Future of Nintendo? Bright.. or Dark

General Discussion
41

First:

Dollar for dollar, the Wii was the most successful gaming home console system this generation. It sold more units then the Playstation 3 and X-Box 360, and, most importantly for Nintendo, it made them way more money than the PS3 and X-Box 360 (actually Microsoft is in the red overall on profits from the X-Box).

It’s true that the Wii is all but dead at this point, but so say that the Wii started up bad is delusional. The Wii sold like hot cakes for the first couple of years of its existence, selling more than X-Box 360 and PS3 combined. It was the hot Christmas item of '06 and '07, and it was very difficult to find.

Now these are the facts. If you don’t like the direction Nintendo took with the Wii in accordance with your own personal tastes, I understand. But don’t say that the Wii was a failure just because you didn’t like it. Don’t lie to yourself. Thats not healthy.

Second:

To answer your question, I mostly like Nintendo’s business model. It’s not perfect, but going through the 5-6 year console cycle (instead of the 10-year Sony and MS do) with profit-making consoles allows Nintendo to be bold and different. I think the Wii U is going to do well: consumers are crazy about tablets these days, so I can see a tablet controller for a gaming system a big selling point. Of course, I could be completely wrong and the Wii U could fail spectacularly.

I do have issues with Nintendo, though. For one, they do a poor job listening to their fans. Thats something you have to do as an entertainment company these days. You don’t have to supplicate, but if you see a large number of fans screaming a message at you, you have to respond, and respond respectfully. This is one of the reasons why hardcore Nintendo fans like yourself are pissed off.

I also think they should have a classic controller alternative in box to lure 3rd party devs and consumer who may not want to use their unique controller to enjoy their games.

Third:

As far as my experience with the Wii, most of the games on the system I didn’t care for. There were long periods of time where I didn’t touch the system (in fact, I let other family members borrow it and I never missed it). But there were a few excellent games for it, and at those times I loved the Wii. Also, playing with friends was the best on the Wii, hands down. Even though it didn’t get as much gaming attention as my PC or my PS3, for $250, I got my money’s worth.

Definitely not my favorite Nintendo system by a long shot, but I’m not disappointed.

42

Goes back to N64, sticking to cartridge format was probably their single dumbest move as a company. They handed the PS1/N64 era to Sony, and Sony was gunning for Nintendo by that time over the time they wasted developing the SNES CD Drive, which Nintendo abandoned the day after they debuted it CES, which really pissed Sony off.
Carts were expensive, limited space, long production turn around so developers had to guess on how many they would sell, investing in shit that didn’t sell, goodbye developer support. Never got it back. They had a chance with the Cube, but the equally stupid decision of going with the small disc format killed the possibility of the Cube playing DVDs, which was a strong selling point for the PS2. Kept adding to the pile by dismissing online play in favor of GBA connectivity and all that bullshit, still saying stupid stuff now like “We’re not concerned about technology needs:shake: we’re about gameplay”. The loads of shovelware and lack of substantial support seems to counter the gameplay thing. Wii friendcodes…:wtf: Wii-U may be better off with 3rd party support initially, but once the tech specs hit for the PS/XBox followups…:confused:

43

It will sell like crazy. I don’t see how you can dumb down Zelda anymore than they have with Skyward Sword. Mario will be solid with one or two new or recycled ideas, sub-par graphics great art, fantastic music. Mario Kart will continue to be crap by comparison to the SEGA kart racer but everyone will play that. They will never recapture the magic of DKC as RARE used to make it. Metroid, StarFox and F-Zero will probably be used to showcase the “new” graphics and Smash Bros will hopefully be good for both competition and casual play.

EDIT: The next Kirby game better let me die, and better not include real estate.
Also: 5 years of gimmick games until the gimmick wears off and every game ignores it.

44

A man I’m subscribed to on YT was playing Kirby’s: EY and he fell off a cliff instead of dying he was picked up and placed back on the ledge with the penalty of losing some beads -_-

Even sillier was how people actually defending the fact that dying was impossible in that game. I mean Yoshi’s Story was “easy” but you could die from loads of shit.

45

That made perfect sense, and it was a great joke :lol:.

46

I don’t care. As long as the next Smash game is good I just don’t care.

47

Yeah, I wish we could go back.

48

Nintendo has quite a few major problems.
1.inability to acknowledge fanbase age growth -They for some reason fail to adjust to the aging of their fanbases.They blatantly ignore and gloss over the fact that maybe just maybe kids want to have games on the wii that are good and have several fun and challenging games to play.Wii was a slap in the face due to the fact they damn near outright said we are not gonna make any games that are challenging .a lot of kids who were playing the wii at age 7 are now 14 the wii abandoned them damn near.
2.Predictable lineups and titles -Nintendo needs to get off its ass and create good ips again.For almot 30 damn years they have been selling the exact same core titles .Goldeneye could have been a great franchise if they played their cards right .that leads me to my next bullet
3.Hardware and 3rd part support goals shortsighted.Nintendos Wii u is competing against the 360 in terms of graphics that is possibly the stupidest fucking decision ever.The goal of this game is to match the comps upcoming hardware and make the consumer decide off of 3 things,accessibility,games,overall fun.Nintendo is hustling backwards .the lack of third party support ismunderstandable but the lack of in house titles of equal quality is not

4.Controller The wii u has a bunch of potential But the insane amount of potential shovel ware could push away many buyers who don’t want another opaque brick tht only plays cooking mama .

49

First. I didn’t say it started bad. It started good bro.

Fiancially…

http://www.vgchartz.com/article/88750/nintendo-profits-in-q4-2011-expects-to-lose-over-800m-in-fy-32012/

But I do know what u mean man.

50

Nintendo started sucking when they started pandering to the lowest common denominator instead of making quality, competitive products.

My favourite Wii games by far are No More Heroes and Mario Galaxy, and both of those games use minimal motion controls. For a while, No More Heroes was the only reason I would use my Wii from time to time. It’s been collecting dust for years now, except for very rare games of Smash Bros with my siblings for shits and giggles.

It’s a shame because there were so many games that I loved on the Gamecube. I can count the number of Wii games that I love on one hand.

51

A shame no one here has mentioned Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn when talking about great Wii titles.

52

The only year Nintendo wasn’t on top this generation of home consoles was last year in which Microsoft took top spot iirc.

53

agreed. That waggle shit is terrible. I want to play games with a regular fucking controller. It reminds me of the DS where every game was touch bullshit until developers realized “Hey, we can just make regular games and people will like them! The second screen just has to be an option.” but people never really did that with the Wii.

Nintendo in general is interesting because most people love Nintendo games, but usually don’t like their hardware. by that I mean it seems like most people would like to go back to the super nintendo days, where you could buy a Nintendo console, get great Nintendo games, and get other great games too. That isn’t the case anymore, ever since the N64. Nintendo systems, at least the home console ones, have been pretty much for Nintendo games, and nothing else. And that’s extremely frustrating, especially now when you have something like the WiiU, which has the power output of what the xbox had in 2006. The WiiU was the console nintendo should have released instead of the Wii.

So on one hand, Nintendo has made a ton of money with the Wii, but on the other, it seems like most core gamers didn’t really care for the system beyond Nintendo’s own games. And to me that seems like it failed, even if the financials say otherwise.

54

Wii was hands-down the best console this generation because of homebrew.

55

My parents, who very much disliked video gaming, got a Wii some time ago. Bobble headed bitches(and party Bro’s) would be buying Wii’s for their sororities or apartments. It may have a lack luster library of games. But like some have said, at least in short term sales, they held their own. Personally for me, I gave up on Nintendo after the 64. Nintendo became as fun as watching paint dry.

56

Nintendo is dead to me until a new F-Zero is produced.

57

“agreed. That waggle shit is terrible. I want to play games with a regular fucking controller.”

EXACTLY. Even the classic controller needed a fucking “pro” version to add two shoulder buttons??? The ps1 having this LONG ago too??? Also the classic controller pro can’t even plug into the system. You’re forced to use the wiimote with it regardless. At least they should have made it wireless on it’s own. What’s even funnier is there’s a actual gamecube keyboard that has the left side of the controller and right side on each -side- of the keyboard too. The hell???

Nintendo KNOWS and has always known what you want. And they make sure to keep that as far away from you trying to sell you the shovelware shit only. It’s like what’s said before. Mario got a fucking rom dump for it’s 25th. Zelda a damn download. Metroid too. If they ONLY think enough of fucking mario to ONLY do that after 25 years of Super Mario Bros you expect anything better from nintendo? Much less anything better for something that isn’t a 1st party game.

All of nintendo’s decisions really make me wonder if they’ll have another virtual boy like failure too. I mean it took a massive discount and TWO mario titles within the first 9 months to really sell the 3DS system too. Everything has REALLY caught up to the “game boy” now. And I wonder if nintendo would just rather go down with the ship and stay stuck in there own ways. Who wants to bet there’s millions of Wii U’s sitting in warehouses right this second too?

58

Nintendo held back it’s games on purpose to actually give 3rd parties a chance on it’s handheld system. If anybody more so dropped the ball on that regard it wasn’t Nintendo. The only thing they messed up on was in trying to change the way they release a system and it ended up biting them in the ass.

59

When I still played I could conciously avoid tripping. It would only happen when I got careless with my movement; it is still in the running for dumbest mechanic. It’d be interesting to do a bunch of focus groups to see what leads to the wide variance. I bring hella hype to any game I play so its kinda impossible for me not to have fun with something. Other than cribbage; how the fuck my girlfriend has a win rate of 70% over me in a game that is mostly random blows my fucking mind. Real talk: fuck that game.

60

No offense to Nintendo fans here, but they’ve sucked hard since the N64 days. N64, gamecube, Wii…look i’m not saying they didn’t have any good games, just that the majority of memorable 3rd party titles in their respectable generations was missing from their consoles.

That is my biggest complaint with Wii, missing too much. Whats the point?

I will give Nintendo this---- their marketing was great. Convincing countless legions into buying a console that provided very little but gimmicks. Though in the end, that also makes them look more like shysters conning the casual gamer. As well as putting out rehashes of old franchises every now & then to keep hold of their dedicated fanbase(AKA: The real gamers Nintendo should be catering too instead).

With this extreme over reliance on gimmicks and banking on marketing to reel in the gullible consumer, the glory days of the NES & SNES are long gone. Just one look at Wii-U shows things have not changed with its goofy tablet style controller.