Firstly, Nintendo can rehash that message as many times as it wants. It's absolutely imperative that this message penetrate, because it's the message that prevented the industry from crashing and burning again. Without games and systems following the principles Nintendo has outlined, the Japanese portion of the industry would have continued it's drastic hemorrhaging and largely disappeared. There's a reason the DS is so popular there.
Secondly, there's a lot more to the keynote than "target casuals". There wouldn't have been the profound impact Zonk described if it was only that.
Finally, if Sony had given the same keynote everyone would be wondering why they were talking about the development of the Wii when they had nothing to do with it.
... but, he didnt. He mostly talked about the development of the Wii. Tell me one thing developers might have gotten from his long winded keynote?
I think Zonk covered that.
it is very important to the developers to see the direction Sony is taking things
The same with Nintendo, and what better way than for perhaps the most influential man in gaming to bare whole his vision of what video games are all about?
Nintendo announced nothing.
Because, as I understand it, the GDC is about developers. The idea that everything it has to involve some big announcement is absurd. It's much more about getting together and discussing the issues of the industry than it is about the tools used. That some companies take the chance to unveil new tools and useful things to developers at GDC is no surprise. However, it isn't the central focus.
If this is the case, I really think the companies should consider a sustainable model of production. The rate at which the production of these art assets gets out of hands appears to be at least geometric in expansion. It looks to me like companies have spent too much time trying to sell consumers on impressive graphics, but have outpaced their ability to properly generate them. This is now hurting them, and they're looking to throw the cost of their mistake onto the consumer.
If it helps them generate revenue for future development, that can only help create incentive for future games.
There are lots of companies making games across the entire spectrum who aren't considering in game ads. That's why I conclude there's something fundamentally wrong with companies with a profound interest in the practice. I have two possibilities in mind for why they'd want this.
1) It's a new source of revenue, and they're so inefficient with their budget that any money they can get will help save them. 2) It's a new source of revenue, and they're so greedy that any money they can get will help their bank accounts.
Maybe I'm too cynical, but I simply don't see in game ads as being a positive influence in the industry, possibly because I don't see the proponents of it as capable of drawing the line before decency is crossed and sticking with it. EA is a major player, and they went well overboard on the microtransactions on Xbox Live. In game ads can have a place (sports, NASCAR, anywhere there are ads in real life that don't already annoy me by their intrusiveness) but I doubt that anyone promoting them will leave it at that.
I still remember when half-time, the defensive play of the day, and other key points in a broadcast were just that. None of this "McBlurgon's Soda shot of the day" or "The Moistinator half-time report". I'm afraid in game adds are going to drive me away from what would otherwise be good games, just like I no longer watch sports for the intrusive nature of the ads.
Indeed, I can think of a huge number of games from the SNES era that I have fond memories of.
Tecmo Super Bowl NBA Jam Secret of Mana Seiken Densetsu 3 Final Fantasy IV Final Fantasy VI Chrono Trigger Earthbound Super Mario World Super Mario Kart Metal Warriors Megaman X Yoshi's Island Super Bomberman 2 Super Metroid Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past F-Zero Street Fighter 2
And that's all top of my head, hardly thinking about it, excluding Genesis titles.
There have been great games since then, Azure Dreams for the Playstation, Super Smash Bros on the N64, or Katamari Damancy on the PS2 being examples. However, it seems a lot easier to completely blow a 3D game than a 2D one.
That always bothered me as well. Aren't they targetting the wrong demographic? You're telling the people who have just paid $9 to see the film that they should see films in theatres. Which is... where they already are and what they're trying to do. The people who pirate the film aren't likely to be there, they saw it 3 days before it arrived in theatres.
Actually, new controllers grabbed a number of headlines last generation. The Wavebird and also the Xbox Controller-S generated buzz when they were announced and released. Not "ZOMG" buzz, but buzz none the less.
The problem is, for games to do the talking people have to sit down with them first. You can't have a conversation on the phone if the other person doesn't pick up. While hardcore gamers always have and probably always will be able to see the input device as secondary to the game itself, everyone else doesn't. There is little or no difference in the mind of the uninitiated between a confusing airplane dashboard full of lights and switches and a game controller. They both are unintuitive and forbidding. However, everyone is already familiar with their TV remotes.
The Wiimote brings people into the conversation, people who otherwise wouldn't even consider joining in. The games we see for the Wii at this point are directed to them, games that simultaneously introduce them to the controller and train them in its use. Games such as Wii Sports and Wario Ware. Some of these people may transform into hardcore gamers, most won't but they'll at least be a part of the system now.
Eventually the Wii will need more than that, especially if they want the the #1 spot in the industry. However, what they have now is sufficient for what they're trying to do.
The other problem is he didn't really articulate anything. If he had thought out statements such as yours he might be taken more seriously. Unfortunately, all he did was throw a few insults at the system and Nintendo without anything to back them up.
If this had been Will Wright, it would definately have been news. This guy isn't Will Wright, and his only crediting is in the Special Thanks section of games. This is why he's being dismissed.
Maybe then you could afford a system for mature, real gamers (take your pick, there's two of 'em.)
The DS and the Wii.;)
I tout the Wii not because I stopped playing games years ago, but because the message it sends is necessary to the industry for survival. It's the same reason I laud the DS. The industry was suffering from internal hemmorhaging, losing gamers yearly. Most causal players had been shed, and the hardcore were even beginning to be shed (see the incredible decline in Japan prior to the DS). The Wii and the DS are harbingers of the message that our previous notion of what the game industry should be is wrong. It was a self-destructive idea, an iterative process that ostracized all but the top eschelons of the 1337.
Nintendo could have produced a more powerful system, and there is definitely a place for such systems in the industry. However, these systems are the Ferraris of the industry. They are undeniably powerful, but they are also the least necessary. There is a market for them, and it is a good market, but it is not the majority market. Like it or not, far more revenue is made on cheaper cars. The games industry was attempting to sell nothing but "Ferraris" such as the Playstation 3 and the Xbox 360. This left the vast majority of potential untapped, as most people aren't obsessed with games enough to spend that kind of money.
I think this is a message that frightens some of the hardcore crowd, and possible the developer in this article. For a long time now games have been a semi-elite club, and systems like the Wii appear to be inviting all the losers to the party. The reality is, just as Ferrari doesn't go out of business simply because the Toyota Corolla is cheaper, hardcore gamers will not lose their part of the market simply because it expands.
The only point which I will agree with you one is that people do forget that Nintendo is a company, and companies want to make money. They aren't some non-profit saviour organization aimed at purifying the market. However, as far as anyone can tell they make money by trying to give gamers what they want rather than tell them what they want.
I have a degree, a real job, and I'm a couple thousand miles from my parents. I'm well classified as a hardcore gamer, I own a 46" HDTV, a brand new car, an Xbox 360, a Wii, a PS2, a DS, a nice PC, and live in a comfortably sized apartment by myself.
Lastly, "Mature" is possibly the most loaded term that can be brought into a discussion of video games.
Similar only in the most basic sense. That's like saying Quake is similar to Counterstrike. They're games of the same genre, of course they're going to be similar on some level.
The actual gameplay and goals for Sunshine were very different from 64. Sure Mario jumped around, collected shiny objects, and saved the princess (yet again) but that's where the similarities end and the new begins.
I'm going to point out something here, and that is the key to Blizzard's success.
We all know Blizzard. They made Warcraft, Starcraft, Diablo 2 and some MMO that 8 million people play. They're extremely successful, rake in tons of though, the only games to even compete on top ten selling lists come from Will Wright. Hard to argue that Blizzard isn't successful.
However, they don't innovate.
Every game they make has horde of people yelling about it because it isn't original. Warcraft was precured by Dune, Starcraft stole concepts from Warhammer, Diablo 2 wasn't the first dungeon crawl, WoW is EQ for casual etc. What people miss is the endearing nature of fitting things together. Blizzard doesn't do anything wholly original, but they do bring together other people's ideas extremely professionally.
For both Home and LittleBigPlanet, certainly most of what you see there has been done before. The potential to both of them isn't that they're innovating new features, but that they're bringing them together. Second Life doesn't allow you to find games of CounterStrike, Home does. Mario Bros doesn't involve 4 players working together, LittleBigPlanet does. These are just small portions of the potential at hand.
Whether or not this is successful is another matter altogether.
People were skeptical about the E3 media blitz Sony displayed, but overall people were extremely positive. This is true of both the PS2 and the PS3. Neither system is or was everything they claimed to be, this is true. So why did the PS2 succeed and the PS3 struggle?
To avoid treating this any differently, as it is in a similar category to the aforementioned media blitzes, we would have to become extremely excited now and get angry later if/when it turns out it was a sham. The only consistently here is that this is being treated the same as the arrogant comments of the Sony execs, except it lacks any of the hallmark foot in mouth situations.
As I said, there's no reason not to be skeptical. Skeptical is good, critical is good. Completely ignoring that something good might have happened for Sony for the sake of panning them is not. If we do that, are we any less arrogant and foolish than the Sony execs we love to hate?
I'm with you. I posted something with a little bit more raving to the rant, but nevertheless along the same lines.
This isn't a pure and blameless event, as there are criticisms and skepticism to be had, but it suprises me at the temper tantrum that's being thrown here. There are people posting well on many perspectives, but they're largely lost in a see of short, mindless bashes of Sony.
If we're really so much better than the arrogant and idiotic PR/execs at Sony, why can't we form the coherent sentences and arguments to prove it?
There's no indication he is that poster, and his comment is highly informative. He hasn't called anyone a fanboy, he hasn't declared these to be the reasons why the new era of Sony begins now. All he did was post links to games that might actually pique interest.
Unless I'm missing something, there's no reason to attack him like this.
I read about this earlier, and the whole thing bothered me. Supposedly the death of their oldest hero is supposed to "resonate" more with people. I'm trying to figure out how that works when they explicitly state that there's the possibility of a ressurection. Death sort of loses its meaning when you can continually return from it without consequence (see Dragon Ball Z).
I realise this is slashdot, and I'm really looking in the wrong place for this.
There seems to be a disproportionate amount of negativity concerning Sony's showing. Sony has said a lot of dumb things, they've done a few dumb things, but this does offer hope for Sony.
That is not to say there aren't criticisms to be brought up, I'm just disappointed at how they have been here. Sony may have obtained the ill-will of gamers, but if we're going to tell them they suck at something we can at least do it intelligently. Calling Zonk a Sony fanboy (oh the irony after all the Nintendo and Xbox related accusations), and dismissing the whole keynote as though it was by default terrible are not effective methods of changing reality. The reality is, Sony and the PS3 have seen the first truly good, even awesome, news for them in a long time. It's not all redeeming, it alone will not outweigh all the crap we've faced. However, if you are truly interested in defending the industry against Sony what I've seen above is not how it is done. This is sticking one's head in the sand.
Point out that Home is needlessly complicated, that it won't appeal to causual gamers, that it makes you unconfortable because it seems designed to overly consumerize online communities. Back up these points with expanded statements, compare them fairly to the counterparts of Live and the Mii Channel, but of all things don't simply pan this without paying attention. If you're intent on keeping Sony your beating horse, you're going to have to put effort into it.
Closing your eyes does not rid the world of light.
I need to look up my representatives and give them a call so that I can directly ask them how often they vote on bills, and if they read every bill they vote on.
If the desired manifestation of the law, justice, is the be lifted high by the rope of legislation it requires that each thread/representative bear their share of the burden. Instead, what we have is a number of threads unaccountable to each other and to themselves who may assume someone will read the whole thing but don't honestly know that anyone is. So we have a myriad of threads all of which may or may not actually be holding up the difficult weight of justice. What guarantee de we then have the justice is upheld?
My only concern about MMOs is what happens when they die. In Diablo 2 there was always the single player if the network was dead or for whenever Battle.net is gone. When blizzard decides it's time to end WoW, where do the characters go? Is all that invested time completely kaput? Will Blizzard provide some method of downloading character information?
It's all fun, I'm just a save file packrat and the idea that I won't be able to go back and revisit the fun makes me sad.
Slashdot Mirror
Firstly, Nintendo can rehash that message as many times as it wants. It's absolutely imperative that this message penetrate, because it's the message that prevented the industry from crashing and burning again. Without games and systems following the principles Nintendo has outlined, the Japanese portion of the industry would have continued it's drastic hemorrhaging and largely disappeared. There's a reason the DS is so popular there.
Secondly, there's a lot more to the keynote than "target casuals". There wouldn't have been the profound impact Zonk described if it was only that.
Finally, if Sony had given the same keynote everyone would be wondering why they were talking about the development of the Wii when they had nothing to do with it.
I think Zonk covered that.
The same with Nintendo, and what better way than for perhaps the most influential man in gaming to bare whole his vision of what video games are all about?
Because, as I understand it, the GDC is about developers. The idea that everything it has to involve some big announcement is absurd. It's much more about getting together and discussing the issues of the industry than it is about the tools used. That some companies take the chance to unveil new tools and useful things to developers at GDC is no surprise. However, it isn't the central focus.
If this is the case, I really think the companies should consider a sustainable model of production. The rate at which the production of these art assets gets out of hands appears to be at least geometric in expansion. It looks to me like companies have spent too much time trying to sell consumers on impressive graphics, but have outpaced their ability to properly generate them. This is now hurting them, and they're looking to throw the cost of their mistake onto the consumer.
There are lots of companies making games across the entire spectrum who aren't considering in game ads. That's why I conclude there's something fundamentally wrong with companies with a profound interest in the practice. I have two possibilities in mind for why they'd want this.
1) It's a new source of revenue, and they're so inefficient with their budget that any money they can get will help save them.
2) It's a new source of revenue, and they're so greedy that any money they can get will help their bank accounts.
Maybe I'm too cynical, but I simply don't see in game ads as being a positive influence in the industry, possibly because I don't see the proponents of it as capable of drawing the line before decency is crossed and sticking with it. EA is a major player, and they went well overboard on the microtransactions on Xbox Live. In game ads can have a place (sports, NASCAR, anywhere there are ads in real life that don't already annoy me by their intrusiveness) but I doubt that anyone promoting them will leave it at that.
I still remember when half-time, the defensive play of the day, and other key points in a broadcast were just that. None of this "McBlurgon's Soda shot of the day" or "The Moistinator half-time report". I'm afraid in game adds are going to drive me away from what would otherwise be good games, just like I no longer watch sports for the intrusive nature of the ads.
And while I'm at it, GET THE HELL OFF MY LAWN!
Sadly, Biff's stupidity can't be qualified as a mixed metaphor so much as a simple screw up.
A fool and his money gather no moss.... that's mixing things up.
And Rocket Surgery needs to be a new game.
Indeed, I can think of a huge number of games from the SNES era that I have fond memories of.
Tecmo Super Bowl
NBA Jam
Secret of Mana
Seiken Densetsu 3
Final Fantasy IV
Final Fantasy VI
Chrono Trigger
Earthbound
Super Mario World
Super Mario Kart
Metal Warriors
Megaman X
Yoshi's Island
Super Bomberman 2
Super Metroid
Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
F-Zero
Street Fighter 2
And that's all top of my head, hardly thinking about it, excluding Genesis titles.
There have been great games since then, Azure Dreams for the Playstation, Super Smash Bros on the N64, or Katamari Damancy on the PS2 being examples. However, it seems a lot easier to completely blow a 3D game than a 2D one.
That always bothered me as well. Aren't they targetting the wrong demographic? You're telling the people who have just paid $9 to see the film that they should see films in theatres. Which is... where they already are and what they're trying to do. The people who pirate the film aren't likely to be there, they saw it 3 days before it arrived in theatres.
The ultimate physics engine for a game would only allow you to change universal constants.
I for one would enjoy seeing the cataclysm resulting from setting the gravitational constant to 0.
Many Bothans died to bring us this information.
Actually, new controllers grabbed a number of headlines last generation. The Wavebird and also the Xbox Controller-S generated buzz when they were announced and released. Not "ZOMG" buzz, but buzz none the less.
The problem is, for games to do the talking people have to sit down with them first. You can't have a conversation on the phone if the other person doesn't pick up. While hardcore gamers always have and probably always will be able to see the input device as secondary to the game itself, everyone else doesn't. There is little or no difference in the mind of the uninitiated between a confusing airplane dashboard full of lights and switches and a game controller. They both are unintuitive and forbidding. However, everyone is already familiar with their TV remotes.
The Wiimote brings people into the conversation, people who otherwise wouldn't even consider joining in. The games we see for the Wii at this point are directed to them, games that simultaneously introduce them to the controller and train them in its use. Games such as Wii Sports and Wario Ware. Some of these people may transform into hardcore gamers, most won't but they'll at least be a part of the system now.
Eventually the Wii will need more than that, especially if they want the the #1 spot in the industry. However, what they have now is sufficient for what they're trying to do.
The other problem is he didn't really articulate anything. If he had thought out statements such as yours he might be taken more seriously. Unfortunately, all he did was throw a few insults at the system and Nintendo without anything to back them up.
If this had been Will Wright, it would definately have been news. This guy isn't Will Wright, and his only crediting is in the Special Thanks section of games. This is why he's being dismissed.
To my knowledge, a fair number of the crappy movie licenses end up on other consoles as well.
The DS and the Wii.
I tout the Wii not because I stopped playing games years ago, but because the message it sends is necessary to the industry for survival. It's the same reason I laud the DS. The industry was suffering from internal hemmorhaging, losing gamers yearly. Most causal players had been shed, and the hardcore were even beginning to be shed (see the incredible decline in Japan prior to the DS). The Wii and the DS are harbingers of the message that our previous notion of what the game industry should be is wrong. It was a self-destructive idea, an iterative process that ostracized all but the top eschelons of the 1337.
Nintendo could have produced a more powerful system, and there is definitely a place for such systems in the industry. However, these systems are the Ferraris of the industry. They are undeniably powerful, but they are also the least necessary. There is a market for them, and it is a good market, but it is not the majority market. Like it or not, far more revenue is made on cheaper cars. The games industry was attempting to sell nothing but "Ferraris" such as the Playstation 3 and the Xbox 360. This left the vast majority of potential untapped, as most people aren't obsessed with games enough to spend that kind of money.
I think this is a message that frightens some of the hardcore crowd, and possible the developer in this article. For a long time now games have been a semi-elite club, and systems like the Wii appear to be inviting all the losers to the party. The reality is, just as Ferrari doesn't go out of business simply because the Toyota Corolla is cheaper, hardcore gamers will not lose their part of the market simply because it expands.
The only point which I will agree with you one is that people do forget that Nintendo is a company, and companies want to make money. They aren't some non-profit saviour organization aimed at purifying the market. However, as far as anyone can tell they make money by trying to give gamers what they want rather than tell them what they want.
I have a degree, a real job, and I'm a couple thousand miles from my parents. I'm well classified as a hardcore gamer, I own a 46" HDTV, a brand new car, an Xbox 360, a Wii, a PS2, a DS, a nice PC, and live in a comfortably sized apartment by myself.
Lastly, "Mature" is possibly the most loaded term that can be brought into a discussion of video games.
Similar only in the most basic sense. That's like saying Quake is similar to Counterstrike. They're games of the same genre, of course they're going to be similar on some level.
The actual gameplay and goals for Sunshine were very different from 64. Sure Mario jumped around, collected shiny objects, and saved the princess (yet again) but that's where the similarities end and the new begins.
I'm going to point out something here, and that is the key to Blizzard's success.
We all know Blizzard. They made Warcraft, Starcraft, Diablo 2 and some MMO that 8 million people play. They're extremely successful, rake in tons of though, the only games to even compete on top ten selling lists come from Will Wright. Hard to argue that Blizzard isn't successful.
However, they don't innovate.
Every game they make has horde of people yelling about it because it isn't original. Warcraft was precured by Dune, Starcraft stole concepts from Warhammer, Diablo 2 wasn't the first dungeon crawl, WoW is EQ for casual etc. What people miss is the endearing nature of fitting things together. Blizzard doesn't do anything wholly original, but they do bring together other people's ideas extremely professionally.
For both Home and LittleBigPlanet, certainly most of what you see there has been done before. The potential to both of them isn't that they're innovating new features, but that they're bringing them together. Second Life doesn't allow you to find games of CounterStrike, Home does. Mario Bros doesn't involve 4 players working together, LittleBigPlanet does. These are just small portions of the potential at hand.
Whether or not this is successful is another matter altogether.
People were skeptical about the E3 media blitz Sony displayed, but overall people were extremely positive. This is true of both the PS2 and the PS3. Neither system is or was everything they claimed to be, this is true. So why did the PS2 succeed and the PS3 struggle?
To avoid treating this any differently, as it is in a similar category to the aforementioned media blitzes, we would have to become extremely excited now and get angry later if/when it turns out it was a sham. The only consistently here is that this is being treated the same as the arrogant comments of the Sony execs, except it lacks any of the hallmark foot in mouth situations.
As I said, there's no reason not to be skeptical. Skeptical is good, critical is good. Completely ignoring that something good might have happened for Sony for the sake of panning them is not. If we do that, are we any less arrogant and foolish than the Sony execs we love to hate?
He's referring to eras, not generations. Zonk laid it out pretty explicitly.
I'm with you. I posted something with a little bit more raving to the rant, but nevertheless along the same lines.
This isn't a pure and blameless event, as there are criticisms and skepticism to be had, but it suprises me at the temper tantrum that's being thrown here. There are people posting well on many perspectives, but they're largely lost in a see of short, mindless bashes of Sony.
If we're really so much better than the arrogant and idiotic PR/execs at Sony, why can't we form the coherent sentences and arguments to prove it?
I don't think that's a fair comment to make.
There's no indication he is that poster, and his comment is highly informative. He hasn't called anyone a fanboy, he hasn't declared these to be the reasons why the new era of Sony begins now. All he did was post links to games that might actually pique interest.
Unless I'm missing something, there's no reason to attack him like this.
I seem to remember a game like this on the PC. Really fun.
The question here is, can you push other people down the stairs? THAT would be entertaining.
I read about this earlier, and the whole thing bothered me. Supposedly the death of their oldest hero is supposed to "resonate" more with people. I'm trying to figure out how that works when they explicitly state that there's the possibility of a ressurection. Death sort of loses its meaning when you can continually return from it without consequence (see Dragon Ball Z).
I realise this is slashdot, and I'm really looking in the wrong place for this.
There seems to be a disproportionate amount of negativity concerning Sony's showing. Sony has said a lot of dumb things, they've done a few dumb things, but this does offer hope for Sony.
That is not to say there aren't criticisms to be brought up, I'm just disappointed at how they have been here. Sony may have obtained the ill-will of gamers, but if we're going to tell them they suck at something we can at least do it intelligently. Calling Zonk a Sony fanboy (oh the irony after all the Nintendo and Xbox related accusations), and dismissing the whole keynote as though it was by default terrible are not effective methods of changing reality. The reality is, Sony and the PS3 have seen the first truly good, even awesome, news for them in a long time. It's not all redeeming, it alone will not outweigh all the crap we've faced. However, if you are truly interested in defending the industry against Sony what I've seen above is not how it is done. This is sticking one's head in the sand.
Point out that Home is needlessly complicated, that it won't appeal to causual gamers, that it makes you unconfortable because it seems designed to overly consumerize online communities. Back up these points with expanded statements, compare them fairly to the counterparts of Live and the Mii Channel, but of all things don't simply pan this without paying attention. If you're intent on keeping Sony your beating horse, you're going to have to put effort into it.
Closing your eyes does not rid the world of light.
I need to look up my representatives and give them a call so that I can directly ask them how often they vote on bills, and if they read every bill they vote on.
If the desired manifestation of the law, justice, is the be lifted high by the rope of legislation it requires that each thread/representative bear their share of the burden. Instead, what we have is a number of threads unaccountable to each other and to themselves who may assume someone will read the whole thing but don't honestly know that anyone is. So we have a myriad of threads all of which may or may not actually be holding up the difficult weight of justice. What guarantee de we then have the justice is upheld?
You underestimated my laziness. Beware!
That and I was at work and unable to access the file sitting on my computer at home.
My only concern about MMOs is what happens when they die. In Diablo 2 there was always the single player if the network was dead or for whenever Battle.net is gone. When blizzard decides it's time to end WoW, where do the characters go? Is all that invested time completely kaput? Will Blizzard provide some method of downloading character information?
It's all fun, I'm just a save file packrat and the idea that I won't be able to go back and revisit the fun makes me sad.