Cultural Blinders Lead to Nintendo Fallacy

obchrisj writes "A week long, unscientific poll on FileFront found 61% agreeing with the notion that Nintendo will soon be "going the way of Sega." In an editorial on their website, they ask Nintendo reps and industry analysts what the future of Nintendo really is, taking a glance at the DS, GameCube, and Revolution consoles. Slashdot recently reported on poor sales performance for Nintendo's GameCube. From the editorial: 'According to O'Rourke, Nintendo's U.S. market position has conditioned North American gamers to believe the company's global fortunes are equally down. Such "Nintendo is dying!" hysteria is largely a product of this cultural tunnel vision.'"

Comments

Nintendo

[Prien715]

Nintendo has made some really great games, the only thing lacking in their console as far as I'm concerned is internet multiplayer, but that's why I have my PC anyway.

Abroad, I think people are much more concerned with a good core single plater experience or in-the-same-room multiplayer. With titles like Mario Party, Smash Bros, Mario Kart, and Metroid Prime 2, I still can't think of a console I'd rather use to play against 3 of my friends.

Re:I dont believe analyst

[CashCarSTAR]

X-Box is on life support..

Actually, I think you're right. Locally, local movie/rental shops are about to drop the X-Box from their shelves. And local sales of X-Box games are fairly..well..slow.

But X-Boxes themselves still go fast. Why? They're cool. But you might only have 2 or 3 games for it..Halo maybe Halo 2 and a Madden game. And that's about it.

And the profit comes from game sales. From what I can tell, Nintendo is making more money than Microsoft. So I doubt Nintendo is going to go the way of Sega. As well, there's a lot of people who are happy with their little cube...

Nintendo

[Sylver Dragon]

Nintendo's biggest enemy seems to be Nintendo. One of the things that Nintendo did very well was market to kids. The problem is, now they have a bunch of people trained to equate Nintendo with kid's games. PS2, on the other hand, went after the late teen and young adult market. So many people are stuck with the Nintendo=Kids, PS2=Adults mentality. While this isn't really true anymore, Nintendo is stuck trying to undo the marketing of the past. Plus, the Nintendo 64 was a dud. I was one of the people to get one early on, I liked Super Mario 64, and had seen some adds for some interesting 3rd party games. Nintendo was screwed by the third party developers in some cases, and the games just didn't materialize for the N64. In the end, I think I owned about 4 games for thr system, because I couldn't find anything on the system which appealed to me. I finally bought a Playstation used, and got more games for it than I did for my N64. When the time to choose between the PS2 and the GameCube came along, I wasn't willing to touch another new Nintendo product, I got a PS2, and have been very happy with it.
Funny aside to that. I went to the E3 where Nintendo and MS were announcing their respective systems. At the time the PS2 looked like it was in trouble. All it had were a bunch of remakes and sequals to show. Then we walked into the Nintendo area, which was a teaming mass of people. We got to see such wonderful titiles as Super Smash Brothers, Pikman, Star Fox Adventures, Rouge Squadron (whatever incarnation), and Luigi's Haunted Mansion. It looked pretty good, though mostly aimed at kids. Lastly we hit the Xbox area, and got to see very little. They had some sort of skiing game and a water based shooter. The graphics were pretty but I just didn't see a killer game on it. The GameCube looked poised to win the war. Now I own a PS2 (which I thought to be the worst in show), the Xbox still has zero interest from me, and the GameCube is only now a consideration since I've watched a friend play Metroid Prime.
Somehow I don't think Nintendo is going anywhere, they've got a ton of cash, lots of brand recognition, and they are finally starting to win the battle against their previous image. Sure, they may go through a few slow years/systems, but I'm expecting that they will end up beating Microsoft in the end.

Nintendo is for Kids

[Shihar]

I tend to agree that people equate Nintendo with kids. Hell, I think that the perception is actually somewhat correct. True, Nintendo has its grown up games, but not many. GTA3 is the reason why I bought my PS2. I want a grown up game complete with violence and cursing. As cute as Mario and a cute little cartoon Zelda is, it simply isn't what I want.

Maybe I should look a little harder, but as far as I can tell, Nintendo promotes cartoons. The few exceptions to the rule are FPS - which I would never buy on consol because I have a perfectly good computer with superior controls and graphics. When I think Nintendo, I think Pokemon, Mario, Donkey Kong, Star Fox, and a whole host of other cartoon games. Hell, each one of those games DID have a cartoon follow up on TV.

Games used to be for kids, but I think what has been proven in this new centaury is that games were for kids because kids picked them up the faster then anyone else. Now those kids are adults, and unlike normal toys, they didn't throw them out. People who grew up with games still like them. Not only do they still like them, but now that have a paycheck each week and the ability to spend significantly more on video games. I am not saying that video game markers should abandon the kids market, just that you would be a fool ignore all of the adults with too much money in their pockets when you make your games. If you want to appeal to adults, you need to make games for them. If people think of your consol and could never imagine playing GTA or some violently and vulgar game, chances are you have been branded a kids consol.

Re:I dont believe analyst

[Alkaiser]

This is the exact same cultural blindness the article's talking about.

Here's some numbers, taken from the-magicbox.com:

First # is the sales for the week, 2nd number is for all of 2005.

PlayStation 2: 65,837/189,238
PlayStation Portable: 62,052/126,654
Nintendo DS: 53,527/162,088
GameBoy Advance SP: 18,289/89,140
GameCube: 7,475/27,178
GameBoy Advance: 588/2,307
Xbox: 506/1,685

In Japan, also known as the LARGEST GAMING MARKETPLACE IN THE WORLD, the XBox is losing to the GameCube by more than a factor of 12.

There are 4 GameCube titles in the top 30 sales chart. There are *0* XBox games in the top 30. I'm not going to say the XBox is on life support, but they're definitely 3rd in the world.

Re:Heres the problem as I see it...

[ElleyKitten]

Now - this is the definition of target deomgraphic. all age 18-25, Male

I'm sick of this target demographic bullshit. As if other people don't buy games. I have more games than probably anyone in your dorm, yet I don't fit your stupid demographic so I guess I don't count.

I'm also sick of this bullshit idea that girls don't play games. I asked my dad for a video game for christmas, and he gave it to my boyfriend. When I play my SP in public, people assume it a book. How the fuck does someone confuse an SP for a book? I don't fucking know. I just wish people would wake the fuck up and realize that not all gamers are "age 18-25, Male".