Nintendo's Mobile Push to Focus on Marketing Demos, Not Full Games

[alent1234]

And you believe this 4 games business model of the past is also viable for present and future? If so, why is Nintendo losing money the third year in a row? Selling dedicated gaming hardware (at a loss) is one thing, selling hardware dedicated to only 4 games is something completely different. It doesn't work out for neither customer nor vendor.

With only 4 games a year, every game has to pay off for 25% of the total hardware ownership cost. And I not only mean the money, but also the wasted space in your living room. God forbid, you don't like one of the games! Imagine how the iPhone would do, if all you could run on the platform would be nothing more but 4 solid Apple apps a year?

Everyting else, sorry: There's no app for that.

it was either the xbox or the xbox 360 that had the highest attach rate at 8 games per console on average.
most people won't buy more than 5 games or so for a console. or they will buy and trade in for new games once they play a game. only a few people will buy a few dozen games for their console

nintendo has also sold their consoles at a profit and 4 first party games per year was about $60 per gamer per year in profit

wii u has very little first party games coming out for it as well. that awesome zelda game they showed off in 2011, no word on release

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

And you believe this 4 games business model of the past is also viable for present and future? If so, why is Nintendo losing money the third year in a row? Selling dedicated gaming hardware (at a loss) is one thing, selling hardware dedicated to only 4 games is something completely different. It doesn't work out for neither customer nor vendor.

With only 4 games a year, every game has to pay off for 25% of the total hardware ownership cost. And I not only mean the money, but also the wasted space in your living room. God forbid, you don't like one of the games! Imagine how the iPhone would do, if all you could run on the platform would be nothing more but 4 solid Apple apps a year?

Everyting else, sorry: There's no app for that.

I said 4 games a year, not 4 games a generation. Generations last 5-8 years, so at 4 games a year, you'd end up with 20-32 per generation. That would be much, much better than the ~1.5/year Nintendo has done with the Wii U so far, which will ultimately see Nintendo publishing at most 12 games for the Wii U during its lifetime. The console has been out for 15 months - it should have 5 solid games from Nintendo by now. It has ONE. They've released one other game, and it's crap. It has a single good third party game (Legends), but that's not abnormal as most third party games suck anyways (which is why it really doesn't matter if Nintendo attracts them or not. Whether COD is released for the Wii U or not doesn't matter because it's a crap game. Hurrah for visuals - they forgot to make it any fun. If I wanted something pretty, I would have bought a painting to hang on the wall.)

 

[fertilized-egg]

Well it wasn't ever on the Genesis. Maybe you meant SNES?

Doh. I obviously meant SNES. Or maybe I secretly was hoping for Shining Force.

I claimed that it was a better experience on a handheld or console than on a smartphone.

There are so many games on the DS/3DS that would benefit from the more modern hardware and display, or in case of the tablet, much larger display as well as more room for content.

I've already mentioned Dragon Quest 9, one of most highly acclaimed games on the DS, as an excellent example of a game that would be much better on a smartphone. There are already games much better on an iPad, such as Scribblenauts and Plants vs Zombies. Scribblenauts is a curious case because it was mildly hyped on the DS but at the end plays much better on the iPad.

A Link Between Worlds uses a Streetpass feature whenever you cross paths with another 3DS. ... This is not possible on iOS. It may one day be, but at the moment it's not. And Nintendo uses features such as these to increase the value of their games.

You know what would be better than a Streetpass feature? A proper online community system. To me that's just Nintendo's workaround to cover up their glaring weakness. If Nintendo want to do something location based, I'm sure they are creative enough that Nintendo could do so much using the GPS on the smartphones.

I should also note that the iPhone does not have 3d, making games like a Link Between Worlds a downgraded experience on a smartphone (Not that I even think the game could run at the 60fps it does on an iPhone).

I don't know about that. Just by getting rid of the 3D, the framerate would improve substantially and the iPhone is considerably more powerful than the 3DS to begin with.

More importantly Nintendo's Iwata himself said the consumers are losing interest in 3D, and followed up by releasing the 2DS without the 3D feature. If Nintendo themselves are moving away from 3D, it doesn't sound like that big of a selling point for the gamers.

 

[Technarchy]

That's because they're in different markets

Different markets for now. Either Nintendo supports iOS in some fashion or competes against iOS with a mobile platform Nintendo designs in-house. That's where this is going it seems.

Nintendo will probably not become a third party game publisher, but as they have shown in the past, they can release innovative products and expand the gaming market.

 

[GizmoDVD]

Slippery slope. Just a matter of time before Mario will be on iOS.

Right.

And let's say he is. Will you pay $29.99 for it? Or just $1 like you do for other crappy games?

Why would Nintendo start selling their games for $1-$2 to compete with Angry bird crap?

 

[alent1234]

Right.

And let's say he is. Will you pay $29.99 for it? Or just $1 like you do for other crappy games?

Why would Nintendo start selling their games for $1-$2 to compete with Angry bird crap?

3ds copy of mario 3d world has like 40 some courses across 6 worlds or so
sell it for $.99 and $.99 per world or $1.99 per world or whatever

it's not like they get the $30 or $40 in revenue now. there are retail costs, manufacturing, etc.

 

[Tech198]

So, Nintendo needs help....So what...

They're slipping... No one buy them much.... Just bring out a really great console like the xBox (but from Nintendo) and you if its any good, you back in business.

And if not, well... rather than use smart-phones to help themselves, at least their TV's are selling ok

 

[fertilized-egg]

So, Nintendo needs help....So what...

They're slipping... No one buy them much.... Just bring out a really great console like the xBox (but from Nintendo) and you if its any good, you back in business.

The Gamecube was great hardware in its time, more power than the PS2 and much more elegant than the first xbox. Yet it just didn't sell all that well. Microsoft literally poured billions of dollars into the xbox to make it a success but financially the xbox business hasn't even broken yet in its life time, and that's not even counting the opportunity cost.

The tough thing about the current console market is that it has gotten really expensive to compete and it's not clear if there's a room for a profitable major 3rd player. Nintendo could survive easily for now if they downsize and concentrate on the handheld market targeted at young demographic and the nostalgic adults but in the long run who knows how long that market will last. It's already much smaller than what it used to be.

 

[Gudi]

It has a single good third party game, but that's not abnormal as most third party games suck anyways (which is why it really doesn't matter if Nintendo attracts them or not.)

Believe it or not, only because you've never been good at something, does not mean, it doesn't matter whether you are. Nintendo could lose much better third party games, if they had been better at attracting them in the first place. Things you've always missed are still missing. Never had a girlfriend? Still really matters if you attract them or not.

 

[jordanm86]

Personally I think it makes sense. Nintendo is trying to use iOS's huge install base as a gateway to their ecosystem.

It might work since Nintendo treats games as value propositions instead of disposable commodities.

Yes but Nintendo are failing to see the changes in the market, their customer demographics and consumer trends.

They might sell plenty of DS's and ermm.. **cough** a few wii's **cough** but the majority of those are to children born in the 00's - the very kids who think anything before Mario Galaxy is 'retro'.

It would make good business sense to relax the archaic rules of not allowing their content on any other machine and put their older games on iOS/Android as the people who would want the older games no longer have nintendo consoles/handhelds, they have smartphones and PS3/PS4/Xbox's.

With this method, they will be able to continue selling new games to the younger generation (and Nintendo fanboys) on their own consoles, but also generate more revenue by porting games which I imagine do basically generate nothing whilst sitting in Nintendo's game store.

This would have a minuscule effect if any with regards to cannibalising their own console sales.

For example, I love the Mario games (and a few others such as original pokemon games) - but does that mean I am going to rush out and spend £100/150 to buy a DS, then have to set up an nintendo store account and pay to download them? No.

But, if Nintendo put a "Mario Collection" on iOS with Mario 1 through to Super Mario World, I would happily pay £20/30 for the collection or even £5-8 per game. If they then slowly began to release more of their older titles on iOS, they could easily get me to spend a couple of hundred pound over a year or two without having to pay for Hardware manufacturing, distribution, marketing, service/support.

Yes, Apple take a big chunk, but I imagine if the CEO of Nintendo walked into Apple HQ and said "Tim, we want to launch some old titles on mobile, we'll give you 6 months exclusive before launching on android and we're gonna list our badass collection of 80s/90s games inc Mario/Mariokart/Pokemon... what offer do you have for me?", i'm sure Tim would be signing over one of his kidneys!

 

[Liquorpuki]

And you believe this 4 games business model of the past is also viable for present and future? If so, why is Nintendo losing money the third year in a row? Selling dedicated gaming hardware (at a loss) is one thing, selling hardware dedicated to only 4 games is something completely different. It doesn't work out for neither customer nor vendor.

With only 4 games a year, every game has to pay off for 25% of the total hardware ownership cost. And I not only mean the money, but also the wasted space in your living room. God forbid, you don't like one of the games! Imagine how the iPhone would do, if all you could run on the platform would be nothing more but 4 solid Apple apps a year?

They're losing money because the industry is transitioning from the 7th to 8th gen consoles and both their console launches have been poorly executed.

Attach rate (games / console) is per generation, not year. But it doesn't have to pay off total hardware cost - that would be giving it something like a 100% profit margin. It's basically a metric that provides a counter for a smaller install base. IE if a console's install base is 20M but attach rate is 1, a 3rd party developer is more likely to develop for a console who's install base is 10M but attach rate is 3.

Profitability is something else. The Wii U only needs an attach rate of 1 to become profitable. Its main problem is profitable or not doesn't matter when its install base is only 4M after a year and people are expecting an install base of 60M at the end of its lifetime.

Different markets for now. Either Nintendo supports iOS in some fashion or competes against iOS with a mobile platform Nintendo designs in-house. That's where this is going it seems.

Nintendo will probably not become a third party game publisher, but as they have shown in the past, they can release innovative products and expand the gaming market.

If mobile/dedicated converges then yeah Nintendo would have to dump dedicated devices. But the hardware won't converge unless the same quality software exists on mobile. Which it can't because software is a disposable commodity on phones. The market that's most prone to convergence, handhelds, is the one Nintendo is doing well in. The market they're not doing well in, consoles, mobile doesn't even have a presence in.

The only reason for Nintendo to jump to iOS is basically short-term profits that erode their brand long term.

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

Believe it or not, only because you've never been good at something, does not mean, it doesn't matter whether you are. Nintendo could lose much better third party games, if they had been better at attracting them in the first place. Things you've always missed are still missing. Never had a girlfriend? Still really matters if you attract them or not.

Have a fiancé with a wedding date just over a year away. And I've played the games that don't come to Nintendo - my friends own them and if I wanted them, I could buy other consoles. But as I see it, the only companies that consistently make games worth playing are Valve and Nintendo (and sometimes Blizzard. Their RTS games are good but their other games... Well, those just aren't my style. I won't judge them for it. FPS is totally my style, and Valve does it right and most other companies don't. ID's original two DOOMs and the entire Quake series has been great... Haven't really enjoyed their other games.)

 

[Lennholm]

wii u has very little first party games coming out for it as well. that awesome zelda game they showed off in 2011, no word on release

Just like the Space World 2000 demo which everyone thought showed off a new Zelda game, the 2011 Zelda demo was only a tech demo.
Nintendo is working on a Zelda game for Wii U, it hasn't been officially announced but they have spoken quite a bit about it. It is said to have the largest development team of any Zelda game to date, they almost showcased it at E3 last year but ultimately opted not to do it which means it will almost certainly be shown at E3 this year.
It won't necessarily look like the tech demo, Nintendo said in January 2013 that they were experimenting with different art styles for the game and that the Wind Waker HD remake was a spin-off project from these experiments (likely meaning that they didn't choose that style for the new game).

 

[Liquorpuki]

Yes but Nintendo are failing to see the changes in the market, their customer demographics and consumer trends.

They might sell plenty of DS's and ermm.. **cough** a few wii's **cough** but the majority of those are to children born in the 00's - the very kids who think anything before Mario Galaxy is 'retro'.

Where are you getting your demographics info from?

 

[alent1234]

Just like the Space World 2000 demo which everyone thought showed off a new Zelda game, the 2011 Zelda demo was only a tech demo.
Nintendo is working on a Zelda game for Wii U, it hasn't been officially announced but they have spoken quite a bit about it. It is said to have the largest development team of any Zelda game to date, they almost showcased it at E3 last year but ultimately opted not to do it which means it will almost certainly be shown at E3 this year.
It won't necessarily look like the tech demo, Nintendo said in January 2013 that they were experimenting with different art styles for the game and that the Wind Waker HD remake was a spin-off project from these experiments (likely meaning that they didn't choose that style for the new game).

more than 3 years to make a console game with specs that are slightly better than your last gen console?

sales are so bad that nintendo won't make any money on the game so they either cancelled it or delayed it hoping console sales will improve. anything coming out this year should be getting hyped with "leaks" by the game media

i wanted to buy a wii U, but its looking to be a paper weight. ended up with the x box one and my kids love it. my 3 year old is learning how to play skylanders now

 

[Lennholm]

more than 3 years to make a console game with specs that are slightly better than your last gen console?

sales are so bad that nintendo won't make any money on the game so they either cancelled it or delayed it hoping console sales will improve. anything coming out this year should be getting hyped with "leaks" by the game media

i wanted to buy a wii U, but its looking to be a paper weight. ended up with the x box one and my kids love it. my 3 year old is learning how to play skylanders now

What does specs have to do with the time it takes to develop a new game? It's simply not true to say it's only slightly more powerful. It's more powerful than the Ps3/360 when out-of-order execution and the GPGPU is utilized properly. There's an avarage of ~4 years between console Zelda games and the last one was released just little over two years ago. Hopefully the bigger dev team means we wont have to wait that long but Nintendo don't rush games.

 

[alent1234]

What does specs have to do with the time it takes to develop a new game? It's simply not true to say it's only slightly more powerful. It's more powerful than the Ps3/360 when out-of-order execution and the GPGPU is utilized properly. There's an avarage of ~4 years between console Zelda games and the last one was released just little over two years ago. Hopefully the bigger dev team means we wont have to wait that long but Nintendo don't rush games.

all the studios have said that you need more people for the new console systems. physics of objects, better lighting, more open game designs since the consoles have hard drives, etc

nintendo has none of that so it shouldn't take that long to make a new zelda game for the new console.

 

[RighteousNixon]

I'm not suggesting Sony paying Nintendo anything. For what again? Sony isn't in trouble and needs nothing from Nintendo. I want all Japanese console makers to form a keiretsu and agree on one single hardware platform, for the good of the nation. Let the self-identifying real gamers pay them all, including Sega, Konami and Namco.

Image​

At one point even Apple itself offered three competing platforms. The Macintosh, Lisa and Apple II were all incompatible with each other and no enemy for upcoming IBM-compatible PCs. If „Dirty Console Gaming Peasants“ want to give the „Glorious PC Gaming Master Race“ a fight, they need to join forces under one flag, excluding Microsoft.

That just makes no sense. They arent going to be exclusive to Playstation, or any other console for that matter, unless they are getting paid to do so. Thats simply how this industry works. Exclusivity costs money. These are corporations and they want higher profits and growth. Deciding to develop games only for Playstation 4 when they could just as easily develop for both the PS4 and XBox One makes absolutely no sense. Your literally cutting your potential profits in half. Not to mention, the PS4 and XBox One are very similar technically so once you have one version made, it takes very little to actually port over to the other console. Its not like they have to develop both games from the ground up. So making a port for the 2nd console would be relatively inexpensive and would basically double the companies potential profits.

Nintendo's best move, if they were going to go this route, would be developing games for both consoles. It basically doubles their potential profits for each game released. Given the popularity of Nintendo first party titles, I have no doubt that Nintendo could sell at least 3 million copies on each console. Your idea of all Japanese game makers agreeing to produce games for just a single console is NEVER going to happen as it makes absolutely no business sense.

 

[RighteousNixon]

I disagree. Nobody has ever bought a Nintendo console because it has 3rd party games on it (well, except maybe for Rare's games on the N64, but Rare as they were known is dead. The entire team left and they built the studio up with lousy people that have made crap so far.) During the N64 era, Nintendo's internal teams were able to release 4 solid games a year. Apart from Rare, those 4 games a year are what sold the console. It was games like Mario 64, Zelda OoT, Zelda MM, Kirby, Yoshi, Pokemon, Star Fox, F-Zero, Mario Kart, and Smash Bros.

The Wii U has Pikmin 3. And Rayman Legends. Maybe the ubisoft team behind Legends/Origins could expand to become a new Rare for Nintendo. Nintendo should just buy that team and bring them in before someone else buys them. Nintendo can definitely survive on first party titles alone, they just need to actually release them. Once every 3 months instead of once every 9 months and they'll be good. Obviously they'll need to stop making crap that tarnishes their brands (like Mario Bros and Hyrule Heros. I tried Wonderful 101 at a demo kiosk. Garbage.)

Of course not, people purchased Nintendo hardware for Nintendo's first party titles. They always have and they always will. Its no different than people buying an XBox for Halo and Gears of War. Those are the major games that get people to buy a partciular console, but that doesnt mean that the other games that get released on that console aren't important. They absolutely are and Nintendo's biggest probelm right now is the fact that the market has shifted significantly and become predominantly 3rd party multi platform. Again, 90-95% of all major releases these days are 3rd party multi-platform releases. That simply wasn't the case in previous generations.

Yes, Nintendo's consoles have always been weak in the 3rd party department, but this problem is magnified dramatically this generation from this huge shift we have seen in the market. Basically a console could have weak 3rd party support and still be successful in previous generations, but that just isnt the case today as 3rd party multi-platform games simply represent too big a fration of the overall market now. So you really can't compare Nintendo's weak 3rd party support in past generations to its weak 3rd party support this generation. Its significantly more damaging this generation than it has been in previous generations.

Just look at 2014. Most of the big title games that everyone is looking forward too aren't coming to the Wii U. You have Destiny, Witcher 3, Dragons Age 3: Inquisition, Mass Effect 4 (2014?), The Division, Metal Gear Solid V, Final Fantasy XIII, Final Fantasy XV, Aliens Isolation, Daylight, Dark Souls 2, Elder Scrolls, Theif, Kindom Hearts 2, South Park: Stick of Truth, and the list goes on and on. In previous generations, Nintendo's console would miss out on maybe 5 big titles each year. Now your talking 10-15 big titles, maybe more. Couple those 3rd party titles with the big exclusive titles MS and Sony have coming (Halo 5, Infamous: Second Son, The Order, TitanFall, Quantum Break, Fable Legends, etc) and the difference between the Wii U and the other consoles, at least in regards to games, becomes massive.

No console can be successful in today's market without decent 3rd party support. Its just not possible in the console market as the vast majority of major releases are 3rd party now.

 

[MagnusVonMagnum]

Let's see. Nintendo isn't able to sell their latest Wii and handheld systems and what not, so they decide they need to get into the mobile field by having DEMOS of games that the person playing them WON'T be able to buy for the device they are playing them on.... Yeah, that will REALLLLLY help their sales. All it does is piss me off, personally.

I'll be sure and NOT buy a Nintendo product ever again. Too bad. I might have bought a Mario game for an iPod or the like. A Mac game would be better yet. But I don't want a Wii just to play Mario.... everything else on their systems seem to suck save a few motion sport games like bowling.

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

Just look at 2014. Most of the big title games that everyone is looking forward too aren't coming to the Wii U. You have Destiny, Witcher 3, Dragons Age 3: Inquisition, Mass Effect 4 (2014?), The Division, Metal Gear Solid V, Final Fantasy XIII, Final Fantasy XV, Aliens Isolation, Daylight, Dark Souls 2, Elder Scrolls, Theif, Kindom Hearts 2, South Park: Stick of Truth, and the list goes on and on. In previous generations, Nintendo's console would miss out on maybe 5 big titles each year. Now your talking 10-15 big titles, maybe more. Couple those 3rd party titles with the big exclusive titles MS and Sony have coming (Halo 5, Infamous: Second Son, The Order, TitanFall, Quantum Break, Fable Legends, etc) and the difference between the Wii U and the other consoles, at least in regards to games, becomes massive.

No console can be successful in today's market without decent 3rd party support. Its just not possible in the console market as the vast majority of major releases are 3rd party now.

I'm interested in a grand total of…

wait for it…

None of those games that you have listed. I have played a lot of games, and I have to say, very few live up to the $50-60 that is asked for. I'll give you $10, max, for most of them. I buy 3-4 games a year (that's all I have the time or money for) so if Nintendo could release games every few months, I'd be good with that

I buy Nintendo games because they have a reputation for rock solid games (when they aren't aimed at the casual market) worth every cent. Nobody else makes games that are as fun as Nintendo (graphics be damned - I couldn't care less. Know what I'm playing in my free time right now? Super Metroid. It's 240x320 and has 256 colors to work with. HD, polycounts, lighting and physics be damned - this game is 2D. And you know what? That's okay because it's still far more fun than most of the games made these days.)

Statistics don't make a game fun. Nor does a specific setting or genre or anything like that. Making a game fun is an art form - it's not as simple as making the game as realistic as possible (and in fact, I've found that the more fun games tend to be the less realistic ones.)

Regarding game development times - from what I can tell, the vast majority of the time and money isn't spent doing anything important. People come up with ideas for the game, it gets programmed, they use stand-in graphics to test the game, and what takes forever is doing the actual artwork. It's not spent building the levels - it's spent making the levels pretty.

If I were to make a game studio (which I would very much like to do - I'm hoping to get money quickly programming for other people, and then starting up a game studio) - I'd probably have some kind of rule that models are limited to under 1K triangles. Not for the purpose of style, but just so that we don't waste time and money polishing the relatively unimportant aspects of the game.

 

[Renzatic]

I'm interested in a grand total of…

wait for it…

None of those games that you have listed. I have played a lot of games, and I have to say, very few live up to the $50-60 that is asked for.

Oh, comeon. There's two on that list I'm interested in, and, for me at least, will be worth every penny of the $60 asking price. I'd suggest Dark Souls 2 at the very least, since that series has been about the only one that's really, truly hooked me in a way I haven't been hooked in a long, long time.

Though I do get what you're saying, otherwise. Graphics don't make a game, and I've seen plenty of low budget indie titles that I'd say were a thousand times better than most multi-million dollar AAA game. Throwing a bunch of money at a game doesn't automatically make it more fun.

 

[shinji]

I'm 31 now and don't really have as much time as I used to for gaming. I have a Wii U because I grew up on Nintendo's first party franchises, and I just don't have the inclination or desire to play the newest fantasy RPG, Call of Duty, EA Sports game, etc.

I don't really care who sells the most consoles this generation for the same reason I don't care that Windows-based PCs outsell Macs. I own Macs because I love them. As long as Nintendo stays in business and keeps making games, I'll still be interested.

It's possible that Nintendo will go the way of Sega and become a third party dev, but that'll be one sad moment in gaming history. Maybe next generation.

 

[RighteousNixon]

I'm interested in a grand total of…

wait for it…

None of those games that you have listed.

And that is supposed to mean something? Those are this years big titles and there are FAR more people that are excited for those titles than aren't. The fact that your not interested in them is completely irrelevant. Don't get me wrong, your entitled to your own subjective opinion on those titles, but if your honestly trying to convince people that those aren't major releases and that people arent excited for those titles.....well, your wasting your time.

I have played a lot of games, and I have to say, very few live up to the $50-60 that is asked for. I'll give you $10, max, for most of them. I buy 3-4 games a year (that's all I have the time or money for) so if Nintendo could release games every few months, I'd be good with that

Once again, is this supposed to mean something? The fact that you think most games fail to live up to their 50-60 dollar price tags is completely irrelevant. If most people believed that, games sales would come to a halt and they haven't. Quite the contrary in fact as sales have been extremely healthy for console games for some time now. On top of that, most people buy a lot more than just 3-4 games per year.

The fact that video games are still only 60 dollars is nothing short of a miracle. Games cost $59.99 back when Sierra was releasing Kings Quest 1 back in 1984. Factoring in inflation, thats basically $134.00 in 2013. Games back then were made by small teams of 3-5 people and required very little money to make. Fast forward to today and you have teams of 50-100+ making some of the major titles and they require a significant amount of money to bring them to market. Yet amazingly the price is still only 60 bucks. Again, games should cost over $130.00 today just based on inflation alone. People that complain about the current pricing of games just have zero perspective on pricing in this market. Gaming has NEVER been cheaper and that is the understatment of the century. Not only are games cheaper than they have ever been, gamers are getting signifcantly more game for thier money then ever before and have a wider selection of games to choose from than every before. There has never been a better time to be a gamer.

I buy Nintendo games because they have a reputation for rock solid games (when they aren't aimed at the casual market) worth every cent. Nobody else makes games that are as fun as Nintendo (graphics be damned - I couldn't care less. Know what I'm playing in my free time right now? Super Metroid. It's 240x320 and has 256 colors to work with. HD, polycounts, lighting and physics be damned - this game is 2D. And you know what? That's okay because it's still far more fun than most of the games made these days.)

Nobody makes games that are as fun as Nintendo? Well considering that is nothing more than subjective opinion, I will assume you just forgot to put the "in my opinion" in front of that. Either way, I disagree 100%. I enjoy Nintendo's games just like the next guy, but in my opinion, there are plenty of other games on the market that I consider to be more fun that Nintendo's games. Grand Theft Auto V and Skyrim are just 2 examples of games I had more fun with than Nintendo's games. Not only were they more fun in my book, I also spent signifcantly more time playing them. In fact, in regards to time spent playing them, there is really no comparison. The longest I spent playing any of Nintendo's games would maybe be 20 hours tops. I spent at least 10 times that playing GTA V and probably 20 times that playing Skyrim.

Statistics don't make a game fun. Nor does a specific setting or genre or anything like that. Making a game fun is an art form - it's not as simple as making the game as realistic as possible (and in fact, I've found that the more fun games tend to be the less realistic ones.)

Statistics don't make a game fun? I think its safe to say that 100% of the gaming population already knows this. Quality game design and a quality story is what makes games fun. Statistics? I honestly have no clue what your even talking about here so I am just going to skip this altogether.

Regarding game development times - from what I can tell, the vast majority of the time and money isn't spent doing anything important. People come up with ideas for the game, it gets programmed, they use stand-in graphics to test the game, and what takes forever is doing the actual artwork. It's not spent building the levels - it's spent making the levels pretty.

From what you can tell, the majority of game development time isn't spent doing anything important. Really? And you came about this information how exactly? Actually, I appreciate these kinds of comments. I really do. They tell me right off that bat that I am delaing with someone that has absolutely no clue what they are talking about and merely pulling stuff out of thier a*s. The majority of game development time isn't spent on anything important, lol. That could be the single most inaccurate statement I have ever heard regarding videogames. Actually, I take the could be part back. That is without question the single most inaccurate statment I have ever heard regarding videogames.

Every aspect of game development is important. You have the overall world design which is the making of the setting, backstory and theme for the game. You have the system design which creates the game rules and underlying mathematical patterns. You have the content design which is the creation of characters, items, missions, puzlles, etc. You have the writers who create the story, dialogue, and text. You have the level designers who design the world levels and its features. You have the user interface designers who create the user interactions and feedback interfaces (menus, HUD's, etcs). You have the audio designers who create the music for the game and record the voice over work. You have the game testers who are responsible for finding bugs and giving overall feedback. Of course, that is just a rough sketch of overall game design, but one thing is absolutely undeniable to anyone that knows anything about quality game design, each and every one of those aspects to game design is extremely important to creating a quality game. Every AAA game out there was created by a developer that took each and every one of these aspects of game creation seriously. To suggest otherwise only shows you know nothing about this topic whatsoever.

To be perfectly honest, the reality of the situation is the exact opposite of what you said. The vast majority of time and money is spent on doing things very important to the overall develoment of the game, unless your curt Schilling of course.

If I were to make a game studio....

Let me just stop you right there as your not going to make a game studio so what you would or wouldn't do is completely irrelevant, like the rest of your post. Your not a game designer and from what you have said in this post, your not even much of a gamer, which is probably why your opinions are so far off base.

 

[RighteousNixon]

I'm 31 now and don't really have as much time as I used to for gaming. I have a Wii U because I grew up on Nintendo's first party franchises, and I just don't have the inclination or desire to play the newest fantasy RPG, Call of Duty, EA Sports game, etc.

I don't really care who sells the most consoles this generation for the same reason I don't care that Windows-based PCs outsell Macs. I own Macs because I love them. As long as Nintendo stays in business and keeps making games, I'll still be interested.

It's possible that Nintendo will go the way of Sega and become a third party dev, but that'll be one sad moment in gaming history. Maybe next generation.

I just turned 42, and I went through a phase in my 30's where I barely played games at all. Between college and starting my own business after I graduated, I just had very little time to play games. Between the age of 31 and 35, I think I played 4-5 games total. That said, things are very different today. I only work from mid April to late September. I then have the rest of the year off, which is basically 6 straight months off of work. So I have a lot of time to play games during my off months and I enjoy doing just that. I have enjoyed a lot of the games that have been released in recent years.

Yeah, it would be sad if Nintendo stopped producing hardware. I personally think it would be the best thing for Nintendo as a company, as they could then focus all of thier efforts on games, at least on the console side, and not even have to worry about the hardware. Still, they have played a MAJOR role in the gaming industry these last 20 years and it would be sad knowing that there would be no more Nintendo consoles coming.