I played the first 2 levels at E3.  Didn't seem too Katamari-esque yet.  Does it get more Katamari-esque later on?  Does the growth make you stronger like it does in Katamari or Elebits or Snake Rattle 'n' Roll?  'Cuz that's what I need.  Growth power.

I would agree with both of those statements. It just irks me that people are slamming a game that had a shit load of devotion put into it. Nothing about the game says lazy at all. Inconsiderate, bad, stupid, and many other adjectives I will not disagree with. I also won't defend the lack of inclusion in other games as hard. Well maybe Punch-out! but only because I think it was a budget issue (that is not a game guaranteed to make any investment back).

It's because Nintendo comes from the future, when all the console wars are over, when games are beautiful art that can do any sort of experiment in any genre and still be appreciated as art.  In a world where critics all herald the latest gritty action/adventure games, from Double Dragon to Street Fighter to Tomb Raider to Gears to Uncharted, Nintendo can make video games about really crazy stupid ideas like plumbers that shoot fireballs at turtles and just jump everywhere yelling "Wahoo!", and not only will these games not be laughed off the face of the Earth, but they will become the best-selling games of all time.  They can do the same with exercise, and even dogs.

The thing that makes Nintendo fans different is we realize that Nintendo is totally insane, and we love it.  It's like being a fan of a really crazy artist, and half the fun is never knowing what their crazy ass is gonna do next.  Even their mistakes are really interesting for being so different, like the Virtual Boy.  Nintendo wasn't hardcore before, and going crazy overnight with the DS and the Wii.  They've been making really weird crazy arty games and design revolutions for decades.  The hardcore Nintendo faithful have been there for the same reasons all along.

On the control side they gave us the D-Pad, shoulder buttons, the first reliable wireless controller, the first microphone, the first touchscreen, the first motion controls, and the first IR controls.  They were the first to give us rumble and the first to put a speaker on the remote itself.  On the gameplay side they gave us platforming, 3-D camera controls, and Z-Targetting, just to name a few.  Whenever Nintendo announces something crazy, the hardcore may laugh, but everybody else is paying very close attention for fear of missing out on another revolution.  For example, nobody knows what the Vitality Sensor even is really, and Sony has already patented a knock-off for the PS3.  Half the fun of being a Nintendo fan is watching the industry reactions to Nintendo, from Sony, Microsoft, and now these new IGN meltdowns.

Sorry if that was too long or too much of the same-old, but I think that's what makes Nintendo's superfans different.  We're in this for the long haul.  We see Nintendo as more of a crazy avant-garde gameplay-art studio.  Ideas are hit or miss, but they have the biggest hits and the biggest misses, and I love them for both.

But then again, I might be crazier than the rest of the Nintendo fans, in which case I'm only talking about myself.

Nah, I think I said what I wanted to say.

It would have been a lot shorter.

And what people mean by value differences is what values they seek out in video games: it's why different people enjoy different games. That's all that's meant. It's a more scholarly way of saying "We don't necessarily like the same things"

It's a sales question, which sort of factors into laziness, but not as directly. They're not just trying to save money, they're trying to save money that, if spent, would net them no recognizable return. I agree that the games would have benefitted from those features from a gameplay perspective (except maybe Wii Sports Resort. That would have just felt wierd online), but would they have sold more? I think that's part of what's stopping Nintendo from embracing online more fully. They're not seeing how it would benefit their bottom line

that would be a great thread, what makes Nintendo games so different?

As for the value issue, it came tome as an arragant just like when HD fans brings up the graphic excuse.

It's not arrogant, though: it's just saying that different people look for different kids of experiences. In order for that to seem "arrogant", you have to assume that people are saying that "different' means "better", which (I hope) is usually not the case.

I think this thread has legs to achieve +500K posts within its lifetime.

You don't think these guys truly believe Nintendo makes better games than anyone else?

Nintendo can do wrong, there is an excuse for everything, some post here sounds like they were there in the meetings with Nintendo because it seems like they know why Nintendo does everything.