This article is like maybe 10 years too late. The business Nintendo has of recycling old games and throwing shovelware on store racks is old hat by now. Nintendo isn't sequestered by its legacy,....that argument is to hide the fact that what they are trying to do is cover the fact that they CANNOT compete with the 3rd party development for the other consoles...Thus they PURPOSELY stick to their exclusive franchises because they know they will get killed because any new IP they try to produce won't cater to their base. Nintendo has been ripping off its customers like crazy for years now...and if you don't believe look at some of their releases over the years....FOUR SWORDS as a full priced game release, Nintendo games priced at 20 bucks on the GBA, The crystal's title (i don't remember the exact title, a square enix offering) requiring not only the game itself but FOUR handhelds as well....what a screw job to its fans.
NONE of its own IP's count as truly "hardcore" and once in an interview when pressed by another videogame publication for lack of games that cater to a hardcore base outside of then exclusive resident evil 4, VP Reggie actually stated that super mario stikers would appease those fans. This illustrates the immense double speak that occurs in nintendo. I remember hearing all day long how mario doesn't shoot strippers but the truth is rockstar look at their console offering as pathetic...funny how they got on their high horse about GTA YET RELEASED A GTA ON THE GAME BOY ADAVNCE AND DS...and one could argue that the nintendo handhelds are aimed at younger consumers by default. Nintendo tries its very best to hide its weaknesses, not saying that the same doesn't occur on the other systems..but its way more prevalent with Nintendo
The truth is, as no one out there in videogame publications seem to understand (especially tom) is that Nintendo has pretty much given up on the AMERICAN market. While advertised here as the casual market...these games that are currently released on their home systems (not handhelds) appeal to the Japanese market. A market where videogames permeate that society to a broader age and gender range than the American audience, thus poor analysts like Tom view this market as maybe just niche JRPG-ish titles but in reality include more family and "non-game" software. Look at the lists of the highest selling games on both markets over the last say 20 years, and while you might see some commonalities...there are some titles that just seem oddball by American standards...back in the day i remember seeing that a HORSE RACE SIMULATOR was like #1-#2 for a considerable amount of time. FPS shooters dominate the American market nowadays, which are aimed at say young to middle aged males, yet are nowhere near the chart toppers across the pacific. The longer life span of Arcades in Japan plus how its culture viewed them also has an appreciable affect on expectations on the consoles.
To any out there who enjoy Nintendo products and such i am not coming down on you. Its your money. But please don't feel the need to ALWAYS justify why you do so. Sales statistics mean nothing (especially considering that price points vary WILDLY) compared to your own enjoyment and if you can look past a company that enjoys pissing on the USA market..hey more power to you. Hey i bought a PS3 myself and sony certainly threw a bucket of pee on its fans as well..but lets not act like NOA is above reproach.
As a passing thought...I would say that gamespot in general isn't a NOA apologist site nor would i levee that claim against Tom. I have read some Tom's articles and reviews on this site and to be honest, not even worth the server space to put up your garbage. On the one hand you "try" to tell it like it is but fail so miserably, this has been a point of contention for what...the LAST TEN YEARS and your now writing this? why? because of the Wii U launch...why not BLAST THEM before? ESPECIALLY WHEN THEY ANNOUNCED THEIR INITIAL LINEUP...You get garbage articles like this because the writers here are just that...professional writers. We as a the readership make the mistake that they are gamers but they are not. They are tools. EVERYONE WITH EVEN A PASSING INTEREST IN VIDEOGAMES KNEW THIS...INSTEAD OF REPEATING SOMETHING U SAW ON A MESSAGE BOARD TRY TO BRING UP SOMETHING NEW...MAKE SOME KIND OF INSIGHT...DON'T ACT LIKE NOA's LIL PRESS RELEASE HO. To any that think the reference to an HD remake of wind waker was innocent...all i can say is that i wish i could live in your world. Oh and if you think tom isnt a tool....If you had put a vote to HD remakes of the zelda series by series fans, there would be maybe 5-6 games easy before this one even gets considered
You don't have to sugar coat it tom. You don't have to write your drivel like your speaking to just the Nintendo crowd and have to sneak in praise....TRAPPED BY ITS LEGACY? are you kidding Tom? GROW A PAIR DUDE. the article's title is disingenuous, Tom writes this knowing that the NOA and its crowd needs some bones to be thrown at so he does. Plays it right on the fence. No insight, no thought, no understanding of the markets, no real analysis of the situation. Nope not from Tom. Just some dreck to make a deadline. I wonder how long this stays up before he deletes it like he always does. With him, its 1984 on a videogame website. The true thing i take from this article has nothing to do with nintendo; its that i seem to expect more from a lazy writer time and time again and i wonder when i will finally learn to just skip this clown.
@BestJinjo Something that i felt should have been explored...especially considering that the PS3 came with usb ports as is...is why they didnt offer the blue ray and BW's compatibility thru external devices? like i honestly believe that Sony as a corporation gave their fans a MASSIVE f-u by using the ps3 as a blue ray platform and drove the costs way too high. I also think sony saw how successful repackaging old software was...and in markets outside the USA the PS2 was still viable so they gave American consumers another f-u.
To an extent...i know that backward compatibility is goin to take a backseat yet again..The infrastructure of the system as far as i understand is to our benefit...my understanding is that developers will have an easier time to make a game on the PS4. But i have to see it to believe that. Having games on the PSN is a mixed blessing...have u seen how nutty that pricing can be? To anyone out there listening, do not buy downloads!!!! they are trying to make physical copies of games go the way of the dinosaur in order to make us shell out more...and they are rather restrictive with the downloads.
What bothers me...is that Sony at one time catered to their fans and you can see now how that is changing fast. I do not expect a return to the PS1-PS2 glory days. I kinda blame Nintendo for starting this ball of wax, but the days that the industry can be viewed as fan friendly looks to be at a close. I shudder to think about crossing over to another system..but i will be honest here..i will show Sony no loyalty if a screwjob is in the works. If they put out some BS money grab expect the hacker/modder community to tear them a new a-hole.
In terms of system releases and such...the only one that ABSOLUTELY needed to come first was the Wii U...since pretty much it would have gotten wiped out had it coincided with either the 760 or ps4 release...
To be honest..i could see sony go either way here...they have LONG boasted about the long life cycle of their systems and some of their publishers (e.g. Square Enix) have a tendency to release very late in s system cycle..so they may potentially wait it out. On the other hand...one could argue that coming last in previous generations allowed MS to become viable to begin with. Its honestly a small detail; the actual launch date won't have much of an effect
The true gauge of how the system wars will shape up is how well they cater to their customers...and its in this point that makes me quite nervous about Sony. Now by no means am i on the xbox side of things, i have only purchased sony products since the PS1 era, but as an outside observer i have to admit that MS has done a better job than Sony. They offered some level of backward compatibility thru out the system's life, a online component fairly early on, and thru what should have been a death roe of a hardware failure...they actually handled it as best one can expect it to be handled (not forgiving the incident entirely, but they did try to make the best of a bad situation).
What i see on the horizon with Sony troubles me greatly. The PS3 simply did not launch well. Sony needlessly added cost to its base with blue ray for the purpose of winning a format war that most true gamers didn't care much for.. They removed the most sought out feature, namely backward compatibility and now we see them repackage old titles to force us to buy old games AGAIN. I personally blasted Nintendo for this practice for years now, and seeing Sony go the same route and fly in the face of what their fans want is a mistake i thought they would avoid. I currently hold no hope for B/W compatibility with the new system but if it comes with some BS protection software to prevent playing used games...or makes us register the games to some "cloud" network or other nonsense I WILL NOT BUY OR SUPPORT SONY ANYMORE. NO OTHER MEDIA DOES THIS.
Sony should learn that its us the consumer...with OUR money that built their empire. It is us that decides your success. Conversely it is us that decide your failures as well.
I love the persona series...and arguably it has the best play mechanics from Shin Megami Tensei as a whole...i would HIGHLY recommend to fellow fans to pick up and play Nocturne and digital devil saga (its a two game series). the story lines in both games are BEYOND great (best storylines i have played in a JRPG)! and i believe that they are relatively cheap purchases nowadays......Cop some of the releases on the handhelds as well...strange journey, devil survivor series, and persona 1 and 2 (innocent sin) were all fun plays....although be prepared for some not as modern play mechanics from the 2 PSP persona games...i know i am hollering at the choir here...lets in general support ATLUS one of the few publishers out there that don't actively screw with their American fans...i feel like a tool for even posting something like this but....<removes shirt in passionate R&B fashion> I LOVE U ATLUS!
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