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I've just read one of the most fascinating articles on IGN.
The reason it did was because it was staring me straight in the face, a concept developing in my mind and there it was. The entire problem surrounding Nintendo's fall from grace. In a collection of words on a page.
It started to play on my mind when the latest DS title was announced. Super Princess Peach, a tongue in cheek role reversal of Nintendo's classic Mario franchise. The game could well be an innovative and enjoyable new franchise. But it isn't. Not really. Instead it is placed along Nintendo's other DS franchises. These are Animal Crossing DS, Wario Ware DS, Mario Kart DS, Mario Brothers DS, Mario 64 DS, Metroid Prime: Hunters, four swords, Pokemon Dash, Yoshi's Touch and go... and so forth.
All of the above titles try to use (and probably succeed) a new and original form of gameplay. Yet they all, every one of them, share a common issue. They are all established Nintendo franchises. Why could Nintendo not call "Yoshi's Touch and Go" something totally different and remove Mario and Yoshi. Introduce a few new characters. Suddenly a new world is born, suddenly a new franchise is born... Yoshi and Mario could help the game to sell well but... we will never truly know.
It is funny how Nintendo are trying to release the most innovative game system ever... and yet they have not got one original game in the line up. SEGA's XY/XX feel the magic, is in fact the only game I see that isn't a new breed of an old franchise.
You see I, you and the legions of avid Nintendo followers love Nintendo for Mario, for Pokemon and for Zelda. So Nintendo continue to keep their forever falling fan base happy with new iterations of Mario and Zelda. Yet by not making a new "Mario" or a new "Pokemon" how can Nintendo ever hope to expand their fan base?
Metroid Prime was Nintendo "re-inventing" the Metroid brand. It was clever and the game is genius. Introducing the gaming world to something totally new. So why Metroid? Strafio, a massive Metroid fan from these very forums, still craves for a third person action platformer. Was it beyond Nintendo's capacity to make this? This would have satisfied the fan base. And what of Metroid Prime? Well did we have to have Samus in it? Did it have to be based around the Metroid universe?
Sure, Metroid Prime may not have sold as much if Samus and his enemies were not part of the game. And yet I feel we could have seen the birth of a brand new killer Nintendo franchise. Metroid could take the crown from Tomb Raider in the action platform sides of things. Whilst this new innovative First Person Adventure from Nintendo will make Perfect Dark a distant memory.
I shall present Zelda as my next example. A perfectly lovely realistic Zelda would have kept all Nintendo gamers happy. But the Wind Waker ruled did it not? The Wind Waker was a great new addition to the series. Yet why did it have to be Zelda? Could we not have seen a new adventure title from Nintendo? Even an RPG game! A cartoon RPG is a good idea (Namco did it). It did not have to be Zelda. It could have been a different game. A whole new series of Nintendo titles. Maybe next year we'd have the cel-shaded new adventure RPG and a new Zelda game. And the series' need not have anything to do with eachother.
Pokemon saved Nintendo back in 1996 as sales started to fall. It was Nintendo "being original". There was no Mario. There was no Zelda. This was something new. This was to attract new gamers. This was a new game. And like Mario and Zelda before it. It was huge. Now though we do not get that. We get Nintendo putting all their money, resources and efforts into keeping the fan base happy with a new Mario title or a new "Zelda Four Swords adventure". If Nintendo can keep 2 20-year-old franchises such as Mario and Zelda feeling fresh imagine what they could do with a new idea? Imagine if they were asked to make a Bongo action game that had nothing to do with Donkey Kong? We'd be looking at a totally new franchise at the beginning of next year.
What could Nintendo create with that sort of freedom on the Gamecube? Let me tell you. Pikmin. Pikmin started life as a demo featuring 100 Mario's. Imagine if that had stayed the same. Imagine if Olimar was a big Mario and the Pikmin were hundreds of little Mario’s/Luigi's and Peach's being directed to do various tasks to defeat Bowser. Indeed the game would still be original and fun. But instead we got a different world. New characters, a new franchise, new iconography and new landscapes. We got a whole new Nintendo game. One that can stand besides Mario/Zelda and Pokemon as a game that had NOTHING to do with another game. Olimar was never a baddie in Mario Land and Pikmin was never a Pokemon.
This is what Nintendo need. New games. New franchises. They don't HAVE to be adult either, might be helpful but hardly essential. Why does Wario Ware have Wario in it? Is he needed? Why did Dinosaur Planet have Fox in it? It was obviously not a Starfox game!
Nintendo are scared. Releasing a totally new game could mean a disaster. A flop. Would Viewtiful Joe have sold through the roof if it were a Megaman game? Hell yes. But would it be a new franchise on which Capcom can build on? No it could not.
Nintendo tried widening its appeal with new games. Metal Gear and Resident Evil remakes are a prime example. Yet these two games are still "old" games. Nintendo should never have bought the Resident Evil games because they had Eternal Darkness. This game could have been a new Nintendo franchise. An ideal new Nintendo franchise. As it happens it was never needed. It would never sell. Capcom's famous survival horror put pay to that.
RARE were never scared to release a new game. They did sequels too but next to the release of Banjo Tooie came Conker's Bad Fur Day. Next to Donkey Kong 64 came Jet Force Gemini. Besides Killer Instinct Gold there was Blast Corps and Goldeneye. Some were sequels. Most were totally new franchises that branched out to new gamers. What would the N64 have been without RARE? What new franchise did Nintendo create themselves? If it wasn't for the fact Nintendo's brand faces were moving into 3D we would all have wondered "what's new?" Just like we are now. If Nintendo still had RARE we would have had Grabbed by the Gholies and Kameo by now. 2 completley original and new games.
X-box gamers are lucky. Loads of totally new games to play, Knights of the Old Republic was a success, Blinx a failure but an attempt at least... and the biggest success story of this generation. Halo. A game that was so totally fresh that nearly every gamer in the world wants to own it. Even Sony, with Ico, the eye toy games, Rachet and Clank and Sly Cooper can risk a new franchise.
Are Nintendo just a bunch old golden oldies? Making nice games with the same faces over and over again? Are Nintendo out of touch? No I don't think so. Shigeru Miyamoto, a guy that made the original Donkey Kong game decades ago, made Pikmin. He hasn't lost it. He can still create a new world to exploit. A New World to delve into and explore.
Retro, Nintendo's latest acquisition, is one of Nintendo's greatest properties. Metroid Prime is almost a totally new franchise. Sure the name is the same but the game is not. Retro are original and Nintendo need to expand this team and bring Raven Blade and the companies back to the release schedule. Rare, Left Field and Silicon Knights have gone. It was a stupid mistake by the big N. But if only Nintendo themselves can make something new.
Nintendo are innovators. They were once the driving force in the gaming industry. Introducing new characters and new ideas. Now they are just a company growing old. Making the same great games... we need new great games.
Wake up Nintendo.
The reason it did was because it was staring me straight in the face, a concept developing in my mind and there it was. The entire problem surrounding Nintendo's fall from grace. In a collection of words on a page.
It started to play on my mind when the latest DS title was announced. Super Princess Peach, a tongue in cheek role reversal of Nintendo's classic Mario franchise. The game could well be an innovative and enjoyable new franchise. But it isn't. Not really. Instead it is placed along Nintendo's other DS franchises. These are Animal Crossing DS, Wario Ware DS, Mario Kart DS, Mario Brothers DS, Mario 64 DS, Metroid Prime: Hunters, four swords, Pokemon Dash, Yoshi's Touch and go... and so forth.
All of the above titles try to use (and probably succeed) a new and original form of gameplay. Yet they all, every one of them, share a common issue. They are all established Nintendo franchises. Why could Nintendo not call "Yoshi's Touch and Go" something totally different and remove Mario and Yoshi. Introduce a few new characters. Suddenly a new world is born, suddenly a new franchise is born... Yoshi and Mario could help the game to sell well but... we will never truly know.
It is funny how Nintendo are trying to release the most innovative game system ever... and yet they have not got one original game in the line up. SEGA's XY/XX feel the magic, is in fact the only game I see that isn't a new breed of an old franchise.
You see I, you and the legions of avid Nintendo followers love Nintendo for Mario, for Pokemon and for Zelda. So Nintendo continue to keep their forever falling fan base happy with new iterations of Mario and Zelda. Yet by not making a new "Mario" or a new "Pokemon" how can Nintendo ever hope to expand their fan base?
Metroid Prime was Nintendo "re-inventing" the Metroid brand. It was clever and the game is genius. Introducing the gaming world to something totally new. So why Metroid? Strafio, a massive Metroid fan from these very forums, still craves for a third person action platformer. Was it beyond Nintendo's capacity to make this? This would have satisfied the fan base. And what of Metroid Prime? Well did we have to have Samus in it? Did it have to be based around the Metroid universe?
Sure, Metroid Prime may not have sold as much if Samus and his enemies were not part of the game. And yet I feel we could have seen the birth of a brand new killer Nintendo franchise. Metroid could take the crown from Tomb Raider in the action platform sides of things. Whilst this new innovative First Person Adventure from Nintendo will make Perfect Dark a distant memory.
I shall present Zelda as my next example. A perfectly lovely realistic Zelda would have kept all Nintendo gamers happy. But the Wind Waker ruled did it not? The Wind Waker was a great new addition to the series. Yet why did it have to be Zelda? Could we not have seen a new adventure title from Nintendo? Even an RPG game! A cartoon RPG is a good idea (Namco did it). It did not have to be Zelda. It could have been a different game. A whole new series of Nintendo titles. Maybe next year we'd have the cel-shaded new adventure RPG and a new Zelda game. And the series' need not have anything to do with eachother.
Pokemon saved Nintendo back in 1996 as sales started to fall. It was Nintendo "being original". There was no Mario. There was no Zelda. This was something new. This was to attract new gamers. This was a new game. And like Mario and Zelda before it. It was huge. Now though we do not get that. We get Nintendo putting all their money, resources and efforts into keeping the fan base happy with a new Mario title or a new "Zelda Four Swords adventure". If Nintendo can keep 2 20-year-old franchises such as Mario and Zelda feeling fresh imagine what they could do with a new idea? Imagine if they were asked to make a Bongo action game that had nothing to do with Donkey Kong? We'd be looking at a totally new franchise at the beginning of next year.
What could Nintendo create with that sort of freedom on the Gamecube? Let me tell you. Pikmin. Pikmin started life as a demo featuring 100 Mario's. Imagine if that had stayed the same. Imagine if Olimar was a big Mario and the Pikmin were hundreds of little Mario’s/Luigi's and Peach's being directed to do various tasks to defeat Bowser. Indeed the game would still be original and fun. But instead we got a different world. New characters, a new franchise, new iconography and new landscapes. We got a whole new Nintendo game. One that can stand besides Mario/Zelda and Pokemon as a game that had NOTHING to do with another game. Olimar was never a baddie in Mario Land and Pikmin was never a Pokemon.
This is what Nintendo need. New games. New franchises. They don't HAVE to be adult either, might be helpful but hardly essential. Why does Wario Ware have Wario in it? Is he needed? Why did Dinosaur Planet have Fox in it? It was obviously not a Starfox game!
Nintendo are scared. Releasing a totally new game could mean a disaster. A flop. Would Viewtiful Joe have sold through the roof if it were a Megaman game? Hell yes. But would it be a new franchise on which Capcom can build on? No it could not.
Nintendo tried widening its appeal with new games. Metal Gear and Resident Evil remakes are a prime example. Yet these two games are still "old" games. Nintendo should never have bought the Resident Evil games because they had Eternal Darkness. This game could have been a new Nintendo franchise. An ideal new Nintendo franchise. As it happens it was never needed. It would never sell. Capcom's famous survival horror put pay to that.
RARE were never scared to release a new game. They did sequels too but next to the release of Banjo Tooie came Conker's Bad Fur Day. Next to Donkey Kong 64 came Jet Force Gemini. Besides Killer Instinct Gold there was Blast Corps and Goldeneye. Some were sequels. Most were totally new franchises that branched out to new gamers. What would the N64 have been without RARE? What new franchise did Nintendo create themselves? If it wasn't for the fact Nintendo's brand faces were moving into 3D we would all have wondered "what's new?" Just like we are now. If Nintendo still had RARE we would have had Grabbed by the Gholies and Kameo by now. 2 completley original and new games.
X-box gamers are lucky. Loads of totally new games to play, Knights of the Old Republic was a success, Blinx a failure but an attempt at least... and the biggest success story of this generation. Halo. A game that was so totally fresh that nearly every gamer in the world wants to own it. Even Sony, with Ico, the eye toy games, Rachet and Clank and Sly Cooper can risk a new franchise.
Are Nintendo just a bunch old golden oldies? Making nice games with the same faces over and over again? Are Nintendo out of touch? No I don't think so. Shigeru Miyamoto, a guy that made the original Donkey Kong game decades ago, made Pikmin. He hasn't lost it. He can still create a new world to exploit. A New World to delve into and explore.
Retro, Nintendo's latest acquisition, is one of Nintendo's greatest properties. Metroid Prime is almost a totally new franchise. Sure the name is the same but the game is not. Retro are original and Nintendo need to expand this team and bring Raven Blade and the companies back to the release schedule. Rare, Left Field and Silicon Knights have gone. It was a stupid mistake by the big N. But if only Nintendo themselves can make something new.
Nintendo are innovators. They were once the driving force in the gaming industry. Introducing new characters and new ideas. Now they are just a company growing old. Making the same great games... we need new great games.
Wake up Nintendo.
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Doak ditched Rare so he could make his own games.
He loves Nintendo though.
He loves Nintendo though.
The thing is, I think one of Free Radical's motives for ditching Rare is so they wouldn't be told what to do, and were free to do what they want.
Expanding Retro sounds interesting, but I think Edgy's idea of revamping NOA and NOE would be even better.
You read his Presential Revolution post yet, Dringo?
Expanding Retro sounds interesting, but I think Edgy's idea of revamping NOA and NOE would be even better.
You read his Presential Revolution post yet, Dringo?
The thing is, I think one of Free Radical's motives for ditching Rare is so they wouldn't be told what to do, and were free to do what they want.
Expanding Retro sounds interesting, but I think Edgy's idea of revamping NOA and NOE would be even better.
You read his Presential Revolution post yet, Dringo?
Expanding Retro sounds interesting, but I think Edgy's idea of revamping NOA and NOE would be even better.
You read his Presential Revolution post yet, Dringo?
Don't forget Killer Instinct.
Nintendo could do with a new RARE. If I were Nintendo i'd look at Free Radical or at least expanding retro.
Nintendo could do with a new RARE. If I were Nintendo i'd look at Free Radical or at least expanding retro.
So you liked the bits that was done like OOT, and the thing that made Windwaker completely different, the sailing around, didn't work so well and didn't seem to fit in so right?
Anysway, I don't think they thought of Windwaker and then painted it Zelda, I think they were trying too hard to do something special with Zelda and threw the Windwaker idea for the sake of originality.
I think Metroid Prime started off to be designed as I imagined it but then they cut out the third person view because either they couldn't impliment it right, or poor Shigsy couldn't cope with the complexity of working with two camera views.
But lets got back to Dringo's real point.
Nintendo seem to be stretching their old franchises as far as they can without making new ones to grow and nurture.
Take Rare:
When they joined Nintendo they started with a clean sheet with no characters, so Nintendo lent them Donkey Kong.
When Donkey Kong Country was fantastic, Rare sort of became DK's foster parents and made more games with him.
But they didn't stop there.
By the end of the N64's life they'd made several great characters and franchises:
Banjo Kazooie, the Jet Force Gemini Team, Conker (who's first appearance was a support role in Diddy Kong Racing) and Perfect Dark.
Now these are all well recognised and loved characters and franchises.
Was it on the strength of the characters? Maybe a little in Conker's case, but for the most time it was just the brand that got associated with such a great game that people fell in love with it also.
That's how Mario and Zelda became so popular in the first place.
And I know that Mario is still popular (like Gerrid said, he was always associated with the classiest games back in the day) but they're not only wearing that a bit thin, they're sort of closing the window for a new big franchise.
Even while the N64 lost Nintendo's stranglehold of the console market, thanks to the outburst of Pokémon, Nintendo made more money than ever during that period.
So will you agree on THAT point atleast? :-)
Anysway, I don't think they thought of Windwaker and then painted it Zelda, I think they were trying too hard to do something special with Zelda and threw the Windwaker idea for the sake of originality.
I think Metroid Prime started off to be designed as I imagined it but then they cut out the third person view because either they couldn't impliment it right, or poor Shigsy couldn't cope with the complexity of working with two camera views.
But lets got back to Dringo's real point.
Nintendo seem to be stretching their old franchises as far as they can without making new ones to grow and nurture.
Take Rare:
When they joined Nintendo they started with a clean sheet with no characters, so Nintendo lent them Donkey Kong.
When Donkey Kong Country was fantastic, Rare sort of became DK's foster parents and made more games with him.
But they didn't stop there.
By the end of the N64's life they'd made several great characters and franchises:
Banjo Kazooie, the Jet Force Gemini Team, Conker (who's first appearance was a support role in Diddy Kong Racing) and Perfect Dark.
Now these are all well recognised and loved characters and franchises.
Was it on the strength of the characters? Maybe a little in Conker's case, but for the most time it was just the brand that got associated with such a great game that people fell in love with it also.
That's how Mario and Zelda became so popular in the first place.
And I know that Mario is still popular (like Gerrid said, he was always associated with the classiest games back in the day) but they're not only wearing that a bit thin, they're sort of closing the window for a new big franchise.
Even while the N64 lost Nintendo's stranglehold of the console market, thanks to the outburst of Pokémon, Nintendo made more money than ever during that period.
So will you agree on THAT point atleast? :-)
Strafio wrote:
> Talking of which, did you think that Windwaker was as good as OOT
> then?
Yes and no.
I prefered the dungeons, and the battles, but OoT was longer and better.
UI never expected WW to be as good as OoT anyway.
> Talking of which, did you think that Windwaker was as good as OOT
> then?
Yes and no.
I prefered the dungeons, and the battles, but OoT was longer and better.
UI never expected WW to be as good as OoT anyway.
I do not agree to disagree.
No no no no no...
Every bleeding debate we have ends up with "I just wasn't totally happy with Wind Waker"...
I'm not letting it go there again.
Every bleeding debate we have ends up with "I just wasn't totally happy with Wind Waker"...
I'm not letting it go there again.
i'munn wrote:
> Of course it didn't fell like OoT, is what you're meaning.
> I don't want to play a game exactly like OoT, that would be stupid.
I didn't want a game exactly like OOT.
You're missing the point.
I was all for cel shading even, it's just the adventure...
It wasn't a bad adventure, it just wasn't Zelda.
I can't explain it right now because I've just had a load to drink and am about to go, but I get the feeling that you're ignoring everything I say except for any line you can take pedantically! :-P
Talking of which, did you think that Windwaker was as good as OOT then?
> Of course it didn't fell like OoT, is what you're meaning.
> I don't want to play a game exactly like OoT, that would be stupid.
I didn't want a game exactly like OOT.
You're missing the point.
I was all for cel shading even, it's just the adventure...
It wasn't a bad adventure, it just wasn't Zelda.
I can't explain it right now because I've just had a load to drink and am about to go, but I get the feeling that you're ignoring everything I say except for any line you can take pedantically! :-P
Talking of which, did you think that Windwaker was as good as OOT then?
Dear Mr. Miyanmoto
Do Pikmin 3, a new Mario game, hurry up with Zelda 2005 before I die, and slap C***** for me.
Your Regards
Dale.
Yeah!
Do Pikmin 3, a new Mario game, hurry up with Zelda 2005 before I die, and slap C***** for me.
Your Regards
Dale.
Yeah!
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