After getting dethroned and beaten to a bloody pulp by Sony for a grueling (or wonderful, if you see it from my point of view) decade, the House of Miyamoto is back in the forefront of the console gaming industry. Sony and (more blatantly) Microsoft are being in one way or another influenced by whatever Nintendo is doing.
Yet, it's a different Nintendo than the one that first gave us Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda. Whereas before Nintendo's strict "Seal of Quality" forced third-party developers to release no more than 5 games a year, Nintendo now looks the other way at the truckload of shoverware provided by anyone with the money to make them. While Miyamoto was previously inspired to create random fantasy worlds of plumbers and princesses, he's now drawn to create experiences akin to his personal (but common) hobbies. This has resulted in a creative shift, where the decades-old hardcore followers of the brand are "dumbfoundedly" looking from the sidelines as their beloved company is courting a less devoted and loyal crowd. It's like the high school girl that continually ignores the friendly guy that has undeniably loved her since first grade, in favor of the new kid that can barely remember her name.
So, what is your view of Nintendo now? Has it changed from your years of loving everything with Mario's face on it? And please, don't hold anything back. Yes, we all know Nintendo is doing the right thing for themselves (or are they?), but as a gamer, how do you feel for Nintendo now? I figure this will get interesting responses since this is a Nintendo-based forum, and probably most of you first joined VGC just to discuss just how awesome Nintendo is in the first place. Yet, Nintendo's face has radically changed in this generation... so where does Nintendo stand with you?
I like Nintendo. They're doing something different to the industry that makes gaming have mass appeal. I don't like where they are going in terms of my personal gaming tastes, but I do see them as necessary. Because of their new direction, I can't say I want to follow that route.
[COLOR=Indigo]I'm a big fan of Nintendo. I've loved them for a very long time. My first system was an original Nintendo Entertainment System. It was superior to my Genesis or my PS1.[/COLOR]
*Sigh*
I thought a lot about this today with their oh-so-crappy conference.
Nintendo, I believe, is falling. Yes, their empire is now stronger than possibly ever. They should have no worries at all. But slowly and surely, everything that made Nintendo great is slowly falling in favor of the mass casual appeal they're able to deliver over and over again.
I loved Nintendo. Even now, it stands as the company that gets top priority for me. I'm certainly no fanboy, but Nintendo comes first. But Nintendo has found a goldmine, and now that they're set, it feels like they never need to go back. Nintendo feels like it's dying more each day, despite its monstrous success. While I'd like to say poor Nintendo, I can much more easily say poor fans. Every longtime fan Nintendo has is slowly starting to question their priorities. 360 or Wii? Final Fantasy XIII or Wii Music? Fallout or Wii Sports 2? All Nintendo seems to care about now is appealing to more and more and more people, and it's working, at the expense of their fans. Where's the Mario? Where's the Zelda? Why does it feel like the iconic face of the italian plumber is being replaced by a Mii? Where are the beautiful, mysterious fantasy worlds Zelda has produced? Where's the addictive, lighthearted fun of Mario? This and more is being upstaged by titles that win with their simplicity, not giving anything in graphical ability, depth, or even purpose, but merely their ability to simplify gaming, and thus reach out to more audiences, which ultimately equals more money.
Sure, Nintendo hasn't forgotten about their fans, but it sure feels like it. Yeah, they're making a Mario somewhere in there. Sure, a Zelda is in development. But what Nintendo lacks for its hardcore fans is consistency. It seems like it's not worth it to own a Wii anymore for Nintendo's classics, since they will only come every couple of years, followed by twenty delays each. What does Nintendo care about third parties? It doesn't look like much. They can't offer what Nintendo can to the casual market, so why try? Nintendo instead uses them to bust out more crap to open consumers eyes, so they can creep up behind them and win with superiority.
Ultimately, I feel frustrated with Nintendo. Nintendo is thriving beautifully, and that's good. But, I feel like the same thing has happened to them that has ruined a lot of things: money. With their outrageous flow of cash, Nintendo is forgetting more and more about their fans. What was once there, an awesome consistent developer and distributor of amazing games is there no longer.
I think today might mark the day I switch my loyalties to Sony. =/ But, we'll see. I just hope Nintendo can retain some dignity, because Nintendo was my favorite thing about video games my whole entire life. Nintendo was video games, there wasn't even a question.
;_;
i feel ya... maybe the casuals will become hardcore, but they will probably end up wanting Wii sports 2, and never even know about mario. I'm happy Nintendo is thriving I've wanted them to be the best, especially after the Gc disaster. but things that originally made Nintendo great are becoming rare. I love Nintendo, I just want some love in return, not wii sports.
After today? I don't think much of them anymore. The best experiences they will have given me are already here. I had already been wanting a 360 for several months, but that conference convinced me: it's pretty much high time that I jump ship.
Now it seems they're more concerned about innovation (smiles!) and profit than they are the fans who got them to the point they're at right now. I realize E3 isn't over, but when those lights dimmed and smoke piled into the arena, I was expecting a new Zelda, or perhaps Kid Icarus. The "unveiling" of Wii Music was one of the biggest "Hey, fuck you."s I've ever seen a game company deliver to their fans. As sad as this might sound, I honestly felt a like I'd just been betrayed by someone.
Wii has Animal Crossing: City Folk, Tales of Symphonia: Dawn of the New World, and MAYBE Wii Sports Resort left in it for me. One of those is a third party title and the last one would lose novelty after a couple of weeks. After that, there's nothing but dust in my Wii's future.
As I said earlier, I'd been considering a 360 for a long time, and if I had the money I'd have one already. After Brawl came out, I was fed up with Nintendo's stance toward online play. Communication in-game is nigh impossible, and the interface as a whole seems rushed and is just plain frustrating at times. If I said it once, I said it a thousand times, "If Nintendo doesn't get with the times on the online front by the next generation, I'm going Microsoft."
Looks like I won't have to wait until then. Nintendo might be raking in the most money, but the Wii is nothing but a sideshow from here on out.
That recent 360 price drop has me wondering if Microsoft saw this shitfest of a Nintendo E3 coming...
Edit: I still love the hell out of my DS, though. Several good titles on the way for that. The Wii's future, though, just looks plain dismal, ESPECIALLY when it's the only current-gen console you own.
Nintendo focuses its attention on casual gamers for the past year and a half, and the people yell foul. "oh dear, Nintendo is going to give up on us, and sell out" right? It's games like Mario Galaxy and Super Smash Bros. Brawl that let me know Nintendo still has what it takes, making me wonder what the fuss is all about (E3? come on now gais.... ***** and moan about the lack of another Zelda game (Hell, I'll join ya in the pain), but don't kid yourself in assuming the Wii reflects all of Nintendo while everyones hammering away on their DSs.
The DS has kept my confidence in Nintendo. Am I upset about their current "casual" strategies? I'd be lying if I said no, but I know they still have what it takes to change gears. Hell, FFCC My life as a king was great, so idc.
Dan said it well. I tried to put that in words. Nintendo's performance today literally made me feel like I was betrayed.
Never saw that one coming.
Like I said, there's still two days of E3 left, so who knows...
But as it stands, you're basically S.O.L. if the Wii is your only current console.
There is more of E3, but I really have been thinking about this for ahwile, except I think I was in denial about it. ;o Nintendo will bust out an amazing title every so often, but it doesn't feel like Nintendo anymore. The games are great, but it feels more like "Well, some of the fans still want some of our old junk, so we better keep making those every once in a while"
[quote]Iron Koala agrees: bust my balls why don't ya :(
Hey, I'm busting my own while I'm at it. :(
Betrayed beshmayed. Their showing at E3 was disappointing, but it just confirms what we've all known since 6 months post-launch. Wii wasn't built for us guys and Nintendo is happy doing what it's doing.
Though, I'll say this much, it's not... Nintendo I have a problem with. It's the Wii. Nintendo's still a good company by all measure, Galaxy was amazing, TP was great, Brawl is awesome, Metroid was really good and so on. They still have the ability to develop (or support at least) key franchises. I mean, they have two Zelda games in development right now, so they're still trying. Whether they're what hardcore gamers want, who knows, but I have faith in that department at least.
Plus, the DS is still great. Developers are doing some good stuff on it, Nintendo is publishing some good stuff on it, etc etc.
Back to my earlier point, it's the Wii that's ****ing terrible. I mean beyond the games I listed, pretty much everything plays like **** or the premises isn't even worth a second glance. No one seems to be trying and we're still seeing next-gen ports on a ****ing last-gen system (graphically and ability-wise.) No one seems to give a **** about the quality of their games on the system and the whole thing is a bloody mess.
I mean, Wii online is the Wii experience in a nutshell. Abysmal, half-assed and overall just lacking. No fault of Nintendo, not necessarily, but rather every other developer. Made even worse by the fact that everything else looks so ****ing great on the other systems. Gameplay was the Wii's one saving grace, and it doesn't even have that.
Now the horrible truth comes out at long last. I've never owned a NES. Or a SNES. Indeed, my first gaming console was the Nintendo 64, given to me on my seventh birthday. With it came Turok: Dinosaur Hunter. It is still one of the best games ever made, in my opinion. The feeling of sitting down there in your room in front of that old TV, starting up the console for the first time and see the magic before ones eyes.. *Nostalgic.*
The Gamecube controller is unsurpassed ergonomically. Has sweet, sweeet games too. But, I dunno. There is so much crap on the Wii. It's missing out on a lot of good games that come to the Ps3 and 360, too. Of course, there are bound to be some kick-*** games coming for the Wii once the developers learn to take full advantage of the Wiimote, but I just bought my Wii so that I'd be able to finish the Prime series in the first place. After TP, I'm not really looking forward to any new Zelda either. RE5 will be out for the 360. (Will probably suck, but maybe Capcom threw in some surprises for old fans.)
I'm not really "allied" to either side. I'm just playing for the sake of playing. But I'm not some kind of rabid fanboy when it comes to Nintendo, not like how I used to be with the Gamecube and N64. I don't stand up to defend the Wii when Ps3/360 fanboys demote it. Just as I don't promote the 360 or Ps3 any.
Those good old days have long since passed.
Too conservative, they haven't made an amazing game in 10 years. They pander too much to idiot gamers who don't want to stick around to figure anything out. PROVE ME WRONG.
[quote=Speedfreak;864537]Too conservative, they haven't made an amazing game in 10 years.Ocarina of Time (widely considering the best ****ing game of all time, jeez), Majora's Mask, Wind Waker, Super Mario Galaxy, Super Smash Bros, Metroid Prime, WarioWare...
give me some of whatever the **** you're smoking bro
[quote=The X;864547]Ocarina of Time (widely considering the best ****ing game of all time, jeez), Majora's Mask, Wind Waker, Super Mario Galaxy, Super Smash Bros, Metroid Prime, WarioWare...
give me some of whatever the **** you're smoking bro
Best game in that list is Majora's mask, which was 8 years ago. The other games are great games for sure, but they're not anywhere close to Nintendo's pinnacle. OoT is f[COLOR=lightgreen]u[/COLOR]cking overrated anyway.
I could spend time justifying it, but you don't give a s[COLOR=lightgreen]h[/COLOR]it, Vamp, maian, Alastor, Willis, Fate won't give a s[COLOR=lightgreen]h[/COLOR]it and Big Boss sure as hell won't give a s[COLOR=lightgreen]h[/COLOR]it so why waste my time?
Bottom line: Nintendo are no Gods of gaming.
I liked Majora's Mask better than OoT. :/
The last game I fell in love with made by Nintendo was Animal Crossing. And even though Harvest Moon is **** and not made by Nintendo, I love that series. I am currently playing The World Ends With You on my pretty pink DS. As a gamer I am obligated to try out the console and see what it has to offer, but after playing a few games I can say this console sucks for me and I find the DS better, even though I ****ing hate handhelds.
I know Nintendo has it in them to develop good stuff, but they found their place in the industry as a good accessory. Not bad, just not for me.
Animal Crossing, I'm gonna point out, is a port of a 10 year old N64 game!
Wherever it came from, it had to be one of the last games from Nintendo I really liked. Pikmin may have been it but I'm kind of lost on release dates. I guess in terms of feeling "timeless" it's three games that do it for me: Yoshi's Island, Animal Crossing, and Majora's Mask.
Majora's Mask is my favorite game of all time.
I actually will agree with Speedfreak, though. It may just be nostalgia that does it, but I haven't been extremely wowed by any game sicne the N64 era. Well, I did love Wind Waker, but I will agree there hasn't been anything that ever affected me like the games on N64 since Gamecube has been around. There still have been great games, but not the *** games I had when I was a child.
...But again, that's probably just nostalgia. ;o
[quote=Vampiro V. Empire;864815]Anyways, I'm not sure why this is being argued. It's my opinion, and if my opinion is changed because of that it's not something that can be argued.
...are you ****ting me?
Not denying the hypocrisy, just take that as a hint I don't feel like arguing it.
So yeah, Nintendo have done pretty much **** all recently, their sequels are becoming more rehash-like than ever before. Compare the "gimmick" of Majora's Mask, a fully fleshed-out system that simulated the independant lives of the townsfolk over 3 days, with all the freedom of time-travel you could ask for, to Wind Waker, a different mode of transport. Phantom Hourglass remedied this somewhat, but back in the day Nintendo could do something totally new and still keep every other area of the game completely up to scratch, or even better.
Or Super Mario Galaxy, a game that essentially took us to where 3D Mario should have started in the first place 10 years ago. On top of that they failed to better or even equal Super Mario Bros 3 in intuitive level design or difficulty, a game that came out twenty years ago.
To me Nintendo is a warm, comfortable house that I have outgrown, or rather has no room for me anymore but was too kind to say it. I've left voluntarily to wander the dark night and search for shelter from the rain, with only the childhood memories from that house to guide me.
Basically they SUCK.
Speedfreak, what do you like. Seriously.
Anyway, I can't believe it took some of you up until yesterday to realize all of this. Personally, Nintendo was dead to me the day the Wii hit shelves.
As for the third-party scenario, it most likely isn't going to change one bit for the rest of the Wii's lifespan. I mean, there hasn't been even the slightest inkling of anything getting better. After almost 2 years, the best third-party offering is a port of a PS2 game.
[quote=Last Fog;864850]Speedfreak, what do you like. Seriously.
http://www.vgchat.com/showthread.php?t=31009&page=2
He's the one on the left.
As far as Nintendo goes, I loved my NES as a kid and the N64 had some pretty great games, but I decided after the Gamecube I was done with Nintendo consoles. There are only so many times that I could play the incarnation of Mario and Zelda, and Sunshine and Wind Waker weren't my cup of tea (not that they were bad or anything).
The Wii screamed "gimmick" at me from the beginning. Glad I went with the PS3. Though I guess I sould say I liked one of Nintendo's earlier gimmicks, the Virtual Boy. Nintendo is a very innovative firm, but a lot of their innovations are kinda gimmicky and, at the end of the day, not any better than the "conventional" gaming experience.
[quote=Last Fog;864850]Speedfreak, what do you like. Seriously.
Why is this subject of so much interest? Is it so hard to believe I have a completely different opinion to most people?
I still don't buy the "Wii is gimmicky" crap, the Wii Remote has done more for games than normal mapping and high res textures have. And that's really saying something, because there's maybe 3 games that actually use it well.
Speedy doesn't hate every game in existence, he's just highly sensitive to people saying how much they admire a game inwhich he sees flaws.
I don't think it's fair to say the Wii is a gimmick just because great games aren't coming, really. I understand the thinking process for arriving at the "gimmick" conclusion, though I thought the Wii pretty much was what Nintendo said it be. Indeed, Nintendo's motion controls weren't as good as promised, and the "revolutionary" Video game experience hasn't really shown itself, but what were your expecting from the cheapest system? The PS3 and Xbox hype their **** up, too. A person could easilly make the case for achievment points and trophies being gimmicks.
It's cheap because it's not as powerful as the PS3 and X360, so the price has nothing to do with it.
[quote=Vampiro V. Empire;865145]It's cheap because it's not as powerful as the PS3 and X360, so the price has nothing to do with it.
Price having nothing to do with what, exatly? And how does that deflate my point that all systems have their gimmicky qualities?
with revolutionary gameplay.
If they wanted to make more realistic gameplay, or added the graphics that PS3 or Xbox have, you can bet your *** the price would have been effected.
Nintendo used to make me feel all warm and gooey inside...mmmmhmmm.
Though now, I'd really like them to start coming out with more "hardcore" games soon. The casual appeal ones are nice, but they begin to lose their taste after so many of them.
If they could just calm down with the whole "OMG LOOK WHAT WE MADE!!! WE MADE IT FIRST!! YEP, US!! NOT YOU, MICROSOFT! NOT YOU, SONY!!!" etc, and start focusing on their faithfuls, perhaps that feeling may someday return.
The system would have still gotten more expensive if they had further developed the sensors to follow 1:1 response at the start. Keeping the Wii cheap was also something Nintendo promised.
but just the term revolutionary is silly, considereing biasness.
Still would've been cheap in comparison to PS3/Xbox. What would it have added, 10, 20 dollars at the most? Not that big of a deal.
Dunno, I still think the "Revolution" was a better name than Wii.
ninja'd
[quote=Vampiro V. Empire;865185]Still would've been cheap in comparison to PS3/Xbox. What would it have added, 10, 20 dollars at the most? Not that big of a deal.
If that was the case, the Wii wouldn't have been released yet. Development costs aren't really the same at any given point in time. What's 20 bucks now probably would have been 50 to 100 bucks two years ago if they had followed the same time frames. Nintendo would have had to hire more people to get stuff done.
Not necessarily. I don't know how much it would've cost, but I doubt it would've been comparable to throwing in more powerful processors and graphics cards.
[quote=Last Fog;865116]Because you apparently hate just about every game in existence.
Alright, lemme try to explain my newfound negativity. This is long, but hey, if you really want to know it won't bother you.
I'm starting to see gimmicks everywhere. The use of the phrase "gimmick" was just a decoy from the purveyors of gimmicky games in an attempt to shoot down something that might actually bring about change.
The definition of a gimmick is literally "an ingenious or novel device, scheme, or stratagem, esp. one designed to attract attention or increase appeal".
These days if a game is successful they will just copy the last game and add a gimmick, something to make it different to the other game, and this gets seen as an improvement because it's a thing that wasn't there before that hasn't ruined the game. This is diffrent to a genuine improvement, for example where the designer is insightful enough to see a problem in his own design and fix the game. Or when they realise they have a perfect game and decide to just take a small peice from it in a totally new direction.
Example: REmake was the pinnacle of the old Resident Evils, nothing needed to be fixed in the game. So when the time for another Resi came along and the retard who landed the project took a look at it he came to the same conclusion. He realised that in order to sell another Resident Evil he'd have to make it different in some way other than the exceedingly obvious, he'd need to add a gimmick. The result was a second controllable character.
Then Mikami got his hands on the franchise again, and in a typical display of bada[COLOR=lightgreen]s[/COLOR]sery he decided that since he made a perfect Resident Evil then the next would have to have only the faintest hint of the old. The result was Resident Evil 4, a game that was a million miles from REmake. Sure it had the same characters, a similar plot and some of the same items, but those mere objects could be transplanted into "Resi Tetris" if they wanted to. The point was it went from an adventure game to an action game, two entirely different types of play.
And it was also perfect, which left the guy in charge of the series after Mikami told Capcom to go f[COLOR=lightgreen]u[/COLOR]ck themselves in a real bind. So what did he do with the franchise? Did he attempt to combine the two styles of play or take the series in another new direction? Hell no, he took the gimmick route. He took the same style of play and added co-op, a prepackaged unecessary feature, a safe route. It'll be the same great game as before and with an added new feature.
This is not clever game design, this is making the new thing work. It is the bare minimum. After I noticed this practice I see it everywhere, and I can't stop. It's in my most hated and my most loved series, from Zelda to Street Fighter, from Tekken to MGS. It's in Fire Emblem, Final Fantasy and Starfox, Metroid, Mario and Animal Crossing. Even the most original of games, your Katamari Damacys and WarioWares aren't exempt from this passion for mediocrity.
So yeah, maybe I dont get as excited over most games anymore, but I haven't lost any love for the hobby because it just makes me appreaciate those games that dare to do better so much more.
I apologise to Big Boss if this is too far from the point of the thread, but I think it really defines how Nintendo have fallen from grace in my eyes. They've lost their passion for the wild tangents of Majora's mask, Yoshi's Island and Wave Race 64.
[QUOTE=Speedfreak;865000]Keep my picture in the member pictures board, please.
I read Last Fog as saying "what do you look like" in my half-awake state last night, and now I see that it isn't! Sorry!
[quote]Why is this subject of so much interest? Is it so hard to believe I have a completely different opinion to most people?
Because discussions often center around what you dislike, leaving the rest of us wondering what games you do like. We're just curious!
Well...if you don't see why I don't get excited by gimmicks after that post I guess you never will. I did my best to explain but it's obviously not an opinion shared by many.
Shoulda said all of that from the beginning. Before it sounded like you were just being grumpy and hating on things for no real reason. Now though, I completely understand where you're coming from.
Looks like I wasn't too far off.
[quote=Iron Koala;865142]Speedy doesn't hate every game in existence, he's just highly sensitive to people saying how much they admire a game inwhich he sees flaws.
[quote=Vampiro V. Empire;865244]Shoulda said all of that from the beginning. Before it sounded like you were just being grumpy and hating on things for no real reason. Now though, I completely understand where you're coming from.
I wouldn't have had a reason to write that post before everyone started thinking I hate all games, though.
HINDSIGHT