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Red Steel Impressions Roundup
Ubisoft is working on one of the more 'adult' titles slated for the early days of the Wii launch, and there are lots of folks with opinions. From IGN's Red Steel hands-on: "Another important element to the gameplay, which is closely related to the story, is the idea of choice. In Japan, the Yakuza are not senseless killers -- they will only do so when forced into the position. With your girl in possession of the Yakuza, you'll need to become part of the culture, and earn opposing groups respect to get where you need to be. So you'll have to make choices with both your sword and your gun; you may want to perform a headshot or slash a guy's throat, but you can also force them to surrender. In the Yakuza this mutual respect and honor, this admission that one is beaten, is a real thing." More views below, if you Read More.
But seriously, the Red Steel videos are impressive. That sword duel part was really exciting. There is another first-person swordfighting game, Maken X for the Dreamcast, and great as it was, its problem was that no control pad could ever have the precision for a "real" swordfight. I think Red Steel may end up being the Wii's killer app.
Circumcision is child abuse.
Simple. Different commercials for different audiences.
You run commercials for Red Steel during wrestling and other male oriented programming. You run commericals for more casual games during more female or generic audiences, like American Idol. Advertise the kid oriented games during cartoons and other childrens programming.
Multiple advertising plans for multiple audiences.
"I think Nintendo needs titles like this to avoid being relegated to the casual market only ..."
Good Lord, more of this garbage from people about how Nintendo needs senseless violence, hookers and people killing cops in order to "break away" from the casual gamer. Go back to playing your GTA LLVIII and I'll handle the casual gaming for you.
The casual market (read Nintendo DS, et. al.) is KICKING THE FUCKING SHIT out of anything around. The 'casual' market is what made a title like the Sims one of the #1 selling games in history. The casual market has more money in order of magnitudes than the hard core gamers that want their "mature" titles. Someone just needs to find the next Sims or the next "Sims" console for these people to spend that money on.
Now the question is, has Nintendo done this with Wii? Time will obviously tell.
Casual and Hardcore have almost nothing to do with the actual content, or the presentation of the content, it is more about the quantity of games played and their knowledge of the industry. You will have both Casual and Hardcore gamers which play everything from Animal Crossing to Grand Theft Auto (in fact many Hardcore gamers will have played both games). Games like America's Army have always been a pretty Hardcore game, not because they're graphically violent (there no blood or gore in AA) but because they require endless ammounts of time in order to be good enough to compete online.
Now, not every game Nintendo has attracted is designed to lure the non-gamer crowd; games like Zelda: Twilight Princess, Metroid Prime 3, Red Steel, Mario Galaxy and Dragon Quest are desinged to target people who are already gamers. Wii Sports, on the other hand, is (supposed to) targeting non-gamers; people who would have difficulties moving their character and swininging the Wiimote at the same time. The fact that Wii Sports recieved so much time at their press conference shows that Nintendo isn't targeting non-gamers in a token way; at the same time, the focus on Zelda and Red Steel shows Nintendo is still focusing on existing gamers.
isn't Ubisoft in charge of marketing Ubisoft games on Nintendo's platform? So simply put, Nintendo is targeting Wii to a wide audience. Ubisoft (being mostly "hardcore" games maker) is targeting the hardcore audience, presumably to get a foothold as the "killer app". On a side note, When's the last time you heard a casual gamer say "killer app"?
disclaimer: I've been known to store numbers in my ass for which to dig out when quantities are required.
I agree it needs a lot more polish, but I'm not sure if this version is anything to judge by. It had the feel of being mostly a controller demo. I doubt that demo will make it into the game intact.
just some guy