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Now im not about to start saying that nintendos for little kids, infact far from it.
My mission in this is to find out how it came about, how its changed and if it will ever be completely gone.
First things first a lot of people class diffrent games as adult, kiddy or neither of them.
Defining games are confusing as some games such as sport games can be classed in any of them, ISS2 can be put in adult because grown men watch it, in kiddy because there is no blood or neither as both kids and aults enjoy it.
But some games are easy to classify such as you cant say that GTA3 is kiddy, even though kids play the game, and you cants say that barbie underwater dream is adult, ok some 55 single men will but lets not go there.
Nintendo has had the kiddy tag for some time, im not sure how long for but i started realising around 10/11 years of age.
I used to have a snes but i was too young to be thinking "ohhhh 18 only thats adult" or vise versa so i cant talk about that era.
I can talk about the N64 though.
Nintendo has top class characters and known by most people, if not all people, in the gaming world. But these charcters are kiddy and there games are too becuase of this, but this is what makes the game good.
Mario is a perfect example as it is a kiddy game, but this is what the game is about, jumping on enemys to kill them requirea diffrent sort of skill, that being time and preciseness, when picking up a gun and firing to kill them is diffrent.
Also another reason why adult gaming is supposedly better than kiddy is becuase most people who have consoles, or at least ones that talk about them, are around the age where saying things like " i love the way you collect little hearts" are likely to get you beaten up when saying "i bust a cap up his...." could actually give you some kind of cred.
The kiddy tag got worse with the best games being ones like banjo and zelda and with 3rd party developers, the ones who create "cool" games did not join the band wagon.
Ever since nintendo has been trying to get rid of this tag, well ok not nintendo much but cirtainly rae, with games like conkers bad fur day.
And with games such as die hard,eternal darkness, mafia, mortal combat, resi evil, the matrix and terminator 3 coming out should help.
But they will never total get rid of it because of mario and games like that, but i for one would rather play mario.
Also the fact nintendo develops for its own console, so most would look at there games, means it gets the kiddy logo when if it wasnt there console and they did multi format the console woulndt have a tag at all.
So nintendo will be stuck with the tag but i dont care as the games which give it the tag are mostly the best games in the gaming world.
My mission in this is to find out how it came about, how its changed and if it will ever be completely gone.
First things first a lot of people class diffrent games as adult, kiddy or neither of them.
Defining games are confusing as some games such as sport games can be classed in any of them, ISS2 can be put in adult because grown men watch it, in kiddy because there is no blood or neither as both kids and aults enjoy it.
But some games are easy to classify such as you cant say that GTA3 is kiddy, even though kids play the game, and you cants say that barbie underwater dream is adult, ok some 55 single men will but lets not go there.
Nintendo has had the kiddy tag for some time, im not sure how long for but i started realising around 10/11 years of age.
I used to have a snes but i was too young to be thinking "ohhhh 18 only thats adult" or vise versa so i cant talk about that era.
I can talk about the N64 though.
Nintendo has top class characters and known by most people, if not all people, in the gaming world. But these charcters are kiddy and there games are too becuase of this, but this is what makes the game good.
Mario is a perfect example as it is a kiddy game, but this is what the game is about, jumping on enemys to kill them requirea diffrent sort of skill, that being time and preciseness, when picking up a gun and firing to kill them is diffrent.
Also another reason why adult gaming is supposedly better than kiddy is becuase most people who have consoles, or at least ones that talk about them, are around the age where saying things like " i love the way you collect little hearts" are likely to get you beaten up when saying "i bust a cap up his...." could actually give you some kind of cred.
The kiddy tag got worse with the best games being ones like banjo and zelda and with 3rd party developers, the ones who create "cool" games did not join the band wagon.
Ever since nintendo has been trying to get rid of this tag, well ok not nintendo much but cirtainly rae, with games like conkers bad fur day.
And with games such as die hard,eternal darkness, mafia, mortal combat, resi evil, the matrix and terminator 3 coming out should help.
But they will never total get rid of it because of mario and games like that, but i for one would rather play mario.
Also the fact nintendo develops for its own console, so most would look at there games, means it gets the kiddy logo when if it wasnt there console and they did multi format the console woulndt have a tag at all.
So nintendo will be stuck with the tag but i dont care as the games which give it the tag are mostly the best games in the gaming world.
I wouldn't say the N64 was aimed at children. Again, I'd say it was aimed at everyone. I know loads of gamers over fifteen that had the N64. I've said what I wanted in my original response, but an example of a kiddy game is Donald Duck: Quack Attack and an example of an adult game is Resident Evil. I feel Nintendo are somewhere in the middle.
Also, I wouldn't say their games were cartoony, just colourful and bright.
Also, I wouldn't say their games were cartoony, just colourful and bright.
You guys sure can type a lot, but did anybody consider using the comma button?
wow only 5 posts in here and they add up to a total of around 9000 characters.
I wasnt expecting such a big responce, infact i was thinking no one would responde.
I only made this topic because for a while i hadnt heard anyone say that gamecube way kiddy, and then about 3 people said it in one day.
i never looked at them as being completely kiddy, never even entered my head before the last year or so of the N64.
After they said that i looked in all the mags i could find with the reviews, news and release charts.
Most of the games you can not class because they are games like racing, sports and stuff.
Then it hit me that there arnt many games which are kiddy at the moment.
These people are living in the past when it was nintendo and rare and a few others that were working for N64.
Actually i would go to say that Gamecube is more adultish than childish, especially in the next year.
I hate the way that call it kiddy becuase really it isnt kiddy until you buy a kiddy game. theres plenty of adult games, and sport,racing ones too.
Untill they buy all these and then have to start buying what they call kiddy games then yes it could be called kiddy as nintendo arnt supplying enough adult games.
Same goes for the old "there isnt enough games" how can they say that until they have every single game, which they wont have.
in this consoles war there are no kiddy only consoles, just one adult console that being the xbox as im 16 and find it hard to work the big controller, i hate to be 12 years old with hands that look like ants next to the cowpat, cough i mean controller.
I wasnt expecting such a big responce, infact i was thinking no one would responde.
I only made this topic because for a while i hadnt heard anyone say that gamecube way kiddy, and then about 3 people said it in one day.
i never looked at them as being completely kiddy, never even entered my head before the last year or so of the N64.
After they said that i looked in all the mags i could find with the reviews, news and release charts.
Most of the games you can not class because they are games like racing, sports and stuff.
Then it hit me that there arnt many games which are kiddy at the moment.
These people are living in the past when it was nintendo and rare and a few others that were working for N64.
Actually i would go to say that Gamecube is more adultish than childish, especially in the next year.
I hate the way that call it kiddy becuase really it isnt kiddy until you buy a kiddy game. theres plenty of adult games, and sport,racing ones too.
Untill they buy all these and then have to start buying what they call kiddy games then yes it could be called kiddy as nintendo arnt supplying enough adult games.
Same goes for the old "there isnt enough games" how can they say that until they have every single game, which they wont have.
in this consoles war there are no kiddy only consoles, just one adult console that being the xbox as im 16 and find it hard to work the big controller, i hate to be 12 years old with hands that look like ants next to the cowpat, cough i mean controller.
2 be honest I had always seen nintendo as a kiddy company sinse mortal Kombat 1 for snes hat this grey stuff instead of blood, what was that all about??? of course this was very minor and could be excused especially when they'd obviously learnt by MK2,
Right here I want to state that whenever I mention 'so called kiddy games' or even just ' kiddy' games I mean the colourful cartoony games that indeed could be enjoyed by all.
anyway basically as I said I agree that the so called kiddy games, can be enjoyed by all, the N64 in particular (the 1st console that ever had me doubting nintendo)although had more of the so called kiddy games than the more properly detailed more realistic and sometimes adult games, and I think the reason PS1 did better than N64 is because PS1 had a helthy mix, with your resi, (I know resi 2 was on n64, but in my opinion it was a straight plug of a game on from a console that was supposedly half the power; how lazy)
PS1 would have games such as
Silent Hill
Resi (as I said)
MGS
Parasie Eve
Dino Crisis
which would be more for adults
then they'd have others like
Croc
Crash Bndicoot
Spyro the dragon
Hugo
Mary Kate and Ashley
that would be put in the so called kiddy cat,
then N64 would just have countless kiddy games and basically the only games I can think of that wern't are 'Golden Eye', 'Perfect Dark', 'Bad fur day...can anyone think of any more, probably you can to be honest but I'm not an expert on N64 but it was quite blaitent that they had more kiddy games than any other.
so basically what I'm saying is that although kiddy is a bit of a rough term, the N64 was definitely aimed more at children than say the PS1 which was more evenly matched with kiddy and adult titles.
Just to add to that last paragraph I think that the N64 was the exact reason for nintendo's lable 'kiddy'
Anyways looks like the gamecube has got it sorted, and is a good return to form for the ledgends of gaming......
Nintendo!
Right here I want to state that whenever I mention 'so called kiddy games' or even just ' kiddy' games I mean the colourful cartoony games that indeed could be enjoyed by all.
anyway basically as I said I agree that the so called kiddy games, can be enjoyed by all, the N64 in particular (the 1st console that ever had me doubting nintendo)although had more of the so called kiddy games than the more properly detailed more realistic and sometimes adult games, and I think the reason PS1 did better than N64 is because PS1 had a helthy mix, with your resi, (I know resi 2 was on n64, but in my opinion it was a straight plug of a game on from a console that was supposedly half the power; how lazy)
PS1 would have games such as
Silent Hill
Resi (as I said)
MGS
Parasie Eve
Dino Crisis
which would be more for adults
then they'd have others like
Croc
Crash Bndicoot
Spyro the dragon
Hugo
Mary Kate and Ashley
that would be put in the so called kiddy cat,
then N64 would just have countless kiddy games and basically the only games I can think of that wern't are 'Golden Eye', 'Perfect Dark', 'Bad fur day...can anyone think of any more, probably you can to be honest but I'm not an expert on N64 but it was quite blaitent that they had more kiddy games than any other.
so basically what I'm saying is that although kiddy is a bit of a rough term, the N64 was definitely aimed more at children than say the PS1 which was more evenly matched with kiddy and adult titles.
Just to add to that last paragraph I think that the N64 was the exact reason for nintendo's lable 'kiddy'
Anyways looks like the gamecube has got it sorted, and is a good return to form for the ledgends of gaming......
Nintendo!
Nintendo have a 'kiddy' tag because most people don't stop and think about what it means. 'Kiddy', means for young children. Nintendo don't have one 'kiddy' game. Nintendo have games 'for everyone'.
Because most Nintendo games aren't about shooting people, and actually have imagination in them, they can't be considered 'adult' games. But because they present a challenge, they can't be considered 'kiddy' games.
Young children can play Mario and have fun, thanks to the great graphics and amusing gameplay. Older gamers can pick it up and work through it, and completing Nintendo's games usually poses a great challenge.
Nintendo's 'kiddy' symbol was established when the PSOne arrived on the scene. Because it was so developer friendly, all games designers rushed to shower Sony with a whole range of different games.
Thanks to this, Nintendo was left with the N64 and continued to produce family games (i.e. for everyone). Because there was no adult games on this console, compared to the PSOne, the N64 was not the console 'to have'.
Nowadays, people are infactuated with image, and being seen with a console that lacks in 18+, all guns blazing shoot 'em ups would land you as a laughing stock with your mates. It was Rare that salvaged the N64.
Games like Mario: 64, Ocarina Of Time and Lylat Wars were fantastic, but no-one bought them because the N64 had no adult games on it. Rare brought out Goldeneye 007, Perfect Dark and Conker's Bad Fur Day and because of this, the Nintendo 64 had good sales.
The fact is, it was because the Nintendo 64 only had family games on it people classed it as 'kiddy'. Now, thanks to the new technology of the GameCube, more developers are making games for Nintendo. People no longer consider Nintendo's console as a console with poor selections, but as an all rounder, and no people can play games like Mario Sunshine and keep their street cred.
That probably didn't make much sense [I wrote what came into my head] but I think I got my point across that Nintendo were just misunderstood, and don't really have any kiddy games at all.
Because most Nintendo games aren't about shooting people, and actually have imagination in them, they can't be considered 'adult' games. But because they present a challenge, they can't be considered 'kiddy' games.
Young children can play Mario and have fun, thanks to the great graphics and amusing gameplay. Older gamers can pick it up and work through it, and completing Nintendo's games usually poses a great challenge.
Nintendo's 'kiddy' symbol was established when the PSOne arrived on the scene. Because it was so developer friendly, all games designers rushed to shower Sony with a whole range of different games.
Thanks to this, Nintendo was left with the N64 and continued to produce family games (i.e. for everyone). Because there was no adult games on this console, compared to the PSOne, the N64 was not the console 'to have'.
Nowadays, people are infactuated with image, and being seen with a console that lacks in 18+, all guns blazing shoot 'em ups would land you as a laughing stock with your mates. It was Rare that salvaged the N64.
Games like Mario: 64, Ocarina Of Time and Lylat Wars were fantastic, but no-one bought them because the N64 had no adult games on it. Rare brought out Goldeneye 007, Perfect Dark and Conker's Bad Fur Day and because of this, the Nintendo 64 had good sales.
The fact is, it was because the Nintendo 64 only had family games on it people classed it as 'kiddy'. Now, thanks to the new technology of the GameCube, more developers are making games for Nintendo. People no longer consider Nintendo's console as a console with poor selections, but as an all rounder, and no people can play games like Mario Sunshine and keep their street cred.
That probably didn't make much sense [I wrote what came into my head] but I think I got my point across that Nintendo were just misunderstood, and don't really have any kiddy games at all.
I think that a lot of people get confused when they say kiddy but what they mean is fun. Games you mentioned like Banjo Tooie and the Mario series are a lot of fun and you will laugh at some of the stuff in it, but that doesn't mean that it is kiddy. How many people can say they have had a lot of fun when playing MGS2 or even Eternal Darkness, as it is more serious so your state of mind towards it is more serious too. Nintendo games are a lot of fun to play and always have a lot of colour and cartoony sound effects, but any age group can still enjoy these games as it delivers in gameplay and how long the game lasts.
Of course people are always suited to different games and love playing what they consider to be the best games, and perhaps envy that Nintendo have games that bring so much pleasure and surprise is why they feel the need to dig at the age group that they think should be playing that particular game. But people have opinions and opinions are fair game, but I think people know that Nintendo games aren’t kiddy in the sense that the software is made for young gamers.
But like you said, Nintendo are trying to lose the brand of kiddy games so along with the Super Mario Sunshine’s and maybe the Pikmins, Nintendo have Eternal Darkness and Die Hard Vendetta to accompany these games. With all of the more serious games coming out I think that Nintendo could turn a lot of heads for neutral gamers and some people who have a rival console and are happy with that. After they see Nintendo is supplying a variety, the brand of kiddy could be lost and the company could profit heavily from it.
Many people have recently commented on the new Zelda game and I for one think this will definitely keep up the tag of being kiddy for Nintendo as the graphics are simple and amusing, and considering that the best games on the N64 were Zelda games I think already people already biased against Nintendo will used this as an excuse to say the game is kiddy and basic. Hopefully the ‘serious’ games will change their minds though.
As Dr Duck said, there are the age group categories and they do all purchase different games in the fashion you described most of the time. But unbiased customers see what is a decent game and will purchase it, but of course everyone no matter what age has their own tastes and I think personal tastes are the reason people buy the games instead of age groups. You’re right about young gamers playing anything though, as the prospect of virtual people running around is excellent and most games can amuse younger gamers.
But Nintendo needs to keep the games classed as kiddy in my opinion to give them their type of game, and supplying other games like Eternal darkness in my beliefs it will then have so much variation then Nintendo do over Microsoft and Sony at the moment.
I might be wrong, probably am, but it's my opinion all the same (:)
Of course people are always suited to different games and love playing what they consider to be the best games, and perhaps envy that Nintendo have games that bring so much pleasure and surprise is why they feel the need to dig at the age group that they think should be playing that particular game. But people have opinions and opinions are fair game, but I think people know that Nintendo games aren’t kiddy in the sense that the software is made for young gamers.
But like you said, Nintendo are trying to lose the brand of kiddy games so along with the Super Mario Sunshine’s and maybe the Pikmins, Nintendo have Eternal Darkness and Die Hard Vendetta to accompany these games. With all of the more serious games coming out I think that Nintendo could turn a lot of heads for neutral gamers and some people who have a rival console and are happy with that. After they see Nintendo is supplying a variety, the brand of kiddy could be lost and the company could profit heavily from it.
Many people have recently commented on the new Zelda game and I for one think this will definitely keep up the tag of being kiddy for Nintendo as the graphics are simple and amusing, and considering that the best games on the N64 were Zelda games I think already people already biased against Nintendo will used this as an excuse to say the game is kiddy and basic. Hopefully the ‘serious’ games will change their minds though.
As Dr Duck said, there are the age group categories and they do all purchase different games in the fashion you described most of the time. But unbiased customers see what is a decent game and will purchase it, but of course everyone no matter what age has their own tastes and I think personal tastes are the reason people buy the games instead of age groups. You’re right about young gamers playing anything though, as the prospect of virtual people running around is excellent and most games can amuse younger gamers.
But Nintendo needs to keep the games classed as kiddy in my opinion to give them their type of game, and supplying other games like Eternal darkness in my beliefs it will then have so much variation then Nintendo do over Microsoft and Sony at the moment.
I might be wrong, probably am, but it's my opinion all the same (:)
In my view, it's not really about kiddy and adult. Not directly anyway.
Here's how i think it breaks down:
Young gamers:
Happy to play everything.
Adolescent/teen gamers*:
Probably the biggest proportion of gamers, most will seek 'adult'-themed games, because it reflects what they're trying to become.
Adult gamers:
Having grown out of the previous category, a gamer won't feel the need to validate their maturity by making a rule of chosing the bloodbath game over the cartoony one, and will feel free to buy whichever game they think they'll enjoy most.
*Though some people in the age category will, of cause, bypass the generalisation and just play whatever games they want. But that's what the categories are - just generalisations.
Here's how i think it breaks down:
Young gamers:
Happy to play everything.
Adolescent/teen gamers*:
Probably the biggest proportion of gamers, most will seek 'adult'-themed games, because it reflects what they're trying to become.
Adult gamers:
Having grown out of the previous category, a gamer won't feel the need to validate their maturity by making a rule of chosing the bloodbath game over the cartoony one, and will feel free to buy whichever game they think they'll enjoy most.
*Though some people in the age category will, of cause, bypass the generalisation and just play whatever games they want. But that's what the categories are - just generalisations.
Now im not about to start saying that nintendos for little kids, infact far from it.
My mission in this is to find out how it came about, how its changed and if it will ever be completely gone.
First things first a lot of people class diffrent games as adult, kiddy or neither of them.
Defining games are confusing as some games such as sport games can be classed in any of them, ISS2 can be put in adult because grown men watch it, in kiddy because there is no blood or neither as both kids and aults enjoy it.
But some games are easy to classify such as you cant say that GTA3 is kiddy, even though kids play the game, and you cants say that barbie underwater dream is adult, ok some 55 single men will but lets not go there.
Nintendo has had the kiddy tag for some time, im not sure how long for but i started realising around 10/11 years of age.
I used to have a snes but i was too young to be thinking "ohhhh 18 only thats adult" or vise versa so i cant talk about that era.
I can talk about the N64 though.
Nintendo has top class characters and known by most people, if not all people, in the gaming world. But these charcters are kiddy and there games are too becuase of this, but this is what makes the game good.
Mario is a perfect example as it is a kiddy game, but this is what the game is about, jumping on enemys to kill them requirea diffrent sort of skill, that being time and preciseness, when picking up a gun and firing to kill them is diffrent.
Also another reason why adult gaming is supposedly better than kiddy is becuase most people who have consoles, or at least ones that talk about them, are around the age where saying things like " i love the way you collect little hearts" are likely to get you beaten up when saying "i bust a cap up his...." could actually give you some kind of cred.
The kiddy tag got worse with the best games being ones like banjo and zelda and with 3rd party developers, the ones who create "cool" games did not join the band wagon.
Ever since nintendo has been trying to get rid of this tag, well ok not nintendo much but cirtainly rae, with games like conkers bad fur day.
And with games such as die hard,eternal darkness, mafia, mortal combat, resi evil, the matrix and terminator 3 coming out should help.
But they will never total get rid of it because of mario and games like that, but i for one would rather play mario.
Also the fact nintendo develops for its own console, so most would look at there games, means it gets the kiddy logo when if it wasnt there console and they did multi format the console woulndt have a tag at all.
So nintendo will be stuck with the tag but i dont care as the games which give it the tag are mostly the best games in the gaming world.
My mission in this is to find out how it came about, how its changed and if it will ever be completely gone.
First things first a lot of people class diffrent games as adult, kiddy or neither of them.
Defining games are confusing as some games such as sport games can be classed in any of them, ISS2 can be put in adult because grown men watch it, in kiddy because there is no blood or neither as both kids and aults enjoy it.
But some games are easy to classify such as you cant say that GTA3 is kiddy, even though kids play the game, and you cants say that barbie underwater dream is adult, ok some 55 single men will but lets not go there.
Nintendo has had the kiddy tag for some time, im not sure how long for but i started realising around 10/11 years of age.
I used to have a snes but i was too young to be thinking "ohhhh 18 only thats adult" or vise versa so i cant talk about that era.
I can talk about the N64 though.
Nintendo has top class characters and known by most people, if not all people, in the gaming world. But these charcters are kiddy and there games are too becuase of this, but this is what makes the game good.
Mario is a perfect example as it is a kiddy game, but this is what the game is about, jumping on enemys to kill them requirea diffrent sort of skill, that being time and preciseness, when picking up a gun and firing to kill them is diffrent.
Also another reason why adult gaming is supposedly better than kiddy is becuase most people who have consoles, or at least ones that talk about them, are around the age where saying things like " i love the way you collect little hearts" are likely to get you beaten up when saying "i bust a cap up his...." could actually give you some kind of cred.
The kiddy tag got worse with the best games being ones like banjo and zelda and with 3rd party developers, the ones who create "cool" games did not join the band wagon.
Ever since nintendo has been trying to get rid of this tag, well ok not nintendo much but cirtainly rae, with games like conkers bad fur day.
And with games such as die hard,eternal darkness, mafia, mortal combat, resi evil, the matrix and terminator 3 coming out should help.
But they will never total get rid of it because of mario and games like that, but i for one would rather play mario.
Also the fact nintendo develops for its own console, so most would look at there games, means it gets the kiddy logo when if it wasnt there console and they did multi format the console woulndt have a tag at all.
So nintendo will be stuck with the tag but i dont care as the games which give it the tag are mostly the best games in the gaming world.