This Just In: Nintendo Doesn't Get It

[NeoZeedeater]

We need a gaming border patrol.

Sounds like Lieberman and Nintendo in the early '90s? No one over the age of ten plays video games. Stop the blood!

[Fe 26]

I don't know, the existence of sex in the city is pretty upsetting.

And I don't know if you have looked at any of the games being marketed towards girls, but a lot of them are pretty damn sexist.

http://www.gamespot.com/ds/adventure...end/index.html
http://www.teamteabag.com/2008/11/18...end-ds-review/

[Hero]

Video games are more than a sub-culture. They are an artistic medium like movies and music. There's enough room for all demographics. The existence of Sex and the City, Celine Dion, and Wii Fit doesn't hinder the existence of Dexter, Megadeth, and Gears of War in any way.

Exactly!


Remember how it was the end of gaming as we know it when the market was made hip and cool and MTV-ed by the advent of the PSOne? Remember how pissed off people were over that? Did it ruin or destroy gaming? Depends on who you ask, although if you did and play Gears, Halo, MW, et al it makes you a bit of a hypocrit (or shortsighted in your youth). Now it's happening again. Just history repeating.

[kedawa]

The trouble with what Nintendo is doing is that the wider demographic doesn't provide the same attach rate for software that the traditional gamer does. Right now, Nintendo is thriving on gimmicks and add-ons. Should that fad ever come to an end, they're going to find that they've conquered a vast desert and conceded all the fertile lands to their competition.
Of course, Nintendo hasn't been raking in cash by being stupid, and they will no doubt find ways to keep the gravy train rolling, but they would be fools to think that they can keep a stranglehold on the casual market for long. Casual gamers aren't likely to exhibit any sort of brand loyalty, after all.

[Fe 26]

Depends on who you ask, although if you did and play Gears, Halo, MW, et al it makes you a bit of a hypocrit (or shortsighted in your youth). Now it's happening again. Just history repeating.

I don't really play much gears, halo, MW, et al. I don't really have the money to buy them at release and pay for a live account. And you do have to get the live account for there to be anything special about those games. You remove it and they become dolled up fps from the 90s.

In fact I would say that live is a big reason a lot of people on TNL still play games. Despite how annoying all that shit was with MTv and the spike video game awards, the ability to play with other dorks across the country more than makes up for it.

btw, I kind of fail to see the connection between games becoming hip on tv causing halo or gears to exist. Those games would probably exist regardless of how hip videos games were marketed as.

Or are you saying that anyone really believed that video games becoming hip would actually end all game making? LOL if so. No one has ever believed that the video game market would die. Just that there would be less good games.

[Hero]

I'm taking the games-are-over in context between now and back then. Both instances you see a strong, knee-jerk opposition to changing what's "theirs" to appeal to a market that isn't worthy. That games as we know it will be dumbed down to the point of just being interactive movies, etc. Now we're getting the line that games NEED story, visuals, world design in order to be 'real' games. Everything else is just a non-game or "casual."

[Hubbitron]

Casual gamers aren't likely to exhibit any sort of brand loyalty, after all.

So casual gamers are the smart consumers? What kind of a retard show's "brand loyalty" when they are spending their own money on something that isn't a necessity?

[Melf]

This is only loosely related, but I figure more people would whine (is that possible?) if I started a new thread. Here is Nintendo mouthpiece Matt Casamassina finally putting the walking and quacking together and calling it a duck.

In New Super Mario Bros. Wii's multiplayer mode, you can play as icons Mario, Luigi or two versions of sideshow character Toad. So when famed Nintendo designer and development leader Shigeru Miyamoto is asked prior to the game's release why Princess Peach wasn't included as a playable character instead, he pauses and says that it would've been nice, but that the physique of Toad more closely resembles that of Mario.

LOL.

Wii is a more powerful GameCube. It won't play high-definition titles. Laughably, it won't even output in Dolby Digital surround sound -- a feat PlayStation 2 accomplished nine years ago -- because the hardware includes only a stereo component.

LAWL.

And really, why should Nintendo try when its strategy not only pays off by the millions but goes largely unquestioned by the fans, some of whom vehemently defend the company's every move.

L-OH-FUCKING-L

[Finch]

MY NITENDO OUTPOTS IN FULL SURROUND SOUND BECAUSE THE PEOPLE BEHIND ME ARE SCREAMING!

[Low]

The trouble with what Nintendo is doing is that the wider demographic doesn't provide the same attach rate for software that the traditional gamer does. Right now, Nintendo is thriving on gimmicks and add-ons. Should that fad ever come to an end, they're going to find that they've conquered a vast desert and conceded all the fertile lands to their competition.
Of course, Nintendo hasn't been raking in cash by being stupid, and they will no doubt find ways to keep the gravy train rolling, but they would be fools to think that they can keep a stranglehold on the casual market for long. Casual gamers aren't likely to exhibit any sort of brand loyalty, after all.

You're not the only one to notice this:

“The interesting thing is Nintendo, they make money off of every console they sell. I think one of the big things that we found out is it really is a mass market product where mom or whoever goes out, the 80% of the people out there who go out and buy a Wii box are happy with Wii Sports and they don’t really need another game. Or if they do need another game, they’ll buy Wii Resort because it comes with a free Wiimote or Wii Play…So, honestly I don’t know…You can obviously see that profits are down for Nintendo. I think the Wii is on its tail slide, unless they drop the price to like 80 bucks then you’ll start seeing it flying off the shelves.And I believe they’ll still make money if they drop it to 80 bucks…Point being is they have the ability to lower the price on the Wii [...] where Sony and Microsoft cannot do that.” - SEGA's Constantine Hantzopoulos

I've stated this a few times before but a company making money hand over fist can afford to bundle add-ons that attract players to useless software instead of more deserving third party works. The result?

-Due to poor sales of Madworld, Overkill, and Conduit Sega is likely cutting mature support for Wii.

-Marvelous (about the only Wii developer I care about) banked heavy on Wii and posted big losses last year.

-Namco Bandai has slowly cut original works for the system in favor of a shift to casual titles. The latest Tales title has underperformed as well.