AceBandage said:
I'm not sure you've really been paying attention to Nintendo at all this generation.
They fully understand that they need core gamers to continue to be successful, in addition to the casual gamer.
They also fully understand that software is what makes a system, as evident by the fact that they have the most 10+ million selling games out there.
The problem, here, is that they seem to be holding back titles for no apparent reason.
But I don't think there is "no apparent reason" they're holding it back.
First we need to assume that NoA and NoJ are different entities to a degree. NoJ has seemingly tried a lot to build a diverse system with a range of games, maybe some will be hits, maybe not, but they're getting that variety out there to hopefully attract a wide array of core gamers. Of course in addition to that they're also going after the Nintendo diehard fans with their core franchises and in addition they have gone after the casual market as well. That's NoJ. Perhaps they're not money hatting as much as some would like, perhaps they don't have as cool an on-line as we would like but you can see them making the efforts.
NoA on the other hand looks to be about safety, it's like they want each title itself to make money instead of worrying about the ecosystem as a whole. I imagine it costs a lot more to QC a game like Xenoblade than it would something like FlingSmash, it's very possible that the title actually wouldn't make much money if at all for the NA release, same with Fatal Frame(which from what I hear is buggy as hell) and Last Story. Now perhaps this is NoJ's fault, perhaps they're worried about hard numbers versus a nonhard number thing like mindshare and customer satisfaction. And perhaps it's not NoJ's fault and NoA are just being asses and have made the decision themselves to focus on real tangible sales and not something untangible like perception.
But I do not believe you can say you want the core gamer and just rely on Mario, Zelda and Smash Brothers, if that's the "core gamer" we and Nintendo is talking about than that is the Gamecube crowd, that's not the core gamer I'm talking about, in fact I'd call them just plain old Nintendo fans. Now some of you may be just fine with Gamecube core gamer support from Nintendo but I believe there is actually a segment of Nintendo's fan base that are not actually hard core Nintendo fans but have stuck with them from the early days when their systems had a wide variety of support from Nintendo and third parties. Those days have been over for awhile and while Nintendo constantly gives lip service to the need for the core gamer there has been little traction on NoA's part to do anything about it. NoJ, sure, NoA, not so much. For myself they've been bleeding mindshare since the N64, I love Zelda, I love Metroid, I love Fire Emblem, but I also like new things, these franchises alone aren't going to get me to constantly buy a system anymore. Some of you perhaps it will and perhaps you think those titles are sufficient evidence of going after the core gamer, fair enough.
As for their software sales I think that supports my assertion. Other companies release stuff that doesn't move anywhere those numbers just to keep a few people happy and on the platform. Lose money on one title and make it back up on your store on something else or from another title or perhaps a royalty from a third party title, a console is the whole package, essentially be willing to lose some money at one place to make money on another. Nintendo can of course stay profitable with not even bothering with that, as has been said they will not take a loss on hardware and so long as they keep the Nintendo fans they have plenty of franchises themselves that can make them money, they can churn a profit all day long in third place if need be but now that they've reached the height they have with the Wii and DS can they really fall back to Gamecube levels again business wise? Look at how their stock does because they're not matching the growth of the DS with the 3DS! It's not like they're losing money they're just not making it as hand over fist as before! So really as a publicly traded company can Nintendo fall back to Gamecube level marketshare on the console side? I think it'd hurt them a lot more than people think.
NoA is essentially acting like a 3rd party on their own hardware and I think that's unacceptable for a console maker, it slowly erodes customer satisfaction and faith in that company and pretty soon all they will have left are diehard Nintendofans and no-one else. When they enlarged the casual gaming audience they did more than just sell their hardware to them, they opened up the possibility of other companies now selling hardware to them. This new audience is not theirs to keep and with their pathetic on-line offering and their seemingly intentionally total disregarding of truly understanding and implementing one in the 3DS and Wii U in my opinion just means that they're going to lose that market come the Wii U. I think MS is actually in a great spot to snatch that up from them, as much as I hate them, Kinect is workable and they have a great store with loads of indie support, I can see Xbox Live's marketplace really taking off next generation with the casuals if not merely later this gen.
And what I mean about software is not just their and third party titles but the OS itself. The damn 3DS can't even message people yet. Everything is like it's own little closed channel on the Wii. I can all but guarantee that while the voice chat feature of the Wii U looks neat that it'll probably gimped in some spectacular way that will probably necessitate you setting up a voice chat over a phone beforehand! I don't know how the shit flies in Japan but I think in the West people find this sort of this ridiculous.
So from where I stand it doesn't look like Nintendo of America gives a damn about the core gamer, it doesn't look like they give a damn about creating a platform of trust between them and the users that can last hardware generations, it just seems like they take what NoJ does and pick and choose only the things they think will make money while not incurring any loss so their division looks good.
Allowing footage of the game to sell the game. Something advertisers don't seem to understand at all.