Can Nintendo Court the Casuals Again?

An anonymous reader sends this quote from Eurogamer: "Do you remember the last time? When the Wii launched at the tail end of 2006, it was to an air of excited curiosity that went well beyond the borders of core gamers, with Nintendo conjuring what ran close to a full-blown phenomenon. ... Nintendo's masterstroke, of course, has been resurrecting the ultimate hardcore poster girl with the announcement that Bayonetta 2 is heading exclusively to the Wii U. There's something slightly incongruous about an over-sexed, incredibly violent action game rubbing shoulders with Mario and co., but then again that's exactly what makes the proposition so very exciting. ... There's still one very important section of the market that may prove a little tougher to persuade. Right now it's harder to see the broader appeal of the Wii U, and it's not simply a case of fearing that it'll fail to replicate the success of its predecessor — there's every chance that it could endure the same rocky start that plagued Nintendo's 3DS."

Comments

Jumped the shark

[DogDude]

Nintendo jumped the shark a long time ago. Only a tiny subset of their game library is aimed towards casual gamers. The rest of it is bizarre, Japanese, anime-based titles that are completely incomprehensible to anybody outside of relevant cultural circles. Sure, they'll always have their obsessed fans, but they'd have to make some radical management and cultural shifts to be able to ever appeal to mainstream, casual gamers again.