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Forums - Nintendo Discussion - Third Party Devs have made up their minds about the Wii.

Meh. The whole problem is that no 3rd party developer expected the runaway hit that Wii became. Once it happened, and they saw how successful Nintendo's 1st and 2nd party games were, they instantly tried to copy that success, without a lot of thought.


They saw Wii Sports and created over 9,000 sports-wagglefests. They saw Wii Play and pumped out over 9,000 minigame compilations. What they failed to do, however, was look at what exactly made these games successful in the first place, and study the people that bought these games.
The execs at Nintendo didn't just wake up one day thinking 'Hey let's make a new console with some wacky new controls, and a bunch of games that'll appeal to a lot of people to go along with it... we'll release it next month!' They *know* what they are doing. However simple their games may seem, they put thought and resources into them, they test them and care for them.

Unlike those 3rd parties who seem content to crap out as many thoughtless 'me-too' compilations without so much as a shadow of a shred of originality or quality as they can - pardon my French.

I say let 'em go, if all they are willing to do is the aforementioned garbage, then good riddance, let 'em take that stuff to PS3 and 360's new motion control devices. And best of luck to them, I'll stick to Nintendo then thank you very much. There have been too many great games for me to play lately anyway, so I'm good.



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Innervate said:
Demotruk said:
11ht11 said:
wii has gotten 3rd party games, but they get ignored

They get ignored because they suck.

I "supported" third party games, but I got burned by them often. The Conduit, Little King's Story, among others. I'm not going to keep doing it just so that third parties can feel a little safer on Wii. I apply to them the same standard I apply to Nintendo these days.

The disdain from 3rd parties caused me to rent or buy used on all systems so they don't get my money. I'd rather support Gamestop before supporting Capcom and EA.

I've been doing that due to prices for some games at times but thinking of doing that for this reason as well.



The_vagabond7 said:
LordTheNightKnight said:
"No I want some reasons not just a foggy statement."

Telling you that specific publishers are reporting losses is foggy?

Yeah obviously the fact that companies are losing money in the worst recession in decades is proof positive that their big problem is that they have an anti-wii bias. Clearly the problem is companies aren't producing enough wii games that look worse than their HD counterparts and have fewer features, or aren't producing higher quality mini-game collections.

 

All the solutions I hear for what 3rd parties need to do seem nonsensical. They start with 1.Shift support from HD machines to Wii 2. Make core games that look inferior to their HD counterparts and have fewer features due to the wii's hardware and software limitations (IE friend codes, lack of unified online network, size limitations on Downloadable content ect), and then spend tons of money marketing them. And 3.Get with the market trends and make better "family friendly" games. Which, lets be honest, not even Nintendo fanboys want a market of high quality carnival games.

 

These aren't viable solutions. If they do (1) then they are getting behind on the technological arms race. As they develop for higher end machines they come up with better methods, better understanding of the technology, and new development tools to use. Without that development gets more expensive, not less, especially as technology marches on and they are left generations behind those that actually invested in higher end development.  They can shift some support, but for every developer/programmer they put on the wii, that is one less person on their staff that is learning how to use or developing the newest advances in programming and development tools. In the long run they shoot themselves in the foot.

(2) doesn't work because people have eyes and memories. They are aware that games can have more than 12 people playing online at once, and that friend codes are ass. The conduit didn't work, not because it wasn't advertised, or because of poor art direction, but because people that want to play that kind of game can play it better elsewhere. Trying to make HD style games on the wii is met with lukewarm reception because we've seen better now. Giving something second rate doesn't cut it when you know that it could have more features and look better. That's why Dead Space was an on rails shooter, otherwise the inevitable comparison's to it's HD big brother would be incredibly unflattering. You could just say "well screw everybody that pays attention to gaming, that's only a minority of several million compared to the wider audience." Well, that includes you pal, you're calling for the destruction of your own culture and the willful jump backwards in computer and programming technology so that you don't have to shell out  200-300 dollars for another system. Saying that 3rd parties should willfully march backwards and work ever harder on the future of gaming that is the wii-mote is not a valid or sane criticism.

and (3) Does anybody here REALLY want that reality, or is it just a snarky way of blaming third parties for not putting more polish on their shovelware titles? Would an extra coat of polish on Imagine Party Babiez (which has sold 250k) really make a difference? The market for these games don't give a rats ass about the quality of them, and flooding the market with more of them isn't going to help anyone.

 

Simply saying "Try harder on wii, people will buy it, look at Resident Evil 4!" is not a valid criticism of third parties. It's easy to be an Armchair CEO, but It is a complex and difficult situation with the wii. Regardless of the tac you take, there is going to be a downside, and reprecussions and viewing their financial woes as "well obviously they are losing money because they made an onrails shooter for wii instead of a third person shooter" is daft and simplistic, especially with the world economy the way it is right now. Clearly it has nothing to do with the rising costs to get health insurance for all of it's employees, cautious investors, currency exchanges, inflation, or any of the major things that go into the cash flow of giant corporations. It's because Madworld was a niche product. The solutions to their complex problems aren't going to be discovered by a bunch of forum dwellers complaining that the wii isn't getting a proper Final Fantasy. Running a multibillion dollar corporation isn't as easy as it looks to some people here.

Its funny how the good solid argument generally gets ignored by just about everyone. So I'd like to quote again and bring it to people's attention that their's more to the economic woe of some gaming company than 'not supporting the wii'.




Actually mibuokami, I think his argument is a bunch of hand-waving with lots of holes in it. But I can't be arsed to type a full rebuttal now, as I'm watching some series.

Maybe tomorrow...



My Mario Kart Wii friend code: 2707-1866-0957

mibuokami said:
The_vagabond7 said:
LordTheNightKnight said:
"No I want some reasons not just a foggy statement."

Telling you that specific publishers are reporting losses is foggy?

Yeah obviously the fact that companies are losing money in the worst recession in decades is proof positive that their big problem is that they have an anti-wii bias. Clearly the problem is companies aren't producing enough wii games that look worse than their HD counterparts and have fewer features, or aren't producing higher quality mini-game collections.

 

All the solutions I hear for what 3rd parties need to do seem nonsensical. They start with 1.Shift support from HD machines to Wii 2. Make core games that look inferior to their HD counterparts and have fewer features due to the wii's hardware and software limitations (IE friend codes, lack of unified online network, size limitations on Downloadable content ect), and then spend tons of money marketing them. And 3.Get with the market trends and make better "family friendly" games. Which, lets be honest, not even Nintendo fanboys want a market of high quality carnival games.

 

These aren't viable solutions. If they do (1) then they are getting behind on the technological arms race. As they develop for higher end machines they come up with better methods, better understanding of the technology, and new development tools to use. Without that development gets more expensive, not less, especially as technology marches on and they are left generations behind those that actually invested in higher end development.  They can shift some support, but for every developer/programmer they put on the wii, that is one less person on their staff that is learning how to use or developing the newest advances in programming and development tools. In the long run they shoot themselves in the foot.

(2) doesn't work because people have eyes and memories. They are aware that games can have more than 12 people playing online at once, and that friend codes are ass. The conduit didn't work, not because it wasn't advertised, or because of poor art direction, but because people that want to play that kind of game can play it better elsewhere. Trying to make HD style games on the wii is met with lukewarm reception because we've seen better now. Giving something second rate doesn't cut it when you know that it could have more features and look better. That's why Dead Space was an on rails shooter, otherwise the inevitable comparison's to it's HD big brother would be incredibly unflattering. You could just say "well screw everybody that pays attention to gaming, that's only a minority of several million compared to the wider audience." Well, that includes you pal, you're calling for the destruction of your own culture and the willful jump backwards in computer and programming technology so that you don't have to shell out  200-300 dollars for another system. Saying that 3rd parties should willfully march backwards and work ever harder on the future of gaming that is the wii-mote is not a valid or sane criticism.

and (3) Does anybody here REALLY want that reality, or is it just a snarky way of blaming third parties for not putting more polish on their shovelware titles? Would an extra coat of polish on Imagine Party Babiez (which has sold 250k) really make a difference? The market for these games don't give a rats ass about the quality of them, and flooding the market with more of them isn't going to help anyone.

 

Simply saying "Try harder on wii, people will buy it, look at Resident Evil 4!" is not a valid criticism of third parties. It's easy to be an Armchair CEO, but It is a complex and difficult situation with the wii. Regardless of the tac you take, there is going to be a downside, and reprecussions and viewing their financial woes as "well obviously they are losing money because they made an onrails shooter for wii instead of a third person shooter" is daft and simplistic, especially with the world economy the way it is right now. Clearly it has nothing to do with the rising costs to get health insurance for all of it's employees, cautious investors, currency exchanges, inflation, or any of the major things that go into the cash flow of giant corporations. It's because Madworld was a niche product. The solutions to their complex problems aren't going to be discovered by a bunch of forum dwellers complaining that the wii isn't getting a proper Final Fantasy. Running a multibillion dollar corporation isn't as easy as it looks to some people here.

Its funny how the good solid argument generally gets ignored by just about everyone. So I'd like to quote again and bring it to people's attention that their's more to the economic woe of some gaming company than 'not supporting the wii'.

Perhaps you missed this post:

NJ5 said:
The_vagabond7 said:
LordTheNightKnight said:
"No I want some reasons not just a foggy statement."

Telling you that specific publishers are reporting losses is foggy?

Yeah obviously the fact that companies are losing money in the worst recession in decades is proof positive that their big problem is that they have an anti-wii bias.

Before I even attempt to read the rest of your post, I have to point out that the recession is a red herring in this argument.

Publishers were already losing money before the recession started, development costs as well as revenue has been rising since the beginning of the generation... just costs have been rising faster.

There are lots of industries that can attribute their losses mostly to the recession, but the gaming industry is not one of them...



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theRepublic said:
mibuokami said:
The_vagabond7 said:
LordTheNightKnight said:
"No I want some reasons not just a foggy statement."

Telling you that specific publishers are reporting losses is foggy?

Yeah obviously the fact that companies are losing money in the worst recession in decades is proof positive that their big problem is that they have an anti-wii bias. Clearly the problem is companies aren't producing enough wii games that look worse than their HD counterparts and have fewer features, or aren't producing higher quality mini-game collections.

 

All the solutions I hear for what 3rd parties need to do seem nonsensical. They start with 1.Shift support from HD machines to Wii 2. Make core games that look inferior to their HD counterparts and have fewer features due to the wii's hardware and software limitations (IE friend codes, lack of unified online network, size limitations on Downloadable content ect), and then spend tons of money marketing them. And 3.Get with the market trends and make better "family friendly" games. Which, lets be honest, not even Nintendo fanboys want a market of high quality carnival games.

 

These aren't viable solutions. If they do (1) then they are getting behind on the technological arms race. As they develop for higher end machines they come up with better methods, better understanding of the technology, and new development tools to use. Without that development gets more expensive, not less, especially as technology marches on and they are left generations behind those that actually invested in higher end development.  They can shift some support, but for every developer/programmer they put on the wii, that is one less person on their staff that is learning how to use or developing the newest advances in programming and development tools. In the long run they shoot themselves in the foot.

(2) doesn't work because people have eyes and memories. They are aware that games can have more than 12 people playing online at once, and that friend codes are ass. The conduit didn't work, not because it wasn't advertised, or because of poor art direction, but because people that want to play that kind of game can play it better elsewhere. Trying to make HD style games on the wii is met with lukewarm reception because we've seen better now. Giving something second rate doesn't cut it when you know that it could have more features and look better. That's why Dead Space was an on rails shooter, otherwise the inevitable comparison's to it's HD big brother would be incredibly unflattering. You could just say "well screw everybody that pays attention to gaming, that's only a minority of several million compared to the wider audience." Well, that includes you pal, you're calling for the destruction of your own culture and the willful jump backwards in computer and programming technology so that you don't have to shell out  200-300 dollars for another system. Saying that 3rd parties should willfully march backwards and work ever harder on the future of gaming that is the wii-mote is not a valid or sane criticism.

and (3) Does anybody here REALLY want that reality, or is it just a snarky way of blaming third parties for not putting more polish on their shovelware titles? Would an extra coat of polish on Imagine Party Babiez (which has sold 250k) really make a difference? The market for these games don't give a rats ass about the quality of them, and flooding the market with more of them isn't going to help anyone.

 

Simply saying "Try harder on wii, people will buy it, look at Resident Evil 4!" is not a valid criticism of third parties. It's easy to be an Armchair CEO, but It is a complex and difficult situation with the wii. Regardless of the tac you take, there is going to be a downside, and reprecussions and viewing their financial woes as "well obviously they are losing money because they made an onrails shooter for wii instead of a third person shooter" is daft and simplistic, especially with the world economy the way it is right now. Clearly it has nothing to do with the rising costs to get health insurance for all of it's employees, cautious investors, currency exchanges, inflation, or any of the major things that go into the cash flow of giant corporations. It's because Madworld was a niche product. The solutions to their complex problems aren't going to be discovered by a bunch of forum dwellers complaining that the wii isn't getting a proper Final Fantasy. Running a multibillion dollar corporation isn't as easy as it looks to some people here.

Its funny how the good solid argument generally gets ignored by just about everyone. So I'd like to quote again and bring it to people's attention that their's more to the economic woe of some gaming company than 'not supporting the wii'.

Perhaps you missed this post:

NJ5 said:
The_vagabond7 said:
LordTheNightKnight said:
"No I want some reasons not just a foggy statement."

Telling you that specific publishers are reporting losses is foggy?

Yeah obviously the fact that companies are losing money in the worst recession in decades is proof positive that their big problem is that they have an anti-wii bias.

Before I even attempt to read the rest of your post, I have to point out that the recession is a red herring in this argument.

Publishers were already losing money before the recession started, development costs as well as revenue has been rising since the beginning of the generation... just costs have been rising faster.

There are lots of industries that can attribute their losses mostly to the recession, but the gaming industry is not one of them...

No I'm not talking about the recession, what I'm saying and what was pointed on in the post is that no one here is a CEO to a multi-billion dollar software publisher and half of us know shit all about the working of such a company much left the the developers that work under the publisher's umbrella.

All we're seeing is the result and that gives room for many armchair general to arbitrate about how obvious it is for a company to turn around and the obvious symptom of their problems (hint: you don't).

In short its much more complicaed than throw money at the wii.

 




mibuokami said:

No I'm not talking about the recession, what I'm saying and what was pointed on in the post is that no one here is a CEO to a multi-billion dollar software publisher and half of us know shit all about the working of such a company much left the the developers that work under the publisher's umbrella.

All we're seeing is the result and that gives room for many armchair general to arbitrate about how obvious it is for a company to turn around and the obvious symptom of their problems (hint: you don't).

In short its much more complicaed than throw money at the wii.

This is too easy.  It's like you didn't even read the thread:

astrosmash said:
Ail said:
With so many people on this site knowing so much more than existing game companies executives, why don't you guys band together and start your own company ?

Oh wait, it's because you are random anonymous people talking out of your ass on an internet forum with no real experience at all working in the software industry, even less the gaming industry...

There were a lot of people, laymen, who saw the problems with the American auto industry back in the 80s and even earlier. But the people with real experience working in the auto industry somehow seemed blind to the obvious problems.

 

I'm not saying that those claiming the video game industry is blind to its own follies are necessarily right, but it is foolish to assume that experience trumps the bias one gains from being personally invested in a situation.



Switch Code: SW-7377-9189-3397 -- Nintendo Network ID: theRepublic -- Steam ID: theRepublic

Now Playing
Switch - Super Mario Maker 2 (2019)
Switch - The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening (2019)
Switch - Bastion (2011/2018)
3DS - Star Fox 64 3D (2011)
3DS - Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (Trilogy) (2005/2014)
Wii U - Darksiders: Warmastered Edition (2010/2017)
Mobile - The Simpson's Tapped Out and Yugioh Duel Links
PC - Deep Rock Galactic (2020)

theRepublic said:
mibuokami said:

No I'm not talking about the recession, what I'm saying and what was pointed on in the post is that no one here is a CEO to a multi-billion dollar software publisher and half of us know shit all about the working of such a company much left the the developers that work under the publisher's umbrella.

All we're seeing is the result and that gives room for many armchair general to arbitrate about how obvious it is for a company to turn around and the obvious symptom of their problems (hint: you don't).

In short its much more complicaed than throw money at the wii.

This is too easy.  It's like you didn't even read the thread:

astrosmash said:
Ail said:
With so many people on this site knowing so much more than existing game companies executives, why don't you guys band together and start your own company ?

Oh wait, it's because you are random anonymous people talking out of your ass on an internet forum with no real experience at all working in the software industry, even less the gaming industry...

There were a lot of people, laymen, who saw the problems with the American auto industry back in the 80s and even earlier. But the people with real experience working in the auto industry somehow seemed blind to the obvious problems.

 

I'm not saying that those claiming the video game industry is blind to its own follies are necessarily right, but it is foolish to assume that experience trumps the bias one gains from being personally invested in a situation.

What does the auto industry have to do with this? There's even a disclaimer at the end of the post stating A does not always equal B.

Is there a chance that the laymen is right? Certainly! But that is certainly not always the case! Generally speaking, when the laymen gets it right in contrary to the industry, its a monumental fuckup and everyone hears about it. When its the other way around, its just people doing there job and no one hears about it.




Khuutra said:
trestres said:
Khuutra said:

I think the thing here is that trestres - like many other Wii buyers (myself excluded, and I want to point that out particularly) - wants third parties to publish the same sorts of games on the Wii that they do on the HD consoles.

It's not a bad wish, it's jsut untenable and it would be a terrible decision for these companies.

I wasn't asking specifically for the same kind of games the HD consoles are getting. My complaint is that none of these devs have invested the time/money/resources on the Wii as they had with the HD consoles. Also I was noting the amount of games coming up that are of quality. Genre doeswnt matter, unless its overflooded.

I apologize for my presumption, I did not mean to misrepresent you.

Don't worry.

Looking forwards to your 2008 vs 2009 vs 2010 thread. Gonna update mines now.



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It's not "throw money at the Wii". It's "don't throw most of the money at HD, when the sales are not increasing to make up for the development costs".



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