Nintendo Seeing Red

[1CCOSA]

Ditto on what kidnemo said. I don't want any of the systems to die, they all have at least one or two major games I gotta have.

[Jeremy]

I'm happy with every system of this generation so far, as they've all provided me with a number of gaming memories.

[MVS]

...
Nintendo sucks, fuck 'em.

Get out of my head!

[1CCOSA]

This reminds me of some of the posts I saw on Xengen/Cloudchaser and GA back in '01 when Sega was in its hardware death throws. "DC is dead? Good! I hate Sega. They'll be better as a thirdparty which will help the industry. Besides the only game I wanna play is Virua Fighter." *Feels the synapses in his head being drained of all life*

Anyways, as others have said this loss is small in the long run. GC is no 2 like it or not.

"Whats wrong with Xbox? I think that is the best system for hardcore gamers."

LOL. That's rich. Define hardcore.

[MVS]

People over the age of 10?

[Master of 7s]

Oh no, Nintendo lost money!!!! I guess those billions of dollars they're sitting on don't mean jack.

Nintendo is d00m3d!!!

[Mzo]

Kosh_H, your sig is fucking huge. Sweet god.

The (current) systems I play the most, in order: PS2, GBA, GC, Xbox. I have great games for all, but the only reason I own 50% of the Xbox games I do is the retail site. Good thing they had Shenmue 2 and PSO there.

[sggg]

I am not surprised. People seem to think that Nintendo can't lose money simply because "that's the way it is"... or because they have always gotten away with all their poor decisions in the past. Well, things change. They have done an increasingly poor job and it's bound to catch up with them no matter how much money they are sitting on. Do they have some decent games on Gamecube? According to some people they do, but according to a lot more people there is hardly anything there (self included). That's the problem. A system like PS2 can appeal to a wise array of people becuase there are games for damn near everyone. My list of favourite PS2 games would be quite different than most people's list. With Gamecube, you either like a certain small batch of Nintendo games... or there is little reason to buy the system. What Nintendo does is cater to a ever-shrinking audience - their traditional fans who will buy damn near anything they make. That's well and fine but low sales and losses are inevitable when you don't appeal have the software to appeal to more diverse groups of people.

Can they fix this? Maaaybe. Will they? I doubt it. The price drop is just a plaster on a serious wound. I guess it would be possible to change their trajectory but I don't see Nintendo changing the way they do business. They've been incredibly lucky to even be where they are today. If not for having a monopoly on the handheld sector, having incredibly loyal fans and, and having a few timely insanely profitable sensations like Pokémon they would have been in this position forever ago. A good illustration is their handheld monopoly. It has been incredibly fortuitious. No-one has ever mounted a serious challenge except for Sega, and despite it's flaws GameGear did quite well until Sega abandoned it thanks to financial problems in the console division. If Sega had come out with a redesigned "GameGear Pocket" instead of dropping the system and taken just 50% of the handheld industry where would Nintendo be right now? Nintendo's handheld consoles have been awful, technologically dated, ergonomic disasters. They keep releasing minor upgrades (GB, GBP, GBC, GBA, GBASP, GBA2 coming next year) and abusing the fanbase but there is no alternative so they get away with it. If this happened with their consoles would they exist now? Look at the spiral 32X sent Sega into. If there was serious portable competition they'd have never gotten away with it.

Now that Sony is jumping into the portable market I think they are in serious trouble. If PSP turns out to be a decent system it won't kill GBA/Nintendo but it could well relegate Nintendo to second class status, something they can hardly afford.

It does not matter how much money they are sitting on if they can't grow their business. They will just be relegated to a small time player. Maybe they can continue to eek out profits by releasing cheap consoles and first party games. They'll always have their fans who will buy systems just for their games. That much they can count on.... but they'll never be a serious player again with the way they do business. I don't see any reason to believe that their next console (if there is one) would fare any better than Gamecube has. Perhaps they'd be better off and have a stronger future if they went 2nd or 3rd party... but Nintendo is not a company that seems likely to change and if they don't they'll continue to be margainalised.

...

For the record I don't really care one way or the other what happens. I'm agnostic. I'll buy whatever system has the games I want. Despite it's horrid ergonomics and the awful D-pad, I adore my GBA and I own 23 games or so. I don't own a Cube because there is hardly any software I want even a little bit. Hardware wise I think it's a wonderfully designed system (technologically and aesthetically) and I really wanted one at first... but sadly it's all about the games so I got a PS2. I might buy one eventually so I can get Billy Hatcher.. but even now. System + Game + Mem Card + 2nd controller. Meh. It's too much for one game.

I actually wish Nintendo (or MS, no matter which one) dropped hardware just so there would only be 2 consoles to buy. 3 is too many. If the Cube/Xbox libraries were combined it would not seem so bad. It might be better for both companies and for the industry... it'd be better for me anyway.

[Mzo]

Only skimmed that beast, sorry...

If you think you spent a lot of money on systems now (due to redundant and sub-par DVD players stuck to my game systems), just wait until MS and Sony start up their set-top box boolshet. The future of console hardware...

[1CCOSA]

SGG: The only game you *reallY* want is Billy hatcher? O_o Come on, what about Metroid? What about Viewtiful Joe or MK: DD? Those two alone are gonna keep me busy for months on replay value. Oh yeah and as for my sig, I chose it because I love the pic and...Soup Nazi voice: No resize for you! Come back, one year!

Also, I totally agree Nintendo does need to change business strategy in some areas. They're at the very least in danger of becoming overly complacent. Since they've decided to launch at the same time as PS3 they'd better do something wise and launch with a console Fire Emblem RPG and a console Pokemon title. And for all that's good, I want Mario on launch, ya HEAR MIYAMOTO? I like Pikmin and all but it wasn't worth waiting for Sunshine.