On Alleged Anti-Nintendo Sentiment In The Gaming Media

Thanks to GamesAreFun for its editorial discussing Nintendo's skewed portrayal in the news media. The writer argues: "I suppose it's just trendy to bash Nintendo right now, even if the arguments for doing it can be easily ripped apart", and goes on to tackle myths on popularity ("..the GameCube has actually never fallen into third place in the overall worldwide market"), a recent half-year financial loss ("old news now... the first loss they've ever reported since going public in 1962"), and temporary suspension of GameCube production ("do they honestly think Sony or Microsoft keep up peak productions at all times?")

Comments

Another article

[Daetrin]

There's been a similar editorial (although shorter and less detailed) up at GameIndustry.biz for the past two weeks. It focuses on the furor when media outlets misinterpreted Nintendo as saying they were canceling their next generation console.

"This is hardly the proudest hour for online game media, and it illustrates the need for journalists - even some of those working for large professional sites - to more effectively divide fact from speculation and opinion in their reporting."

Re:1962?

[00420]

What the hell did Nintendo make in 1962??

Playing cards.

10 (or more) must have games

[Daetrin]

but can you name 10 games that are must owns for every gamecube owner?

Metroid Prime
Eternal Darkness
Super Smash Brothers Melee
Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker
Viewtiful Joe
Super Monkey Ball
Pikmin
Animal Crossing
Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles
Mario Kart Double Dash
Mario Party
Super Mario Sunshine
Mario Golf
F-Zero GX
Rogue Squadron
Ikaruga
Pac-Man vs.
Star Fox Adventures
Wario Ware

Oooops, went over ten, sorry. There are also some games available for multiple systems, or that aren't quite out yet.

Metal Gear Solid: Twin Snakes
Tales of Symphonia
Prince of Persia
Beyond Good and Evil
Resident Evil
Lord of the Rings
Spider-Man
Harvest Moon
Skies of Arcadia
Soul Caliber II
SSX 3
The Simpsons Hit & Run

I'm not even including several cases of multiple games from the same series. (I don't count Mario Kart, Mario Party, etc as being the same series.)

There's probably a lot more than i'm forgetting about, especially in the action and sports genres which i don't play very much.

Re:Woah.

[XellDx]

All that means is that Nintendo can survive some financially stupid decisions.

Correct, and they actually have survived those decisions in the past as well. The difference the article is trying to paint is that while Microsoft (and for this purpose Sony's game division) have a very loyal, devoted fanbase, neither has actually SURVIVED something like the Virtual boy.

Or The SNES-CD which became the Playstation.

I can't argue against the logic that those numbers are not good to investors. However, none of the articles which usually bring up the information that Nintendo posted a loss ever mention that the other 2 of the three might have done so as well. In fact, when was the last time you heard of Sony's finances?

To illustrate, I have no way of knowing or proving that (other than the microsoft information in the article) Nintendo's Numbers where either unique or a reflection of a trend thanks to the affor mentioned decline of the US dollar. It stands to reason that if this is an multinational industry trend, that they wouldn't be to worried though.

Blah blah blah

[XellDx]

I love this. Especially the SEC report on Microsoft. I myself had no such luck searching the SEC website, but I'm attributing that to short attention span and lack of interesting in learning about that search engine. Goolge has provided, on the other hand, what seems to be lacking from the article. An explination of exactly WHY Nintendo's profits fell.

But in the end, does that really matter? Nintendo lost 26 Million. Microsoft is loosing a quarter of a Billion dollars every quarter this thing goes on. And desipte the nay sayers which come out of unholy holes whenever Nintendo's on the board, when its the turn for the Xbox usually the spectacular loss gets a footnote for the entire article. Blah.

And no one's willing to try and touch Sony. I mean, doesn't anyone remember this??? I know I sure as hell do. And that's when it started.

On of the biggest secrets of the PS2 are Disc read errors. Well, it's actually not so big of a secret. When you get buisness offering to fix your game console becuase Sony won't, you've found a pretty significant problem. Granted, the Xbox has the same thing, but my understanding is that those have been overcome. Sony has denied that this is a problem. How many people have heard they where sued over it??

I'm spouting rhetoric now and will stop. My point that negative attention about either Sony or MS rarely gets published on gaming websites stands. These are examples, and I'm pretty sure that given some creative manuvers i can find more, but I need to get back to work. :)

Re:Blah blah blah

[Anonymous Coward]

Granted, the Xbox has the same thing[disc errors], but my understanding is that those have been overcome.

Really? Tell me how to overcome these problems as my Xbox still has those damned "Dirty Disc Error" messages despite being shipped back to Microsoft four times! MS's fix is to either delete all of my save data or just send it back with a "duh, works good here" note. I even have a movie disc that consistantly locks up my Xbox but works fine on ten other units that I've tested it on including two other Xboxen.

In contrast, my GC has never given me any disc errors despite it's frequent travelling and excessive use in less than ideal environments.

Damn it! Know your video game history!

[PigeonGB]

Nintendo was a major producer of all sorts of toys and games. They made playing cards and some of the first light gun games, as well as the Ultra Hand (not to be confused with the Power Glove).

And don't forget the "love hotels" and taxi services.

Nintendo's been around for much longer than 1962. It's over 100 years old.

Seriously, go read the book "Game Over" to brush up on your Nintendo history. B-)

Re:On the flip side

[n0wak]

If I can't appreciate the company, I can't enjoy their product.

Then I hope you don't have a Gamecube, as neither company (MS, Sony, Nintendo) is a bastion of ethical business. How much was it that Nintendo got fined for price fixing? $150 million?

Anyway, I have them all, so I'm likely going to hell.

Eople don't

[AllenChristopher]

" Why is it that whenever Nintendo zealots give their list of games, they include every single game Nintendo has ever made?"

He didn't... he only listed the good ones, and those are the only ones you've heard of or remember. Simple.

Luigi's Mansion isn't on that list... fun it might have been, but it was basically a tech demo. Offensive that it was full price.

If you want a real stinker, go back to something like Yoshi's Safari, Yoshi's Story, or Paper Mario. Shudder. Some will tell you Paper Mario was pretty good... I don't know if these people are thick in the head or don't know about Super Mario RPG or what.

" Is Nintendo REALLY 100% infallible, that every title they have ever produced is SO great that everyone 'must own' it?"

They aren't infallible, but you know what I never hear about Nintendo? I never hear "The game sucked because it was rushed to market." I don't hear, as I did of Beyond Good and Evil "The game would have been better if the heroine's personality and appearance hadn't been changed at the last second for market reasons."

As far as I can tell, they give their teams as long as it takes to do a new game. If the game isn't working out, they kill it and move on.

That seems to work pretty well, huh?

Further, when soemthing really IS bad, like Yoshi's Story, Nintendo is pretty good at making it disappear. The biggest black eye Nintendo has is the virtual boy... other failures don't come up much.

Re:On the flip side

[DeadScreenSky]

Of course, we all remember the early Xbox flash cartoon making fun of Nintendo, don't we?

No, I personally don't - even then, it doesn't really sound all that bad. I do remember, however, Nintendo threatening retailers not to advertise for the Xbox in the USA prior to the GC and Xbox's release, otherwise they wouldn't get GBAs to sell.

And the price-fixing was already mentioned by others (though I was not clear if this was referring to the case they lost in the USA or one of the many ones in Europe).

And let's not forget the congressional hearings on videogame violence that Nintendo launched (by sending propoganda vids and similar to Senator Lieberman) to fight off Sega's success with the Genesis. Real classy.

You are a fool if you think any of the current major console makers can be considered completely ethical, especially Nintendo.

And though the 'forgiveness benefit' of it can be debated, Bill Gates' various donations have done far more good for the world than anything Nintendo has even tried to do in its hundred year history. Things aren't so black and white.

(And it wasn't that Prince of Persia 2 wouldn't fit, it is just that it would have been very hard to emulate on the GC or especially the PS2. I mean, the PS2 has problems emulating an old game like SmashTV. The GC just has very different hardware than what PoP2 ran on originally, which isn't a problem with the Xbox. That the PC version didn't include any bonus games is worse, besides. But regardless, these old games were just bonus features - the devs can only devote so much time to such stuff, especially with a game like PoP that was so rushed that they had to remove some boss fights.)