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[ethelred]

It's comments like this that cause Wii threads to turn into crap. Why wouldn't someone who owns a Wii NOT want to play those kinds of games and why should they expect NOT to get those kinds of games? The Wii is a console like any other console, but with gamers there's this mentality that it can't get "normal" games. It bothers me to no end. Which is why I can understand why the IGN guys would be bitter and a little disappointed. Just because it's the Wii it somehow doesn't qualify for the games that we've been playing all these years, even though the Xbox (around the same power level) got those games in spades.

The Xbox got those types of games because those were the types of games Microsoft wanted it to get, those were the types of games Microsoft itself strived to put on it, and those were the types of games Microsoft induced other publishers to put on it. Those were the types of games most wanted by the demographics Microsoft marketed the machine to, and those were the types of games Microsoft cultivated its console around so that it was viewed widely as the best place for them.

None of these things, needless to say, is true of the Wii. One may like it or not, but publishers tend to play follow the leader, which is why once the PSX became viewed as a prime system for RPGs, that was the type of game every publisher wanted to make on it; once the Xbox was seen as a good place to develop and publish shooters, the same effect manifested. I think everyone is aware at this point what the viewpoint of the Wii is with the publishing community.

Someone who owns a Wii can want to play violent online shooters on the Wii as much as they want, but you think they should expect them? No, I'm afraid that this expectation is why Wii threads are typically crap, not the sentiment to which you're responding. It's the same as the people who say "Square Enix should cancel DQ6 DS and put it on the Wii because the Wii needs RPGs and it should have them and Square should make sure it does! And some Final Fantay games, too!" There's no standing to expect certain types or genres of games on a particular console, and third party publishers aren't expected to ensure that every console offers well rounded gaming experiences that fill the desires of every single-console owner or first-party fanboy, especially when those desires run counter to what the fate of the machine has already shaken itself out as.

If you bought the Wii expecting violent, online shooters, you bought the wrong damned console, and there's no two ways about that. What's more, there are actually two other systems out there right now that cater to this type of gameplay, so it'd be extremely easy for your gaming wants to be sated elsewhere.

Now, all of that touches mainly on you, not the IGN team. The issue with the IGN team is that they hold this particular type of gaming experience up as the holy grail and consistently gnash their teeth that it isn't being provided, berate any other type of game for not being the sort of PS2 RPG or Xbox shooter they want it to be, and use their influence and position to push an actual agenda -- rather than being fair and even-handed in their coverage, they've made it their mission to promote certain types of games that meet their criteria and to shun those that don't in such a way that goes beyond neutral reviewing.

 

[Sipowicz]

i do think that different systems have different strengths and weaknesses and are more suited to certain types of game. In the case of the wii this does not include violent, graphically intensive online shooters. i prefer playing them on pc and think it's better suited for it

i find the attitude from the guys on this podcast pretty sad. they ignore stuff unless it meets their childish definition of "mature" (i.e. aliens/tits/blood). that's a huge shame when there's all these cool games coming to the wii a lot of which are really quirky and niche.

those are the types of games that deserve to be hyped and brought to people's attention, not stuff like conduit or dead space extraction

 

[AniHawk]

Let's not lump The Conduit in with Dead Space: Extraction now.

 

[Sipowicz]

Let's not lump The Conduit in with Dead Space: Extraction now.

even if you like the idea of a full priced dead space lightgun game made by ea/eurocom it should still get lots of publicity

a lot of the other ones wont get nearly as much and they'll probably be a lot more deserving

 

[AniHawk]

even if you like the idea of a full priced dead space lightgun game made by ea/eurocom it should still get lots of publicity

a lot of the other ones wont get nearly as much and they'll probably be a lot more deserving

No, I mean the difference in quality between the two are pretty great.

But the point in general should be that IGN, as a site that reports news, shouldn't be giving any game preference, whether it's violent and bloody, or cute and whimsical.

 

[Sipowicz]

No, I mean the difference in quality between the two are pretty great.

But the point in general should be that IGN, as a site that reports news, shouldn't be giving any game preference, whether it's violent and bloody, or cute and whimsical.

that's a fair point

but they kind of go crazy when they see aliens or a bit of gore, and they seem nonplussed by stuff like little king story

 

[jay]

The real issue with IGN is they're nigh illiterate. Everything else like a severe lack of journalistic integrity is icing on the cake.

 

[EDarkness]

The Xbox got those types of games because those were the types of games Microsoft wanted it to get, those were the types of games Microsoft itself strived to put on it, and those were the types of games Microsoft induced other publishers to put on it. Those were the types of games most wanted by the demographics Microsoft marketed the machine to, and those were the types of games Microsoft cultivated its console around so that it was viewed widely as the best place for them.

None of these things, needless to say, is true of the Wii. One may like it or not, but publishers tend to play follow the leader, which is why once the PSX became viewed as a prime system for RPGs, that was the type of game every publisher wanted to make on it; once the Xbox was seen as a good place to develop and publish shooters, the same effect manifested. I think everyone is aware at this point what the viewpoint of the Wii is with the publishing community.

Someone who owns a Wii can want to play violent online shooters on the Wii as much as they want, but you think they should expect them? No, I'm afraid that this expectation is why Wii threads are typically crap, not the sentiment to which you're responding. It's the same as the people who say "Square Enix should cancel DQ6 DS and put it on the Wii because the Wii needs RPGs and it should have them and Square should make sure it does! And some Final Fantay games, too!" There's no standing to expect certain types or genres of games on a particular console, and third party publishers aren't expected to ensure that every console offers well rounded gaming experiences that fill the desires of every single-console owner or first-party fanboy, especially when those desires run counter to what the fate of the machine has already shaken itself out as.

If you bought the Wii expecting violent, online shooters, you bought the wrong damned console, and there's no two ways about that. What's more, there are actually two other systems out there right now that cater to this type of gameplay, so it'd be extremely easy for your gaming wants to be sated elsewhere.

Now, all of that touches mainly on you, not the IGN team. The issue with the IGN team is that they hold this particular type of gaming experience up as the holy grail and consistently gnash their teeth that it isn't being provided, berate any other type of game for not being the sort of PS2 RPG or Xbox shooter they want it to be, and use their influence and position to push an actual agenda -- rather than being fair and even-handed in their coverage, they've made it their mission to promote certain types of games that meet their criteria and to shun those that don't in such a way that goes beyond neutral reviewing.

To be frank, why in the world did anyone NOT expect "mature" games on the Wii? It's the damn market leader. There should be games for all ages, and all demographics. This idea that the system can't and shouldn't get those kinds of games is bunk. You can dress it up all you want, but the bottom line is developers made it this way and this thinking that Wii owners can't get those games is something that games keep harping on. In the beginning the Wii was marketed like any other console. There were games of all genres and some of them were quite good. Say what you will, but I enjoyed CoD 3, The Godfather, Scarface, Red Steel, etc. The lack of any real push after the first year is really what changed the landscape. It's like that idea that the Gamecube was "kiddie". Just because Nintendo doesn't make the ultra violent kinds of games, doesn't mean that owners of Nintendo consoles shouldn't expect them or even want them. It's up to the 3rd Parties to fill that void. They always complain that competing against Nintendo is bad, but that's an area Nintendo doesn't go. Lots of room to expand that market and make a name for themselves. Say what you will about The Conduit, at least they realized this and though the quality of their game may not be the best, they at least made an attempt at filling this void.

Also, people act like money grows on trees. At the time the Wii was the cheapest console and if a person wanted a new machine to replace their PS2, then the Wii was a good bet. Now that may not be true, but when the Wii was launched it was. I would bet that most of the people who bought a Wii originally were looking at future potential. I don't think anyone thought the situation would be what it is today. So que people being disappointed that the market leading system can't get the big named games. I bought a Wii for the potential gameplay advances. Granted, I have a 360 as well, but that doesn't stop me from being a little annoyed at the current state of the Wii.

True that IGN guys are journalists, but they're human like the rest of us. They wanted bigger games for the system they work on. Who wouldn't? In my opinion, I like quirky games sometimes, but a console should offer a range of experiences, not pigeonholed into a specific demographic. This goes for the HD systems as well.

 

[schuelma]

The issue with the IGN team is that they hold this particular type of gaming experience up as the holy grail and consistently gnash their teeth that it isn't being provided, berate any other type of game for not being the sort of PS2 RPG or Xbox shooter they want it to be, and use their influence and position to push an actual agenda -- rather than being fair and even-handed in their coverage, they've made it their mission to promote certain types of games that meet their criteria and to shun those that don't in such a way that goes beyond neutral reviewing.

Well said

 

[ethelred]

To be frank, why in the world did anyone NOT expect "mature" games on the Wii? It's the damn market leader.

Because that doesn't matter.

Maybe you and a lot of other people think it should, but it doesn't. And until such time as its market eclipses that of the PS3, the 360, and the PC combined, and until such time as the games you want start selling more on the Wii than on those systems, it isn't going to matter.

There should be games for all ages, and all demographics. This idea that the system can't and shouldn't get those kinds of games is bunk.

I didn't say that it can't. I said that, primarily, it won't. As far as "shouldn't," well, I didn't say that it shouldn't, either -- I said that gamers shouldn't expect that, and that third party publishers are under no obligation to fill in for Nintendo's deficiencies, and that they're under no obligation to support it with specific, narrow types of content that a certain portion of the fanbase wants above all else (particularly those games are doing much much better on other systems, as far as they're concerned).

You can dress it up all you want, but the bottom line is developers made it this way and this thinking that Wii owners can't get those games is something that games keep harping on.

Well, I would say that, first and foremost, Nintendo made it this way as they created the machine, they chose who it would be marketed towards, they chose the type of software that would take a lead role on it... but sure, other developers and publishers made it this way, too, by following suit. So what?

In the beginning the Wii was marketed like any other console. There were games of all genres and some of them were quite good. Say what you will, but I enjoyed CoD 3, The Godfather, Scarface, Red Steel, etc. The lack of any real push after the first year is really what changed the landscape.

It most certainly was not marketed like any other console in the beginning, and I think you've fallen into some kind of revisionist void if that's the reality you think existed in 2006. As far as Scarface and the Godfather went, I don't think publishers ever viewed those as real support -- they were, regardless of maturity level, quick and easy ports to recoup development costs. Red Steel was not a huge success, and it was even less a success in comparison to the party game that Ubisoft put out at the same time... to say nothing of the shovelware they've earned money on since.

Also, people act like money grows on trees. At the time the Wii was the cheapest console and if a person wanted a new machine to replace their PS2, then the Wii was a good bet. Now that may not be true, but when the Wii was launched it was. I would bet that most of the people who bought a Wii originally were looking at future potential. I don't think anyone thought the situation would be what it is today. So que people being disappointed that the market leading system can't get the big named games. I bought a Wii for the potential gameplay advances. Granted, I have a 360 as well, but that doesn't stop me from being a little annoyed at the current state of the Wii.

Oh, don't get me wrong, I'm a little annoyed at the current state of the Wii, too, because I think it could be more than it is. But I also accept the reality that it's never going to be a PS2 or an Xbox 360. I'll get some niche games here and there for it, and have fun with those, and that's mostly it; I've already gotten the requisite number of games for the machine that if nothing else is ever made for it, I will, ultimately, be satisfied with what it has provided me. You, on the other hand, seem much less accepting, so I'd say that perhaps this should be yet another one of those life lessons: don't buy machines for potential. It's the same problem with the host of rabid PS3 fanboys bitching constantly that Sony's new golden glory hasn't ascended to the throne of the PS2 and claimed all of its RPG spoils. They bought it for the potential, for the expectation that things would work out the way they thought that it should. And that was a bad idea. Buy a system when it has enough of the games you want, and then be happy with those. If it doesn't get the games you want, don't buy it expecting that someday its nature will change and everyone will see it in a new light and they'll just magically appear.

Well said

I should note that as bad as the IGN team is, they get way too much positive feedback for those bad actions because there are way too many internet forumers more than happy to go along for the ride with them. Observe the praise they get for the "dark game" bullshit, or how many people were thrilled to help them hype up a mediocre game from a shovelware developer that was never going to create any kind of top-notch gaming experience.

 

[Davey Cakes]

While I like the IGN Nintendo team overall, there are times during the podcasts where it seems like Matt just can't get off the whole "hardcore game" thing. He almost seems overly focused on the "hardcore" games for Wii when, honestly, most of the Wii's best games have either been of the casual or bridge variety.

I've just really grown to hate the throwing around of terms like "hardcore" and wish that, for once, games would just be games.

 

[Stumpokapow]

I'll just say what I've said before.

It sucks having to buy a system you don't own because of the upfront cost. If you only own a Wii, buying a 360 costs $199-$299, and then at that point you have no games or accessories so you'll have to buy those. But the value of the hardware goes up as you buy more games. Obviously, a console that you buy and end up buying 50 games for is a better buy than a console you buy and buy 4 games for.

Excluding the people who are so die-hard they literally refuse to buy something based on brandname (those people are jokes and should be laughed at), everyone has a certain threshhold for which a console purchase would become good value. Let's say that a very conservative individual might not buy a console until there are 10 games available for it they're dying to play. Maybe even 15!

I've really enjoyed good implementations of Wii pointer controls. But what I don't understand is how someone can love Wii controls so much that they'd have a voracious appetite for a genre they'd never be willing to play without Wii controls. It makes sense to play an FPS on Wii that you wouldn't elsewhere because of the controls, but I don't get someone who demands versions of every major FPS but would be unwilling to play ANY of them elsewhere. In other words, I can believe someone who says Wii controls make a 7/10 game into a 9/10 game or vice versa but I can't believe someone who says Wii controls make a 2/10 game into a 9/10 game or vice versa.

Now, noting that, I've heard people ask for Wii versions of the following FPS/TPS games:
- The Orange Box (now <$20 for PS360)
- BioShock (now <$20 for 360, cheap for PS3)
- Mirror's Edge (now $9 in Canada for PS360)
- Dead Space (now <$40 for PS360)
- Call of Duty MW
- Call of Duty MW2
- Resident Evil 5 (now ~$45 for PS360)
- Fallout 3 (now as low as $40 for PS360)

In addition, if you go with the 360 you'll get Halo 3 ($30), Gears ($20), and Gears 2 ($30). If you go with the PS3 you'll get Resistance ($30), Resistance 2 ($35), and Killzone 2 ($45). You can also throw in the literally dozens of lower prominence/quality games (Army of Two & sequel, Ghost Recon, Vegas, SOCOM, MAG, Borderlands, etc) to round out a B-tier, since any genre affectionado is going to go beyond the top tier.

If you like shooters, even only a little bit, you will be able to find at least a dozen AAA+ of them for the 360 or PS3. Even someone with the most conservative standards for buying a console should get good value for money. Like I said, even if you deduct a whole 20% from the game score because it doesn't have Wii controls, and don't give any credit for seamless multiplayer, audio-visual fidelity (which I think would be a grave mistake because while the Wii has advanced controls versus the PS2, the PS3 and 360 have definitely made significant experiential strides in this genre versus the PS2)--you've still got an armada of games worth buying in the genre.

So, like, setting aside what you want to happen going forward or what you'd change retrospectively, looking strictly at how the cards lie on the table, I do not know what group of individuals simultaneously really wants to play FPS/TPS games on Wii and wouldn't get their money's worth out of purchasing a 360 or PS3. And that's just for one genre. To me, it makes more sense to get enjoyment from what's available on the market than to deny yourself enjoyment because you'd have liked the games better in a parallel universe where things were different.

Plus, as I noted, many of the games people would like ports of are now available so cheaply on PS360 that the additional money spent on the console is further offsetted by money saved on buying games on the cheap!

 

[Blackbird|]

Matt is a fucking bastard,after the visit at retro studios the only thing he got is a metroid prime trilogy exemplar

http://wii.ign.com/articles/101/1012308p1.html

 

[AniHawk]

Mirror's Edge is a platformer.

 

[Stumpokapow]

Mirror's Edge is a platformer.

If I had to pick one genre for it, yeah, it'd be platformer, but it has FPS elements in terms of perspective, elements of the motion, and the combat should you choose to use the guns. Nitpicking the exact specifications of the games really does nothing to change the point that if you want--nay, need FPS games on the Wii, you'd be able to find enough games to play on PS360 no matter what kind of a ridiculous criteria you'd have to meet to justify purchasing the console.

 

[lordfroakie]

Matt is a fucking bastard,after the visit at retro studios the only thing he got is a metroid prime trilogy exemplar

http://wii.ign.com/articles/101/1012308p1.html

Sorry but :lol

 

[BDGAME]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EG7rDOF9nwI

WOW! This video is too good to be true! It deserve his own topic!

 

[ZAK]

Matt is a fucking bastard,after the visit at retro studios the only thing he got is a metroid prime trilogy exemplar

http://wii.ign.com/articles/101/1012308p1.html

...........

What the fuck is this shit? Can we at least know whether it can use a Corruption save?

 

[AceBandage]

WOW! This video is too good to be true! It deserve his own topic!

It is a good video. Showed a lot of footage I hadn't seen yet.

 

[freddy]

That IGN article is basically an advertisement.

 

[jay]

That's what the site does. Take a look at most games and you'll see news stories covering inane details, half a dozen previews and half a dozen features, and even possibly developer blog posts. They would claim they are just keeping us informed but the site is clearly an extension of publishers marketing teams.

Here's an example:
http://xbox360.ign.com/objects/142/14290725_articles.html

 

[EDarkness]

Because that doesn't matter.

Maybe you and a lot of other people think it should, but it doesn't. And until such time as its market eclipses that of the PS3, the 360, and the PC combined, and until such time as the games you want start selling more on the Wii than on those systems, it isn't going to matter.

The funny thing about this is that all through every generation up to this one, it's always been argued that the market leading console gets the games. This was true with all generations except this one. Last generation it was PS2 owners strutting their stuff saying that the Cube couldn't get games because it wasn't the market leader. Now, it's "being the market leader doesn't matter".

My personal opinion is that it has to do with perception of the product by gamers and the development community. If they don't like it, no amount of sales will bring games to the platform.

I didn't say that it can't. I said that, primarily, it won't. As far as "shouldn't," well, I didn't say that it shouldn't, either -- I said that gamers shouldn't expect that, and that third party publishers are under no obligation to fill in for Nintendo's deficiencies, and that they're under no obligation to support it with specific, narrow types of content that a certain portion of the fanbase wants above all else (particularly those games are doing much much better on other systems, as far as they're concerned).

This argument is flawed and simply justified by unsupported theories. There aren't any blockbuster 3rd party games so there's no way to know if those games will sell better on the Wii. You're right, though, 3rd parties are under no obligation to make these games for the Wii. Thing is we always hear about how some company can't compete with Nintendo's software and it's silly that they're trying to copy Nintendo instead of following their own niche. For this reason, I have no sympathy when their game falls flat on its face.

Well, I would say that, first and foremost, Nintendo made it this way as they created the machine, they chose who it would be marketed towards, they chose the type of software that would take a lead role on it... but sure, other developers and publishers made it this way, too, by following suit. So what?

Nintendo didn't make it this way. They made the games they always make. Metroid, Mario, Zelda, etc. They added to their portfolio with Wii Sports. When has Nintendo ever made a Gears of War, Scarface, or Call of Duty type game?

It most certainly was not marketed like any other console in the beginning, and I think you've fallen into some kind of revisionist void if that's the reality you think existed in 2006. As far as Scarface and the Godfather went, I don't think publishers ever viewed those as real support -- they were, regardless of maturity level, quick and easy ports to recoup development costs. Red Steel was not a huge success, and it was even less a success in comparison to the party game that Ubisoft put out at the same time... to say nothing of the shovelware they've earned money on since.

I think you need to go back to the original Wii ads. They were all inclusive and included many different genres.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73yDRm8KaWY

People looking at those ads back then were not looking at "core"/"casual" games, but just games in general.

Regardless of how publishers viewed those games, they were examples of possible games to come and pretty good experiences. Red Steel went on to sell over a million copies as well. Sure they've sold lots of shovelware, but damn the PS2 was the shovelware king. No one was denying it the right to have non shovelware games. The market leading console gets shovelware, that's how it goes.

Oh, don't get me wrong, I'm a little annoyed at the current state of the Wii, too, because I think it could be more than it is. But I also accept the reality that it's never going to be a PS2 or an Xbox 360. I'll get some niche games here and there for it, and have fun with those, and that's mostly it; I've already gotten the requisite number of games for the machine that if nothing else is ever made for it, I will, ultimately, be satisfied with what it has provided me. You, on the other hand, seem much less accepting, so I'd say that perhaps this should be yet another one of those life lessons: don't buy machines for potential. It's the same problem with the host of rabid PS3 fanboys bitching constantly that Sony's new golden glory hasn't ascended to the throne of the PS2 and claimed all of its RPG spoils. They bought it for the potential, for the expectation that things would work out the way they thought that it should. And that was a bad idea. Buy a system when it has enough of the games you want, and then be happy with those. If it doesn't get the games you want, don't buy it expecting that someday its nature will change and everyone will see it in a new light and they'll just magically appear.

I think we're gonna have to agree to disagree on this one. If people didn't buy new products on expectations of the future and potential then no new technologies would ever sell. I'm sure the guys who bought HD-DVD were not just looking at their current lineup of movies, but also preparing for the future. Same with people who purchased Beta over VHS. This is especially true with consoles. No one really buys consoles for one game (well some do, heh, heh). There are lots of factors involved, especially if you're an early adopter. With the Wii selling like hotcakes who wouldn't think that there were big games on the horizon? The PS2 lit up the charts and as a result, big name games were made for the system.

The excuse for the lackluster game output in 2008 was that developers were caught with their pants down and now looking to take the Wii seriously. As we find out now, that simply wasn't the case. It's potential lost for whatever reason and the backlash by the gaming community when it comes to the Wii has been entertaining at least. The threats of the Wii killing the industry and such making its way into many threads over the years as well as developer(s) openly saying the Wii sucks, etc. Just a testament at how crazy this generation has been.

I should note that as bad as the IGN team is, they get way too much positive feedback for those bad actions because there are way too many internet forumers more than happy to go along for the ride with them. Observe the praise they get for the "dark game" bullshit, or how many people were thrilled to help them hype up a mediocre game from a shovelware developer that was never going to create any kind of top-notch gaming experience.

Heh, heh. It's like if you're a failure in life, you will always be a failure. Right?

 

[ggnoobIGN]

Do you a source? If true that's 4 years should be nice.

My source is myself. It's been in dev for along time, but most of that has been pre development. Still, why we haven't even seen an announcement yet is beyond me.

 

[freddy]

My source is myself. It's been in dev for along time, but most of that has been pre development. Still, why we haven't even seen an announcement yet is beyond me.

Your source is Hal_Laboratory who posts here, works at a nintendo centric website and also lives in Austin, Texas.

He bragged about this on the IGN forums ages ago and claimed he told a select few forum elite(haha) what the game was. Not sure if someone from Retro read his stupid comments but he shut up about it soon after. You still have people like the above poster who flock to any post about retro and the game they are working on and claim insider knowledge.

Just thought I'd clear that up.

 

[ggnoobIGN]

Your source is Hal_Laboratory who posts here, works at a nintendo centric website and also lives in Austin, Texas.

He bragged about this on the IGN forums ages ago and claimed he told a select few forum elite(haha) what the game was. Not sure if someone from Retro read his stupid comments but he shut up about it soon after. You still have people like the above poster who flock to any post about retro and the game they are working on and claim insider knowledge.

Just thought I'd clear that up.

It's not much at all to be honest. And it wasn't what he told us. He was just passing a file that wasn't his along, which is probably why he shut up about it.

 

[ethelred]

The funny thing about this is that all through every generation up to this one, it's always been argued that the market leading console gets the games. This was true with all generations except this one.

It was true with the last generation (PS2) and true with the prior generation (PSX), but there was a fairly interesting split of third party support during the SNES/Genesis generation. Regardless, when this generation was first starting up and some were doubting that the Wii and its unique approach would find success in the marketplace, a lot of Nintendo fans started trotting out this Blue Ocean schpiel about how the Red Ocean is too competitive, so Nintendo would move out into the Blue Ocean where they'd create their own market and bring in new success. In short, they'd succeed outside of the traditional parameters of success that had driven the SNES/PSX/PS2.

Well, Nintendo found its Blue Ocean. And I guess you guys found out that it's awfully lonely out there.

My personal opinion is that it has to do with perception of the product by gamers and the development community. If they don't like it, no amount of sales will bring games to the platform.

I'm not sure what to say except: duh?

This argument is flawed and simply justified by unsupported theories. There aren't any blockbuster 3rd party games so there's no way to know if those games will sell better on the Wii. You're right, though, 3rd parties are under no obligation to make these games for the Wii.

It's not a theory, though... third parties have no obligation to make certain types of games for a specific console, and as long as the games their top-tier development teams want to make are, by and large, are doing well on the combined PC/PS3/360 market, they're not going to shift those over to the Wii. You're right; the Assassin's Creed team, the Modern Warfare team, and the Resident Evil 5 team haven't made games for the Wii and haven't proven out how those games would sell. But you know what's also true? They don't have to (because their games are succeeding on the platforms they want to develop on), and they're not going to.

I think you need to go back to the original Wii ads. They were all inclusive and included many different genres.

I've seen the original Wii ads. I was at E3 2006, and I remember all that. I also remember the "let's have the family play MP3" ads and the ridiculous Rayman ads -- actually, come to think of it, Nintendo used that corny, hokey style in all of its ads, and it had early third party supporters use that same corny, hokey style. And the biggest marketing push was to define the console as something different from ordinary gaming machines. It succeeded.

Regardless of how publishers viewed those games, they were examples of possible games to come and pretty good experiences. Red Steel went on to sell over a million copies as well.

Hate to break it to you, but Red Steel didn't come anywhere close to selling a million copies in the US.

I think we're gonna have to agree to disagree on this one. If people didn't buy new products on expectations of the future and potential then no new technologies would ever sell. I'm sure the guys who bought HD-DVD were not just looking at their current lineup of movies, but also preparing for the future. Same with people who purchased Beta over VHS.

Yeah, and guess what? Those people, like the people who spend several hundred dollars at a console's launch without having a list of confirmed in-development games that they want to play, are making bad purchasing decisions. The people who banked on HD-DVD and Beta made bad calls. They were wrong. You're using that as evidence of proper the decision-making process in action; it isn't!

This is especially true with consoles. No one really buys consoles for one game (well some do, heh, heh). There are lots of factors involved, especially if you're an early adopter. With the Wii selling like hotcakes who wouldn't think that there were big games on the horizon? The PS2 lit up the charts and as a result, big name games were made for the system.

Early adopting consoles is inherently a risky prospect; if you do it without knowing what you're getting, that's a risk. And if you're later going to trot out the "I can't buy every console because money doesn't grow on trees," you've got to be pretty stupid to be an early adopter. If you're so concerned about wasting your money on a console not geared around providing the types of entertainment you're looking for, play it conservatively and wait until the race shakes out a bit and you see which system actually has the games you want rather than the sales you want and thus, as your thinking goes, actually deserves the games you want.

The excuse for the lackluster game output in 2008 was that developers were caught with their pants down and now looking to take the Wii seriously. As we find out now, that simply wasn't the case.

You're right. It's not an excuse. Publishers aren't providing an excuse. Publishers don't care, and the reason they don't care has nothing to do with being caught by surprise, and their lack of caring isn't going to go away. Get over it. Stop trying to rationalize it. It is what it is.

Heh, heh. It's like if you're a failure in life, you will always be a failure. Right?

As far as game development goes? Sure, why not. If you've been making a long string of crap games for 15 years (occasionally punctuated by rare bursts of mediocrity), you're not suddenly going to create a great game just because you've discovered the wonders of motion technology and it's driven you to show the fanwankers the world over that unlike everyone else, you really get it and you want to try and put out effort.

Try. Put out effort. Sometimes your best just isn't fucking good enough.

 

[LINK.AGE76]

And I thought Matt would at least get an interview :lol

 

[Shadowlink]

Maybe Matt is under NDA?

 

[JDSN]

Im sure the annoying hinting about dark shit will start next week.

 

[EDarkness]

It was true with the last generation (PS2) and true with the prior generation (PSX), but there was a fairly interesting split of third party support during the SNES/Genesis generation. Regardless, when this generation was first starting up and some were doubting that the Wii and its unique approach would find success in the marketplace, a lot of Nintendo fans started trotting out this Blue Ocean schpiel about how the Red Ocean is too competitive, so Nintendo would move out into the Blue Ocean where they'd create their own market and bring in new success. In short, they'd succeed outside of the traditional parameters of success that had driven the SNES/PSX/PS2.

Well, Nintendo found its Blue Ocean. And I guess you guys found out that it's awfully lonely out there.

I never bought that BS back then, and don't buy it now. Nintendo said back then that they wanted to include everyone all types of gamers and games. I thought Nintendo fans back then were silly for even bringing that sort of thing up. All it does is paint a picture that they were only going after one kind of gamer and that was far from the truth.

I'm not sure what to say except: duh?

<sigh> Not even gonna bother to comment on this.

It's not a theory, though... third parties have no obligation to make certain types of games for a specific console, and as long as the games their top-tier development teams want to make are, by and large, are doing well on the combined PC/PS3/360 market, they're not going to shift those over to the Wii. You're right; the Assassin's Creed team, the Modern Warfare team, and the Resident Evil 5 team haven't made games for the Wii and haven't proven out how those games would sell. But you know what's also true? They don't have to (because their games are succeeding on the platforms they want to develop on), and they're not going to.

I think you and I have a bit of a misunderstanding. I fully accept the state of the Wii as it is. I have a 360 and a PC to play other kinds of games on and don't have a problem with buying games on other systems. I'm not some kind of Nintendo fan who only plays Nintendo games. To be honest, I don't like most of their games. That said, I can sympathize with the Wii only owners who want games for their system. As a follower of the game market since the days of the Atari 400, it's interesting to see things play out the way they are. Have I been butt hurt in the past over the way things changed, sure. When Sega dropped out of the console race with the DC, I was seriously irritated and got out of the business for a while. Took a while to get over that. Heh, heh.

The point I was making originally was about why people can't get good Wii discussions on this and other boards. I don't come to this site for meaningful Wii game discussion and I'm sure there are others, too. One of the reasons Wii threads degenerate into crap is because people get into these arguments about what games it should and shouldn't have and what users should and shouldn't get. It's a silly argument that can't be won by either side, yet we have to sift through those arguments for page upon page on forums and stuff. Sometimes people just want to talk about the console they like with fans. Different opinions are great, but not everyone wants to be arguing all the time.

I've seen the original Wii ads. I was at E3 2006, and I remember all that. I also remember the "let's have the family play MP3" ads and the ridiculous Rayman ads -- actually, come to think of it, Nintendo used that corny, hokey style in all of its ads, and it had early third party supporters use that same corny, hokey style. And the biggest marketing push was to define the console as something different from ordinary gaming machines. It succeeded.

Your interpretation of those ads is different from mine as well as other people. The Metroid Prime 3 ads didn't say anything about family, but were about a different way to play. That was the point of those "Wii would like to play" ads. If you took that to be it's family friendly, then I don't know what to say. That's obviously not what they were going for. Sure they were corny, but wasn't playing games "different" what the Wii was/is all about?

Hate to break it to you, but Red Steel didn't come anywhere close to selling a million copies in the US.

Who's talking about the U.S.? I'm talking about worldwide.

Yeah, and guess what? Those people, like the people who spend several hundred dollars at a console's launch without having a list of confirmed in-development games that they want to play, are making bad purchasing decisions. The people who banked on HD-DVD and Beta made bad calls. They were wrong. You're using that as evidence of proper the decision-making process in action; it isn't!

No one said anything was a good or bad decision. Just that looking at the future application of a product can affect a purchasing decision. There are winners and losers to be sure, but no one knows the future of a piece of hardware (or anything else for that matter) when they buy it. All the analyzing in the world won't tell you if this investment you're about to make is gonna have a bright future. Hype, word of mouth, past experience, news articles, history, etc. can influence whether or not someone buys something. In this case, the Wii is selling like hotcakes, people are generally happy with the games, hype is pretty high, why in the world would someone not expect to get "normal" games on it?

Early adopting consoles is inherently a risky prospect; if you do it without knowing what you're getting, that's a risk. And if you're later going to trot out the "I can't buy every console because money doesn't grow on trees," you've got to be pretty stupid to be an early adopter. If you're so concerned about wasting your money on a console not geared around providing the types of entertainment you're looking for, play it conservatively and wait until the race shakes out a bit and you see which system actually has the games you want rather than the sales you want and thus, as your thinking goes, actually deserves the games you want.

If there weren't early adopters, no new hardware/device would sell. Someone has to take the plunge. People make bad calls, that's life. However, to say that their logic was flawed at the time is silly. It's easy to look back and say people made a bad choice. I don't think I made a bad choice with my purchase. I've enjoyed many games and I own almost 40 Wii games (maybe more). I'm just empathizing with people who can't just buy any game or any system they want.

You're right. It's not an excuse. Publishers aren't providing an excuse. Publishers don't care, and the reason they don't care has nothing to do with being caught by surprise, and their lack of caring isn't going to go away. Get over it. Stop trying to rationalize it. It is what it is.

Again, you're preaching to the choir.

As far as game development goes? Sure, why not. If you've been making a long string of crap games for 15 years (occasionally punctuated by rare bursts of mediocrity), you're not suddenly going to create a great game just because you've discovered the wonders of motion technology and it's driven you to show the fanwankers the world over that unlike everyone else, you really get it and you want to try and put out effort.

Try. Put out effort. Sometimes your best just isn't fucking good enough.

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. I think everyone deserves a fair shake. Sure their past history wasn't the best, but new blood, new focus, more money, or whatever can affect whether or not a game turns out good. Considering how crappy support has been across the board, why not give them a chance? I don't believe a failure will always be a failure. Regardless of how it turned out they at least had the balls to TRY to use various features of the console. Regardless of how the game turned out, I give them props for that. Hell, even Nintendo doesn't really use Wii Speak...their own product. That's what I find funny.

 

[accathoidprotoss]

edit

 

[ZealousD]

There's no way either IGN or Nintendo funded a 2-way plane trip for Matt to fly all the way to Austin just to pickup the first retail copy of the Prime Trilogy. If that was all they were doing they could have just shipped the game.

Matt had to have seen something.

 

[AniHawk]

There's no way either IGN or Nintendo funded a 2-way plane trip for Matt to fly all the way to Austin just to pickup the first retail copy of the Prime Trilogy. If that was all they were doing they could have just shipped the game.

Matt had to have seen something.

Something horrible.

 

[tetrisgrammaton]

Something horrible.

Zelda Tri: Oxidation

 

[Bluemercury]

i wonder if the pal version is the same.....