| Mummelmann said: I was not aware of that at all, for me it's mostly a personal principal though. My principals classify it as wrong, JL's principals probably don't. But then, as far as ethics go and marketing towards kids is a non-issue I will also resent the idea that anyone can oppose companies charging money for online services, DLC and produce hardware with a higher failure rate and mark that as unethical in a capitalist environment that has takes no issue with making young children into consumers. Heck; many smartphones and tablets have horrible failure rates across the line and people make a fortune repairing these fragile devices. I'm glad you wrote this though; these nuances are interesting and important in the big picture regardless of my feelings on the matter. If JL really wants to have a go at some companies with questionable ethics regarding pricing, hardware and overall consumer treatment, I think he should place Google, Facebook and Apple way higher up on the priority list. It's somewhat a question of moral relativism then, which could be a problem, then again; a lot of JL's arguments are partially or entirely hinged upon personal opinions and views rather than clean, measureable metrics. I've been thinking about what you said earlier about both me and JL possibly being wrong about what Nintendo intended with the Gamepad; that the selling point was primarily asymetric gameplay and not touch and that might very well be true. However; regardless of the original intention of the concept(s), I still think it will fail to reel in the "casual" audience that bought the Wii in droves. They might not be lost forever to some form of home console but I honestly believe that the Wii U and the Gamepad are not the bait to lure them back, not even close. I think that this audience is going to be a non-factor in the entire 8th gen, both for dedicated handhelds and home consoles and I think that Microsoft pushing their Kinect 2.0 as a mandatory part of the One is a massive mistake; they're offering a form of controls and interaction that would in most cases appeal to a customer base that wouldn't otherwise thrive on their overall platform environment, this is just another attempt at forcing market convergence and it will fail. It doesn't even make any kind of developmental, conceptual and philosophical sense, Nintendo are at the very least already known for being a bit out there with some of their hardware and solutions. I'm 100% sure that Kinect will not have any impact on traditional gaming, or perhaps even gaming at all and will largely be implemented as an interface addition. That will make it hard to defend long term, both the added cost and policy and adding of a piece of kit that really doesn't serve any real purpose for the platform on the whole. I honestly do not understand what they were thinking; their pedigree in software is top notch but they are showing a fairly big lack of understanding of hardware appeal and overall demographics with this move, in my opinion. |
I'm not dipping into the ethics black hole, but what you say about the Gamepad, the Wii U in itself and the casuals is a good segue into some of the points that I think is being overlooked.
First of all, the gamepad is often seen as the primary controller for the Wii U, but that is not really the case the way I see it. It's the bundled controler with the system, but I don't see it as a game controler foremost. For many of the Wii U games the Wii Remotes are still the best option. As everyone here know, the Wii U is fully backward compatible with all controler for the Wii. This is actually a great selling point for the Wii U to previous Wii owners, but it's not (yet) effectivly communicated to the market. When people say that the Wii U is the opposite of the Wii I think they miss what it really is. The Wii U is a fully functional Wii, with added capabilities. The failure of the Wii U in the market is not because of a failed concept that people don't want. It's because Nintendo has not been able to show why it's the upgarde path people should take.
The way I see it, the issues facing the Wii U are not related to unappealing hardware or features. After all, according to what Nintendo has said, their market research shows that people who have a Wii U are overwhelmingly happy with it. The issue is that the value of the hardware is much more difficult to communicate than it was for the Wii. Anacotal as it is, I sort of see this first hand as a Wii U owner. Some of the things I enjoy the most about the machine are the things I didn't really care much about before getting it. Off TV play for example sounds pretty bland and firmly in the 'nice to have' category. Turns out it's a HUGE thing in our household. In comparison, the main selling point for me, the move to HD has (so far) proved to be pretty much a non-factor.
Anyway, the nature of the Wii U means that people have to use it and feel it to get the appeal of it. When people do, I have no doubt that they many people will love what is on offer. For this reason, I think the Wii U will turn out to be a much slower burner than what people are used to and what many people predict for the console. I think it has huge 'word of mouth potential' and that it has the ability to go much higher than current sales would seem to indicate.
I don't think that the 'casuals' have abandoned console gaming at all, they will move to whatever is the next hot item. As Farmville and Zynga is a great exapmle of, the mobile crowd is as much of a transient market as anything else. There's no reason why people won't move on to the Wii U, or PlayStation 4 or Xbox or Oyua or whatever if the proposition is right. The Wii U has a few things working for it: great brand recognition, a huge previous userbase from the Wii and it is easily the closest to that sweet $199 spot.
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