Atari Drops GameCube Support For Two Titles

dade writes "Atari has dumped on Nintendo, making it the third company to do so in recent weeks. However, because the GameCube is a vehicle for first-party games, Nintendo's bottom line isn't affected. This article at switchbox asks if such a situation can last." Some good points are raised. While Nintendo is ostensibly content to hide in its niche market, it would seem to make sense that it would want to corner more of the gaming market if possible, especially given their history.

Comments

Jokes aside, its what I've thought all along

[Mike Hawk]

The market is finally going to mature and splinter. Microsoft will be the "other" console in the US and Europe and Nintendo will be the "other" console in Japan. This will allow the companies to taylor their products to the different audiences, which continue to grow more and more different everyday. The niche fanboy crowd can always import of course.

This is good news for third party publishers too. With only two consoles to worry about in either market, their development efforts can be more focused on making the best possible end product. So farewell, Big N. I'll always remember the good times we had. IMHO, though, this is a good thing.

Re:Jokes aside, its what I've thought all along

[Daetrin]

You seem to be missing out on the fact that Microsoft is determined to get more market share in Japan (by releasing a lot more games over there,) and Nintendo is determined to get more marketshare overall (by releasing their next conosle early.) Sony of course is determined not to let either of those happen. If Microsoft, by far and away the one closest to becoming a "niche" market given sales in Japan, is still working on rectifying that manner, why are you so sure that the trend will not only continue but accelerate?

I'll agree that different people have different tastes, but thoses tastes are only partially delineated by geographic boundaries. The market maturing doesn't mean that some companies are going to give up on certain areas. What it does mean is that there are enough users that even niche games can be profitably ported to other teritories.

If your claim was true, we would be seeing less and less games get ported from Japan to the US and vice versa. Instead what we're seeing is _more_ games getting ported. If only one percent of the console owners are interested in a certain game when the market is small, it's probably not worth it to translate. However as the market gets larger companies will be more likely to consider porting the game to get that one percent.

All in all it sound like you just want an excuse to bash Nintendo, as usual.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[scot4875]

Gee, thanks for your insight, Mr. Video Game Market Analyst Expert.

I hear this tired straw man argument so often that I wonder if people actually believe it's true. Can you offer one piece of evidence other than the anecdotal "Dreamcast had many 1st party games, Gamecube has many 1st party games, therefore they're the same thing!" Can you give *any* supported arguments that back up your implication that the Gamecube is going the way of the Dreamcast?

Here -- I'll offer some other bullet points to consider: Sega of America was horribly mismanaged during the Dreamcast's demise. The Dreamcast had to compete with the Sony marketing juggernaut/hype machine far more than the Gamecube did/does. Sega has far fewer huge franchises than Nintendo does. I'd even go so far as to say that a larger part of Sega's fanbase was the more casual "I play X because it's cooler" segment of the market, whose loyalty stayed with Sega as long as they stayed in fashion.

Maybe there was more to the Dreamcast's failure than just lack of 3rd party support.

--Jeremy

Re:Paraphrased

[ForemastJack]

I read this and I think, "God, grant me mod points."

But since that ain't happening today, I'll just respond. I have a GameCube. I had a PS2. (Now heading off to eBay.) Here's the difference between the systems, and why this doesn't matter:

Buy a PS2 game, you've got what, a 50-50 chance of buying dreck -- assuming you haven't done your homework and checked reviews, etc. Buy a GameCube game, take it home, pop it in, and it's good.

If a game is big enough, it'll get to the GameCube...GTA being a principle exception. Do I care? Hell no. My time, these days, is so precious that I don't have the time to wade through crap to find a good game. Who am I? Nintendo's core marketing demographic in America.

See? A lengthy response to a pithy, concise summary. Slow day at work.

Re:Sounds familiar.

[unclethursday]

I recall another game console where it had great strength in its first party titles, even if the third party was a bit wobbly; a number of key characters and franchises with rabid fanbases which were proven sellers in the past; and a console which was cheap compared to the competition and sold to its niche.

I think it was called 'Dreamcast'. At least check they were being sold out of stock at fifty bucks a pop to folks who wanted to use them as cheap Linux routers.

Except that Sega was (and still is) in finacial trouble when they released the Dreamcast. Nintendo is not.

Sega was reeling from past faliures like the Sega CD and 32X add ons for the Genesis/Mega Drive, and from the poor showing of the Sega Saturn when they released the Dreamcast.

Nintendo, even though they lost a lot of marketshare to Sony during the PSOne/N64 times, was still very profitable with the N64.

Sega was losing money (and is only just now starting to make money again). Nintendo was, and still is not losing money, but is making money.

I love my Dreamcast, and wouldn't get rid of it for anything, but the fact remains that Nintendo and Sega were, and are in two different worlds when it comes to hardware buisness.

The Dreamcast was a wonderful system that was killed by Sony's PS2 hype (even though in many ways the DC was superior to the PS2), and Sega's own blunders in the past. The only thing hurting the GameCube, really, is the supposed stigma that they are the 'kiddy console', mostly said by hormonal teenage boys (read: kids themselves).

So, no, it doesn't sound fammiliar at all, really.

Thursdae

niche?

[Funk_dat69]

I think its funny that Nintendo has a reputation for appealing to a niche market, when actually they try to market their games and hardware toward a more general audience (kids and adults included).

Sony (with MS trying to steal their cake), it seems, markets towards a more specific group of people, that being the male teenager. It's just that this specific group BUYS GAMES LIKE MAD, and makes up the biggest percentage of gamers.

Funny how that works...

Re:They'll Have to Pry The Nintendo Controller...

[BTWR]

Nintendo... seems to be slipping; much like Sega years ago

Nintendo is JUST LIKE SEGA??? Consider Nintendo's consoles:

NES (Profitable)
SNES (Profitable)
N64 (Profitable)
Gameboy (Profitable)
Gameboy Pocket (Profitable)
Gameboy Color (Profitable)
Gameboy Advance (Profitable)
Gamecube (Profitable)

Virtual Boy (Unprofitable)

Sega:
Genesis (Profitable)
Master system (?)
Game Gear (unprofitable)
Nomad (unprofitable)
32X (unprofitable)
Sega CD(unprofitable)
Saturn (unprofitable)
Dreamcast (unprofitable)

So... they're exactly the same... how?

Re:Other thoughts (Nintendo != Apple)

[Neuticle]

Is Xbox live profitable? Given that the xbox in general is hemorrhaging money like a fire hydrant, I'd say not.
Is Sony making money off of PS2 online gaming? I don't know, but I don't think they are.
Many of the MMORPGs are consistantly profitable (Sony, but on PC), but Nintendo isn't opposed to facilitating that, as evidenced by PSO I/II.
When there is money to be made for Nintendo, Nintendo will offer an online service. Right now, they'll let others throw money at online console gaming. The next generation of consoles will be out before online=sound investment, and by then Nintendo says they will be ready. I think they realize the importance of online play, but they see that the market just isn't ready.

In general, I think many Nintendo fans are the type of people who like to sit down with friends and play together, not play by themselves against some dweeb named HaX0rURbraIN who's half way around the world. There is something in 4-way social gaming that is unreproducible online, like high fiving a partner, or gloating after a win. That something = more fun and Nintendo is catering to that demographic just fine: Gamecube has the best party games by FAR. Monkeyball, Smash and Mario Party are enough to keep a crowd entertained near indefinately. Time splitters 2, while not exclusive, has huge replay value. Throw in the obligitory Madden and FIFA, and with Kart ariving, the Cube is the perfect party machine.

Personally, I like the Mario Kart take on online play: make it network playable, and then if people want to play on the internet, just fake the local network. No investment from N, but online none the less. I wish Nintendo had done this from the start with a lot of games, and hope they make it standard.

Nintendo isn't the one button mouse, [loose analogy] they're the trusty CD-ROM while others spend tons of money on unprofitable DVD drives. Once profitable uses of DVD drives appear, they'll start using them. People who sunk $1000 into a drive that didn't do much untill 2 years later (when it cost $40 and was actually usefull) wasted their money.

Don't give MS too much credit for throwing money into a hole untill it fills up. Get some friends, get a 'cube and get ready to have a shit-ton more fun than playing GTA-3 by yourself for 5 hours like a hermitt, and more variety than Halo, and uhh... Halo2 for group gaming.

Friends are like cheese, they make everything better...