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Nintendo To Dominate Next Generation?
Via GameSetWatch, an editorial on the site Firing Squad suggesting that Nintendo is poised for a gaming industry coup. Their unique controller and appeal to casual gamers, the author posits, will turn the status quo on its head. From the article: "The cheapness of the console will help it sell and it's unlikely that Nintendo will face production shortages since it won't use exotic and difficult-to-make components. With a large installed owner base, more developers will be inclined to take a shot at it, publishers will feel pressured to release key titles (like Madden) for the Revolution regardless of their past GameCube experience. The controller is standard enough to work for most titles - so Xbox and PlayStation games will most likely work on the Revolution without major trouble, yet that same controller offers unique features that will be difficult to replicate for Microsoft's and Sony's consoles."
Anyway, it makes sense that the revo will get independent and interesting games, if only because of the controller, while the other two consoles will get the same old, same old. Not that there's anything wrong with a new NHL game for the Xbox360 or PS3;)
Condemnant quod non intellegunt.
This depends heavily on the public being interested in the system. Nintendo were able to churn out GCs super-cheap for years without taking over the market. Of course, the PS2 and Xbox were already around in large numbers and getting price cuts by that stage- a £130 Revolution going up against a limited stock of £300 360s and PS3s would have a more impressive advantage.
This will also depend on the public, especially non-gamers, "getting" the controller, which will require really good in-store demos.
There's always the risk that good value will backfire in the face of percieved value - namely, that the Revolution will be looked upon as cheap and underpowered in comparison to its competitors.
Finally, there's the assumption that the Revolution will use no exotic, hard-to-produce components. You've got to wonder if the little motion-sensor widgets for pitch/roll/yaw are going to be a rate limiting step in production.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
The GabeCube cost as little as half as much as the PS2 and XBox during their lifespans (GameCube is currently priced at $99 Canadian with the XBox at $199 Canadian). Despite costing half as much, the GameCube occupied a distand third place in market share.
If anything sells the Revolution, it won't be low price. Otherwise the GameCube would have dominated the market for the same reason.
I am looking forward to getting one of these bad boys when they come out.
But what bothers me is Nintendo's secrecy about specs. They seem to downplay any inprovements in graphical performance and they say that it will have complete backwards compatability with the GameCube on top of having an amazingly low price. This made me wonder how will they achieve this. My thought is that the Revolution will really just be a GameCube with some extra hardware added and put in a different case.
Anyone else get this vibe?
DEAD DEAD DEAD DELETE ME
Video game industry has become the Console Wars. PC gaming is on a major decline and arcades are a thing of the past.
Each console brings something different to the market. Nintendo with its edgy and risky ideas and strong 1st party titles, Xbox360 with its live component and the "winner" for time to market, and the PS3 with its established user base.
They will all do well.
In the last round of the console wars I went with the XBox and the GC. I really enjoyed the XBox, but as an ex-PC gamer, felt that I was just regurgitating IDs back-catalogue, but with slightly better graphics. The GC provided me with the most fun. The games were cheaper, had greater variety, and for all the fun of Halo 2 Live, playing drink monkey ball proved that its was more important to be able to punch your opponent in the real world, than snipe them from behind a exquisitly rendered rock on Live.
;)
I still don't understand what all the fuss was/is about the PS2. Lifes too short to watch progress bars, when your supposed to be having fun.
Being able to play Nintendo's entire back catalogue sounds too good to be true. Finally having a controller that reacts to its possition in space has been the aspiration of every gamer since the 80s - the only thing that could top that is having a game that gives you extra control when you stick your tounge out
I don't care that its not HD. Even if I buy one HD TV in the next year, that will be one in a house of 4 TVs. I've yet to see any real evidence that I need it. As my PC improved I was able to play Half-life at 640x480, then 800x600 and finally 1024x768. It was the graphics that got better, not the game. It may add a layer of realism to the game, but Doom 3 proved that once you stop looking at the eye-candy it's the underlying gameplay that makes the game worth the money.
Scared of flying, pointy things snce 1979!
But because Nintendo is making the controller, it's automatically going to reshape the gaming landscape. Such claims need to be taken with a rather large grain of salt - Virtual Boy, anyone?
Force-feedback, anyone? Analog stick, anyone? Shoulder buttons, anyone? Yeah, no-one else has every used anything that Nintendo's pioneered on its' controllers. That would be just plain nutty.
(And I'll put good money on the odds that the PSP2 will have a touch screen, and that the PS4 and Xbox720 controllers will have accelerometers.)
Actually one button + spatial-awareness is equal to lots of input.
:p
Hold "A" and move the controller to the left, certain action if performed. Move to the right, another. Move to front, then up, *another*. Back, left, up-down quickly, and your "Finish Him" move is performed. Or use the nunchaku for movement, and let the controller take care of other actions.
The controller knows where it is in space, what angle is facing, and what speed is moving. That's a *lot* of buttons
Maybe it won't be confortable, or it won't be fun, but that we will have to wait to see...
Buy a Nintendo DS Lite
"4 Controller Ports, Bally Astrocade, 1980"
Virtually non-existent again until the N64. Now it's standard fare on everything except the Sony systems.
"Analog stick, Emerson Arcadia, 1982"
Virtually non-existent again until the N64. Now it's standard fare on everything.
"Rumble, Sony Dual Analog Japanese version, 1996 (Rumble Pack was 1997)"
Nintendo's Rumble Pack was announced well before the Dual Analog Sony controller came out. This is the exact reason Nintendo was so secretive about the Rev controller.
I never used the word invent. Nintendo's been leading the controller parade since the SNES. They have also been leading the portable parade, despite bringing up the Virtual Boy.
"Derp de derp."
"1. We've had a chance to watch the 1st next-gen console launch, with its attendant hardware failure stories, and criticise it (X360)
2. We've seen Sony do ridiculously stupid things with DRM in the music space, and so we hate them, and have possibly boycotted them"
You've been on Slashdot too long. In the Real World, few people have heard of the X360 hardware problems and nobody cares about the Sony rootkit (if they even know about it). Neither company is exactly losing money hand over fist because a handfull of Slashdotters are boycotting them.
"Japanese nationalism hurt XBox 360 sales"? Bullshit.
From TFA: "In Japan, as usual, an American-made (or rather, American-designed) product has flopped. Like countless other American companies, Microsoft has faced a stiff, impenetrable and informal wall of Japanese nationalism which clings stubbornly to a Japanese product."
The author ignores the fact that Microsoft dominates the desktop PC OS market in Japan as it does in most other parts of the world.
Look, I wouldn't try to counter claims that there's a lot of unchecked racism in Japan, and I've been told -- by many Japanese people -- that believe they take their nationalism more seriously than people in other countries. But I think that when it comes to games, the formula is this simple:
( fun game + reasonable price ) -->yields--> ( customer of game producer and platform manufacturer )
It's the kids of middle-class families and the teen-to-thirtysomethings who decide whether the 360 will sink or swim, and they sure as hell aren't thinking about the emperor when they try to decide whether to drop the money for it. It may be that Microsoft didn't cater to the gaming preferences that are more prevalent in that country, but if so, that's their *avoidable* problem. It's not like they don't have huge corporate offices in Japan.
I think if nintendo is bringing the same innovative ideas to the console market that they first brought with handhelds. Consoles need a new gimmick in game design and this might just be the thing to bring life and innovation back to video games again.
insane power advantage?
chances rising that Microsoft will pull the plug on the 360?
Someone is letting their wishes dictate how they think.
You know what my favourite type of comment on Slashdot is? The type of comment both this post and the grandparent made when they pulled out a bunch of numbers without a URL to back it up.
(My second favourite type of post is a tie between unneccesary sarcasm and blatant hypocracy)
As for the Revo, don't underestimate it. I completely agree with Nintendo's sentiment that Sony and MS are moving in the wrong direction. High costs, high prices, system shortages, and the like.
Personally, I don't even really care about the differences between the 360 and a plain vanilla XBox (or Gamecube for that matter, though PS2 draws the line). The graphics, while better, don't affect the gameplay, and don't get me any more into the game at all. But I know lots of people who do feel a big difference, so fair enough. Clearly, all the consoles will have a good share or supporters, with the Revo being the most "different" of the three.
Hopefully Nintendo will be smart enough to get kiosks wherever they can, not just in game retail stores. The low price is really going to help them in some markets, and the controller is another big point. Hopefully, they'll fund indie companies to make games for their console as they claimed they would, because that'd be another big draw for me.
"When the atomic bomb goes off there's devastation...but when the atomic bong goes off there's celebraaaaation!"
Shoulder buttons were considered a gimmick when they were first announced on the SNES.
Dedicated camera controls were considered a gimmick when they were announced for the n64, as was the controller expansion slot, and force feedback (which Nintendo announced before Sony added it standard to their controllers).
No one called the analog thumbstick a gimmick, but they did call dual screens, and touch screens a gimmick. But so are microphones, bongos, cameras and what-not. Let's not forget the gameboy camera predates the eyetoy by more than 5 years.
Just because something is a gimmick doesn't mean it's not worthwhile. It only remains a gimmick until it becomes the standard. So the Rev controller may be gimmicky today, but I'm willing to bet that many of it's features will be standard in the following generation of controllers.
just some guy