Nintendo - Money, Announcements, Comeback?

Thanks to GameSpy for their new 'Sole Food column, which discusses Nintendo's recent announcements and their prospects for the future. They point out that "Despite the large number of 'Nintendo-is-doomed' articles written over the last few years, the company still has a ton of cash (around six-billion USD by most reports)", and speculate on the 'big announcement' Nintendo are promising early next year ("Initially, the buzz was that it will be announcing a new console to be released in 2005. Lately, the buzz has shifted to a new handheld announcement.") Finally, the opinion piece ends on an upbeat note: "If any company is capable of making a comeback, it's Nintendo. It has the money and the talent. It just needs to strategize better to ensure that its future consoles appeal to a broad audience."

Comments

Nintendo? Fail? Like junk mail, maybe.

[Asprin]

Irrelevant!

Even if Nintendo's consoles tank, they will still be around for years to come because they know how to design games. They'll just pull a Sega and we'll all be playing Animal Crossing 3 on our Playstation 5 Mega-Media Centers in a few years.

Re:Nintendo? Fail? Like junk mail, maybe.

[The Munger]

They sure do know how to make a decent game. I recently borrowed a GameCube of a friend (mine's a PS1). Two of the games I got with it were Super Monkey Ball and Mario Party. I'm a gamer through-and-through, but my girlfriend is not.

Enter SMB:
Girlfriend: Can we play some more SMB?
Me: Sure, but do you want to try MP?
Girlfriend: No, let's just play some more SMB.
After convincing her to play a round of MP:
Girlfriend: Hey, that was pretty fun. Let's play that again.
Me: Sweeeeeet

So after thinking about updating the PS1 for a while, after 2 days of a GameCube, GF says 'Let's get a GameCube.' Suddenly that PS2 and Xbox have just slipped out of my mind.

Sure the PS2 may have the sheer number of games, and the Xbox may be able to show off my shiny Home Theatre gear, but the GameCube has games that me and my friends want to play the most.

Now, if I could only convince her of just how good a game Metroid is...

Here we go

[JGag21]

Mandatory Nintendo needs to drop "kiddy image" comments in 3....2....1....

Re:Here we go

[neostorm]

They have fully embraced all levels of maturity in entertainment, but Nintendo will forever create first party games that are acceptable to all audiences simultaneously. They really have never created "games for kids", so what really needs to be dropped here is the concept that colorfully animated, easily playable video games are "for kids only".

comeback?

[H0NGK0NGPH00EY]

"If any company is capable of making a comeback, it's Nintendo. It has the money and the talent. It just needs to strategize better to ensure that its future consoles appeal to a broad audience."

I really don't understand the mindset of people when it comes to Nintendo. They have a great line of products, loyal fans, and ca$h in the bank. Even though their sales are far behind Sony in the home console market, they are still turning a decent profit on the GameCube. Why do people seem to have the obsession that Nintendo must have the #1 selling console, or that this should even be Nintendo's goal? I don't see the local flower shop strategizing over how to overtake all of their competitors and rise to the top flower distributor in the nation. Sometimes a company is content just to make a great product and turn a profit. Not that I really know if that is Nintendo's mindset, but I certainly wouldn't be surprised.

Re:Oh for crying out loud

[Dsal]

The "Nintendo is Kiddie" argument is pretty shallow. But that doesn't stop a large segment of the gaming populace from feeling it's the truth.

There's a lot of adults out there that feel silly playing games where the hero screeches italian stereotypes in an annoying falsetto. I personally think it's funny and just enjoy the gameplay, but I can't blame people for thinking it's annoying either.

I can't blame adults for wanting to play golf as Tiger Woods instead of as a giant green dinosaur. I can't blame adults for wanting games more like the movies they love and less like a Disney cartoon. I can't blame adults for liking stuff specifically made for them more than stuff made for a vague general audience.

That segment of gaming just can't get over that surface stuff. They'll NEVER "open their eyes up." They're the kind of casual gamer to whom the premise is more important than the game (probably for their other forms of entertainment too). It seems stupid to people like us, but that's just how those people are and more and more of them are joining the gaming market and deciding with their dollars. I can think of no better company that manipulates this fact than EA, and that's why they've profited so much from it.

Nintendo seems to think that somehow by making beautiful, misunderstood games that they will someday get those kind of people into their camp. The problem is that it will never work (just ask Sega). If they don't care about attracting those people, that's fine by me and I'll buy their hi-quality sparsely released stuff, but they'll have to settle for third place in the meantime.

Re:Graphics and Demographics

[unclethursday]

It's all about Demographics, really. Sony struck gold by marketing to 20+ year old gamers, making games they wouldn't feel silly playing (it's hard for a 27 year-old welder to play a cartoon peter pan running around rescuing a cartoon princess. But let him play a mobster capping other mobsters...)

29 year old heavy machinery operator here (and game reviewer/newsie on the side). I have no problems picking up Nintendo first party games. Neither do most of my friends who are of similar age, if not similar working enviroments.

This is what Nintendo never got. Adults don't feel silly watching action movies and thus don't feel silly playing action movies. Adults do feel a little silly watching peter pan cartoons, and thus do feel silly manipulating a little guy with his green hood and tights.

Maybe it's you who has a slight problem dealing with the things you mention, and not the whole world?

You say that the M-rated games on the PSOne marketed the PSOne to the 20+ crowd....yet the fact is the real 20+ crowd buys games from any rating, from E all the way to M.

You do know where the M rated games sell the most, though, right? The 12-16 crowd. Yep, teenagers, most barely old enough to shave or look at a girl without thinking about 'girl germs'. The real kiddies of the video game market.

And they flock to blood and polygonal boobie filled games like flies to shit. And, while the oogle over the game and say how cool it is and beg mommy and daddy to buy it for them (because they aren't old enough to have a job), they'll scoff at the Nintendo stuff as 'kiddie'.

Irony, your face is pimply.

Thursdae