seller while Metroid was not, just like nowadays how Halo is the big selling game while Metroid is not.

To make it sound simpler, Halo has more market potential than Metroid. The same goes for Nintendo other games that appeal to older gamers, maybe with the exception of Zelda. Although, then again, Zelda can't pull in the kind of numbers that Call of Duty can. Of course, if Nintendo was like certain other developers (cough, Capcom, cough), they would cheapen some of their franchises in order make them more like some popular franchises in the West.

As I mentioned to another poster earlier, Halo:CE was slow as well. It's not the same game we have today. Yet it still managed to sell 6.43m (as much as Mario Sunshine).

Also, what stops Nintendo from playing with Metroid to pace it a little more pick-up-and-go from the get-go? In Assassin's Creed, you start with all of Al-Tair's powers, and then they are stripped from you. The same was done for Metroid Prime 3 iirc (I forget how the game starts).



Walkthrublazer3 on 30 November 2012
pezus said:
happydolphin said:
pezus said:
happydolphin said:

Fair, but Microsoft snagged it in a gen (with the 360). Why would it not be possible for Nintendo? They have money, they just need to have the right idea in mind and make it happen.

No, they already had much of it. Xbox was a purely hardcore console. They just expanded that. Nintendo don't seem to care about games like that.

You must've missed the memo. The cube was a hardcore console, no question about it.
 It had its share of kids games, for sure, but so did the PS2. The cube catered to a core demographic, and this is non-debatable.

The xbox sold 25m units, that's 1/6th of the sales the PS2 got. Now MS sold almost 75m units, that's triple the sales. Software-wise,it gets sillier. The 360 sold 700m pieces of SW while the xbox sold a meager 271m. So don't give me this "they already had it" spiel.

EDIT: I forgot to mention that Halo:CE was a Launch Title, no market to leech off of. They built their marketshare themselves.

Which core games sold well on Gamecube?

Aside from Resident Evil 4 and Soul Caliber 2, None. The Gamecube was not a hardcore system and aside from a select few 3rd party titles, only Nintendo games sold on the system. The Gamecube was labeled as a "Kiddy Console" from both the media and core gamers. It was nicknamed "The Purple Lunchbox" and many Nintendo fans decided to leave Nintendo, after games like Super Mario Sunshine and Wind Waker were released. It was by no means a "hardcore system" instead it was a machine that was only viable for Nintendo's kid friendly games.

For proof here is the top 25 highest selling GC games according to VGchartz

1 Super Smash Bros. Melee GC 2001 Fighting Nintendo 4.41 1.04 1.39 0.22 7.07
2 Mario Kart: Double Dash!! GC 2003 Racing Nintendo 4.12 1.77 0.87 0.19 6.95
3 Super Mario Sunshine GC 2002 Platform Nintendo 4.01 1.26 0.87 0.17 6.31
4 The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker GC 2002 Adventure Nintendo 2.60 0.99 0.89 0.13 4.60
5 Luigi's Mansion GC 2001 Action Nintendo 2.38 0.67 0.46 0.10 3.60
6 Animal Crossing GC 2001 Simulation Nintendo 1.92 0.16 0.99 0.09 3.15
7 Metroid Prime GC 2002 Shooter Nintendo 1.96 0.67 0.10 0.09 2.82
8 Sonic Adventure 2 Battle GC 2001 Platform Sega 1.70 0.59 0.21 0.07 2.56
9 Pokémon Colosseum GC 2003 Role-Playing Nintendo 1.21 0.57 0.70 0.07 2.54
10 Mario Party 4 GC 2002 Misc Nintendo 1.13 0.36 0.92 0.07 2.47
11 Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door GC 2004 Role-Playing Nintendo 1.48 0.25 0.46 0.06 2.25
12 Mario Party 5 GC 2003 Misc Nintendo 0.97 0.33 0.73 0.06 2.08
13 Sonic Mega Collection GC 2002 Misc Infogrames 1.47 0.48 0.05 0.06 2.05
14 Star Wars Rogue Leader: Rogue Squadron II GC 2001 Simulation LucasArts 1.03 0.75 0.03 0.09 1.90
15 Star Fox Adventures GC 2002 Adventure Nintendo 0.96 0.53 0.30 0.09 1.87
16 Resident Evil 4 GC 2005 Action Capcom 0.98 0.42 0.22 0.06 1.69
17 Mario Party 6 GC 2004 Misc Nintendo 0.90 0.11 0.60 0.05 1.65
18 Pikmin GC 2001 Strategy Nintendo 0.78 0.25 0.56 0.04 1.63
19 Kirby Air Ride GC 2003 Racing Nintendo 1.01 0.11 0.45 0.04 1.62
20 Super Mario Strikers GC 2005 Sports Nintendo 0.98 0.38 0.20 0.04 1.61
21 Sonic Heroes GC 2003 Platform Sega 1.05 0.44 0.06 0.04 1.60
22 The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess GC 2006 Adventure Nintendo 1.15 0.36 0.04 0.04 1.59
23 Mario Party 7 GC 2005 Misc Nintendo 0.95 0.11 0.46 0.04 1.57
24 Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour GC 2003 Sports Nintendo 1.09 0.15 0.25 0.04 1.53
25 Super Monkey Ball 2 GC 2002 Puzzle Atari 1.11 0.31 0.06 0.04 1.52


I'm an advocate for motion controls, Nintendo, and Kicking freaking Toad to the Moon!

3DS Friend Code - 0860-3269-1286

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Walkthrublazer3 on 30 November 2012
happydolphin said:
Walkthrublazer3 said:


1. True, IF he would of stated that Metroid should be given to an "Adventure Company" his point still stands. But I like stated before, he is unfamiliar with Metroid games which diminishes his validity in the subject. It would be like someone stating that the next Zelda game should be given to the God of War because Zelda is a sword combat/hack and slash game.

2. No, Nintendo is both publishing and developing the new SSB. Namco is a part of the developement team, they have joined Nintendo's team.

It's true that the games you posted were developed by outside teams, just like Star Fox Assault was developed by Namco.

SSB is like Mario Kart7. Retro helped design some stages for MK7 but the game was still developed by Nintendo EAD.

1. I understand what you mean, but imho having played the Prime games I think it's fair to call them a shooter, much like Bioshock is a shooter. They're adventure games, but with shooter mechanics and other tools. It's being a bit picky to do that at this point. But I see what you mean.

2. I know, that's why I gave the alternate examples to show the point he was trying to make, despite the ill-suited example.

I understand.

But in the end, given that his point stands with the new examples I provided, don't you think his ideas are valid, and if so, if they were to outsource it, if the marketing and advertising was bad, do you believe it would "suffer" the same fate as Prime? That's the OP question ;)

Fair enough, I was in the wrong and apologize to both of you.

Yes, I believe that giving Metroid to a notable PC developer (like Crytek) and making more approachable to the western audience could definitely increase the sales and awareness of the series. Of course this could also burn established fans of the series. Best case scenario would be a Wind Waker, where Nintendo loses a lot of old fans, but gains new ones.

As far as marketing goes, No. I think only reviews and quality of the title would determine how much it sold.



I'm an advocate for motion controls, Nintendo, and Kicking freaking Toad to the Moon!

3DS Friend Code - 0860-3269-1286

oniyide on 30 November 2012
happydolphin said:
kitler53 said:

gamers go to where the games they want to play are ... and for the "older-teen" it isn't nintendo.  nintendo content for that audience sucks compared to what MSony currently offer. 

like wise, MSony make sucky content for children, girls, and the "casuals" that nintendo dominates.  therefore those audiences don't like MSony content or console.

i've been slammed before for even suggesting that the userbase for nintendo and non-nintendo consoles were anything but identical but look at the facts.

1 Just Dance 3 Wii 2011 Misc Ubisoft 5.46 3.14 0.00 0.96 9.56
2 Just Dance 3 X360 2011 Misc Ubisoft 1.35 0.33 0.00 0.17 1.84
3 Just Dance 3 PS3 2011 Misc Ubisoft 0.23 0.11 0.00 0.06 0.39

 

1 Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 X360 2011 Shooter Activision 9.10 4.07 0.11 1.41 14.69
2 Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 PS3 2011 Shooter Activision 5.40 4.68 0.44 2.01 12.53
3 Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 PC 2011 Shooter Activision 0.36 0.92 0.00 0.26 1.54
4 Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 Wii 2011 Shooter Activision 0.33 0.15 0.00 0.05 0.53

 

1 Zumba Fitness Wii 2010 Sports 505 Games 2.90 2.27 0.00 0.61 5.78
3 Zumba Fitness X360 2010 Sports 505 Games 1.16 0.37 0.00 0.16 1.68
4 Zumba Fitness PS3 2010 Sports 505 Games 0.23 0.09 0.00 0.05 0.37

 

1 Madden NFL 12 X360 2011 Sports Electronic Arts 2.30 0.08 0.00 0.20 2.58
2 Madden NFL 12 PS3 2011 Sports Electronic Arts 1.78 0.12 0.00 0.19 2.09
3 Madden NFL 12 Wii 2011 Sports Electronic Arts 0.37 0.00 0.00 0.03 0.40

 

 

the issue with MP isn't advertisement, it's content. 

Part of that is the MP content itself.  don't get me wrong, MP is a good game.  But, MP is also design with features like aiming locks and it gameplay is slow paced.  it should be pretty self evident from the "call of dutying" of all shooters that fast twitch gameplay is the in thing with that teenage boy crowd. 

The other part of content is nintendo's overall library.  half of nintendo's library has mario in the title and mario (or anything else that would even slightly demasculate a teenage boy) is to be shunned.

nintendo is better at making certain types of content.  MSony are better at making other types of content.  it is as simple as that.

The numbers are correct, but I think your analysis is a little shallow.

Do you think that Nintendo is incapable of getting a solid 1st party offering that caters to the older-teen demographic? That's even demostrably false, as games like Perfect Dark, Conker's bad fur day, Eternal Darkeness and other 1st party games will show you.

It's not that Nintendo isn't capable of making them, not at all, you really need to find a better argument than that.

Also, games that were aimed at non-gamers and casuals were booming on the PS2, so how did the Wii snag that crowd? Easy, with sw and marketing to drive that initiative.

It's the same concept here, so if they were able to snag the casuals from the Playstation, then they can also snag the older-teen crowd, imho.

those games were made by dev teams that has long since broken ties with Ninty. Lets be real, do you think the Ninty of TODAY can make those types of games?



NintendoPie on 30 November 2012
happydolphin said:
NintendoPie said:
Nintendo not marketing these "core" titles enough is no where near the whole problem.

Where did OP say core?

Is that the only thing you got from my post? 

I put quotation marks around it for a reason, I'm referring to titles such as Metroid and CoD. Which is what your OP is talking about. I thought you would've known what I meant.



S.T.A.G.E. on 30 November 2012

I dont know when the last time that I've actually played Blockbuster on a Nintendo console. I dont think their goal was ever to be the blockbuster company but rather the company everyone to grow up with and love. Their games are just plain fun in a fantastical manner and most of the blockbuster games are borderline mature.



happydolphin on 30 November 2012
NintendoPie said:
happydolphin said:
NintendoPie said:
Nintendo not marketing these "core" titles enough is no where near the whole problem.

Where did OP say core?

Is that the only thing you got from my post? 

I put quotation marks around it for a reason, I'm referring to titles such as Metroid and CoD. Which is what your OP is talking about. I thought you would've known what I meant.

You have no idea how often I've heard the rehashed reply about the core being overrated that it's like it was all I could see. Apologies if you meant otherwise. What then is the whole problem (your own words), and what needs to be done to solve it?

We are talking about being effective in targetting the older-teen hd twin crowd.

S.T.A.G.E. said:

I dont know when the last time that I've actually played Blockbuster on a Nintendo console. I dont think their goal was ever to be the blockbuster company but rather the company everyone to grow up with and love. Their games are just plain fun in a fantastical manner and most of the blockbuster games are borderline mature.

True but it doesn't have the likes of Assassin's Creed of Halo in marketting and appeal. Ie. games that sell hd twin consoles.

oniyide said:

those games were made by dev teams that has long since broken ties with Ninty. Lets be real, do you think the Ninty of TODAY can make those types of games?

Internally, only Retro as far as I know. They have Monolith, but RPGs generally don't sell HD twin consoles, on the whole. By other means (contracting to a 3rd party), yes.

Walkthrublazer3 said:

Fair enough, I was in the wrong and apologize to both of you.

Yes, I believe that giving Metroid to a notable PC developer (like Crytek) and making more approachable to the western audience could definitely increase the sales and awareness of the series. Of course this could also burn established fans of the series. Best case scenario would be a Wind Waker, where Nintendo loses a lot of old fans, but gains new ones.

As far as marketing goes, No. I think only reviews and quality of the title would determine how much it sold.

Appreciated. @marketing. What of a game like Xenoblade or Prime, which were of great quality and high reviews, but didn't make it in the sphere of games like COD or Halo?

@hardcore titles (earlier post), you have to keep going in the list. See my reply to pezus.