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Forums - Nintendo Discussion - Nintendo CEO Seen Missing Profit Target as Wii U Founders

Buzzi on 23 April 2013

Iwata promised profits for the current fiscal year, not the last one, where the company expects a loss despite being in the green for the first three quarters.



CURRENTLY PLAYING: Xenoblade (Wii), Super mario 3D land (3DS), Guild Wars (PC)

 

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Soundwave on 23 April 2013
curl-6 said:
Soundwave said:
curl-6 said:
cbarroso09 said:
curl-6 said:
Fusioncode said:

Nintendo needs to stop letting each developer take 5 years to make one title. I figured the drought of games for the last few years of the Wii meant that there would be a very strong lineup on the WiiU but so far there's nothing. It's time to hammer down and get your developers working faster nintendo.

Precisely. I put up with 2011 and 2012's barrenness on the promise of a killer Wii U lineup, and the fact we're still in a draught is unacceptable.

And before someone posts that "delayed game is eventually good, rushed game is bad forever" quote, (which isn't necessarily true, Duke Nukem Forever and Conduit 2 case in point) a great game can still be made in 2 years instead of 5.

Nintendo need to push their teams harder. Work them overtime if necessary.

Now you are comparing Nintendo to Gearboxshit? 

I'm saying that delaying a game doesn't necessarily mean it will be good, and that great games don't have to take half a decade to make.


Nintendo's problem is they don't have enough overall dev resources, especially once they let go of Rare/Factor 5/Left Field and downscaled NST on top of the fact that handheld development eats up more resources today on top of consoles.

Their reluctance to work with Western developers has bit them in the rear end big time.

Most Nintendo games take 2-3 years of development, which isn't unsual, "half a decade" is stretching it. They just don't have enough teams overall to make enough games.

They lost Rare and Factor 5, but they gained Retro and Monolith. They seem to have plenty of manpower, they're just doing a godawful job of prioritising it.

Miyamoto confirmed that Nintendo were working on Pikmin 3 at E3 2008. That was half a decade ago. It's not even a complex game; if they'd delayed something like a HD Zelda or Xenoblade 2 by a few months I might understand, but Pikmin 3 is essentially a Wii game with a shiny coat of paint.

Retro is kept on a tight leash, a one team studio that's only allowed to work on 1 game at a time. Slowly. Another example of Nintendo being afraid of trusting a Western developer. Monolith is a good find, but not enough.

I believe the Pikmin 3 team has been working on other games like the NSMB games during that time period too, Pikmin isn't big enough of a priority at Nintendo to get in the way of Mario. 

Rare was bigger than Retro + Monolith + Next Level Games + Monster Games combined.

They were almost half of Nintendo's output during the N64 days ...

GoldenEye, Jet Force Gemini, Blast Corps, Killer Instinct Gold, Perfect Dark, Banjo-Kazooie, Banjo-Tooie, Mickey Speedway, Diddy Kong Racing, Conker's Bad Fur Day, Donkey Kong 64 = 11 games, or an average of 2 game releases/year during the N64 era, not even counting Game Boy content.

EAD put out Mario 64, Zelda: OoT, Zelda: MM, Yoshi's Story, 1080, F-Zero X, Wave Race 64, Mario Kart 64, Star Fox 64 = 8 titles. 

Other North American alliances brought Pilotwings 64, NBA Courtside 1 + 2, Ken Griffey Jr. MLB, Excitebike 64, Starcraft 64, Star Wars: Rogue Squadron, Star Wars: Battle for Naboo, Tetrisphere, etc.

Other Japan studios brough Paper Mario, Pokemon Snap, Mario Party 1-3, Pokemon Stadium 1/2, Super Smash Bros.

You can see there's a pretty even balance here, Rare actually produced more software than EAD did for the N64. Losing Rare or specifically their output was like a sports team losing their second highest scoring player and then doing nothing to replace him. Of course the team (err ... future consoles) are going to have issues.

Losing Rare's output is actually probably a fair reason why they dropped from 33 million N64 owners to 23 million GameCube owners.



curl-6 on 23 April 2013
Soundwave said:
curl-6 said:
Soundwave said:
curl-6 said:
cbarroso09 said:
curl-6 said:
Fusioncode said:

Nintendo needs to stop letting each developer take 5 years to make one title. I figured the drought of games for the last few years of the Wii meant that there would be a very strong lineup on the WiiU but so far there's nothing. It's time to hammer down and get your developers working faster nintendo.

Precisely. I put up with 2011 and 2012's barrenness on the promise of a killer Wii U lineup, and the fact we're still in a draught is unacceptable.

And before someone posts that "delayed game is eventually good, rushed game is bad forever" quote, (which isn't necessarily true, Duke Nukem Forever and Conduit 2 case in point) a great game can still be made in 2 years instead of 5.

Nintendo need to push their teams harder. Work them overtime if necessary.

Now you are comparing Nintendo to Gearboxshit? 

I'm saying that delaying a game doesn't necessarily mean it will be good, and that great games don't have to take half a decade to make.


Nintendo's problem is they don't have enough overall dev resources, especially once they let go of Rare/Factor 5/Left Field and downscaled NST on top of the fact that handheld development eats up more resources today on top of consoles.

Their reluctance to work with Western developers has bit them in the rear end big time.

Most Nintendo games take 2-3 years of development, which isn't unsual, "half a decade" is stretching it. They just don't have enough teams overall to make enough games.

They lost Rare and Factor 5, but they gained Retro and Monolith. They seem to have plenty of manpower, they're just doing a godawful job of prioritising it.

Miyamoto confirmed that Nintendo were working on Pikmin 3 at E3 2008. That was half a decade ago. It's not even a complex game; if they'd delayed something like a HD Zelda or Xenoblade 2 by a few months I might understand, but Pikmin 3 is essentially a Wii game with a shiny coat of paint.

Retro is kept on a tight leash, a one team studio that's only allowed to work on 1 game at a time. Slowly. Another example of Nintendo being afraid of trusting a Western developer. Monolith is a good find, but not enough.

I believe the Pikmin 3 team has been working on other games like the NSMB games during that time period too, Pikmin isn't big enough of a priority at Nintendo to get in the way of Mario. 

Rare was bigger than Retro + Monolith + Next Level Games + Monster Games combined.

They were almost half of Nintendo's output during the N64 days ...

GoldenEye, Jet Force Gemini, Blast Corps, Killer Instinct Gold, Perfect Dark, Banjo-Kazooie, Banjo-Tooie, Mickey Speedway, Diddy Kong Racing, Conker's Bad Fur Day, Donkey Kong 64 = 11 games, or an average of 2 game releases/year during the N64 era, not even counting Game Boy content.

EAD put out Mario 64, Zelda: OoT, Zelda: MM, Yoshi's Story, 1080, F-Zero X, Wave Race 64, Mario Kart 64, Star Fox 64 = 8 titles. 

Other North American alliances brought Pilotwings 64, NBA Courtside 1 + 2, Ken Griffey Jr. MLB, Excitebike 64, Starcraft 64, Star Wars: Rogue Squadron, Star Wars: Battle for Naboo, Tetrisphere, etc.

Other Japan studios brough Paper Mario, Pokemon Snap, Mario Party 1-3, Pokemon Stadium 1/2, Super Smash Bros.

You can see there's a pretty even balance here, Rare actually produced more software than EAD did for the N64. Losing Rare or specifically their output was like a sports team losing their second highest scoring player and then doing nothing to replace him. Of course the team (err ... future consoles) are going to have issues.

Losing Rare's output is actually probably a fair reason why they dropped from 33 million N64 owners to 23 million GameCube owners.

I'd attribute the GCN's lower sales more to the fact that they made bad creative decisions with so many of their core franchises (3D Mario, Zelda, Mario Kart, Starfox) instead of pursuing their N64 approaches.

And there's still no reason for Pikmin 3 to have been delayed so much. Nothing we've seen indicates it's any more complex than its predecessors with exception of a pretty modest graphical facelift.



DanneSandin on 23 April 2013

If Iwata can't get some high profile games out this holiday, and is unable to sell Wii U and turn a profit, it's simply time to go. But replacing him would be hard! I'd like to see someone else from inside Nintendo take over, but someone younger (40-ish) whom understands Nintendo.



I'm on Twitter @DanneSandin!

Furthermore, I think VGChartz should add a "Like"-button.

Nem on 23 April 2013

Wait, so Nintendo is gonna post profits once more but still DOOOOM?! Theres no winning.



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DanneSandin on 23 April 2013
Nem said:
Wait, so Nintendo is gonna post profits once more but still DOOOOM?! Theres no winning.

Earning money=d00med confirmed! No wonder Sony ISN'T doomed XD



I'm on Twitter @DanneSandin!

Furthermore, I think VGChartz should add a "Like"-button.

Nem on 23 April 2013
DanneSandin said:
Nem said:
Wait, so Nintendo is gonna post profits once more but still DOOOOM?! Theres no winning.

Earning money=d00med confirmed! No wonder Sony ISN'T doomed XD


Hohooo... that was rather ingenius of you. xD I lol'ed.



Jumpin on 23 April 2013

Iwata hasn't seen good results in the last 2 years. In the last 6 years, Iwata's Nintendo has seen unparalleled profits in this industry at any point, by any company, ever.



I describe myself as a little dose of toxic masculinity.

Jumpin on 23 April 2013
DanneSandin said:
If Iwata can't get some high profile games out this holiday, and is unable to sell Wii U and turn a profit, it's simply time to go. But replacing him would be hard! I'd like to see someone else from inside Nintendo take over, but someone younger (40-ish) whom understands Nintendo.

There is a fallacy here where people seem to think simply having a different CEO will magically increase game production and make Nintendo more popular among consumers. This just imply isn't the case.

Considering Iwata was a highly successul programming lead at Nintendo, and also the most successful producer/manager in the company's history - I don't think replacing him would offer any sort of a benefit to Nintendo. There isn't anyone who knows the company better than he does.

Rather, if Iwata left Nintendo, it would most certainly be bad for the company.



I describe myself as a little dose of toxic masculinity.

Lafiel on 23 April 2013
Jumpin said:
Iwata hasn't seen good results in the last 2 years. In the last 6 years, Iwata's Nintendo has seen unparalleled profits in this industry at any point, by any company, ever.

Yea, in this sad world you are axed as soon as you make a mistake, no matter how good your former performance was

that said, I think nintendo should have increased their development team much more during the boom years to make sure they can provide enough content for their hardware by themselves

now you could argue that 3rd parties are already whining that they have no chance on Nintendo platforms as it is, but in my opinion they would quickly flock to them again after Nintendo pushed a console to the top with their own efforts (see DS, 3DS)